Ex-Treasury official warns Iran funds going to terror groups

A former Treasury Department official raised concerns on Wednesday about terrorists obtaining some of the international community’s financing to Iran.

The U.S. is ceding $11.9 billion in cash transfers to Iran between November 2013 and June 31 as the Obama administration looks to finalize a nuclear deal with Tehran.

{mosads}”I am concerned that some of these funds have already found their way to terrorist groups, and that much more terror finance could be on the way,” Jonathan Schanzer, a former Treasury counterterrorism analyst, told lawmakers at a hearing.

Schanzer, a vice president of research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, testified before the House Financial Services Committee’s terrorist financing task force, which held its first hearing on Wednesday.

Task force Chairman Mike Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) said that “today’s terror organizations are more — thanks in no small part to better methods of funding and financing their dangerous brands of hate, extremism and violence.”

Fitzpatrick vowed to use the newly created task force to ensure “the federal government is using every tool at its disposal to deprive groups like the Islamic State [in Iraq and Syria (ISIS)], Boko Haram and other terrorist organizations of the funds they rely on to advance their warped ideology.”

Fitzpatrick said that the task force will look to see if the “rules and regulations the United States Government has in place are effective.”

House Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) said that he couldn’t think of a more “somber responsibility” for his colleagues on his panel. 

“You are each charged to ensure that the work of this task force is to thoroughly examine and evaluate any need to upgrade and improve our nation’s ability to starve the terrorists of the financial resources they need to carry out their evil attacks,” Hensarling said.