Obama Moves to Prevent Rift With Allies Over Iran Deal [View all]

[Purveyor]

By Mike Dorning and Margaret Talev - Nov 25, 2013

President Barack Obama moved to keep a deal with Iran over its nuclear program from being undermined, as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said lawmakers would weigh whether new sanctions are needed.

“We cannot close the door on diplomacy,” Obama said during a speech today in San Francisco. “Tough talk and bluster may be the easy thing to do politically,” though it is not right for national security. The agreement reached over the weekend will place the first real constraints on Iran’s nuclear program in a decade, he said.

Reid said today that members would “take a look at this to see if we need stronger sanctions” after the Senate returns from its Thanksgiving holiday break on Dec. 9.

Obama’s aides have been calling lawmakers urging them to hold off passing more sanctions against Iran. The president spoke by phone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who called the six-month interim deal with Iran “an historic mistake.”

The agreement among the U.S. and other world powers with Iran provides a foreign policy achievement for a president whose standing has been damaged by the flawed rollout of his health-care law. Any political boost may be limited because the accord is temporary and the negotiating partner isn’t trusted by the U.S. public.

Diplomatic Breakthrough

For now, the deal averts the risk of another U.S. military action in the Middle East and represents a breakthrough in relations between the U.S. and Iran 34 years after the Islamic revolution broke ties.

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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-11-24/obama-moves-to-prevent-rift-with-allies-over-iran-deal.html