Mark Dubowitz

Shawn: This comes as Iran has threatened a private American citizen. State Department pushing back, saying that the outlaw regime in Tehran will face consequence if indeed anything happens to Mark Dubowitz and the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, Tehran announcing sanctions on them and basically threatening a private American citizen and the FDD because of their outspoken efforts for the Iranian people, for democracy and freedom in their country.

Wachtel: That’s right Eric. It’s like a throwback to the days when Salman Rushdie wrote the controversial book, the Satanic Verses, that the Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwah, actually put a death sentence on his head, asking for people to go out and kill him. It’s reminiscent of the early days of the Iranian revolution when there was so much zest and craziness and fanaticism in that country and it continues to this day and this is absolutely absurd.

Shawn: And Zarif seems to back all of this. Here’s what Mark Dubowitz tweeted about this, from the FDD, about this, saying “this is a direct threat against FDD, me and our Iranian and non-Iranian friends. These threats will only strengthen our resolve to research and reveal the truth about the regime in Iran, and to support the burning desire of the vast majority of Iranians for freedom.” Last word, Jonathan Wachtel, on what you would expect.

Wachtel: On the Foundation for Defense of Democracies? Bless them, I hope they’re going to be okay and nothing happens, but the international community, it shouldn’t just be the United States outraged about this, it has to be anybody. You can have differences with that foundation, which is pretty strident when it comes to Iran. It’s been very tough and it’s not surprising that the Iranians look at them as a direct threat. But they’re out promoting democracy, that’s the name of their organization. Iran is not about promoting democracy, it’s about shuttering, it’s about not allowing their own people to have access to social media, it’s about forcing women to wear hijabs – even if they want to or they don’t they should have the ability to decide what they want to do, and executing people for crimes that don’t constitute anything near what should be capital punishment in that country, imprisoning political prisoners, it’s out of control there.

Shawn: Speaking of civility, Iran is now targeting Americans as they have in the past. Mark Dubowitz is a very prominent critic, head of the think tank Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and the Iranian regime reportedly slapped sanctions on Mark and the FDD. What do you think about that?

Dr. Grant: Well I know Mark and his work and I have a great respect for him. I like what the State Department said and that is they take this very seriously, it’s absolutely wrong, and the State Department has said they will hold Iran accountable for compromising any security of Americans. I don’t remember, Eric, ever seeing this happen. FDD is a great think tank, super research, and what Iran has done is completely wrong. Macron has to keep that kind of stuff in mind as he’s trying to work with them.

Shawn: We’re looking at some video of Mark Dubowitz who is CEO of the FDD. Tehran claims they’re engaged in “economic terrorism” and that they spread lies about their regime but you know the FDD, look at their name – Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. And Mark is saying it’s a badge of honor to be on the list. This is what he tweeted out: “This is a direct threat against FDD, me and our Iranian and non-Iranian friends. These threats will only strengthen our resolve to research and reveal the truth about the regime in Iran, and to support the burning desire of the vast majority of Iranians for freedom.” You know, finally, Dr. Grant, it seems the Iranians know no boundaries. I mean, here they’re targeting a private group, going after a private American citizen publically in their way, they have allegedly tried to assassinate their opponents, critics among the Iranian resistance group to bomb one of their meetings in France as well as assassinate a critic and the Saudi Arabian ambassador here at the Georgetown restaurant, Café Milano, where all the big-wigs in Washington go to eat up there in Georgetown. It seems they know no bounds when it comes to trying to reach out their tentacles of murderous terror.

Dr. Grant: This is why Iran cannot be trusted with nuclear weapons and why President Trump was right to back us out of that and get us on course, and we are on course now with Europe as well, to try and find a different situation. The world cannot be secure if Iran has access to that technology. Stupid diplomats that they are, terrible regime, 40 odd years now, and it’s time to draw that line and make something different.

Interviewer: the Trump administration has been sending mixed signals on Iran this week. It imposed sanctions on Iran’s foreign minister and is taking other steps to isolate the country. But the administration also quietly waved some sanctions to allow a key part of the Iran nuclear deal to continue. Joining us now to talk about why is NPR’s Michelle Kelleman. Michelle, I want to start with the sanctions that have been waved, what’s the significance of this?

Kelleman: So the administration says that it’s allowing some projects to continue. These are Russian, Chinese, European companies that are working on projects that are central to the nuclear deal, that’s the deal the Trump administration left which limits Iran’s nuclear activity and ensures that it would take at least a year for Iran to produce enough material for a bomb. The state department says that these are limited, non-proliferation activities that do not help Iran, instead they help restrict and constrain Iran’s nuclear program, so it’s things like redesigning a reactor, and support for a Bushier reactor so that Iran doesn’t need to enrich uranium for that.

Interviewer: But the Trump administration withdrew the US from this deal, which President Obama negotiated. So, in some sense, is this the administration acknowledging that it’s keeping some of it alive?

Kelleman: Well as some critics have said, it’s on life support. It may not be for long, listen to how national security advisor John Bolton described this decision in an interview with the Fox Business Network: “this is a short, 90 day extension, it’s intended, as I say, to be under constant observation and I just keep my eye on that spot.” And Bolton, as you know, is a hawk on Iran, he seemed to be indicating that he’d like to see the administration stop waving these sanctions next go around.

Interviewer: Is the administration, essentially, all on the same page?

Kelleman: It doesn’t look like it, I put that question to Mark Dubowitz of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, he’s also a critic of the Iran nuclear deal, known as the JCPOA: “I think there’s an ongoing internal struggle within the administration between those who want to retain the JCPOA as a framework for future nuclear negotiations with Iran and those who believe that the JCPOA is a fatally flawed agreement.” And he says this whole debate about waivers, the extension for 90 days, these waiver extensions, really captures that internal disagreement.

Interviewer: Here, Dubowitz is talking about the idea of negotiating a new deal. The administration says it wants to do that, but it’s also imposing sanctions on Iran’s foreign minister, what’s the disconnect here?

Kelleman: Well diplomats are sure trying to figure that out right now and trying to figure out what the US strategy is here. France, Britain, and Germany, all signatories of the Iran nuclear deal, say that the US should keep all diplomatic channels open. The UN Secretary General again today called for maximum restraint rather than maximum pressure, the policy that the Trump administration is pursuing. So far Iran’s foreign minister is brushing off the sanctions, saying that they won’t have any effect on him because he doesn’t have any assets here but it’s obviously going to be hard for US officials to deal with him if he continues to be the main diplomat from Iran.

Sanctions alert

Iran’s new financial channel with Europe is linked to sanctioned entities

 

The following is an excerpt:

In April, Tehran created the Special Trade and Finance Instrument (STFI) as a counterpart to the European SPV, formally known as the Instrument for Supporting Trade Exchanges (INSTEX). Set up by Germany, France, and the UK, INSTEX would avoid U.S. sanctions by enabling trade without using the U.S. dollar or going through U.S. banks. STFI was registered in April in Tehran’s Davudieh near the CBI’s headquarters.

[…]

The EU would be wise not to enter into any transaction with the STFI given its connection to sanctioned entities. Non-U.S. firms that are involved in legitimate trade with Iran can conduct it through Iranian banks that are not on the SDN list or not subject to secondary sanctions. Treasury can clarify the risks of dealing with the STFI by adding it to the SDN list, and issuing guidance related to the risks of doing business with proliferators and terrorist sponsors through the STFI. If the EU persists, Treasury could go a step further by threatening to apply secondary sanctions to the STFI.

Read Mark and Saeed‘s policy brief on FDD’s website here.

Gigot: The Trump administration this week deployed USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group along with the USS Arlington and a Patriot surface-to-air missile battery to the Persian Gulf. A response to what Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called a number of troubling and escalatory warnings from Tehran. The deployment comes as the U.S. announces fresh sanctions targeting Iran’s copper, or iron, steel, and aluminum industries and as Tehran warns European leaders that it will stop complying with key parts of the 2015 nuclear deal setting a 60-day deadline for the parties to negotiate new terms. Mark Dubowitz is Chief Executive of the Foundation For Defense of Democracies where he leads the Iran program. So, Mark thanks for coming in good to have you back.

Dubowitz: Thanks, Paul.

Gigot: So, in my experience the U.S. doesn’t deploy this kind of military force as quickly as it has unless there’s really good intelligence saying there’s something to worry about. Is that how you read it?

Dubowitz: Paul, certainly there’s really good intelligence that the regime in Iran was threatening US interests and US allies and so the deployment of these assets is obviously sent as a message to the regime to be careful in that these the carrier group the b-52 bombers that went back they were part of a regularly scheduled redeployment. But certainly I think it sounds like things were expedited to send a message over the past couple of weeks that they had real intelligence of real threats

Gigot: Yeah, now Qasem Soleimani the head of the Kurds force and of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, his tactics do include the use of force and striking back usually through proxies like Hezbollah and militias. Is that how you think this would happen if it did from an Iranian point, if it does, from an Iranian point of view?

Dubowitz: Yeah, Soleimani’s playbook and has been for years. And he’s you know he’s killed hundreds of Americans and maimed thousands of Americans over the years and so I think that probably was the Intel that the U.S government was picking up that Soleimani was going to be using Shiite militias potentially against US troops in in Iraq or in Syria and certainly against US allies and US interests throughout the Gulf

Gigot: Yeah, maybe your American diplomats and embassies, I think they’re also worried about that. Do you think that the Iranian government could actually want some kind of skirmish with the United States militarily? Is that just to help themselves domestically at home?

Dubowitz: Look, it’s always possible. I mean, I think it would be suicidal for the regime to confront the United States certainly given overwhelming American conventional power. And I think it’s also the reason that you hear from President Trump, Secretary Pompeo, Ambassador John Bolton as well as the commander of U.S. forces in in the Middle East, that if they if Soleimani tries this indirectly through proxies as he has in the past they will hold the regime in Iran accountable.

Gigot: Alright, let’s turn to the nuclear agreement and the threat the to the Europeans from Iran that if they don’t do something to fulfill the economic terms of the agreement beyond US sanctions they will withdraw in 60 days. You take that seriously?

Dubowitz: I don’t take it that seriously. I mean, I think the regime in Iran understands that if they do withdraw the Europeans will actually join the United States in reimposing EU sanctions and UN sanctions. So, Iran has to be careful, but I think what you will see is again the Iranian playbook tends to be they expand their nuclear program incrementally, not egregiously, though overtime the sum total of those incremental expansions are egregious. So, I think they will try to blackmail the Europeans and get the Europeans to try to force businesses and banks to start returning to Iran. I think it’ll be wholly unsuccessful.

Gigot: Yeah, it hasn’t been successful so far. But what about the threat what the policy they’re already imposed they’re going to keep their excess enriched uranium and heavy water that they’ve been sending overseas as part of the agreement. Now, they’re going to keep that how serious important is that?

Dubowitz: Look, it is important I mean that would be an incremental breach of the agreement and a serious breach of the agreement because it lowers the breakout time for Iran to weaponize uranium and develop nuclear weapons. So I think they will start to dial up on the nuclear side and again use nuclear blackmail against Europeans on the assumption that the Europeans will then freak out and start to put immense pressure either on Washington or start to breach sanctions. So, this is part of the Iranian playbook it has been for years and it’s something that we’ve expected.

Gigot: Is all of this acting out here by the Iranians a sign that the US tighter sanctions, particularly sanctioning the IRGC there in the Revolutionary Guard Corps and then now tighter sanctions on oil exports, that those are really starting to hurt?

Dubowitz: There’s no doubt about it, I mean I think the sanctions that President Trump has reimposed the new sanctions that have come on board and past couple of weeks against the IRGC and against oil exports are really beginning to put a severe amount of pressure on the economy in Iran and I think that the regime war is at this point that they may see state facing a severe economic crisis but as well a political crisis as thousands of Iranians are still on the streets every day yelling death to the Ayatollah, death to the regime. Why are you spending your money supporting Assad and Hezbollah instead of supporting Iranian’s? And so they’re worried about an economic crisis and a political crisis and they’re really being squeezed between a, I guess, a Trumpian rock and a Bolton hard place

Gigot: All right, Mark Dubowitz thanks for being here appreciate it.