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Europe Should Realize the Risk of Negotiations With the Iranian Regime

The EU, while continuing this wrong policy encourages Iran to increase its terrorism, which has been its blackmailing tool for decades.

Iran’s regime support and funding of terrorist groups such as Hamas, Hezbollah and Houthis in Yemen, is a known fact and has been a concern not just for the Iranian people who have been losing their resources because of the regime’s warmongering policies, but for the Western governments.

In an op-ed in TownHall published on September 6, Ambassador Adam Ereli, former U.S. Ambassador to Bahrain and Deputy State Department spokesperson during the Bush administration expertly examined the Iran’s destructive role in the Middle East.

“The Iranian regime was a major topic of discussion during the G-7 Summit in Biarritz last month. But neither France nor any other European country should be helping the murderous regime to acquire a larger presence on the international stage.”

Referring to European causalities of Iran’s terrorism, Mr. Ereli wrote,”Both French and American citizens were among the hundreds of victims of Hezbollah attacks in the 1980s and 90s. But France was also the site of one of the most ambitious Iranian terror plots to be thwarted in recent years.”

“As Iran’s Foreign Minister, it is impossible for Javad Zarif not to have been aware of this plan to set off explosives on European territory.  Given the use of Iranian diplomatic facilities abroad, it is also reasonable to conclude that he was in fact complicit,” Ambassador Ereli added, describing the role of Iran’s regime diplomacy.

“European and American policymakers must resist the impulse to offer Tehran concessions in the vague hope of encouraging a moderate shift in the regime’s behavior.  Current efforts to provide Iran with a $15 billion line of credit in return for full compliance with the 2015 nuclear agreement is exactly the wrong approach.  Over the past four months, Iran has bombed or hijacked more than half a dozen commercial tankers, imprisoned French and British academics and violated the 2015 nuclear deal’s limits on uranium enrichment.  Simply put, relaxing sanctions sends a message that crime pays. Far from incentivizing Iran to abide by global norms, it would just encourage further bad behavior” he added, underlining how the appeasement policy emboldens this regime.

In addition to Ambassador Ereli, another top European politician, Claude Moniquet, in an op-ed in Issues & Insights, while criticizing France approach toward the Iranian regime underlined this fact the giving incentive packages to this regime emboldens it to continue its terrorist activities especially in Europe.

“Those used to dealing with Iranian affairs, especially when it comes to intelligence and security, know that truth in the mullahs’ regime is often wrapped in the sails of mystery. As Winston Churchill said once (evoking Russia): “a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma…”

“I am referring specifically to the handling of Iranian state-sponsored terrorism that has directly reached European territory. According to well-placed friends in France and Belgium, some sinister realities might be brewing behind the scenes when it comes to dealing with Iranian terror,” Mr. Moniquet added.

Referring to Iran’s recent terrorist plots against its opposition Mr. Moniquet wrote, “A step back is necessary to fully understand what is at stake. By March 2018, Iranian operatives had already been arrested in Albania for plotting an attack on a compound belonging to Iran’s leading democratic opposition group, the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (MEK). Had the plan not been uncovered, there is no telling how many of the 3,000 residents might have been killed. Other Iranian terrorist plots were uncovered in 2018, in Germany, Netherlands and Denmark.”

“So it should have come as no surprise when another terror plot was disrupted in France on June 30, 2018, following a major intelligence operation coordinated between several countries – Israel, Belgium, France, and Germany. An Iranian couple who had been living in Belgium as refugees for a long time were arrested in Brussels. In the trunk of their car was a bomb. Everything was in perfect working order and ready to use; the detonator only needed to be connected to the payload” Mr. Moniquet added.

Mr. Moniquet reminded its European colleagues of the danger of policy of appeasement and wrote, “If Paris goes to bed with the ayatollahs again, it will demonstrate a totally immoral attitude and will also endanger all French and Western nationals. The common interests of the West and free world are at serious risk from the ayatollahs’ state-sponsored terrorism.”

“President Macron has stated that in combating terrorism, France is in total unity with the US. But it is increasingly clear that Washington wants to hold Tehran to account for all of its malign activities, particularly terrorism. Can Paris say the same of itself?” Mr. Moniquet added.

“It should. The experience from forty years of the ayatollahs’ drama leads to one conclusion: Tehran yields under pressure. Firmness is the only answer. There is no other option” Mr. Moniquet concluded.

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