AIPAC becoming less effective on US foreign policy: Ex-US senator
The United States will ultimately uphold the nuclear accord with Iran despite intense opposition from Israel and its supporters in Washington, a former US senator and presidential candidate says.
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and other pro-Israel lobbying groups in the US, who have spent millions of dollars to scuttle the agreement, are losing their influence in Washington, said Mike Gravel, a former Democratic US senator from Alaska.
“The majority of the American public is for this deal and that AIPAC has spent so much money to try and reverse that, I think is proving that AIPAC is becoming less effective on American policy,” Gravel told Press TV in a phone interview on Wednesday.
“I’m very optimistic that the United States will go ahead and sustain this agreement,” he added.
A new survey has found that a majority of Americans want US lawmakers in Congress to approve the nuclear agreement with Iran.
According to the survey from the University of Maryland released on Tuesday, 55 percent of respondents said Congress should uphold the nuclear accord.
Congress is reviewing the nuclear agreement and is expected to vote to disapprove of it by September 17.
US President Barack Obama says he is confident that the nuclear accord will go forward despite opposition from congressional Republicans. He is only one vote short in the Senate to sustain his veto.
Gravel, who served two terms in Congress from 1969 to 1981, said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fabricated the false accusations that Iran has military objectives in its nuclear program.
“This whole issue is a fabricated issue by Netanyahu that Iran wanted to get the bomb,” Gravel said.
“Iran has never moved to get the bomb, there’s no intelligence organization who has reported that there’s any effort by Iran to acquire the bomb,” he emphasized.
Israel has publicly opposed the nuclear agreement reached between Iran and the P5+1 group -- the United States, Britain, France, China, Russia and Germany – in Vienna in mid-July.
Obama has repeatedly criticized Netanyahu for his opposition to the accord and his efforts to block it in Congress.
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