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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (152211)	11/21/2004 1:47:54 PM
From: carranza2	Respond to of 281500

The nuts who hold power in Iran are not moderates, have not moderated their views, and in fact have acted to consolidate their power much against the will of the Iranian people, among whom we are very, very popular. In point of fact, even so called moderates are in the process of radicalizing their views. The best example is Rafsanjani, who in the 1980s considered a more or less moderate, someone we could talk to. He has recently become more radical as the Mullahs have themselves become more extreme. As statement such as the one he is known to have made, i.e, our nukes will be capable of annihilating Israel while we suffer 'damages' only, would have been inconceivable from him a decade or so ago. The elections bit in Iran--well, what else need be said about it. There is NO MODERATION when a regime excludes genuine moderates from the ballot. Jeeez, I should think anyone would know that.

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (152211)	11/21/2004 2:40:46 PM
From: Michael Watkins	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Nadine, if you were in charge of the White House, or the Knesset, 25, 30, 40 years ago, Egypt and Israel would still be at war. It frequently takes a long time for cultural and political change to happen. Political circumstance within a country is often shaped by the then-current popular opinion, in addition to other groups vying for power. Things are not always as they seem on the surface, nor do apparent hard-liners always end up being unable to deliver peace in the end. Israel and Egypt are a perfect case in point. In the early 70's Sadat himself was still openly opposed to Resolution 242 - perhaps a notional move to placate the masses, or perhaps he actually believed in in that stance. Editorials of the day spoke to this: Arab policy at this stage has but two objectives. The first, the elimination of the traces of the 1967 aggression through an Israeli withdrawal from all the territories it occupied that year. The second objective is the elimination of the traces of the 1948 aggression, by the means of the elimination of the State of Israel itself. This is, however, as yet an abstract, undefined objective, and some of us have erred in commencing the latter step before the former. Yet people on both sides of the border continued to move moderation forward, often against intense domestic pressure, and despite ongoing military conflict. Within that decade a peace agreement was signed, and Israel was recognized. Later, anti-moderates on both sides of the fence made both Sadat and Rabin pay the ultimate price.