Senate Republicans Write To Biden Demanding Answers On Iran Deal
A group of 26 US Republican senators sent a letter to President Joe Biden Friday demanding answers on its controversial money for hostages deal with Iran.
A group of 26 US Republican senators sent a letter to President Joe Biden Friday demanding answers on its controversial money for hostages deal with Iran.
US Senator Jim Risch (R-Idaho), ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Tim Scott (R-R-SC), Tom Cotton (R-Ark) and Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.) were among the signatories of the letter to the White House.
Earlier this month It was announced that the Islamic Republic of Iran released five US dual nationals held in prison on trumped-up charges have been released into house arrest pending Iran receiving around $6 billion of its frozen funds in South Korea. The White House has to waive its sanctions to allow Seoul to free up the money.
Immediately, lawmakers, former officials and many Iranian Americans began to voice strong criticism of the White House decision, that would provide a financial relief to the Iranian regime while it engages in systematic human rights violations and destabilizing activities against other countries.
The 26 senators wrote to President Biden that a $400 million cash payment by the Obama administration in 2016 to free hostages held by Iran set a dangerous precedent of more hostage-taking, and “Seven years later, the current administration is providing a ransom payment worth at least fifteen times that amount to the world’s largest state sponsor of terror, in yet another violation of the United States’ long-standing ‘no concessions’ policy.”
Many media reports have indicated that the administration in effect has released more money, with allowing Iraq to free up to $11 billion held by its banks, while the reason for that decision is being kept secret by the administration. Many sources are reporting that the US is holding secret talks with Iran to reach an informal and unwritten deal to put a cap on its uranium enrichment, and the hostage release deal is just the first step.
The administration so far has denied any nuclear deal and insists that the unblocked funds can only be used by Iran to import food and medicine. However, the money will go to Iranian bank accounts in Qatar, a close Iranian ally in euros and it is not clear how much leverage the United States will have on oversee the disbursement of the funds.
The senators who signed the letter stated, “We are also worried that your administration is attempting to sidestep Congress and pursue other pathways to financially compensate Iran in an attempt to renegotiate a successor to the ill-fated 2015 nuclear deal. Any agreement with the Iranian regime that entails financial reward for malign behavior is wholly unacceptable.”
They went on to ask the administration if the release of the assets from South Korea violates existing US sanctions. “Will the President issue a waiver and required report to Congress consistent with Section 1245 of the FY2012 National Defense Authorization Act?”
They also argued that the released cash, even if not delivered directly to Iran, is fungible and asked, “How can your departments guarantee that the funds will only be used for humanitarian purposes and will not free up additional resources that the Iranian regime can use to support terrorist networks and weapons proliferation, or increase its nuclear enrichment activities?”
The senators, representing more than half of all Republicans in the Senate, also asked several other questions about other possible secret deals with Iran.
While no Democrats joined co-sponsored the letter, Senator Bob Menendez (D-NJ) fired his own salvo, regarding the case of Rob Malley, Biden’s former Iran envoy who has been apparently fired and is under investigation by the FBI on possible breach of security rules. Menendez said that he is working on legislation to mandate the State Department “to be transparent when there are security issues with senior officials.”
Criticism has been coming thick and fast as the State Department continues to deny any sort of update of “nuclear understanding”
Republican Senator Bill Hagerty slammed the secrecy surrounding the latest talks which saw at least $6b in frozen Iranian funds freed up in South Korea and handed to Qatar to manage, in exchange for five dual citizen hostages, as “a Biden family business deal”.
Demanding transparency, he said: “Follow the law by writing these understandings down and sharing them with Congress”, referring to the fact the administration has skirted the legislation to protect any changes being made to the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act which requires President Biden to notify Congress of any agreement with Iran related to its nuclear program.
Meanwhile, Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken met with Israeli Minister for Strategic Affairs Ron Dermer on Thursday in Washington, Iran one of the key elements of the talks, including the formation of a ‘limited defense treaty’.
Reports about a potential treaty have been mooted many times in the past, as recently as 2019. This issue died down only to resurface now while being pushed by Dermer, who has not hidden his support for such a treaty for more than a decade.
But, now the talks might become more serious, connected to a possible comprehensive US-Saudi deal, involving Israel and a potential normalization between Israel and the kingdom.
In a press release, the State Department confirmed talks delved into “cooperation on regional challenges, including threats posed by Iran and its regional proxies in Lebanon and elsewhere”, in addition to ongoing discussions about further normalization deals across the region.
Talks to normalize with Saudi Arabia have also come under fire as the implications to Israel’s position regarding its arch-enemy Iran remain at the heart of talks. Jacob Nagel, who previously served as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's national security advisor and head of the National Security Council warned that “a limited defense treaty between the US and Israel as part of a normalization agreement with Saudi Arabia and a trilateral agreement between the US, Saudi Arabia, and Israel, contains much more cons than pros”.
Writing in Israel Hayom, he said this was especially critical when it might come at the expense of Israel's top priority concern: preventing a bad Iran nuclear deal that will lead Iran on its sure path to a bomb in a very short timeframe.
For the US, there is a wide-reaching ripple effect of the talks, suggesting there is more on the table than merely hostages and Iran’s nuclear program. According to The New Arab, Iran has sent General Esmail Qaani, the commander of Iran's Quds Force, for secret talks in Iraq this week in a bid to soften tensions with the US and urge a halt to military action against US forces in Iraq.
The US’ years-long shadow war has seen more than 80 attacks on its facilities in Iraq and Syria with multiple casualties and fatalities among them, and just five retaliations by the US.
As calls for transparency continue to ring loud for the Biden administration, the acting US envoy to Iran remains silent, and the State Department continues to gaslight questions. In its latest press briefing, spokesman Vedant Patel reiterated earlier lines about remaining tough on Iran, claiming the US “will continue to take steps to hold the Iranian regime accountable for their malign, destabilizing activities in the region, as well as more broadly as well”.
Talks behind the scenes remain unclear, but what is clear is regional changes are afoot.
As part of a secretive deal reached with Iran’s regime, the Biden administration will funnel $6 billion in sanctioned oil revenue to Tehran in exchange for the release of five unjustly detained Americans. The US government will also free jailed Iranians as part of the controversial deal.
Gen. (Res.) Yossi Kuperwasser, now a senior researcher at the Israeli Defense Security Forum, said “Money is fungible” and added the amount of money that will be sent to Iran is, according to media reports, more than $6 billion.
The Islamic Republic “can use the money to fund terrorist proxies and armaments,” said Kuperwasser, who was the former head of the Research Division at the Israel Defense Forces Intelligence Corps.
He noted the hostage payment deal is “acquiescence to the Iranian policy of kidnapping to force the International community to do what it wants.”
Kuperwasser cited the example of the clerical regime seizing the Belgian aid worker Oliver Vandecasteele as a hostage. The Belgium government released the convicted Iranian terrorist Assadollah Asadi in exchange for Vandecasteele.
He said the current deal is “another sign to accept the malign behavior of the Iranian regime. The IRGC has not yet been proscribed as a terrorist organization by the Europeans and the United Kingdom.” Kuperwasser, who was also the Director General of the Ministry of Strategic Affairs, said the Western countries “are not doing anything to enrage the mullah regime.”
He continued that “This is a dangerous situation. The international community allows Iran to be a [nuclear] threshold state.” Kuperwasser outlined the three pre-conditions for Iran’s atomic weapons program.
He said,“the fissile material is there” for Iran’s nuclear weapons program and the “delivery system is basically there,” adding that only “The weaponization is missing.” Iran has amassed enough enriched uranium for at least two nuclear weapons, experts say.
Kuperwasser said against the backdrop of the astonishingly fast progress Iran’s regime has made with respect to its nuclear weapons program, the hostage payment deal worries the Israeli security establishment.
He noted that Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a statement about the hostage agreement, in which he scorned the deal that will pump $6 billon into the coffers of the clerical regime. Netanyahu said Israel’s policy against the Iranian regime will not be sidelined by Biden’s efforts to reach a new nuclear deal with Tehran.
Iran International reported in June that European intelligence agencies issued a batch of reports, documenting Iran’s attempts to obtain nuclear weapons technology in 2022. According to the Netherlands General and Intelligence Security Service (AVID), the Islamic Republic’s highly advanced and fast-moving enrichment of weapons-grade uranium “brings the option of a passible Iranian first nuclear test closer.” The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) first located and translated the European intelligence documents.
Last week, Iran International reported that critics of Biden’s new deal to free American hostages say it will only emboldens the Iranian regime’s hostage-taking policy.
Kupperwasser said in October more sanctions will be lifted on Iran’s regime at the UN. Ballistic missile sanctions imposed on Iran in a 2015 UN resolution will expire on October 18.
Iranian media and some observers on both sides say domestic politics in both countries can affect the deal's fate.
Qasem Mohebali, told Didban Iran [Iran Monitor] website that any permanent and official deal between Iran and the United States is unlikely before the US presidential elections.
Asked whether Iran deserved an "oil for food" deal, Mohebali said, "Iranian officials should have thought of this before their policies led to its nuclear case being referred to the UN Security Council.
Iran has effectively lost its political and financial independence after its nuclear case was handed over to United Nations Security Council, he said, and a series of resolutions were issued against it (2006-2012). Mohebali argued that at the present time also Iran has little control over its international economic and financial transactions, as other states decide what it can have and to what extent.
As regards possible links between the prisoner swap and nuclear negotiations, Mohebali said these are two different issues. The prisoner swap is important for the United States from a humanitarian perspective and Iran is interested in repatriating its money. But the nuclear negotiations must be discussed within a different context.
He added that the prisoner swap will be a positive point for US President Joe Biden and other US Democrats although there is still a long way before the elections. Iran and the United States have many different matters to discuss, the former diplomat pointed out, including the nuclear issue, the Middle east, human rights, missile development, terrorism and most recently Iran's contribution to Russia's war against Ukraine. Every single one of these issues should be dealt with separately, a package deal involving all of them looks is not very likely.
Mohebali added, it is unlikely that Iran and the United States start negotiations about these matters before 2025 after the US elections. Iran is not certain about the policies of the next administration and is not certain if it will stand by an agreement with the Biden Administration.
"What US government is currently doing is helping innocent individuals to get out of prison. However, its political rivals might question the payments made during the swap. At the same time, others accuse the US of taking Iran's assets hostage. Still others might ask whether the prisoners to be released are Iranians or US citizens," Mohebali explained.
Meanwhile, in an article about what might go wrong in a deal between Iran and the US, proreform website Fararu wrote: "The test agreement to secure the release of Iran's assets and the freedom of prisoners in the two countries might come across problems and its entirety could come under a shadow of doubt during the weeks before it is finalized."
The website argued that despite the apparent diplomatic victory, it is still too early to be optimistic about the deal. One of the hindrances might be the deployment of US Marines to oversee shipping along the Strait of Hormuz.
Referring to Qatar's role in forging the Iran-US deal, Fararu wrote that Doha does not want to see any tension between Iran and the United States. Nonetheless, despite Qatar's help, there is still the danger of a conflict between Iran and Washington in the volatile Persian Gulf.
According to Fararu, at the same time, domestic politics both in Iran and the United States can make matters complicated. The Biden Administration has already been accused by some US lawmakers and others of bribing the Islamic Republic. In an August 14 tweet, Holly Dagres, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council wrote that she told AFP: "if a hostage deal is implemented around the Mahsa Amini protests anniversary, it'll be a win for the clerical establishment. Doing a deal with the United States around such a sensitive period is, in essence, communicating to protesters that Washington doesn't care about their plight.”
Meanwhile, United Against of Nuclear Iran (UANI) on the same date quoted the White House Spokesman as having said that "Iran will only be able to use the $6 billion [released by South Korea] for “humanitarian purposes.” However, UANI asked: “In a competition for the funds between the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and the public health of the Iranian people, who do you think wins?”