[Senate Hearing 118-380]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 118-380
TEHRAN'S SHADOW ARMY: ADDRESSING IRAN'S PROXY NETWORK IN THE MIDDLE
EAST
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
FEBRUARY 28, 2024
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Relations
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via http://www.govinfo.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
56-429 PDF WASHINGTON : 2024
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland, Chairman
ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey JAMES E. RISCH, Idaho
JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire MARCO RUBIO, Florida
CHRISTOPHER A. COONS, Delaware MITT ROMNEY, Utah
CHRISTOPHER MURPHY, Connecticut PETE RICKETTS, Nebraska
TIM KAINE, Virginia RAND PAUL, Kentucky
JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon TODD YOUNG, Indiana
CORY A. BOOKER, New Jersey JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming
BRIAN SCHATZ, Hawaii TED CRUZ, Texas
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland BILL HAGERTY, Tennessee
TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois TIM SCOTT, South Carolina
Damian Murphy, Staff Director
Christopher M. Socha, Republican Staff Director
John Dutton, Chief Clerk
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
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Page
Cardin, Hon. Benjamin L., U.S. Senator From Maryland............. 1
Risch, Hon. James E., U.S. Senator From Idaho.................... 3
Maloney, Dr. Suzanne, Vice President and Director, Foreign
Policy, The Brookings Institution, Washington, DC.............. 5
Prepared Statement........................................... 7
Hook, Hon. Brian H., Former Special Representative for Iran and
Senior Policy Advisor to the Secretary of State, U.S.
Department of State, Washington, DC............................ 12
Prepared Statement........................................... 14
Additional Material Submitted for the Record
Letter to Senators Benjamin L. Cardin and James E. Risch from
United Against Nuclear Iran, February 28, 2024, submitted by
Senator Risch.................................................. 43
Opinion: A Brief History of the Netanyahu-Hamas Alliance,
Haaretz, October 20, 2023, submitted by Senator Chris Van
Hollen......................................................... 50
Qatar sent millions to Gaza for years--with Israel's backing.
Here's what we know about the controversial deal, CNN.com,
updated December 12, 2023, submitted by Senator Chris Van
Hollen......................................................... 58
`Buying Quiet': Inside the Israeli Plan That Propped Up Hamas,
the New York Times, December 10, 2023, submitted by Senator
Chris Van Hollen............................................... 63
Israel Found the Hamas Money Machine Years Ago. Nobody Turned It
Off, the New York Times, updated December 28, 2023, submitted
by Senator Chris Van Hollen.................................... 73
(iii)
TEHRAN'S SHADOW ARMY: ADDRESSING IRAN'S PROXY NETWORK IN THE MIDDLE
EAST
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WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2024
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Foreign Relations,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in room
SD-419, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Benjamin J.
Cardin, chairman of the committee, presiding.
Present: Senators Cardin [presiding], Menendez, Shaheen,
Coons, Murphy, Van Hollen, Risch, Romney, Ricketts, Young,
Barrasso, Cruz, and Hagerty.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. BENJAMIN L. CARDIN,
U.S. SENATOR FROM MARYLAND
The Chairman. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee will
come to order.
In January an attack by Iranian proxies in Jordan killed
three American service members and injured more than 30 others.
We mourn with their loved ones this incredible loss.
The Biden administration's response was pragmatic, it was
resolute, and given the loss of American life it was entirely
justified.
U.S. strikes send a clear message that we will not be
pushed out of the region by these attacks. From Syria to Yemen
to Iraq to Lebanon, Iranian proxies are a serious lethal threat
to our allies globally, to our partners in the region, and to
the United States' national security interests.
Hezbollah has as many as 150,000 rockets, some of them
highly precise and sophisticated, pointed at Israel. Its elite
forces on Israel's border continue to play a dangerous tit for
tat game with the IDF.
Iranian proxies have fired drones and rockets at American
and coalition facilities more than 180 times since October 17.
The Houthis in Yemen have wreaked havoc on commercial
shipping through the Red Sea, using weapons provided by the
Iran Islamic Revolutionary Guard.
I want to thank Senator Murphy and Senator Young for the
hearing they held yesterday on the subcommittee that dealt with
the Houthi issues and at that hearing I expressed my support
for Senator Murphy and Senator Kaine's concerns that there
needs to be an AUMF in regards to our military operations in
the Red Sea.
But while Iran backs these groups, gives them weapons and
training, Iran does not have complete command and control of
their operations. That makes this a very precarious situation,
one that requires careful, clear eyed American leadership.
The risks of miscalculation will not only lead to another
deadly attack against U.S. service members, it could lead to a
full scale regional war.
The Biden administration has not taken the bait on every
attack. Instead, it has focused on significantly degrading
proxies' capabilities and interdicting their resupply.
It has made clear that while the United States will do what
is necessary to protect our people and interests we do not seek
a wider war in the Middle East or a direct confrontation with
Iran.
This hearing, I hope, will help us better understand Iran's
intentions and how it is using its proxy network. There has
been a lull in recent attacks in Syria and Iraq, but not in the
Red Sea.
Does Iran want to avoid an escalation, and if so to what
extent do its proxies share that sentiment? Or is it laying the
groundwork for something else?
As you walk us through the expert assessment of Iran's
calculations I would like to hear what might have changed in
recent months.
Has the risk to U.S. personnel and facilities changed?
Where does it go from here, and importantly, what should we in
Congress consider doing as our next steps to respond to these
potential shifts over the longer term?
I believe we need to do everything in our power to protect
our allies and the United States from the Iranian threat. That
means responding to proxy attacks in a way that defends our
people and our interests without escalating conflict.
That means fully funding our diplomatic and security
efforts with proxy forces--where proxy forces operate, and it
means not only imposing sanctions against Iranian proxies but
enforcing existing sanctions.
At the same time we need a long term plan to deal with the
Iran proxy network. Tehran is playing a long game. Its Supreme
Leaders favor strategic patience. Iran thrives on chaos and
suffering.
The best way to undermine the Iranian threat in the long
term is to offer an alternative, a comprehensive and lasting
peace that allows for real regional integration.
I realize this is no easy task, but that does not mean we
should not make our efforts, and that is what the President and
Administration are doing.
We all know the horrific attack by Hamas in Gaza on Israel.
We also know that part of that was to disrupt the normalization
in the region.
So the best way to counter these threats is for us to move
forward with peace and normalization. It is critical that the
United States continue to be a force for security and
prosperity in the region.
We cannot let Iran succeed in pushing us out of the Middle
East or undermining the hard work of charting a path toward
peace.
With that let me turn to my distinguished ranking member,
Senator Risch.
STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES E. RISCH,
U.S. SENATOR FROM IDAHO
Senator Risch. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Certainly those facts are undeniable and that you have laid
out. I want to thank the witnesses for being here. We have two
very good witnesses on this subject with somewhat divergent
views, but certainly people that know this subject.
Let me start by saying at the beginning of the Biden
administration the President's Iran policy was abundantly clear
and that was an attempt to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal
regardless of the cost.
The Administration chose engagement and appeasement over
containment and isolation. Three years later Iran is more
emboldened and empowered than before, and the Middle East is in
turmoil.
Iran has dramatically expanded operations against the
United States. Israel has decisively engaged against Iranian
proxies in Gaza, and Lebanese Hezbollah is poised to enter the
conflict.
The Houthis are being fueled and directed by the Iranians,
and Iran is moving into the Horn of Africa. Iran is building
its proxy network in Sudan and backing the Sudanese Armed
Forces.
Threats are multiplying, and attacks against Americans are
at an all time high. While nuclear negotiations have collapsed
the Administration has failed to enforce sanctions, unfrozen
Iranian assets in exchange for Americans, allowed Iranian
drones and ballistic missiles to fuel Russia's aggression in
Ukraine, and stood by while Iran uses its oil and its oil
reserves to fund its lifestyle.
As Iran marches across the Middle East the Biden
administration has still not articulated a coherent Iran policy
outside of the nuclear negotiations. It is time to change
course.
Iran is an enduring national security challenge and
requires a serious policy that uses all instruments of national
power.
First, we must adopt a policy of containment. Iran does not
think like the West, and it cannot be talked or charmed into a
change of conduct.
While the regime may make tactical concessions we must
recognize and accept Iran's longstanding strategic hostility
toward the United States.
Second, we must better deny the regime the resources it
uses to support terrorism. It is really straightforward. We
must enforce existing Iran sanctions to include stopping
Chinese purchase of Iranian oil, and we must permanently freeze
Iranian assets around the world.
Iran has earned a shocking $80 billion in oil revenues
since 2021. Its once meager exports at the end of the last
Administration are now over 2 million barrels a day. Let me say
that again--2 million barrels a day--in the face of our
sanctions.
Not only does this supercharge Iran's support for
terrorists, but the lack of sanctions enforcement provides Iran
with greater resources to support Russia's invasion of Ukraine,
and China with greater access to oil to pursue its dominance in
the Pacific.
Third, we must restore deterrence. There have been, as the
chairman noted, at least 170 attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq,
Syria, and Jordan since October 7. It is clear the Iranian
regime doubts Biden's will to impose serious costs. It is time
to do things differently. We must dial up deterrence and force
the regime to take notice.
Fourth, we must demonstrate American leadership. Iran's
support for Russia, quashing of protests at home, and attack
against Israel have forced many of our partners to rethink
their approaches to Iran. We should be leading those efforts.
Finally, we must better support the aspirations of the
Iranian people. The Iranian people are disillusioned and at a
breaking point. The lack of concrete response from the
Administration has missed an opportunity.
I cannot overstate how bad policy has allowed Iran, Russia,
China, and North Korea to move from being transactional
partners to strategic allies with each other. This is a failure
of American policy that will have consequences for years to
come.
This committee has a clear role in shaping Iran policy. We
have several pieces of legislation in front of us including my
bill to better enforce oil sanctions.
Many of these Iran related bills like the SHIP Act have
already passed the House, and I look forward to working with
the chairman to push these over the finish line.
In closing, I would particularly like to thank Mr. Hook for
being here. The threats against you and your family in
connection with your past work as the U.S. Iran envoy are
unacceptable and underscore the threat that Iran poses to
Americans.
With that, I will turn back to the chair.
The Chairman. Let me thank Senator Risch.
We are in total agreement that Iran's intentions are
against our national security interests, that we need to
enforce our sanctions particularly in the energy sector, and
the importance of U.S. leadership.
So I look forward to working with Senator Risch and all
members of this committee on legislation that addresses those
important issues and strengthens our resolve against Iran's
nefarious activities.
I also agree with Senator Risch that we have two
distinguished witnesses here today, and I want to thank both of
them for being with us.
Let me introduce both of you.
First, Suzanne Maloney, who is the vice president and
director of the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings
Institution where she served as the deputy director of the
Foreign Policy program for 5 years. Her research focuses on
Iran and Persian Gulf energy.
Ms. Maloney also advised both Democrats and Republican
administrations on Iran policy including as an external adviser
to senior State Department officials during the Obama
administration, and a member of Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice's policy planning staff.
Mr. Brian Hook, who is well familiar with the members of
this committee, I appreciate very much the relationship I have
had with Mr. Hook when he was part of the Administration, and
we had a chance to talk about issues sometimes in this hearing
room, sometimes in a classified setting, and I thank him for
his service to our country.
He is currently vice chairman of the Cerberus Global
Investments and former State Department Special Representative
for Iran during the Trump administration.
Prior to his appointment as Special Representative he
served as the director of the policy planning staff from 2017
to 2018, and from 2009 to 2017 he managed a international
strategic consulting firm based in Washington, DC.
So we will start first with Dr. Maloney.
STATEMENT OF DR. SUZANNE MALONEY, VICE PRESIDENT AND DIRECTOR,
FOREIGN POLICY, THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION, WASHINGTON, DC
Dr. Maloney. Chairman Cardin, Ranking Member Risch,
distinguished members, it is an honor for me to address this
committee today.
As noted I am vice president and director of foreign policy
at the Brookings Institution but my views today represent only
my own.
Iran is a profound and enduring threat to American national
security as a result of its nuclear ambitions, its terrorism
and hostage taking, its military support to Russia's war in
Ukraine, and brutality toward its own people.
One of the most valuable tools in the Iranian arsenal is
the network of militias that Tehran has cultivated,
coordinated, trained, and supplied with advanced weaponry. This
adaptive layered so called axis of resistance extends across
the Middle East and around the world.
Through opportunistic and flexible arrangements Tehran has
built partnerships of enduring value that provide strategic
depth and insulate its government from the full risk of its
militancy.
Increasingly Tehran supplies the means of production and
modification to enable independent weapons manufacturing as
well, providing redundancy, innovation, and deniability.
Iran's leaders have exploited the shocking Hamas massacres
on October 7 and the war in Gaza to elevate their own regional
status, block normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia,
incapacitate and delegitimize Israel, and test America's spine.
They also seek to precipitate American mistakes.
Historically, Iran's most valuable openings have come as a
result of strategic missteps by Washington or our regional
partners such as the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
[Disturbance in the hearing room.]
Dr. Maloney. Such as the invasion of Iraq and the
withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal. For Tehran the
prospective advantages and rewards of its regional aggression
are huge.
Iran does not actually have to achieve anything. Chaos and
pressure on Israel and the United States itself constitute a
victory for the Islamic Republic.
On that basis the Iranian leadership escalated hostile
actions by its proxy militias resulting in at least 186 deaths
or injuries to American troops, and the Iran backed Houthis
have launched at least 57 attacks on commercial shipping in the
Red Sea, prompting the rerouting of international maritime
freight traffic with significant delays and costs to the global
economy.
Additional threats loom large. Any miscalculation by any of
the actors could ignite a wider and much more dangerous war,
and in the long run Iran's proxies erode governance and
security across the Middle East.
The Biden administration has been resolute and pragmatic in
managing these threats. The rapid deployment of American
military assets to the region, together with the tireless
diplomatic engagement by President Biden and senior U.S.
officials, has succeeded in averting the wider war that Hamas
hoped to precipitate.
U.S. retaliatory strikes in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen have
degraded militia capabilities and leadership and signaled to
Tehran's partners that they will pay a price for their
militancy.
The calibrated use of force is having a positive effect.
The pace and scope of attacks emanating from Iraqi militias has
waned. The combination of deterrence and diplomacy has
succeeded in preventing the eruption of a wider war.
Still, Iran's militias are tenacious and adaptable with a
plentiful and inexpensive arsenal, especially compared with the
costs entailed in shooting them down. So we must remain
vigilant.
The use of force alone will not eliminate the threat posed
by Tehran or its militia network, and overreach or over
reliance on military instruments could undermine our objectives
in the region, including objectives for stability and good
governance in our partners there.
Together with our regional partners Washington must plan
meticulously for the day after the war in Gaza. We must ensure
that civilian authorities independent of Hamas and other Iran
backed militias are resourced for rapid and effective
reconstruction and governance.
Getting this right has been a high priority for the White
House since October 7, but the obstacles to effective
implementation remain staggeringly high. We must also craft and
execute a new strategy that addresses the totality of the
challenges posed by Tehran to its neighbors and the world.
Contesting and containing the Islamic Republic's most
dangerous policies will create time and space for Iran's
century old movement for representative democracy to gain
strength.
This can and should be a bipartisan effort. As noted, I
have had the opportunity, the privilege, to work with both
Republican and Democratic administrations on Iran, and I
believe there is substantial alignment around both the nature
of the threat and the most effective tools for countering
Tehran's malign policies across both sides of the aisle.
And we need not go it alone internationally. As noted, the
U.S. military response in the Red Sea reminds us that
investments in coalition building require time and energy to
mature and be effective.
But the crisis in the Middle East has laid bare several
hard truths. Like it or not, the United States remains an
indispensable player in the region.
No other world power can surge military and diplomatic
capability to manage a spiraling conflict and avoid the worst
outcomes, and even if Americans are weary of our commitment,
they are standing by our allies, and protecting our interests
requires that commitment and readiness.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Maloney follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dr. Suzanne Maloney
Chairman Cardin, Ranking Member Risch, and distinguished members,
thank you for inviting me to contribute my views on the intensifying
threats posed by Iran's proxy network across the Middle East and how
U.S. policy might counter these threats most effectively. It is an
honor for me to address this committee.
I am Vice President and Director of Foreign Policy at the Brookings
Institution, a U.S. nonprofit organization devoted to independent
research and policy solutions. Brookings's mission is to conduct high
quality, independent research and provide innovative, practical
recommendations based on that research for policymakers and the public.
My testimony represents solely my personal views and does not reflect
the views of Brookings, its other scholars, employees, officers, and/or
trustees.
The Islamic Republic of Iran presents a serious and abiding threat
to American national security through its decades long bid to achieve
nuclear weapons capability, its extensive track record of terrorism,
hostage taking, and violent subversion, its deepening involvement in
Russia's barbaric and illegal war in Ukraine, and its brutality toward
its own citizens. One of the most valuable tools in the Iranian arsenal
is the network of militias that its leadership has cultivated,
coordinated, trained, and supplied with advanced weaponry. The network
extends across the broader Middle East from Lebanon to Pakistan, and
these proxies have proven integral to Tehran's security, longevity, and
influence. They provide the Islamic Republic with strategic depth and
wide regional influence and access while insulating Iran's leadership
from the full risk of their actions.
Since the shocking massacres perpetrated by Hamas in Israel on
October 7, hostile actions by Iran's proxy militias have dramatically
escalated in ways that pose a complex challenge for Washington and the
world. Already, militia attacks have resulted in at least 186 injuries
or deaths to American troops serving in the Middle East, including 130
who have suffered traumatic brain injuries and the tragic loss of three
U.S. service members in Jordan, as well as two U.S. Navy SEALs killed
in a mission to interdict illicit Iranian weapons. \1\ And the Iran
backed Houthi movement in Yemen has launched at least 57 attacks on
commercial shipping in the Red Sea, prompting the re-routing of
maritime freight traffic with significant delays and additional cost.
The persistence of deadly militia violence augurs even greater
risks. A miscalculation by any of the actors involved could ignite a
much wider and more intense conflict across the Middle East, with
profound damage to regional stability and the global economy. And over
the long term, the empowerment of these non-state armed actors
contributes to the erosion of governance and security across the region
to the advantage of Iran and other bad actors.
Over the past four and a half months, the Biden administration has
been resolute and pragmatic in managing the threats posed by Tehran and
its self-described ``axis of resistance'' in the wake of Israel's war
in Gaza. The rapid deployment of American military assets to the
region, together with tireless diplomatic engagement by President Joe
Biden and a host of senior U.S. officials, have thus far succeeded in
averting the wider war that Hamas had hoped to precipitate. And a
series of U.S. retaliatory strikes in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen since
October have degraded militia capabilities and leadership and signaled
to Tehran's partners that they will pay a steep price for continued
aggression against Americans. Still, the post-October 7 strategic
landscape demands more from both the United States and its allies and
partners in the Middle East and beyond.
iran's proxy network in the middle east
One of the most important elements of Iran's regional and
international power projection is its deployment of proxy militias.
Over decades, and with only limited effective pushback from regional
states or the international community, Tehran has assembled an
adaptive, layered network of regional militias with discrete
organizational structures and leadership and overlapping interests and
ties to Iran's security and religious establishments. This proxy
infrastructure has enabled the Islamic Republic to wield significant
sway and sow instability across the broader Middle East and beyond,
while preserving plausible deniability. Although these relationships
are often highly opportunistic, that does not invalidate their utility
for either side of the equation; in many respects, it reflects shared
preferences for autonomy and self-interest. And the evolutionary nature
of Iranian investments in its clients has worked to its advantage,
enabling Iran's security establishment to build partnerships of
enduring strategic value.
Over four decades, militant proxy groups have become a core
component of the Islamic Republic's regional and international
strategy, which relies on asymmetric warfare to gain leverage against
more powerful adversaries, including and especially the United States.
In seeking to entrench its own influence at the expense of its
adversaries, Iran's power projection via proxies is purposeful rather
than wanton, conscious of the balance of costs and benefits, determined
to exploit openings or weakness, inventive in its implementation, and
wide ranging in scope. Iran's access has been boosted by the
elimination of its historic competitors among the radical camp in the
Middle East. As deep pocketed dictators with Saddam Hussein and Moammar
Gaddafi were eliminated from the scene, the Islamic Republic has become
one of the only games in town.
Tehran's operational governance of its proxies has proven versatile
and dynamic, utilizing umbrella groups and joint operation rooms to
coalesce and direct diverse factions, while at other times fragmenting
existing groups as a means of maintaining its sway. \2\ While Iran's
provision of funding as well as materiel support has long been a
central dimension of sustaining its relationships with individual
militias, increasingly, Tehran is equipped to transfer not just
weaponry, but the means of production and modification to enable
independent manufacturing as well. Any risks of obsolescence seem to be
outweighed by the opportunity to build redundancy of supply, seed
innovation, and enhance deniability. \3\
A brief review of Iran's ``shadow army'' will focus on its most
prominent and effective components--Hezbollah in Lebanon, Palestine
Islamic Jihad and Hamas, the panoply of Iraqi Shia militias, and the
Houthis in Yemen. These groups have emerged as the most powerful nodes
of Iran's militia network, but they represent only a small minority of
the multitude of groups across the world that Tehran has patronized
over the past 45 years.
Iran's proxy network emerged organically from the transnational
operational and ideational networks that facilitated the 1979
revolution. From the inception of the Islamic Republic, its leadership
has harbored expansive ambitions. The ideology that shaped Iran's post-
revolutionary state was explicitly universalist, and its first leader,
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, maintained that exporting the revolution
was necessary for its survival, arguing that ``(i)f we remain in an
enclosed environment we shall definitely face defeat.'' \4\ Determined
to spark a wider wave of upheavals, its leaders developed an
infrastructure dedicated to toppling the status quo across the Muslim
world through proxy groups, Islamist propaganda, and instrumental use
of extraterritorial violence. To extend the regime's vision of an
Islamic order, Tehran sought to subvert its neighbors through attempted
coups, assassinations, and bombings.
Despite wide ranging efforts, the anticipated revolutionary wave
failed to materialize. Still, the Islamic Republic's early investments
yielded one enduring asset--the Lebanese Shia militia Hezbollah. Iran's
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) played a foundational role in
forging the organization after the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon,
building on communal and clerical ties between the two states, as well
as collaboration among militants during the 1970s. Hezbollah's long and
bloody track record includes a devastating series of suicide bombings
in 1983 and 1984 that targeted American and French government
facilities in Lebanon, as well as kidnappings, hijackings, as well as
actions further afield, such as the 1994 bombing of a Jewish cultural
center in Argentina and the 2012 suicide bombing that killed 5 Israeli
tourists in Bulgaria. It has fought and survived multiple wars with
Israel, maintains tens of thousands of active fighters, and with
Tehran's help has amassed a massive arsenal estimated to include
150,000 rockets and missiles, mostly short range and unguided, as well
as drones, precision missiles, anti-tank, anti-aircraft, and anti-ship
missiles. \5\
Through its political wing, Hezbollah has insinuated itself firmly
in the fraught Lebanese government, with members serving in parliament
and in the cabinet. This political role has not tempered the group's
reliance on coercion; several Hezbollah members have been convicted in
the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri.
Today, Hezbollah is the jewel in the crown of the Iranian proxy
network; as Maj. Gen. Aharon Haliva, who heads Israeli military
intelligence, has noted, ``for a while now Hezbollah has not been a
proxy of Iran; it is an inseparable part of the decisionmaking process
in Tehran . . . It is no longer a discussion of whether Hezbollah is
the defender of Lebanon, the defender of the Shiites, or the defender
of Iran and just one part of the axis. It is the axis.'' \6\ [Emphasis
added.] Its ideological affinity with Tehran is unique, its commitment
to ``resistance'' unyielding, and it proved central to the Islamic
Republic's existential struggle to sustain Bashar Assad's regime after
the eruption of the Syrian civil war. That conflict elevated Hezbollah
to first among equals, working closely with the IRGC to provide
training and coordination among a wider transnational network of Shia
militias from Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Yemen.
Tehran's deep involvement in Lebanon also provided the springboard
for its patronage of various Palestinian groups, which also built on
extensive pre-revolutionary interactions. The Palestinian issue has
always loomed large for the Islamic Republic's leadership, but
historically, their inroads with Palestinian groups have been limited
by sectarian and doctrinal differences, as well as by Yasser Arafat's
embrace of Tehran's mortal enemy, Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. One key
exception to that estrangement was Palestine Islamic Jihad (PIJ), a
small Sunni group that fused Muslim Brotherhood doctrine with an
affinity for the Iranian revolution. Embraced by the IRGC, Islamic
Jihad's commitment to militancy made it a valuable partner for Tehran
in its efforts to sabotage U.S. led efforts to advance peace between
Israelis and Palestinians.
In its outreach to the Palestinians, Tehran has consistently sought
to court Hamas, which emerged in the 1980s as the most influential
opponent of Palestinian-Israeli peacemaking. With strong roots in the
Muslim Brotherhood movement, Hamas leaders traditionally kept Tehran at
greater distance than PIJ, although they too were receptive to Iranian
funding and arms supplies. But the relationship shifted in the mid-
2000s, with the assassination of the group's founder, the fallout from
the war in Lebanon, and the Hamas victory in Palestinian parliamentary
elections and subsequent seizure of control in Gaza. Munitions,
training, and suitcases full of cash began flowing from Tehran to
Hamas.
A few years later, as Iran mobilized Shia groups from across the
region to fight on behalf of Bashar Assad, its relations with both
Hamas and PIJ would once again become strained. But the frictions were
soon repaired and by 2018, Hamas leader Yahyah Sinwar lauded Hamas's
``strong, powerful and warm'' ties with Iran and boasted that ``we have
excellent relations with our brothers in Hezbollah . . . We work
together and coordinate and are in touch on an almost daily basis.''
\7\ In particular, Iranian backing facilitated the very capabilities
that enabled the October 7 attacks, as well as Hamas's stockpile of
thousands of rockets utilized on that terrible day and persisting
still. In turn, both PIJ and Hamas have enabled the proliferation of
violent resistance among Palestinians, nurturing smaller affiliated
cells of violent rejectionists.
A key factor in the convergence over the past 15 years among a
diverse array of Iraqi Shia militias under Iranian coordination was the
2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, which eliminated its longtime Baathist
government and unleashed waves of violent insurgency that mobilized
both Shia and Sunni extremists. Tehran was well situated for this
transition; since Baghdad's 1980 invasion of the fledging revolutionary
state, Iranian leaders had cultivated Iraqi Shia opponents of Saddam
through the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq and its
military wing, the Badr Corps.
The underlying pragmatism of Iran's leadership worked to its
advantage, as its initial allies cooperated closely with Washington in
the run up to and in the years after the invasion. Still, Iran's
partners were steadily eclipsed as a political and military force in
post-Saddam Iraq by an array of other paramilitaries. The militias
initially flexed their muscles to provide security in the post-war
vacuum; many quickly aligned with Iran to undermine U.S. dominance and
eventually to contest Sunni extremists, including the Islamic State.
Tehran developed powerful operational and financial relationships with
a wide variety of Iraqi militias, which continue to have outsized
influence on the political, economic, and security trajectory of the
state.
The most recent addition to Iran's militia lineup is Ansar Allah,
more commonly known as the Houthi movement, in Yemen. The Houthis, a
Zaydi Shia group, launched an insurgency against Yemen's government
nearly 20 years ago, and have been fighting against internal and
regional adversaries ever since. In 2015, Saudi Arabia launched a
military intervention, with cooperation from its regional partners in
the Gulf as well as the United States. The operation failed to unify
the country or restrain the Houthis, but precipitated a horrific
humanitarian crisis in Yemen, as well as the deepening of Iranian
support to the insurgents. Over subsequent years, it became clear that
the Houthis had developed sophisticated capabilities to strike civilian
infrastructure. Since the 2022 cease fire, hostilities remained at a
low ebb, but a lasting political settlement proved elusive, and Iran
continued to provide lethal support to the Houthis, including ballistic
and cruise missiles, sea mines, UAVs, and unmanned marine vehicles.
iran backed militias and u.s. responses since october 7
For the Islamic Republic's leadership, the October 7 attacks and
the war in Gaza provides an opportunity for to advance its long
cherished goal of crippling its most formidable regional foe. Iran's
supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has never wavered in his
feverish antagonism toward the United States and Israel. He and those
around him are profoundly convinced of American immorality, greed, and
wickedness; they revile Israel and clamor for its destruction, as part
of the ultimate triumph of the Islamic world over what they see as a
declining West and illegitimate Israel.
The attacks on Israel and the subsequent Israeli military campaign
in Gaza have served several important Iranian objectives--elevating
Tehran's stature as a regional interlocutor and heavyweight;
emboldening its proxy network; blocking nascent efforts to achieve
formal normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia, which would have
further isolated Iran; and weakening its adversaries, especially Israel
which was left with little choice but to embark on a ferocious
offensive that has resulted in immense civilian casualties in Gaza and
inflicted damage on its international standing. And Tehran and its
proxies sensed an opportunity to seize the initiative and test the
spine of U.S. leaders in the face of an unanticipated crisis.
The Iranian leadership has exulted in Israelis' terror and grief
and exploited the immense suffering of Palestinian civilians trapped in
Gaza in a bid to elevate the Islamic regime as a key regional power
broker. In October 2023, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman placed
his first ever phone call to Iranian president Ibrahim Raisi, who later
participated in a regional summit in Riyadh the following month. Other
Iranian officials, including Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian,
have shuttled around the region and the world, posturing as a
peacemaker and honest broker even as the regime maintains full throated
support for Hamas and continues to stoke the flames of instability
across the region.
At the same time, Iran's network of proxies quickly and
significantly ramped up hostile activity targeting Israel directly as
well as U.S. presence in the region. Predictably, Hezbollah was the
first to join the fight, with a barrage of rockets, missiles, and
drones from across the border in Lebanon, aimed at Israeli military and
civilian infrastructure. Over the course of subsequent weeks, Iraqi
militias began targeting U.S. forces scattered across Iraq, Syria, and
Jordan, with at least 170 missiles, rockets, and drone strikes. The
third front emerged from Yemen, with initial attempts by the Houthis to
strike Israel directly with ballistic and cruise missiles as well as
drones. By late November 2023, the group had shifted its focus closer
to home, mounting a series of sophisticated attacks against commercial
shipping in the Red Sea that have forced more than 540 ships to reroute
at considerable additional time and expense.
The Biden administration has engaged in active defense, utilizing
both military and diplomatic tools to contain or dissuade the extension
of the conflict beyond Gaza. The earliest U.S. steps, including the
dispatch of two battle carrier groups to the region and high level
official engagement, signaled the strength of American resolve, and
together with a steady tempo of Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon,
prevented the expansion of a full fledged conflict on Israel's northern
front. The administration's intense efforts to secure an agreement that
would enforce the terms of past United Nations Security Council
resolutions and ensure the redeployment of Hezbollah north of the
Litani River remain a critical aspect of averting further escalation
and enabling some semblance of normal life to resume in northern
Israel.
To counter Iran backed militias, the U.S. has struck more than 100
targets in Iraq and Syria associated with the Revolutionary Guard and
its assets in those countries since late October. And to address the
ongoing threats posed by the Houthis in the Red Sea, the Pentagon has
stepped up efforts to intercept Iran's supplies of advanced weapons to
the Houthis and launched two new initiatives aimed a blunting in the
region--Operation Prosperity Guardian, \8\ a multinational security
mission intended to protect safe transit through the Red Sea, and
Operation Poseidon Archer, an operation led by U.S. Central Command to
degrade the Houthis' strike capabilities. The administration has also
resumed the designation of the Houthis as a Specially Designated Global
Terrorist Organization, and reportedly launched a cyberattack against
Iranian ships that have helped facilitate the Houthi attacks.
the path forward on iran and its proxies
The Biden administration's use of force against Iran's proxies
appears to be having a salutary effect on the crisis, with some early
evidence that individual militias may have been weakened and that
attacks emanating from Iraq have slowed and/or halted altogether. \9\
And more broadly, deterrence is working, at least in forestalling the
eruption of a wider war. Still, the tenacity and adaptability of Iran's
various militias is prodigious and time tested, and the weapons at
their disposal are relatively plentiful and inexpensive, especially as
compared to the costs entailed in shooting them down. So Washington
must remain vigilant.
But it is also clear that the use of force alone will not eliminate
the threat posed by Tehran or its militia network, and overreach or
overreliance on military instruments could undermine the ultimate
objectives of U.S. policy in the region and elsewhere. Even a
spectacular U.S. strike, such as the January 2020 assassination of Qods
Force commander Qasem Soleimani along with a key Shia militia leader in
Iraq, has had relatively limited long term impact on the strength,
durability, or efficacy of Iran's ``axis of resistance.''
For Tehran, the prospective advantages for its regional aggression
are huge. Iran doesn't actually have to achieve anything; chaos and
pressure on Israel and the United States will itself constitute a
victory. By contrast, the stakes for American success are high. With
their attacks, Iranian leaders seek to precipitate U.S. mistakes.
Historically, its most valuable openings have come as a result of
missteps by the United States and our regional partners, such as the
2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq and the 2018 withdrawal from the Joint
Comprehensive Plan of Action.
Together with our regional partners, Washington must begin planning
meticulously for the day after the war in Gaza. It will be critical to
ensuring that civilian authorities that are independent of Hamas and
other Iran backed militias are resourced to undertake the
reconstruction effort effectively and quickly. In the aftermath of the
2006 war in Lebanon, Iranian aid enabled Hezbollah to snatch victory
from the jaws of defeat and outmaneuver the Lebanese government with
almost instantaneous compensation and rebuilding programs. \10\ While
U.S. led diplomatic efforts to coalesce leaders in the Gulf around
post-war plans for Gaza's governance and reconstruction have been
underway for some time, the obstacles to effective implementation
remain staggeringly high.
In addition, the United States must craft and execute a new
strategy that addresses the totality of the challenges Iran poses to
its neighbors and the world. The assumptions underlying Obama era
diplomacy toward Tehran--a conviction that the Islamic Republic could
be persuaded to accept pragmatic compromises that served its country's
interests--are no longer credible. Today's Iranian leaders have
assessed that the strategic landscape incentivizes a more aggressive
posture and an embrace of the authoritarian alternatives to the West.
In turn, they have reverted to the regime's foundational premise, a
determination to upend the regional order by any means necessary. We
can contest and contain the Islamic Republic's most dangerous policies,
and in doing so create time and space for Iran's century old movement
for representative democracy to gain strength.
This can and should be a bipartisan effort. The past decade has
witnessed an immensely problematic polarization of the debate around
Iran policy, both here in Washington and around the country. I've had
the privilege to work with Republican and Democratic administrations on
Iran, and there is substantial alignment around the nature of the
Iranian threat and the most effective tools for countering Tehran's
malign policies among the American people and their representatives and
leaders across both sides of the aisle. Unfortunately, it is also
evident that the fierce disagreements in Washington have at times
stymied opportunities to enhance our deterrence.
We need not go it alone, and the U.S. military response in the Red
Sea is a reminder that investments in coalition building require time
and energy to germinate and mature. But the crisis in the Middle East
has laid bare several hard truths. Like it or not, the United States
remains an indispensable player in the Middle East, despite a dubious
track record of limited success in the region over the past several
decades. However, no other world power can surge military and
diplomatic capacity to help manage a spiraling conflict to avoid the
worst outcomes. And even if Americans are weary of the military,
economic, and human toll of our commitment there, standing by our
allies--even when that requires a careful balance of support and
restraint--and preserving access to the energy that, at least for now,
remains vital to the world economy requires that commitment and
readiness. Several American Presidents have hoped to downsize our role
in the Middle East on the cheap in order to focus on Russia's urgent
threat and China's pacing challenge. Instead, Americans will have
generate the fortitude to lead on both, while also endeavoring to
extinguish a dangerous fire in the Middle East and construct the
diplomatic pathway that can enable the region to navigate toward a more
peaceful and prosperous future.
references
\1\ Meghann Myers, ``Most casualties from recent attacks in Middle
East are brain injuries,'' Military Times, February 13, 2024. https://
www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2024/02/13/70-of-casualties-
from-recent-middle-east-attacks-are-brain-injuries/
\2\ Phillip Smyth, ``The Path to October 7: How Iran Built Up and
Managed a Palestinian `Axis of Resistance','' CTC Sentinel 16:11
(December 2023), https://ctc.westpoint.edu/the-path-to-october-7-how-
iran-built-up-and-managed-a-palestinian-axis-of-resistance/
\3\ ``Missile Multinational: Iran's New Approach to Missile
Proliferation,'' International Institute for Strategic Studies, April
2021, https://www.iiss.org/globalassets/media-
library_content_migration/files/research-papers/irans-new-approach-to-
missile-proliferation.pdf
\4\ R.K. Ramazani, Revolutionary Iran: Challenge and Response in
the Middle East (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986),
p.24.
\5\ David Daoud, ``Breaking down Hezbollah's rocket strategy: the
Short-Range Threat,'' Long War Journal, February 26, 2024, https://
www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2024/02/breaking-down-hezbollahs-
rocket-strategy-the-short-range-threat.php
\6\ Ofer Shelah and Carmit Valensi, ``The Campaign Between Wars at
A Crossroads: CBW, 2013-2023: What Lies Ahead?'' Institute for National
Strategic Studies, November 1, 2023, https://www.inss.org.il/wp-
content/uploads/2023/11/Memo_227_ShelahValensi_ENG.pdf
\7\ Sue Surkes, ``Hamas chief boasts of Tehran's support, close
ties to Hezbollah,'' The Times of Israel, May 23, 2018, https://
www.timesofisrael.com/hamas-chief-boasts-of-tehrans-support-close-ties-
to-hezbollah/
\8\ Statement from Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III on
Ensuring Freedom of Navigation in the Red Sea, Department of Defense,
December 18, 2023, https://www.defense.gov/News/Releases/Release/
Article/3621110/Statement-from-secretary-of-defense-lloyd-j-austin-iii-
on-ensuring-freedom-of-n/
\9\ Farnaz Fassihi, Eric Schmitt, and Julian E. Barnes, ``After
U.S. Strikes, Iran's Proxies Scale Back Attacks on American Bases,''
New York Times, February 27, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/27/
world/middleeast/us-iran-militias.html See also comments on the
reduction in sophistication and lethality of Houthi attacks in the Red
Sea, ``On-the-Record Press Gaggle by White House National Security
Communications Advisor John Kirby,'' February 23, 2024, https://
www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/press-briefings/2024/02/23/on-the-
record-press-gaggle-by-white-house-national-security-communications-
advisor-john-kirby-3/
\10\ Aurelie Daher, Hezbollah: Mobilization and Power (London:
Hurst, 2019), pp. 227-9.
The Chairman. Thank you for your testimony.
Mr. Hook.
STATEMENT OF THE HON. BRIAN H. HOOK, FORMER SPECIAL
REPRESENTATIVE FOR IRAN AND SENIOR POLICY ADVISOR TO THE
SECRETARY OF STATE, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, WASHINGTON, DC
Mr. Hook. Chairman Cardin and Ranking Member Risch,
distinguished members of this committee, thank you for inviting
me to testify.
I was last here in 2019, as Senator Cardin noted, and here
we are 5 years later, and so this is a good opportunity to
share some reflections on where we are.
In 2019 I explained that our Iran strategy had three
objectives, and that is to deny the regime the revenue it needs
to fund its proxies. We did that through oil and banking
sanctions principally.
We defended our interests with the credible threat of
defensive military force, but we also kept the lines open for
diplomacy and engagement. To achieve that first objective of
denying Iran the revenue it needs to fund its proxies, we
vigorously enforced the oil sanctions, and we reduced Iran's
oil exports by more than 80 percent.
We did that while holding energy prices steady for American
families. My office created an interagency team that tracked
and countered Iran's oil sanctions evasion, and Secretary
Pompeo and I tracked these numbers on a daily basis.
The regime lost $30 billion per year as a result. President
Rouhani said that our sanctions cost the regime over $200
billion.
Now, why does Iran's oil matter? Iran spends its oil
revenue on proxies who then kill and terrorize American troops.
As Iran's funds dried up during our Administration, so too did
the money to its proxies.
In 2019 Hezbollah's leader, Hassan Nasrallah, publicly
appealed for donations for the first time ever. Hezbollah
officials told the Washington Post that their fighters are
being furloughed, withdrawn from Syria, and having their pay
cut.
In 2019 Iran proposed a 28 percent cut to its defense
budget--a 28 percent cut to its defense budget--because of our
sanctions. During the Iran nuclear deal, Iran's defense budget
achieved record highs.
I believe that an Iran strategy without the goal of zero
oil exports is not an effective strategy. The proxies that are
the subject of this hearing all bank at the same address. It is
in Tehran.
That bank's deposits depend on oil revenue, and as the
leader of Hezbollah said in 2016, as long as Iran has money, we
have money.
So to achieve our second objective of deterrence when
American interests abroad were threatened by Iran and its
proxies, and we did not make a distinction between Iran and its
proxies, we responded with targeted force.
President Trump, supported by a unanimous national security
cabinet, took Iran's most dangerous terrorist off the
battlefield, Qasem Soleimani, when he was plotting to kill
Americans in the region.
The regime understood very clearly that we would always
take decisive action when we are faced with credible threats to
American lives.
Now, looking to the present I think this Administration has
shown how quickly deterrence can be lost, and how rapidly
diplomatic leverage can be lost, and how swiftly a region can
slide from stability into chaos.
Part of this is because the U.S. sanctions on oil are,
largely, unenforced. Exports have increased--oil exports have
increased by almost 80 percent.
This has netted the regime, as Senator Risch mentioned,
this has netted the regime as much as $90 billion in revenue.
That is since February 2021.
On top of this, some of the deals that the Biden
administration has negotiated with Iran have unfrozen billions
more with $6 billion in funds sitting in Qatari banks, and as
much as $10 billion in accessible funds sitting in Oman.
A recent poll shows that a plurality of the American people
believe that President Biden has not been aggressive enough in
his dealings with Iran.
I believe that Iran knows that it can safely expand its
axis of resistance because of the Biden administration's deep
aversion to defensive military action.
The Biden administration deescalates to deescalate. The
Iranian regime thrives under this strategy. American troops do
not. They have been attacked 165 times by Iranian proxies since
October, and the United States has responded 11 times.
This imbalance is untenable. Directly or indirectly through
its proxies Iran has attacked the United States, Israel, Saudi
Arabia, UAE, Pakistan, Jordan, Bahrain, and Iraq.
In the Red Sea the Houthis are using Iranian missiles,
rockets, and training and intelligence to bring international
shipping to a grind. Our military response to 45 Houthi attacks
has failed to achieve deterrence.
The Iran policy of the United States over many
administrations has a lot of facets. It should not be over
simplified. I think people can be very dogmatic on this
subject. A lot of slogans do not get us very far.
I have tried to present a respectful critique of the Biden
administration's approach to Iran. I think that we share a lot
if not all of the same objectives, but I do not think the
Administration has calibrated its means to achieve its ends,
and I think members of this committee can help lead the way in
regime accountability.
There are several good bills before this committee to
accomplish this. The bipartisan SHIP Act has more than 36
bipartisan co-sponsors. This bill would target Iran's illicit
oil trade with new sanctions on foreign ports and refineries.
There was a companion bill that passed the House in
November with 133 Democrats voting in favor. There is another
measure, the End Iranian Terrorism Act, which was recently
introduced by Senator Risch.
I think it is a smart approach to target Iran's illegal oil
smuggling to China. That is, Chinese imports make up the
majority of Iran's illicit exports, a number that was as high
as 1.5 million barrels per day. It will creep up to 2 million.
I think on the subject of Iran both sides of the aisle
agree on more than they disagree. Listening to Chairman Cardin
and Ranking Member Risch, there is so much that we agree on,
and I think that is the foundation of a very good and sound
Iran policy.
I think Republicans and Democrats are very clear eyed about
the threats that we face, and I think Congress uniting to send
a very clear message and helping the Biden administration match
its means and ends is the right and responsible course of
action on our foreign policy.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Hook follows:]
Prepared Statement of Mr. Brian H. Hook
Chairman Cardin, Ranking Member Risch, distinguished members of the
committee, thank you for inviting me to testify. I previously spoke
before this committee in 2019 as the U.S. Special Representative for
Iran, and I am honored by the opportunity today to share my reflections
more than 5 years later.
In 2019, I explained our Iran strategy had three objectives: Deny
the regime revenue for its proxies through oil and banking sanctions,
defend our interests with the credible threat of military force, and
keep the lines open for diplomacy.
To achieve our first objective, we vigorously enforced oil
sanctions and reduced Iran's oil exports by more than 80 percent, while
holding energy prices steady for American families. My office created
an interagency team to counter Iran's sanctions evasion. Secretary
Pompeo and I tracked oil sanctions metrics on a daily basis. The regime
lost well over $30 billion per year as a result. President Rouhani said
that our sanctions cost the regime $200 billion.
Why does Iran's oil matter? Iran spends its oil revenue on its
proxies who then kill and terrorize American troops. As Iran's funds
dried up under our Administration, so too did the money to its proxies.
One fighter in Syria complained to the New York Times, that ``the
golden days are gone and will never return--Iran doesn't have enough
money to give us,'' he said. In 2019, Iran proposed a 28 percent cut to
its defense budget because of our sanctions.
An Iran strategy without a goal of zero oil exports is
fundamentally unserious. The proxies that are the subject of this
hearing all bank at the same address: Tehran. That bank's deposits
depend on oil revenue.
To achieve our second objective of deterrence, when American
interests abroad were threatened by Iran and its proxies, we responded
with targeted force. President Trump, supported by his national
security cabinet, took Iran's most dangerous terrorist off the
battlefield, stopping Qassem Soleimani as he plotted to kill Americans
in the region. The regime understood we would always take decisive
action when faced with credible threats to American lives.
Turning to the present, the Biden administration has shown how
quickly deterrence can be lost, how rapidly diplomatic leverage can be
squandered, and how swiftly a region can slide from stability into
chaos.
Today, U.S. sanctions on Iran's oil exports are largely unenforced.
Exports have increased by more than 80 percent. This has netted the
regime as much as $100 billion in revenue since February 2021. Lobsided
deals negotiated by the Biden administration with Iran have unfrozen
billions more, with $6 billion in funds now sitting in Qatari banks and
as much as $10 billion in accessible funds in Oman.
It is obvious to me and to a plurality of the American people that
President Biden has not been aggressive enough in his dealings with
Iran. Iran knows it can safely expand its axis of resistance because of
the Biden administration's immense aversion to defensive military
action. The Biden administration deescalates to deescalate. The Iranian
regime thrives under this strategy. American troops do not. They have
been attacked over 200 times by Iranian proxies during the Biden
presidency.
Directly or indirectly through its proxies, Iran has attacked the
United States, Israel, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Pakistan, Jordan, Bahrain,
and Iraq.
In the Red Sea, the Houthis are using Iranian missiles, rockets,
training, and intelligence to bring international shipping through the
Bab-Al-Mandeb to a grind. Their latest adventure at our expense is
cutting subsea cables. Our military response to 45 Houthi attacks has
failed to achieve deterrence.
The Biden administration's policy of diplomacy without pressure, of
talks without the credible threat of military force is failing. We
simply cannot lower the costs of Iran's violent extremism and expect to
see less of it--we will only get more.
Admittedly, Iran policy has many facets and should not be
oversimplified. Dogma and tired slogans will not get us anywhere. I
have endeavored to present a respectful critique of this
Administration's approach to Iran. Members of this committee can help
lead the way in restoring accountability to the Iranian regime.
There are several good bills before this committee to accomplish
this. The bipartisan SHIP Act, introduced by Senators Rubio and Hassan,
has more than 36 bipartisan cosponsors. This bill would target Iran's
illicit oil trade with a raft of new sanctions on foreign ports and
refineries. A companion bill passed the House in November. 133
Democrats joined 209 Republicans to pass the bill. America's Iran
policy can truly be bipartisan.
Another measure, the End Iranian Terrorism Act, was recently
introduced by Senator Risch. It is a smart approach to target Iran's
illegal oil smuggling to China, which today makes up the majority of
Iran's illicit exports, a number that was as high as 1.5 million
barrels per day in 2023.
When it comes to Iran, both sides of the aisle agree on more than
they disagree. Republicans and Democrats are clear eyed about the
threats we and our allies face. Congress should unite to send a message
to Tehran that its terrorism comes at a significant cost. This is the
right and responsible course of action.
I thank you again for the opportunity to testify before you, and I
look forward to your questions.
The Chairman. Thank you for your testimony.
We will now have 5-minute rounds.
Dr. Maloney, I want to start with your assessment as to
what Iran's strategies are about in regards to its proxies and
whether there has been a shift during the last 4 months on the
Iranian strategies.
We saw the loss of U.S. servicemen in regards to the proxy
attacks. The U.S. responded and that response has resulted in a
significant reduction in the militias' attacks against U.S.
interests.
My question to you is we see concerns with this tit for tat
in the northern border of Israel with Hezbollah, but it has
prevented the civilian populations from being able to live
safely in that region on both sides of the border.
How much control does Iran have over the activities of
Hezbollah in regards to these attacks that are preventing the
civilian populations from being able to live in that region?
Yes, they have not invaded Israel but it is certainly
disruptive to the civilian population. We know that the Houthis
in the Red Sea are creating havoc with the commercial shipping.
We have a international coalition that is--the targets are
not Israel. The targets are international, and we have an
international coalition that is responding to that. How much is
Iran encouraging those types of activities, and has their
strategy changed during the last 4 months?
So I would like to get an understanding as to what Iran's
game plan is here. We have been told they do not want to get
into direct conflict, but they certainly are enabling a
significant amount of challenges in the region that could
escalate the conflict.
Dr. Maloney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I think you have characterized Iran's behavior and its
motivations very accurately. Ultimately, what the Iranians are
looking to do is to try to drive the United States out of the
region. That has been their goal since 1979, and it has not
wavered.
But they adapt over time, they look for opportunities, and
they often try to test the resolve of the American leadership,
and so what we have seen since October 7 is the Iranians
stepping up the tempo in hopes of creating more pressure from
within the United States to pull American troops out of those
places where they are currently stationed.
They have also sought to try to further delegitimize Israel
and to put additional pressure on Israel and to create doubt
within the Israeli public.
They watch very closely the domestic politics, and they are
seeking to take advantage of that as well. I think they
recognize that they are outmatched by the United States and by
Israel and so that they are very hesitant to get into a direct
conflict.
But they will push the envelope because they presume that
our willingness to push back is less than theirs, and our
willingness to take risks is less than theirs.
With respect to Hezbollah and the Houthis they have very
longstanding and organic relationships. They are not puppets of
Iran by any stretch of the imagination.
They have a considerable amount of strategic autonomy, but
they also have shared interests, and I think that there is
nothing that Hezbollah nor the Houthis have done that is in any
way opposed to what the Iranians would like them to be doing.
It has been successful to date. I think in terms of how to
secure the northern border of Israel the diplomacy that Amos
Hochstein is engaged in is the best prospect that we have to
try to enforce the U.N. Security Council resolutions.
The Chairman. In regards to that, that is an area of
immediate interest because he is trying to get Hezbollah to
pull back and have a safe zone so that the civilian populations
can return to the border areas.
How much is Iran influencing those decisions by Hezbollah
as to whether to respond to the actions to get them to move off
the border, recognizing that Israel at any time could be taking
kinetic action on their own?
Dr. Maloney. Well, Iran has an interest in trying to
preserve Hezbollah as a deterrent against any future Israeli
action against Iran's nuclear program, and so I think that is
why Hezbollah has been both reluctant to get too far into the
fight as well as at least somewhat open to diplomacy under the
current circumstances.
Pulling Hezbollah back from the border has been a
requirement since the 2006 war. They have not respected it. The
international community has not enforced it, and if we are able
to do so through diplomacy then we have a better prospect of
ensuring that Israel does not face the same level of
devastating attacks from the north.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Senator Risch.
Senator Risch. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Hook, first of all, let me say yours and Secretary
Pompeo's efforts against Iran are legendary, and of course,
thus you are suffering the consequences of it today with
threats against you and your family.
It is hard for me to sit here and believe that a country
all the way around the world and the nature Iran is that they
can actually deliver threats to you and your family here in the
United States, which is just a despicable act. So thank you for
your service, and thank you for what you have done.
Let me ask, as you pointed out things have changed
dramatically in the last 3 years, and with all of the money
that is flowing into Iran now, are you surprised at all that
they are firing up the proxies to do the kinds of things that
they are doing?
Mr. Hook. I had hoped in light of the hand that the Biden
administration inherited that there would be sort of a greater
continuity of peace. In the last 4 months of the Administration
we negotiated--in the last 5 months we negotiated four peace
deals between Israel and Arab nations.
I think that we had put Iran in a very defensive position,
and we were a very good friend to our partners, and we were
very tough on the Iranian regime.
I think that is a winning formula for the region, and I
think that the United States over the last 20 something years
has struggled to find the right calibration, the right--get the
pendulum somewhere in the right place, and I think this
Administration inherited a pretty good hand.
I think they put all of their focus on getting back into
the Iran nuclear deal, and as a consequence of that they wanted
to create, I think, positive negotiating atmospherics for that,
and that meant relaxing all of the oil sanctions that we had so
vigorously enforced.
And I think it also meant looking the other way on a lot of
Iranian aggression. In light of the understandable objective to
deal with the nuclear problem, that is number one. That is the
biggest problem that we face.
Proxies are secondary. I think my view on the Iranian
regime is that you are more likely to get the deal you want
with crippling sanctions, and that if you create this sort of
positive environment Iran is going to play cat and mouse with
you for as long as you will let them.
And then I think at some point the Administration sort of
figured out that they were not going to be able to get back
into the Iran deal. There has been some increase in sanctions.
I think the Administration should have announced that talks
are dead. By always leaving that door open I think it prevents
them from doing the necessary things on oil and banking
sanctions that would dry up the revenue for Iran and its
proxies.
Hamas receives 93 percent of its finances from Iran.
Hezbollah receives 70 percent. Iran is--the first check that
Hamas was written was in 1992 when Yasser Arafat said that the
Iranian regime gave them $30 million. In a very short time that
number went up to $100 million, then to $300 million.
And they have trained thousands of fighters. The IRGC has
done that. Money is the sinews of war. Iran understands that.
If you do not go after the money, it is just not a serious
strategy.
Senator Risch. Well, I appreciate that. Has anybody from
the current Administration consulted with you after you left,
your thoughts as to how we might achieve what I think is the
goal, as you noted, of everybody on this committee and should
be everybody in this Administration and the last
Administration?
Has anybody talked to you about how they could ratchet up
their efforts to match what you guys were doing in the last
Administration?
Mr. Hook. There was one meeting I had that was suggested by
a friend, and I do not want to say who that was but it was a
senior person in the Administration, and we got together and
had dinner and talked about it. So there was one occasion.
Senator Risch. Thank you.
My time is almost up.
But Ms. Maloney, I wanted to touch bases with you on
something. On your website there is a quote from you saying
that we have a rare opportunity with Iran and that is an
Iranian consensus on the benefits of engagement with the U.S.
My feeling is your thoughts have evolved on this to maybe a
little different position than what is stated there, but it
does not indicate when you had those thoughts. Has your
thinking evolved on this?
Dr. Maloney. Yes. I think that there was a period in time
in which negotiations with Iran proved that they could be
fruitful in terms of getting concessions on real security risks
that we have with respect to the regime.
I think that time is now firmly over. The current
leadership within Iran has no interest in making concessions to
the United States.
Much of that has to do with the changes in the
international environment since that time, their very close
relationship with Russia, and the increasing reliance on China
as an economic partner.
Those were not the conditions that were in place at the
time of the negotiation of the 2015 nuclear deal. At that time
we had consensus from both the Russians and the Chinese as well
as the wider international community on the need to apply
pressure to Iran in order to achieve these concessions.
We no longer have that international consensus. It is a
much harder row to hoe.
Senator Risch. So are you now in agreement with those of us
who believe that we need to turn the screw really, really tight
if we are going to get something done?
Dr. Maloney. I believe that pressure will achieve results
with respect to Iran. I think that it is more difficult because
it does invoke other interests.
We should be working with the Chinese to try to persuade
them that it is not in their interest to see a wider conflict
in the Middle East, and that Iran is a bad actor and not a
useful partner.
But we have many other interests with respect to the
Chinese, and I understand why the Biden administration was
reluctant to try to go after Chinese firms as aggressively as
it should have in order to try to achieve those results.
I think, again, in the situation that we are in today it
makes very good sense to try to continue to reduce Iran's oil
exports and its revenues.
Senator Risch. Thank you.
My time is up.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator----
Senator Risch. Before we do that, I would ask unanimous
consent to--we have a letter from a group, United Against a
Nuclear Iran, which I think is pretty instructive. I would like
to include that.
The Chairman. Without objection, that will be included in
the record.
[Editor's note.--The information referred to above can be
found in the ``Additional Material Submitted for the Record''
section at the end of this hearing.]
The Chairman. Senator Menendez.
Senator Menendez. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Would it be fair to say that without Iran's financing,
without its missile supplies, without its strategic support,
that Iran's proxies either would not exist, at least not as
they are today, or would not have the reach and ability that
they have today?
Mr. Hook. Who would you like----
Senator Menendez. Both of you, actually.
Mr. Hook. Suzanne.
Dr. Maloney. Absolutely yes.
Mr. Hook. Yes.
Senator Menendez. OK. So then if that is the case and
reading from Dr. Maloney's written testimony where she says the
assumptions underlying Obama era diplomacy toward Tehran, a
conviction that the Islamic Republic could be persuaded to
accept pragmatic compromises that served its country's
interests, are no longer credible.
And if that is the case, and I believe I agree with your
assessment, then the question of the financing, which has been
a big part of Mr. Hook's testimony, I think is incredibly
important.
The reality is that if Iran is dramatically curtailed in
its flow of revenue, it has domestic consequences in terms of
those who wish to see a change in their own country, and we
have seen elements of that which had been snuffed out and which
the world has largely not embraced to try to create such
peaceful change, and at the same time it fuels its missile
technology with the end of U.N. Security Council resolutions
this past October and it provides the resources and the
missiles to its proxies, and of course, of late providing drone
technology to the Russians in the war in Ukraine as well as
continues to fuel its nuclear program for which it has failed
to meet to the IAEA safeguards and standards and inspection
requirements.
We know less today, at least through the IAEA, than we did
before. So all of that brings to my mind, and taking the last
point you made, Dr. Maloney, about China, I think the Chinese
have shown that they are happy to see conflict in the world,
because if they did not, they would do something differently in
supporting Russia in Ukraine.
Conflict for the Chinese, especially when the West is
involved in that conflict, inures to their benefit, and I wish
that they saw it as a global power to be part of an
international order that would seek to avoid conflict.
But I believe the Chinese--I believe Xi Jinping--has a
different view. If that is the case is it not time to do two
things, one, internationalize--get our allies who were
resistant to joining us on a sanctions regime to now
multilateralize those sanctions, and two, to ratchet up those
sanctions dramatically in terms of enforcement including--
including--toward the Chinese? Because that is the biggest
spigot by which Iran is receiving huge amounts of money.
Mr. Hook.
Mr. Hook. Senator, I fully agree with everything you said.
Senator Menendez. You can stop there.
[Laughter.]
Senator Menendez. I am just kidding. We have to have a
little humor here at times. Go ahead. I am sorry.
Mr. Hook. It would be good if we could multilateralize the
sanctions. The problem is that if we go to New York to the U.N.
Security Council, China and Russia will veto that.
Senator Menendez. Without looking through U.N. because that
is not going to fly.
Mr. Hook. Right. So I think it has to be done bilaterally,
and that is something that was a huge focus for me. When I was
in office building a coalition of people, we were able to get a
number of countries to designate Hezbollah as a foreign
terrorist organization.
We worked with Treasury under Secretary Mnuchin. We worked
a lot with the Financial Action Task Force in Paris and FATF-
imposed sanctions on Iran. We worked with SWIFT. SWIFT de-
SWIFTed 33 Iranian banks.
Mahan Air and Iranian Air, they fly all over the world. We
worked with airports and governments to stop Iranian planes
from landing in other countries.
Senator Menendez. Those are all examples of how you
ultimately bite off the flow of money.
Mr. Hook. I think so. But it has got to be----
Senator Menendez. I would like to get in my last few
seconds Dr. Maloney's view on this.
Dr. Maloney. I think there is far more that we could be
doing to enforce our existing sanctions, especially with
respect to the oil that flows to China. That is the lifeblood
for the Iranian regime, and it has been what has enabled Iran
to have the resources to provide to its proxies around the
region.
Senator Menendez. And finally, Mr. Chairman, with the
expiration of Security Council Resolution 2231 this past
October, new restrictions on Iran's ballistic missiles and
drones have to be implemented, which is why I introduced the
MISSILES Act, and I hope that as the chairman and the ranking
member work toward, develop a mutual Iran legislation that the
chair will consider that.
Thank you very much.
The Chairman. Senator Hagerty.
Senator Hagerty. Thank you, Chairman Cardin.
Mr. Hook, I would like to start with you, and first, I
would like to echo the sentiment that was reflected by Ranking
Member Risch.
Your service as special envoy was exceptional, and I think
a mark of that, unfortunately, is the fact that you have
extraordinary threats against your life and your family's life
right now.
In fact, I just received reports from the State Department
that there remains serious and credible threats against Mr.
Hook and his family.
I regret you have to live through this, but I would take it
as a badge of honor in terms of the effectiveness of the role
that you played.
And I want to talk about the role that you played, and the
role that was played in the Trump administration because we
took a very different approach than what has been undertaken
today.
We moved our embassy to Jerusalem. No war. We acknowledged
Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights. No war. We withdrew
from the JCPOA. No war. We entered the Abraham Accords. No war.
In fact, what happened? Iran felt the pressure. We kept
their enrichment below 4 percent. We took the pallets of cash
delivered by the Obama administration and Jack Lew himself--we
took those pallets of cash to a reserve level below $8 billion.
Hamas and Hezbollah were widely reported as broke. You
mentioned the connection there. Somehow the strategy changed.
Three years into this new strategy, where are we? Iran is
enriching now greater than 60 percent. Sudan falling into civil
war. Israel, on October 7, saw the greatest loss of Jewish
lives since the Holocaust.
The Houthis have taken control over shipping in the Red
Sea, driving up inflation here, endangering lives around the
world, disrupting supply chains. And we have a situation right
now where Iran backed terrorists in Iraq and Syria are
attacking U.S. personnel, and they killed three U.S. heroes.
So, Mr. Hook, I would like to ask you what has changed?
What has changed in these 3 years?
Mr. Hook. I think what has changed is a return to the sort
of the Obama administration focus on the Iran nuclear deal at
the expense of regional stability, and I understand the premise
that you need to focus on the biggest threat which is the
nuclear piece.
But you cannot relax your vigilance and your deterrence
against this regime, and you are more likely to get the deal
you want if you take a very strong approach as we did around
financial sanctions, credible threat of military force,
diplomatic isolation.
And earlier when Senator Menendez asked about alliance
building, Senator, when you were our Ambassador to Japan we
worked closely--you worked closely with Prime Minister Abe to--
Japan has a 60 year relationship history with Iran.
Senator Hagerty. They were tough discussions, I will tell
you.
Mr. Hook. And while Prime Minister Abe was in Iran, they
blew up Iranian oil tankers, and I think that was a wakeup call
for the regime--I mean, for the Japanese.
They then started to get on their front foot and impose
sanctions, and so I think it is vital to do alliance building
in this regard. An Iranian regime with a nuclear weapon
dominating the Middle East is in the interest of almost no
country in the world.
Senator Hagerty. I cannot agree with you more. I can tell
you the conversations with Prime Minister Abe were quite
difficult. He talked about the length--the decades long
relationship.
But it was a simple question. You can do business with the
United States, or you can do business with Iran, but you cannot
do business with both.
And as tough as it was, we got to the right solution, and
we did isolate Iran, and we brought their revenues down--their
cash reserves down to below $8 billion. We brought their
production down to below 300,000 barrels a day.
And now with another person taking the job, a guy named Rob
Malley who is now under Federal investigation, stopped
enforcing the sanctions wholeheartedly. What we see now is an
Iranian regime with over $100 billion that have flowed back in.
You mentioned Rouhani talking about the $200 billion impact
that we had with our sanctions. They have gotten more than half
of that back with Malley forcing the Administration to look the
other way.
It is a disgrace. We have seen the results in the Middle
East. We have got to bring Iran back under maximum pressure. I
agree with what Senator Menendez said, too. We need to get our
allies on board with this.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator Coons.
Senator Coons. Thank you, Chairman Cardin, Ranking Member
Risch, and thank you to our witnesses today.
I have just returned from Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Oman, and
Israel, where I spent the last week in a variety of meetings.
Senator Blumenthal joined me in Israel, Lebanon, and Jordan.
I am very concerned about the increasing malign influence
of Iran throughout the region. I think this has been a steadily
growing challenge for decades, and more recently the attacks by
Iranian proxies throughout the region, again, the Houthis in
the Red Sea, Hezbollah into the north of Israel, obviously, the
brutal terrorist attack by Hamas and the attacks by militias in
Iraq. There have been no more attacks in the last 3 weeks since
we took a fairly aggressive and forceful set of strikes against
Iranian interests in Iraq and Syria.
But I am concerned by the meetings that I had throughout
the region with partners and allies, almost all of whom
uniformly said, even those who are gravely concerned, alarmed
about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, still did not want the
United States to leave the region.
So we are at a key point in Lebanon. As referenced by the
chairman, there is some possibility for a resolution to the
Hezbollah challenge in the south of Lebanon. In Iraq there is
active negotiations in the higher military commission about the
future of the U.S. military presence in Iraq.
Even in Oman, the Switzerland of the Middle East, there is
boycotts of American businesses and products and protests in
the streets.
If you would both, please, talk to what you think should be
our path forward in Iraq. We have been there since 2014 as the
leader in many ways of Operation Inherent Resolve, the counter
ISIS mission.
There is an active debate following our forceful strikes
about our future in Iraq, and I would be interested in your
thinking on that and how we can most effectively contain Iran
in Iraq.
And I would be interested in how you view the prospects for
a better future in Jordan and in Lebanon if we continue to
support Israel in its campaign in Gaza, and if there is no
change in the current trajectory of the prime minister's
strategy with regards to Rafah.
Please, Dr. Maloney first, and then if you would, Mr. Hook.
Dr. Maloney. I think it is very important that we maintain
our presence in Iraq. Obviously, it has come under significant
pressure and we have to work closely with the government and
ensure that we are not taking steps that in any way undermine
the stability of either the government or the overall social
and political environment in Iraq.
But we have important interests there in preventing the
resurgence of ISIS and in ensuring that we are able to protect
both our broader interests across the Middle East by having
small force presence in a variety of countries.
So I think it is quite important that we do stay, but that
we do it in cooperation with Prime Minister Sudani and with the
government there.
In terms of how we look to the future in the region I think
that the Biden administration has, in fact, invested an
enormous amount of effort in taking forward the Abraham Accords
which the prior Administration actually produced and really
bringing them to the fruition of seeing a Saudi-Israeli
normalization.
That would be an absolute game changer for the region. It
would be fundamentally transformative for the politics, for the
economy, and for the security scenario. And I think it is a
critical piece of the puzzle of moving beyond this terrible
conflict that is currently underway in Gaza.
There can be no future unless there is a political and
economic horizon for the Palestinian and the Israeli people,
one that is based--grounded in real security and opportunity
and the only way to achieve that is through this kind of a
breakthrough moment.
Senator Coons. Thank you, Dr. Maloney.
Mr. Hook.
Mr. Hook. I think on the subject of Iraq I mentioned in my
testimony the number of attacks since October, but I think you
also note, Senator, during this Administration there have been
over 250 attacks in Iraq and Syria against American troops, and
since October we have responded 11 times.
I think the attacks that we have done are necessary but
insufficient. This is defensive military action.
Senator Coons. How would you account for the lack of any
attacks in the last 3 weeks?
Mr. Hook. It is a positive development, but I just think
that there is----
Senator Coons. What do you think caused that?
Mr. Hook. Well, certainly, our attacks, but I think that if
we had established deterrence sooner, three Americans who were
killed in Jordan may be alive today.
Senator Coons. Having been briefed on the underlying facts
of the Tower 22 attack I will simply say it is a little more
complicated.
But I am very concerned about the vulnerability of our
forces in Iraq and Syria, and I will more broadly agree that I
think we have to restore a deterrence against Iran.
Iran is one of the leading human rights violators in the
world. The people of Iran deserve a positive path forward, and
to Dr. Maloney's point, in conclusion, I could not agree more
that if we can find a path toward Israeli-Saudi reconciliation,
recognition, that is the most important strategic advance
building on the Abraham Accords that we could make.
But the Saudi--the Crown Prince is very clear, there has to
be an end to fighting in Gaza and there has to be a path toward
Palestinian self-determination. I only hope that the Israeli
government can recognize the historic moment that we are at.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator Romney.
Senator Romney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to
the witnesses for your testimony. It has been most instructive,
and I want to join my words with those of others with regards
to the threats against Mr. Hook and against others in the prior
Administration as a result of taking a brave action to protect
American lives by taking out General Soleimani.
It is outrageous, in my view, that the fatwa continues to
be heralded by Iran, and how we can have anything other than a
most hostile relationship with Iran when that continues is
beyond me.
I find it unfortunate that we do not have a member of the
Administration here. I would like to understand the logic for
their current position, how it may have changed, what their
views are for going forward.
It is helpful to hear from experts such as yourselves but
you raise questions that really need to be responded to by the
current Administration.
I do understand--Mr. Hook, you made the point that given
the Administration's interest in getting a renewed discussion
on the JCPOA that they want to create a friendly environment,
and therefore, soften the oil sanctions to create that
environment.
But surely at this point, given what is going on in the
Middle East and the attacks by these various proxy groups, the
Administration is no longer trying to have a friendly
environment with Iran.
But what do you imagine accounts for the fact that we have
not dramatically tightened our oil sanctions? I do not
understand what the logic could be for not engaging now in
crippling sanctions against Iran and their oil revenue.
And I will ask you, Ms. Maloney, first and then--Dr.
Maloney, rather--and then Mr. Hook.
Dr. Maloney.
Dr. Maloney. We do have in place ostensibly crippling
sanctions on Iran's oil exports, and as Mr. Hook noted at the
outset, they were respected by the international community
because of the recognition that it would complicate doing
business in the United States.
So it is the power of the reach of the U.S. dollar. Over
time the Chinese began to test that resolve, to test those
opportunities. They also worked with the Iranians in a very
sophisticated set of smuggling and evasion tactics.
The Chinese have companies that are not banked--in any way
connected to the U.S. financial system, and so they are less
vulnerable to American financial pressure, and over time this
has created a vast network that has enabled Iran to export
illicitly in violation of current U.S. sanctions without a very
easy way for us to impose severe costs on the companies that
are in fact importing.
Senator Romney. Thank you.
Mr. Hook.
Mr. Hook. I had this sort of conversation with countries
around the world and is what Senator Hagerty mentioned earlier.
I said that you can either do business with Iran and buy
their oil and buy their metals and buy their petrochem, or you
can do business with the United States. And any country faced
with that choice, it will be the easiest decision they have
ever made.
They are going to side with the United States. That is the
economic leverage we have that Dr. Maloney mentioned.
I think the Biden administration hesitated to enforce the
oil sanctions at a level that they should be until like the
summer of 2022 when it became clear that the Iranians were
toying with our negotiators.
I think since then, the Biden administration has done some
sanctions against WMD proliferators and human rights violators
but they have not done it against oil.
They have shown an interest in energy sanctions in the
context of Russia, but they need that sort of level of sort of
vigor and enforcement in Iran, and that is going to--I mean,
look, Iran represents about 3 percent of the world's oil
supply, and they--maximum around 2.5 million barrels.
We took them down to 300,000 barrels of oil in about 12
months. Now, China, China is most of it. You have to drive up
the costs in the bilateral relationship with China to get that
number lower.
That will impose an economic crisis on Iran, and it causes
them to start changing their thinking around their proxies and
their nuclear program.
Senator Romney. You make the point that China is the major
provider of the funds in purchasing the oil from Iran. Cutting
off a relationship with China, and saying to China, hey, it is
either Iran or us is that what you are proposing saying to
China, we will shut you off?
The challenge, of course, is that our economy depends on a
lot of things coming from China. So this is--it is one thing to
say that to Lebanon or other countries, but to say that to
China is a very different matter.
Mr. Hook. Well, Senator, I remember when I was in office.
When we started our oil sanctions after we got out of the Iran
nuclear deal--I will just mention when you are in the Iran
nuclear deal you cannot touch the oil, and that is an enormous
handicap.
And so getting out of the Iran nuclear deal allowed us then
to go after the oil revenue, which funds their proxies. And so
when we were looking at China and its imports, we did sanction
a lot of Chinese banks, but it was not enough, and I think that
you can have--there are many aspects to our bilateral
relationship with China.
This has to be a big part of it. When we started our oil
sanctions the price of Brent crude was 74. We lowered it to 72,
even after taking off almost 3 percent of the world's oil
supply.
And I worked with oil ministers around the world to
increase production to offset the loss of Iranian crude on the
global energy markets.
So you can zero out Iran's oil exports and still not have
an energy shock if you work with other oil ministers to
increase production.
Senator Romney. Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Let me just point out that we did have a
classified briefing with the Administration on Iran not too
long ago, and we also had the Secretary before the Senate on
the Middle East--Secretary of State. So we have had
opportunities to hear from the Administration. Admittedly, they
were in classified settings.
And let me also point out that there has been no sanctions
removal since the Biden administration took office. In fact,
there has been additional sanctions that have been imposed.
There is an enforcement issue. There is no question about it.
But I do not want to give the impression that there has
been any sanction relief given to Iran during the Biden
administration.
With that, let me recognize Senator Murphy.
Senator Murphy. We also had two Administration witnesses
before the subcommittee yesterday on this exact topic.
Mr. Hook, I appreciate your service to the country. I
believe you are a deep patriot. But frankly, I thought your
opening remarks sounded a lot more like a campaign speech for
Donald Trump's reelection than a sober analysis of the
situation on the ground in the region.
Charitably, they were an attempt to rehabilitate President
Trump's Iran policy that was a complete, total failure by every
available metric.
I was not coming to this hearing to rehash our policy
toward Iran from 2017 to 2020, but I think it is really
important to set the record straight. Because if this committee
or the American public gets the impression that what President
Trump was doing was working and should be brought back as
policy going into the future, we are in real trouble.
Here are the facts. When Donald Trump came into office,
Iran was over a year from being able to achieve a nuclear
weapon. By the time President Trump left office, that breakout
time had dropped to months.
When President Trump came to office, proxies of Iran were
strong. When he left office, they were just as strong if not
stronger.
This idea that Iran stopped sending money to Hezbollah
during Trump's presidency is just wrong. Seven hundred million
was the annual amount of support delivered to Iran in the
middle of Trump's presidency. That is what was being delivered
at the end of the presidency.
[Editor's note.--We endeavor to publish accurately the
spoken and written words of Senators and witnesses in each
hearing published. The paragraph above reflects what Senator
Murphy said. The Senator intended to say, ``Seven hundred
million was the annual amount of support delivered from Iran in
the middle of Trump's presidency.'']
Senator Murphy. There were no attacks on U.S. forces in
Iraq when Donald Trump became President. From 2019 to 2020
attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq increased by 400 percent. It got
so bad that Secretary Pompeo started to close down the embassy
in Baghdad because it had become so dangerous.
Attacks on U.S. forces raised to epidemic levels from the
beginning of Trump's presidency to the end. The anti-Iran
coalition was not strengthened. It was shattered.
We had Russia and Iran on board with the JCPOA. By the end
of the Trump presidency Europe was not supporting our Iran
policy, they were undermining it.
[Editor's note.--We endeavor to publish accurately the
spoken and written words of Senators and witnesses in each
hearing published. The paragraph above reflects what Senator
Murphy said. The Senator intended to say, ``We had Russia and
China on board with the JCPOA.'']
Senator Murphy. President Trump's policy toward Iran was a
disaster. They got closer to a nuclear weapon. Their proxies
did not get any weaker. U.S. troops came under attack in a way
that they were not prior to Trump's presidency. And our
coalition that had been carefully built around the nuclear
agreement but ready to be used to go after Iran's ballistic
missile program or their support for proxies had vanished.
And so, Mr. Hook, let me just ask you about these metrics,
and I will give you a chance to respond and tell me why I am
wrong.
I mean, let me just give you four and just tell me why I am
wrong about this. Iran was closer to a nuclear weapon at the
end of Trump's presidency than at the beginning. Iran's proxies
were at least just as strong if not stronger.
Here is another stat. In 2016 there were five Houthi
attacks against Saudi Arabia and UAE. By 2020 those attacks
were averaging 25 a year.
Third, Iran was threatening U.S. troops in the region by
the end of Trump's presidency in a way that did not exist in
2016, and fourth, the anti-Iran coalition was weaker, not
stronger.
Am I wrong about any of those things? I do not think I am.
Mr. Hook. I would say--I can go through these four points.
On the 1 year breakout when we left the deal Iran then did what
it is allowed to do when the deal expires, and we pulled
forward the expiration date of the Iran deal because Iran was
getting stronger financially during the deal.
They were expanding their missile proliferation during the
deal. They were increasing their aggression during the deal,
and I think Iran understood that under the Iran nuclear deal
they had a green light to be expansive in the region as long as
they complied with modest and temporary nonproliferation
benefits.
And so whether we did it in our Administration, or another
Administration did it later, or we waited to expire Iran is
going to start enriching at that level.
And what I would say is what does it say about the Iran
nuclear deal that it is able to achieve the purity that it did
when we left the deal? I think the Obama administration went
into the deal with the goal of no enrichment but they gave that
away. And the right standard is no enrichment.
Anytime we are talking about how close Iran is to nuclear
breakout is the problem because as long as they are allowed to
enrich we are going to have this discussion.
UAE has a civil nuclear program. They do not enrich. That
should be the standard. And unfortunately, as soon as you
concede on enrichment, you are going to have other countries
that are going to say, we would like the same deal you gave the
Iranians; we would like to enrich.
And so I think that is the problem.
On the proxies being as strong, we never claimed that we
solved the proxy problem. But there is no question--I would
refer you to the New York Times and the Washington Post.
These are articles that said Hezbollah is weaker because of
our sanctions. The Washington Post ran it. There were fighters
in Syria saying to the Washington Post the golden days are
over. Iran does not have the money that it used to.
Fighters were being furloughed. You had a massive--
Hezbollah had to undertake a fundraising drive for the first
time in its history because Iran did not have the money that it
used to.
And so I think the historical record presents a different
picture of much weaker proxies.
The Chairman. Senator Ricketts.
Senator Ricketts. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Iran's proxies are a threat to American national security,
and yet the Biden administration's appeasement first foreign
policy has emboldened Iran, not only emboldened them but
enriched them as well.
The world's leading sponsor of state terrorism has more
money now in its coffers than it did before, and I think that
is what you were talking about. I think the payments, for
example, to Hezbollah have gone up from--or Hamas have gone up
from $100 million to $350 million, and that is the point you
were just making there, Mr. Hook, around the amount of money
and why it is so important that we enforce these sanctions.
I want to hit a topic, though, that we have not talked
about, but Iran is a theocracy. Is that correct?
Mr. Hook. Yes. Iran has been a theocratic regime since
1979.
Senator Ricketts. And so do you think it follows then that
they do not necessarily share the same goals we would in, say,
a republic like the United States where we elect our officials?
This is an administration and regime that is based on religious
philosophy. Is that accurate?
Mr. Hook. Yes, that is accurate.
Senator Ricketts. And so they do not think like us?
Mr. Hook. They do not think like us. They are a
revolutionary expansive regime that is committed by its
constitution to death to the United States, death to Israel,
and overthrowing Sunni governments in the Middle East.
Senator Ricketts. So is it naive to think there is any
amount of money we can give Iran, and they are going to be nice
to us?
Mr. Hook. I do not think that money or talking nicely is
going to get us anywhere with Iran.
Senator Ricketts. Right.
And I think, Dr. Maloney, you said their goal since 1979
has been to kick us out of the Middle East. Is that correct?
Dr. Maloney. Yes, it is.
Senator Ricketts. Right. So we have a regime that wants us
out of the Middle East, that thinks differently than we do.
There is no amount of money that we can give them and they are
going to play nice with us.
So let us change topics here a little bit. In Gaza--since
the war in Gaza began, Houthis have attacked--I think you
referenced 45 attacks. The military has shot down 95 drones and
missiles, and of course, we have also seen the attacks on U.S.
forces in Iraq and Syria have tapered off recently, but
certainly that had been a big increase.
In January, President Biden when asked whether the strikes
are working responded, ``When you say working, are they
stopping the Houthis? No.'' That was his quote. And then he
said, ``Are they going to continue? Yes.''
If this is not emblematic of a failed exercise in
deterrence and failed Iran policy, I do not know what is. It is
also unsustainable. The defense munitions the U.S. is expending
to interdict the Houthi attacks are costly, more so than the
cheap drones the Houthis are using, and to make matters worse
the Biden administration has overturned the Trump
administration's designation of the Houthis as a foreign
terrorist organization and recently made a specially designated
terrorist organization.
It is only partially reversing course to designate it SDTG,
and let us not forget the Iran support that is going on with
them.
Mr. Hook, why did the Trump administration designate the
Houthis as an FTO, and do you believe the Biden administration
should relist them as such?
Mr. Hook. We listed the Houthis as a foreign terrorist
organization because they met the definition under almost every
criteria according to the lawyers in the State Department.
I thought it was a mistake for the Biden administration to
delist them very early on. It was one of the--sort of the early
policy decisions of the Administration.
They have since done a redesignation of the Houthis. That
is necessary. It is important to do. You need to do other
things. I am very happy that we did, because they are a foreign
terrorist organization.
Senator Ricketts. So when it comes to deterring the
Houthis, clearly, the strikes we have been doing have not been
doing that. They continue to attack the shipping, as you point
out, in the Red Sea.
What can we do to deter or establish credible deterrence?
Do we need to start targeting Houthi leaders? Do we need to
start providing direct military support to the anti-Houthi
faction in Yemen? What should we be doing?
Mr. Hook. The Houthis are a tribal militia that are
fighting at a level entirely beyond their natural capability.
And Iran has organized, trained, and equipped the Houthis for
many years now, I am not privy to the intelligence that would
drive decisions like targeting in terms of assets or
individuals that enable the Houthis to have shut down
international shipping.
The Houthis did not shut down international shipping when
we were in office. We worked very closely with our partners to
put the Houthis in a defensive position. It is not--it was not
perfect but it is much better than what we have today.
So I would strongly encourage the Biden administration to
do the defensive military measures that will achieve
deterrence. I do not think we are there yet.
Senator Ricketts. Great. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator Shaheen.
Senator Shaheen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to
each of our witnesses for being here.
Iran continues to stage proxy attacks on U.S. forces from
Syria. It is also emerging as a new front in the Israel-Hamas
war.
So should we have a more comprehensive strategy to address
the threats that are stemming from Syria and to look at the
long term status of Syria and the continued opportunity that it
presents for Iranian proxies to attack the U.S. from there?
Dr. Maloney, I will ask you to go first, and then Mr. Hook.
Dr. Maloney. We absolutely need a real Syria policy. We
have not had one for about a decade now under several
Administrations, and that is because it is a pretty hard issue
to deal with.
Senator Shaheen. So talk, if you would, about what that
Syria policy ought to look like.
Dr. Maloney. I think we have to be working much more
closely with the region. There has been an effort by some of
our partners in the region to try to normalize with Bashar
Assad, essentially overlook a decade of just horrific abuse of
his own people, and we have not really been able to manage that
process.
We have not really been able to shape a better alternative
to that process. Our approach has been to kind of see no evil,
hear no evil, and that has left us in a position where Bashar
Assad has been able to commit unspeakable evil.
Senator Shaheen. Never mind Iran and Russia there as well.
Dr. Maloney. It has been a very useful staging ground for
both the Iranians and the Russians, and it really provided the
seeds of the strategic partnership between them that is now
being played out in an even more horrific way on the
Ukrainians.
Senator Shaheen. I just came back with Senator Murphy from
a visit to Turkey, and we had a chance to meet with President
Erdogan and talked a little bit about the potential to work
together in the future in Syria where, obviously, Turkey has
interests as well.
Mr. Hook, can you speak to what that kind of coordination
might look like and whether you believe there is an opportunity
to work more closely with Turkey on the future of Syria?
Mr. Hook. All of our options in Syria are bad, and it is a
matter of choosing between the best of worst options. I mean,
we are so late into this.
I think what is, unfortunately, missing, as Dr. Maloney
said, it is unclear what the Syria strategy is. But the Syria
strategy needs to nest within a larger Middle East strategy,
and I wish President Biden coming into office had given a major
speech with a Middle East policy and how everything fits
together.
I wish he had appointed an envoy for the Middle East like
President Obama did, like President Trump did. I also wish that
he had put forward an economic and political vision between
Israel and Palestine.
Senator Shaheen. Well, can you----
Mr. Hook. But these two things have not been done, and
until you have a broader strategy it is reactive.
Senator Shaheen. Right. I understand that.
But I guess what I am asking you is what do you think that
kind of policy should look like. What should it include, and
how does Syria fit into that?
Mr. Hook. Yes. It fits into it, Senator--and it is the
right question to ask. It fits into it--I remember during the
Syria civil war Qasem Soleimani was overseeing 10,000 fighters
in Syria, and that same network of fighters, many of them, are
still available to be part of an attack against Israel, as you
mentioned.
And so I am very glad that we recognized Israeli
sovereignty over the Golan Heights. There are other things that
we need to be doing to--the subject of this hearing is relevant
because the proxies that Iran commands in Syria need to lose
their banker, and they also need to--I think our military can
play a bigger role in driving the risk of miscalculation on the
part of all these proxies. I think right now the proxies in
Syria feel like it is a very permissive environment. Same in
Iraq.
Senator Shaheen. Yes. I was among those who was very
disappointed when we withdrew our forces from northeastern
Syria.
Dr. Maloney, do you have anything to add to that in terms
of a broader strategy that would recognize addressing Syria and
the problems that it presents?
Dr. Maloney. I just did want to take the opportunity to
point out that I do not think the problem of our Middle East
policy is the lack of a presidential speech, and I am not
really convinced that success or failure rests on that
particular barometer, nor could one point to one coherent
speech during the Trump administration that would have set
forward a coherent policy and effective policy toward the
region.
I think, in fact, the Biden administration and the
President's visits to Israel with the Jerusalem declaration has
in fact put forward a vision that is one that builds on some of
the few positives that the Trump administration actually
achieved during his time in office, which were the Abraham
Accords, and if we can in fact continue to make progress toward
normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia, then we are in a
much better position to deal with the challenge of a country
like Syria.
Senator Shaheen. Thank you both.
The Chairman. Senator Van Hollen.
Senator Van Hollen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
As this hearing attests there is no doubt that Iran exerts
its malign influence throughout the Middle East by supporting
various proxies. It is also true that these proxies have
different origin stories and have different relationships with
Tehran.
One of them is Hamas, the terror group responsible for the
horrific October 7 massacre in Israel. Now, Iran, of course,
did not create Hamas nor does it exercise command and control
over Hamas, but they do provide support to Hamas primarily
because of Hamas's despicable goal of destroying Israel and the
overall goal of Iran of weakening U.S. influence in the region.
I am one who believes that we should have been doing more
all along to weaken Hamas. We have talked about Iran today. We
have not discussed the inconvenient truth of the fact that
Prime Minister Netanyahu himself saw it in his interest to keep
Hamas in control in Gaza.
Do not take my word for it. He told us this back in 2019 at
a Likud party meeting where he said, and I quote, ``Anyone who
wants to prevent the creation of a Palestinian state needs to
support strengthening Hamas. This is part of our strategy to
divide the Palestinians between those in Gaza and those in
Judea and Samaria.'' End quote. Netanyahu.
After all, so long as Hamas was in control in Gaza, how
could anybody ask Israel to accept a Palestinian state that
included Gaza and the West Bank? Good question.
So Prime Minister Netanyahu and his extreme right wing
partners have embarked on a concerted strategy to weaken the
Palestinian Authority, which recognizes Israel's right to
exist, and to strengthen Hamas, which does not.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to enter into the record a piece
that appeared in Haaretz in October of last year, ``A brief
history of the Netanyahu-Hamas alliance.''
The Chairman. Without objection it will be included in the
record.
[Editor's note.--The information referred to above can be
found in the ``Additional Material Submitted for the Record''
section at the end of this hearing.]
Senator Van Hollen. We also have heard a lot of talk since
October 7th about Qatari funds going to Hamas.
Ms. Maloney, is it not true that those funds flowed with
the concurrence of Prime Minister Netanyahu and Israel?
Dr. Maloney. Yes, that is true.
Senator Van Hollen. That is true. So when I hear all my
colleagues talk about this Qatari money, please recognize that
this was done with the consent and encouragement of Prime
Minister Netanyahu.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to enter into the record a CNN
article, ``Qatar sent millions to Gaza for years--with Israel's
backing.''
The Chairman. Without objection it will be included in the
record.
[Editor's note.--The information referred to above can be
found in the ``Additional Material Submitted for the Record''
section at the end of this hearing.]
Senator Van Hollen. And Mr. Chairman, I would also like to
enter into the record a New York Times article from December of
last year entitled ``Buying quiet: Inside the Israeli plan that
propped up Hamas,'' subheadline ``Prime Minister Netanyahu
gambled that a strong Hamas (but not too strong) would keep the
peace and reduce pressure for a Palestinian state.''
The Chairman. Without objection it will be included in the
record.
[Editor's note.--The information referred to above can be
found in the ``Additional Material Submitted for the Record''
section at the end of this hearing.]
Senator Van Hollen. And Ms. Maloney, have you also seen the
reports about how Prime Minister Netanyahu was informed about
various sources of Hamas's moneys kept overseas including some
in Turkey and decided to ignore those warnings?
Dr. Maloney. I have seen those reports.
Senator Van Hollen. Mr. Chairman, I would like to enter
into the record a New York Times piece, again from December of
last year, headline, ``Israel found Hamas money machine years
ago. Nobody turned it off.''
The Chairman. Without objection.
[Editor's note.--The information referred to above can be
found in the ``Additional Material Submitted for the Record''
section at the end of this hearing.]
Senator Van Hollen. And I want just to quote from Mr. Levy,
who was the Mossad chief in charge of economic policy, who
says, and I quote, ``I can tell you for sure that I talked to
him''--referring to Prime Minister Netanyahu--``about this,''
unquote, quote, ``but he did not care that much about it.''
The article goes on to point out that Mr. Netanyahu's
Mossad chief shut down Mr. Levy's team, the Task Force Harpoon
that focused on disrupting the money flowing to groups
including Hamas.
So, Mr. Chairman, as we watch what is happening in Gaza in
the aftermath of the terrible Hamas attacks of October 7 and we
try to bring that conflict to an end and President Biden talks
about the importance about providing some light at the end of
this very dark tunnel by creating a two state solution to
provide security for Israel including normalization,
ultimately, from Saudi Arabia and Arab states but also a state
for Palestinians to live in dignity of their own, let us
remember the lengths that Prime Minister Netanyahu has gone to
try to prevent that from happening including--as all of these
articles in fact attest, including going to the lengths of
strengthening Hamas to try to in turn weaken the Palestinian
Authority and prevent those negotiations from going forward.
It is well documented. He always opposed the Oslo Accords.
He has always been opposed to a two state solution. His
coalition right now, and it is in their founding documents,
want the entire West Bank effectively annexed by Israel.
So we need to go into this with clear eyes as to all the
factors that are at play here, Iranian influence and malign
efforts certainly being a factor across the Middle East. But it
is a complicated story, and if we are going to find a way out
that brings any hope to anybody in the Middle East and more
stability, we need to look at this full story.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator Barrasso.
Senator Barrasso. Thanks so much, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you both for being here today.
Mr. Hook, so the Trump administration pursued a maximum
pressure campaign designed to choke off revenues that the
Iranian regime used to fund terrorist activities. We now
learned last week from the New York Times that a lot of the oil
has now been moving from Iran to China--I think 59 million
barrels worth over--almost close to $3 billion.
The tankers ended up in China, the money ended up in Iran,
and the Biden administration said they are doing everything
they can. I think they have looked the other way and completely
been outplayed.
So the Biden administration decided to pursue what I
describe as a maximum concession campaign as opposed to a
maximum pressure campaign, and it was aimed at appeasing Iran,
letting Iran do more and more.
So we have the crippling sanctions from the Trump
administration, Joe Biden lifting sanctions. Do you believe the
Biden administration's approach to Iran has worked or has
failed?
Mr. Hook. I think they relaxed enforcement in order to try
to get back into the Iran nuclear deal, and I think that that
was probably a bad gamble because this--the Iran nuclear deal
started to expire when I was in office, and it is going to keep
expiring in successive years.
And so I know there was talk about a longer and stronger
deal and a number of things like that, but they should not have
relaxed their enforcement as a tactical negotiating matter.
They would have been more likely to achieve their results
by continuing maximum pressure than by relaxing it.
Senator Barrasso. So along that line, and you used the word
tactical negotiating approach, what lessons will other
adversaries around the world learn about the U.S. in the light
of Biden's concessions campaign toward Iran?
Mr. Hook. What happens in places like Iran is a teaching
moment in places like North Korea and Venezuela and Cuba and
other governments around the world, and so I think that if we
show weakness and unnecessary concessions to the world's
leading state sponsor of terrorism it has ripple effects around
the world.
It certainly, I think, could signal to somebody like
President Xi after Afghanistan, after another war in the Middle
East, that the United States does not have the stomach to do
what is necessary to maintain deterrence.
And so I would have much rather seen them continue the
deterrence that we--when we came into office it is clear from
talking with our partners--with our Sunni Gulf partners and
with the Israelis--that we had lost deterrence against Iran,
largely because of the Iran nuclear deal.
It took a while to regain it. It is hard to restore
deterrence. You can lose it very quickly. And so I think the
Biden administration was in a great position to pursue its
nuclear objectives, but they needed to continue the maximum
pressure campaign.
Senator Barrasso. So you mentioned President Xi by name,
and there is talk of the concerns of, perhaps, China's
involvement with an invasion at some point potentially of
Taiwan.
Does this also send a message that makes that more likely
that they view weakness on behalf of the United States as an
invitation for a time to go after something that they have been
wanting for a long time?
Mr. Hook. In a similar way of not enforcing our red lines
in Syria, it just sends the wrong message to tyrannical
regimes, autocratic regimes, that would like to displace us and
our allies whether that is in Asia, Europe, or the Middle East
or Africa.
And so I think it is very important for the United States
to be, as the old saying in the military goes, no better friend
and no worse enemy.
Senator Barrasso. So then following up on that, talk a
little bit about the extent that the maximum pressure campaign
previously actually worked, succeeded in achieving the stated
objectives regarding Iran's nuclear program.
Mr. Hook. I think on the nuclear piece there was--the Iran
nuclear deal was going to expire, and as I said earlier we
pulled forward the expiration date, and then we put in place
what we thought were the standards for a new and better deal.
I think if given more time, given the political and
economic pressure we were putting on the regime, I think
eventually we would have created an atmosphere to get a much
better deal than was negotiated under the Iran nuclear deal.
I know for a fact that we dried up enormous amounts of
funding for the Iranian regime and its proxies, and it worked.
Senator Barrasso. Let me ask a final question. September
2023 the President's National Security Adviser, Jake Sullivan,
said the Middle East region is quieter today than it had been
in two decades.
A few days later we see Hamas terrorists, Iran backed
financially, coming in to Israel. How has the Biden
administration's Iran strategy led to chaos and instability
throughout the Middle East?
Mr. Hook. I think it would have been much better off for
the Administration to not delist the Houthis, to have better
relations with our Sunni partners. It is very--when I was in
office we worked to organize not only our Sunni partners and
Israel against the common threat of Iran, but we also did it in
Europe and other parts of the world.
And so I think when you come in to office, and you alienate
your Sunni partners and Israel, and you then relax your
sanctions against Iran that is exactly the kind of environment
that Iran thrives in, and you need to be doing the opposite.
Senator Barrasso. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Hook. I
understand your family and you have all been subjected to
threats because of the role that you have taken previously in
the previous Administration, your willingness to continue to
speak out forcefully and truthfully.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Senator Risch.
Senator Risch. Thank you.
Mr. Hook, you and I sat here and listened to Senator Murphy
attempt to muddy the water here using some unrelated
statistics, and for those who he may have confused, let us you
and I try to clear this up a little bit.
Would you agree with me that the central cause of
difficulties in the Middle East today is Iran?
Mr. Hook. Iran is the principal driver.
Senator Risch. Number two, would you agree with me that
Iran's ability to do that is totally related to its oil
revenues?
Mr. Hook. Yes.
Senator Risch. Number three, what did you have--when you
left office after your attempts to constrain the flow of oil
from Iran, what did you have it to when you left office?
Mr. Hook. We took it from about 2.2 million barrels down to
300,000.
Senator Risch. What is it today? Since you left office, and
the Biden administration has taken over, what is their flow
today?
Mr. Hook. I think it is between 1.5 and 2.
Senator Risch. And that cash is being used to do what we
have all been talking about all day in the Middle East. Is that
a fair statement?
Mr. Hook. Yes. The oil revenue goes to the IRGC and Quds
Force, and then they use that money to spend on its proxies to
kill and terrorize American soldiers.
Senator Risch. Thank you.
The Chairman. Senator Young.
Senator Young. Thank you, Chairman.
Dr. Maloney, you said that Iran is using the war in Gaza to
weaken Israel's international standing. I noted in yesterday's
Foreign Relations subcommittee hearing that Iran's bloody
fingertips are all over the region, both before October 7 and
even more so on that day and since then.
From your perspective, Doctor, is the Administration doing
enough to engage with partners and skeptical nations to remind
the world about Iran's destabilizing efforts in the region?
Dr. Maloney. I think the Administration has become more
vocal on that issue over the past several months for obvious
reasons. I think that Iran's behavior is well known to many
partners in the region and elsewhere, and I think that it is
absolutely critical for us to continue to shine a light on
Iranian aggression.
Senator Young. What about emphasizing Iran's support for
Hamas? Is this something where the Administration is doing
enough communicating that?
Dr. Maloney. I believe that, again, it is very well known
that Iran is the primary financial backer, that Iran has
provided absolutely critical access to rockets and missiles and
the means of production to Hamas, that Iranian support has
essentially helped to build the tunnel structure that has
enabled Hamas to survive.
Senator Young. Mr. Hook, I would ask you basically the same
questions. How would you grade the Administration's efforts to
demonstrate to the world Iran's malign actions and intentions?
Mr. Hook. Well, Senator, as I mentioned earlier the leader
of Hezbollah has said publicly as long as Iran has money we
have money, and that is the same for Hamas. Hamas--93 percent
of its money comes from Iran, and we have to get serious about
oil sanctions, banking sanctions, petrochemical sanctions,
metals, all of it.
And if you undertake a focused, sustained effort in that
regard you are going to dry up funding for Hamas and Hezbollah,
and you are going to make Iran choose between guns in Damascus
or butter in Tehran. That is the choice that we have to have
them make.
Senator Young. So it sounds as though right now that the
grade would be for pass/fail. It might be failing, but it is
incomplete.
So tell me what can the U.S. be doing to better demonstrate
to Iran's proxies, many of whom thirst for international
legitimacy, that no such reward will come as long as they
willingly refrain in Iran's orbit, perpetrate attacks, and sow
unrest?
Mr. Hook. I think it is a combination of maximum economic
pressure, political isolation. I think we need to improve our
military cadence to restore deterrence, which we have lost.
As I was talking earlier with one of the Senators, we have
not had any attacks in the last 3 weeks. That is good. But we
are going to need to keep up this tempo and increase it if we
are going to protect the 30,000 American troops that are in the
Middle East today.
Senator Young. So hit our adversaries more frequently?
Mr. Hook. As a defensive military action, yes.
Senator Young. As a defensive military action.
Mr. Hook. Yes. Our troops are very exposed. As I was saying
earlier, since I think November you have had 165 attacks
against American troops in Iraq and Syria, and we have
responded 11 times.
Senator Young. Yes.
Mr. Hook. It is insufficient. That imbalance is untenable.
Senator Young. Well, I think we are also going to have to
wrestle with the legal implications of some of the military
actions that are occurring and are being contemplated.
This was a focus of the subcommittee hearing that we held
yesterday as well. So when you are attacking Houthis, for
example, in response to attacks they have made on partner
nation commercial shipping, I think there are legitimate
questions to be asked about whether or not congressional
authorization is required.
Mr. Hook, I believe that imposing costs on Iran's terrorist
proxies is just one necessary response to their continued
attacks across the region against the U.S. and our interests.
We have to also actively seek to break their network. This
in part requires the U.S. to force the leadership of these
groups to question the risks they individually and collectively
are willing to take, and sow doubt that either their partners
of convenience or their masters in Tehran are going to leave
them holding the bag if they choose further escalation, whether
it be in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, or elsewhere.
Mr. Hook, how might you suggest that we act in this area?
Mr. Hook. Iran has for its 42 something year history
operated in the gray zone, and they let the proxies do the
dying for them, and they have been very effective at building
out this Shi'a crescent, this axis of resistance that has
imposed massive costs on the United States, Israel, and our
Sunni partners.
And so I think that if we are going to degrade and disrupt
these networks in the gray zone, the Biden administration
should announce that they make no distinction between Iran and
its proxies, and anything that a proxy does we will attribute
agency to the Iranian regime, and they will be held accountable
as if it were a direct attack.
And I do not think that Iran itself has endured sufficient
costs directly. We have gone after things like--the Biden
administration has gone after Hezbollah and some other proxies.
But Iran is not feeling any of the pain and until the
regime starts feeling it, they are going to continue to operate
with impunity in the gray zone.
The Chairman. Senator Cruz.
Senator Cruz. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Hook, I am deeply concerned that the Biden
administration systematically downplays Iran's aggression
against America and against Americans. Sometimes they do it by
downplaying the aggression. They act, essentially, as Iran's
lawyers. Other times they simply hide information from Congress
or the public.
For instance, as Senator Risch mentioned in his opening
remarks, you are personally threatened by this regime. As
anyone here can see you have a security detail because the
Iranian regime is targeting you for the service that you have
provided our country.
It is not just you. Former Secretary of State Pompeo,
former National Security Adviser Bolton, are also being
targeted for assassination, as are other former officials.
What Americans do not know is that the Biden administration
has gone to great lengths to hide the extent and persistence of
those threats, including abusing the classification system.
They find public discussion of Iran's aggression politically
inconvenient because it gets in the way of their appeasement of
the regime.
Americans understandably do not like their government
sending billions of dollars to theocratic thugs trying to
murder fellow Americans. For instance, the Administration is
required to regularly notify Congress of threats to former U.S.
officials such as yourself.
But when they were negotiating their $6 billion ransom deal
last summer, they took the unprecedented step for the first
time before or after of classifying their notification to limit
who could see it and who could discuss it.
I would like to give you the opportunity to comment on the
significance of these threats.
Mr. Hook. Senator, I do not have access to the intelligence
anymore. I also do not have any visibility into the process
whereby the persistent threat determination is made.
What I can say is that I am grateful to the committee and
to the Senate and to the Congress for its funding that provides
protection for me and my family.
I am grateful to the Office of Diplomatic Security at the
State Department that provides that protection. I wish we were
in a place that it was not necessary, but that is where we are,
and again, I am grateful to this committee for its support on
that matter.
Senator Cruz. Well, let me say, Mr. Hook, I want to say to
you and your family, thank you. You should not have to endure
this as the price of public service. And I think it is
completely unacceptable that the current Administration has
flowed $100 billion to a regime that is actively trying to
murder former senior U.S. officials.
I want to turn--you were saying a moment ago about how Iran
has not felt any of the pain despite its actively directing and
funding proxies.
I want to talk about how the Iranian regime funds the
proxies that are attacking Americans, that are attacking
Israel, that are attacking our allies.
During the Trump administration you were part of the team
responsible for imposing a maximum pressure campaign against
the Iranian regime. That was the right strategy.
That is how you deal with enemies that are trying to kill
you, and you specifically targeted Iran's energy exports. That
was very successful.
The Trump administration, through focusing sanctions, was
able to reduce their exports from a million barrels a day down
to approximately 300,000 barrels a day.
However, when the Biden administration came into office
they dismantled that pressure. Today Iran's oil exports are,
roughly, 2 million barrels a day, largely sold to communist
China, and uncountable billions of those dollars have flowed
toward the Ayatollah to be used for terrorism to murder
Americans and murder our allies.
Biden administration officials say they are doing their
best, but they simply cannot do anything at all about this,
that they are helpless to stop the billions from flowing to
Iran to be used to attack our country.
Is that your assessment? Are they in fact helpless? Is
there nothing they can do to impose costs on Iran and to cut
off their cash?
Mr. Hook. Senator, the Biden administration is in a perfect
position to announce zero oil exports of Iranian crude. And I
would also say they should do the same thing on petrochemicals
and industrial metals, and that would have a measurable impact
on Iran's funding for its proxies.
We have proven that it can be done. Secretary Pompeo and I
announced the goal of zero, right. Even if you do not meet that
goal, and we had metrics every day that----
Senator Cruz. And can you explain from a foreign policy
perspective is there any national security justification for
the Biden administration hating oil and gas production in
America and relentlessly assaulting domestic energy production,
but at the same time giving a theocratic lunatic a green light
to mint money and refusing to act against their energy exports?
Mr. Hook. I think there is a way to impose crippling oil
sanctions on the Iranian regime without driving up the price of
oil for American families at the gasoline pump.
We have done it. We did it. It can be done again, and it
can be done----
Senator Cruz. So what specifically should they do? And my
time has expired so but please explain specifically if the
Biden administration wanted to cut off the cash and impose zero
oil on Iran how would they do it?
Mr. Hook. They would explain to every country that imports
Iranian crude oil that they would be cut off from the
international financial system because of our sanctions.
Now, China has ways to circumvent that, but you have to
look for other pressure points in the bilateral relationship
with China so that you drive up the costs of their importing of
Iranian crude.
Then you bring that down, and if you can deal with China
and some other imports that are leaking--ship to ship
transfers--we set up an interagency team that monitored every
single act of Iranian sanctions evasion on oil, and we
countered it.
And so we were very aggressive, and we were very
successful. It can be done again.
Senator Cruz. Thank you.
The Chairman. Let me thank--Senator Risch.
Senator Risch. Very briefly.
We never talked about it, and I am not going to get into
the details here but one of the real things that we really need
to focus on is not a drop of oil moves without it going into a
ship, and that ship has to have insurance or the ship does not
move, and those insurance companies are all international
companies.
Do you agree that that is a focus that we really ought to
have as far as trying to enforce the sanctions?
Mr. Hook. Yes, we did that. We made clear to every company
that was insuring Iranian oil tankers that they need to get out
of that business, and we had a dramatic reduction in that.
What we did is we did a systematic analysis from production
to export, and we looked for every single node in that process,
and then we put pressure on it. And insurance is a big part of
this.
Senator Risch. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
The Chairman. So let me make just one or two observations.
First, yes, we have to enforce our sanctions, particularly
on the energy sector, and I think there is going to be
consensus in this committee to strengthen those tools, and
China is going to clearly be a focus of our attention as to how
we can better enforce the energy sector sanctions in China.
But let me just make an observation. Iran will find ways to
finance its proxies to the detriment of its own people. The
first priority of their budget is this terrorist activities and
their military to the detriment of the welfare of the people of
Iran.
And then, second, let me point out that what Iran's proxy
Hamas was about was to stop normalization in the region, the
expansion of the Abraham Accords, and that anything we can do
to strengthen normalization in the region by giving hope for
the Palestinians and Israelis for peace, to deal with the
moderate Arab states that we have relationships in the region,
particularly the Saudis in regards to normalization with
Israel, all that will undermine the capacity of Iran to have
influence and its proxies to have influence in the region.
So these are areas I think we need to work on in addition
to cutting off the support for Iran through the enforcement of
sanctions.
So I thank our witnesses. I see----
Mr. Hook. Senator, I love that observation, tying this all
together back to normalization. When Jared Kushner was leading
our efforts on the Abraham Accords--what became the Abraham
Accords--we were working on the Middle East peace plan.
It was very clear to us in hindsight, and even at the
present time that unifying our Sunni partners in Israel against
the common threat of Israel, against Iran, created the
conditions--it was part of the conditions that enabled the
Abraham Accords.
And if your Sunni partners and Israel understand what you
are doing on Iran, it increases trust and confidence. But if
you have the wrong Iran strategy it makes normalization very
hard.
The Chairman. That is the reason why we are having this
hearing on Iran to be----
Dr. Maloney. Might I say one very brief----
The Chairman. Absolutely.
Dr. Maloney [continuing]. Remark as well, which is that
maximum pressure has had a lot of attention in today's
conversation, and it is true that the Trump administration was
very successful in bringing down Iran's oil revenues and
exports for a period of time.
However, part of the price of that strategy was an increase
in Iran's attacks across the region, shipping, and an increase
in Iran's nuclear malfeasance. And we are closer today to an
Iranian nuclear weapons capability as a result of the decision
to walk away from the deal.
Even though the Trump administration actually had an
opportunity to strengthen the deal, the decision was to simply
scuttle it, walk away, and leave us with no real way to impose
those kinds of constraints and restrictions on Iran's nuclear
activities.
The Chairman. I whispered to Senator Risch that I thought
we had two outstanding witnesses here for this presentation.
Not that I agreed with either of your total observations; in
some cases, I have some strong disagreements.
But I think you have really added to the debate, and your
commitment to these policies and your commitment to public
service is incredible. So we thank you.
Mr. Hook, I also want to add my deep concern for your
safety and for your courage in what you have been able to do in
public service. We will stand by you and make sure that you
have adequate resources in that regard.
Mr. Hook. Thank you, Senator.
The Chairman. The committee record will remain open until
close of business tomorrow for questions for the record. We
would ask that if members submit questions that you would
respond in a timely way so that we can have the benefit of your
knowledge as we go forward with this subject matter.
With that, the hearing stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:53 a.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
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