 So, something really alarming and nefarious is going on, and what we're seeing is this active effort to undermine diplomacy between Iran and the United States, which is now possible because Joe Biden wants to re-enter the JCPOA, otherwise known as the Iran Nuclear Agreement, which is a peace deal. Because in this agreement, Iran agrees to not enrich uranium to a certain point, and in return, the United States will not do sanctions on them. That's basically an agreement that stops the United States from going to war with Iran. But Iran hawks, like Republicans and Israel, they don't like this agreement, and they lie about this agreement because they want regime change in Iran. So what we've seen is Donald Trump behind the scenes do everything in his power to undermine a future Biden administration from re-entering this agreement, and we even learned that Trump was reportedly talked out of bombing Iran recently, but now we are learning that a top Iranian scientist was inexplicably assassinated on Friday. And what we're seeing here should be alarming to everyone, but not many politicians are paying attention. Rokana has spoken up about this, and Bernie Sanders has also sounded the alarm, and I think that the alarm should be sounded because this is serious. So as Jake Johnson of Common Dreams reports, Senator Bernie Sanders warned over the weekend that the assassination of top Iranian nuclear scientist Mosin Faqrizadeh, widely believed to have been the work of Israel, was carried out with the intention of undermining any prospect of diplomacy between the United States and Iran just weeks before President-elect Joe Biden is set to take office. The assassination of Mosin Faqrizadeh was reckless, provocative, and illegal, Sanders tweeted Saturday. As a new administration takes power, it was clearly intended to undermine U.S. Iran diplomacy. We must not allow that to happen. Democracy not murder is the best path forward. Sanders tweet came days after Faqrizadeh was fatally wounded Friday in what was described as an ambush as the scientists traveled by car near Tehran. While specific details surrounding the assassination continue to emerge, Iranian and U.S. officials have both said Israel, led by right-wing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, was responsible. It remains unclear what, if any, role the Trump administration played in the killing, which took place less than a week after Netanyahu, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman reportedly discussed Iran during a secret meeting that prompted fears of a coordinated attack. The Vermont senator's view that the assassination of Faqrizadeh was aimed at forestalling the possibility of diplomacy between the United States and Iran was echoed by other lawmakers, activists, and analysts who pointed to Biden's vow to return the U.S. to the Iran nuclear accord that President Donald Trump violated in 2018. Netanyahu has publicly urged Biden against reviving the 2015 agreement. Trita Parzi, executive president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, argued Friday that the assassination and other likely future attacks will likely harden Iran's position and complicate if not ultimately cripple the Biden team's attempts to revive diplomacy. If Israel was behind the assassination of Faqrizadeh, which seems highly likely, though not yet proven, it demonstrates the degree to which Netanyahu feels emboldened to undermine Democratic U.S. presidents with impunity and drag the United States into war, road Parzi. This will not change unless and until Washington decides to end its drive for military hegemony in the Middle East. So there's a lot to unpack here with regard to this story. But before we get to that, I want to show you this story from the Hill, which explains how the Israeli military was reportedly instructed to prepare for a Trump strike on Iran. Now, I don't know if they were actually literally instructed to prepare for a Trump strike on Iran. It could be real since he was already considering it. Or it could be fake news, for lack of a better word. It could be just Israel posturing in order to scare Iran and go them into escalating in order to basically give Trump a reason to strike if Iran believes this and acts out. I mean, the situation here is just it's really depressing, right? Because it seemed very unlikely that Iran would even be willing to come to the table. But once Biden was declared the winner of the election, well, the president of Iran, Hassan Rouhani, who is more moderate, basically called on Iran to reenter the Iran nuclear agreement, something that seemed unlikely. Because I mean, think of it from Iran's perspective, take yourself out of, you know, this American centric perspective of foreign policy. Like if someone withdrew on a deal that you signed with them, that was really difficult to negotiate when you gave up quite a bit. Wouldn't you not want to reenter a negotiation with someone who is very obviously a bad faith negotiator? But Iran proved that they're more reasonable than us, at least in this instance, and decided, hey, let's get back into this agreement, because I think that they know it's mutually beneficial. It stops the United States from invading them. And they also don't get the sanctions imposed on them. But by basically doing all of this, it's going to be a tougher sell for Hassan Rouhani to even come to the table because there's going to be hardliners, the Ayatollah and individuals in Iran who aren't going to want to reengage with the United States. So all of this, I don't know who's doing it. It's an active effort to undermine diplomacy between the United States and Iran, which is more likely with Biden as president. And it's disgusting. Mike Fettuccine needs your support on Patreon. What a loser. Visit patreon.com slash humanist report to support the low ratings humanist report. Sad. My views are much higher.