RETARGETING IRAN

The follow-up to Targeting Iran (2007).

In a Q&A format about the continued demonization of Iran by the U.S., Barsamian enlists the expertise of five longtime observers: Noam Chomsky, Azadeh Moaveni, Trita Parsi, Ervand Abrahamian, and Nader Hashemi. In the wake of the Trump administration's canceling of Obama's Iran nuclear deal (aka the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, adopted in 2015) as well as the recent U.S. assassination of a prominent Iranian general, Barsamian gets at the key to the deterioration of the relationship between the two nations. His expert contributors dig into a variety of topics: the general breakdown in relations since Iran’s Islamic Revolution of 1979; the failure of U.S. sanctions; the gains in education and civil rights for women in Iran even as censorship and repression have tightened; and the outsized role of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps. Parsi, who advised Obama on the JCPOA deal, notes the role Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had in unwittingly pushing the agreement along: "He thought that he could force the U.S. to take military action, but he underestimated Obama and he misread the American public, which has been adamantly against another war." Abrahamian, author and professor emeritus of Iranian and Middle Eastern history and politics, offers a wise overview of Iran, its history, and political makeup. Longtime MIT professor Chomsky argues that the U.S. has no right to impose sanctions on Iran or force it to "capitulate" in any way. Furthermore, he notes, the U.S. under Trump is now “the world’s leading rogue state.” Moaveni, a journalist, writer (Lipstick Jihad, etc.), and academic, speaks on women and society, and Hashemi, director of the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Denver, discusses Iranian politics and the reform movement, noting that “we are now witnessing the worst moment in U.S.–Iran relations in over forty years.”

The myriad topics sometimes blur together, but the discussion is astute and relevant.