Howard Schweber: Iran and the Syrian Gambit: Via Huffington Post .

The U.S. has three key interests with respect to Iran: containing its nuclear program, limiting its reach in the Middle East and, quite possibly, extending Iranian influence in Afghanistan in cooperation with the U.S. These three interests have to be pursued against the ever-shifting backdrop of the protests. At this point, what looks like the most likely outcome of the protests over the election provide both encouraging and cautionary signals. The challenge for Obama has been to recognize both and to respond appropriately while keeping his eye on all three of these balls at once. For this week, at least, Obama and his State Department get an A. Maybe even an A+, but the week is not over yet.

First, where do things stand with the protests? The government's repressive measures appear to be increasingly effective in suppressing the movement to the streets. At the same time, however, there is word that Rafsanjani may have collected enough anti-Khamenei votes in the Assembly of Experts to force a compromise, possibly in the form of a run-off election between Ahmadinejad and Mousavi. At the same time, it seems unlikely that Rafsanjani has the votes to have Khamenei removed outright. The outcome, in other words, looks increasingly like something like a power-sharing agreement between the clerics allied around Rafsanjani and the militarist/nationalists (including plenty of clerics) around Khamenei and Ahmadinejad, in which Khamenei will remain Supreme Leader but the orthodox clerics will get some concessions -- possibly starting with the rumored run-off election -- and will insist on a greater say in how things are done from here on out.
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