Iran

Subterms

    More stories

    • 50 Shares149 Views

      in Elections

      My Brother’s Thanksgiving Lament

      by

      Thanksgiving began as a time of prayer. We could use some prayers right now, in a country inflamed with hate and prejudice and generational mistrust. Americans are at each other’s throats, living in different realities, fraught by two brutal, calamitous wars. So, as this annus horribilis lurches to a close, with the hope that we can understand each other better, or at least eat pie together, here is the annual holiday column from a man I frequently disagree with, but always, love, my conservative brother, Kevin.****Less than a year before the country chooses a president, President Biden’s poll numbers are almost catastrophic. The overwhelming majority of voters say he is too old, and Donald Trump is beating him in five of six battleground states, according to one recent survey.While majorities of the country find both Trump and Biden unacceptable, Trump remains the Republican front-runner, bolstered by what his supporters see as overeager Democratic prosecutions. This scenario holds great peril for Republicans because Trump is the weakest candidate against Biden. He already lost to him in 2020 and the reflexive hatred he generates, especially among women, could boost Democratic turnout as only Trump could manage.Biden’s three years have been a disaster. An exorbitant round of unnecessary Covid spending sent inflation through the roof, leading to a destructive rise in interest rates and further squeezing consumers.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.We are confirming your access to this article, this will take just a moment. However, if you are using Reader mode please log in, subscribe, or exit Reader mode since we are unable to verify access in that state.Confirming article access.If you are a subscriber, please  More

    • 163 Shares149 Views

      in US Politics

      In a world on fire, Biden struggles to banish the curse of Trump

      by

      Is Joe jinxed? In less than three years as US president, Joe Biden has faced more than his fair share of international crises. America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan blew up in his hands like a cluster bomb. Then came Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and Europe’s biggest war since 1945. Now, suddenly, the Middle East is in flames.It could just be bad luck. Or it could be Biden, who prides himself on foreign policy expertise, is not as good at running the world as he thinks. But there is another explanation. It’s called Donald Trump. If Biden’s presidency is cursed, it’s by the toxic legacy of the “very stable genius” who preceded him.It’s worth noting how the poisonous effects of Trump’s geostrategic car crashes, clumsy policy missteps and egotistic blunders continue to be felt around the world – not least because he hopes to be president again. In 2020, with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu at his side, Trump unveiled his “ultimate deal” for peace in Israel-Palestine.His plan was a gift to rightwing Jewish nationalists, offering Israel full control over Jerusalem and large parts of the West Bank and Jordan Valley while shattering hopes of a viable Palestinian state. It was laughably, amateurishly lopsided. Except it was no joke. It excluded and humiliated Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority, convinced many that peaceful dialogue was futile and so empowered Hamas.Netanyahu had long advised Trump that the Palestinians could be safely ignored, normalisation with Arab states was a better, more lucrative bet and Iran was the bigger threat. Now he could barely contain his glee. “You have been the greatest friend that Israel has ever had in the White House,” he cooed. Naturally, Trump lapped it up.The catastrophic consequences of Trump’s dangerous fantasising are now plain to all – but it’s Biden, his re-election prospects at risk, who is getting heat from left and right. Partly it’s his own fault. He thought the Palestinian question could be frozen. Meanwhile, Trump, typically, has turned against Netanyahu while praising Hamas’s close ally, Iranian-backed Hezbollah, as “very smart”.The 2018 decision by Trump, egged on by Israel, to unilaterally renege on the west’s UN-backed nuclear counter-proliferation accord with Iran was the biggest American foreign policy blunder since the Iraq invasion. Ensuing, additional US economic sanctions fatally weakened the moderately reformist presidency of Hassan Rouhani.Iran took Trump’s confrontational cue – and shifted sharply to the anti-western, rejectionist right. A notorious hardliner, Ebrahim Raisi, president since 2021, has pursued close alliances with Russia and China. At home, a corrupt, anti-democratic clerical oligarchy, topped by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, brutally suppresses dissent, notably advocates of women’s rights.Mahsa Yazdani is the mullahs’ latest victim. Her “crime”, for which she was jailed for 13 years, was to denounce the killing by security forces of her son, Mohammad Javad Zahedi. Such persecution is commonplace. Yet if the Barack Obama-Biden policy of engagement, backed by Britain and the EU, had been maintained by Trump, things might be very different today, inside and outside Iran.Instead, Biden faces an angry foe threatening daily to escalate the Israel-Hamas war. Iran and its militias are the reason he is deploying huge military force to the region. Iran is why US bases in the Gulf, Syria and Iraq are under fire. And thanks to Trump (and Netanyahu), Iran may be closer than ever to acquiring nuclear weapons capability.Trump’s uncritical, submissive, often suspiciously furtive attitude to Vladimir Putin has undermined Biden’s Russia policy, doing untold, lasting harm. Untold because Democrats have given up trying to cast light on at least a dozen, publicly unrecorded Trump-Putin calls and meetings over four years in the White House.It’s not necessary to believe Moscow’s spooks possess embarrassing sex tapes, or that Trump solicited Russian meddling in US elections, to wonder whether he cut private deals with Putin. Did he, for example, suggest the US would stand aside if Russia invaded Ukraine, where there had been fighting over the Donbas and Crimea since 2014? Trump has a personal beef with Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy. That alone is sufficient to shape his policy.Trump’s criticism of European allies and threats to quit Nato caused a damaging loss of mutual confidence that Biden still struggles to repair. For his part, manipulative Putin sticks up for the former president. He recently declared that federal lawsuits against Trump amounted to “persecution of a political rival for political reasons”. Evidently, he’d like to see his pal back in power.Did Trump’s behaviour in office, his impeachments and failed coup, encourage Putin (and China’s Xi Jinping) to view American democracy as sick, failing and demoralised. Probably. Trump’s 2020 Afghanistan “peace deal” – in truth, an abject capitulation to the Taliban – confirmed their low opinion. It led directly to the chaotic 2021 withdrawal and a shredding of US global credibility that was largely blamed on Biden.Little wonder Putin calculates that American staying power will again fade as Trump, campaigning when not in court, trashes Biden’s Ukraine policy and his House Republican followers block military aid to Kyiv. Unabashed by his Middle East fiasco, Trump vainly boasts he would conjure a Ukraine peace deal overnight – if re-elected (and not in jail).It’s an unusually challenging time in world affairs. And Biden has been unlucky domestically, too, given a post-pandemic cost of living crisis and a supreme court gone rogue. Yet his biggest political misfortune remains the noxious global legacy and continuing, uniquely destructive presence of Trump.He is more than just a rival waiting for an 80-year-old president to slip and take a tumble. Symbolically, Trump is nemesis. He is the darkness beyond the pale, he’s a monster lurking in the depths, he’s the enemy within. He’s Joe’s Jonah.
      Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. More

    • 213 Shares189 Views

      in US Politics

      The Guardian view on Biden’s urgent mission: the US pivots back to the Middle East | Editorial

      by

      In the wake of the carnage wrought by Hamas in southern Israel, killing at least 1,300 people; with bombs still raining upon Gaza, having killed at least 3,000; and with 199 children and adults still held hostage, the horror is increased by the prospect of this violence begetting more.The US hopes two aircraft carrier groups in the eastern Mediterranean, non-stop shuttle diplomacy by the secretary of state and a presidential visit to Israel will see off the twin spectres of even greater humanitarian disaster in Gaza and regional catastrophe drawing in Hezbollah in Lebanon and perhaps others. Officially, Joe Biden’s visit to Israel on Wednesday will demonstrate that the US stands with Israel. It may offer Benjamin Netanyahu, disgraced in the eyes of his nation, a political lifeline. But if it is a warning to Hezbollah and Iran, it is also being used to rein in Mr Netanyahu. The US reportedly agreed to the trip only after Israel agreed to move on humanitarian aid and safe areas for civilians to avoid the bombing.But the statement that the two countries will “develop a plan” for delivery is noticeably modest. Even if implemented, it might not hold. Though Israel told the US it would restore the water supply to southern Gaza on Monday, those on the ground report only tiny quantities getting through. And while aid is essential, delivering food and medicines is hard to do and of limited use while air strikes continue.More critical may be the fact that the US, with its own disasters in Afghanistan and Iraq in mind, is pressing Israel to think hard about its plan for Gaza. President Biden warned publicly on Sunday that occupying Gaza would be a mistake. At that point, a ground incursion was regarded as imminent. But his visit has pressed pause, and on Tuesday, the IDF spokesperson Richard Hecht remarked: “Everyone’s talking about the ground offensive. It might be something different.”What happens in Gaza is likely to determine what happens in the north. On Monday, Israel gave an unprecedented order for residents close to the Lebanon border to evacuate south. The area has already seen rocket and missile attacks and border skirmishes. Hezbollah and Israel have trodden carefully since the 2006 war, for which Lebanese civilians mostly paid, though the militant group has built up its fire power and tested the boundaries. But Hezbollah has indicated that it has two red lines: the forcible displacement of large numbers of Palestinians outside Gaza – though Egypt has made it clear it does not want them – and a ground invasion aiming to destroy Hamas: Israel’s stated intention. Behind Hezbollah stands Iran; its foreign minister has warned of “multiple fronts” opening against Israel if it continues to kill civilians in Gaza.Iran does not want to lose Hezbollah, its main proxy force. But nor does it want to see Hamas wiped out. If that looks likely, experts suggest that it would probably also ask Iraqi militias to deploy to Syria or Lebanon. Washington has sent clear warnings to Tehran to stay out of it, while also indicating that it is not looking for a fight. The danger is that while neither the US nor Iran want to be drawn in further, the dynamics on the ground have their own momentum.The unendurable violence witnessed this month in part has its roots in the belief of the US and other governments that the conflict at the heart of the Middle East was unsolvable but manageable, and could be sidelined. Many warned at the time that was wrong. It appears all the more impossible to manage now – and yet that is precisely why the US and others must attempt to do so. More

    • 113 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      Trump’s Remarks on Hezbollah and Netanyahu Prompt Bipartisan Outcry

      by

      Republican rivals and the White House were among those to roundly condemn the former president for his characterization of the Lebanese militant group.Former President Donald J. Trump drew scorn from both sides of the political aisle on Thursday for remarks that he made one day earlier criticizing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and referring to Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militant group, as “very smart.”During a speech to his supporters in West Palm Beach, Fla., on Wednesday, he weighed in on the Hamas attacks on Israel, the worst experienced by America’s closest Middle East ally in half a century.Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite group, has clashed with Israeli forces in the days after Hamas fighters from Gaza attacked border areas in southern Israel, intensifying concerns that the country could be drawn into a conflict on a second front.“You know, Hezbollah is very smart,” Mr. Trump said. “They’re all very smart.”He took swipes at Mr. Netanyahu on the “Brian Kilmeade Show,” a Fox News Radio show, broadcast on Thursday, arguing that intelligence lapses by Israel had left it vulnerable to the sweeping attack, kidnappings and slaughter of civilians leading to the war.A broad spectrum of political rivals condemned Mr. Trump on Thursday, including the White House and several of his Republican primary opponents.“Statements like this are dangerous and unhinged,” Andrew Bates, the deputy White House press secretary, said in a statement. “It’s completely lost on us why any American would ever praise an Iran-backed terrorist organization as ‘smart.’ Or have any objection to the United States warning terrorists not to attack Israel.”While filing paperwork on Thursday to appear on the Republican primary ballot in New Hampshire, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who is running a distant second to Mr. Trump in national polls, also admonished his main rival.“You’re not going to find me throwing verbal grenades at Israeli leadership,” said Mr. DeSantis, whose campaign shared a clip Wednesday night of Mr. Trump’s Hezbollah remarks on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.Former Vice President Mike Pence similarly objected to Mr. Trump’s rhetoric, saying that his former boss was sending the wrong message.“Well look, this is no time for the former president or any other American leader to be sending any other message than America stands with Israel,” Mr. Pence said during a radio interview with “New Hampshire Today.”Mr. Pence disputed Mr. Trump’s characterization of Hezbollah and pointed out that Mr. Trump’s compliments to a brutal figure were not new: Mr. Trump referred to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia as a “genius” and “very savvy” after Russia invaded Ukraine last year. And as president, Mr. Trump praised Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader, as “very honorable.”“Look, Hezbollah are not smart,” Mr. Pence said on Thursday. “They’re evil, OK.”Gov. J.B. Pritzker of Illinois, a Democrat who is a national advisory board member for President Biden’s re-election campaign, slammed Mr. Trump in a statement on Thursday.“No true friend of Israel, the Jewish people or of peace would praise Hezbollah just days after what President Biden and Jewish leaders have called the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust,” Mr. Pritzker said.In a statement on Thursday, Steven Cheung, a spokesman for the Trump campaign, defended Mr. Trump’s comments. He accused the Biden administration of telegraphing its concerns about the potential for a Hezbollah offensive in northern Israel, and he cited a background briefing that a senior defense official gave to the media on Monday.But the Israeli Army had already been engaged in clashes with armed militants along the country’s volatile northern frontier for several days. On Sunday, the day before the briefing, The Associated Press reported that Hezbollah had fired dozens of rockets and shells at three Israeli positions in a disputed area along Lebanon’s border with the Golan Heights.“Hezbollah has operated there for decades,” Mr. Bates said. “And the United States’ words of deterrence have been welcomed across the board in Israel — unlike some other words that come to mind.”Mr. Trump, who has frequently sought to cast himself as a champion for Israel, maligned Mr. Netanyahu on multiple occasions in recent days.On Wednesday in Florida he said that Israel had in 2020 opted out of participating in the U.S. drone strike that killed Iran’s top security and intelligence commander, Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, who the Pentagon said had been planning attacks on Americans across the region — despite its coordination on the plan.“But I’ll never forget,” Mr. Trump said. “I’ll never forget that Bibi Netanyahu let us down. That was a very terrible thing.”In the “Brian Kilmeade Show” interview, the former president criticized Mr. Netanyahu and Israeli intelligence as being poorly prepared for the attacks by Hamas on Saturday.“Thousands of people knew about it, and they let this slip by,” he said. “That was not a good thing for him or for anybody.”Mr. DeSantis said that Mr. Trump had crossed the line with his attack on Mr. Netanyahu.“We all need to be on the same page,” he said. “Now is not the time to air personal grievances about an Israeli prime minister. Now is the time to support their right to defend themselves to the hilt.”Gov. Doug Burgum of North Dakota and former Gov. Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas, who are also challenging Mr. Trump for the Republican nomination, condemned his remarks as well.“Shame on you, Donald,” Mr. Hutchinson wrote on X. “Your constant compliments to dictators, terrorist groups, and evil-doers are beneath the office you seek and not reflective of the American character.”Speaking to reporters in New Hampshire, Mr. Burgum said that “smart” was not how he would describe Hezbollah or Hamas.“I’d call them barbaric,” he said. “I’d call them inhumane. I’d call it unthinkable. But what Hezbollah and Hamas have done, but I don’t think I’d characterize them in any positive fashion — not when you see this incredible ability to conduct the atrocities that most of us would find as unthinkable and unimaginable.”In an interview on CNN on Thursday, Chris Christie, the former New Jersey governor, told the anchor Wolf Blitzer: “Only a fool would make those kinds of comments. Only a fool would give comments that could give aid and comfort to Israel’s adversary in this situation.”While campaigning in New Hampshire on Thursday, Nikki Haley criticized Mr. Trump in response to a question from a voter during a town hall. “I don’t want him hitting Netanyahu,” she said, adding: “Who cares what he thinks about Netanyahu? This is not about that. This is about the people of Israel.”Jazmine Ulloa More

    • 163 Shares199 Views

      in US Politics

      US reportedly persuaded Qatar to halt $6bn to Iran in breach of deal

      by

      A contentious deal to unfreeze $6bn of Iranian oil revenues has been plunged into uncertainty amid reports that the Biden administration has persuaded Qatar to withhold the funds in breach of a previous agreement following the devastating attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Israel.There has been mounting pressure from both Democrats and Republicans for the White House to deny Iran access to the revenues in the face of speculation over how big a role Iran played in the weekend’s attack by Hamas, Tehran’s close ally and proxy.CBS reported that the US had reached a “quiet understanding” with Qatar – which played a mediating role in last month’s agreement that saw the release of five Americans imprisoned by Iran – to keep the funds locked in a bank account specially set up in the Gulf kingdom.“CBS News has learned that the US reached a ‘quiet understanding’ with Qatar not to release any of the $6bn in Iranian oil money that was transferred as part of a US-Iranian prisoner swap,” the network’s chief White House correspondent, Nancy Cordes wrote on X, the social media platform previously known as Twitter.Iran’s mission to the United Nations in New York city criticized any move to hold up the revenues, saying in a statement: “The US cannot renege on the agreement. The money rightfully belongs to the people of Iran, earmarked for the government to facilitate the acquisition of all essential and sanctioned requisites for Iranians.”The US deputy treasury secretary, Wally Adeyemo, had earlier told a behind-closed-door session of congressional Democrats on Capitol Hill about a “quiet agreement” to retain the cash, saying that it “isn’t going anywhere anytime soon”.The administration’s signals appeared designed to dampen controversy surrounding the funds – frozen as a result of sanctions imposed by the Trump administration in 2019 – after five Democratic senators demanded they be re-frozen in the wake of the Hamas assault, which has so far left 1,300 dead in Israel.The $6bn has also become a line of attack for Republicans, particularly Donald Trump, the former president and the party’s frontrunner for next year’s presidential nomination, who has mischaracterised the money as “US taxpayer dollars” which he said was used to finance Saturday’s attack.The White House national security council spokesman, John Kirby, declined to confirm any change in its status but repeatedly stressed that it had been untouched since the release of the five imprisoned Americans on September 18. “It’s still sitting in the Qatari bank account, all of it, every dime of it. None of it has been accessed by anybody,” he told a White House press briefing on Thursday, side-stepping questions about any new agreement to withhold it.“The [Iranian] regime was never going to see a dime of that money. This account was set up by the previous administration for this exact purpose. We have done nothing different. All that we have done is just moved the money from South Korea – where it was inaccessible – to Qatar, where it’s more accessible.”Under the terms of the agreement, he added, the money would not be accessible to Iranian regime officials but to “approved vendors” who would be allowed to use it for humanitarian and medical purposes. “We have always had the ability to provide oversight over the dispersal of these funds,” Kirby said.At the core of the controversy is speculation over what hand Iran’s theocratic rulers might have played in planning the attack by Hamas, an Islamist group which Tehran has financed over many years.Amid suggestions that the assault’s unprecedented magnitude and sophistication would surely have needed an Iranian hand, US intelligence agencies have said they have discovered no evidence of this. Instead, officials have cited early indicators that Iran had no advance knowledge of the attack and was taken by surprise, a view greeted by widespread scepticism among Republicans.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionCritics of the exchange deal contend that regardless of whether the $6bn – originally earned from oil sales to South Korea – is actually touched, the money is “fungible”, meaning Iran could still exploit it by re-allocating funds originally earmarked for other purposes.Trita Parsi, of the Washington-based Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, said re-freezing the funds would signal acceptance of this argument and warned that it could kill any future US-Iran diplomacy. “This would be the second time in five years that the US has reneged on an agreement with Iran,” said Parsi. “But the last time was the Trump administration pulling out of the JCPA nuclear accords agreed with Barack Obama. This is very different – it’s Biden’s own deal that he made four weeks ago.“Even if we accept that the JCPA is dead, it doesn’t mean that some kind of agreement down the road cannot be pursued. However, reversing after four weeks on this issue makes it very difficult to have any diplomacy going forward, because the image in Iran is that the US is a serial betrayer of any agreement it signs.”Seasoned Iran watchers have reacted doubtfully to speculation that the country’s rulers played a decisive role in Hamas’s attack.“There’s definitely a convergence of interests between Hamas and Iran,” said Vali Nasr, a Middle East specialist at Johns Hopkins school of advanced international studies. “But that doesn’t mean that Iran directed this and Hamas said, OK we are going to do it. The truth is that Hamas would be in charge.“Where Iran comes in – and I don’t know how much planning they would be involved in – is that what we saw in this attack was an upgrade to the capabilities and sophistication of Hamas as a fighting force.” More

    • 163 Shares169 Views

      in US Politics

      Biden under pressure to refreeze $6bn in Iranian oil money after Hamas attack

      by

      Joe Biden is under pressure from fellow Democrats to refreeze $6bn of Iranian oil revenues released last month as part of a prisoner exchange deal amid accusations that Iran played a key role in last weekend’s deadly attack on Israel by the Palestinian group Hamas.Five Democratic senators up for re-election next year have joined Republican calls for the US president to effectively renege on the agreement that led to the release of five Americans held captive by Iran unless it is proved that the country’s theocratic regime was not involved in Saturday’s assault, which killed more than 1,000 Israelis.The clamor comes even as US intelligence sources have sought to dampen speculation of close Iranian involvement.Although the White House has accused Tehran of being “broadly complicit” due to its long-term financial and logistical support for Hamas, US officials have said multiple pieces of intelligence indicate that Iran’s leadership had no prior knowledge of the devastating onslaught launched from Gaza, and that it may have caught them by surprise.That has failed to reassure some Democrats gearing up for tough challenges from Republicans in 2024.“Until I have full confidence that Iran did not play a role in these barbaric terrorist attacks on the Israeli people, the United States should freeze the $6bn dollars in Iranian assets,” wrote Tammy Baldwin, a senator for Wisconsin, on X, the platform formerly called Twitter.Four other Democrats in the Senate so far have echoed the call. They are Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Jon Tester of Montana, Jacky Rosen of Nevada and Bob Casey, the senator from Pennsylvania.“I wasn’t supportive of the initial $6bn transfer,” Manchin, a known moderate with a track record of mirroring Republican positions, told reporters. “We should absolutely freeze these Iranian assets while we also consider additional sanctions.”Last month’s unfreezing of revenues from oil sold by Iran to South Korea – originally frozen by the Trump administration in 2019 due to sanctions imposed under its “maximum pressure” policy towards Tehran – had already been fiercely criticized by Republicans, who claimed it projected weakness and said the funds could be diverted to finance terrorism.After Saturday’s attack, Donald Trump, the former president and 2024 Republican frontrunner, intensified that criticism by falsely portraying the money freed in exchange for releasing the five prisoners as “US taxpayers’ dollars”, which he said had helped fund the Hamas assault.The White House dismissed the claim as “total lies” and “disinformation”.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAdministration officials say the funds, which were released to a bank account in Qatar, have not been touched since they were unfrozen. They were released on condition that they were used only for humanitarian purposes, such as buying medicines and medical equipment.Janet Yellen, the US treasury secretary, speaking at the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in the Moroccan city of Marrakesh, said the administration could reverse the decision to unfreeze the money if evidence of Iran’s involvement emerged.Republicans have voiced skepticism over the intelligence notes of caution about an Iranian hand, even though they have been echoed in some Israeli quarters.Don Bacon, a Republican senator for Nebraska, accused the Biden administration of being “in denial” about Iran’s role, while the South Carolina senator Tim Scott, a candidate for the Republican presidential nominee, said Biden had “blood on his hands”. More

    • 125 Shares139 Views

      in Elections

      Trump and Other GOP Candidates Use Israel-Gaza to Criticize Biden

      by

      Republicans renewed their opposition to President Biden’s decision to unfreeze $6 billion for humanitarian purposes as part of recent hostage release negotiations.Republican presidential candidates seized on the Hamas attack on Israel Saturday to try to lay blame on President Biden, drawing a connection between the surprise assault and a recent hostage release deal between the United States and Iran, a longtime backer of the group.Former President Donald J. Trump, who has frequently presented himself as a unflinching ally of Israel and who moved the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv in 2018, blamed Mr. Biden for the conflict.While campaigning on Saturday in Waterloo, Iowa, he said the attacks had occurred because “we are perceived as being weak and ineffective, with a really weak leader.”On several occasions, Mr. Trump went further, saying that the hostage deal was a catalyst of the attacks. “The war happened for two reasons,” he said. “The United States is giving — and gave to Iran — $6 billion over hostages.”In exchange for the release of five Americans held in Tehran, the Biden administration agreed in August to free up $6 billion in frozen Iranian oil revenue funds for humanitarian purposes. The administration has emphasized that the money could be used only for “food, medicine, medical equipment that would not have a dual military use.”A senior Biden administration official responded to the comments by Mr. Trump — as well as to criticism by other Republican candidates — by calling them “total lies” and accusing the politicians of having either a “complete misunderstanding” of the facts or of participating willingly in a “complete mischaracterization and disinformation of facts.”Another Biden administration official, Adrienne Watson, a spokesperson for the National Security Council, said in a statement, “These funds have absolutely nothing to do with the horrific attacks today, and this is not the time to spread disinformation.”Mr. Trump, the G.O.P. front-runner, was not alone in assailing Mr. Biden, as the entire Republican field weighed in on the attacks on Saturday.In a video posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida faulted the Biden administration for its foreign policy decisions in the Middle East.“Iran has helped fund this war against Israel, and Joe Biden’s policies that have gone easy on Iran has helped to fill their coffers,” he said. “Israel is now paying the price for those policies.”In a statement issued through the White House, Mr. Biden pledged solidarity with Israel and said that he had spoken with Benjamin Netanyahu, the country’s prime minister.“The United States unequivocally condemns this appalling assault against Israel by Hamas terrorists from Gaza, and I made clear to Prime Minister Netanyahu that we stand ready to offer all appropriate means of support to the Government and people of Israel,” Mr. Biden said.Yet while the G.O.P. candidates rallied around Israel on Saturday, there is a divide in the party between foreign policy hawks and those who favor a more isolationist approach.In addition to criticizing Mr. Biden on Saturday, former Vice President Mike Pence had harsh words for fellow Republicans who prefer a more hands-off approach to conflicts abroad.“This is what happens when @POTUS projects weakness on the world stage, kowtows to the mullahs in Iran with a $6 Billion ransom, and leaders in the Republican Party signal American retreat as Leader of the Free World,” Mr. Pence wrote on X. “Weakness arouses evil.”Other Republican candidates, including Nikki Haley, who was an ambassador to the United Nations under Mr. Trump, and Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina denounced the attacks as acts of terrorism.“Make no mistake: Hamas is a bloodthirsty terrorist organization backed by Iran and determined to kill as many innocent lives as possible,” Ms. Haley said in a statement.Former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey echoed the criticism of his Republican rivals in a social media post, calling the release of $6 billion by the Biden administration to Iran “idiotic.” Gov. Doug Burgum of North Dakota and Mr. Hutchinson similarly sought to connect the attack with the release of humanitarian funds for Iran.Vivek Ramaswamy, the biotech entrepreneur, called the attacks “barbaric and medieval” in a post on X.“Shooting civilians and kidnapping children are war crimes,” he wrote. “Israel’s right to exist & defend itself should never be doubted and Iran-backed Hamas & Hezbollah cannot be allowed to prevail.”Michael Gold More

    • 238 Shares99 Views

      in US Politics

      Freed Americans on flight bound for US as families hold ‘emotional call’ with president Biden – as it happened

      by

      From 1h agoFive detained Americans and two of their family members have been allowed to leave Iran and are on their way back to the United States after the Biden administration reached a deal in which Washington freed five jailed Iranians and allowed Tehran to access $6b in oil revenue, but only for humanitarian purposes. The agreement comes as the United Nations general assembly kicks off in New York, but it’s too soon to say if the deal between the two archenemy nations will lead to further negotiations down the road.Here’s what else happened today:
      Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi described the release of the Americans as “purely a humanitarian action”.
      Joe Biden held what the White House described as “an emotional call” with the freed Americans as they traveled back to the United States.
      Michael McCaul, the Republican leader of the House foreign affairs committee, worried the deal would incentivize “future hostage-taking” and “free up funds for Iran’s malign activities.”
      Siamak Namazi, an Iranian-American businessman, credited “all of you who didn’t allow the world to forget me” for his release.
      Hunter Biden sued the IRS, arguing that the tax authority broke the law by failing to protect his privacy when two agents went public with claims of political meddling in their investigation.
      You can read our latest full report here:Our diplomatic editor Patrick Wintour has written about how this deal may signal new direction in western diplomacy:In a statement, Michael McCaul, the Republican chairman of the House foreign affairs committee, welcomed the release of the five Americans from Iranian custody, but criticized the Biden administration for allowing Tehran to access $6b in oil revenue:
      I am immensely relieved that five Americans held hostage by Iran are finally reunited with their families and on their way home. I wish them peace, strength, and health as they rebuild their lives in freedom.
      I am very concerned that this $6 billion hostage deal incentivizes future hostage-taking. Even though the Administration claims these funds are limited to humanitarian transactions, we all know that transactions are difficult to monitor and that money is fungible. There is no question this deal will free up funds for Iran’s malign activities.
      Republicans have generally called for harsh measures against Tehran, and during his presidency, Donald Trump went as far as to authorize a drone strike that killed top Iranian general Qassem Suleimani in 2020. Democrats, meanwhile, have tried to find common ground where they can with Iran, such as the 2015 deal Barack Obama reached to curb its nuclear weapons program – which Trump announced the US would withdraw from in 2018.In domestic political news, NBC News reports that the far-right Republican troublemaker Matt Gaetz is highly likely – in the estimation of one source, “100% in” – to run for governor in Florida in 2026.By then, the current hard-right Republican governor, the presidential candidate Ron DeSantis, will either be in the White House or at the end of his two-term time in state office.On Monday, NBC quoted one “longtime Florida Republican lobbyist” as saying that at a reception in Tallahassee on Sunday, “there was a lot of talk about it … and Gaetz was telling people to basically expect him to be in”.Another “Florida Republican operative” was quoted as saying: “He’s 100% in. I think Gaetz is an instant frontrunner and from what I hear he’s already won the Trump primary”, meaning Donald Trump’s endorsement.Gaetz, 41, told NBC: “Many did encourage me to consider running for governor one day.”He also aimed a dig at DeSantis, saying: “But we have an outstanding governor who will be in that position through 2026.”Gaetz’s “only political focus right now”, he added – other than opposing almost everything Kevin McCarthy does as US House speaker, including proposing ways to fund the federal government – “is Trump 2024”.Some further reading:The Iranian nationals who were released in a prisoner swap with the United States have landed in Tehran, state-run PressTV reports:Reuters reports that the two individuals arriving in Iran after transiting Qatar are Mehrdad Moin-Ansari and Reza Sarhangpour-Kafrani. Another two Iranians released by the United States will stay in the country, while a fifth will go to an undisclosed country to join his family.The White House announced that Joe Biden this morning “held an emotional call with the families of the seven American citizens who are returning home to the United States from Iran.”“Each family member who joined the call spoke with the president,” it added in a statement, which also confirmed the group had departed Doha, Qatar for the United States.The five Americans released by Iran today in a prisoner swap have departed Doha, Qatar for the United States, Reuters reports, citing a source familiar with the matter.Qatar helped broker the deal between the two archenemy nations, and the group of former detainees along with two American family members that had been prevented from leaving Iran were flown earlier today from Tehran to the Gulf nation.World leaders meeting at the United Nations in New York on Monday warned of the peril the world faces unless it acts with urgency to rescue a set of 2030 development goals to wipe out hunger and extreme poverty and to battle climate change, Reuters reports.The news agency further writes:
      Their declaration, adopted by consensus at a summit before the annual U.N. General Assembly, embraces a 2015 “to-do” list of 17 Sustainable Development Goals that also include water, energy, reducing inequality and achieving gender equality.“The achievement of the SDGs is in peril,” the declaration reads. “We are alarmed that the progress on most of the SDGs is either moving much too slowly or has regressed below the 2015 baseline.”U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the summit of leaders that only 15% of the targets are on track and that many are going in reverse.Earlier this month, Guterres called on G20 leaders to ensure a stimulus of at least $500 billion per year towards meeting the goals. He called on countries to act now.The leaders are meeting in the shadow of geopolitical tensions – largely fueled by the war in Ukraine – as Russia and China vie with the United States and Europe to win over developing countries, where achieving the Sustainable Development Goals are key.“Instead of leaving no one behind, we risk leaving the SDGs behind … the SDGs need a global rescue plan,” Guterres told the summit.The U.N. said this month that there are 745 million more moderately to severely hungry people in the world today than in 2015, and the world is far off track in its efforts to meet the ambitious United Nations goal to end hunger by 2030.
      The United Nations General Assembly is getting underway in New York with world leaders flying in and the biggest leaders getting ready to deliver their headline speeches tomorrow.Joe Biden has already traveled north and has a couple of Democratic fundraising events this evening in the Big Apple.Tomorrow, the US president will speak at the UN headquarters, following the major opening address by the UN secretary general António Guterres. Guterres will be followed by Brazil’s Lula and then Biden. We expect Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who appeared by video link last year but is attending in person this year, to make his speech around noon local time at a crucial time in the counteroffensive against Russia’s invasion 1.5 years ago.The Ukraine war will be the dominant topic, especially in the absence of Russia and China’s leaders.But Reuters adds:
      With the world on track to break the record for the hottest year in history, world leaders, business leaders, celebrities and activists have converged on midtown Manhattan for Climate Week and the U.N.’s Climate Action Summit, again focusing the world’s attention on the climate crisis. The annual climate gathering coincides with the start of the United Nations General Assembly, bringing heads of state and top government officials together with private-sector leaders to focus on climate change in a year marked by a record number of billion-dollar disasters, including eight severe floods.The main event will take place Wednesday when Guterres will host his own Climate Action Summit, a high-profile event meant to reverse backsliding on Paris climate agreement goals and to encourage governments to adopt serious new actions to combat climate change.“There is lingering doubt that … we can meet our climate goals. There is too much backtracking; so we’re really hoping that this summit can be used as a moment to inspire people,” Selwin Hart, special adviser on climate to the secretary-general, said in an interview.
      The five Americans freed from imprisonment in Iran are now on a flight bound for the US, Reuters reports.Citing an unnamed source, the news agency just reported that an aircraft has departed Doha, the capital of Qatar, where the Americans had been taken as an interim stage, en route for the States.Five detained Americans and two of their family members have been allowed to leave Iran, in a deal with the Biden administration that saw Washington release five jailed Iranians and $6b in oil proceeds, which Tehran can only spend on humanitarian supplies. The agreement comes as the United Nations general assembly kicks off in New York, but it’s too soon to say if the agreement between the two archenemy nations will lead to further negotiations down the road.Here’s what else has happened today so far:
      Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi described the release of the Americans as “purely a humanitarian action”.
      Siamak Namazi, an Iranian-American businessman, credited “all of you who didn’t allow the world to forget me” for his release.
      Hunter Biden sued the IRS, arguing that the tax authority broke the law by failing to protect his privacy when two agents went public with claims of political meddling in their investigation.
      Businessman Siamak Namazi said in a statement released on his behalf, “I would not be free today, if it wasn’t for all of you who didn’t allow the world to forget me,” the Associated Press reports.Namazi was among the five Americans released by Iran today in exchange for the freeing of five Iranians detained in the United States and access to $6b in money from oil sales Tehran can spend only on humanitarian supplies.Namazi continued:
      Thank you for being my voice when I could not speak for myself and for making sure I was heard when I mustered the strength to scream from behind the impenetrable walls of Evin Prison.”
      A dual US-Iranian national, Namazi was detained in 2015 while visiting family in Tehran. Months later, his father, Baquer, was detained when he came to visit him in jail, before being released in 2022.Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the United Nations general assembly in New York, Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi cast Tehran’s release of five Americans as “a humanitarian action”, and hinted that similar deals could be possible, Reuters reports.“This was purely a humanitarian action … And it can certainly be a step based upon which in the future other humanitarian actions can be taken,” the Iranian leader, who was elected in 2021, told reporters.In his remarks to reporters, secretary of state Antony Blinken said seven, not five, Americans had been released by Iran.Blinken included in that number two Americans who had been prevented from leaving the country.“Just a few minutes ago, I had the great pleasure of speaking to seven Americans who are now free, free from their imprisonment or detention in Iran, out of Iran, out of prison, and now in Doha enroute back to the United States, to be reunited with their loved ones,” Blinken said.“Five of the seven, of course, had been unjustly detained, imprisoned in Iran, some for years. Two others had been prevented from leaving Iran.”In a briefing to reporters, secretary of state Antony Blinken said the $6bn in money from oil sales released to Iran can only be used to buy humanitarian supplies: More