A second extension of the nuclear talks with Iran is the option favored by all sides, including Israel.

Anyone who knows how complicated the negotiations are, technically and politically, understands that the temporary interim agreement reached in Geneva a year ago is the maximum compromise the world powers (the five permanent Security Council members and Germany) are able to achieve with Iran.

The attempt to reach a permanent agreement which would completely remove the risk of Iran becoming militarily nuclearized, in exchange for a removal of the sanctions, failed because Iran is unprepared to give up its status as a nuclear threshold state and is prepared to pay a heavy economic price for that.

Moreover, it still wants to shorten as much as possible the period of time needed to “break through” towards a nuclear weapon, so that the Western intelligence will not have enough time to discover that Iran has already begun producing an atomic weapon and in order to neutralize a military action which would stop the ayatollahs before they cross the finish line.

But the West isn’t giving up either. Speaking at a press conference in Vienna, US Secretary of State John Kerry clarified that he and his allies hoped the situation would change for the better in seven months’ time. How? Kerry implied that there is more to the progress made in the past year of negotiations than what meets the eye, and he may also be hoping that processes within the Iranian society will lead to a change in supreme leader Ali Khamenei’s tough stance.

Read the article in full at Ynet.