Is the world ready to condemn murder of Iranian Nuclear Scientist?

Israel used all the four years of Trump’s presidency to entrench its systems of occupation and apartheid. Now that Joe Biden has won the US election, the assassination of Iran’s top nuclear scientist, likely by Israel with the go-ahead from the US administration, is a desperate attempt to use Trump’s last days in office to sabotage Biden’s chances of successful diplomacy with Iran. Biden, Congress and the world community shouldn’t let that happen.

On Friday, November 27, Iran’s top nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, was assassinated in the Iranian city of Absard outside of Tehran. The immediate speculation was that Israel had carried out the attack, perhaps with the support of the Iranian groups.

In 2018, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu identified Fakhrizadeh as a target of his administration during a presentation in which he claimed that Israel had obtained secret Iranian files that alleged the country was not actually abiding by the Iran Nuclear Deal.

During 2010 and 2012, four Iranian nuclear scientists were assassinated that included: Masoud Alimohammadi, Majid Shahriari, Darioush Rezaeinejad and Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan. Though Israel never accepted responsibility of these murders, reports suggested that Israel, working with Iranian rebel groups, was behind the killings. The Israeli government also never denied the allegations. 

The assassination of Fakhrizadeh also follows reports that the Israeli government recently instructed its senior military officials to prepare for a possible US strike on Iran, likely referring to a narrowly averted plan by President Trump to bomb Iran’s Natanz nuclear site. Furthermore, there was a clandestine meeting between Netanyahu and Saudi ruler Mohammed bin Salman.

Israel’s attacks on Iran’s nuclear activities are particularly annoying given that Israel, not Iran, is the only country in the Middle East in possession of nuclear weapons, and Israel refuses to sign the International Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.

Iran doesn’t have nuclear weapons and it has opened itself up to the most intrusive international inspections ever implemented. Adding to this absurd double standard is the intense pressure on Iran from the United States, a nation that has more nuclear weapons than any country on earth.

Given the close relationship between Netanyahu and Trump, and the seriousness of this attack, it is very likely that this assassination was carried out with the green light from Trump himself. Trump has spent his time in the White House destroying the progress the Obama administration made in easing the conflict with Iran. He withdrew from the nuclear deal and imposed an unending stream of crippling sanctions that have affected everything from the price of food and housing, to Iran’s ability to obtain life-saving medicines during the pandemic. He also blocked Iran from getting an IMF US$5 billion emergency loan to deal with the pandemic. In January, Trump brought the US to the brink of war by assassinating Iranian General Qassem Soleimani, and in an early November meeting with his top security advisors, and right before the assassination of Fakhrizadeh, Trump himself reportedly raised the possibility of a military strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities. 

After the news broke of the assassination, Trump expressed implicit approval of the attack by re-tweeting Israeli journalist and expert on the Israeli Mossad intelligence service, Yossi Melman, who described the killing of Fahkrizadeh as a “major psychological and professional blow for Iran.”

Iran has responded to these intense provocations with extreme patience and reserve. The government was hoping for a change in the White House and Biden’s victory signaled the possibility of both the US and Iran going back into compliance with the nuclear deal. This recent assassination has further strengthens the hands of Iranian hardliners who say it was a mistake to negotiate with the United States and that Iran should just leave the nuclear deal and build a nuclear weapon for its own defense. 

Iranian-American analyst Negar Mortazavi lamented the chilling effect the assassination will have on Iran’s political space. “The atmosphere will be even more securitized, civil society and political opposition will be pressured even more, and the anti-West discourse will be strengthened in Iran’s upcoming presidential election,” she tweeted.

The hardliners already won the majority of seats in the February parliamentary elections and are predicted to win the presidential elections scheduled for June. So the window for negotiations is a narrow one of four months immediately after Biden’s inauguration. What happens between now and January 20 could derail negotiations before they even start. 

Jamal Abdi, president of the National Iranian American Council said that US and Israeli efforts to sabotage Iran’s nuclear program have now morphed into Trump and Netanyahu sabotaging the next US President. They are trying to provoke Iran to accelerate nuclear work—exactly what they claim to oppose.

That is the reason US members of Congress, and President-elect Joe Biden himself, must vigorously condemn this act and affirm their commitment to the US rejoining the nuclear deal. When Israel assassinated other nuclear scientists during the Obama administration, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton denounced the murders, understanding that such illegal actions made negotiations infinitely more difficult.

The European Union, as well as some important US figures have already condemned the attack. Senator Chris Murphy pointed out the risks involved in normalizing assassinations, how the killing will make it harder to restart the Iran Nuclear agreement, and how the assassination of General Soleimani backfired from a security standpoint. Former Obama advisor Ben Rhodes tweeted that it was an “outrageous action aimed at undermining diplomacy,” and former CIA head John Brennan called the assassination “criminal” and “highly reckless,” risking “lethal retaliation and a new round of regional conflict,” but rather than putting the responsibility on the US and Israel to stop the provocations, he called on Iran to “be wise” and “resist the urge to respond.”

Many on Twitter have raised the question of what the world response would be if the roles were reversed and Iran assassinated an Israeli nuclear scientist. Without a doubt, the US administration, whether Democrat or Republican, would be outraged and supportive of a swift military response. But if we want to avoid escalation, then we must hope that Iran will not retaliate, at least not during Trump’s last days in office.

The only way to stop this crisis from spiraling out of control is for the world community to condemn the act, and demand a UN investigation and accountability for the perpetrators. The countries that joined Iran and the United States in signing the 2015 nuclear agreement —Russia, China, Germany, the UK and France—must not only oppose the assassination but publicly recommit to upholding the nuclear deal. President-elect Joe Biden must send a clear message to Israel that under his administration, these illegal acts will have consequences. He must also send a clear message to Iran that he intends to quickly re-enter the nuclear deal, stop blocking Iran’s US$5 billion IMF loan request, and begin a new era of diplomacy to dial back the intense conflict he inherited from Trump’s recklessness.

Human rights groups condemn sale of US arms to UAE

Human rights groups and arms control organizations have condemned sale of arms by United States to the United Arab Emirates, asking the Congress to block the mega deal. The groups signed a letter opposing the sale of US$23 billion worth of missiles, fighter jets, and drones, raising concern about the UAE’s role in the Saudi-led devastating war on Yemen and Libya conflict.

"The hope is to stop these sales altogether," said Seth Binder, advocacy officer at the Project on Middle East Democracy, who spearheaded the effort.

"But if that is not possible in the short term, this sends an important signal to the incoming Biden administration that there is a diverse group of organizations that oppose delivery of these weapons."

The letter, sent to US lawmakers and the State Department, said the planned arms sale would fuel continued harm to civilians and exacerbate humanitarian crises due to conflicts in war-wracked Yemen and Libya.

Signatories include human rights organizations from the region, including the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies and Mwatana for Human Rights.

The US-UAE arms deal includes F-35 fighter jets, Reaper drones, air-to-air and air-to-ground missiles, and more than 14,000 bombs.

The sale was approved following a US-brokered agreement in September in which the UAE agreed to normalize relations with Israel.

Several US senators, including Murphy, earlier this month proposed legislation to halt the weapons sale to the UAE, setting up a showdown with President Donald Trump weeks before he is due to leave office.

Trump administration officials briefed the Senate Foreign Relations Committee about the deal on Monday evening.

Democratic Senator Chris Murphy, a sponsor of the resolutions of disapproval, responded later on Twitter: "Just a mind blowing number of unsettled issues and questions the Administration couldn't answer. Hard to overstate the danger of rushing this."

Murphy had said, "I support the normalization of relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, but nothing in that agreement requires us to flood the region with more weapons and facilitate a dangerous arms race."

Iran’s Zamaninia elected as chairman of OPEC Executive Board for 2021

Iranian Deputy Oil Minister for International Affairs and Trading Amir-Hossein Zamaninia, who is the country’s governor at the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) has been elected new Chairman of the OPEC Executive Board for 2021. The decision was made during the 180th meeting of the OPEC Conference which was held on Monday, the meeting lasted for more than four hours.

The mentioned Board is the executive body of OPEC which directs the Organization's affairs, implements the decisions made at meetings, reviews and decides on the reports submitted by the Secretary General, submits reports and recommendations to the ministerial meetings, prepares the budget for each calendar year and submits it to the ministerial meetings for approval and etc.

In the meeting, extending the oil output cut of 7.7 million barrels per day was discussed. Although, some OPEC members complained that some members had not complied with the previous decisions, there was a consensus that the organization’s complaint was not in a way that could prevent an extension of the existing deal.

OPEC members’ main concern was how non-OPEC members would cooperate? Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh said in a press conference following the 180th OPEC meeting which was held through video conference.

The 12th meeting of the oil and energy ministers of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its allies, a grouping known as OPEC plus, was due to be held on Thursday in Vienna but it was postponed to Thursday December 03, 2020

“What is important is that we negotiate and have the patience to reach a conclusion,” Zanganeh said announcing the adjournment of the ministerial meeting.

Jebel Ali Port receives first shipment from Israel

According to media reports, Jebel Ali Port, a major Dubai port has received the first export shipments from Israel. The shipment has been sent by Emirati firm Kimoha from Ashdod of adhesive tape manufactured by Israeli company Davik. The shipment is the first to arrive in the United Arab Emirates and even more notably at one of the busiest ports in the world, since the Abraham Accords normalized ties between the two countries.

“We would like to congratulate Kimoha Entrepreneurs FZCO for adding value to the UAE and Israel diplomatic relations by initiating trade association with Israel-based establishments,” Dubai Ports World (DP), which operates the port, CEO and chairman Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem said in a statement.

“And we are glad that Jebel Ali Port could be an intrinsic part of the transfer from Israel to the UAE. We take great pride in being involved in this momentous achievement that is integral for both countries. This operation is just the beginning of trade and commerce activities. We are confident that this move will be the starting point for trade activities that will have a significant impact on both economies, and the business in the region. We are in complete support of the leadership of the UAE and will do everything in our capacity to foster trade ties with Israel and accelerate economic growth.”

“It is an honor to be able to partake and initiate a significant move that will greatly influence the trade exchange in the UAE and Israel,” said Kimoha chairman Kiran Asher.

“This move will go down in the history of the two countries. We cannot thank DP World enough for helping us to make this transfer a seamless process. We have been running operations from Jafza since 1988, and I must say that it is an ideal location to set industries and connect with the world. Emirates NBD, the largest banking group in the UAE supported this transaction seamlessly.”

DP World is playing an active role since ties between Israel and the UAE were normalized. In early November, it teamed up with Israel Shipyards to try to win the tender to run Haifa Port, and the company is an expert at maximizing efficiency of harbors, even one as relatively small as Haifa's.

What after Fakhrizadeh assassination?

If the reports are true that Israel was involved in Mohsen Fakhrizadeh’s killing, the manner in which it was carried out – in broad daylight and without anyone being caught – shows again Israel’s tremendous capabilities, that is something Iran would be wise to take into consideration while weighing its next moves.

Friday’s assassination of Iran’s top nuclear scientist Fakhrizadeh led to predictable concern from those who prepared the Iranian nuclear deal in 2015. Former CIA head John Brenner was furious, “This was a criminal act and highly reckless,” he tweeted. “Such an act of state-sponsored terrorism would be a flagrant violation of international law and encourage more governments to carry out lethal attacks against foreign officials.”

Ben Rhodes, President Barack Obama Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications was indignant, “This is an outrageous action aimed at undermining diplomacy between an incoming US administration and Iran,” he tweeted. “It’s time for this ceaseless escalation to stop.”

Jeremy Ben-Ami of the left-wing J Street lobbying group was furious. “The assassination of a senior Iranian nuclear scientist appears to be an attempt to sabotage the ability of the incoming Biden administration to re-enter the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), as well as the chances of further diplomacy, either by limiting the political leeway of Iranian officials who want to restore the deal, or by triggering an escalation leading to military confrontation,” he said.

Each of these reactions pushed the same theme: whoever carried this out – and all fingers are pointed at Israel – intended to limit President-elect Joe Biden’s space for maneuvering and sabotage any possible diplomacy with Iran.

The unstated subtext of this type of criticism is the same, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu still leading the way, trying to sabotage diplomatic efforts to solve the Iranian nuclear dilemma and undermine the Biden presidency from the get-go.

But that is wrong, the assassination of Fakhrizadeh is not about Biden, it is about Israel’s nearly three-decade effort to prevent Iran from getting a bomb. It is Israel trying to demolish a threat for its existence.

The assassination is just the latest in a series of steps over the last three decades taken to prevent Iran from getting the ability to do it. The killing of Fakhrizadeh will set back Iran’s efforts to attain the bomb because he was a key player in the nuclear program.

Iran has been unable to realize its nuclear ambitions up until now, though it has been trying since the end of the Iran-Iraq War in 1988, is not because of a lack of trying, or because they are any less capable than any of the other countries that have nuclear weapons. Rather, it’s because of actions that Israel and others in the West have taken over the years to bar their path.

These actions included setting up straw companies selling damaged goods to the Iranians so that when they would spin their centrifuges, they would blow up; computer worms and cyber sabotage; mysterious explosions; and assassinations.

Most people, when imagining how Israel might stop Iran from getting a bomb, imagine it will be via bombs or missiles falling from the skies, as was the case when Israel destroyed the Iraqi nuclear reactor in 1981, or the Syrian one in 2007. It has to be a new strategy and a new game plan in 2020.

Iran has been kept from reaching its nuclear goals through numerous actions, of which the killing of Fakhrizadeh is just the most recent one, through one big dramatic explosion. To present the killing of Fakhrizadeh as a move intended simply to make things more complicated for Biden is to fail to fully appreciate the degree to which the Israeli government genuinely believes a nuclear Iran is an existential threat that must be stopped at all costs.

The killing need not undermine the diplomacy that Biden might want to pursue. The hit was carried out under the outgoing Trump administration. If Iran does indeed want to turn over a new leaf with the new administration – which it is very much in its interests to do – then it would only be counterproductive to let this killing stand in the way.

Israeli perspective that the JCPOA is a non-starter because under its terms, Iran will be able to produce as much nuclear fuel as it wants in 2030 is worth noting. And as steps such as Friday’s assassination show, Israel – if it was involved – is not going to sit idly by and allow what it deems to be an existential threat to develop, regardless of who is the US president.

OPEC plus leaning towards oil cut extension

According to media reports, OPEC and allies (OPEC plus) are leaning towards delaying next year’s planned increase in oil output to support the market during the second wave of COVID-19 and rising Libyan output, despite a rise in prices.

OPEC plus was due to raise output by 2 million barrels per day (bpd) in January 2021, about 2% of global consumption as it moves to ease this year’s record supply cuts. With demand weakening, OPEC plus has been considering delaying the increase.

Russia is likely to agree on a rollover of current output for the first quarter if needed, a source familiar with the issue said, and would prefer to decide later on extending for the second quarter.

“It looks like the extension is needed,” the source said, citing “possible price drops and demand uncertainties” amid the second wave of the virus.

Oil has rallied in the past weeks, rising to its highest since March this year, near US$49 a barrel, on hopes that coronavirus vaccines will lead to higher demand. This hasn’t changed OPEC plus thinking around the extension.

 “This increase in prices is about sentiment, but we need to extend to have solid market fundamentals to support the prices,” said one. “So far, the best choice is the three-month extension.”

Still, enthusiasm for extended cuts is not universal, delegates and analysts say.

A potential complication is the United Arab Emirates’ wish for a higher OPEC plus quota, Goldman Sachs said this week.

Nigeria also wants a higher quota, and Iraq has talked about being exempt from 2021 reductions.

Goldman said it did not expect such a push from the UAE to derail the extension, and Iraq has said it will support any unanimous OPEC plus decision.

There are several technical meetings this week to prepare the ground for ministerial gatherings on Monday and Tuesday. All meetings are virtual due to the pandemic.

Christyan Malek, Managing Director and Head of oil & gas research at J.P. Morgan, said he expected OPEC+ plus to delay the increase by up to six months despite the price rally, with Saudi Arabia possibly offering deeper voluntary cuts until March next year.

“Inventories are not coming down as quickly as expected. Lockdowns are moving east to west, with more lockdowns expected in the US,” he said.

Malek said the departure of Donald Trump as US President, who was seen by some in OPEC as a friend after he helped bring Russian President Vladimir Putin into the OPEC plus output cut in April, would actually boost the producer alliance.

“Without Trump, OPEC plus is getting stronger rather than weaker,” he said. “Putin is using OPEC plus to get closer to Saudi Arabia, as the departure of Trump creates a bit of a vacuum in the US-Saudi relations.”

According to another report, Saudi Arabia and Russia summoned OPEC plus ministers who oversee their oil production cuts for last-minute talks on Saturday, as the cartel prepares for a decision on whether to delay January’s output increase.

A clear majority of OPEC plus watchers expect the group to maintain their supply curbs at current levels for a few months longer due to lingering uncertainty about demand. However, the decision is by no means certain amid public complaints from Iraq and Nigeria, and private discord with the United Arab Emirates.

The two leading members of OPEC and its allies, Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak and Saudi Energy Minister Abdulaziz bin Salman, requested an informal video conference with their counterparts from the Joint Ministerial Monitoring Committee, which includes Algeria, Kazakhstan, Iraq, Nigeria and the UAE, according to a letter seen by Bloomberg.

The unscheduled gathering comes just two days before a full OPEC ministerial meeting on November 30, which will be followed by OPEC plus talks on December 01. The JMMC met online as recently as November 17, but that ended without any kind of recommendation about delaying the January supply increase.

On Thursday, Algerian Energy Minister Abdelmadjid Attar, who this year holds OPEC’s rotating presidency, told Bloomberg that the group must remain cautious because the recent surge in oil to US$45 a barrel in New York could prove fragile.

A separate meeting of a committee of OPEC technical experts considered data that pointed to the risk of a new oil surplus early next year if the cartel and its allies decide to go ahead with the production increase. The 23-nation OPEC plus is scheduled to ease its 7.7 million barrels a day of production cuts by 1.9 million barrels a day from January 01, 2021

Can Iran become a dependable source of copper for Pakistan?

Pakistan imports substantial quantity of refined/purified copper to meet its industrial demand. At present the metal is being imported from far-flung countries, costing huge freight cost. Pakistan can’t import copper from Iran due to the sanctions imposed on the country by the United States.

Production of copper cathode in Iran increased six percent during the first half of the current Iranian calendar this year as compared to the same period last year. Copper cathode output was recorded at about 139,900 tons during the period under reviews, while the budgeted figure was 130,015 tons. Monthly copper cathode production was 24,198 tons or 10 percent higher than the figure of the same month in the previous year.

Production of copper cathode this year is budgeted at 280,000 tons as against reported production of 250,000 tons last year.

In early May, four development projects worth slightly more than US$952 million were inaugurated in the copper sector of Kerman Province in the southeast of Iran.

The projects inaugurated in Khatoon Abad Copper Complex included increasing the capacity of copper smelting in the complex, building a copper concentrate storage, construction of a sulfuric acid production plant, and an oxygen supplying unit. 

By putting the first project into operation, the complex’s capacity for producing copper anode rose by 50 percent to 120,000 tons, and the country’s copper smelting capacity rose to 400,000 tons. This project created jobs for 120 persons.

The second project, which was the construction of a 60,000-ton storage facility, was implemented at the cost of about US$3.7 million plus three million euros, creating jobs for 250 people. The third project was valued at about US$17.8 million plus 100 million euros and the fourth one was put into operation at the cost of about US$4.5 million plus 31 million euros.

Iran has seen its copper exports doubled in the past Iranian calendar year despite a series of bitter sanctions imposed by the United States aimed at hampering the Islamic Republic’s trade of metals.