28 Mar 2024


Sputnik - The Israeli-influenced sacking of US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson may draw President Donald Trump even closer to withdrawing from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) that governs Irans nuclear program, analysts told Sputnik.




On Friday, aftera meeting ofthe JCPOA commission inVienna, Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi held separate talks withUS officials, local media reported. On Tuesday, Tillerson was dismissed viaTwitter and replaced byCIA Director Mike Pompeo a move Trump said was overdisagreements onpolicy issues, including the JCPOA.

Triumph forIsrael

On March 5, arounda week beforefiring Tillerson viaTwitter, Trump told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu duringa meeting that the United States would pull outof the 2015 Iran nuclear deal if his demands tomake "significant" changes tothe agreement were not met, US media reported, citing officials.

Retired US Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski told Sputnik that Trumps decision todrop Tillerson and replace him withPompeo, a longtime critic ofthe nuclear deal, was a triumph forIsraels right wing Likud government and its US political allies.
"A more concerning issue withthe dismissal ofTillerson, are rumors that he was soft onIran, and that his removal had been demanded byLikudniks inIsrael and congressional supporters ofAIPAC [American Israel Public Affairs Committee] and right-wing Israeli politicians," she said.


Tillerson had also clashed withTrump onother major areas offoreign policy, Kwiatkowski said.

"Movement towardspeace onthe Korean peninsula, resolving Syria, dealing withIran, and determining directions withChina and Russia were all areas that the State Department, and byextension Tillerson, were and are resisting Trumps preferences," she added.

Trump wanted tobreak stalemates and negotiate his own original deals, Kwiatkowski explained.

Gina Haspel, the veteran intelligence professional whom Trump has named ashis choice toreplace Pompeo asCIA Director appeared unlikely tochallenge any hardline efforts byTrump and his team toscrap the agreement withIran, Kwiatkowski suggested.
"Haspel is not widely known exceptin regards toher loyalty tothe CIA, her willingness tofollow orders, and the fact that several neoconservatives and interventionists have already lauded her nomination," she said.


US Looks toExit

In January, Trump said he was "waiving" the application ofcertain sanctions asstipulated bythe JCPOA butonly so that the European parties tothe deal could work onimproving it.

Former US Army officer and historian Todd Pierce told Sputnik that the personnel shakeup atthe top ofthe administration was likely tointensify US pressure onIran.

Pompeos appointment tosucceed Tillerson was "not so much a policy shift buta solidifying ofan aggressive policy towardIran I believe. The entire Trump team is onboard withtearing upthe Iran agreement now," he said.

Trump had promoted and moved hardliners intokey decision-making positions and he had eliminated more cautious voices likeTillerson who opposed or sought tomoderate confrontational policies, Pierce explained.

The president had selected "the most militarist officials we have setting policy and terms ofdebate, and coloring intelligence interpretation, withno moderates likeTillerson interfering inthe discussion," he said.

Trump had made his consistent hostility tothe agreement clear duringhis 2016 election campaign even when he sounded more moderate tones onother foreign policy issues, Pierce recalled.
"Trump has already shown withJerusalem that [the Israeli government] this may be one deal where he gives them their moneys worth, inmy opinion," he said.


In July 2015, Iran and the P5+1 group ofnations the United States, Russia, China, France and the United Kingdom plus Germany signed the JCPOA. The agreement stipulates a gradual lifting ofsanctions imposed onIran inexchange forTehran maintaining the peaceful nature ofits nuclear program.

 

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