In a statement posted to Apple’s Web site on Thursday, Apple CEO Steve Jobs defined Apple’s objections to supporting Flash in the iPhone OS.

Outlining six major points, Jobs explains why Apple and Adobe are at odds over Flash support in iPhone OS. He takes issue with Adobe’s characterization that the decision is “primarily business driven,” and explains the technical rationale behind Apple’s decision.

Points addressed by Jobs include Flash’s proprietary nature, compared to Apple’s support of open standards including HTML5, CSS and JavaScript; issues surrounding reliability, security and performance of Flash; its effect on mobile device battery life and a user interface designed for mice, not touch screens.

“Adobe also wants developers to adopt Flash to create apps that run on our mobile devices,” referring to Adobe’s Creative Suite 5 software. Apple’s revised iPhone developer agreement prohibits developers from using these tools to create iPhone apps.

“We know from painful experience that letting a third party layer of software come between the platform and the developer ultimately results in sub-standard apps and hinders the enhancement and progress of the platform,” said Jobs.

“Our motivation is simple – we want to provide the most advanced and innovative platform to our developers, and we want them to stand directly on the shoulders of this platform and create the best apps the world has ever seen,” he added.

Calling Flash an artifact of “the PC era” designed for PCs and mice, Jobs referred to “the mobile era” as being driven by low power devices, touch interfaces and open Web standards, “all areas where Flash falls short.”

“Perhaps Adobe should focus more on creating great HTML5 tools for the future, and less on criticizing Apple for leaving the past behind,” he concluded.