There may be some clearing of the air by the time this article appears in print. The air would clear if the ongoing negotiations hosted by Oman lead to some understanding between Iran on the one hand and the United States and Israel on the other. This would settle down the region I have been calling the extended Middle East by including in it Afghanistan, Pakistan and the countries of Central Asia. As discussed below, an understanding between the contesting parties would bring much-needed peace to the area and have the policymakers concentrate their attention on improving the lives of their large citizenry.

In an article titled "A Tough but Sensible Way to Solve the Iran Problem', Bret Stephens, a columnist who writes for The New York Times, quoted from the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, according to which Iran had enriched uranium to 60 per cent purity and might be able to enrich enough uranium to make five fission weapons in less than two weeks.

Stephens argued that the real problem with Iran is not that it would go nuclear, but its geopolitical ambitions and raging anti-Americanism, as well as its long record of supporting terrorism. He argues that there are two paths to dealing with the Iran situation. One is to go back to the sanctions-for-nukes deal that was the basis of the agreement reached by the Barack Obama administration in 2015 of which Trump pulled out when he first took office. The other is normalisation of relations with Iran by the United States.

Normalisation means the resumption of full diplomatic ties between Tehran and Washington, including the reopening of embassies that have been shuttered for........

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