President Barack Obama waves as he embarks Air Force One with first lady Michelle, in background partially visible, at Pratica di Mare's military airport, near Rome, Friday, July 10, 2009. After attending a three-day G8 (Group of Eight) Summit meeting in L'Aquila, central Italy, President Obama sat down with Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican on Friday for a meeting in which frank but constructive talks were expected between two men who agree on helping the poor but disagree on abortion and stem cell research. (AP Photo/Riccardo De Luca)
ROBERT BURNS | July 10, 2009 09:15 PM EST | AP
WASHINGTON — After a half-year of extending patient feelers to Iran, President Barack Obama has set a timeline _ warning Tehran it must show willingness to negotiate an end to its nuclear program by September or face consequences.
If the West weighs new moves against Iran this fall, as Obama suggested Friday, it will likely mean new U.N. sanctions or unilateral U.S. penalties, rather than military strikes.
Obama told reporters in Italy, where he met with other world leaders, that there is now a September "time frame" for Iran to respond to offers to discuss its nuclear program. While he did not call it a deadline, he said the world cannot afford to wait long for Iran to make its intentions clear.
"We're not going to just wait indefinitely and allow for the development of the nuclear weapon," he said.
Obama said that in September "we will re-evaluate Iran's posture toward negotiating the cessation of a nuclear weapons policy." If by then it has not accepted the offer of talks, the United States and "potentially a lot of other countries" are going to say "we need to take further steps," he said.
The president did not say what steps he has in mind. He mentioned neither sanctions nor military force. But it seems clear that a next step to pressure Iran would entail some form of sanctions.
"The administration and the other powers would probably like to leave the toughest forms of sanctions to be used if they feel that diplomacy has not gone anywhere _ not in this pre-diplomacy period," said Trita Parsi, president of the National Iranian American Council, which supports expanded U.S.-Iranian contacts.
Working against Obama's expression of urgency is the political paralysis in Tehran, where protesters this week sought to revive street demonstrations over the country's disputed presidential election. Iranian authorities, while accusing the U.S. and other Western countries of secretly instigating the protests, seem likely to put nuclear negotiations on the back burner until the election dust settles.
State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley acknowledged as much on Friday, saying, "This (postelection turmoil) has clearly diverted the attention of the Iranian government from offers of engagement."
At the Group of Eight summit in Italy, world leaders issued a joint statement deploring Iran's crackdown on protesters. They also said they remain committed to finding a diplomatic solution to the nuclear issue and said that in September they would "take stock of the situation" on the nuclear front.
Jon B. Alterman, director of the Middle East program at the Center For Strategic and International Studies, said that if reports of rifts among some of Iran's ruling clerics are true, then it will be hard for the government to agree on a policy response to the West's offer of direct negotiations.
He sees the prospect of movement toward sanctions this fall. That could mean any combination of additional financial penalties, trade restrictions, limits on travel by Iranian government officials and other actions.
"Clearly the world is moving toward presenting Iran a choice" between diplomacy and isolation, Alterman said.
Before the June election, the Obama administration had figured that once the result was in, the Tehran government could be expected to make clear whether it intends to take up the offers of nuclear talks.
"All of that has been completely put on its head" by the postelection turmoil, said Parsi. He believes Iran's political paralysis will continue as long the protest movement is alive.
But the clock keeps ticking, moving Iran closer to obtaining the nuclear bomb that the U.S. and much of the rest of the world says it cannot be allowed.
By U.S. estimates, Iran is one to three years away from the capability to make nuclear weapons. Some think they are closer, and the fact is that no one outside Iran really knows. The five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council _ Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States _ as well as Germany have offered Iran incentives to stop reprocessing uranium that could fuel a nuclear bomb.
Iran so far has ignored the offer and continues to amass enriched uranium, sparking grave fears, especially in Israel, which has not ruled out military strikes to deal with the threat.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad insists the program is intended only for peaceful nuclear purposes.
The U.S. has not publicly ruled out using military force against Iran, but it seems far from that stage.
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Tuesday that military action could backfire.
"I worry a great deal about the response of a country that gets struck," he said. "It is a really important place to not go, if we cannot go there in any way, shape or form."
Editor's Note: Robert Burns has covered national security and military affairs for the AP since 1990.
Despite rhetoric, Netanyahu has suspended Jewish settlement building.
.. fingers .. legs .. eyes .. arms .. toes .. XXXXXXed .. "i"s dotted, too
Imagine - John Lennon
Israel's prime minister has defended such projects in the West Bank. But officials say he is also quietly seeking a compromise that would facilitate a revival of peace talks with Palestinians.
A Palestinian on a bus turns her attention to Israeli protesters defending Jewish settlement construction in East Jerusalem. Palestinians have refused to restart peace negotiations without a freeze on such housing. (Jim Hollander / European Pressphoto Agency / August 17, 2009)
By Richard Boudreaux August 19, 2009
Reporting from Jerusalem - Cameras were rolling, capturing the defiant Israeli mood over President Obama's stand on Jewish settlements.
With three other Cabinet officials at his side, Interior Minister Eli Yishai toured a Jewish outpost in the West Bank on Monday and declared: "Israel must do what it believes is right, and the Americans will understand that there was no choice but to continue building" on Palestinian-claimed land.
That evening, as former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee attended a dinner in support of a Jewish housing project in predominantly Arab East Jerusalem, an Israeli demonstrator unfurled a banner portraying Obama in a checkered Palestinian kaffiyeh. "Barack Hussein Obama -- Anti Semite Jew-Hater," it read.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has exploited such sentiment to depict Washington's opposition to settlement growth as unreasonable. But Israeli officials say he is also seeking a compromise that would limit the growth and facilitate Obama's goal of restarting Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
Several officials said Tuesday that Netanyahu, Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Housing Minister Ariel Atias had quietly agreed to suspend all government tenders to build new Jewish housing in the West Bank and East Jerusalem at least until the start of next year.
The government and its critics acknowledge that there has been no green light for construction bids since November and that Netanyahu, after taking office on March 31, allowed the de facto suspension to continue.
One official said the recent decision, which was not announced, makes the suspension explicit in advance of a new round of talks set for next week between Netanyahu and U.S. envoy George J. Mitchell.
"The fact is, we are in a holding pattern," Atias told Israel Radio. "This is an attempt, I believe, to reach an understanding with the American administration, to reach a comprehensive peace agreement."
Israel's move falls short of the total freeze the Obama administration initially sought. At the same time, it has provoked an outcry within Netanyahu's conservative-led government, highlighting the difficulty of ending Israel's most pointed disagreement in years with the United States.
Obama said Tuesday that he was nonetheless encouraged.
"There has been movement in the right direction," he told reporters at the White House after talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Israel "has taken discussions with us very seriously."
Obama said he expected Palestinians to improve the climate for renewed negotiations, such as by ending incitement of violence against the Jewish state. The latest round of U.S.-brokered peace talks collapsed late last year.
In resisting a settlement freeze, Netanyahu and his aides have complained that the Obama administration is putting undue emphasis on such a step and not enough pressure on the Palestinians, who have refused to renew the talks without one.
Huckabee and other visiting Republicans have sharpened the divide, accusing the Obama administration of undermining Israel.
After the State Department objected last month to a planned Jewish housing project in East Jerusalem, Netanyahu declared, "We cannot accept the idea that Jews will not have the right to live and purchase [homes] anywhere in Jerusalem." His popularity at home rose among Jews throughout Israel as well as the estimated 300,000 who live in West Bank settlements that most of the world views as illegal.
At the same time, Netanyahu and his aides have been quietly negotiating terms of a settlement freeze with U.S. representatives led by Mitchell.
In doing so, the Israeli leader is reattempting the failed balancing act of his previous stint as prime minister, in the late 1990s. After positioning himself as a hard-liner then, he yielded to U.S. pressure and gave up partial control of the West Bank city of Hebron to the Palestinians. Right-wing allies defected, bringing down his government.
"We're seeing the same gap between rhetoric and reality today," said Hagit Ofran, an activist for Peace Now, an Israeli organization that monitors and opposes settlements. "The government insists that Israel must build here and there. In fact, there's a limited freeze. It's not enough, but it's a good sign."
A senior Israeli official said Netanyahu was moving toward a compromise with Mitchell that, during the freeze on new projects, would allow completion of existing work in large settlements that Israel expects to keep in a final peace treaty. The official said he expected agreement on terms of a freeze by October.
"The idea is to find a modus vivendi to alleviate any concerns the Palestinians have but also to allow a normal life for the people" in the settlements, he said. "I think we can find a way that is credible and workable."
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat dismissed the freeze on tenders as a "play on words" that will not stop construction of 2,500 Jewish homes he said is underway in the West Bank.
Peace Now put the number of settlement homes under construction at 1,000. It said private construction by settler groups accounted for 60% of building in the West Bank and would not be halted by a freeze of government tenders.
Even so, right-wing reaction to the freeze was furious and pointed to disarray in the government.
"Once again we elected Netanyahu and got the old Bibi," said a statement by the Binyamin Settlers Committee, using the prime minister's nickname. "The one who talks passionately about the rock of our resistance but capitulates in the face of American pressure."
"Israel is not a satellite of the United States," declared Daniel Hershkowitz, the minister of science and technology. Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon objected to the freeze, noting its lack of full Cabinet approval.
Asked about dissenting voices in the government, Atias, the housing minister, told Israel Radio: "Who am I to criticize other ministers? Everyone has his own view."
He added: "The prime minister is acting wisely about one thing. He's not trying to clash with the Americans."
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