Why the U.S. Shouldn’t Succumb to European Pleas on Iran

Since his arrival in Washington on Monday, the French president Emmanuel Macron has already spoken with President Trump about the future of the nuclear deal with Tehran, which the White House has committed itself either to strengthen or to abandon. Undoubtedly, the two have also spoken in private about the subject. Richard Goldberg urges the president not to compromise on the most important issues:

[L]ess than three weeks before Trump’s deadline [for extending the nuclear agreement], critical gaps [between Europe and the U.S.] remain. Europe won’t explicitly endorse the elimination of sunset dates and objects to any mechanism that would automatically re-impose sanctions if Iran cut the time in which it could produce enough weapons-grade uranium for one nuke.

Europe is also willing to agree to powerful sanctions on Tehran only for the testing of long-range missiles that the regime doesn’t yet possess. As for missiles capable of wiping out Israel, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, or the United Arab Emirates, the Europeans are willing to apply only mild and ineffectual sanctions. To avoid a transatlantic rift, Trump will face enormous pressure to follow suit. . . . Europe’s thirst for trade with Iran is so intense, apparently, it’s willing to sacrifice Israel and its Gulf allies to keep the money flowing. . . .

When Barack Obama sold the nuclear deal to Congress, he claimed that nothing would preclude the West from re-imposing sanctions [on Iran] for illicit non-nuclear activities. But it never happened, and without a formal transatlantic political agreement, the fear of jeopardizing the deal will always prevent it from happening. This sanctions paralysis regarding non-nuclear threats is one of the deal’s unspoken fatal flaws. That’s why Trump must ask Macron not only to acknowledge the legitimacy of such actions but pledge his support for them. If he won’t, Trump would be better off nixing the deal entirely.

Macron reportedly has a fallback plan in case Trump opts to nix the deal altogether: ask him not to enforce U.S. sanctions involving Europe and, instead, let Europe keep doing business with Iran. Trump should forcefully reject this request as well. Not enforcing sanctions lets the Iranian regime get wealthier and stronger, leading to increased funding for Bashar al-Assad, terrorism, proliferation, regional expansion, and repression. And North Korea will think Trump can be manipulated and will adjust its diplomatic strategy accordingly.

Read more at New York Post

More about: Donald Trump, Emmanuel Macron, Iran nuclear program, Iran sanctions, Politics & Current Affairs, U.S. Foreign policy

It’s Time for Haredi Jews to Become Part of Israel’s Story

Unless the Supreme Court grants an extension from a recent ruling, on Monday the Israeli government will be required to withhold state funds from all yeshivas whose students don’t enlist in the IDF. The issue of draft exemptions for Haredim was already becoming more contentious than ever last year; it grew even more urgent after the beginning of the war, as the army for the first time in decades found itself suffering from a manpower crunch. Yehoshua Pfeffer, a haredi rabbi and writer, argues that haredi opposition to army service has become entirely disconnected from its original rationale:

The old imperative of “those outside of full-time Torah study must go to the army” was all but forgotten. . . . The fact that we do not enlist, all of us, regardless of how deeply we might be immersed in the sea of Torah, brings the wrath of Israeli society upon us, gives a bad name to all of haredi society, and desecrates the Name of Heaven. It might still bring harsh decrees upon the yeshiva world. It is time for us to engage in damage limitation.

In Pfeffer’s analysis, today’s haredi leaders, by declaring that they will fight the draft tooth and nail, are violating the explicit teachings of the very rabbis who created and supported the exemptions. He finds the current attempts by haredi publications to justify the status quo not only unconvincing but insincere. At the heart of the matter, according to Pfeffer, is a lack of haredi identification with Israel as a whole, a lack of feeling that the Israeli story is also the haredi story:

Today, it is high time we changed our tune. The new response to the demand for enlistment needs to state, first and foremost to ourselves, that this is our story. On the one hand, it is crucial to maintain and even strengthen our isolation from secular values and culture. . . . On the other hand, this cultural isolationism must not create alienation from our shared story with our fellow brethren living in the Holy Land. Participation in the army is one crucial element of this belonging.

Read more at Tzarich Iyun

More about: Haredim, IDF, Israeli society