US and Israel planning large exercises at end of six month deal

:US and Israel planning large exercises at end of six month deal 

Israel Chris Emb Jeru.  28-Nov-13

TIME magazine reported on Thursday that at the end of the six-month period set down by a recent agreement between Iran and the P5+1 nuclear powers (US, UK, France, Russia, China and Germany) designed to resolve the crisis over Iran’s renegade nuclear program, a large military training exercise will be carried out involving forces of Israel and the US.  “[The exercise] is going to be big,” an Israeli officer said. “The wind from the Americans into the Israeli sails is, ‘We will maintain our capability to strike in Iran, and one of the ways we show it is to train. It will send signals both to Israel and to the Iranians that we are maintaining our capabilities in the military option. The atmosphere is we have to do it big time, we have to do a big show of capabilities and connections.” 

TIME also quoted the Israeli source as saying that the Jewish State has made a “strategic decision to continue to make noise.” 

The report came as senior diplomats from France and the UK visited Israel to consult with Israeli security, defense and intelligence officials about the negotiations and the plan for an endgame with Iran. US Secretary of State John Kerry, who is due to return to Jerusalem next week, also made a video address aimed at Congress and the American people on Wednesday, addressing the negotiations and the Obama Administration’s plans going forward. 

Elsewhere, US State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters Tuesday that the six-month countdown has not yet begun, and that the next phase will feature “a continuation of technical discussions at a working level so that we can essentially tee up the implementation of the agreement.” 

The next day, Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, told Iran’s Parliament that the Islamic Republic will continue construction work at the Arak heavy water plant, a direct violation of the agreement that was announced last Saturday. Iranian officials have also said the US mis-represented the deal saying it included things that Iran had not in fact agreed to. 

"The agreement is silent on the manufacturing of remaining key components of the reactor and its continued heavy-water production," former chief UN nuclear inspector Olli Heinonen wrote in an analysis. "Technically, such efforts are not reasonable if the goal is either to dismantle the reactor or modify it to a more proliferation-resistant, smaller light-water reactor as one of the alternative paths of producing isotopes for medical and industrial purposes." 

However, on Thursday Iranian officials issued an invitation for UN inspectors to visit the Arak facility on 8 December.