 Hello, and welcome to NewsClick. On April 30th, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unveiled a dramatic presentation claiming that Iran had lied about the nuclear deal and its nuclear program. However, the evidence for it has not been very impressive, to say the least. To talk more on this issue, we have with us Prabir Purghoyasta, editor-in-chief of NewsClick. Hello, Prabir. So, could you start with maybe a context of Netanyahu's revelations and a brief history of what has happened, as well as what is really the hub and the nub of this revelation? You know, before getting into the revelations themselves or if there are indeed revelations, I think the context is very important. Israel from the beginning has argued that Iran deal was bad, it should not have been entered into, and Iran in fact should be attacked and all its basic shall we say military assets taken out. Though they haven't said it in so many words, this has been the underlying context or the underlying message that Netanyahu and the Israeli security establishment has been saying publicly for a long time. It's also known that the Israeli security establishment, particularly the military chiefs have not been very keen on a military attack on Iran, because they think the consequences will be much more. Given the fact that there is also the Lebanon issue, that they have not therefore been very keen to get into a fresh war in, shall we say, West Asia. But nevertheless, Netanyahu and a whole bunch of people around him, as well as a section of the United States have always been wanting to have U.S. take out Iran. And one could argue that Iraq on Saddam Hussein's government being taken out was really a part of ensuring Israel's protection that they should have no military, shall we say, opponent in the regime, in the region. And therefore, taking out Iraq was really a part of that, and taking out Iran now becomes more and more important, because it's obviously an important player in the region. Let's look at the claims that have been made time and again. As we know earlier itself, there were these claims made by Israel. And again it was Netanyahu who in the United Nations unveiled this famous power point of a bottle with the fuse, which had some lines on it. And this was supposedly a proof that Iran was making nuclear weapons by concentrating fissile material. Now, it's true the centrifuges can be used to concentrate fissile material to weapons grade, but it is also true that the centrifuges are allowed under the basically the NPT to which Iran is a signatory and Israel is not. It allows centrifuges for civilian nuclear reactors. So therefore, centrifuges by themselves do not constitute any violation, which is what Netanyahu was trying to claim. Enough evidence has been given to the United States government by security agencies that Iran did not have a nuclear bomb program at least after 2003, if it ever did have any. Therefore, what we see is a second attempt to manufacture evidence. The first attempt was again claimed to be by an unnamed power, which gave documents to the IAEA. And this was supposedly again by various public leagues now, was supposedly a dossier prepared by Israel planted through MEK, which as you know has been a party in Iran, which has been declared earlier as a terrorist organization lately taken up the terrorist list by the United States. So, this was the organization which Israel had apparently had used to claim that they had got the material from MEK as an Iranian entity and then given it to the Security Council. This thousand documents that they claim to have found in a warehouse, which the apparently carted possibly in a truck to Israel, which could be unveiled by Netanyahu, sounds completely outlandish film script, it does not seem to have any basis to it. Even if we take for granted that before 2015 agreement Iran had all these plans, it does not mean anything because all these documents are supposed to be pre-2015. So, the whole argument that Iran should be the Iran agreement should be abandoned does not really is not strengthened by this, but I think the more important part of it is really Netanyahu using fabricated evidence from all accounts once again, which do not bear out what he is saying, does not show what he claims to be showing and certainly does not indicate any bad faith on Iran's part. So, the other key point of this issue is the timing as well because over the past couple of months Donald Trump has been making a lot of noises over the deal and in a few weeks there is also a key point of the deal is going to come up. So, what is likely to be the strategy of the United States and Israel regarding the region as a whole especially using this deal? Well, as you have seen some of the cartoons which have appeared that Netanyahu was not doing it for the world leaders. Most of the global press as well as the world leaders seem to have taken the stand that they are not too impressed by this dossier that this is another of the doji dossiers which are prepared in order to precipitate a new invasion or a new war in the East Asia. In this particular case this seems to be a salvo designed essentially for Trump's benefit so that he can respond to this by say ok now that we have this new evidence I am pulling out of the treaty. So, more as a public relations exercise in United States it is also interesting he gave this presentation in Fox and Friends now as you know Fox and Friends is the probably the channel most watched by Donald Trump when he makes his foreign policy or domestic policy pronouncements that is at least the what the rumors around the White House seem to say. So, the fact that he would it is really targeted for one individual can also be seen by the preparatory work that seems to have gone into this we had various senior officials flying back and forth between the United States and Israel to prepare this stage. So, it does seem that this was actually a prepared shall we say curated event and the target is around middle of May when Donald Trump has to either certify or pull out of the agreement. Last time what he did was he said I am not certifying it I am letting the congress decide what it wants to do this time he may actually say I am pulling out of the agreement. Now, what does pulling out of the agreement really mean now one part of it is this was not an agreement between only Iran and United States Israel was not even a player in this it was really between a number of powers which include France UK it also includes Russia. So, there are number of other powers involved in it. So, if US pulls out then it can start leaving sanctions by itself on Iran which is not the problem it can then pull out of all the obligations it had and some of this obligations were trade obligations as well as monetary obligations in terms of what it will not do with Iran's money in different places. The last part of it is that will it also go to the extent of imposing sanctions if countries like Germany France refuse to accept and do not pull out of the agreement or say they will not follow United States in imposing sanctions. Then the issue that will come up is the US can impose unilateral sanctions on the banks that deal with Iran and because most of the international deals today are done to the swift system and the swift system has one of its hub in the United States therefore the United States claims that it has the legal authority to sanction any bank which participates in the swift system and transaction that takes place in foreign exchange do take place to the swift system. So, therefore, it opens foreign banks also to sanctions partly or mainly because the swift system hub is in the United States and this sanctioning that United States threatens has also been used for instance against India when we are buying Iranian oil the financial entities the banks in India were threatened with sanctions with the United States. So, either you give that up or you give up trading with the United States using these banks become then the issue and are the banks willing to take that risk. So, yes it does open up a whole bunch of issues if the United States breaks from the agreement the Jacoba as it is called and then imposes new sanctions in Iran and then insists on other parties also to impose sanctions what will Iran's response be Iran's response may well be that even if the United States impose starts or let me rephrase that even if the United States withdraws from the agreement they will not withdraw from the agreement that could be Iranian position because it can say that well we really did not want to make the nuclear bomb that was our position from the beginning. So, breaking US breaking from the agreement does not mean we have necessarily to break from the agreement as long as other parties continue we will continue with our commitments that is one position Iran could take or it take out the other position we will continue with it, but we have no obligation to continue right. The third key question here is of Syria also because couple of days before the this dramatic press conference Israeli jets had also believed to have attacked a base in Syria which is likely also to have had Iranian observers and even last month the T4 base was similarly attacked. So, is this also part of a larger pressure tactic on Iran and Syria by these two countries? I think it is a little more than that what Israel wants is to for Iran to respond and therefore what it is doing is it is systematically trying to create incidents which make it makes it more and more for Iran to not respond. So, I think what you should see is in this process is that all of these incidents are incidents in which Iranian soldiers are being targeted they are being killed. So, how long can Iran not respond to it is the really the key issue. So, there these are to be military provocations designed for an Iranian response at the moment Iranians have not responded to it Iranians have also had a long history of playing the diplomatic cards on a long term basis not on a short term basis. One must not forget there is a whole history of a Persian civilization in which they do not do things immediately urgently right now that is on the way Iranians have moved on diplomacy they played really a much longer game. So, I think they will be willing to take some punishment right now and not respond to the provocations at least directly and wait to see how this whole issue develops internationally. So, not to give any cards to Israel further let us not also forget one of the reasons Netanyahu is doing this is Trump is a Iranian agreement etcetera etcetera. The other issue is domestic he is under serious threat of having cases against him there are investigations going on all reports indicate that those investigations will lead to finally his being put on the docks. And of course, a war is something any leader thinks is very good to distract attention from his state or his solid state of affairs shall be said. So, I think that is also the other reason why Netanyahu is on this dangerous path of trying to create a military situation in West Asia which might lead to a new war in the region and the only person the only shall be say section of the people who might benefit from such a war is a small section around Netanyahu and of course, himself and of course, the military industrial complex which would be able to sell a lot of weapons to it and the cost of destroying again another country the region and possibly if it becomes even bigger than that a threat to all that we know. Thank you very much for being that is all we have time for today. Thank you for watching us.