Trump’s confrontation with Iran will backfire: Commentator

The administration of US President Donald Trump is trying to create a confrontation with Iran over the 2015 nuclear deal but it will backfire, says Brian Becker, an American political commentator and antiwar activist. 

Becker, national coordinator of the ANSWER Coalition, a protest umbrella group consisting of many antiwar and civil rights organizations, made the remarks in a phone interview with Press TV on Friday.

On Thursday, Donald Trump accused Iran of not acting in keeping with the international nuclear deal, 10 days before the US president has to report to Congress whether or not Tehran is complying with the 2015 accord.

"They have not lived up to the spirit of the agreement," Trump declared during a meeting with senior military leaders in the Cabinet Room of the White House in Washington, DC.

Trump has desperately sought a pretext to scrap or weaken the nuclear pact, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), and get rid of the limits it imposes on the US ability to pursue more hostile policies against Iran.

The Republican president faces an October 15 deadline for certifying that Iran is complying with the deal. Such certification is needed by US law every 90 days in order for Congress to continue to withhold nuclear-related sanctions against Iran, itself a US commitment under the JCPOA. If he argues that Iran is not in compliance, that could cause an American withdrawal from the international pact.

PressTV-Iran has not lived up to 'spirit' of deal: Trump

US President Donald Trump has accused Iran of not not living up to the spirit of the international nuclear deal.

Becker said, “Trump has made it clear during the 2016 election campaign and now since he has become the president of the United States that he plans to try to sabotage the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in order to create a new phase or stage of confrontation between the United States and Iran.”

“The whole world knows and even the US government was forced to admit that Iran is complying with its part in the JCPOA. And we also know that the United States is the non-compliant because the United States is adding to gratuitous sanctions already against Iran and this by the way is not simply Donald Trump but a by-partisan effort including the Democratic Party elites and the Republican Party establishment,” he stated.

“What we have here is a premeditated action on the part of the US government to try to create confrontation with Iran and I believe this will backfire, because Iran has complied with the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action and because the other signers to the agreement know that Iran has complied,” the analyst said.

“What we will see at the end of day is that United States government and not Iran is further isolated as a consequence of the unilateral US action by the Trump administration,” he noted.

PressTV-180 Democrats ask Trump to certify Iran nuclear deal

At least 180 members of the US Congress have called on President Donald Trump to certify the Iran nuclear deal.

In a letter to Trump on Wednesday, at least 180 members of the US Congress called on him to endorse the Iran nuclear deal, saying an American withdrawal from the pact would be against the interests of the US and its allies.

The Trump administration has twice so far certified Iran’s compliance with the deal, but if he refuses to do that for a third time, then the Republican-controlled Congress will have 60 days to decide whether to re-impose sanctions waived under the deal. That would allow Congress to effectively decide whether to kill the deal.

This is while the other parties to the deal, along with the entire international community, have thrown their weight behind the accord, praising the Islamic Republic for its full commitment to its side of the bargain.

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