← Christiane Amanpour Presents: The Ex Files
Christiane Amanpour Presents: The Ex Files
Iran the day after: Pushed to make a bomb or back to the negotiating table?
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- [00:03]
Jamie Rubin
This is a Global Player original podcast.
- [00:06]
Christiane Amanpour
Hello, everyone. It's Tuesday and I am on my way to the NATO summit in the Netherlands. Really important because Iran will be top of mind. And President Trump is here. After we finished recording yesterday, Iran did launch missiles at a US Air base in Qatar. That's its response to the whole 12 days in the US bombing of its country. It said it was proportional. Donald Trump even thanked Iran, Iran for giving them a heads up and allowing them to get personnel out of harm's way. It is an extraordinary situation. And he then declared a total ceasefire by all sides. Now, our conversation on the episode is still as important as ever because it asks the fundamental questions about the day after and what happens next. So after those airstrikes and presumably some kind of bringing all parties together, does that mean Iran goes back into the sort of community of nations when it comes to declaring its nuclear program? Or eventually might it rush for a bomb in secret? How likely anymore is regime change? We're hearing from the Iranian people. That's not very likely right now. And the vital necessity for diplomacy to create once and for all an end to this. That's all coming up. Hello and welcome to the X Files with me, Christiana Manpour.
- [01:27]
Jamie Rubin
And and I'm Jamie Rubin, two time senior State Department official under Presidents Clinton and Biden.
- [01:33]
Christiane Amanpour
I am Christiana Monpo. I'm actually at my CNN office today because there's so much going on and I am a longtime correspondent for CNN, covered all the wars and crises for the last 35 years. And now I have my own show here where I attempt to hold world leaders accountable, including and especially right now in this new war that has been unleashed in the Middle East.
- [01:56]
Jamie Rubin
I'm sitting here from Carmela's Kitchen, as I call it, which is in Long Island.
- [01:59]
Christiane Amanpour
We were married for 20 years, divorced seven. And we just decided to reopen this conversation because at first I said desperate times call for desperate measures. And we are indeed in very heightened times right now. So we do need to have, you know, a conversation about this and where it's all going. And of course, this is being recorded on Monday, June 23, just after the weekend strikes by the United States and as Israel continues its strikes and expands its target list to really hitting internal regime targets. What does that all mean? We're going to find out in this episode. So obviously everybody knows that I'm part Iranian. I grew up in Iran until the revolution and I left. And again, something that I said last, last time, last episode, you can disagree with all your might with this regime. But you can also be an Iranian who loves your country and be very concerned, worried, pained by what you're seeing happening, especially to civilians and the civilian neighborhoods, including the ones that have just been bombed by Israel, around even prison. I grew up very close to there. I went riding at a stables that was practically next door to that location. Didn't know about it at the time, but it's now really densely populated and it's home. You know, it's my old and ex home. And you'll find actually that not just me being outside, but those inside, and we're going to talk about this later, are incredibly conflicted because many have very, very, you know, negative views of their government, but very patriotic views about their homeland being attacked from foreign actors, Israel and the United States.
- [03:43]
Jamie Rubin
And that's exactly how I feel as an American. With this war being launched by Donald Trump, I can oppose Donald Trump's policies. The administration has no clue how to end this war. He thinks he can just get the Iranians to capitulate. That's not going to happen. How does this war end? So I can be supportive of the United States and protective of the United States while still opposing the Trump administration's policies for not having any strategic objectives. They don't understand that in order to get a result, you need to have diplomacy backed by force. Now all they've got is force and no diplomacy. And I think they are in dream o vision if they think this war is just going to magically end with the Iranians capitulating. That's not what extremist regimes do. But will they really have destroyed Iran's nuclear program? Because one of the responses Iran can make is to go covert and actually rush towards weaponizing its enriched uranium, something it has not been trying to do for decades, Something people don't realize. They have been building enriched uranium, they have been enriching it to weapons grade, but they have not tried to turn that weapons grade to uranium into a bomb, at least until now. It's worth remembering that all Trump has done here is return us to a place we were before he pulled out of the Obama agreement. Remember, we're only in this situation where we're worried about Iran's nuclear weapons program because Trump pulled out of the agreement that Barack Obama had struck the jcpoa. It's called the Joint something something something.
- [05:22]
Christiane Amanpour
Agreement, Comprehensive Plan of Action.
- [05:25]
Jamie Rubin
Thank you. Trump pulled out, Iran, began enriching to a higher degree and more uranium. And we faced the prospect of Iran on the verge of a nuclear weapons Capability only because Trump pulled out. Now, by using military force, perhaps we've set back the program some period of time, but we have provoked exactly what we don't want, which is a covert rush to a bomb. Iran is an agent of chaos, this regime, and in that sense, they've retained inside Iran the leader of Al Qaeda, I believe, I believe his name is Saif Al Adel, who is in Iran under their protection. And they could weaponize Al Qaeda. And Al Qaeda has shown in the past an ability to conduct terrorist attacks. I think we're going to get some reaction. It's very hard to predict how strong and how comprehensive and how dangerous it will be, but there is going to be a reaction. I don't think the regime can survive without reacting in some respects. When Trump killed Soleimani, the leader of the Iranian irgc, they reacted by using their proxy in Iraq to attack an American military base. So they have options.
- [06:38]
Christiane Amanpour
But I actually want to ask about the intelligence, because you mentioned at the beginning, and this goes to the heart of the causes, Belli, if you like, the Israelis and now Trump has, have been just saying that, you know, they were this close to getting the bomb. And again, just lay out what US Intelligence says. And then I want to talk about how much damage they may or may not have done to the enrichment facilities.
- [07:04]
Jamie Rubin
Well, when talking about the intelligence on weapons of mass destruction, given our fiasco in Iraq, it's very important to be as precise as possible. Intelligence can always be exaggerated, can always be slightly adjusted to make a political point. I'm not interested in that. So I'm going to tell you what I know and what has been now, I think, pretty much affirmed publicly, and that is that they were expanding their capability by expanding their ability to have uranium enriched to 90% in sufficient quantities to construct a weapon. But there is something called weaponization where you take that enriched uranium and you weaponize it, you use uranium metal in an actual device, then that implosion has to be occurred, and then you frankly have to test it. Iran wasn't doing those things. They were thinking about it and doing some modest testing back 20 years ago. But then they made a decision to stop weaponization. They wanted the capability, remember enriched uranium to 60%. It has no value for civilian nuclear purposes. They were doing it as a threat. And this is where Iran's policy of chickens coming home to roost. They were threatening the world with their nuclear capability. And they reached a point where, in the aftermath of October 7, Israel finally decided, decided to do something about that threat. Because diplomacy wasn't working. The problem here is that the best way to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear weapons state to actually testing a weapon is diplomacy, is having a diplomatic agreement with inspectors on the ground. So you know where everything is. You know that the program is contained and it is not being weaponized. You can't do that from the air, you can't do that from afar.
- [08:51]
Christiane Amanpour
Okay.
- [08:51]
Jamie Rubin
And in the end, if Trump wants to succeed in denuclearizing nuclearizing Iran, he's going to have to move to diplomacy with inspections.
- [09:00]
Christiane Amanpour
Right. So lot to unpack there. And let's just say that the immediate issue of what have they done to these nuclear enrichment facilities is unclear because we're getting all sorts of different commentary from Israel, from the US from within the US Administration. Trump himself, on the eve when he announced the bombing raids by the B2s, said that they had been completely obliterated.
- [09:25]
Jamie Rubin
Tonight, I can report to the world that the strikes were a spectacular military success. Iran's key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated.
- [09:37]
Christiane Amanpour
And now he's not likely. And now his own cabinet people are basically saying, well, you know, maybe not obliterated, but severely damaged. Somebody else said we've taken them off the table. Others said, and this is all within the administration, that perhaps we've delayed the program, you know, by I think, two years to five years. And I will say that the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Mike Mullen, had told me just before this bombing raid that, you know, everybody's hyped up about the MOP and the 30,000 bomb, 30,000 pound bomb, but we've never ever deployed it. And there is a lot of unknowns about whether it can actually do what we think it can. And the depth of the, of the location at Fordeaux is so deep, they have no full battle, you know, BDA battle, damage assessment yet. And they don't know exactly. And then they possibly possibility is that Iran could have moved its stockpiles of enriched uranium anyway by potentially going underground with an out of inspection view. But can before we get there, because you've talked about a little bit, it must be inspected, all of this. You said a failure of diplomacy, or rather only way diplomacy could work. And look, I mean, it's a truism, you don't have to be a genius to know that the Iranians were deliberately deceived by the United States and Israel. They thought they were going to another round of negotiations with the United States. And Israel decided to preemptively strike because it had that time. Then Trump apparently, and he said it, and his sources in his administration are now telling reporters that he said, oh, I'll make up my mind within two weeks about whether to use the B2S. This is what he said on Thursday, knowing that he was going to do it and wanting the time to be able to do it so that Iran was again unaware of anything happening. Arakshi said this completely puts paid to the anybody's trust in negotiations and diplomacy. What do you think about that?
- [11:37]
Jamie Rubin
The Iranians had a lot of nerve blaming everyone else for their problems.
- [11:41]
Christiane Amanpour
No, but on this issue, let's just.
- [11:43]
Jamie Rubin
Take it on this issue specifically. Let me address this.
- [11:47]
Christiane Amanpour
No, no, no. This is really important. Is there any comparison? When a nation, let's say the United States during the first, first Gulf War, they actually developed a coalition, went for about six months of diplomacy and then gave Iraq a fixed deadline. This one was strike under potentially a deception over diplomacy.
- [12:08]
Jamie Rubin
Look, I'm not gonna parse Donald Trump's games. It was within two weeks. If you really wanna parse it, he did it within a couple days, not two weeks. That's not really the point here. The point here is that Iran's chickens are coming home to roost. Before Israel struck Iran, the IAEA made a declaration, the entire board of the iaea, declaring in paragraph three of their action item that Iran's behavior constitutes non compliance with its obligations under safeguards agreements with this organization. They provoked this crisis by not cooperating with the IAEA and by threatening to go nuclear every day by enriching uranium to a higher and higher degree. That's the game they were playing and it's now blown up in their face. So they were playing their own. Trump plays his games. That's not really the point. The point here is that without diplomacy, without inspections over the long term, we will never know where Iran stands in terms of nuclear weapons capability. They could have put centrifuges in many locations around the country. They could have taken the 60% enriched uranium and removed it from Ford O, which reports suggest they did, and then further enrich it to 90%, which is not very hard. The hard part, it's a reverse equation. The hard part is to go from 10 to 20. Once you're at 60, it's very easy to go to 90. And so if they do that, then they will have the nuclear material that they can weaponize. That's not that hard. A graduate student in physics knows the physics of weaponizing nuclear material if you have it to 90%. So that's what we're facing. A covert program without diplomacy, without an agreement. And this is how North Korea went nuclear. The west adopted a maximalist strategy, demanding that they surrender and give up all their stuff and demand, you know, basically capitulation from North Korea. And North Korea said, yeah, watch this. And they pulled out of the npt, they removed their material, and then they tested a nuclear device. And that has brought them a level of security because people are reluctant to attack North Korea because they have nuclear weapons. Did we just do that by attacking Iran? That's the hard question that neither Trump, nor J.D. vance, nor the IAEA, nor anyone knows the answer to. Right now, the Iranians probably don't even know it. They're probably figuring out what they have and what they where it is and what they can do about it and.
- [14:33]
Christiane Amanpour
Whether they can survive. Because Israel has massively expanded its targets and it's hitting domestic targets now as well as presumably perhaps some, you know, military and nuclear still. It's actually hit northern Tehran, the capital, very close to where I grew up. Evin Prison is literally almost next door to the riding stables I used to go to. I did not know the prison was that kind of prison at that time, but I know exactly where it is. And right now, it's very densely populated. And my question is, did they evacuate the prisoners, many of whom. Not all, but many of whom are actually political prisoners and opponents of the current regime. So this is a big question, and it seems to be that Israel is upping the ante. And you can see it on its tweets, on its messages, on everything for regime change. And Trump has now posted about that, having said point blank, that this is not about regime change or at least his administration. Hold on, I'm going to talk about it in the second part. Could it also become a failed state? And what will that mean? Anybody remember Iraq? We'll talk about it in the next part. Okay. Welcome back to the conversation. In this part of our episode, we want to talk about what's now being much more publicly and openly stated by both Israel and President Trump himself, which is the notion of. Of regime change. You know, we've spoken, Jamie, in the last part about what might happen, but that implies that this regime survives. And all the things we talked about is about what this regime might do. Go dark, go this, go that. So, first and foremost, it's clear that Trump has been pulled into this moment by Netanyahu. There has been deep reporting, notably by the New York Times, about this. So now the question is, since he said, this is not about Iran and his, you know, administration. Hegseth Vance, all the rest of it said, we're not at war with Iran, we're at war with their nuclear program. Now Trump posts that why not regime change if Iran wants to be great again? So, again, it's being posited that this is Netanyahu getting into his ear and saying, now's the time, now's the time.
- [16:52]
Jamie Rubin
Yeah, I think they're not understanding that when the president muses about regime change, that becomes perceived as American policy, because when the President. President speaks, people pay attention to it. Regime change is a dumb policy. I think if there's anything we learned in the last 20 years is that trying to organize our diplomacy and our use of military power based on our fundamental interests around questions of regime change is a terrible mistake because it's got a mixed record. In some cases, it's been successful a la Serbia, briefly after the fall of Kosovo to the. Because for Albanians, but a mixed record in Libya, an obviously mixed record in Iraq, and a mixed record in Afghanistan. So regime change is not a sensible way to go. The Israelis are exaggerating the ability of military power to bring down the regime. I don't believe that outside forces can bring down this regime. I believe that that will only happen when the people of Iran reach a threshold in which they are forcing their regime to change. That's possible, but in this circumstance, that's not the way it happens. And we've seen, Christiane, over the last 20 years, what happens when the people of Iran try to stand up and change their regime? They get slaughtered by their own security forces. And I would hate to see the President of the United States inspire Iranians to try to protest or demonstrate if they would in these circumstances, and get slaughtered. And I don't see the regime as about to fall. And I think organizing ourself around that is a terrible mistake. We need to figure out how to end this war. The Israelis can't figure it out. I heard, I read today that they're looking to bring this to a close. But how are you going to do it? They have the same problem in Gaza, the same problem all over the Middle East. Their military and intelligence capabilities are extremely successful, but their diplomatic capabilities under Netanyahu are a colossal failure. We should never have been in this situation if Netanyahu had made the right decisions about Gaza.
- [18:55]
Christiane Amanpour
Really? What do you mean?
- [18:56]
Jamie Rubin
I mean that he could have made. Ended the war in Gaza, put in place an Arab force and gotten Saudi recognition of Israel and ended the conflict between Israel and its neighbors, if he would just do the right thing in Gaza.
- [19:10]
Christiane Amanpour
As we're talking, I just wanted to read something by Muhammad Ali Abtahi. Now he is a reformist political mullah in Iran and he was the reformist President Mohammad Khatami's chief of staff. So I known him pretty well, even though I haven't been in touch for a bit. But he was in touch with the wonderful journalist Farhanaz Fasihi from the New York Times, who is the most plugged in and with the best contacts, even though she's outside of Iran. She talks to everybody there, regime and non regime and military and, you know, political and all the rest of it. Anyway. Abtahi said he believes Israel has miscalculated Iran's reaction to the war. He said, and he acknowledged the deep political factions that are typically in sharp disagreement with one another had rallied now behind the Suprem leader and their own flag and focus the country on defending itself from an external threat. Israel's attacks, he said, has set off a resurgence of nationalism amongst many Iranians inside and outside the country, including many critical of the government. And this is emerging, as we've probably seen and anybody can look now in a torrent of postings all over social media. You know, it's physicians, it's celebrities, it's sports heroes. You know, Iran takes its sports very seriously, especially its national soccer team and weightlifting.
- [20:29]
Jamie Rubin
Right. Don't they have great weightlifters?
- [20:31]
Christiane Amanpour
Yes, and the, but the soccer team have even beat the United States on the soccer field. So you can imagine. And I've watched those matches, he said.
- [20:37]
Jamie Rubin
Like you went to one together, I believe, with Darius.
- [20:40]
Christiane Amanpour
Yes, we did California in the Rose Bowl. Like family? No, Darius was not born yet. Like family, he said, we may not always agree, but Iran's soil is our red line. And I think think that's being missed. Which is not to say that there won't be a reckoning in the future. There is bound to be a reckoning, but right now, the result of this unprecedented bombardment, including those massive American bombs which have now been test used on Iran for the first time, is causing a huge amount and there are hundreds of people who've been killed, including civilians. And I know from my own family that they are nervous, they're worried, they don't know where to run to. And now that it's coming to residential.
- [21:22]
Jamie Rubin
Neighbors and remember, this is the same as happening in Israel, Israeli citizens are dying in large numbers because of Iranian attacks on Israel. So Bibi Netanyahu has launched a war. I agree, but I'm just explaining that they're suffering. In both countries, the war continues, an air war which is easy for governments to implement, but hard to figure out how to stop it. So how does this end? Is the famous question, I think. Was David Petraeus in the Iraq War. How does this end? Well, it's not obvious. It's not obvious that Donald Trump's administration understands how to use force to back up diplomacy. Not force for its own sake, not force for bragging rights, not forced to show everyone how tough you are, but forced to achieve an objective by combining it with diplomacy. And because, as you suggested earlier, they've now raised questions as to their legitimacy of their negotiations. If they're just being used as cover to use force, the Iranians are going to be less likely to negotiate with them. But we will get back to the table. The Europeans may end up playing an important role as a broker between the two sides. And something has to be decided to end this war. The Israelis are not going to get regime change, and they're going to figure that out, if they haven't already. The United States is not going to get regime change. The war will continue until a diplomatic solution is developed that deals with the nuclear issue and that deals with the ongoing warfare between Israel and Iran.
- [22:50]
Christiane Amanpour
Israel and probably the United States are clearly backing certain horses like the young Shah of Iran. Some in America and obviously in Israel also believe in the mek, the Mujahideen Khalq, which those people, they used to be branded as a terrorist organization by the US and the UK Then they, you know, launched a very successful lobbying campaign portraying themselves as true democrats and the only people with any heft inside Iran. And they renamed themselves, I believe it's. At one point it was the Iranian Council of Resistance. But the fact of the matter is that their history is incredibly checkered. These people based themselves in Iraq during the Iran Iraq War and were perceived as fighting for Iraq and in fact, you know, working for Iraq. And so the Iranian people have never forgiven them. On the other hand, Israel has most definitely used them and their connections for a lot of the evidence that has been produced inside Iran. For instance, the. That document back in 2009 which revealed the Fordo nuclear plant.
- [23:56]
Jamie Rubin
But the point here is that those who support the Iranian people, those who support the Israeli people and those who support the American people, I'm one of those people want to find a way for this war to end and for it to end, the leaders have got to realize that force alone cannot achieve their objectives. Remember, we were talking over the weekend, look at who's running the world now. We have Xi Jinping in China, Vladimir Putin in Russia. We have Ayatollah Khamenei in Iran. We have, you know, these crazy people, leaders who think you have Netanyahu and his extreme, Netanyahu in Israel and Trump.
- [24:34]
Christiane Amanpour
And his very right.
- [24:36]
Jamie Rubin
They are not very able negotiators of successful diplomatic achievements. That's what worries me.
- [24:42]
Christiane Amanpour
Some have said, like this week, as we record, the Iranian foreign minister has been in Russia. He met with Vladimir Putin, but it looks like they're not going to get any military help from Russia because there was no defense pact signed. And Russia's pretty much made it clear we support you diplomatically, but not militarily. So Iran has very, very few friends. But, Jamie, because we're talking about what might come next. People like our friend Vali Nasser, who's a longtime expert on Iran, wrote the book on the Shiites, was a government. He's very concerned about a failed state. You know, all those other states you talked about where regime change didn't work very well, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Afghanistan, these fell into failed state status. And it was a disaster, not just for the people there, but for the security of the world and the US And Israel and US and everywhere. And so that's what's very frightening for people who look at the day after.
- [25:43]
Jamie Rubin
Let me suggest that I understand Valley's concern and a lot of people's concern. I don't see that as the outcome here. I think the Iranian regime has sufficient control over its country and its people. I think, as you pointed out, I'm.
- [25:56]
Christiane Amanpour
Talking about if it collapses.
- [25:58]
Jamie Rubin
Well, it's not going to collapse, is my opinion.
- [26:00]
Christiane Amanpour
I think not. Okay.
- [26:01]
Jamie Rubin
Because some people think it will. They're well established in their rule of Iran. I don't think it's going to collapse. I'm prepared to make that prediction. Certainly not in the coming weeks and months, years from now. I certainly hope so, but not in the coming weeks and months. So instead of worrying about a failed state in Iran, which is not. Not something we can do anything about, we should worry about ending the conflict. How does Israel and Iran come to an agreement to stop the war?
- [26:28]
Christiane Amanpour
Jimmy? They say to stop the bomb. Only way to do that is to remove the regime. I'm talking. I'm quoting them. And Trump is saying the same thing, in so many words.
- [26:37]
Jamie Rubin
I think the Israelis. If.
- [26:38]
Christiane Amanpour
Do we think Trump is being pulled along by the Israelis?
- [26:41]
Jamie Rubin
I don't know. Certainly he's gone farther in, in terms of launching a war in the Middle east than he claimed to his supporters during the campaign. But I don't think the Israeli government in the end is going to wait to stop. In other words, I don't think they're gonna keep going until the regime falls. I think they're gonna realize sooner rather than later that the regime isn't falling, that the people are rallying around the regime, even people who don't like them very much as, like the person you quoted, and that the regime is not gonna collapse. It may be weak, weaker, and it may get weaker and weaker, and that may not be good for anybody because remember, they have inherent in their capabilities. They've always had a split government. There's been the Iranian elected government of presidents and ministers, et cetera. And then they had Khamenei, the irgc, the Al Quds Force. And that part of the Iranian regime supports terrorism and has funded terrorism, has been a state sponsor of terrorism. If they now House sponsor terrorism, we're all going to be really sorry that President Trump got involved.
- [27:46]
Christiane Amanpour
Okay, I think we should end here. Move. Just move. You take a break. Because they're so heavy. This subject. It's so heavy. We're back. Final part of our discussion, this episode. And we want to talk about what's next and we want to know and discuss, discuss really whether there will be some kind of regime change or will diplomacy be given a chance and will it work? So Trump, when he visited the Middle east not so long ago in Saudi Arabia, he gave a speech against, in his words, all those American presidents who believed in intervention and nation building. And look how well it turned out for them. In other words, not. And he said, you know, in his 2016 campaign, you know, called the invasion of Iraq a big, big fat mistake. The result of, he said, deliberate act of deception by US Intelligence. They lied, he said during a Republican primary debate that February. They said there were weapons of mass destruction. There were none and they knew there were none. Here he is doing the same thing at a time when the intelligence has said that they do not have that, as we've decided, discussed.
- [28:59]
Jamie Rubin
There is an eerie, eerie ring to it with Donald Trump accepting Israeli intelligence about Iran's nuclear program. Program. That's Israeli intelligence, which is sometimes brilliant, as we've seen, but sometimes completely wrong. Look, I don't think the Israeli intelligence argument that Iran was rushing to weaponize its nuclear material is accurate. It's not accurate based on what I saw up till six months ago. And the US Intelligence community folks have repeated that in recent weeks. So I don't think anything's changed. So Trump has used intelligence to launch military strikes in just the same way that he said the Bush administration did. We can get into whether they were lying or not another day.
- [29:42]
Christiane Amanpour
For now, they never found weapons of mass destruction. Searching.
- [29:45]
Jamie Rubin
That's true. Whether they were lying is a whole other question.
- [29:48]
Christiane Amanpour
Just so happens that around now is the 23rd anniversary. Anyway, in 2002, in May, George W. Bush, remember, went onto that aircraft carrier and said, mission accomplished.
- [30:00]
Jamie Rubin
And in fact, I think it was 23 when he.
- [30:03]
Christiane Amanpour
Whatever. I think it was 2002.
- [30:06]
Jamie Rubin
Yeah. 2002 was the war buildup. 2003 was.
- [30:10]
Christiane Amanpour
Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. In 2003.
- [30:15]
Jamie Rubin
This is another. Do it again.
- [30:18]
Christiane Amanpour
In 2003, he declared mission accomplished shortly after invading Iraq. And sure enough, that war went on for another 10 years with catastrophic consequences. Deaths, insurgency blowback, politically all over the place. I mean, absolutely awful for another 10 years. So. Yeah, but Trump is saying this has been a great success. So is he going to fall into that trap?
- [30:41]
Jamie Rubin
I hope not. Look, the good news, if there is any good news, is that the Europeans have stood up in the case of Ukraine to play a role in the world. Now we need them to stand up and be a bridge between the United States and Iran and between Israel and Iran. We need European diplomats to play a role.
- [31:02]
Christiane Amanpour
We've got this incredible, incredible soundbite from Chancellor Mertz. This is the dirty work Israel does for all of us. I can only say that I have.
- [31:11]
Jamie Rubin
The greatest respect for the Israeli army.
- [31:13]
Christiane Amanpour
And the Israeli leadership having the courage to do this.
- [31:16]
Jamie Rubin
Well, maybe it won't be German diplomats who do it.
- [31:20]
Christiane Amanpour
And listen, J.B. i'm sorry. Of course Iranians were furious at being called the dirty work. I mean, the people. But also Trump. This is just an aside. Trump, when he made his speech, he said, I think, and I'm paraphrasing, you know, congratulations. I was a team with Benjamin Netanyahu. Congratulations to the Israeli military. God bless Israel.
- [31:41]
Jamie Rubin
I want to thank and congratulate Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu. We worked as a team like perhaps no team has ever worked before. God bless the Middle East. God bless Israel and God bless America.
- [31:56]
Christiane Amanpour
Thank you very much. I mean, all right, if you want to say that to your domestic constituency, but how do you think that goes down in the Muslim world?
- [32:03]
Jamie Rubin
Agreed that it will be hard for the US to be immediately accepted as a mediator by the Iranians because of it being appeared that they were used as a device to and to do Israel's work.
- [32:16]
Christiane Amanpour
Actually, the dirty work that the Germans say.
- [32:19]
Jamie Rubin
And look, as complicated as this issue is, it's important to try to us be lucid. I am glad that Iran's enriched uranium is. Some of it is destroyed. But I believe that in order to be sure Iran doesn't go nuclear, we need a diplomatic solution that will last for the long term. The kind of solution that Donald Trump ruined by pulling out of the Obama agreement back in his first term. We need another agreement. We need another agreement that will allow the Israelis to stand down, the Iranians to stand down, and the United States to not be suffering blowback from an Iranian support for terrorism. That's what we need. How are we going to get it? My best guess, as I said, is it will be some European leaders like the British foreign minister, who seemed to have a good discussion with Trump before he went back and began to negotiate. I think we need someone like that, the British, maybe the French, to convince the Iranians and the Israelis and the United States together to, to stand back from force and to let diplomacy do its work.
- [33:25]
Christiane Amanpour
You Remember after the 8 year Iran Iraq war, then Supreme Leader and the father of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Khomeini said that he basically was forced to drink from the poison chalice. But after eight years, they fought to a draw. Nobody won.
- [33:43]
Jamie Rubin
A million people. The lesson from that was they would take a lot of suffering, Suffering. And it took many, many, many years for that chalice to be drunk from.
- [33:51]
Christiane Amanpour
And of course, any way before.
- [33:54]
Jamie Rubin
That's what I'm worried about is exactly that, that they can take a lot of pain. The Israelis can take a lot of pain. And this thing can go on for a long, long time. And unless some leadership is shown by somebody somewhere to figure out how to marry force and diplomacy, we're going to be into a long term conflict. Conflict with the Israeli people suffering, the Iranian people suffering, and potentially, I pray not the American people suffering.
- [34:19]
Christiane Amanpour
And of course, the question then is will Khamenei, the current supreme leader, who's apparently renamed and re inserted a whole new layer of military commanders, who has written his own will, who has produced some names for mullahs, ayatollahs, who would.
- [34:36]
Jamie Rubin
Replace him to succeed him.
- [34:37]
Christiane Amanpour
Yeah, yeah, to succeed him. If he's taken out, will he drink from that poison?
- [34:41]
Jamie Rubin
I sure hope so. I hope so, but I wouldn't bet on it.
- [34:45]
Christiane Amanpour
And then what happens when Trump says if he doesn't, that is the Iranians have to now make peace or else we have many more targets and it'll be a tragedy and etc. Etc.
- [34:55]
Jamie Rubin
I think it's a much different case. And this is why I thought it was important what J.D. vance said. He was distinguishing between a war against Iran's nuclear program and a war against Iran. I think it's possible we could probably hit Fordeau again, but I don't think it's going to make that big a difference. But I don't think the United States, even under Donald Trump's administration, wants to engage in a war against Iran. And the Israelis can't do this forever. Remember, they have planes flying every day.
- [35:23]
Christiane Amanpour
Yeah. You say that 20 months of attrition against Gaza, I mean, Ehud Barak, the former prime minister, obviously a military commander in his day and a defense minister, said he really hopes, to your point, Jamie, that this does not become a war of attrition between Israel and Iran.
- [35:39]
Jamie Rubin
You're worried about it.
- [35:40]
Christiane Amanpour
Yeah. Well, the other thing to worry about is, and you saw it in the Clinton administration, in the Obama administration, in the Biden administration, is America's national security and its national interests always Israel's? Because there has been complaints that Israel is often, you know, wagging the dog, so to speak, and that it certainly in this case has managed to get a US President to do what no other US President has.
- [36:07]
Jamie Rubin
I think on this program twice now, and let me do it a third time. What the Trump administration ought to do is to leverage our involvement and support for Israel in this long war for a change in Israel's policy in Gaza. There is a way out. There is a plan that Secretary Blinken put together with many Arab leaders and Israeli leadership of putting in place a force in Gaza, pulling Israeli troops out, out stopping the war in Gaza, which will open up many, many opportunities for Israel to be accepted in the region that needs to be front and center or else we have a war on attrition in Gaza and a war of attrition in Iran and all the great success the Israeli military has had all over the region may be lost in a long term war of attrition.
- [36:57]
Christiane Amanpour
Okay, so last, last, last point. The Iranians, as you started to say, chickens are coming home to roost, etc. Etc. Etc. But they're also often accused of over negotiating, thinking they're so, you know, able to get, you know, the ultimate deal, et cetera, et cetera. So you talk about diplomacy, but even in the Biden administration, they tried to bring Iran back into a nuclear deal after we've discussed Trump. Okay, why because this is instructive for.
- [37:24]
Jamie Rubin
The future because of two reasons. One, I think we perhaps we didn't find a way to answer their question of what happens if Trump's elected again and he pulls out of the agreement. That was the legitimate question and a fair question. How could it not be? And again, reminding everyone that Trump has just destroyed the very facilities. It wouldn't have mattered if he hadn't pulled out of the Obama accord. So it is hard. But now Trump is the negotiator and that might make it easier because if he agrees to it, there's not someone they need to worry about. We were unable to answer that question and the Iranians were unable to able to make real compromises on their enrichment program. Remember, they don't need enriched uranium to 60%. They don't need it for a civilian nuclear program. They need it for bragging rights. And maybe bragging rights won't be so important to them anymore. And maybe someone, whether it's the IAEA or the French or the British, can get involved in getting Iran temporarily to stop enrichment while they figure out where all their stuff is, is allow the IAEA to come back in and in exchange get the Israelis to stand down and the United States to stand down. That's the deal that's waiting to be made. It will be very hard to do when bombs are flying and missiles are flying every day back and forth.
- [38:43]
Christiane Amanpour
It is a fast moving situation. We've raised and tried to answer a lot of questions, but also admitted that there is so much that we just don't know. A lot of speculation right now. Thanks for listening. Make sure you're following the feed so you never miss an episode and we'll see you on Thursday, of course, for our bonus episode where we answer your questions, which you send in on social media and via email. So email us@amanpourpodlobal.com or find us on social media@amanpour pod. And you can always listen to me, Christiana Manpour and the X Files with you, Jamie Rubin on Global Player and of course download it from the App Store or go to globalplayer.com thank you all. Bye. I cannot stop thinking about this that I saw at the Smithsonian years ago when the famous Cyrus Cylinder, the first recorded human rights document, was brought to the United States. Cyrus, of course, was the great shah of Iran 2,500 years ago. And in 539 he defeated the Babylonians, freed the Jews from enslavement, and issued a decree allowing everybody to go back and practice their own religions and all the rest of it, including the Jews, who were able to go back to Jerusalem and rebuild their temple. This is a major piece of history that I think people should understand. David Ben Gurion himself, Israel's first prime minister, wrote this. Cyrus displayed a spirit of charity towards his adversaries and a unique tolerance towards all religions. And I think they might have put him amongst the righteous. In any event, it's an interesting part.
- [40:27]
Jamie Rubin
Of history, and he's the father of Darius, who we named Darius because he allowed the Jews to continue to rebuild their temple.
- [40:36]
Christiane Amanpour
This is an important part of Persian and Jewish history as we contemplate what's going on right now between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the state of Israel.
- [40:49]
Jamie Rubin
This is a Global Player original podcast.