No country in the world  — not Syria, not Libya, nor even Saudi Arabia – matters to the near-term price of oil more than Iran.

Saudi Arabia produces more crude, and if and when its ruling dynasty is challenged in the streets by the Sunni majority crude prices will almost certainly explode skyward.

But Saudi Arabia is not engaged in nuclear brinksmanship with the West, and its oil industry hasn’t been crippled by sanctions. Nor has it, like Iran, threatened to close the Persian Gulf and start a wider war if attacked.

It is Iran whose suspected covert nuclear bomb development has been challenged. It is Iran that’s seen production drop to a 25-year low this summer, while exports have been halved in two years by sanctions imposed as punishment for uranium enrichment and attempts to deceive international inspectors.

A peaceful resolution might boost global production capacity by a million barrels a day or more in a relatively short period of time, potentially pressuring oil prices. A military confrontation would almost certainly jump crude prices well past $150 a barrel, shocking the global economy.

The key to the current situation is that is neither stable nor sustainable. Sanctions have robbed Iran of economic growth, made consumer goods and even food staples scarce and ignited inflation estimated at up to 100 percent annually.

The longer the sanctions persist, the weaker the Iranian regime gets and the more ground it loses to Saudi Arabia in their longstanding rivalry for regional dominance.

This is why Iran, as represented by its recently elected president Hasan Rouhani, has waged a charm offensive, officially forswearing nuclear weapons, dialing down threats against Israel and seeking negotiations to end the sanctions.

The Obama Administration has welcomed the opening, which included an exchange of guardedly friendly letters between Rouhani and Obama, though the US has also made it clear that there will be no quick end to the sanctions in exchange for half-measures on nuclear work.

But this peace initiative is fragile, beset on both sides by hardliners who want to see it fail. For example, Rouhani avoided a meeting with Obama on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly where both men spoke Tuesday, because such a meeting might have given ammunition to his hardline critics.

Similarly, even though Obama told the world Tuesday that the US would explore Iran’s willingness to strike a deal he faces deep skepticism from conservatives in Congress as well as the Israeli and Saudi allies.

Next week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu goes to the UN to accuse Iran and Rouhani of playing for time while it acquires nuclear weapons.  And while Israel is hardly unanimous on the proper policy toward Iran, Netanyahu does possess a veto over any peace process in the form of the Israeli capability to strike Iran independently of US intentions.

Since Netanyahu is on record to the effect that a bad deal is worse than no deal at all, he may be tempted to order a strike should he conclude that the US is about to be had.

So the key takeaway is that while the sanctions regime isn’t stable, neither is any attempt to break out of it. It will face odds as long as the history of mutual suspicion and enmity between the antagonists, made longer by the presence on both sides of powerful people who want no deal of any kind.

In other words, expect no discount on crude until a comprehensive deal has been sealed and an Israeli attack definitively ruled out. It could happen, but not any time soon. And in the meantime conflicts in the Middle East, including the threatened US attack on the Syrian regime backed by Iran, could yet derail the peacemaking.

Israel and Saudi Arabia would like nothing more than to continue weakening Iran with sanctions until its economy falls apart and the ruling regime falls. Iran sees its nuclear capabilities as insurance against subversion by its enemies.  These realities are still huge obstacles to peace,  despite the hopeful words spoken this week in New York.