Israeli Analyst: A Better Agreement Could Have Been Achieved with Different Negotiation Management

Emily Landau, an Israeli analyst, believes that the nuclear agreement between Iran and the West has now become a reality, and the international community, including Israel, is focusing on what the next steps will be. She also states that asking how the situation would have been without this agreement is not the right question; instead, one should ask how this agreement could have been better. Review Ms. Landau's responses to Radio Farda's questions: Emily Landau is a senior analyst at the Institute for National Security Studies in Israel. She has written numerous articles on disarmament and security mechanisms in the Middle East and has been teaching nuclear strategy and related issues at Tel Aviv University since 2004. Forbes magazine named Emily Landau one of the 50 most influential women in Israel in 2015 for her work on security issues, including the Iranian nuclear crisis. You are in Israel. Do you think the government considers the nuclear agreement a done deal and is now thinking about the post-JCPOA era? I think the JCPOA is a reality for everyone, both for those who negotiated it and for the rest of the world, including Israel. The international community has reached the point where last year's agreement was announced, and subsequent actions were taken. Now everyone is focused on what the next steps will be, how the agreement will be implemented, and how the P5+1 countries will continue their relationship with Iran regarding nuclear and other related issues. This agreement was about the nuclear issue, but unfortunately, the missile issue was not included at a time when Iran has an active nuclear program and other elements regarding Iran's behavior in the region directly impact the nuclear domain. The P5+1, especially the U.S., repeatedly emphasized after reaching the nuclear agreement that the world would be a safer place following this nuclear deal. Israel has assessed Iran's nuclear program as a threat to its security for over a decade. How is it today? Does this agreement help Israel feel more secure? This agreement should be evaluated in the context of the principles of nuclear non-proliferation. Iran is a member of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and has committed not to militarize its program. However, Iran has been working for decades to militarize its program. The final report of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on this matter was published in December 2015 after a long period during which Iran, even in the last months, was not cooperating with this agency. Therefore, this report could have addressed even more how far Iran had worked on militarizing its nuclear program. The agency could not provide a definitive timeline because Iran did not cooperate. The issue is that Iran has not cooperated and is deceiving. Israel has always been subjected to terrible rhetoric; Iranian leaders, including Rouhani, do not hide their deep enmity towards Israel and repeatedly state that from Iran's perspective, Israel should not be part of the Middle East, or the controversial statements of senior Iranian officials who said 'Israel must be removed from the map,' and whether this was actually said or not is no longer important because they say Israel should not be in the Middle East, which is a complete denial of Israel's existence. For a country that is a member of the United Nations to deny the existence of another country that has sovereignty is a denial of Israel's existence. In such an atmosphere, when Iran works on militarizing its nuclear program, this is a serious basis for threatening Israel's security. You cannot separate nuclear issues from the behavior of countries, their actions in the region, and their approach to the international community. What Israel has repeatedly stated is that a country that is also an NPT member is violating its commitments and denying Israel and its existence. This agreement does not guarantee that Iran will not acquire nuclear weapons because, firstly, it has an expiration date and will end in 10 to 15 years. This has nothing to do with Iran's behavior in the region, the denial of Israel's existence, its ballistic missile program, or interference in the affairs of other countries (which from Israel's perspective, the most important is Syria). If nothing changes, and Iran does not abandon its ambitions to militarize its nuclear program, and now according to the agency's report, we know that it has been doing so for decades, why should we think that Iran will not return to what it was doing before the agreement? Of course, the agency's report stated that the research Iran was conducting on militarizing its program stopped in 2003. No. The agency says that until 2003, Iran was systematically working on this issue, and at least until 2009, it conducted sporadic activities. It states at least because last summer, Iran was not cooperating with the agency to provide a precise timeline. When we talk about coordinated work until 2003, we must consider that according to many analysts in this field, Iran began working on its nuclear program in the late 1980s, which means they spent a lot of time on militarizing this program. The fact that the report considers activities until 2009 is truly astonishing because it means that at the beginning of Obama's administration, Iran was still working on militarizing its program. Some, including Iranian officials themselves, say that Iran is in a tense region like the Middle East. A region where Pakistan has a bomb to its east, Israel has a bomb but does not confirm it. Their nuclear program and ballistic missiles have a defensive and deterrent aspect. What is your response to this group? First of all, Iran has a program to gain hegemony in the Middle East and does not hide it. You hear this in the words of Iranian leaders about how important it is for them to strengthen their influence in the Middle East and beyond. It is not surprising that Iranians say this is for self-defense. Despite the agency's reports, Iran has always denied working on militarizing its nuclear program and claimed these are lies and fabrications. This itself is a sign of how much Iran cooperates with the international community. Then it says all its work on ballistic missiles and militarizing its nuclear program is defensive while wanting to take regional hegemony and everything I mentioned earlier about how it speaks about Israel. Israel did not make Iran its enemy; Iran did that. Before 1979, when another regime was in power in Iran, there was a different relationship between Israel and Iran, and one could even say a relatively good relationship. With the revolution, without Israel doing anything, this behavior changed, and Israel became the number one enemy. No message was sent from Israel to Iran that now you are the enemy; rather, the opposite message was sent from Iran to Israel that you are our number one enemy. When I speak of terrible rhetoric towards Israel, one must recall the discourse of Iranian leaders, who continuously utter words that I do not even want to repeat. They do not even mention Israel by name and refer to it as the illegitimate Zionist regime, calling it a dirty germ and cancer, and this has continued for years. Now to claim that all this is for defensive purposes, and Iran wants to keep its borders secure, they have no real evidence to prove it, and there is a lot of evidence that contradicts it. My last question for you is, do you think the situation would have been better without the nuclear agreement? Honestly, I have a problem with this question, which is often raised. I do not think it is the right question. The issue is not whether we have this agreement or not. The issue is whether we have this agreement or whether we could have had a better agreement. This relates to the negotiations and the opportunity that negotiators had in 2013 when the final stage of negotiations began, and severe sanctions were imposed on Iran. The negotiators, faced with Iran's stubbornness, made proposals that opened the door for further concessions. At one point, Iran concluded that the P5+1 and the U.S. were showing more willingness to reach an agreement than Iran, and in such a situation, Iran understood that more compromise was on the way, and here the agreement became problematic. Therefore, it is not correct to ask whether the situation would have been better without the agreement. No, the situation could have been better with a better agreement, which I believe could have been achieved with different negotiation management.