Shurat HaDin-Israel Law Center – which represents American families of terror victims who have won U.S. court judgments against Iran for its support of terrorist attacks in Israel – alleged this week that the Obama administration kept secret the details of large cash payments made to Tehran in order to evade efforts by its clients to recover those funds to satisfy outstanding court awards.

A letter to Congress from attorneys Nitsana Darshan-Leitner of Tel Aviv and Robert Tolchin of New York recalled that President Obama on January 17 announced the settlement of a legal dispute between the United States and Iran over $400 million held by the U.S. in a Foreign Military Sales (FMS) program account since 1979.

The administration agreed to pay the $400 million it conceded it owed Iran, plus payment of an additional $1.3 million in interest on that amount.

In recent weeks, the $1.7 billion, which was secretly paid out in cash, has come under scrutiny because the timing and circumstances of the payments appeared to confirm the Iranian claim that the White House agreed to pay the money as ransom to Tehran for the release of American hostages.

However, in light of revelations during a Sept. 8 Congressional subcommittee hearing, Shurat HaDin is asserting “it is now clear the administration has deliberately kept numerous payments to Iran secret in order to shield Iran from having to forfeit those funds to pay terror victims amounts Iran owes under outstanding U.S. judgments.”

Shurat HaDin says that under legislation passed in 2000, the U.S. was legally entitled to apply the $400 million in the FSM account to satisfy terror victims’ judgments, eliminating the $400 million balance and nearly 16 years of interest claimed by Iran.

The Shurat HaDin letter cites the “suspicious revelation” at the Congressional subcommittee hearing that the United States and Iran did not draft a written settlement agreement or any other formal documentation of the cash transfers, and that “Iran specifically directed the Iran-U.S. Tribunal at The Hague, where the claim was to be resolved through arbitration, that it not record the settlement of the claim for the parties.”

Shurat HaDin’s Darshan-Leitner said in a statement: “We believe that the secrecy in which these cash payments were made was part of an effort by the White House to conceal these payments from the terror victims and to hide the fact that it was effectively canceling Iran’s debt for its terror-related activity. This is a horrible fraud against the terror victims.

“It appears the secret cash transfers were specifically done as an end-run around the ability of the families to attach the money and enforce their federal court judgments. Instead, the administration went to great lengths to ensure that the $1.7 billion payment was shrouded in secrecy, never reduced to writing nor even recorded with The Hague, and was paid to Iran in cash as quickly and directly as possible.”

Shurat HaDin urged Congress “to take action to guarantee that further payments to Iran are not made as long as Tehran remains a state sponsor of terrorism and a threat to its neighbors “and until it has paid every judgment it owes to American victims of terror.”

(JNi.Media, Jewish Press staff)

Shurat HaDin-Israel Law Center, representing American the families of terror victims who have won US court judgments against the government of Iran for its support of Palestinian terrorist attacks in Israel, on Tuesday released a letter it sent US Congress members alleging that the Obama Administration kept secret the details of the $1.7 billion in cash payments to Tehran in January 2016 in order to evade efforts by their clients to recover those funds to satisfy outstanding court awards.

In the past, American terror victims have been successful in seizing Iranian bank accounts when those had been located.

The letter, sent by attorneys Nitsana Darshan-Leitner of Tel-Aviv and Robert Tolchin of New York, recalls that on January 17, 2016, President Obama announced the settlement of a legal dispute between the United States and Iran over $400 million held by the US in a Foreign Military Sales (“FMS”) program account since 1979. The Obama Administration agreed to pay the $400 million it finally conceded it owed Iran, plus payment of an additional $1.3 million in interest on that amount.

Then, “in recent weeks, the $1.7 billion which was secretly paid out in cash has come under severe scrutiny because the timing and circumstances of the payments appear to confirm the Iranian claim that the White House agreed to pay the money as ransom to Tehran for the release of American hostages.”

However, in light of the recent revelations in a Congressional subcommittee hearing held on Thursday, September 8, 2016, Shurat HaDin is asserting that “it is now clear that the Administration has deliberately kept numerous payments to Iran secret in order to shield Iran from having to forfeit those funds to pay terror victims amounts Iran owes under outstanding US judgments.”

The Shurat HaDin letter cites a “suspicious revelation at the Congressional subcommittee hearing that the United States and Iran did not draft a written settlement agreement or any other formal documentation of the cash transfers, and that Iran specifically directed the Iran-US Tribunal at the Hague, where the claim was to be resolved through arbitration, that it should not record the settlement of the claim for the parties.”

Shurat HaDin asserts that under a legislation passed in 2000, the US was legally entitled to apply the $400 million in the FSM account to satisfy terror victims’ judgments, and this way eliminating the $400 million balance and nearly 16 years of interest claimed by Iran.

Shurat HaDin President Nitsana Darshan-Leitner said in a statement: “We believe that the secrecy in which these cash payments were made was part of an effort by the White House to conceal these payments from the terror victims and to hide the fact that it was effectively canceling Iran’s debt for its terror-related activity. This is a horrible fraud against the terror victims. It appears the secret cash transfers were specifically done as an end run around the ability of the families to attach the money and enforce their federal court judgments.”

Why didn’t the Treasury ever tell the families they were holding these funds?” Darshan-Leitner demanded to know.

Had either the settlement or an award against the United States at the Iran-US Tribunal been entered on the books, and Iran had sought to have the settlement or award confirmed in US court, then terror-victims with judgments against Iran could have legally “attached” any judgment affirming the settlement or award, so that the amount could be applied to satisfy their terror-compensation judgments, Shurat HaDin contends, explaining that “instead, the Administration went to great lengths to ensure that the $1.7 billion purported settlement was shrouded in secrecy, was never reduced to writing or even recorded with the Tribunal in Hague, and was paid to Iran in cash as quickly and directly as possible in order to head off any chance that Iran would be forced to forfeit any amount to pay legal judgments it owes to American terror victims.”

Shurat HaDin urged Congress to continue to investigate these issues, and to take action to guarantee that further payments to Iran do not take place as long as Iran remains a state sponsor of terrorism and a threat to its neighbors, “and until it has paid every judgment it owes to American victims of terror.”

Nitsana Darshan-Leitner addressed her letter to Senator Marco Rubio and Representatives Mike Pompeo and Ed Royce, who have each introduced legislation in response to the $1.7 billion payment to Iran, and to House Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling and Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Chairman Sean P. Duffy, whose subcommittee held a special hearing on the $1.7 billion payments last Thursday, September 8, 2016.

Gaza terrorists were undoubtedly anxious late Saturday night upon failing to carry out a rocket attack on southern Israel, due to quick-trigger backfire on the launching pad.

According to Arab media reports, the operatives tried to launch two rocket attacks towards Israel: but both rockets went off too early, during takeoff.

It was a case of premature explosion on the launching pad.

No details were made available regarding possible casualties resulting from the backfire.

There have been cases in the past when women and children have been injured as a result of such “work accidents.”

A suspected car bomb was discovered during the Sabbath outside a synagogue in the southern French city of Marseille on Saturday.

Two gas cylinders were found in a car parked outside the Bar Yohaye synagogue in the fourth district, according to numerous posts on social media.

Dozens of worshipers were praying the shacharit morning service when the car was spotted, at approximately 11 am.

Bomb squad sappers were immediately called to the site.

But Bouches-du-Rhône region Police Commissioner Laurent Nuñez told media no trigger mechanism was found, and the car was not stolen.

French police have been on high alert since an ISIS-inspired attempt a week ago, however, to blow up the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

Authorities said seven gas canisters were found inside an abandoned Peugeot vehicle with no license plate outside the Paris cathedral. Forensics experts tracked down suspects via DNA found at the site.

Three women have since been arrested in connection with the attempted terror attack a week ago in Paris.

American victims of Iranian terror were handed a $400 million loss with the payment of that sum to the Iranian government earlier this year. Whether it was a ransom payment for the release of hostages or, as defined by the White House, the payment of Iranian claims against the United States that was used as leverage for the hostages release, the fact of the matter is that the Obama administration has turned its back on American victims of Iranian terrorism.

My daughter Alisa, a 20-years old Brandeis University student studying in Israel, was murdered in 1995 by Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a client of the Islamic Republic of Iran that was caught red-handed funding PIJ murders. Using the provisions of a 1996 federal law, our family pursued the Iranian government for its role in the attack, and in 1998 was awarded approximately $250 million in damages.

The small feeling of victory that led me to believe we would hold Iran financially accountable was soon dashed to bits by the Clinton administration as it fought to prevent us from collecting money from the Iranians. Every time we attempted to seize an Iranian-controlled asset in this country, we were confronted by a phalanx of lawyers from the departments of Justice, State and Treasury.

Despite our courtroom losses, a number of victims’ families banded together to press the fight in the Congress and in the press. As a result we were able to convince the Clinton administration that something had to be done and President Clinton selected Jacob Lew, then director of the Office of Management and Budget, to act as a sort of mediator in the discussions between the families and the government.

Lew’s efforts were rewarded with an agreement that would allow terror victims to receive payment on a portion of their damage claims. Not wanting to take taxpayer money, I insisted that the money come from designated Iranian assets, the main one being the $400 million of Iranian money in the Foreign Military Sales Program account. Lew assured me the money would have to come through the Treasury but there was that account to reimburse the government for any payments.

With the families in agreement as to the nature of the payments and their source, President Clinton signed Public Law 106-386 on October 28, 2000. Payments were made to my family and others, and the issue of the Iranian money faded into the background until earlier this year when it was revealed that $400 million was paid to Iran. The same amount as in the FMSP account.

At this point I should be beyond being shocked at the treatment of American terror victims by our government, but I am not – as the source of money that was to be used to reimburse American taxpayers for the money I received was used for other purposes.

Notwithstanding the grandiose verbiage used by the White House and the State and Treasury departments to describe the payment and the reasons behind it, I can only view it as a sellout of American victims of Iranian terror and of the American taxpayer.

I have publicly stated that, despite what happened to Alisa, I was never opposed to the restoration of relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran. However, that restoration had a price – Iran had to account for its role in the murders of Alisa and so many others. Indeed, the statute that gave us our payments provides just for that.

No doubt, the White House and other government spokesmen will come up with more platitudes as to just what the statute means. To my mind, they can say what they want; the bottom line is that terror victims have seen their claims pushed aside by a government desperate to bring Iran to the negotiating table. Unfortunately, it’s more of a poker table, and the Iranians hold the cards.

[Originally posted to the author’s blog, The Lid}

Relax America, Secretary of State John Kerry has figured out how to win the war on terrorism. His solution is so far beyond the line where ideas are considered moronic– it is almost brilliant in its stupidity.

We don’t need to destroy the terrorist forces.

We don’t have to negotiate with them, making all kinds of concession that will only lead to our own destruction the way John Kerry and Barack Obama did with the Iran deal.

According to John Kerry the way to stop terror is to stop covering it in the media. Really that’s all we have to do–if the media doesn’t cover it, no one will know about it and abracadabra…no terror!

“Kerry in Bangladesh: Media Should Cover Terrorism Less,” by Jeryl Bier, Weekly Standard, August 29, 2016:

During Secretary of State John Kerry’s first official visit to Bangladesh, he met with top Bangladeshi government officials and held a press conference at the Edward M. Kennedy Center in Dhaka. In light of recent terror attacks in that country, Kerry addressed the problem of terrorism, including root causes and how the terrorists spread their message. The secretary said that the media could “do us all a service” by reducing coverage of terror attacks:

Remember this: No country is immune from terrorism. It’s easy to terrorize. Government and law enforcement have to be correct 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. But if you decide one day you’re going to be a terrorist and you’re willing to kill yourself, you can go out and kill some people. You can make some noise. Perhaps the media would do us all a service if they didn’t cover it quite as much. People wouldn’t know what’s going on. (Applause.)…

Who knew? If people didn’t know what was going on…there would be no terrorism.

WAIT A SECOND! Didn’t Kerry’s State Dept. also say that people join terrorist groups because they don’t have Jobs? Heck I was even willing to hire one to help the effort:

Granted no one wanted the job because the salary was too low (zero) but at least I tried.

But now it doesn’t matter, John Kerry has changed the State Dept.’s approach all we have to do is ignore the terrorism and it will go away. If reporting on terrorism makes terrorism happen, perhaps if sports pages stopped reporting the NY Jets blowing big games in the second half, they would finally win. Perhaps the reverse works, if people started reporting that I won a billion dollars–that would come to pass. According to Kerry’s logic it should work.

Holy tunnel diggers!

A new 31.5-meter (102-foot) smuggler tunnel has been discovered snaking under the U.S.-Mexican border, according to a statement issued Sunday by Mexican federal police, and quoted by Associated Press.

The unfinished illegal conduit was discovered by a team of Mexican police working together with the U.S. Border Patrol in Nogales, Arizona.

The entrance to the tunnel was found in Mexico inside the wall of a storm drain, but the exit had not yet reached its intended destination on the Arizona side of the border.

There are a number of drug trafficking organizations in Mexico who are known for using tunnels to transport their wares into the United States.

Across the Atlantic, the Gaza-based Hamas terrorist organization has used subterranean tunnels beneath the Egyptian border to smuggle drugs, arms, money and other contraband in and out of the Sinai Peninsula to help its ally, the local Da’esh (ISIS) terrorist affiliate, known as “Sinai Province” and formerly known as Ansar Beyt al-Maqdis.

Likewise, the Lebanon-based Iranian proxy Hezbollah terrorist organization who taught Hamas, has used tunnel-building locally for decades as well.

But Hezbollah has also long funded its terrorist activities via drug smuggling in Europe as well as in Latin America, and even as far north as in the United States itself.

Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) acting deputy administrator Jack Riley told reporters earlier this year that Hezbollah has, in fact, established business relationships with drug cartels in South America.

Hezbollah was accused of using the profits from the sale of cocaine in the United States and Europe to fund arms purchases for military use in Syria, according to a February 2016 statement by the DEA.

Sanctions were imposed against money launderers Mouhamad Noureddine and Hamdi Zaher El Dine by the U.S. Treasury Department, in connection with the DEA probe into Hezbollah drug trafficking and terrorism.