House Foreign Affairs Chair: Iran’s Proxies Must Be Tied to Agreement

House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Brian Mast told the Daily Signal that while the current memorandum of understanding with the Iranian regime delivers a win for President Donald Trump’s administration, Iran’s terror proxies—Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthi rebels in Yemen—must be tied to the final peace agreement.

The Florida Republican’s remarks come after Hezbollah, a Lebanese terror group funded by Iran, launched a barrage of rockets into Israeli villages hours after the United States signed the memorandum with Iran that established a framework for a final peace deal.

“If you ask Brian Mast,” he told the Daily Signal, “Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas, Houthi, are tied at the hip.”

“It is extremely significant that Iran ties Hezbollah and Lebanon to this deal, because these proxies are intrinsic to them. They are a part of them, right? This deal is between Iran and the United States of America,” Mast added, saying that the final agreement should include all of Iran’s proxies.

Mast said that, under the current agreement, Israel is held accountable if it retaliates against Hezbollah. He added that the same standard should apply to the Iranian-funded groups that have vowed to expel Western influence from Lebanon, destroy the State of Israel, and establish an Iranian-style Islamic regime.

Refuting the ‘Costly War’ Cry

The deal, as it currently stands, will give the Iranian regime at least $300 billion for reconstruction. However, under the framework, the funds will not reach the regime unless Iran complies with the agreement.

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“Don’t look at it and say, oh, the starting point is we’re giving them this money,” Mast said. “No, the starting point is, we just killed their generals, their scientists, their clients, all of their nuclear facilities, their army, their navy, their air force, their cash chains, their steel industry, all of this stuff.”

Despite criticism from House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., that the conflict is a “costly war,” Mast told the Daily Signal that “there are reasons to be optimistic” about its conclusion, adding that the Iranian regime will not have the strength it possessed at the start of the year.

Mast stated that the war has reached this point because of the president’s decisive military action.

“There are reasons to be optimistic; the world is a different place—post-Epic Fury, post-Midnight Hammer, and present-day President Trump that’s shown he’s willing to lay the hammer,” he said. “The world is a different place, so the point of that is to change behavior.”