Infographic on good vs bad Iran deal
Infographic on good vs bad Iran dealThe Israel Project

Beyond the rhetoric of “tearing up” or “abiding by” Obama’s Iranian Nuclear deal, lies the question of what President Trump should actually do with it. The fact is that the Middle East is on fire. And, it’s on fire mostly as a result of Obama’s Iran deal.

What's the connection? Because in order for Obama to “make” the deal (that was never signed by anybody, and is “voluntary”), Obama agreed to “disconnect” all of Iran’s conventional warfare Middle-East actions from its nuclear dossier. In effect, Obama put the nuclear cart before the conventional warfare horse.

Iran is exhibiting purely malign motives and actions in its conventional action, so how can it ever be trusted when it comes to nuclear actions? Obama used the pretext of the Iran deal to ignore all of Iran’s genocidal actions after the deal was struck. Hence, President Trump shouldn’t start by tearing up Obama’s deal, he should first reverse all the conventional regional policies that have let Iran turn the entire Middle East into a towering inferno.

First of all, box Iran out of Syria, and buy the Sunnis into Syria. Trump needs to triangulate Putin, Erdogan, and the Sunni countries to stabilize Syria, and to box Iran out of Syria. In 2013, General Mattis testified that if Assad falls, it would be the “biggest strategic setback in 25 years” for Iran.

What was General Mattis referring to that was “25 years” ago in 1988? Operation Praying Mantis was the American armed attack on Iranian oil facilities and military facilities on 18 April 1988 in response to Iran’s mining the Straits of Hormuz. Also, Syria is the driver of the Muslim refugees to Europe. Stabilize Syria and you stabilize the Muslim refugee “soft” invasion of Europe. Hence, it is in Russia’s, Turkey’s, America’s, the Sunnis, Europe, and the Israelis' best interests to stabilize Syria and lock Iran out of the Levant. Stabilize Syria and Trump will actually earn the Nobel Prize.

Second, partner with the Saudis to eradicate the Shiite Houtis from Northern Yemen, and destroy al Qaeda in Eastern Yemen.

The weakest link in the Iranian malignant chain of evil is Yemen. President Trump should enforce a solid impregnable weapons blockade of Yemen against Iranian weapons. Obama has been letting the Saudis struggle and bleed in Yemen.

To America, an Iranian Yemen would mean Iranian control of the Bab el-Mandab Straits that exit the Red Sea into the Indian Ocean. This choke-point transits 3 million barrels of oil a day. This would mean that in addition to the Straits of Hormuz that transit 17 million barrels, Iran will control the additional 3 million. Not only that, with both the Bab el-Mandab and Hormuz Straits under Iranian control, the Iranians could paralyze any emergency defense of Saudi Arabia from Iranian attack.

Third, expose Iran’s game of using the sectarian Shiite Flag to divide and conquer the Arabs to enable the Iranians to steal the Arab “Black Gold Triangle” oil resources.

President Trump has to simply tweet that Iran is playing the Sunni and the Shiite Arabs for fools by instigating their intra-Muslim genocide. President Trump can earn the high praise of the McCain/Graham contingent of the Republican party and the world by exposing Iran as the purveyor and instigator of intra-Arab genocide, as well a bring peace to Iraq and Syria. By raising the Arab flag, President Trump can drain Iraq of its Iranian and al Qaeda sectarian swamp, and bring peace to the area.

Fourth, openly support Iranian democratic forces and demand the release of the imprisoned Iranian presidential candidates that Obama has allowed to remain imprisoned.

Unless and until the Iranian theocracy is displaced by a non-sectarian government, the world will suffer from Iran’s malignant actions. President Trump should correct Obama’s tragic mistake of ignoring the forces of democratic change in Iran. Obama’s Iranian policy was ludicrous on its face: by appeasing the Iranian mullahs, and ignoring the home-grown democratic Iranians he thought he would bring positive democratic change to Iran. That’s like saying that by appeasing Hitler with 150 billion dollars and betraying a nascent German democratic revolution, Roosevelt would have empowered the liberal Germans to overthrow Hitler.

Every one of Obama’s catastrophic regional conventional Iranian policies must be reversed. Otherwise, Iran will continue to set the Middle East, and beyond, afire. President Trump must void Obama’s Iranian policy of sanctioning Iran’s malignant regional mode of conventional warfare and his past attempts to curry nuclear favors with a genocidal Iranian Shiite regime bent on regional and global hegemony.

The writer is Chairman of Americans for a Safe Israel (AFSI) and specializes in security issues, has created an original educational 3d Topographic Map System of Israel to facilitate clear understanding of the dangers facing Israel and its water supply. It has been studied by US lawmakers and can be seen at www.marklangfan.com.