{"id":6365,"date":"2012-02-25T07:54:58","date_gmt":"2012-02-25T14:54:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=6365"},"modified":"2012-02-25T07:54:58","modified_gmt":"2012-02-25T14:54:58","slug":"iran-mastering-ropes-of-nuclear-detente-without-nukes-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=6365","title":{"rendered":"Iran Mastering Ropes of Nuclear Detente without Nukes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>US aide tells Israel sanctions on Iran need time<\/strong><br \/>\n21 February, 2012 &#8211; Maan News Agency<\/p>\n<p>WASHINGTON (Reuters) &#8212; A top aide to US President Barack Obama told Israel&#8217;s leaders this weekend that there is still time for diplomacy to keep Tehran from getting a nuclear weapon, the White House said on Tuesday, amid growing concerns that Israel might resort to a preemptive strike.<\/p>\n<p>National security adviser Tom Donilon told Israeli officials that Washington shares their concern about Iran&#8217;s nuclear push but also stressed the need to let sanctions work, White House spokesman Jay Carney said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We certainly understand the heightened concern that Israel has given its geographic location and other circumstances that are involved here for Israel,&#8221; Carney told reporters, discussing Donilon&#8217;s visit and the White House view on Iran&#8217;s ambitions.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Having said that, we believe that the approach this administration has taken has resulted in a level of consensus within the international community regarding Iranian behavior that has never been attained before that&#8217;s resulted in a level of punitive sanctions that have never been attained before &#8230; and that that has had an impact,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We believe that there is time and space to attempt to resolve this peacefully.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Iran says its nuclear program is meant to develop energy, not weapons.<\/p>\n<p>But its recent shift of uranium enrichment to a mountain bunker and refusal to negotiate guarantees that the program is peaceful have raised security fears &#8212; particularly in Israel &#8212; and also stoked concerns about Gulf oil supplies.<\/p>\n<p>Donilon was the latest in a series of high-level US officials who have traveled to Israel in recent weeks to impress US concerns over any attack on Iran.<\/p>\n<p>James Clapper, the US Director of National Intelligence, said last week he would soon visit Israel to discuss intelligence sharing.<\/p>\n<p>General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, who traveled to Israel last month, acknowledged in a weekend television interview that the two long-time allies have divergent views of the best course of action on Iran.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m confident that (Israel&#8217;s leaders) understand our concerns that a strike at this time would be destabilizing and wouldn&#8217;t achieve their long-term objectives,&#8221; Dempsey told CNN.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I also understand that Israel has national interests that are unique to them. And, of course, they consider Iran to be an existential threat in a way that we have not concluded that Iran is an existential threat.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Speculation has been growing that Israel may attack Iran&#8217;s nuclear facilities to set back the Islamic Republic&#8217;s weapons progress. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.maannews.net\/eng\/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=462214\" target=\"_blank\">&#8230;more<\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"igit_tsb_button\" style=\"float: left; margin-right: 10px;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/share?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.crookedbough.com%2F%3Fp%3D6365&amp;text=Iran+Mastering+Ropes+of+Nuclear+Detente+without+Nukes&amp;count=horizontal&amp;via=\" style=\"\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>US aide tells Israel sanctions on Iran need time 21 February, 2012 &#8211; Maan News Agency WASHINGTON (Reuters) &#8212; A top aide to US President Barack Obama told Israel&#8217;s leaders this weekend that there is still time for diplomacy to keep Tehran from getting a nuclear weapon, the White House said on Tuesday, amid growing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=6365#more-'\" class=\"more-link\">more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[247],"tags":[2554],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6365"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6365"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6365\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6367,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6365\/revisions\/6367"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}