John Kerry, Call Holding Line 2, Tehran Terrorism Calling

Posted on July 8, 2016July 8, 2016 by Denise Simon

Iranian commander: Missiles ready for the ‘annihilation’ of Israel

JPost: The deputy commander of Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guard said the country has over 100,000 missiles in Lebanon alone readied for the “annihilation” of Israel.

Speaking before Friday prayers on Iran’s state-run IRIB TV, Hossein Salami also said that Iran has “tens of thousands” of additional missiles that are ready to wipe the “accursed black dot” of Israel off the map, according to a translation from the Farsi by the Middle East Media Research Institute.

Salami is deputy head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which is under the command of the country’s Supreme Leader.

*****

Iran’s Support for Terrorism Under the JCPOA

WashingtonInstitute/Levitt: The Islamic Republic’s terror sponsorship has hardly abated since the nuclear deal was reached, giving the Obama administration another opportunity to reassess these menacing behaviors and hold Tehran accountable.

July 14 will mark one year since the signing of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the nuclear agreement with Iran. This article is part of a series of PolicyWatches assessing how the deal has affected various U.S. interests, to be released in the days leading up to the anniversary.

When the JCPOA was implemented in January, terrorism-related sanctions remained in place against Iran, and U.S. officials promised they would hold Tehran accountable for any such activity despite the lifting of nuclear sanctions. As Secretary of State John Kerry noted on January 21, “If we catch them funding terrorism, they’re going to have a problem with the United States Congress and with other people, obviously.” And yet, in the year since the deal was signed, Iran’s threatening behavior has not diminished.

In February, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper testified that “Iran, the foremost state sponsor of terrorism — continues to exert its influence in regional crises in the Middle East through the International Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF), its terrorist partner Lebanese Hezbollah, and proxy groups…Iran and Hezbollah remain a continuing terrorist threat to U.S. interests and partners worldwide.” A month later, CENTCOM chief Gen. Joseph Votel testified that Iran had become “more aggressive in the days since the agreement.”

Sponsoring Terrorists in the Levant

Iran has been a consistent supporter of U.S.-designated Palestinian terrorist organizations, including Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and Hamas. In August 2015, after four rockets hit the Israeli Golan Heights and Upper Galilee, Jerusalem attributed the attack to a joint effort by PIJ and the IRGC-QF. These claims were substantiated when Israeli counterstrikes against the cell that launched the initial salvo wound up killing an IRGC general, Mohammad Ali Allahdadi.

In September, the Treasury Department designated Maher Jawad Yunes Salah, a dual British-Jordanian citizen who headed the Hamas Finance Committee headquartered in Saudi Arabia. In that capacity, he had been overseeing the transfer of tens of millions of dollars from Iran to the committee; these monies were used to fund Hamas activity in Gaza, including the group’s military “wing,” the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades.

Although Iran and Hamas have argued at times over the latter’s refusal to support the Assad regime in Syria, they rekindled their broken relationship this year. According to a November report issued by Congressional Research Service, “Iran has apparently sought to rebuild the relationship with Hamas by providing missile technology that Hamas used to construct its own rockets, and by helping it rebuild tunnels destroyed in the [2014] conflict with Israel.” At a press conference in 2015, an Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman asserted that bolstering resistance to Israel — in part by funding Hamas — is a “principled policy.” This support was clarified in February when a Hamas delegation visited Iran for eight days and met with various officials, including IRGC-QF commander Qasem Soleimani. According to a member of the delegation quoted by the Jerusalem Post, Soleimani stated that “Iran was a staunch supporter of the Palestinian resistance before the nuclear deal, and it will remain so after the deal.” Hamas celebrated the trip in a statement of its own, highlighting its “successful and positive meetings with Iranian officials.”

Despite this rapprochement with Hamas, Iran continued its sponsorship of al-Sabirin, a new proxy militant group in Gaza. Led by a former PIJ commander, al-Sabirin reportedly receives $10 million a year from Tehran. Members of the group have also apparently converted to Shia Islam despite operating in Sunni-majority Gaza, adding another level of complexity to the relationship. In December, al-Sabirin claimed responsibility for an explosion that targeted Israeli forces on the border.

Elsewhere in the Levant, Lebanese Hezbollah remains Iran’s primary terrorist proxy. Last month, the group’s secretary-general, Hassan Nasrallah, bluntly declared that “Hezbollah gets its money and arms from Iran, and as long as Iran has money, so does Hezbollah.” Since the JCPOA was signed, the U.S.-designated terrorist organization has engaged in numerous criminal, espionage, and terrorist plots.

In February, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration announced that it had uncovered a major drug trafficking and money laundering network during a multinational investigation. The agency named the “Business Affairs Component” of Hezbollah’s External Security Organization as one of the main benefactors of a network that collected and transported “millions of euros in drug proceeds,” which in turn were used to purchase weapons for Hezbollah fighters in Syria.

Last year, less than a week after the JCPOA was signed, Israeli officials arrested a Swedish-Lebanese man, Hassan Khalil Hizran, at Ben Gurion Airport for attempting to gather intelligence on Israeli targets on Hezbollah’s behalf. And just days before the signing, a Lebanese-Canadian man confessed his ties to Hezbollah and said the group had directed him to attack Israeli targets. He was jailed in Cyprus after authorities seized nine tons of a chemical compound used in bombmaking from his home there.

As Hezbollah pours considerable weaponry and manpower into the conflicts in Syria and Iraq, it has also directed third-party actors to carry out terrorist attacks. This January, Israeli authorities arrested five Palestinians for planning an attack “organized and funded by Hezbollah.” According to Israeli officials, the leader of this West Bank cell was recruited by Hassan Nasrallah’s son Jawad. Hezbollah trained and directed the group to surveil Israeli targets, giving the men $5,000 to carry out suicide bombings and other attacks. Based on these and other cases, a senior Israeli official warned in February that Iran was “building an international terror network” of cells with access to weapons, intelligence, and operatives to carry out attacks in the West.

The Gulf

In naming Iran as a major sponsor of terror, the State Department’s 2015 Country Reports on Terrorism revealed that Tehran has “provided weapons, funding, and training to Shia militants in Bahrain,” and that the island state had “raided, interdicted, and rounded up numerous Iran-sponsored weapons caches, arms transfers, and militants” that year. In November, Bahraini authorities arrested forty-seven individuals for their involvement in a terrorist organization linked to the IRGC. And this January, authorities detained six individuals for their involvement in a terrorist cell with claimed links to Iran and Hezbollah. The cell was accused of orchestrating a July 2015 explosion that killed two people outside a girls school in Sitra.

Iran also continued to support Shiite terrorists in Kuwait. In August 2015, local authorities raided a terrorist cell of twenty-six Shiite Kuwaitis, accusing them of amassing “a large amount of weapons, ammunition, and explosives.” After media outlets reported the cell’s alleged links to Iran and Hezbollah, the public prosecutor issued a gag order on the investigation. In January, a local court sentenced two men, one Kuwaiti and one Iranian, to death for spying on behalf of Iran and Hezbollah.

Tehran’s antagonistic relationship with Saudi Arabia also continued this year, mainly through proxy warfare, but also through alleged activities against Saudi targets. In February, the Saudi-aligned Yemeni government asserted that it had evidence of “Hezbollah training the Houthi rebels and fighting alongside them in attacks on Saudi Arabia’s border.” And according to another report that same month, Filipino authorities claimed to thwart an IRGC plot against a fleet of Saudi passenger planes in the Philippines.

Beyond the Middle East

This May, an American drone strike killed Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansour on the Iran-Pakistan border. At the very least, his activities indicated tacit Iranian support for the Taliban, if not more. U.S. authorities had tracked him visiting family in Iran and conducted the strike as he returned to Pakistan. Afterward, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid stated that Mansour had been on one of his several “unofficial trips” to Iran because of “ongoing battle obligations.”

Previously, in November, Kenyan authorities arrested two Iranian citizens on charges of plotting to carry out a terrorist attack against Israeli targets in Nairobi. The Iranians were allegedly sent by the IRGC-QF.

A month later, the Nigerian army launched a massive attack on the Shiite town of Zaria after reportedly obtaining intelligence about an assassination attempt on the country’s army chief of staff. The plot was allegedly organized by the Islamic Movement of Nigeria, a Shiite militant group that Iran had previously trained in the assembly of explosives and other skills, according to a former Iranian Foreign Ministry advisor.

Conclusion

At an April 2015 Washington Institute event held three months before the signing of the JCPOA, Treasury Secretary Jack Lew stated, “Make no mistake: deal or no deal, we will continue to use all our available tools, including sanctions, to counter Iran’s menacing behavior.” A year later, President Obama underscored this pledge to Gulf Cooperation Council partners at a Camp David summit: “We have to be effective in our defenses and hold Iran to account where it is acting in ways that are contrary to international rules and norms.”

Today, however, it is clear that Iran’s support for terrorism has only increased since the deal was reached, and officials cannot feign surprise on the matter. In June, for example, senior Treasury official Adam Szubin bluntly concluded, “As we expected, Iran has not moderated this conduct since the implementation of the JCPOA.” Given Iran’s ongoing support for terrorism and regional instability and the administration’s repeated insistence that it would hold Tehran’s feet to the fire on these very issues, the JCPOA’s first anniversary presents Washington with a perfect opportunity to reassess the regime’s menacing behavior and take steps to hold it accountable.

Deeper Ties of the Dallas Sniper/Terrorists

Posted on July 8, 2016July 8, 2016 by Denise Simon

BARC

Note the bottom flag on the lower left. Referenced here in this article.

The organizer of the Black Lives Matter protest in Dallas is Jeff Hood. You can meet him here as described by Breitbart.

So, this goes to a deeper condition and Robert Spencer did some great work.

Dallas massacre of police: FBI investigating anti-police group that attended Dallas mosque
JULY 8, 2016 10:26 AM BY ROBERT SPENCER
The Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and other Islamic supremacist groups have assiduously courted Black Lives Matter, and linked their propaganda efforts against “Islamophobia” to the Black Lives Matter stand against perceived racism. In Dallas last night, we see where this is tending: as Kyle Shideler notes in the March article below, “At the event, MAS leader Khalilah Sabra openly discussed the importance of Muslim support for Black Lives Matter, and urged ‘revolution.’ Comparing the situation in the United States to the Muslim Brotherhood-led Arab Spring revolutions, she asked, ‘We are the community that staged a revolution across the world; if we can do that, why can’t we have that revolution in America?’” And with the mass murder of police in Dallas last night, we’re getting there.

The Nation of Islam is not an orthodox Muslim group, and subscribes to a great deal of racial mythology that is nowhere in Islamic tradition. It is, however, also true that many black Americans first enter the Nation, and then become orthodox Sunni Muslims. And given the increased racial tensions of the Obama era, many people in both the NOI and among mainstream Sunnis have a taste for the “revolution” that is brought about by means of jihad.
“Dallas police shootings: Race rally cops killed in Dallas sniper ambush,” The Australian, July 9, 2016:

Heavily armed snipers killed five police and transit officers in downtown Dallas and wounded seven more, in a premeditated and triangulated “ambush-style” assault during a rally protesting against the killing of black men after two shootings this week….

As the FBI and local authorities launched an investigation, their focus was expected to probe militant black rights groups set up in Dallas. Anti-police groups include the New Black Panther Party and Huey P. Newton Gun Club, named after the founder of the 1960s activist Black Panther Party.

The Huey P. Newton Gun Club includes a coalition of BARC (Blacks Against Racist Cops) and other African-American groups, who agitate against police brutality. The group attended the Nation of Islam’s Muhammad mosque in Dallas in April to monitor protests by an anti- Islamic group, the Bureau of American Islamic Relations. Both sides were armed, and moved on by police….

It’s useful to recall this: “Black Lives Matter and a History of Islamist Outreach to African Americans,” by Kyle Shideler, Townhall, March 17, 2016:

Once the dust settled, last week’s protest of a Donald Trump rally in Chicago demonstrated a growing nexus between Islamist groups in the United States and the radical leftist “Black Lives Matter” movement.

This rhetoric of unity between these movements was clearly on display at the 2015 joint conference of the 2015 Muslim American Society (MAS) and the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA). MAS was described by federal prosecutors as the “overt arm” of the U.S. Muslim Brotherhood, and ICNA is recognized as the front for the Pakistani Islamist group Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI) founded by one of the foremost thinkers on modern Jihad, Syed Abul A’la Maududi.

At the event, MAS leader Khalilah Sabra openly discussed the importance of Muslim support for Black Lives Matter, and urged “revolution.” Comparing the situation in the United States to the Muslim Brotherhood-led Arab Spring revolutions, she asked, “We are the community that staged a revolution across the world; if we can do that, why can’t we have that revolution in America?”

Reporting on this merging “revolutionary” alliance goes back as far as the first outbreak of disorder in Ferguson. Few may recall the attendance at Michael Brown’s funeral of CAIR executive director Nihad Awad. Awad was identified in federal court as a member of the Palestine Committee, a covert group of Muslim Brothers dedicated to supporting Hamas in the United States.
CAIR joined other groups named by federal law enforcement as Muslim Brotherhood organizations and lined up behind the Ferguson protests.

In November of 2014, Fox News reported on an effort by CAIR Michigan Director Dawud Walid to link the death of Michael Brown at the hands of police and the death of Luqman Abdullah, a Detroit imam shot during an FBI raid.

Abdullah was described by the FBI as a leader of a nationwide Islamic organization known as “The Ummah,” run by convicted cop-killer Jamil Abdullah Amin. Abdullah’s group engaged in criminal activity in order to raise funds in order for an effort to establish Sharia law in opposition to the U.S. government.

Amin and CAIR have a long association together, with CAIR providing funding for Amin’s legal defense, and issuing numerous press releases in support of the Georgia radical imam and former Black Panther.

While this linkage of Islamist front groups to radical racial politics may seem a relatively new development, the reality is it has been the result of a nearly four decade long effort by Islamist groups. A major thinker on this effort was a Pakistani immigrant and ICNA leader named Shamim A. Siddiqui, who knew JeI founder Maududi personally. Siddiqui wrote his work, Methodology of Dawah Il Allah in American Perspective in 1989. Read more here.

Due to Sanctions, North Korea Declares Act of War

Posted on July 7, 2016July 8, 2016 by Denise Simon

Counter North Korean ThreatsPress Release 07.08.16

Media Contact 202-225-5021

Washington, D.C. – House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-CA) released the following statement regarding the joint South Korea-U.S. decision to deploy the U.S. Army’s Terminal High Altitude Area Defense System (THAAD) to defend against North Korean threats:

“The North Korean regime’s continued belligerence is a threat to South Korea and the entire Pacific region. The deployment of the THAAD defensive missile system will help protect against Kim Jong Un’s illicit weapons programs. Along with new sanctions mandated by my North Korea Sanctions and Policy Enhancement Act of 2016, this action demonstrates the strong resolve of the U.S. and South Korea to promote peace, stability, and respect for human rights.”

NKorea: US sanctions tantamount to act of war

SEOUL, South Korea (AP)— North Korea said Thursday that U.S. sanctions on leader Kim Jong Un and other top officials for human rights abuses are tantamount to declaring war.

The country’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency saying the announcement of sanctions on Kim and 10 other officials was “peppered with lies and fabrications” and demanding the sanctions be withdrawn.

“Now that the U.S. declared a war on the DPRK, any problem arising in the relations with the U.S. will be handled under the latter’s wartime law,” the statement says, using the initials of the country’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

North Korea has already been sanctioned heavily because of its nuclear weapons program. However, Wednesday’s action by the Obama administration was the first time Kim has been personally targeted, and the first time that any North Korean official has been blacklisted by the U.S. Treasury in connection with reports of rights abuses.

The North Korean statement called the sanctions a “hideous crime.” It demanded that the sanctions be retracted or else “every lever and channel for diplomatic contact between the DPRK and the U.S. will be cut off at once.”

U.S. and North Korea do not have formal diplomatic relations, although they retain a channel of communication through the North’s diplomatic mission at the United Nations in New York.

State Department spokesman John Kirby said that the U.S. stands by its decision to impose the sanctions.

“We once again call on North Korea to refrain from actions and rhetoric that only further raise tensions in the region. I can’t see how this rhetoric does anything but that,” he told reporters in Washington when asked about the North Korean response.

North Korea frequently uses harsh rhetoric and denunciations of the United States, and threats of hostilities are not uncommon.

On Wednesday, the State Department also released a report, mandated by Congress, on human rights abuses in North Korea. Administration officials said it was intended to name and shame responsible officials in North Korea’s government, and send a message to lower and mid-ranking officials to think twice before engaging in acts of cruelty and oppression.

Secretary of State John Kerry said Thursday the new sanctions could cause North Korean officials to think twice before committing rights abuses.

“It is important,” he told reporters during a visit to Ukraine, “that all North Korean officials know and understand going forward that at all levels there are consequences for actions and they hopefully might consider the implications of those actions,” he said.

In addition to blacklisting Kim, the Treasury Department blacklisted officials at the Ministry of State Security — which it said administers political prison camps and is engaged in torture and inhumane treatment of detainees — and the Ministry of People‘s Security which operates a network of police stations, interrogation centers and labor camps.

The State Department said North Korean political prison camps hold between 80,000 to 120,000 prisoners, including children and other family members.

***** Mostly importantly from 6 months ago:

After Bomb Test, North Korea, Iran Continue Illicit Nuke Cooperation

After test explosion, lawmakers, experts warn of illicit nuclear axis

FreeBeacon: One day after North Korea claimed to have successfully tested a miniaturized hydrogen bomb, lawmakers and regional experts are warning that Pyongyang and Tehran are continuing an illicit clandestine partnership enabling the rogue nations to master nuclear technology.

Loopholes in the nuclear pact recently reached between Iran and the international community have allowed the Islamic Republic and North Korea to boost their nuclear cooperation, which includes the exchange of information and technology, according to material provided to Congress over the past year.

Iran is believed to be housing some of its key nuclear weapons-related technology in North Korea in order to avoid detection by international inspectors. Iranian dissidents once tied to the regime have disclosed that both countries have consulted on a nuclear warhead.

Following the test, however, the White House publicly denied that Iran and North Korea are working together, according to multiple statements issued by the administration on Wednesday.

Still, the Iranian-North Korean nuclear axis is coming under renewed scrutiny by lawmakers in light of Pyongyang’s most recent detonation, which is the fourth of its kind in recent years.

Congressional critics now warn that the Obama administration cannot be trusted to clamp down on North Korea given its recent efforts to appease Iran by dropping a new set of sanctions that were meant to target its illicit ballistic weapons program.

Iran, on the other hand, thinks that the bomb test will give it “media breathing space” by drawing attention away from its own nuclear pursuits, according to Persian-language reports carried by state-controlled media outlets closely aligned with the country’s Revolutionary Guards Corps.

“The entire world may well consider North Korea a failed state, but from the view point of the [Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps], North Korea is a success story and a role model: A state which remains true to its revolutionary beliefs and defies the Global Arrogance,” said Ali Alfoneh, an expert on the inner workings of the Iranian regime.

Prominent members of Congress are now warning that North Korea’s latest nuclear test is a sign of what could come from Iran, which they claim is closely following the North Korean nuclear playbook.

Rep. Ileana Ros Lehtinen (R, Fla.), chair of House’s foreign relations subcommittee on the Middle East and North Africa, described North Korea’s latest test as “a precursor to what we can expect from Iran in a few years.”

Iran, Ros-Lehtinen told the Washington Free Beacon, “is following the North Korea playbook” and “stands to be the main beneficiary of Pyongyang’s continued nuclear progress.”

“Iran and North Korea have a history of collaboration on military programs and have long been suspected of collaborating on nuclear related programs,” she said, noting that the Iran deal provides the Islamic Republic with the cash necessary to purchase advanced nuclear technology.

“Iran won’t even need to make any progress on its domestic nuclear program—once it perfects its ballistic missiles it could purchase a weapon from North Korea and all of the conditions and monitoring in the [nuclear deal] would be ineffective in detecting or stopping that,” she said.

“Let’s not forget, Iranians have reportedly been present at each of North Korea’s previous nuclear tests,” Sen. David Perdue (R., Ga.), a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a statement. “We cannot turn a blind eye to ongoing ties between North Korea and Iran. President Obama must act now to stop these rogue nations from supporting each other’s nuclear weapons efforts aimed at harming America and our allies.”

Rep. Patrick Meehan (R., Pa.) expressed concern that Iran is following in North Korea’s footsteps, and that the nuclear deal will collapse just as Bill Clinton’s agreement with North Korea did in the mid-1990s.

“This test is just the latest sign that North Korea is a regime hell-bent on building and developing a sophisticated nuclear program,” Meehan said. “The passage of the 1995 nuclear deal with [North Korea] came with it promises from the Clinton administration of accountability and transparency for Kim’s regime.”

“Those same sort of assurances are echoed today by the Obama White House as it seeks to assure us that its own deal with Iran will be more successful,” Meehan said. “The Iran deal and the North Korean deal were sold with the same promises, the same assurances, to the American people, sometimes even word-for-word.”

“When you put the rhetoric of the 90’s and the North next to the rhetoric of today and Iran, it’s hard to tell the difference,” he added.

Sen. Mark Kirk (R., Ill.), a chief advocate for increased economic sanctions on Iran, highlighted what he called North Korea’s “alarming record” of “cooperating on missile development with Iran.”

With Iran set to receive billions of dollars in sanctions relief later this month, regional experts have informed Congress that the nuclear deal “creates conditions and incentives that are highly likely to result in the expansion” of Iran and North Korea’s illicit nuclear exchange, according to testimony submitted last year by Claudia Rossett, an expert at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

The deal fails to “cut off the pathways between Iran and nuclear-proliferating North Korea” and even has made “it safer for Iran to cheat,” according to Rossett’s testimony.

Additionally, sanctions relief gives Iran a chance to “go shopping in North Korea,” she said.

The Obama administration denied the ties between Iran and North Korea, telling reporters on Wednesday that “they’re entirely two different issues altogether.”

“We consider the Iran deal as a completely separate issue handled in a completely different manner than were the—than was the Agreed Framework with North Korea,” said John Kirby, a State Department spokesman, echoing similar remarks issued by the White House.

The administration’s hesitance to link the two nuclear issues has angered some critics of the Iran deal.

“This is exactly the kind of dishonest incoherence that the Iran nuclear deal forces its advocates to defend,” said Omri Ceren, the managing director of press and strategy at The Israel Project, a D.C.-based organization that works with journalists on Middle East issues.

“The Obama administration can’t admit that the [deal] provided the Iranians with hundreds of billions of dollars, some of which they’re going to invest in nuclear research beyond their borders, allowing them to get sanctions relief while advancing their program anyway,” Ceren said. “So instead they have to deny that there are links between Iran and North Korea’s nuclear program, even though that’s laughable.”

Iran Deal: Thomas Pickering Got Big Bucks

Posted on June 23, 2016June 23, 2016 by Denise Simon

Thomas Pickering is PRO IRAN, let that sink in…

Ex-Clinton official got Boeing bucks while pushing Iran nuke pact – before $25B jet deal

FNC: A former top Clinton administration diplomat who used his political sway to garner support for the Iran nuclear deal apparently was being bankrolled the entire time by Boeing — which is set to make billions off a jet deal with Tehran now that sanctions have been lifted.

Thomas Pickering, who also served as co-chairman of the board examining the Benghazi attack response, publicly pushed for the nuclear deal before its approval last year. He did so by penning op-eds, writing to high-level officials and even testifying before Congress.

With the deal in place, Boeing has since moved forward on a $25 billion deal with Iran Air made possible by the nuclear agreement.

While Pickering never denied being on Boeing’s payroll during the talks, he didn’t regularly disclose it either, according to a new report in The Daily Beast. And that’s the problem, transparency advocates say.

“In Pickering’s case, he has a direct connection to Boeing, which I think should be disclosed,” Neil Gordon, an investigator for the Project on Government Oversight, told The Daily Beast. “I think it’s necessary for the public debate. It’s necessary for the public to fully realize the participants’ financial interests. Some of them might have a direct financial stake in a particular outcome.”

Pickering was a former top State Department official in the Bill Clinton administration, and before that ambassador to Russia. He also served as ambassador to the United Nations, Israel and elsewhere in prior administrations.

When Pickering testified before the House Armed Services Committee on June 16, 2014, the biography provided to committee members touted his military and government services but did not list his business ties.

Pickering also sent a July 7, 2015 letter to lawmakers urging them to back the nuclear deal but reportedly did not make his association with Boeing known. The letter was cited by the media, lawmakers and the White House in the push to sell the nuclear deal to the public.

In op-eds for The Washington Post and Tablet, he also made the case for the deal but again did not disclose his ties.

He confirmed to The Daily Beast that he was a Boeing employee from 2001 to 2006 (which was more widely known) and later worked as a “direct consultant” from 2006 to 2015.

Earlier this month, Boeing reached a tentative agreement to sell passenger planes to Iran’s state-run carrier, Iran Air. The deal is the first major business venture after sanctions were eased against Tehran last year and is seen by many as a groundbreaking test for other American companies looking to profit from Iran’s untapped economy.

The deal is still in its early stage and will likely face scrutiny from U.S. trade regulators and lawmakers.

“It’s tragic to watch such an iconic American company make such a terribly short-sighted decision,” Rep. Peter Roskam, R-Ill., told FoxNews.com in a statement. “If Boeing goes through with this deal, the company will forever be associated with Iran’s chief export: radical Islamic terrorism. The U.S. Congress will have much to say about this agreement in the coming days.”

Roskam and Rep. Jeb Hensarling, R-Texas, sent a letter to Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg last week raising concerns about Tehran’s history of using commercial planes to support “hostile actors.”

“We strongly oppose the potential sale of military-fungible products to terrorism’s central supplier. American companies should not be complicit in weaponizing the Iranian Regime,” the lawmakers wrote.

Boeing wrote back saying it would follow the lead of the U.S. government with regards to working with Iran Air and that “any and all contracts with them will be contingent upon continued approval.”

“And as we have stated repeatedly, should the U.S. Government reinstate sanctions against the sale of commercial passenger airplanes to Iranian airlines, we will cease all sales and delivery activities as required by U.S. law,” Tim Keating, Boeing senior vice president, wrote.

Five years ago, the Obama administration slapped sanctions on Iran Air, claiming the company used passenger and cargo planes to transport rockets and missiles to places such as Syria, sometimes disguised as medicine or spare parts. In other cases, members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps took control of flights carrying sensitive cargo.

Although U.S. officials never said such conduct ended, the administration used a technicality to drop those sanctions as part of last year’s seven-nation nuclear deal. The agreement also allowed the Treasury Department to license American firms to do business in Iran’s civilian aviation sector. The changes enable Boeing to sell up to 100 aircraft to Iran Air, by far the most lucrative business transaction between the U.S. and Iran since the 1979 Islamic Revolution and U.S. Embassy hostage crisis.

State Department spokesman John Kirby said the sale and any possible future deals depend on Iran’s good behavior.

The U.S. could revoke the license for the deal if planes, parts or services are “used for purposes other than exclusively civil aviation end-use” or if aircraft are transferred to individuals or companies on a U.S. terrorism blacklist, Kirby said.

Any suggestion “that we would or will turn a blind eye to Iran’s state sponsorship of terrorism or their terrorist-supporting activities is completely without merit,” Kirby said.

The details of the arrangement between Boeing and Iran Air aren’t entirely clear. Iran’s Transportation Minister Abbas Akhoundi said it could match the $25 billion package between the Islamic Republic and Boeing’s European rival, Airbus. Iran Air has stated its interest in purchasing new Boeing 737s — single aisle jets that typically fly up to five hours. It also wants 777s — larger planes that can carry passengers for 12 hours or more.

But if Iran Air continues supporting Iranian military or Revolutionary Guard operations, it would put the Obama administration or any successor in a bind.

Revoking the license and suspending future plane transfers risks angering the Iranians, who’ve already complained about not receiving sufficient benefit for their nuclear concessions. It also could mean billions in lost revenue for a large American company with more than 130,000 employees in the United States.

**** Hold on, it gets worse, much worse.

Lawmakers Seek to Re-Open ‘Flawed’ Iran Nuclear Weapons Investigation

Revelations Obama admin knew of possible weapons work, stayed silent

FreeBeacon: U.S. lawmakers and foreign policy insiders are calling on the international community to re-open its “flawed” investigation into Iran’s past nuclear weapons research, according to conversations with multiple sources who say the extent of Iran’s past nuclear work is likely much larger than previously believed.

The calls to reinvestigate Iran’s nuclear work come on the heels of revelations by anonymous U.S. officials who said the Obama administration held onto evidence showing the Islamic Republic performed extensive nuclear weapons research—a finding that contradicts findings by international monitors and longstanding claims by Iranian officials.

Administration officials made no mention of the finding when International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors first discovered it in December, but now say the evidence is proof Iran worked to build nuclear weapons as recently as 2003.

The discovery has prompted lawmakers to demand that the IAEA re-open its currently closed investigation into Iran’s past nuclear weapons work.

“The Obama administration’s contradiction of both Iran and the IAEA on this uranium issue calls for a re-examination of the flawed potential military dimensions report,” Rep. Mike Pompeo (R., Kansas), a member of the House’s intelligence committee, told the Washington Free Beacon. “The IAEA cannot claim to have an accurate accounting of the situation while nuclear particles are unaccounted for.”

U.S. officials promised Congress during negotiations with Iran that no deal would be implemented until the issue of Iran’s past nuclear weapons work was settled.

“Even Obama administration officials disagree with the report’s conclusions, now six months later,” Pompeo said. “It is common sense that when you uncover a problem, you investigate until you find a solution. Now all agree we have a new fact—and a problem. Failing to investigate what happened with Iran’s nuclear weapons program sets a dangerous precedent.”

Sen. Mark Kirk (R., Ill.), another vocal critic of the administration’s diplomacy with Iran, told the Free Beacon that international inspectors with the IAEA were not thorough enough in their investigations due to “political pressure” from pro-Iran forces.

“It’s deeply troubling that the world’s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, appears to have lost its independence due to the Iran nuclear deal,” Kirk said. “Nuclear inspectors should have intensified their investigation into Iran’s nuclear weapons program after uranium particles were found at Iran’s military base at Parchin, but instead they stood down due to political pressure.”

Senior congressional officials apprised of the situation told the Free Beacon that the administration ignored these new nuclear findings at a critical point in its diplomacy with Iran.

“The IAEA’s PMD [Possible Military Dimensions] report came out in December, and Obama administration officials are only just now speaking—anonymously—on why they disagree with the report and why these nuclear materials are a huge problem,” the source said. “They cannot so easily assuage their consciences and undo the damage they caused by closing the PMD case. The Obama administration’s decision to ignore Iran’s covert nuclear weapons development, and attempt to sweep it under the rug, will no doubt haunt us for decades.”

Pompeo and other House lawmakers introduced a bill in January that would require the Obama administration to provide a full accounting of Iran’s past nuclear weapons work before any sanctions on the Islamic Republic were lifted.

Another source who works closely with Congress on the Iran issue told the Free Beacon that the new nuclear disclosures cast doubt on past international reports claiming that Iran has stopped all nuclear work.

“It’s time to reopen the so-called PMD file, to figure out what weapons work Iran was doing,” the source said. “The IAEA is supposed to make sure that Iran has stopped all of the nuclear weapons work it was doing, but here is a place where there is broad confusion over what nuclear weapons work was happening. So there’s no way for the IAEA to confirm it stopped. The first step to fixing that is to have the IAEA go back into Parchin and figure out exactly what was happening.”

One last item:

UANI Sparks Debate in India on Risks and Propriety of Doing Business in Iran

UANI Leadership Pens Op-ed and Conducts Interview in Indian Media

New York, NY – United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI), the non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to heightening awareness of the danger the Iranian regime poses to the world, has sparked a national debate in India on the risks and propriety of doing business in Iran. UANI is in the midst of a global education and awareness campaign focused on the corporate risks of doing business with Iran.

In a June 19 op-ed in The New Indian Express, UANI Chairman Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman warned that doing business with “Iran can create more problems for India than it can solve“:

In Iran, business is routinely intertwined with terrorism. Therefore, if Indian companies sign deals with Tehran, they will be lending support to its belligerent behaviour… Pursuing business in Iran can also lead to losing out on more lucrative opportunities in countries that oppose its hegemonic policies. For instance, India has the choice to invest in the US, Britain, France, Germany, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, UAE, other GCC countries, and allied countries with a combined GDP of over $32 trillion, or take a gamble on Iran’s economy with a GDP of under $400 billion. There is a real risk that Indian companies investing in Iran will lose market share in some of these other countries. So, while Iran could help alleviate India’s energy problems, there are better ways to solve those. Doing business with the regime can create even more problems for New Delhi-economically, diplomatically, and in terms of security.

In a June 10 interview in India’s Hard News, UANI CEO Amb. Mark D. Wallace said:

UANI is aware of the economic and political links between Iran and India. UANI is also aware of similar ties between India, the US and numerous other countries in the region that feel threatened by Iranian aggression. I doubt it is in India’s national interest to side with a state associated with terrorism, corruption and money laundering over a confederation of responsible state actors opposed to Iranian regional hegemony. Moreover, if India wants to oppose corruption and terrorism, it cannot at the same time embolden and reward a regime that is notoriously corrupt and also the world leading state sponsor of terrorism. Indian leaders should back up their rhetoric with action and use its ties and link to Iran to influence the regime to change its terrorist behaviour and corrupt business environment instead of prematurely rewarding Iran with Indian business.

A statement by Sen. Lieberman and Amb. Wallace regarding Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Iran on May 22-23 was featured widely in Indian media, including the Business Standard, India Today, DNA India, CNN-News18, and the Deccan Chronicle. UANI reminded Prime Minister Modi of his previous strong statements about fighting terrorism and corruption.

The Business Standard responded to the statement with an editorial addressing the “unsolicited advice” from the “maverick former Senator” Joe Lieberman.

UK’s Dept for International Development Funded Terror

Posted on June 14, 2016June 14, 2016 by Denise Simon

Multi-million pound foreign aid grant spent on encouraging terrorism

Telegraph: A multi-million pound foreign aid project aimed at promoting Palestinian state building and peace has instead encouraged terrorism and led to an increase in violence, The Telegraph can disclose.

The Department for International Development (DFID)’s £156.4 million grant providing financial aid to the Palestinian Authority (PA) led to civil servants being “more likely” to commit acts of terrorism, an independent evaluation suggested.

An official report found that the five-year project encouraged public sector employees to engage in “active conflict” since their salaries were paid to their families even if they were convicted and imprisoned for criminal acts, including terrorism.

On completing jail sentences, civil servants were able to return to their jobs which had been “kept open when they return from detention”, and continue to draw a salary funded by the UK taxpayer.

It comes as MPs prepare for a parliamentary debate on foreign aid spending, held on Monday in the House of Commons.

Sir Eric Pickles MP said: “Sadly, the Palestinian Authority role has deteriorated to, at best, the cheerleader to acts of violence to, at worst, the operator of a revolving door policy for terrorists.

“British taxpayers will be shocked to learn that we are helping to fund an equal opportunity employment policy for convicted terrorists.”

Rt Hon Joan Ryan MP, Chair of Labour Friends of Israel called for an independent inquiry to “ensure that taxpayers’ money assists the process of building peace and coexistence rather than ending up in the pockets of convicted terrorists”.

The report, written by the Overseas Development Institute, found that DFID’s grant failed to “promote peace or peaceful attitudes” and appeared to lead to an increase in violence among Palestinians.

The DFID funds were enough to cover the salaries of 5,000 civil servants over five years, the report said, but the more foreign aid money was spent on public sector employment, more “conflict-related” deaths occurred.

“The study suggests that in the West Bank, an increase in the number of public sector employees is associated with an increase in Palestinian fatalities due to conflict,” the ODI report said.

“An increase in public sector employment by one per cent is associated with an increase in fatalities by 0.6% over this time period.”

The report cited the “opportunity cost” hypothesis which states that “conflict, and therefore fatalities, are more likely when the opportunity cost of engaging in conflict is lowered”.

It goes on: “For public sector employees, the opportunity cost of conflict is lowered as their employment will be kept open when they return from detention, and their family will continue to be paid their salary.”

Ms Ryan said the report “adds to the mounting concerns about the support which DFID is providing to the Palestinian Authority”, and that she has “no confidence” in DFID’s internal review into UK spending in the Palestinian territories.

“This is an issue which has been put to the department repeatedly over recent years and which is has consistently and repeatedly failed to act on,” she said.

Lord Polak CBE, a Tory peer, said: “We have been campaigning for many years to ask DFID to ensure that UK taxpayers’ hard-earned money was reaching the right places and not the wrong pockets.

“DFID and the FCO will now need to rewrite their parliamentary answers”.

A DFID spokesman said: “The ODI report clearly states that UK support on the ground helped prevent economic collapse and an escalation in violence. In turn this reduces the risks of further displaced people leaving the region.”