 Hello and welcome to NewsClick. Today we're going to be talking about the assassination of Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsen Pakrazadeh. Now the assassination took place on Friday. There are varying reports even from Iran and how it took place. There are reports that there were armed gunmen and also recently Iranian authorities have claimed that there was a remote explosive device that was used. What is certain nonetheless is the fact that this is yet another major strike against Iran. Iran, of course, has blamed Israel. Many observers have claimed that Israel has in fact pointed him out before as a significant part of Iran's earlier nuclear program, of course. But we're going to be talking about what the assassination means, what Israel, the US and its allies in the region are trying to do. And we have with us Prabir Pulkaster. Prabir, thank you so much for joining us. So quickly over the past few weeks, the number of developments, the sanctions in Iran have continued. There was a secret meeting which was leaked between Benjamin Netanyahu and Salman bin Mohammed when Mike Pompeo was in Saudi Arabia. And now we have the assassination of a very prominent Iranian nuclear scientist. So in these few months that Donald Trump has left, presumably, what are this group of allies actually trying to do? Well, I think two things we should register. This is not the first time Iranian nuclear scientists have been assassinated. This is in fact a set of series of assassinations which had stopped in the middle, but this is the latest in that sense. Of course, it is a combination of within Iran, certain groups who have been against the Iranian government who have carried out terrorist activities in different parts and Israeli intelligence agencies who have quite proudly taken credit for such assassinations in the past. And even this time, they seem to be tacitly accepting that they were behind the assassination. So that is one part of it. And I'll come to also this, what you talked about, Fakhrizada being identified by Netanyahu in 2018 when he talked about Iran's nuclear program. If you remember, he presented a bottle with the fuse in it, which actually was quite laughable in the sense that nothing was backed up in that statement that Iran is almost at the nuclear threshold. So all of this has been Israel's campaign to get the U.S. to act against Iran in one way or the other because Israel by itself cannot militarily attack Iran. It wants the United States to do so because the consequence of such an attack, if it is unilaterally done, would be quite significant for Israel as well. So that's why they need the United States to do so. So provocation of this kind, particularly when you have a lame duck President Trump, that I think is what we had discussed earlier as well. That the attempt by Israel and the Trump administration is to leave a scenario in West Asia by which the clock cannot be set back. That means you lock all the contestants in a place from which collision is inevitable and the return to a path of diplomacy, return to normal relationship that is there between states, even where they disagree. Because after all, agreement, disagreement are part of international process. So conflicts are contained by discussions, negotiations and contestation. That is the normal process of international relationship. But in this case, not to have anything but contestation and leaving out any negotiations, any process apart from hostilities. This is the Trump administration's gift to West Asia now, before it leaves. And Israel is very clearly wanting a war with Iran before Trump leaves, so that for the foreseeable future Netanyahu will be protected in Israel. He's under severe stress, corruption charges, various other problems that he has. And of course Israel being the major power in West Asia, slowly losing its total hegemony that it had militarily over the region. I think that is also something that Israel would like to postpone and therefore taking out Iran at this stage. I think the assassination is clearly an attempt to provoke Iran to respond in a manner by which then Trump and Netanyahu, Pompeo can all get together. To attack Iran. Two issues that are there is what is the two MBS MVZs going to do, the two crown princes. That it's also clear that there have been threats to both by Iran even earlier, saying that if the West wants to attack Iran, we have the ability to retaliate against you. Two of the Saudi oil installations were attacked by the Houthis. And it has been construed internationally as science that Iran can head back at Saudi Arabia, particularly its oil infrastructure. And apparently this is the Middle East eyes report. Apparently MVZ was warned by the Iranian administration that in case there is an attack on Iran, then they would retaliate against also UAE, particularly as UAE has normalized its relations with Israel. Officials are now there in Dubai. So all of this also means that if Israel can get both bin Salman and Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates on their side in a military attack against Iran, with of course the United States participation, that would leave Iran in a difficult position. So their response has been to want both United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia that whether we can attack Israel or not, you guys would be in our process in such an eventuality. I think this is the broad picture that we see. Absolutely. And it's interesting also because Iran has been taking extra efforts to ensure that there is no conflict in the time leading to the Trump administration's leaving. For instance, they've asked Iraqi militias also to make sure they step down. But I wanted to come to the point you mentioned earlier about the nuclear program of Iran. Now Netanyahu of course pointed out that like you said that it is just a matter of time before Iran had nuclear weapons all over. But the record actually shows that Iran has never, at least in the recent past, has not had any kind of military nuclear program. So could you talk a bit about that? You know, this is again one of those Israeli myths which have been propagated by almost all western news agencies. That Fakhrizadeh was the nuclear weapons program head. Now nuclear weapons program head is presumably because in the IIEA final assessment report which was submitted in 2003, they had talked about a set of activities that Iran had carried out which would give them nuclear weapons capability. Now what does it really mean? If you remember nuclear weapons capability is not a huge scientific issue. After all, this is something which the Manhattan Project showed took place almost 75 years back. So this took place 75 years back. Technologically something that could be achieved in the 40s is certainly with the reach of any scientific community today with a certain infrastructure background which of course Iran has. There's no question about that. What was discussed was did it have, and this is what the final assessment report which concluded that by 2003, and this is IIEA's official final assessment report on Iranian nuclear weapons program which they investigated, was that they had a set of activities before 2003 which had or was trying to look at weapons capability. That these were activities which could be then used if they wanted to develop weapons. So it was really about weapons capability rather than building a bomb. And that is the basic distinction we have to make that yes, Iran was looking at capabilities rather than a weapons program and they had admittedly there is nothing secret about it. They had the capability perhaps by 2003 if they wanted to build nuclear weapons to go ahead and do it. They took a decision not to do it and it is also behind the reason that why because of this decision that they wound down these programs completely. And they also then opened themselves to various inspections by IIEA including enhanced inspections with the stop only because of continued demand that they should submit to inspections complete open inspections of every facility in Iran without a reciprocal guarantee of lifting of the sanctions. Now they had the Iraq experience before that that IIEA inspectors which had American component in it had mapped out every bit of the infrastructure of Iraq and that was used later on the attack on Iran. So they were not going to ask Iranian they were not going to ask the IIEA inspectors which had Western agencies participating in it to open them open every door in Iran and let them see every bit of military facility that it had. And that was the basic bottleneck which came about but 2007-16 spy agencies in the United States had given a statement saying they do not see any remnant of a weapons program. And as I said, it was not a weapons program as much as a capabilities program. And therefore they did not perceive that Iran was continuing on that line at all. And this when finally the agreement when the Obama and under the Obama administration but the negotiations was finally done with Iran. Then the agreement said that Iran will give up 97% of its average uranium stock which they did. They also destroyed a very large part of their centrifuges or they activated them. They dismantled one of the nuclear reactors. So they have taken a significant steps in six months to implement all the demands that had been made. But what happened was of course that the United States did not reciprocate to the extent that it was supposed to be done and under Trump withdrew from the agreement. The sanctions still continue and they are global sanctions because other countries have not been able to withstand American sanctions or the threat of American sanctions on them if they trade with Iran. So effectively Iran got nothing out of the nuclear deal at least for the long run. Now what do they do? That's a different question. But the issue is did they have a nuclear weapons program before 2003? No, they seem to have nuclear capability program but not a weapons program. And did they assemble a nuclear weapons before 2003? No. Did they actually weaponize the capabilities? It seems no. This is the IAEA's assessment as well, not what I am saying. And post-2003 there is no significant development that can be attributed to the weapons program. When you talk about dual use technologies, the nature of dual use technology that what creates the ability to have a nuclear trigger is the same one that is actually used for creating industrial diamonds. So these are all dual use technologies of different kinds. And if you want a country to give up all dual use technology, you are really asking it to remain in the not exactly the stone age but at least in the iron age only. Now no country which wants to be an advanced economy can do that. And those are the kind of demands Israel would like to put on Iran. So that Iran effectively remains as a third rate economic power. And that's the demand which Iran is never going to accept. And therefore Israel's demand is really is to have a war with Iran. And I think the whole weapons program bits that Israel has built repeatedly, including the pictures Netanyahu showed in the United Nations platform. All of this point to the fact that this a vilification campaign backed up by various interested parties who have really tried to isolate Iran and see that the United States attacks Iran. And Trump seems to have been very much interested in it. He backed away from it time and again taking the final step probably under the military's advice that a war on Iran was not something which was desirable. And it's something after the Afghan war, after the Iraq war, that is not something which will help in the long run the US hegemony on the world. So Trump did not receive the support that he probably wanted to what to have a war on Iran. But he still has been actively considering according to press reports that whether a strike against Iran is possible against his nuclear reactors is possible. And of course, if the spin off would be it could spill into a war with Iran as well. So the lesser of the step has been assassination programs. We had Soleimani's assassination earlier. And now we have other assassination. All of this is to see if Iran can be goaded into action at the moment Iran is not responding in that way. But Iran believes in a that is institutional memory will belong. And it is not that it is not going to respond. But when and how it will respond is something it will see it will not respond in kind it will not do an assassination versus assassination. But it will take steps tomorrow to how to counter Israel in the region. And I think Iran's even earlier response to assassination of Soleimani was that their response would be drive United States out of Iran. That would be the response. What would be its response to Israel? We would have to see but respond they will military response. Most probably no. An assassination versus assassination. I don't think they're going to trend that far. So they're going to at least for next two and a half months till Biden comes like to see what would develop. And only when Biden takes charge and all attempts for restarting the Iran agreement fails. Then they will probably look at options before them. But I don't think they're going to respond in the next two and a half months unless they're completely forced into action by hostile acts like bombing their harbours bombing their nuclear facilities. In which case of course they would have to respond in some way. Thank you so much for talking to us. That's all your time for today. Keep watching.