He came in and he made it clear that we would engage with Iran if Iran was willing to change its behavior.
We do, however, believe that there is time and space to pursue diplomacy, to pressure the Iranian regime, to sanction it further to get it to change its behavior.
But I am focused on -- I mean, we are focused on working with our partners internationally to take steps that will persuade or compel the Libyan government to change its behavior.
For that reason and others, we believe there is time and space to pursue a diplomatic path, a path that intensifies the sanctions, intensifies the isolation, and attempts, through unified international action, to get the Iranian regime to change its behavior.
And if Iran is unwilling to constructively take part in that and change its behavior, then, as the President said in the State of the Union, and as the Russians and the French and the Americans said in a letter to the IAEA today, not changing their behavior will have consequences.
First, our approach to this has been to galvanize and mobilize the international community to make it clear that Iranian behavior is the issue, to pressure and sanction Iran for its failure to live up to its international obligations, and to ratchet up that pressure and increase the sanctions on Iran to the point where we hope Iran will change its behavior.
So I don't think there will be -- I think the Israelis understand the policy approach that this President has taken and what our view is of what Iranian behavior is about, what our view is of the time and space that still is there for us to continue to pursue the diplomatic path -- isolating Iran, pressuring Iran to change its behavior.
Rather than look inward and evaluate how its own behavior could change for the better, in hopes of avoiding another implosion, Wall Street has spent tens of millions lobbying to water down new regulations called for by the Dodd Frank legislation.
The ratcheting up of sanctions will continue, because the only change in that effort will come -- if it comes -- with a change in Iranian behavior with regards to its nuclear programs.
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