Khamenei Considers a Fatwa Prohibiting Nuclear Weapons in Exchange for U.S. Sanctions Relief

Iran's Supreme Leader Khamenei mulls issuing a Fatwa against Iran's production of nuclear weapons in exchange for President Trump lessening U.S. sanctions. Matthew RJ Brodsky joins a panel on Al-Hurra to discuss why the Trump administration will not fall for this ploy, the way the Obama administration swallowed it hook, line, and sinker in order to sell the idea that Iran wasn't even interested in nuclear weapons.

As Brodsky wrote in 2015:

[A]nother key talking point the Obama administration relied on is an understanding that "the Leader's fatwa against the building or use of nuclear weapons could establish an excellent basis for discussions with the aim of agreement for greater IAEA access to Iran's nuclear program to assure the world about Iran's nuclear intentions and develop an arrangement regarding enrichment." This nuclear fatwa, however, is a canard and a hoax. It is "nothing more than a propaganda ruse on the part of the Iranian regime," according to many analysts including the Middle East Media Research Institute. Nevertheless, it has been frequently cited by the administration and repeated by Mr. Obama in his March 2015 annual statement to Iran marking the Persian new year. And the IAEA now has secret side deals with Iran for inspections with holes so big one could drive a rundown Iranian Saipa through.

To top it all off, The Iran Project policy plan also called for "mutual recognition that both leaders of the U.S. and Iran have stated publicly their desire for a world without nuclear weapons." That was designed to send a shot over Israel's bow--an assumed nuclear weapons program that sparked no regional nuclear arms race such as Iran's today. True to form, with the July nuclear deal sealed and in the rearview mirror, Mohammad Zarif penned an article in The Guardian, "Iran has signed a historic nuclear deal--now it's Israel's turn."