So we'll just add 168 Iranian lives to the cost of the West's century-long effort to pressure the Middle East to accept a Jewish state contrary to the values and sensibilities of nearly every non-Jewish person in the region.
Iranians will immediately connect this crash to the US embargo on airplane parts. One short term effect will be an emotional anti-Western reaction. Parties in Iran calling for reconciliation with the US will be weakened and those opposing it will be strengthened by the short term reaction. Another short term reaction will be that the election dispute will be pushed out of people's attention.
There is also the possibility that the plane was downed by Iranian separatist forces supported by the US and or Israel. If that is the case, or if for any reason it appears that it may be the case, then those who hope for semi-open hostility between the US and Iran will get their wish.
We all mourn for the 168 people who died and their families and hope for as soon as possible an end to the hypocritical US policies that indirectly were responsible for the tragedy.
