Losing an Enemy: Obama, Iran and the Triumpf of Diplomacy by Trita Parsi is a detailed, step-by-step account of the heated debates for closing the Iran deal. Parsi, one of the founder and former president of the American-Iranian Council, is a frequent editorialist and commenter on issues pertaining to diplomatic developments in the Middle East, particularly Iran.
For someone interested to read more about the diplomatic steps and proceedings leading to the conclusion of this unique agreement, between two countries whose diplomatic relations were frozen for decades, the book is an useful read. How Obama succeeded to dupe his European partners while working hard to achieve the deal through mysterious ways, including by using a very secret Oman channel, is, among others, an important element to understand the post-Cold War diplomatic games.
The author´s appreciation for the Iranian top diplomat, Javad Sharif, is clear and compared to a certain part of the local Iranian elites, he certainly may deserve the praise. On the other hand, Sharif himself acknowledged recently in the Iranian Parliament, on an exasperating tone, how much he and his ´diplomats´ worked together to achieve political and ´revolutionary´ aims endeavoured by the militant side of the regime, including the late Qasem Soleimani. In a plain translation, diplomatic positions and outposts of Iran were used for undiplomatic aims, such as planning terror attacks or fuelling Hizbollah and its proxies. Candidly, in the book, Parsi mentions Hizbullah, which is funded regularly with money and ideology by the regime in Tehran, as ´a close ally of Iran´. For an academic approach, I would have expected a critical approach on Sharif and its interesting diplomatic game.
Also a critical stance is missing when it comes to Israel. Clearly, during the negotiations, the long-term prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu was a hawkish opposer of it, and a supporter of military strikes against Iran, despite the clear opposition of the Israeli intelligence and military establishment. But not all that glitters is gold and taking ad litteram Netanyahu´s declarations and accusing him and the ´lobby´ - that is not called throughoutly this but described in clear terms as one - does not bring any contribution to understanding the complexity of the problem. Blaming Netanyahu and the pro-Israeli voices for the mishaps of an international system is wrong. Some people simply deserve each other.
As I had the book in audio format, a sidenote is for the pronunciation of non-English words: from Madrid to Persian and Hebrew names, the results are horrendous. Like the content of the book was not deceiving enough.
Rating: 2 stars
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