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Anger in U.S. over Classified Report on Revolutionary Guard’s Arrest of Marines | ASHARQ AL-AWSAT English Archive 2005 -2017
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London-The issue of Iran’s arrest of American marines earlier this year has come to forefront amid calls on the Obama administration and the U.S. Navy to release the details of a report on Tehran’s humiliation of sailors in the Arab Gulf.

America’s Fox News quoted Congressman Randy Forbes (R-Virginia) as saying recently that the full details on how badly the American sailors were mistreated by the Revolutionary Guard will shock the nation but won’t be released for at least a year because the Obama administration has classified this information.

Iran captured 10 American sailors on January 12 when their boats wandered into Iranian waters in the Arab Gulf. During the 15 hours the sailors were held, Iran humiliated them, forced an American female sailor to wear a hijab, and released photos of Americans with their hands up surrounded by armed Iranian soldiers.

The sailors also were interrogated, filmed while crying and forced to apologize at gunpoint. One of the sailors was forced to make a video apologizing for wandering into Iranian territory and thanking Iran for “your hospitality and your assistance.”

Fox News wondered why this information is classified and who the U.S. government is keeping it from.

Congressman Forbes said Americans will be outraged when they learn the full details of how Iran mistreated our sailors. “But I am already outraged by what was publicly released about this incident. What could have happened that the Obama administration does not want us to know?”

The full details on Iran’s capture and humiliation of the U.S. sailors have been classified by the Obama administration for one reason – to hide this information from the American people so it does not lead Congress to pass new sanctions against Iran that could cause Tehran to back out of the president’s legacy nuclear deal with Iran.

According to Fox News, this is part of a pattern of the Obama administration concealing and explaining away any behavior by Iran which could threat the nuclear deal.

The report said suggesting that Congress break classification laws and regulations is a very serious matter. But if there ever was a moment to do this, because of the nuclear deal with Iran this moment has come.

It made the following remarks in conclusion:

• The deal between is an affront to the Constitutional prerogatives of Congress since the president refused to submit it as a treaty for ratification by the Senate. A majority of Congress voted against the Iran agreement last September but it survived since it was not defeated with filibuster-proof majorities.

• House Intelligence Committee member Mike Pompeo (R-Kansas) is pressing for a formal congressional investigation on whether the Obama administration deliberately misled Congress about the Iran deal last summer to prevent Congress from voting to disapprove the deal.

• The nuclear deal is a dangerous fraud that will do little to address the growing threat from Iran’s nuclear program. A senior Obama aide has admitted the administration sold this agreement to the American people through a campaign of lies and deception.

• Iran’s behavior has grown much worse since the Iran deal was announced in July 2015 by increasing its support to Bashar Assad’s regime and the Shi’ite insurgency in Yemen, continuing its threats to Israel, recent threats to “down” U.S. Navy ships in the Persian Gulf, and other belligerent behavior.