Last month, Boeing signed a landmark agreement with Iran to sell or lease a hundred and nine passenger jets. The mega-deal, worth at least twenty billion dollars, would be the largest sale of American goods to the Islamic Republic since the seizure of the U.S. Embassy, shortly after the 1979 Revolution. ...
Will the Iran nuclear deal survive? https://t.co/y6ex9lXtJq pic.twitter.com/MJzxd2waGg
In the week marking the one-year anniversary of the nuclear deal, Congress prepared to discuss three bills that would impose new sanctions on Iran – all of which President Obama has promised to veto if they are passed. The bills include:
President Hassan Rouhani is still the favored candidate for the 2017 presidential election, but his predecessor, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has made significant gains in public opinion, according to a new University of Maryland survey. While large majorities said they had a favorable view of Rouhani’s efforts to improve national security and international relations, Iranians had a more mixed view of his economic policies.
A new University of Maryland poll found that a majority of Iranians continued to support sending their own military personnel to Syria. Half of Iranians said their country should increase support for Bashar al Assad’s government. About two thirds of respondents said Iran should seek to increase the role it plays in the region.
Iranians indicated mixed views of Turkey, China and Russia. They had largely positive views of Iraq, the Lebanese militia and political party Hezbollah, Syria and Germany. They had overwhelmingly negative views of ISIS and Saudi Arabia.
One year after the nuclear deal was reached, Iranians’ views of the United States have not improved, according to a new poll by the University of Maryland. As of June 2016, 73 percent of Iranians had a negative view of the United States. About the same percentage thought Washington was actively preventing other countries from strengthening economic ties to Iran.
On the eve of the one year anniversary of the nuclear deal, President Hassan Rouhani warned that Iran could quickly restore its nuclear program if the world’s major powers violate the agreement. “If the P5+1 wriggles out of its commitments, we are completely ready and capable to reach our desired point in a short time span,” he said during a cabinet meeting. The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which went into its implementation phase in January, rolled back key elements of Tehran’s nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief.
The nuclear deal, signed in July 2015, has been a game changer for Iran. A year later, the Islamic Republic is again a player on the international circuit. Top Iranian leaders have visited Europe, Asia, Africa and Latin America. Tehran has hosted a steady stream of heads of state or foreign ministers, many from the West, interested in upgrading relations.
Senators Susan Collins (R-ME) and Bill Nelson (D-FL) organized 33 of their colleagues to sign a bipartisan letter urging the Obama administration to rigorously enforce sanctions on Iran’s illicit, non-nuclear activities — namely its support for terrorism, development of ballistic missiles, and human rights abuses.
The U.S. Navy has decided to discipline nine personnel who were responsible for the detention of U.S. sailors by Iranian forces in January 2016. Iran seized two U.S.