BICOM

US officials believe that Iran will continue to comply with the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear deal and wait until the end of Donald Trump’s presidency for a change in policy.

According to a report in Haaretz by Amos Harel and Amir Tibon, Iran will continue to comply with the nuclear deal in order to avoid military action. The report, based on recent conversations with Israeli and American officials, concludes that the Iranians believe the deal can act as an ‘insurance policy’ against any attempts from the Trump administration to introduce harsher sanctions on Iran.

Mark Dubowitz, from the Foundation for Defence of Democracies, told Haaretz that former officials from the Obama administration have encouraged Iran to hold out for the end of Trump’s presidency. However, Haaretz claims Iran will find this strategy increasingly difficult to implement, due to the growing pressure of American sanctions. If the economy collapses and sanctions prove devastating for Iran, Dubowitz believes Iran might try to force the Trump administration into negotiations, calculating that the negotiations will help loosen some of the pressure on the economy.

Israeli security officials quoted in the report believe US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s demands on Iran have returned a sense of balance to US policy in the Middle East. That the US is not solely focused on defeating ISIS, but also seeking to block Iranian regional influence.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Qasemi urged the remaining signatories to the JCPOA – Britain, France, Germany, China and Russia – to speed up efforts to avoid the agreement’s collapse, after Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh confirmed yesterday that Total has withdrawn from a billion dollar contract to develop Iran’s South Pars Gas project.

US National Security Advisor John Bolton concluded his visit to Israel with a news conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Bolton said that Netanyahu’s analysis of the issues the West faces in the region, namely the nuclear threat of Iran and its sponsorship of terrorism, is “right on target”. Netanyahu described Trump’s decision to leave the JCPOA nuclear deal as “nothing less than a hinge of history”.