Warning ⚠️ Biden-Harris administration about to launch an economic warfare campaign against Israel. On February 1st, they issued Executive Order 14115, establishing first-ever U.S. sanctions program explicitly targeting an ally. They intend a major escalation in the lame duck. “This dynamic may explain why the Biden administration created a sanctions regime against Israel. The rapidly expanding blacklist—against any Israeli deemed an obstacle to peace—may be the most dangerous innovation in U.S.-Israel policy. Harris staffer Ilan Goldenberg reportedly played an enthusiastic role in developing the sanctions. He’s now her Jewish outreach director.”

Here’s what you need to know about the “Butcher of Tehran”

1. Raisi’s Role in Iran’s 1988 Massacre of Political Dissidents

Raisi played a key role in Tehran’s 1988 massacre of thousands of political prisoners, serving on a four-member panel known as a Death Commission, which decided who would live and who would die. The commission would conduct interviews of prisoners — often just a few minutes long — aimed at determining their loyalty to the Islamic Republic. Typical questions included: “What is your political affiliation?” “Do you pray?” “Are you willing to clear minefields for the Islamic Republic?” The wrong answer meant death. The executions usually occurred by hanging or by firing squad on the same day as the interrogations. The Death Commissions denied prisoners both lawyers and appeals. Burials occurred in unmarked mass graves, and the regime refused to tell relatives the locations of the bodies. The victims included women and children as young as 13.

🧵What do we know so far:

1. This morning, Iran-backed Hamas fired thousands of rockets from Gaza at Israel, while Hamas terrorists invaded Israeli towns and roamed the streets while murdering and kidnapping innocent Israeli men, women and children. 2. Israeli men, women and possibly children (not confirmed) have been kidnapped and taken hostage in this unprecedented attack. Some of the hostage situations within Israeli communities are ongoing at this moment.

The problem with this piece is that it ignores the substantial national interests of the leaders.

1. MBS wants a security deal with the US to establish KAA as a regional & global powerhouse. Needs US security guarantees, guaranteed FMS, free trade agreement & nuclear industry.

https://twitter.com/foreignaffairs/status/1692121223394730250

2. Biden wants a deal with KSA to limit Chinese regional influence, to secure oil trades in dollars, to build a regional military & security alliance to constrain Iran, and to promote greater prosperity and stability in the Middle East.

🧵 Biden is walking into an Iranian nuclear trap 
 
Look at the different split screens and you will see the Biden administration seems dead set on concluding a nuclear arrangement while bypassing review by Congress. 

Let’s take a look: 1. Green-lighting $6 billion in ransom payments and $3 billion in additional cash payment from Iraq to Iran, while turning a blind eye to massive increases in Chinese purchases of Iranian oil.

My take: Jordan is an important American and Israeli ally but it is becoming more of a problem by the day. The evidence:

1. Amman refuses to extradite Palestinian terrorist Ahlam Tamimi, who played a role in the murder of two Americans in a 2001 bombing in Jerusalem.

https://twitter.com/amichaistein1/status/1650152419383181312

2. Amman incites against Israel every Ramadan, fanning the flames of Palestinian violence in Jerusalem.

3. The Jordanians refuse to join moderate Arab states like the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and Egypt in pursuing normalization with Israel.

Jordan’s rhetoric is self-defeating. Israel saved Jordan from Syrian invasion during 1970 “Black September” crisis & repeatedly rescued King Hussein from assassination & coup attempts. Jordan relies heavily on Israel for security, intel, water & gas. thedispatch.com/article/jordan… Washington provides Jordan significant support, including more than $1.5 billion per year.

(Despite this, Amman refuses to extradite Palestinian terrorist Ahlam Tamimi, who played a role in the murder of two Americans in a 2001 bombing in Jerusalem.)

In a question from @SenSusanCollins Collins, @SecBlinken backs down from his previous commitment at his @SFRCdems confirmation hearing to defend terrorism sanctions on the Central Bank of Iran and National Iranian Oil Company. appropriations.senate.gov/hearings/a-rev… At his @SFRCdems @SenateForeign nomination hearing, @SecBlinken had committed to maintaining these terrorism sanctions on the CBI and NIOC.

Even Iranian negotiators are floored at how far @USEnvoyIran has caved. History may show that John Kerry may have restrained @Rob_Malley back in 2015. Now that’s something.

https://twitter.com/negarmortazavi/status/1388957438175481861

People ask me why @Rob_Malley is collapsing at the negotiating table? Understand this: Rob believes U.S. leverage is something to use against ALLIES not against ADVERSARIES.

My friend ⁦@MaxBoot⁩ says the nuclear deal is the only way to restrain Iran’s nuclear ambitions and criticizes me for my rejection of the Biden administration’s desperate effort to return to it.

I adore Max but he’s wrong. Here’s why: washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/… JCPOA gives Tehran patient pathways to nuke weapons because of restrictions that sunset, advanced centrifuge R&D that permits Iran to develop easier clandestine sneakout, no prohibitions on weapon-grade uranium after 2030 & no requirement for Iran to come clean on weaponization.

Has @USEnvoyIran given away the US dollar to the regime? Because if he hasn’t yet, he will.

Lifting the prohibition on the “U-Turn” and facilitating the regime’s use of the US dollar.

When this is said and done, you will be shocked by how much is given away. Cotton-Gallagher resolution with over 60 lead co-sponsors explicitly: “(5) opposes the lifting of the “U-Turn” prohibition, which bans Iran from accessing the United States financial system for the purpose of conducting dollarized transactions” congress.gov/bill/117th-con…

The Biden administration is going back into a deeply-flawed nuclear deal that gives the regime in Iran patient pathways to atomic weapons and flows tens of billions of dollars into the coffers of the IRGC.

Don’t lose the thread in the tic-toc of the daily hurly burly. The strategy will be to negotiate like John Kerry but sound like Tom Cotton (the “Tom and Kerry” strategy) to try and break the Republican consensus & neutralize our MidEast allies.

This is a much more sophisticated group than 2015 in terms of political strategy & messaging.

Thread. Nuclear versus Economic Snapbacks: How nuclear extortion beats economic pressure every time when a US president fears Iranian nuclear escalation. 1. We warned in 2015 that Iran has a nuclear snapback, a threat of nuke blackmail that would block an American economic snapback, unless a US president refused to be extorted and was prepared to go it alone.

I have my disagreements with this piece by ⁦@DanielBShapiro⁩ but there’s common sense in many of his recommendations. The U.S. & Israel share common goals; the important differences will be tactical over the question of when & how to wield leverage. washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/1… Dan perhaps understandably avoids the real tactical and profound disagreements between the Biden and Netanyahu teams of how and when to use leverage.

“For two decades, Fakhrizadeh was the driving force behind what American and Israeli officials describe as Iran’s secretive nuke weapons program.

His **work continued** after Iran’s push to develop a bomb was formally disbanded in 2003... nytimes.com/2020/11/27/wor… ... according to American intelligence assessments and Iranian nuclear documents stolen by Israel nearly three years ago.”

In 2018, I co-authored this ⁦@WSJopinion⁩ piece with my @FDD colleague ⁦@ordefk⁩ about the despicable use by Hezbollah and Hamas of human shields.

We were gratified that Congress unanimously passed & president signed human shields law. wsj.com/articles/get-s… Almost two years have passed & @USTreasury has issued no designations under the law.

Today, @IsraeliPM revealed Hezbollah building & storing precision guided missiles under apartment buildings.

Terror group using Lebanese civilians as human shields.

That’s a war crime.

Israeli PM just revealed Hezbollah missile depot next to gas company near Beirut airport, saying depot could be cause of catastrophic explosion similar to Beirut port.

Long past time to sanction Hezbollah for war crimes under human shields law passed 535-0 & signed in Dec 2018. Hezbollah’s precision-guided missile manufacturing site is located under four seven-story apartment buildings in Beirut that are home to 70 families.

Hezbollah should be designated by @USTreasury for war crimes.

Quoted: “Protections already exist for humanitarian trade,” but this “has a major chilling effect on any financial entities considering doing business with Iran.

This action would turn Iran’s financial sector radioactive.” bloomberg.com/news/articles/… Note: humanitarian transactions take place through the central bank of Iran thanks to General License No. 8 and not through these 14-16 banks. OFAC also gives comfort letters to foreign banks and a Swiss channel exists to facilitate this trade: sanctionsnews.bakermckenzie.com/ofac-issues-ne…

Message to Iran watchers. No it’s not about the JCPOA, snapback or sanctions.

Tehran debuts on @AppleTV in three days. First three episodes drop on Friday. This is really good by @AmySpiro with interviews and a trailer. jewishinsider.com/2020/09/behind…

No. Iran had patient pathways to build an advanced nuclear program *under* the JCPOA. And it would have done so with a powerful economy and regional dominance.

Now it has been severely weakened by maximum pressure, Suleimani’s death & Israeli Air Force & Mossad operations.

https://twitter.com/vali_nasr/status/1308027820245999625

This was @vali_nasr analysis of Obama policy just before JPOA. He writes that administration’s current policy toward Iran (its assumptions & strategy now “hardly distinguishable,” he says, “from those of the Bush White House”) will “eventually turn Iran into a failed state...

“Arab-Israeli normalization is a powerful reminder for Iranians of both the venality & abject failure of the Islamic Republic’s imperialist policies, triggering backlash that has left them increasingly isolated, impoverished & insecure.” @FDD John Hannah: realcleardefense.com/articles/2020/… “Reducing what would have been a several thousand mile problem to a few hundred miles resolves a lot of operational obstacles, significantly boosting the credibility & success of any independent Israeli military option to destroy Iran’s nuke program, should it prove necessary.”