{"id":8993,"date":"2011-01-28T08:57:24","date_gmt":"2011-01-28T16:57:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=8993"},"modified":"2011-01-28T12:01:14","modified_gmt":"2011-01-28T20:01:14","slug":"friday-iran-talking-points-23","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2011\/01\/28\/friday-iran-talking-points-23\/","title":{"rendered":"Friday Iran Talking Points"},"content":{"rendered":"

from LobeLog<\/a>: News and Views Relevant to U.S.-Iran relations for January 28th, 2011:<\/em><\/p>\n

The Atlantic<\/a><\/em>: Jeffrey Goldberg<\/a> lists his observations on the ongoing events in Egypt and mentions that friends of his, like FDD <\/a>fellow Reuel Marc Gerecht<\/a>, advocate that democratically elected Islamist governments might be part of a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153long-term process of gradual modernization.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d But Goldberg is \u00e2\u20ac\u0153not so sure\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and suggests that not all democratically elected governments are worth ending \u00e2\u20ac\u0153fifty years of peace\u00e2\u20ac\u009d which have \u00e2\u20ac\u0153meant propping up dictators for fifty years.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I support democratization, but the democratization we saw in Gaza (courtesy of, among others, Condi Rice) doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t seem particularly worth it,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he writes.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Goldberg then tries to deny the importance of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153linkage<\/a>\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00e2\u20ac\u201ddespite its embrace by the military establishment<\/a> and the Obama administration<\/a>\u00e2\u20ac\u201dand concludes, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153these uprisings are offering proof that Israel isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t the central Arab preoccupation. Wikileaks showed us that Iran is the obsession of Arab leaders, and these mass demonstrations are showing us that the faults of Arab leaders are the actual obsession of Arab people.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d (Jim Lobe and I took a closer look at those cables and found a very different message<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

The National Interest<\/a><\/em>: Ben-Gurion University professor Benny Morris writes, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The regimes that have crumbled or appear to be on the verge of crumbling, are those linked to the West, and they are regimes characterized by a relatively soft authoritarianism, and are commonly perceived as weak, if not downright flabby, well past their prime.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d He contrasts the end of Ben Ali\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s rule and the escalating situation in Egypt with the suppression of protests by the Iranian government in 2009. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153All of this stands in stark contrast to the Iranian regime\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s successful suppression of last year\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s street rebellion, triggered by the fraudulent elections that left President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad in power,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he writes. Morris concludes, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153What is clear is that the West, as usual, is faring poorly among the Muslims of the Middle East, where real savagery\u00e2\u20ac\u201dsadly\u00e2\u20ac\u201dwins respect, and irresolution, a kick in the pants.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

from LobeLog: News and Views Relevant to U.S.-Iran relations for January 28th, 2011: The Atlantic: Jeffrey Goldberg lists his observations on the ongoing events in Egypt and mentions that friends of his, like FDD fellow Reuel Marc Gerecht, advocate that democratically elected Islamist governments might be part of a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153long-term process of gradual modernization.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d But […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":71,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-8993","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8993","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/71"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8993"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8993\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8998,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8993\/revisions\/8998"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8993"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=8993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}