Ernest Moniz: Netanyahu Has Accepted the JCPOA

Ernest Moniz, the U.S. Secretary of Energy, stated after a trip to Israel and discussions with officials there that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has come to terms with the JCPOA and "has now accepted it." During his two-day visit last week, Moniz met with Yuval Steinitz, Israel's Minister of Energy, who is a senior member of the ruling Likud party and the minister responsible for Iran's dossier. Invited to Israel to participate in an international energy and gas conference, Moniz told Bloomberg's affiliated television network in an interview on April 7 that the Israeli Prime Minister has accepted the JCPOA as a reality and now emphasizes that it must be implemented carefully. Moniz, who was a close ally of John Kerry during the challenging nuclear negotiations between Iran and world powers, played a significant role in technical discussions with Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization, in various cities in Switzerland and Austria. Given that Donald Trump and Ted Cruz, two of the remaining three candidates for the Republican presidential nomination in the U.S., have expressed dissatisfaction with the nuclear deal with Iran and stated they would annul it, Bloomberg asked Moniz about the possibility of the next U.S. president canceling the JCPOA. Ted Cruz, more extreme than Trump, has repeatedly stated that he would tear up the JCPOA, and Trump, who initially described it as the worst deal he has ever seen, has now spoken of tearing it up and emphasized that he would annul the agreement "on the very first day" of his presidency. However, Moniz, one of America's leading nuclear scientists, told Bloomberg that technically, a president might be able to do this, but anyone who reaches the presidency must consider the implications and calculations for a wise decision, and there are no rational criteria that would advise the president against the JCPOA. According to the U.S. Secretary of Energy, the next president cannot simply say, "Well, I don't like this agreement, so let's start negotiations from scratch... It is meaningless; unacceptable." Moniz also mentioned that one of the shared concerns of the U.S. and Israel is Iran's long-range missile tests, just as Iran's continued military support for Hezbollah has been a shared concern for both countries. Regarding the discovery of gas fields in the Mediterranean Sea and Israel's claim that it could become a "gas-exporting power," Moniz stated after attending the energy conference and the outlook for Israel's gas that if the Israelis truly advance in this industry, they might provide a good option for supplying gas to Europe instead of Russia. According to Moniz, Israeli gas exports could be used as a "strategy" in the region and even beyond. He noted that Israelis could send their gas to Turkey and then export it to Europe via a land pipeline. The U.S. Secretary of Energy also mentioned that Israel could strengthen its ties with its Arab neighbors, such as Egypt and Jordan, by exporting gas to them. Israel had imported natural gas from Egypt for years; however, after the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak's regime in January 2011, this pipeline was repeatedly blown up by armed militants who later pledged allegiance to ISIS. However, the development of Israel's gas industry has been halted due to a ruling by the Israeli Supreme Court last month. The judges of this court even rejected Netanyahu's arguments, who made an unprecedented appearance at the court to justify his government's regulatory plans for exploiting the "Leviathan" gas fields. Israeli opponents of this project and opponents of the company "Noble Energy," which was supposed to have the rights to extract gas from the "Leviathan" field for a ten-year period, have filed complaints with the Israeli Supreme Court and currently have the upper hand with the ruling issued by the court. Moniz told Bloomberg that the U.S. also has significant interests in gas production plans in the region because this matter is not only related to energy but also involves the collective security of nations. The U.S. Secretary of Energy also commented on global oil prices and Iran's renewed role in it, stating that "it is hard to prevent Iran from increasing its oil production and exports after the JCPOA and to convince Iran to agree to maintain the current OPEC export ceiling to raise oil prices or at least not let them drop further." Iran insists that it is its right to export more oil and regain its former position in OPEC.