Will the economic sanction imposed by Washington on Iran cause it to abandon the path of terror? For the time being, as one expert told Israel Hayom on Tuesday, the answer appears to be no.
"To understand the influence of sanctions on the Iranian regime's behavior, you must first understand the modus operandi of Iranian banks and the Revolutionary Guard Corps,"explained Yossi Mansharof, a researcher of Iran and Shiite militias at the University of Haifa's Ezri Center for Iran and Persian Gulf Studies.
"More than a few Iranian banks were included in the sanctions that were in place before the nuclear deal in 2015, because they were involved in money laundering for the Revolutionary Guards. Over the past six years, several European banks have been fined billions of dollars by the American authorities after admitting to helping the Iranian regime bypass the sanctions and launder billions of dollars," he said.
"The method that keeps recurring in Iran is the use of straw companies, which the U.S. authorities keep trying to expose, just as we saw in the United Arab Emirates recently. The U.S. administration still has its work cut out for it in this department, it appears," Mansharof said.
The degree to which sanctions will impact the Iranian economy "depends on the objectives of the American government," Mansharof explained. "The central goal declared by the U.S. is to reduce Iranian aid to terrorist organizations to the minimum possible. As we know, the administration defines Iran as the world's pre-eminent state sponsor of terrorism. The implication is that Iran would rather use its energy revenues on terrorist organizations in the region rather than on the welfare of its own citizens, who are buckling under soaring inflation."
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani promised to work to improve his country's economy. Mansharof, however believes that "in light of the increasingly harsher stance many public circles in Iran will take against the regime; in light of the president's limited authority in the regime's hierarchy; and in light of the assumption that the regime will continue to prioritize its militias and terrorist organizations over its own people – we can surmise that the protests won't wane. They will continue to erupt sporadically, and the circle of demonstrators will expand."
