WarSclerotic

BRUSSELS — The EU warned Tehran over its ballistic missile program and interference in the Syria conflict Monday, while welcoming a new mechanism to trade with Iran while bypassing US sanctions.

In a long-awaited statement on Iran that has been the subject of more than a week of wrangling in Brussels, the EU restated its commitment to saving the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran and took aim at Washington for abandoning the pact and reimposing sanctions.

The bloc hailed the creation last week by France, Britain and Germany of a system to allow firms to trade with Iran without falling foul of US sanctions as vital to supporting legitimate business and said the “resolve to complete this work is unwavering.”

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But with numerous European powers growing increasingly concerned about Tehran’s missile program, meddling in several Middle East conflicts and recent attempted attacks on opposition figures living in the EU, the bloc urged Iran to mend its ways.

Illustrative: A missile launched from the Alborz mountains in Iran on March 9, 2016, reportedly inscribed in Hebrew, ‘Israel must be wiped out.’ (Fars News)

The statement criticized Iran’s “provision of military, financial and political support to non-state actors in countries such as Syria and Lebanon.”

“The (EU) Council has serious concerns regarding Iran’s military involvement and continuous presence of Iranian forces in Syria,” the statement said.

Iran is a key supporter of Syrian President Bashar Assad and the statement urged Tehran to use its leverage to get Damascus behind UN-led efforts to end the civil war, which has claimed more than 360,000 lives since it began in 2011.

While defending the nuclear deal — which limited Tehran’s atomic ambitions in return for sanctions relief — Europe has sought to keep up pressure with sanctions, most recently listing Iranian intelligence services over plots to assassinate regime opponents on Dutch, Danish and French soil.

Continuing Iranian missile tests have also alarmed the EU — not to mention countries in the Middle East — and Monday’s statement called on Tehran to stop such activities.

“Iran continues to undertake efforts to increase the range and precision of its missiles, together with increasing the number of tests and operational launches. These activities deepen mistrust and contribute to regional instability,” the statement said.

Brussels hopes the new Iran trading mechanism — registered last week in Paris under the name INSTEX — will keep Tehran in the nuclear deal by preserving some of the economic benefits it received.

Iran gave INSTEX a cautious welcome but US officials have dismissed the idea that the new entity would have any impact on efforts to exert economic pressure on Tehran.

Before INSTEX can go live, Iran has to set up a similar entity of its own so the two sides can clear trading on a barter basis without transferring money. It is not clear how long this will take.

WASHINGTON — The Senate voted Monday to oppose the withdrawal of US troops from Syria and Afghanistan, breaking with President Donald Trump as he calls for a military drawdown in those countries.

Senators voted 70-26 for the amendment sponsored by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. The measure says the Islamic State group and al-Qaeda terrorists still pose a serious threat to the United States, and it warns that “a precipitous withdrawal” of US forces from those countries could “allow terrorists to regroup, destabilize critical regions and create vacuums that could be filled by Iran or Russia.”

Trump abruptly tweeted plans for a US pullout from Syria in December, arguing that the Islamic State group had been defeated even though his intelligence chiefs have said it remains a threat. Trump also ordered the military to develop plans to remove up to half of the 14,000 US forces in Afghanistan.

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The strong bipartisan vote comes as Republican senators have increasingly diverged from Trump on foreign policy. When he introduced the amendment last week, McConnell said “ISIS and al-Qaeda have yet to be defeated.”

In this file photo taken on January 25, 2019, US Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell talks with reporters at the US Capitol in Washington, DC (WIN MCNAMEE / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA / AFP)

McConnell’s amendment, which is nonbinding, would encourage cooperation between the White House and Congress to develop long-term strategies in both nations, “including a thorough accounting of the risks of withdrawing too hastily.”

Idaho Sen. Jim Risch, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the amendment was not a rebuke to Trump, though he added, “we can do things over there which will make us safer here.”

While the majority of senators voted for the amendment, a handful of Republicans voted against it. McConnell’s Kentucky colleague, Republican Sen. Rand Paul said before the vote that “enough is enough” and the money spent on wars should be spent at home.

“I want to compliment President Trump for being bold and brave,” Paul said.

Many of the most liberal members of the Senate — including several Democrats who are eyeing presidential runs in 2020 — also voted against the amendment. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and others have agreed with Paul that the United States should withdraw, though they have criticized Trump for his sudden announcement.

McConnell’s provision was added to a wide-ranging foreign policy bill that has been pending on the Senate floor for several weeks. The legislation includes measures supporting Israel and Jordan and would slap sanctions on Syrians involved in war crimes. The Senate is expected to vote on the broader measure later this week.

That bill has split centrist and liberal Democrats due to a provision from Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., that seeks to counter the global Boycott, Divest and Sanctions movement against Israel over its treatment of Palestinians and the West Bank settlement enterprise. Israel sees a growing threat from the BDS movement, which has led to increased boycotts of the Jewish state in support of the Palestinians.

A man holds a sign during a rally in support of the BDS movement in Albany New York, on June 15, 2016. (AP/Mike Groll)

That has led to a “boycott of the boycotts” as Israel pushes back against those aligned with BDS.

In support of Israel, Rubio’s measures would affirm the legal authority of state and local governments to restrict contracts and take other actions against those “engaged in BDS conduct.” Several states are facing lawsuits after taking action against workers supporting boycotts of Israel.

Opponents say Rubio’s measure infringes on free speech.

Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah on Monday accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of inciting Western powers against Lebanon, a day after the premier blasted the country for including the Iran-backed terrorist group in its newly formed government.

“The new Lebanese government is not controlled by Hezbollah,” Nasrallah said in a speech broadcast by Hezbollah’s al-Manar TV channel.

“The new Lebanese health minister is close to Hezbollah, but not a member of the party,” he said.

“The Zionist prime minister is inciting the US, European countries, and the Gulf states against the Lebanese government, claiming it is controlled by Hezbollah,” Nasrallah charged.

Political factions in Lebanon on Thursday ended a nine-month deadlock and agreed on the new government, which saw a strengthening of the Shiite terrorist group.

Hezbollah and its allies now hold two ministries and a ministry of state, including for the first time the Health Ministry, which has one of the country’s largest budgets. The Finance Ministry remains in the hands of a Hezbollah ally, Ali Hassan Khalil.

On Sunday, Netanyahu told a group of 40 UN ambassadors that Iran was in control of the Lebanese government, via its proxy Hezbollah.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu briefs a delegation of ambassadors to the United Nations, at a helipad at the Knesset in Jerusalem, on February 3, 2019. (RONEN ZVULUN / POOL / AFP)

“Iran has proxies. One of them is Hezbollah. Hezbollah just joined the government of Lebanon. That’s a misnomer; they actually control the government of Lebanon,” Netanyahu said. “It means that Iran controls the government of Lebanon.”

Nasrallah’s deputy, Sheikh Naim Qassem, on Sunday responded that Israel was not ready for a conflict with Lebanon.

“The situation is complicated and Israel is not interested in war,” Qassem told local TV. “But it if wants to launch a war, we are ready.”

Lebanese President Michel Aoun (L) and Prime Minister Saad Hariri meet at the presidential palace in Baabda, east of the capital Beirut, on January 31, 2019. (Anwar Amro/AFP)

Rival political groups in Lebanon had been locked in disagreement over the makeup of a new government since May, after the country’s first parliamentary elections in nine years.

The breakthrough came after rival factions worked out a compromise allowing representation of Sunni lawmakers backed by Hezbollah.

The new government will be headed by Saad Hariri, the Sunni politician who headed the outgoing government since 2016. The post always goes to a Sunni politician under the country’s political system.

The government also sees an increase in the number of ministries affiliated with Hezbollah, which is under tightening sanctions from the United States that labels the group a terrorist organization. The group made significant gains in last year’s parliament elections while Hariri’s bloc lost a third of its seats.

Raphael Ahren and AP contributed to this report.

President Donald Trump said the US military would continue to protect Israel, but vowed to push ahead with a controversial troop withdrawal from Syria, in an interview aired Sunday.

Trump announced in December that he was withdrawing American troops from Syria, sparking worries that the move could leave Israeli and Kurdish allies in the lurch and open the way for Iran, Turkey and Russia to expand their influence in the war-torn country.

Trump told CBS’s Face the Nation the 2,000 US troops in the country to assist local forces would leave “in a matter of time,” and cited the need to “protect Israel and other things that we have” for slowing down — after initially announcing an immediate pull-out.

He said troops could keep an eye on Iranian activity from a base in Iraq, which he said the US would not give up, though insisted he would not use it to attack the Islamic Republic.

“We spent a fortune on building this incredible base. We might as well keep it. And one of the reasons I want to keep it is because I want to be looking a little bit at Iran because Iran is a real problem,” he said.

“All I want to do is be able to watch. We have an unbelievable and expensive military base built in Iraq. It’s perfectly situated for looking at all over different parts of the troubled Middle East rather than pulling up,” he said.

Members of the Maghawir al-Thawra Syrian opposition group receive firearms training from US Army Special Forces soldiers at the al-Tanf military outpost in southern Syria on October 22, 2018. (AP/ Lolita Baldor)

Trump’s abrupt announcement in December he would pull all American soldiers from Syria, saying the Islamic State had been defeated, set off alarm bells in Israel, which has being carrying out a campaign to prevent an Iranian military presence there.

Israeli officials have pointed to the al-Tanf base in southern Syria, near the borders with Iraq and Jordan, as key to curbing Iranian attempts to smuggle weapons to Syria and Lebanon.

The planned withdrawal has driven a rare wedge between his administration and Jerusalem, and sparked a rebuke from friendly lawmakers in Washington.

Last week, the Senate voted on a measure opposing the withdrawal. An amendment from the congressional body said that Islamic State and Al-Qaeda still pose a threat to US interests and that a US withdrawal would “allow terrorists to regroup, destabilize critical regions and create vacuums that could be filled by Iran or Russia.”

A convoy of US troops drive along a road leading to the front line with Turkish-backed fighters in north Syria, March 31, 2018. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla, File)

Trump defended the policy Sunday saying that IS has lost 99 percent of its land. “We will be announcing in the not too distant future 100%,” Trump said.

In a report to Congress last week, US intelligence leaders warned that IS still commands thousands of fighters in Iraq and Syria, and they could easily spring back in the absence of US forces.

Trump responded by rebuking as “naive” and “wrong” his intelligence chiefs, who also had appeared to contradict him on Iran and North Korea.

“When I look at Iran, I look at Iran as a nation that has caused tremendous problems,” he said in the interview. “So when my intelligence people tell me how wonderful Iran is – if you don’t mind, I’m going to just go by my own counsel.”

Members of the military cheer as US President Donald Trump speaks at a hanger rally at Al Asad Air Base, Iraq, on December 26, 2018. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

He played down the danger of an extremist resurgence, but said, “We’ll come back if we have to.”

“You’re going to always have pockets of something,” he said. “But you’re not going to keep armies there because you have a few people. Or you even have fairly reasonable numbers of people.”

Moreover, he argued that US could return to Syria if there were to be a resurgence of IS.

“We’ll come back if we have to. We have very fast airplanes, we have very good cargo planes. We can come back very quickly, and I’m not leaving,” Trump said.

AFP contributed to this report.