While President Biden prepares to travel to Israel to show support for the country and its people after barbaric Hamas terrorists slaughtered innocent Israelis while aerial attacks continue to be launched from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip and Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon, the Biden administration is set to allow a UN ban on Iran missile development to expire on Wednesday.
As the Foundation for Defense of Democracy (FDD) explained, the sanctions, which expire on October 18, "seek to constrain Iran’s missile and drone activity." Now, unless a "snapback of sanctions is initiated by a nation still party to the 2015 nuclear deal and its companion UN Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 2231, Iran would be free to sell its ballistic missiles and related long-range strike technologies to its anti-Western partners and clients."
Those partners and clients, of course, include Iran-backed Hamas, Hezbollah, and Islamic Jihad terrorists, just to name a few. The missiles would also likely be sold to Russia as it wages its war against Ukraine — and all those funds turned around and used to fund even more terror around the globe.
"The president gives a speech saying he is heartbroken about the images of the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust and opposes Hamas, and a week later, he hands a gift to Hamas' sponsor, Iran," FDD Senior Advisor and former National Security Council official Richard Goldberg told Fox News this week. Biden allowing the sanctions to lapse will be "a huge victory for Tehran that is simply serving as a reward for terrorism and proliferation around the world," he added.
As FDD Senior Fellow Benham Ben Taleblu noted in a brief, "Lapsing UN penalties on Iran’s ballistic missile tests, transfers, and other activities will be yet another sign of the international community’s irresolution to say and do the right thing on Iran. It will, therefore, embolden Iran to double down on its terror proxies and arms proliferation," he warned. "The more confident Tehran feels, the more lethal the threat."
Andrea Stricker, an FDD research fellow and Deputy Director of FDD's Nonproliferation and Biodefense Program, said a snapback of UN sanctions on the terror-sponsoring regime in Tehran are "long overdue" and must be implemented to make clear to Iran that "the international community won't tolerate its arming of Hamas and other terrorist proxies to attack Israel or supply Russia's war against Ukraine." Stricker also called on President Biden to "work with our European partners to initiate the snapback and maintain these missile and drone embargoes, restore arms restrictions, and prevent nuclear sunsets from kicking in."
Already, as FDD's brief on the UN sanctions notes, Iran has been in violation of the resolution:
Prohibitions in UNSCR 2231 set to lapse this week include sanctions on key persons and entities connected to Iran’s nuclear and military infrastructures. Annex B of that resolution prohibits activities like development, tests, military employment, and others.
In violation of the UN prohibitions, however, Iran has already continued to develop and test ballistic missiles, conducting at least 230 ballistic missile launches since 2015. Tehran recently tested a Qased Space-Launch Vehicle that placed a satellite into space. Earlier this year, the regime tested the nuclear capable Khorramshahr-4 medium-range ballistic missile and displayed the new Fattah ballistic missile that Iran claims hypersonic. If the UN prohibitions expire, a newly emboldened Tehran would likely further strengthen and expand its development and proliferation of missiles.
Notably, without U.S. leadership on the issue to restore sanctions against Iran and prevent it from having another outlet through which to arm and fund terrorists around the world, President Joe Biden will land in Israel on the same day Iran gets permission to fully relaunch its missile program:
I hadn’t put that together. Biden arrives in Israel to show solidarity the same day he allows the UN missile embargo on Iran to expire. Wow. https://t.co/IXUPoA0pQL
— Richard Goldberg (@rich_goldberg) October 17, 2023