U.S. to squeeze Iran for behavior in Middle East, globally

Shaimaa Hefzy

White House national security adviser John Bolton vowed Thursday that Washington will “squeeze Iran” with maximum economic pressure in response to Tehran’s “malign” behavior in the Middle East and around the world.

In August, the Trump administration restored sanctions against Iran that had been suspended under former President Barack Obama's 2015 nuclear deal. The deal has been characterized as an ineffective giveaway that allowed Iran to finance terrorism without actually checking its nuclear ambitions.

Even more severe U.S. sanctions against Iran's banking and energy sectors are slated to go into effect in November, including restrictions on Iran's oil industry that could cut off a crucial source of hard currency. The sanctions already imposed target Iranian trade in automobiles, gold and other key metals.

And despite being hit with protests and demonstrations against high unemployment rates, poverty and other issues, Tehran claims its economy can endure the effects of the U.S. sanctions.

According to International Monetary Fund (IMF) statistics, Iran’s economic growth rate in 2016 was 12.5%, however, it has projected that this rate will drop to 3.5 percent and 3.8 percent in 2017 and 2018 respectively, as the boost to oil output after the lifting of sanctions wears off.

“We are going to squeeze Iran because we think their behavior in the Middle East and, really globally, is malign and needs to be changed,” Bolton said. “We are concerned about its ballistic-missile programs and its active conventional military operations in Syria and Iraq and elsewhere.

“We are going to squeeze Iran because we think their behavior in the Middle East and, really globally, is malign and needs to be changed,” Bolton added.

A Congressional Research Service report, entitled “Iran’s Foreign and Defense Policies,” said Iran supports acts of international terrorism, as the “leading” or “most active” state sponsor of terrorism, according to each annual State Department report on international terrorism since the early 1990s.

In earlier statements, Bolton called the Iranian regime the “central banker of international terrorism since 1979.”