STOPIRANNOW.ORG Via Fox News
By Senator Marco Rubio
Pictured: Russian President Vladimir Putin and Iran Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei.
Russia’s economy is proving much less resilient than the fighting spirit of the Ukrainian people. In the wake of the Russian invasion, countries across the world moved swiftly to disconnect President Vladimir Putin’s war machine from the global market, and the result is an economy in freefall.
Unsurprisingly, the Chinese Communist Party refuses to join in the sanctions. But Communist China is not Putin’s only supporter.
Recent reporting reveals that Iran is supplying Russia with illicit oil supplies to finance his war in Ukraine. This is alarming to say the least, because America and its allies are on the verge of providing a $10 billion windfall to the terrorist regime in Tehran.
For reasons that are still unclear, the Biden administration has long sought to revive the failed Obama-era 2015 nuclear deal with Iran. Reports suggest an agreement is imminent, with the lead Russian negotiator in the talks saying Russia and China teamed up and "Iran got much more than it could expect. Much more." Whether that is an exaggeration or not, removing sanctions and allowing the sale of Iranian oil across the globe would be a massive victory for Tehran — and a massive loss for the U.S.
While most of the media coverage this week will focus on rising oil prices, this Wednesday also marks 15 years since the Iranian government kidnapped Florida resident and former FBI agent Bob Levinson.
Levinson was held in captivity for longer than any other U.S. citizen in history. For 10 years, I worked with his family to secure information about his status and bring him home. Tragically, Levinson died in captivity sometime in 2020. The Iranian authorities still deny responsibility for his capture and death.
Iran’s is a murderous, backstabbing, and fundamentally anti-American regime. The case of Bob Levinson makes that clear enough, but unfortunately, the Levinsons are not the only family to have lost a loved one at the hands of Tehran.
The Iranians support Hezbollah in Lebanon and Syria, Hamas in Palestine, and numerous other Shia militant groups throughout the Middle East, as well as Nicolás Maduro’s tyrannical narco-regime in Venezuela.
Iran is also responsible for multiple acts of cyberterrorism. And agents from Tehran have plotted to kidnap and/or kill Iranian dissidents on the sovereign soil [of the United States] and of Western states like the Netherlands, Belgium and Denmark.
We know from experience how Tehran will use its windfall. When the Obama administration established the first nuclear deal in 2015, Iran did not live up to its end of the bargain. On the contrary, Tehran used its newfound funds to develop its ballistic missile program, strengthen Hezbollah and the brutal Assad regime in Syria, and crack down on domestic dissent. All the while, the Iranian authorities continued nuclear weaponization experiments at a secret facility.
There is no doubt that the Biden administration and many Western governments are feeling the pressure of high oil prices. President Biden is desperate to bring energy costs down without upsetting the fanatical left wing of this party, so desperate that he would rather import bloodstained Iranian oil than permit further energy exploration in the U.S.
He is also running to Saudi Arabia and Venezuela, as if foreign oil were better for the climate than American oil. This is pathetic, and Americans deserve better. The family of Bob Levinson deserves better.
By reviving the failed Iran deal, the Biden administration will fill the coffers of a murderous, terrorist regime, without putting an end to Iran’s nuclear weaponization. And some of that windfall may find its way to Russia, fueling Putin’s war machine.
It will go down in history as one of the president’s most disastrous foreign policy decisions.
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