Rosner's Domain: Rosen's blog: Rumored CIA Pick Soft on Iran

Steve Rosen spent the last couple of years fighting the (legal) battle of his life. Rosen is one of the two former AIPAC employees charged with conspiracy to communicate information related to national defense. In short: he is the defendant in the so-called AIPAC trial.

But Rosen is also an experienced Washington insider. He still has many friends in the city (but not as many as before the trial, as you might expect), and some contacts. He still goes to events in think tanks around town, and keeps his ears open. Now - he also writes, sharing his thoughts and bits of information in the "Obama Mideast Monitor".

Here's one of his latest posts: Rumored CIA Pick John Brennan Soft on Iran, Hezbollah:

John Brennan, who heads the Obama team managing the transition process for the intelligence community, is rumored to be Obama's pick to head the CIA. Brennan published a long article on Iran in July 2008, expressing a benign view of the Islamic Republic and harsh criticism of U.S. policies that he believes have driven Iran in the wrong direction. Excerpts follow:

"Notwithstanding the fiery rhetoric coming from Iranian officials such as President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian theocracy has made much more limited use of terrorism over the past decade than it did in the first twenty years of its reign....Although it would represent a significant act of domestic political courage, U.S. national security would be best served if Washington publicly acknowledged and explored the roots of this shift in Iranian state support for terrorist activities....While it may serve some narrow political agendas to lump together a wide variety of Iranian policies and actions that are antithetical to U.S. policy aims under the rubric of state-sponsored terrorism, U.S. strategic interests require a more nuanced analysis of and less absolutist approach to this problem....Instead of pursuing a nuanced strategy that could have allowed flexibility in U.S. policy, the Bush administration regrettably opted to conduct its activities under the overarching banner of "The Global War on Terrorism" and declared it would make no distinction between terrorist operatives and their state sponsors....Despite a December 2007 National Intelligence Estimate that assessed "in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program," the administration indicated no interest in easing the pressure on Iran (National Intelligence Council 2007)....The bellicose volleys coming from the chief spokesmen of both the American and Iranian governments have served to widen the rift that exists between the two countries and to make constructive engagement virtually impossible in the current climate...An improvement in U.S.-Iranian relations will not take place overnight, and the new U.S. administration must be willing to exercise strategic patience....It would not be foolhardy, however, for the United States to tolerate, and even to encourage, greater assimilation of Hezbollah into Lebanon's political system, a process that is subject to Iranian influence....The best hope for maintaining this trend and for reducing the influence of violent extremists within the organization—as well as the influence of extremist Iranian officials who view Hezbollah primarily as a pawn of Tehran—is to increase Hezbollah's stake in Lebanon's struggling democratic processes."

I'm going to be a reader.