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Ebrahim Raisis election as president of Iran came as no surprise. All those who might have been a threat to him were disqualified. He was the choice of the supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, and small wonder: Few people better embody the ideology of the Islamic Republic. He will not open Iran up to the outside world, and will certainly not look to accommodate the United States in any way. As for Irans behavior in the Middle East, he has made clear that it is not negotiable.

The Israel-Hamas conflict last month was a reminder that nearly everything in the Middle East is connectedand whether were talking about Hamas rockets, the ongoing calamity in Yemen, or the Iran nuclear deal, Tehrans destabilizing role in the region is the common factor.

We understand why President Joe Biden seeks a return to the deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA. The United States must roll back Irans nuclear program and then use the time left before the agreements sunset provisions lapse to either produce the longer and stronger deal the Biden administration seeks, or enhance our deterrence so Tehran understands that the U.S. will prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear-threshold state.

However, although we are convinced of the value of containing Irans nuclear program, that is not enough. The administration will also need to counter what will almost certainly be Irans escalating efforts in the region: With the sanctions relief that will result from returning to compliance with the JCPOA, Tehrans troublemaking resources will increase. Donald Trumps maximum pressure campaign limited the resources Iran could make available for militant groups such as Lebanons Hezbollah, Shiite militias in Iraq, and the Palestinian outfits Hamas and Islamic Jihad, but it never stopped Irans ongoing provision of training, weaponry, and other material and technical assistance.

Karim Sadjadpour: Iran stops pretending

After the recent conflict with Israel, Hamas leaders effusively praised Tehran for what it had provided them. And we know from leaked audio that Irans own Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif was frustrated by the Iranian regimes elite Quds Force consistently undercutting what he hoped to achieve with diplomacy. Moreover, Khamenei will want to show that the return to the JCPOA does not mean he is giving up his resistance ideology, so we can expect more Iranian expansion in Yemen, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon, as well as threats to neighboring states.

This fear of Irans regional agenda explains much of the opposition to the JCPOA, both when it was agreed and through to the present day. Many in the U.S. Congress as well as leaders of Middle East states worried thenas they do nowthat the administration and its European partners will wrongly see the Iran file as closed because they see the threat Iran poses too narrowly, and in only nuclear terms. Critics in the region, however, see the past as prologue: Just as Iran became much more active and aggressive in the Middle East after the JCPOA was agreed upon, so now do they expect threatening acts if and when the U.S. and Iran come back into compliance. Fairly or not, much of the region remains convinced that the Obama administration ignored Irans aggression out of a concern for jeopardizing the deals implementation.

The regional perspective on Iran is driven by these leaders experience with the Islamic Republic. For them, the core question with Iran, as Henry Kissinger once put it, is whether it is a country or a cause. The case for the latter is strong and deeply rooted: Revolutionary Iran uses Islamic, Shiite, and anti-colonialist rhetoric to justify an expansionist nationalistic agenda. Soon after the Iranian revolution, the execution of thousands of real or imagined regime opponents, support for terrorist groups throughout the region, unrelenting threats to Israels existence, the dangerous counteroffensive into Iraq in the 1980s, the assault on the U.S. in Lebanon in 1983, and the tanker war with America all made clear Irans nature and threat.

When, by 2005, Irans development of a nuclear-weapons program became apparent, it was first seen as yet another, if particularly dangerous, tool in Irans box of power politics. Thus, the Bush and Obama administrations declared that the U.S. would use force to stop Iran from developing a weapona threat not levied against South Africa, Libya, India, or Pakistan, each of which at various points had developed some nuclear capacity. Seen by the West as a dangerous cause, Iran was treated as an inherent aggressor.

The Obama administration understandably worried that if the Iranian nuclear program could not be stopped diplomatically, it would trigger a wider conflict, either because Israel, feeling existentially threatened, or the U.S., knowing the danger of a nuclear arms race in the Middle East, would act. Pursuing diplomacy as the means to alter Irans behavior was for many reasons not just the logical but also the politically necessary path to follow. Inevitably, it implied that Iran was now not a cause but a country, whose nuclear ambitions, and perhaps, by extension, regional threat, could be tamed by traditional carrot-and-stick diplomacy.

Tom Nichols: Irans smart strategy

Some in the Obama administration came to believe that the JCPOA could signal a diplomatic regime change: By witnessing Western respect and trust, Iran would embrace the globalized made-in-America world.

If that was the bet, it didnt pay off. From 2013, when serious negotiations with the Iranian government began, until 2018, when Trump pulled out of the deal, Iran did not moderate its behavior. Instead, it accelerated its regional aggression, exploiting the instability caused by the Arab Spring as well as the rise of the Islamic State to expand its power. For many in the region, the lesson was obvious: There is no way to build trust with Iran, because Iran has an agenda to dominate the Middle East.

Regardless of how Israelis, Saudis, Emiratis, and others saw the Obama administration, Bidens approach toward Iran is clearly different from what they perceived Obamas to be. Note, for example, the following signs that the Biden team wont be passive in the face of direct or indirect threats from Iran: air strikes on both sides of the Iraq-Syria border in response to Iranian-backed Shiite militia rocket and drone attacks against Iraqi bases where U.S. forces are deployed; naval interdiction of dhows carrying Iranian weapons to Yemen; despite pressure, the stalwart support for Israels right to self-defense against Hamas rockets. At the same time, American officials are making commitments in private conversations with our allies in the region to not allow the nuclear file to change what the U.S. tolerates when it comes to Iran in the Middle East.

The challenge will be to follow up on these early moves and show, once the JCPOA is restoredwhich we both believe will happen sometime this yearthat the administration will work with our partners and contest the Iranians as they directly and via proxies expand and threaten others. The irony is that for diplomacy to work, whether on the nuclear question or on other regional issues, Tehran must know that there is muscle behind it. Absent pressure, there would have been no JCPOA, and if we want to deter Irans egregious actions, we must be able to show its leaders that they will pay a price.

As Israel is now in the U.S. Central Commands area of responsibility, along with the rest of the Middle East, the Biden administration should bring it together with our Arab partners to develop options and conduct contingency planning for dealing with Shiite-militia threats. The administration must also encourage the Gulf states to better support the Iraqi government; to use our collective assets to do more to suppress Irans ability to export weapons to its clients; and to support continuing Israeli strikes against Iranian efforts to build its military infrastructure and develop precision-guidance capabilities for Syrian and Hezbollah missiles.

During the Trump administration, Washington used differing means across the Middle Easts various countries but on the whole applied military, economic, and diplomatic pressure to impede Irans advance. Its actions were supported by a regional coalition that eventually coalesced into the Abraham Accords. Building on those agreements makes sense not only in terms of using Arab outreach to Israel in order to elicit Israeli moves toward peace with the Palestinians, but also in terms of strengthening the coalition that is arrayed against Iran.

Jeffrey Goldberg: Iran and the Palestinians lose out in the Abraham Accords

To succeed, the Biden administration will need to work with Arab, Israeli, and Turkish partners on Iranian regional issues, and maintain pressure on both Tehran and those governments tempted to yield to Iran. Such an approach does not preclude diplomacy; quite the contrary, it could promote it. Indeed, managed the right way, we may build Irans interest in a dialogue.

Ultimately, if regional discussions with Tehran are to have any chance of reducing tensions and minimizing the potential for conflict and escalation, they must generate the kind of pushback from the region that gives Iran a reason to temper its behavior.

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The Iran Nuclear Deal Isnt the Problem. Iran Is. - The Atlantic

A natural gas flare on an oil well pad burns as the sun sets outside Watford City, North Dakota January 21, 2016. REUTERS/Andrew Cullen

June 30 (Reuters) - Who of the traditional bulls predicted a rally that saw oil prices doubling in the last eight months? The short answer is no one.

Of more than 50 analysts polled by Reuters last October when Brent was hovering near $35 per barrel amid a second large wave of global lockdowns to slow the coronavirus pandemic, almost none dared to predict prices would approach $60.

U.S. bank Goldman Sachs saw second-quarter average prices hitting $57.50 a barrel and much smaller Houston-based consultancy Stratas Advisors had the boldest bet at $60.

As prices have exceeded $75 per barrel this June, the most accurate forecasters predict a further rally fuelled by recovering demand and tight OPEC supply albeit at a more modest pace.

Overall, the 44 analysts polled by Reuters this month forecast benchmark Brent prices to average about $67.48 a barrel this year, up from the $64.79 consensus in May.

Oil demand was seen growing by 5-7 million barrels per day (bpd) this year.

"The upward range of oil will be limited by the ability of OPEC to bring back supply to address unexpected upward movements in demand and prices," John Paisie, Stratas Advisors president, told Reuters.

Paisie predicts Brent will average around $75 a barrel in the third quarter and $78.50 in 2022, adding: "One reason that we think that increase in oil prices will be more moderate is the strength of the U.S. dollar."

A firmer greenback makes oil priced in dollars more expensive in other currencies, potentially weighing on demand.

Goldman Sachs was more bullish, seeing Brent averaging $80 a barrel in the third quarter "with potential spikes well above", with the global market facing "its deepest deficits since last summer." read more

Most analysts expect the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies, or OPEC+, to gradually unwind record output cuts this year, with discussions over easing likely to start in August. read more

Oil's rally could also face headwinds from a potential U.S-Iran deal that could boost global supplies and a spike in COVID-19 cases, which could undermine demand recovery, participants said.

Analysts saw Iran potentially adding about 1-2 million bpd of output into the global market over the next six months or so.

"The main question is whether Saudi Arabia and other Gulf producers are ready to accommodate Iranian volumes while maintaining a tight control on their cumulative supply under the OPEC+ deal," said Intesa Sanpaolo analyst Daniela Corsini.

Reporting by Nakul Iyer in Bengaluru; Editing by Arpan Varghese, Noah Browning and Louise Heavens

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Oil to sustain surprise rally despite Iran, third COVID-19 wave threat: Reuters poll - Reuters

They say time changes things, but actually you have to change them yourself, said Andy Warhol.

The pop artists famous paintings of Campbells soup cans and Coca-Cola bottles were actually criticized for their celebration of conformity, but his insight about change, whether cultural, social or political, sure was right: It never comes by itself.

That certainly goes for revolutionary Iran, where everyone except its oligarchy has been awaiting change for the past 42 years in vain.

Now, as its seventh president prepares to succeed the sixth, the questions are what Iranian voters just said, where their country is headed, and what the Jewish state should do. And the answers are that the people are bitter, their country is in the doldrums, and Israel should let it change by itself.

Yes, non-Islamist candidates could never even dream of being allowed to run, nor could anyone otherwise disagreeable to the regime, and also the entire female population.

Even so, the regime used to try to create an impression of democracy by choreographing presidential contests between hardliners and pragmatists. That is how Mohammad Khatami became president back in 1997, while advocating free speech, market reforms and a cultural thaw with the West.

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That gospel was crushed in 2009, when the regime robbed reformist candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi of his electoral victory and placed him under house arrest, where he continues to languish.

Still, the democratic masquerade continued. When Hassan Rouhani ran in 2013, he faced seven opponents, including a former commander of the Revolutionary Guards and a former commander of the air force.

Now even that veneer was shed. The clerics had one candidate and pushed aside anyone who might threaten his victory, even the notorious Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, for whom they stole the 2009 election.

RAISI IS no version of Hassan Rouhani or Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, who earned academic degrees in Britain and the US, or of Mohammad Khatami, who lived in Germany and speaks four languages. Raisi, by contrast, is not known to have even finished high school.

What is not unknown is Raisis record as a prosecutor, which is harrowing. As a member of the forum that in 1988 sent to the gallows an estimated 5,000 untried prisoners, he is a slaughterer of his own people. (See Amnesty International, Blood-soaked secrets: Why Irans 1988 Prison Massacres are Ongoing Crimes Against Humanity, 2018.)

A regime that imposes on the citizens a man who mass-murdered innocent citizens says it is scared. And the regime is scared with good reason.

With the population more than double its size when the Islamists took over; with industry held hostage by the Revolutionary Guards, whose chieftains win tenders unfairly and then prize cronies and sideline professionals; with negligent planning resulting in dried lakes, rivers and faucets; and with the government fearful of corporate freedom and monetary discipline, the steadily shrinking economy is an inversion of the shahs era, when jobs were abundant and annual growth rates exceeded 10%.

On the eve of the coronavirus pandemic, unemployment in greater Tehran reportedly reached 41%. In some regions, youth joblessness has been higher than 60%, and university-educated womens unemployment exceeded 80%. The dollar, which in Khatamis time cost less than 9,000 rials, now costs more than 230,000.

The pandemic further debilitated the country, having plagued according to statistical Website Worldometer at least 3.11 million and killed at least 83,000.

Is it any wonder, then, that more than half the public didnt bother voting? Life stinks, they effectively said, and the unelected clerics who run the show now want to hand the wheel over to the murderer of our kith and kin. How much lower can we sink?

That, in brief, is where Irans political degeneration has arrived. Now, as its most violent leader since Ayatollah Khomeini approaches its helm, some might feel circumstances demand an extravagant Israeli attack on Iran. Nothing could be more wrong.

THE IRANIAN peoples abuse can only last so long. Ultimately, the people will respond.

Waiting for that days arrival demands much patience and poise, but that is what we must muster. Millions throughout Iran know the truth. They know Israel has never been their enemy and has taken nothing from them. Many of them also know that the Jewish nation actually recalls fondly the Persian Empire that restored Jerusalems leveled temple and returned the Land of Israel to the Jews.

Millions of Iranians also know that until the Islamist takeover, Israeli-Iranian trade was brisk, and that it will resume in earnest the day the fundamentalists will be removed.

And yes, Israelis know Irans nuclear program is intolerable and that sabotaging it is imperative. Even so, this should be done in a way that will not make average Iranians feel that Israel humiliated them.

Israel should initiate and also preempt, but only tactically; derail whatever it is the mullahs are plotting about us, bomb their Syrian outposts, sting their nuclear operation, but avoid the grand attack.

That attack should come not from without, but from within, and not from the air, but from below, and it should be waged not by foreigners, but by the great Persian people whom the ayatollahs have so thoroughly disempowered, dispossessed and dishonored, and now so justly fear.

Amotz Asa-Els bestselling Mitzad Haivelet Hayehudi (The Jewish March of Folly, Yediot Sefarim, 2019) is a revisionist history of the Jewish peoples leadership from antiquity to modernity.

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Israeli attacks must not humiliate Iranian people ...

Irans newly chosen president, in his first news conference, on Monday rejected the United States push for a broader deal with the Islamic Republic that would restrict its ballistic missiles program and curb its regional military policies in addition to containing its nuclear program.

President-elect Ebrahim Raisi, a conservative cleric, said that Irans ballistic missiles and its regional policies were nonnegotiable and that he would not meet with President Biden. He called on the United States to comply with a 2015 accord in which Iran agreed to limit its nuclear program in return for the lifting of economic sanctions against it.

My serious recommendation to the U.S. government is to immediately return to their commitments, lift all the sanctions and show that they have good will, he said in a briefing with domestic and international reporters in Tehran.

Regional issues and missiles are not negotiable, he said, adding that the United States had not carried through on matters it had negotiated, agreed and committed to.

The comments appeared to signal a hardening of Iranian policies as the conservative faction takes control of all branches of the government: Parliament, the judiciary and soon, the presidency.

Mr. Raisi, who takes office in August, said his administrations policies would be revolutionary and anti-corruption.

While Iran has always insisted that its military capabilities are not up for discussion, the current president, Hassan Rouhani, who is considered moderate, has said he would be willing to meet anyone if it benefited his country. He also said broader negotiations with the United States could be possible under the umbrella of the nuclear deal once the Americans returned to the 2015 accord, which was abandoned in 2018 by President Donald J. Trump, who called it too weak. The Trump administration then imposed some 1,600 sanctions on Iran.

The United States and Iran are holding talks through intermediaries in Vienna about reviving that 2015 agreement. American and Iranian officials familiar with the talks said that an agreement had been drafted and that a deal could be possible in the six weeks that remain before Mr. Raisi takes office.

Mr. Raisis government would benefit from an economic boost if it begins its term with sanctions eased by a renewed deal, as well as access to billions of dollars of frozen funds. Improving the economy and peoples livelihoods was one of Mr. Raisis main campaign pledges.

Mr. Biden has promised to seek a return to the deal, which would remove key sanctions, including those dealing with oil, banking transfers, shipping and insurance, though penalties on conglomerates, charities and individuals accused of human rights violations would remain.

Mr. Raisis pledge to refuse to negotiate on missile and militia issues, which fell outside the 2015 nuclear agreement, was not a surprise, analysts said. It echoed positions he took as a candidate and was in keeping with the views of the countrys supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, a hard-liner who sets Irans key policies.

It was quite expected he knows more about what he is not going to do than what he is going to do in terms of any specific plans in foreign policy, said Hamidreza Azizi, a visiting fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs in Berlin. He was just repeating the general positions of the Islamic Republic.

On whether he would meet Mr. Biden, the Iranian president-elect had a one-word answer: No.

Mr. Azizi attributed the striking firmness with which Mr. Raisi rejected the possibility of such a meeting to his lack of a background in diplomacy.

Mr. Raisi, who has been the head of the judiciary for the past 18 months, has no experience in politics or governing. He has spent his career in the legal system as a prosecutor, a judge and the head of the judiciary, with a brief stint as the leader of a powerful and wealthy religious conglomerate.

The tone was not diplomatic, and this is something we are going to see more during his presidency because he has no experience in diplomacy, Mr. Azizi said.

Talal Atrissi, a sociologist at the Lebanese University in Beirut who studies Iran and its regional allies, said Mr. Raisis victory was a blow to reformists and would strengthen Irans ties with its regional militia allies, known as the axis of resistance. These include Hezbollah in Lebanon, various militias in Syria and Iraq, and the Houthi rebels in Yemen, who receive support from Iran and share its anti-Israeli and anti-American stances.

Raisi will stay committed to the axis of resistance, Mr. Atrissi said.

On Monday, Mr. Raisi also declared that Mr. Trumps so-called maximum pressure campaign against Iran had failed.

The president-elect did say that a negotiating team would continue indirect talks in Vienna until his administration took its place. Mr. Raisi said that he supported discussions that secured Irans national interests, but that we will not allow talks for the sake of talks.

He addressed accusations by international rights groups that he has had a dismal record of human rights violations during his time with the judiciary, including involvement in the mass execution of opponents of the government in 1988. That record has brought him sanctions from the United States.

Mr. Raisi said those who are accusing him must answer for their own violations of human rights and called himself a defender of human rights and of peoples security and comfort.

Narges Mohammadi, a prominent human rights activist who was sentenced to 16 years in prison for her campaign to abolish Irans death penalty, reacted to Mr. Raisis comments on her Instagram page. I cannot accept Mr. Raisis presidency as one of the most serious violators of human rights in 42 years, she said,

Mr. Raisi said that he would prioritize improving relations with neighboring countries, and that Iran was willing to restore diplomatic ties with Saudi Arabia, which collapsed in 2016 after Iranians protesting the kingdoms execution of a prominent Shiite cleric stormed Saudi diplomatic missions in Iran. Iran and Saudi Arabia have been quietly negotiating to restore diplomatic relations.

Mr. Raisi will preside over a government that was elected with a minority of votes in an election process largely viewed as engineered to ensure his win, and over a restive and frustrated population that is seen as capable of exploding into street unrest with the smallest trigger.

Opposition to the result of local City Council election results led to clashes in several provinces on Sunday and Monday. In the city of Yasouj, security forces on motorbikes and on foot beat the crowds with batons and fired gunshots, videos posted on social media showed. In the city of Karoun, protesters gathered outside government buildings shouting that the vote counts were rigged.

Political figures from a reformist faction that is regrouping pointed to the low voter turnout as indicative of Iranians discontent. Former President Mohammad Khatami issued a statement saying he bows his head to all those who did not vote.

The unprecedented lack of voter participation above 50 percent is a sign of people being disillusioned and hopeless, he said. The gap between the people and the governing system should serve as a dangerous warning call to all.

Hwaida Saad contributed reporting.

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Irans Incoming President Vows Tough Line on Missiles and Militias - The New York Times

Saudi foreign minister says he was very concerned about unanswered questions on Irans nuclear programme.

Saudi Arabia will judge Iranian President-elect Ebrahim Raisis government by the reality on the ground, the kingdoms foreign minister has said, adding that Irans Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has the final say on foreign policy.

Raisi, a hardline judge who secured an expected election victory on Saturday, said on Monday he wanted to improve ties with Gulf Arab neighbours while calling on regional rival Saudi Arabia to immediately halt its intervention in Yemen.

After six years of war, a military coalition led by Riyadh has failed to defeat the Houthi movement in Yemen. Tens of thousands have been killed in the war, which has caused what the UN has described as the worlds worst humanitarian crisis.

Saudi Arabia also opposes the Iran nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), that Tehran and Washington are trying to revive in indirect talks.

The accord between Iran and world powers, which lifted sanctions on Tehran in return for curbs on its nuclear programme, has been in tatters since the US unilaterally withdrew in 2018 under former President Donald Trump. Since the US pulled out and reimposed harsh sanctions, Iran has gradually lessened its own compliance with the deal.

From our perspective, foreign policy in Iran is in any case run by the supreme leader and therefore we base our interactions and our approach to Iran on the reality on the ground, and that is what we will judge the new government on, regardless of who is in charge, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud told a news conference in Vienna on Tuesday.

He said he was very concerned about unanswered questions on Irans nuclear programme, an apparent reference to the UN nuclear watchdog seeking explanations on the origin of uranium particles found at undeclared sites in Iran.

The current agreement between Iran and the UNs International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is set to expire on June 24.

A new interim agreement under which the IAEA is allowed access to Iranian nuclear sites has yet to be announced.

I think its important that even though the JCPOA [Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action] discussions are ongoing, that these outstanding issues be addressed and be addressed seriously and that we hold Iran accountable for its activities, and hold it to its commitments under the non-proliferation treaty and its commitments to the IAEA, Prince Faisal said.

Saudi Arabia and Gulf allies continue to pressure Iran over its nuclear programme, which Tehran says is entirely peaceful, and its ballistic missile programme. US intelligence agencies and the IAEA believe Iran had a secret, coordinated nuclear weapons programme that it halted in 2003.

In a bid to contain tensions between them, Saudi Arabia and Iran began direct talks in April in the Iraqi capital Baghdad to address several points of contention.

Ties between Iran and Saudi Arabia were cut in 2016 after Iranian protesters attacked Saudi diplomatic missions following the kingdoms execution of a revered Muslim Shia scholar.

The Saudi embassy in Iran shut down in 2016 as relations deteriorated.

Raisi said on Monday that Iran would have no problem with a possible reopening of the Saudi embassy in Tehran and that the restoration of relations faces no barrier.

There are no obstacles from Irans side to re-opening embassies there are no obstacles to ties with Saudi Arabia, he said.

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Saudi Arabia to judge Irans Raisi by reality on the ground - Al Jazeera English