Apropos of John Bolton's op-ed in today's Wall Street Journal, asking "What If Israel Strikes Iran?" here's a persuasive prebuttal from CFR analyst Steven Cook:

Every three weeks or so, within a few hours of one Israeli leader or another making a statement about the threat of Iran's nuclear program, my phone starts lighting up. It's never the press, which has become inured to Israel's periodic warnings. Rather, it is nervous hedge fund managers and securities research analysts calling to find out if this is "it." Are the Israelis on the verge of attacking Iran's nuclear facilities? No doubt, should Israel launch airstrikes against the Bushehr reactor or the uranium enrichment facilities at Natanz, it would be a market-shaking event. "No," I assure the financial whiz kids on the other end of the line, explaining that "if Israel's leaders were going to strike, they would not be broadcasting it to the world." The phone will then go quiet for a few weeks until the next time Shimon Peres, Ehud Barak, Benjamin Netanyahu, an Israeli security consultant, or my cousin Ari warns that time is running out. 

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"Ahmadi bye-bye." That's one of the chants that supporters of Iranian presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi were yelling Monday when they decked out in green and formed a stunning human chain along a 12-mile-long arterial road that runs through Tehran.

Many Iranians are fed up with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad -- the man who has presided over a crumbling economy and damaged Iran's international standing. They head to the polls Friday to select one of four candidates, and if the outcome is "Ahmadi bye-bye," the most-likely new president would be Mousavi, a relative unknown until recently.

FP has an Iran package to keep you in the know. Check it out:

Iran's Presidential Wannabes: Meet the four men vying to lead the Islamic Republic and learn where they stand on foreign policy and domestic politics.

Iran's Potato Revolution: Former Prime Minister Mir Hossein Mousavi has spent the past two decades out of the public eye, pursuing his interests in architecture and painting. Now he's the man most likely to dethrone Ahmadinejad.

Who's Winning Iran's Google War? To understand Iranian politics, ask a search engine. Over the past 90 days, Farsi-language Google searches for "Mousavi" have increased 1,300 percent.

Iran's New Revolution: Candidate Mousavi may have less charisma than Michael Dukakis, but the rock star has Iranian youth screaming.

Ahmadi Bye-Bye in Iran? A photo review of the best moments from Iran's wild campaign.

Photo: Majid/Getty Images

The AP's recent report about Iranian reformist presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi paints an optimistic picture, describing enthusiastic voter outreach campaigns and other exercises of political freedom the country isn't typically known for. This is all very promising—both for Iran and the United States. But the report misses some fundamental points.

Roughly 46 million Iranians will be eligible to vote on June 12. According to Mousavi's campaign manager, the chances of Mahmoud Ahmedinejad losing the race shoot up to 65 percent if voter turnout exceeds 32 million. By contrast, he says, the odds of a regime change plummet to just 35 percent if voter turnout is limited to 27 million or fewer. Might this election hinge on five million voters?

If his calculations are correct, a best-case scenario for Mousavi would have to count on 70 percent of eligible voters showing up to the polls. That's an astronomical number, considering how badly turnout in recent years has been slumping.

Still, keep your eyes out for a surprise—this presidential race is fast becoming one of the most energetic and competitive in the nation's history.

Mohammad Khatami isn't running for president of Iran, but the former president still seems to be constantly in the headlines these days. President Ahmadinejad recently attacked his predecessor for bringing shame on the country. RFE/RL reports:

 

The president told Iran's state radio that Khatami’s 2005 visit to France was one of the saddest days of his life, because Khatami "had to climb several flights of stairs" in the Elysee Palace to reach Jacque Chirac, the then French president.

Ahmadinejad said he found it “insulting” to Iranians.

Oh snap! But Khatami wasn't just going to take that of course:

Khatami fought back, writing in the "Hayate Nou" daily, saying that the real insult was thrown during Ahmadinejad’s trip to Columbia University in New York in 2007, when Ahmadinejad was introduced to the audience as a “cruel and petty dictator.”

As for the Elysee Palace incident, Khatami wrote that actually Chirac had descended a few flights of stairs -- breaching official protocol -- to greet him.

Between this and last week's Azeri-gate, it certainly seems as if Ahmadinejad's supporters are trying their best to keep the focus on Khatami rather than the opposition who's actually running, Mir Hussein Moussavi. It does make sense that it would be easier to attack Khatami, who is in fact quite popular and well-known in the West, as a sell-out of the Iranian revolution that Moussavi, who was a favorite of Ayatollah Khomeini and in many ways on the conservative end of the Iranian political spectrum. 

Khatami certainly has a right to defend himself from Ahmadinejad's petty attacks, but the best way for him to help the candidate he supports (who does seem to be gaining some momentum) may be to lay low for a bit. 

Getty Images

Guy Dinmore of the Financial Times reports that Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini is planning is flying to Tehran today to meet with his Iranian counterpart, and possibly President Ahmadinejad. This is a break from the official EU policy of avoiding high-level nation-to-nation contact with the Iranians:

Mr Frattini will be the most senior official from a European government to visit Iran in the four years since Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad was elected president.

Western diplomats expressed dismay that Mr Frattini intended to break EU ranks. They also said that Washington had not given Rome a “green light”. Allies have warned Mr Frattini that he risks handing a propaganda victory to Iran’s hardline president less than a month before he stands for re-election.

EU governments had agreed to shun Iran because of its refusal to halt its uranium enrichment programme in line with United Nations resolutions. The decision to keep contacts limited to Javier Solana, the EU’s foreign policy chief who last visited Tehran a year ago, was reinforced by Mr Ahmadi-Nejad’s rhetorical attacks on Israel.

Dinmore also notes that Italy has long resented being left out of the "EU3" group of Britain, France, and Germany that has dominated decision-making on Iranian issues. 

Frattini's diplomatic freelancing raises some questions about the EU's ability ability to present a unified foreign-policy front. Recently-departed EU President Mirek Topolanek said earlier this month that the one regret of his tumultuous term was not keeping Nicolas Sarkozy on a shorter leash. The French president's shuttle diplomacy in the Caucasus and the Middle East "gave the impression that the French were dominating the show.” Given this impression, it's not exactly surprising that countries like Italy would look to pull off some diplomatic coups of their own.

It looks like the speech by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that prompted a walkout at the U.N. anti-racism conference was actually the watered-down version:

An official Iranian text of Ahmadinejad's address to the conference on Monday referred to "the ambiguous and dubious question of the Holocaust". However, when the president delivered the speech he omitted the phrase, referring more vaguely to "abuse of the Holocaust". He also dropped a segment about Zionist "penetration" of western society.

So how did Iran respond to U.S. President Barack Obama's midnight overture?

Predictably, by kicking him in the teeth.

Speaking before an audience of thousands in Mashhad, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei said Saturday that "changes in words" wouldn't be enough to recast the relationship.

So far, Khamenei sees more of the same. "We do not have any record of the new U.S. president," he told the crowd. "We are observing, watching and judging. If you change, we will also change our behavior. If you do not change, we will be the same nation as 30 years ago."

The Associated Press, however, sees a potential opening in this remark by Khamenei: ''Should you change, our behavior will change too.''

It remains to be seen just how much change from the U.S. side would be sufficient. Khamenei's advice? "Avoid an arrogant tone, avoid arrogant behavior, avoid bullying behavior, do not interfere in nations' affairs, be contented with your own share, do not define interests extra-territorially all over the world."

Here's what Iran's president had to say at a summit of the Central Asia's 10-nation Economic Cooperation Organization:

"After the collapse of the closed socialist economy, the capitalist economy is also on the verge of collapse," Ahmadinejad said in a speech.

"The liberal economy and the free market have failed," he said, pointing to the use of "thousands of billions of dollars" to bail out Western banks and companies.

Ahmadinejad proposed a single currency for the region to facilitate trade, though I'm not sure if even he'd go as far as Kazakh President (and fellow ECO member) Nursultan Nazarbayev's global "acmetalism" idea. The ECO definitely seems like a contender for the world's most outside-the-box regional trade federation.

With a delegation of American movie industry officials, including actresses Annette Benning and Alfre Woodard, visiting Tehran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's "art and cinema advisor" Javad Shamaqdari has decided that it would be a good time to demand an apology for Hollywood's "insulting" treatment of Iran. Particularly offensive are the films 300 and the The Wrestler:

The film "300," portrays the battle of Thermopylae in 480 B.C., in which a force of 300 Spartans held off a massive Persian army at a mountain pass in Greece for three days. It angered many Iranians for the way Persians are depicted as decadent, sexually flamboyant and evil in contrast to the noble Greeks.

Iranians also criticised "The Wrestler" starring Mickey Rourke as a rundown professional wrestler who is preparing for a rematch with his old nemesis 'The Ayatollah'.

During a fight scene, "The Ayatollah" tries to choke Rourke with an Iranian flag before Rourke pulls the flagpole away, breaks it and throws it into the cheering crowd.

Shamaqdari's case is pretty weak here. It's telling that neither of these movies has anything to do with contemporary Iran (The symbolism of 300 is debateable but that movie should only be offensive to people who aren't legally brain dead.) and I'm having a hard time thinking of another recent film that was in any way insulting to the country.

As The Atlantic's Ross Douthat has pointed out, Hollywood has generally shied away from Middle Eastern villains in the post-9/11 era compared with the 1980s and '90s. 

Then again, this is the same country that accused Harry Potter of being a Zionist stooge so I'm not really sure if logic is the best response.

The Iranian elections just got a whole lot more interesting. Mohammed Khatami, the reformist former president, has announced that he'll be challening Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in June. Nasser Karimi for the AP:

Khatami's decision to run against Ahmadinejad could significantly shake up Iran's politics, appealing to citizens disillusioned by the country's failing economy and Ahmadinejad's staunch anti-U.S. foreign policy.

What remains to be seen is to what extent Khatami's entry into the race will energize young Iranians -- especially in Tehran -- who have become deeply disillusioned with politics. And, of course, Ahmadinejad and his hardline allies will probably stop at nothing to win. As the LA Times notes, the president has the Interior Ministry firmly under his thumb, and Khatami is not known as a fighter.

Another big question now: How will Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei play it? In ideology and temperament, he's much closer to Ahmadinejad, who he supported in 2005. But Khamenei's expressed some displeasure with the incumbent over the past year and he certainly doesn't want to be associated with the lousy Iranian economy. Maybe he'll decide to sit this one out?

BEHROUZ MEHRI/AFP/Getty Images

The Financial Times reported this morning that Mohammad Khatami is "expected to announce that he will contest the presidential elections in June," according to a handful of reformist politicians who seem to be trying to create a fait accompli by talking to the press.

So far, the moderate former Iranian president hasn't announced squat and seems to be hoping that Mir-Hossein Moussavi, an ex-prime minister also in the reformist camp, will run in his stead.

If he indeed runs -- pass. the. popcorn. As one leading Iranian reformist told the FT, "If it is Khatami versus Ahmadi-Nejad, this will be the most interesting election in the world."

But I'll believe it when I see it. Khatami seems like a good guy, but the rap on him has always been that he shies away from conflict. Does he have the stomach for political hardball? I'm not so sure, but as someone who's fascinated by Iranian politics, I'll be watching closely.

Though Iran's leadership has maintained its verbal assault against Israel for its invasion of Gaza, they have also made sure that their rhetoric does not lead to a violence by Iranian citizens. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei stepped in yesterday to ban hardline students who had volunteered to serve as suicide bombers from traveling to Israel. Over 70,000 students had apparently signed up to serve, rallied by exhortations from President Ahmadinejad's hardline allies. This has led some to speculate about the existence of a rift between Ahmadinejad and Khamenei.

Not so fast. Ahmadinejad might be reckless, but there is no evidence that he sincerely desired tens of thousands of Iranian suicide bombers to descend on Israel -- a step that would virtually guarantee a war with Israel and the United States.

"[The situation in Gaza] is embarassing to Iran," Carnegie Endowment fellow Karim Sadjadpour told me. "Despite paying lip service to its Palestinian allies, it can really do nothing." Like Khamenei, Ahmadinejad likely encouraged widespread protests in Iran and the exhortations to fight Israel as a symbolic resistance, rather than a serious battle plan.

That is not to say that Ahmadinejad enjoys Khamenei's unyielding support. The deteriorating economic situation has damaged Ahmadinejad's domestic popularity, a fact not lost on Khamenei. Sadjadpour characterized the relationship between the two Iranian leaders as a "master-student relationship."

Ahmadinejad owed much of his success in the 2005 presidential election to Khamenei's support. Khamenei can quietly swing elections through his influence over the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and the Basij -- a volunteer paramilitary corps -- or disqualify potential presidential candidates through the Council of Guardians. As the Iranian presidential elections approach, analysts will be looking very carefully for which way this most important Iranian voter is leaning.

BEHROUZ MEHRI/AFP/Getty Images

I just noticed that the Jerusalem Post has a top-level link on its Web site called "Iranian Threat":

Kind of unusual for a newspaper, no?

Haaretz, in contrast, plays it straight:

UPDATE: A journo friend in Beirut writes in:

I am loving the Foreign Policy blog as always, but I am curious exactly how Haaretz "plays it straight" with sections titled "Diplomacy" and "Defense"?

I'm embarrassed to admit that I didn't really notice this myself until I'd been reading Haaretz for months. It's still the best source I've come across for Israel-Palestine related news.

There seems to be a consensus in Washington about the United States' need to engage in talks with Iran. But how and when? Peter Baker reports on the debate brewing over this latter question:

Two leading research groups plan to issue a report Tuesday calling on him to move quickly to open direct diplomatic talks with Iran without preconditions.

The report by the groups, the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution and the Council on Foreign Relations, urges Mr. Obama to put all issues on the table with Iran, including its nuclear program. The proposal calls for "swift early steps" to exploit a "honeymoon" period between his inauguration and the internal political jockeying preceding Iran's presidential elections in June.

The report breaks with experts on Iran who say Mr. Obama should wait until a clear winner emerges in Iran and calls instead for "treating the Iranian state as a unitary actor rather than endeavoring to play its contending factions against one another." The report also calls on him to back Israeli peace talks with Syria.

Karim Sadjadpour, a prominent Iran analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, has been arguing that the United States should "refrain from any grand overtures to Tehran" until after the Iranian elections. Sadjadpour worries that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the current president, would otherwise be able to say that his hardline policies brought the Great Satan to its knees.

The trick, then, is to show enough leg that you help bring a more responsible government to power in Tehran, but not so much that the United States looks weak. A delicate task, no doubt.

UPDATE: The report is here.