Media
Democrats pander to Iran, kill measures which stop U.S. taxpayers from financing regime
Democrats have “killed a handful of measures that would have stopped the Biden administration from providing U.S. taxpayer funds to the hardline Iranian regime and increased economic sanctions on the country” reports The Washington Free Beacon.
In fact, seven Republican-led measures targeting Iran were shot down by Democrats running the House Rules Committee just last week. The Republican foreign policy leaders were attempting to place the measures to be included in the recently passed National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the annual national security funding bill.
The Beacon reports:
Congressional sources who spoke to the Washington Free Beacon said House Democrats rejected the measures to help the Biden administration in its push to secure a revamped version of the 2015 nuclear accord. Those negotiations are ongoing, and the White House is pushing its allies in Congress to avoid passing any measures that may upset the hardline regime and erode progress in talks.
Republican Representative Jim Banks of Indiana said “Democrats’ foreign policy is even weaker now than it was during the Obama years.”
“House Democrats voted to pave the way towards a JCPOA 2.0 that will enrich terrorists and bring Iran even closer to obtaining a nuclear weapon. It’s not just Joe Biden—the whole party is to blame” added Banks, referring to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) more commonly referred to as the Iran Nuclear Deal.
Specifically, the measure put forward by Banks and his colleagues would have stopped any funds allocated in the fiscal year 2023 NDAA from going to “the government of Iran,” “any person owned or controlled by the government of Iran,” and “any person identified on the list of specially designated nationals,” according to a copy of the rejected amendment.
The Beacon reports on the other measures:
Another measure the Republicans expected to receive Democratic support would have terminated the president’s authority to waive sanctions on Russians who work on Iran’s contested nuclear program. Even with a bipartisan opposition to Russia’s unprovoked war in Ukraine, Democrats rejected this provision.
Other measures would have sanctioned the Iranian supreme leader’s office for human rights abuses and required the Biden administration to submit a report to Congress on Iranians who could be targeted with additional sanctions.
Democrats also rejected a measure that expressed support for forcing Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), the paramilitary fighting force that has killed hundreds of Americans, to pay compensation to its victims. The resolution also expressed support for keeping the IRGC on the U.S. terrorist lists. The Biden administration was rumored to be considering dropping the designation as part of a concessions package to Tehran in nuclear talks. Biden during his first visit to the Middle East last week said dropping the designation is no longer under consideration.
One measure that was killed would have stopped funds from being allocated to any effort aimed at removing Iran from terrorist financing watchlists, and another would have mandated congressional reports on Iran’s illicit oil trade, which has skyrocketed since the Biden administration relaxed sanctions.
Over the weekend, Iranian leaders boasted that they officially have the ability to produce an atomic bomb. The disclosure has increased calls for the Biden administration to cease diplomacy and begin sanctioning Iran’s nuclear and missile programs.
Israel
Senior Saudi official says Iran ‘engineered’ war in Gaza and ‘should have been stopped a long time ago’
Although it has been widely believed, a senior Saudi Arabian official has accused Tehran of having “engineered a war in Gaza” for the purpose to interfere with Jerusalem’s attempts to normalize relations with Riyadh. The unnamed official then described the regime as “a country that sponsors terrorism, and it should have been stopped a long time ago.”
In an interview with Israel’s Kan public broadcaster, the anonymous individual said that “any suspicious object” entering his country’s airspace is intercepted by the Kingdom’s defense forces. The comment may suggest that there was some level of participation by the Saudis in neutralizing the missiles and attack drones that the Islamic Republic fired at Israel on Saturday, notes Foreign Desk News.
Reports have confirmed that the American, British, French, and Jordanian militaries assisted the IDF in the air defenses during the bombardment.
Foreign Desk News states of the improving relations between Israel and its neighbors:
In 2020, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, and Morocco signed normalization agreements with the Jewish state under the direction of the Trump administration, in what was called the Abraham Accords. The following January, Sudan would also join the reconciliation.
Any diplomatic understandings between Israel and Saudi Arabia would be seen as a big boost to regional security, considering the Kingdom is often viewed as the most powerful Arab-majority country in the world.
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