{"id":67284,"date":"2021-04-27T16:14:48","date_gmt":"2021-04-27T21:14:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=67284"},"modified":"2021-04-27T16:14:48","modified_gmt":"2021-04-27T21:14:48","slug":"67284","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=67284","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/media.townhall.com\/Townhall\/Car\/b\/afb042721dAPR20210427054505.jpg\" alt=\"Political Cartoons by AF Branco\" \/><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nationalreview.com\/the-morning-jolt\/kerrys-denial-on-leaking-to-iran-doesnt-add-up\/\">Kerry\u2019s Denial on Leaking to Iran Doesn\u2019t Add Up<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"nr-heading\"><strong>\u2018The Kerry\u2013Zarif Special Relationship\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>For what it\u2019s worth, former secretary of state John Kerry\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/JohnKerry\/status\/1386822566539632643\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">denied late yesterday<\/a>\u00a0that he had informed Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif about 200 Israeli attacks on Iranian targets in Syria. \u201cI can tell you that this story and these allegations are unequivocally false. This never happened \u2014 either when I was Secretary of State or since.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--center ad-unit--inline\">\n<div class=\"ad-unit__inner\">\n<p>Some of the usual suspects on Twitter, eager to defend Kerry, made an implausible claim that those Israeli attacks were public knowledge at the time, and asked, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/AlanVRK\/status\/1386784257843109890\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">You don\u2019t normally believe anything that comes out of Iran.<\/a>\u00a0Why now?\u201d (I welcome their newfound skepticism of statements from the Iranian regime, and hope they apply that skepticism consistently to any negotiations or discussions with the Iranians from here on out.)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/04\/25\/world\/middleeast\/iran-suleimani-zarif.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Kerry defenders need to reread the\u00a0<em>New York Times<\/em>\u00a0piece that started all this.<\/a>\u00a0The comment comes from Foreign Minister Zarif, who\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/av\/world-us-canada-24292640\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">met with<\/a>\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/iranprimer.usip.org\/blog\/2014\/feb\/03\/kerry-and-zarif-meeting-munich\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Kerry<\/a>\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-iran-nuclear-talks\/kerry-irans-zarif-meet-again-in-paris-to-narrow-nuclear-gaps-idUSKBN0KP12H20150116\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">many<\/a>\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/2009-2017.state.gov\/secretary\/remarks\/2016\/04\/256536.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">times<\/a>\u00a0while Kerry was secretary of state during Obama\u2019s second term. In fact, you may recall Kerry and Zarif\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bostonglobe.com\/news\/nation\/2018\/05\/04\/kerry-quietly-seeking-salvage-iran-deal-helped-craft\/2fTkGON7xvaNbO0YbHECUL\/story.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">continuing their conversations after Kerry left government service,<\/a>\u00a0in an effort to preserve the nuclear deal.\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/world\/national-security\/how-john-and-javad-learned-to-work-together-on-an-iran-deal\/2015\/07\/03\/c1dd3ffa-cb17-40c3-ac37-a97c4f495b65_story.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The two men are on a first-name basis, and were characterized as \u201cfriendly but not friends.\u201d\u00a0<\/a>The\u00a0<em>Financial Times<\/em>\u00a0characterized it as \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/content\/c3527314-bf57-11e5-846f-79b0e3d20eaf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the Kerry-Zarif special relationship.<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--center ad-unit--inline\">\n<div class=\"ad-unit__inner\">\n<p>By Iranian standards, Zarif is one of the nicer guys, one who is more eager to engage with the West, and to the extent Kerry has a . . . maybe \u201cfriend\u201d is putting it too strongly, but . . . to the extent Kerry has a reliable partner in the Iranian regime, Zarif is the guy. If this is all a big lie from Zarif to make Kerry look bad . . . why would Zarif do that? What would Zarif have to gain by trying to make the former U.S. government official most eager to reach a deal appear incapable of keeping secrets?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Sure, the Iranian regime lies all the time. But if this is a lie, why would the foreign minister lie about his favorite negotiating partner in this case?<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>This is the sum total of what the original\u00a0<em>Times<\/em>\u00a0article says about Kerry:\u00a0<em>\u201cFormer Secretary of State John Kerry informed him that Israel had attacked Iranian interests in Syria at least 200 times, to his astonishment, Mr. Zarif said.\u201d\u00a0<\/em>This morning,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/04\/26\/us\/john-kerry-iran-israel-syria.html?searchResultPosition=1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">subsequent reporting by the\u00a0<em>New York Times<\/em>\u00a0provides a little more context:<\/a><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The recording in question captures Mr. Zarif speaking for hours to an interviewer producing an oral history of the current Iranian administration.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cKerry has to tell me that Israel has attacked you 200 times in Syria?\u201d says Mr. Zarif, who complains in the recording that Iran\u2019s military has long kept him in the dark on crucial matters.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou did not know?\u201d the interviewer asks twice. Both times, Mr. Zarif replies, \u201cNo, no.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In the recording, Mr. Zarif does not specify when Mr. Kerry was supposed to have made the comment.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>From that,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-mideast-crisis-israel-syria-iran\/israel-says-struck-iranian-targets-in-syria-200-times-in-last-two-years-idUSKCN1LK2D7\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">we don\u2019t know whether the alleged leak was before or after public reports in September 2018 that Israel had struck 200 Iranian targets in Syria,<\/a>\u00a0but the fact that Zarif was surprised by what Kerry had told him \u2014 and that the Iranian military had not kept him in the loop \u2014 strongly suggests that this information had not yet appeared in news reports.<\/p>\n<p>It is likely that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps already knew, or strongly suspected, Israel was behind these attacks. The IRGC probably suspected the Israelis every time something went wrong for the Iranians in Syria \u2014 something important blew up, or someone important died in mysterious circumstances. (I would guess that when Iranian hardliners stub their toes in the morning, they suspect the Mossad was behind it.)<br \/>\nBut notice that the context of Zarif\u2019s comment is not, <em>\u201cBoy, that John Kerry is a big blabbermouth.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0He\u2019s not setting out to stab his old negotiating partner in the back. He\u2019s complaining about the Revolutionary Guard Corps. The context is,\u00a0<em>\u201cI\u2019m the foreign minister, but those jerks at the IRGC aren\u2019t keeping me in the loop on anything; I have to learn about what the Israelis are doing from my American counterpart!\u201d<\/em>&lt;<\/p>\n<p>And whatever the Iranian regime as a whole knew, believed, or suspected, Zarif didn\u2019t expect Kerry to come out and confirm their suspicions. Zarif says he learned this \u201cto his astonishment.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>So we\u2019re left with my original questions from yesterday:\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nationalreview.com\/corner\/never-tell-john-kerry-anything\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Was this a deliberate Obama administration decision to tell the Iranians, or was Kerry freelancing?<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Either way, it seems extraordinarily unlikely that the Israelis had signed off on Kerry revealing this information to Tehran. We\u2019re left where we started: John Kerry knowing about military actions that an allied country had taken in Syria that were not meant to be public knowledge \u2014 and sharing information about them with the Iranian foreign minister.<\/p>\n<p>Also note that by speaking this bluntly and critically of the Revolutionary Guard Corps and the late Major General Qasim Soleimani, it seems clear Zarif did not expect this interview to go public at this time. Maybe he thought his comments would be revealed far in the future, after his retirement or after his death \u2014 if they were ever revealed at all. For what it is worth,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.al-monitor.com\/originals\/2021\/04\/leaked-recording-irans-foreign-minister-stirs-debate#ixzz6tEhI1YpO\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the Iranian foreign ministry says the recording was never meant to be released to the public:<\/a><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Iran\u2019s Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.tasnimnews.com\/fa\/news\/1400\/02\/06\/2491769\/%D8%B3%D8%AE%D9%86%DA%AF%D9%88%DB%8C-%D9%88%D8%B2%D8%A7%D8%B1%D8%AA-%D8%AE%D8%A7%D8%B1%D8%AC%D9%87-%D8%A2%D9%86%DA%86%D9%87-%D8%A7%D8%B2-%D8%B8%D8%B1%DB%8C%D9%81-%D9%85%D9%86%D8%AA%D8%B4%D8%B1-%D8%B4%D8%AF-%DB%8C%DA%A9-%D9%85%D8%B5%D8%A7%D8%AD%D8%A8%D9%87-%D8%B1%D8%B3%D8%A7%D9%86%D9%87-%D8%A7%DB%8C-%D9%86%D8%A8%D9%88%D8%AF-%D8%B7%D8%B1%D8%AD-%DA%AF%D8%A7%D9%85-%D8%A8%D9%87-%DA%AF%D8%A7%D9%85-%D8%B1%D8%A7-%D9%86%D9%85%DB%8C-%D9%BE%D8%B0%DB%8C%D8%B1%DB%8C%D9%85\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">said today<\/a>\u00a0that the recording was not supposed to be released to the media. The interview took place with economist Saeed Leylaz, who is a supporter of the Rouhani administration. Khatibzadeh said the recording was a \u201ctypical discussion within the administration.\u201d The intention of the talks was a Rouhani administration initiative that all Cabinet members record their experiences in order to serve as documents to help the next administration.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>It seems pretty clear that we in the West were not meant to hear this interview anytime soon, if ever \u2014 which makes it even more implausible that this is some sort of Iranian misinformation effort to undermine John Kerry\u2019s reputation. However, it does feel as if somebody in the Iranian government wanted to kneecap Zarif, and\/or his political allies. Iran is scheduled to have a presidential \u201celection\u201d in June 18. (Those scare quotes are deliberate.) While the final ballot has yet to be set,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.arabnews.com\/node\/1838066\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">take a look at who a bunch of the top contenders are:<\/a><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>A number of Iranian military leaders, from both the army and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), are among the likely candidates for Iran\u2019s presidential election, which will be held on June 18. Among these candidates are the former IRGC air force commander and former defense minister in the Rouhani government Hossein Dehghan; former IRGC commander and current Secretary of Iran\u2019s Expediency Discernment Council Mohsen Rezaee; and the former head of the IRGC\u2019s Khatam Al-Anbiya Construction Headquarters Brig. Gen. Saeed Mohammed, as well as other politicians with a military background, including Ali Larijani, Parviz Fattah and Mehrdad Bazrpash.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>If you\u2019re the IRGC or an ally of that faction within the Iranian government, and you come across an audiotape of the foreign minister trashing your beloved brigadier-general-turned-airport-highway-speedbump, you\u2019re sure as heck going to release that.<\/p>\n<p>This isn\u2019t a lie designed to smear Kerry. There\u2019s no good reason to think Zarif is lying to the interviewer. Kerry\u2019s reputation is collateral damage in a fight among factions within the Iranian government.<\/p>\n<p>We as Americans have very little ability to influence who runs what within the Iranian regime. But we can decide which people can be trusted with secrets within the U.S. government \u2014 and John Kerry isn\u2019t one of those people.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--center ad-unit--inline\">\n<div class=\"ad-unit__inner\">\n<div class=\"dfp-ad dfp-inline_3\">\n<div class=\"\" data-react-component=\"AdUnitVisibility\" data-unit=\"inline_3\" data-lazy-load=\"true\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kerry\u2019s Denial on Leaking to Iran Doesn\u2019t Add Up \u2018The Kerry\u2013Zarif Special Relationship\u2019 For what it\u2019s worth, former secretary of state John Kerry\u00a0denied late yesterday\u00a0that he had informed Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif about 200 Israeli attacks on Iranian targets in Syria. \u201cI can tell you that this story and these allegations are unequivocally false. &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=67284\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-67284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-deceit","category-enemies-foreign-domestic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=67284"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67284\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67285,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67284\/revisions\/67285"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=67284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=67284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=67284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}