In the article transmitted below, Said Arikat, Washington bureau chief of AL-QUDS, the leading Palestinian newspaper, and a persistent poser of relevant but unwelcome questions at U.S. State Department briefings, offers important historical background in support of the argument that I made in a recent article (https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/07/01/the-excuse-of-the-iranian-nuclear-threat) that the alleged "Iran nuclear threat" is the excuse, not the reason, for the Israeli (hence American) obsession with destroying Iran.
https://www.alquds.com/en/posts/236991
Twenty Years of Negotiations Prove the U.S. Used Iran’s Nuclear Issue Merely as a Pretext
By: Said Arikat
April 25, 2026
News Analysis
Washington, D.C- From the outset, one factor was consistently minimized in public discussion yet central in practice: sustained Israeli pressure on Washington to confront Iran militarily. Across Republican and Democratic administrations alike, successive Israeli governments (mainly Benjamin Netanyahu) lobbied the United States to tighten sanctions, sabotage diplomacy, preserve military options, and keep the threat of war alive, then wage war on Iran. Any honest review of the last twenty years must recognize that US-Iran nuclear diplomacy unfolded not in a vacuum, but under relentless Israeli influence designed to prevent any durable US-Iran rapprochement.
The reported hesitation surrounding new contacts in Islamabad only reinforces an older truth. The crisis over Iran’s nuclear program was never solely about centrifuges, enrichment levels, or safeguards inspections. Those issues were real, but they were often secondary to a broader geopolitical objective: containing Iran, preserving Israeli regional military supremacy, and maintaining US leverage in West Asia.
The modern dispute accelerated in 2002 when Iranian facilities at Natanz and Arak became public. What could have remained a technical matter under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty rapidly became an international confrontation. Iran maintained that its program was peaceful and lawful under treaty provisions guaranteeing access to civilian nuclear technology. The United States and European allies framed the issue as a strategic threat requiring exceptional restrictions.
Israel played a decisive role in shaping that perception. For years, Israeli officials publicly warned that Iran was nearing a weapons threshold, urged punitive action, and repeatedly signaled that if Washington would not act, Israel might. Those warnings helped create a permanent atmosphere of urgency in Western capitals, where diplomacy was tolerated only if backed by coercion.
The first major diplomatic phase, involving France, Germany, and the United Kingdom, led to the 2003 Saadabad Declaration. Iran voluntarily suspended enrichment and accepted expanded inspections through the Additional Protocol. These were substantial concessions intended to build trust and avert escalation.
Yet trust never materialized. Instead, temporary Iranian steps were treated as precedents for permanent limitations. Rather than normalization, Tehran encountered fresh demands. Israeli officials simultaneously dismissed compromise as deception and continued urging Washington not to ease pressure. The message was clear: concessions by Iran should produce more pressure, not reciprocity.
By 2005, the arrangement had broken down. Iran resumed parts of its program, arguing that restraint had yielded nothing. In 2006, the file was referred to the UN Security Council, and sanctions multiplied. Restrictions targeted banking, shipping, energy, arms transfers, and strategic industries. Parallel US sanctions intensified the economic siege.
Again, Israeli pressure was central. Israeli leaders repeatedly argued that sanctions must be crippling enough to destabilize Iran internally or force strategic surrender. When sanctions alone failed to achieve those goals, the call for military strikes routinely returned. In effect, diplomacy was boxed in from both sides: if talks advanced, critics sought to sabotage them; if talks stalled, they cited failure as proof war was necessary.
The 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) briefly interrupted that cycle. Iran accepted severe limits on enrichment, reduced stockpiles, redesigned facilities, and opened itself to intrusive monitoring. International inspectors repeatedly confirmed compliance.
Yet Israel fiercely opposed the agreement from the beginning. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu openly campaigned against it, directly challenged the sitting US administration, and argued that no deal with Iran should stand. That opposition was not marginal rhetoric; it was a sustained campaign aimed at ensuring the agreement remained politically vulnerable in Washington.
Even while the JCPOA formally existed, businesses feared future US penalties and political reversal. Then, in 2018, President Donald Trump withdrew from the agreement and reimposed sweeping sanctions despite verified Iranian compliance. The collapse vindicated those in Tehran who had warned that Washington could not be trusted to honor commitments.
Israel welcomed the withdrawal and pushed for the “maximum pressure” strategy that followed. Once again, the pattern was unmistakable: when diplomacy produced verifiable constraints, opponents of diplomacy worked to destroy it; when the agreement collapsed, Iran was blamed for the resulting escalation.
Subsequent efforts to revive talks faced the same structural obstacle. Iran wanted guarantees that any future US commitment would survive domestic political change. Washington said no administration could fully bind the next. Meanwhile, Israeli officials continued lobbying against meaningful concessions and keeping military threats in circulation.
This is why new rounds of talks, including any Islamabad track, remain fragile before they begin. The technical questions are difficult but manageable. The political architecture is the real problem. Negotiations cannot succeed when one side doubts enforcement, the other insists on reversible promises, and a powerful regional ally continually pressures for confrontation over compromise.
Over twenty years, the nuclear issue frequently functioned less as a genuine nonproliferation file than as a vehicle for strategic pressure. Iran’s program became the language through which larger aims were pursued: weakening Tehran, limiting its regional role, and preventing normalization between Iran and the West.
The lesson is plain. If diplomacy is repeatedly subordinated to coercion, it ceases to be diplomacy. If agreements are honored only until domestic politics change, they cease to be agreements. And if Israeli pressure for war continues to shape US policy more than negotiated outcomes do, future talks will remain what many previous rounds became: delay, theater, and another missed chance to resolve a manufactured crisis.