Iran will hold high-level nuclear talks with six major world powers at the United Nations this week.  The charm offensive will include a sit down with American Secretary of State John Kerry and Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, the highest-level contact in more than three decades.

The meetings will take place on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York.  In addition to the former “Great Satan”, Iran will also meet with the rest of the permanent members of the Security Council; Britain, China, France, Russia; plus Germany.  Those six nations are known as the “P5+1 Group”.

Iran’s new President Hassan Rouhani has said he is ready to restart stalled nuclear talks without preconditions, and last week emphasized that Iran does not plan to build nuclear weapons.  Iran is under international economic sanctions because of suspicions of that program.

The US is cautioning that decades of mistrust is not going to be suddenly resolved because of a chat on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. 

Meanwhile, Israeli officials are worried that it could be isolated because of the lingering apprehension manifested by the scornful attitude Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has displayed towards Rouhani, seen by many as much more reasonable than his bombastic predecessor and representing the first real chance to ratchet down the regional tension.

“One should not be taken in by Rouhani’s deceptive words,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement last week, “The same Rouhani boasted in the past how he deceived the international community with nuclear talks, even as Iran was continuing with its nuclear program.”

Even less diplomatically, Netanyahu has said Rouhani is “a wolf in sheep’s clothing.”