Iran’s economy has been suffering greatly from the Trump Administration’s re-imposition of sanctions. Majid Rafizadeh recently provided a report on just how bad things have become for the Islamic Republic: “Iran’s Mullahs are in Turmoil Thanks to America’s Current Policy,” Gatestone Institute, November 2, 2020:
…Iran’s currency, the rial, lost more than half its value so far just in 2020. That decline makes it one of the most worthless national currencies in the world. As of October 25, the rial traded on unofficial markets at 300,500 to the US dollar. The rate has pushed the Iranian authorities to agree on removing four zeros from its currency, which has gone into a virtual free-fall. Two years ago, one US dollar was worth nearly 30,000 rials.
The rial has, in just two years, lost 90% of its value, and it is still dropping. This makes it almost impossible for Iranians to afford goods from abroad.
The plummeting currency has also increased the demand for US dollars and gold. Even Iran’s state-run Mardom Salari Daily warned:
“We have an extremely failed and fallen economy. The main reason is the currency shock and the plundering of the economy by semi-private companies and banks. Sanctions have become an excuse for some people to plunder the country. We suffer from both foreign and domestic sanctions and those who profit from this situation.”…
The regime’s mouthpiece, the Mardom Salari Daily, puts all the blame for Iran’s failed economy on sanctions from abroad – that is, the hated Americans — and on those inside Iran, in “semi-private companies and banks,” that with their access to dollars are supposedly buying up Iranian assets very cheaply. Nothing is said about the mismanagement and corruption of the regime, of course. Not a word about the $250-billion business empire of the Supreme Leader, or the sums to which other high-ranking clerics and military men have helped themselves. Nor is there any mention of the huge amounts that Iran, while suffering economically, continues to send or spend abroad, on its proxies and allies. Iran supports with money and weapons the Houthis in Yemen in a war that has been going on for five years with no end in sight. It supports certain Shi’a miitias, including Kataib Hezbollah and Hezbollah al-Nujaba, in Iraq. Iran has spent more than $30 billion on its support for Bashar Assad in the Syrian civil war. It has provided enormous amounts of expensive weaponry – including 150,000 rockets and missiles – and money, to Hezbollah in Lebanon. It also sends aid to Hamas in Gaza. All of this expensive adventurism abroad is well known to Iranians suffering from economic distress; protesters in Iran have shouted “No to Gaza, no to Lebanon” and “Leave Syria and think of us.”
In the last two years, Iran’s oil exports have fallen by 96%. What’s more, the price of oil has been steadily sinking as well, ever since the Saudi-Russian oil price war. In 2019 the price of a barrel of oil was $57; in 2020, it had fallen to $38.75, and at one point this year had even dropped to $11.28. And since oil has been relied on by the government for 30% of Iran’s fiscal budget, Iran is now desperate for funds. In March it asked for an IMF loan of $5 billion to help fight the coronavirus; the U.S. blocked the loan, noting the sums that Iran continued to spend on its allies, who include the Houthis in Yemen, Kataib Hezbollah and Hezbollah al-Nujaba in Iraq, Bashar Assad’s forces in Syria, and Hezbollah in Lebanon. As the Americans saw it, Iran had made clear its priorities, and would have to live with its choice.
As a result, the ruling mullahs are facing one of the worst budget deficits in their four-decade history of being in power. Iran’s regime is currently running a $200 million budget deficit per week and it is estimated that if the pressure on Tehran continues, the deficit will hit roughly $10 billion by March 2021. This deficit will, in return, increase inflation and devalue the currency even further….
A deficit of $200 million a week times 52 weeks amounts to an annual deficit of $10.4 billion. Meanwhile, the value of Iran’s oil exports, which once amounted to tens of billions of dollars annually, has fallen to less than $4 million a day, or $1.46 billion for the entire year.
Iran’s militia groups are subsequently receiving less funding to pursue their terror activities. This shortfall may be why, for the first time in more than three decades, Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, made a public statement asking people to donate money to his group. “The sanctions and terror lists,” he pointed out, “are a form of warfare against the resistance and we must deal with them as such. I announce today that we are in need of the support of our popular base. It is the responsibility of the Lebanese resistance, its popular base, its milieu,” to battle these measures….
For Hassan Nasrallah to ask publicly for donations from his long-suffering “people” was both hypocritical – think of his own $250 million fortune – and pitiable, a tacit admission by Hezbollah that Iran has slashed the funds it formerly supplied to the terror group.
It’s not only Hezbollah, but the Houthis who have been asking for the public to donate to their cause, for they, too, have had their Iranian subsidy decreased. The same diminishment in financial support from Iran is no doubt being felt keenly by Bashar Assad, on whom Iran has already spent $30 billion and, as Assad now controls more than three-quarters of the country, Tehran no doubt feels it can safely cut back on his funding.
Facing significant financial problems, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in October 2020, surprisingly ordered all factions of Iraqi armed groups to stop attacking US interests in Iraq, according to Middle East Eye. A senior commander of an Iranian-backed armed group involved in the attacks told Middle East Eye, “Khamenei’s orders were straightforward and clear. All attacks targeting US interests in Iraq must stop”.
Khamenei’s interest is in having the American troops, now being reduced from 5,200 to 3,000, leave Iraq altogether. Thus he wants no more attacks on the Americans by the Iran-backed militias, which would only prolong the American military presence, and might even lead to a halt in the planned troop reductions. Without the American presence the Iraqi-backed militias, it is assumed, will be largely unopposed and thus need less financial support from Iran.
The Trump administration also triggered snapback sanctions against the Iranian regime. That act will put further pressure on the ruling mullahs in spite of the fact that other members of the UN Security Council opposed Washington’s move. As a prominent cleric, Saidd Lavasani, head of Lavasan’s Friday prayer, acknowledged regarding the regime’s defeat:
“Activation of the trigger mechanism means the defeat and complete death of the JCPOA (the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action,a/k/a the Iran nuclear deal), which means the path that we went with for seven years and on which we put all the facilities of the nation, now we must return that way. The mechanism of the Security Council is such that it allows the United States to take such an action, which, although China and Russia have formally opposed it, implicitly acknowledges that a new legal challenge is emerging in the Security Council that will lead to long discussions, of course, it is not in our interest.”…
Iran’s ruling mullahs desire to maintain the JCPOA. It not only provided their regime with many benefits, including economic relief and global legitimacy; at the same time, it ignored Tehran’s military adventurism in the region, its ballistic missile program and its support for terror groups across the Middle East. Most importantly, the JCPOA also paved the way for Tehran ultimately to become a nuclear state.
Thanks to the Trump administration’s re-imposition of sanctions on Iran two years ago, the regime of the mullahs is now running on empty. A 96% drop in oil exports in two years, and at the same time a drop in the price of oil, a 90% drop in the value of the rial in the same period, a budget deficit currently amounting to $200 million a week, are the signs of financial ruin. Iran has in response to this crisis had to slash its subsidies to the terror group Hezbollah and to the Houthis, but that will save very little compared to Iran’s needs. Hezbollah, the largest recipient of Iran’s aid, has seen its yearly subsidy of $800 million cut, analysts suggest, down to $500 million. Trump’s economic war against Iran has been a complete triumph,
But what happens when, as seems likely, Biden assumes the presidency? Will a Biden presidency pull Iran’s chestnuts out of the fire? Will he end the sanctions on Iran, allowing a rise in Iranian oil exports, which in turn will give Iran more funds to support terror groups like Hezbollah? Or can Biden be convinced that the sanctions are working, that Iran remains the most dangerous threat to our ally Israel, and to our quasi-allies among the Gulf Arab states, and – let’s not forget – Iran also remains a threat to the “Great Satan,” the United States. The Trump administration’s economic pressure has proven to be the ideal way to undo the Islamic Republic, and its financially dependent proxies like Hezbollah, without going to war in Muslim countries. For such wars in Muslim lands, as our experience with tarbabies Iraq and Afghanistan show, turn out to be colossally expensive and do not accomplish very much. Perhaps Biden can be persuaded to stick with what is working so well, even if this relentless economic pressure on Iran is a policy formulated by the much-maligned Trump Administration.
“Wonders never cease” – often have you heard that told. Could Biden come to his senses about Iran? Most doubtful. But we can only hope.
SJ says
Good to know! That’s what Islamists deserve.
Walter Sieruk says
Rouhani is this so ” upset” about this terrible economy of Iran ,he should then pray to the false god of Islam and therefore the false god of this “mullah regime” Iran.
For God of the Bible is not really Allah the god of Islam. To explain, through the passing of time it has become widely accepted that the word “Allah” is just the Arabic word for God. This started when truth compromising Bible “translators” substituted the word Allah where the word God should have had been uses in the Arabic translation of the Bible.
Furthermore, in the glossary in the book ASSASSINS! By Dr. Haha Lung it defines Allah as the “Pre-Islamic Lunar god : the god of Islam. “ Likewise, in the book entitled INSIDE ISLAM by a former Muslim who is now a Christian, Reza F. Safa ON PAGES 22, 23 it reads “In pre-Islamic times both Allah –worship and Baal-worship involved the worship of the sun, the moon and the stars which h defines them as astral religions. [Which are condemned in the Bible, Second Kings 23:5] The crescent moon, which was the symbol of moon worship, is also the symbol of Islam.”
In conclusion the Islamic god, Allah, is not the God of the Bible.
The words in brackets are my own.
In addition other some other books that expose this little known truths are WHO IS THIS ALLAH ? by G..J.O.. Moshay also UNVEILING ISLAM by Ergun Mehmet caner and Emir Fethi Caner and THE ISLAMIC INVASION by Robert Morey . There is also PHILISTINE by Ramon Bennett and ANSWERING JIHAD by Mabeel Qureshi .
Rarely says
Your point being…?
Walter Sieruk says
My point being the entire religion is a falsehood, meaning Islam was founded by ad false prophet who started false religion which is based on belief in a false god, Allah.
Therefore this Islamic regime of Iran, that so inappropriately has the word “republic” in its title ,is based likewise on falsehoods and lies since its very foundation is Islam.
Since this Islam and Sharia law based tyranny is founded and based on the deception of fraud and falsehoods it’s only a matter of time before that ” mullah regime ” does collapse for it only sandon a”house of cards”
That is my point . it seems that this must be my day to explain the obvious.
Infidel says
This is the #2 reason that Iran is a far lesser threat in the region than Turkey. There’s also the fact that the Fifth column of Arab shi’a, who used to look up to Iran for protection, have been turned off due to Iran being the hub of the coronavirus in the region.
I disagree w/ Hugh: I don’t think it likely that Biden will win. I think it’s more likely that it’ll go to Congress for a vote for both President and Vice President
Wellington says
I hope you’re right, Infidel. Dominion Voting Systems, a Canadian company, is presently under scrutiny by Trump and his associates for messing up the election big time. The contention is that this company is either massively inefficient, complicit, or both.
But if you go to the Wikipedia article on this company, it could have been written by members of the DNC. Yep, just more right-wing hysteria with no facts is the thrust of this Wikipedia article. This is the modus operandi of the Left, i.e., refute any conservative claims that challenge the “received wisdom,” in this case the election of Biden, by asserting that the Right is full of it, which I see as just more unwitting projection.
Infidel says
Wellington, this election is cooked. Who is to say how to review the raw data of the votes, particularly since even if people’s votes were recorded differently from how they voted, they can’t overturn it? In the past, I used to be all for Digital Voting Machines, as I used to think that one could design systems w/ minimal logic to do just a handful of things: record the candidates and parties, enable the voter to input their preferences, and instantly have the results on hand after polls closed.
I never thought about thoroughly computerizing the voting process, b’cos it then allows all sorts of chicanery (to use Biden’s vocabulary) to be tried. Like for the Dominion software, they had an update that was fed b/w the voting and the counting! The moment you allow complex software to be involved, there’s the possibility of software writers coding it so that if the GOP candidate had a margin within a certain threshold, the votes would flip just enough to give the Dems the win.
I get the Tenth Amendment and all that, but we need to federalize federal elections: the election of the president can’t be left to crooked secretaries of state or attorneys general in states that are run like fiefdoms. In the short term, use paper balloting until a digital, minimal functionality voting machine is developed that allows only the voting, printing and counting of votes, and nothing else. No ‘software updates’ b’cos that whole thing wouldn’t have software: it would just be some firmware that enables the machine to work, and that’s it!
In the meantime, as far as this year goes, just do the constitutional alternative and have House and Senate elect the President and VP. Then work on fixing the voting systems and laws
Keith O says
Infidel, STOP IT! your using that common sense thingy again and we all know the government doesn’t work that way.
Infidel says
We came horribly close to it in this administration. If Biden or Obama had been in charge, we’d have had millions dead, not the numbers we have today. Operation Warp Speed and all the other measures taken, like getting car companies to re-jig their lines to make ventilators, was OOTB thinking that only this government could have done: not only could Dems not have done it, but I even doubt that the Bushes could have done it, had they been running a GOP administration
Cornelius says
Great stuff Hugh. Nice to know the extent of Tehran’s current economic mess. But all hope aside….Biden will surely come to the rescue by removing sanctions.
It’s interesting how we seem to be witnessing a new paradigm…whether Venezuela, Syria, Iran….even Belarus, no matter how economically ruinous a regime is….and no matter how disaffected the populace, regime survival seems to be the new rule. Chalk it up mostly to foreign friends offering money and arms.
Templer says
So much for there god a chirstain countrey put this Islamist on it arse but Biden will give in to Islamist putting the USA chirstains and the Jews last Muslims first all the way god save the USA under Biden canonlyhope trump ptoves fraude
Tony Naim says
This article paints a wrong image about Iran. It is obvious the sanctions have had a deep effect on its economy, however, the regime continues to be resilient , is still developing increasingly sophisticated weapon systems and they continue to enrich uranium. The regime remains in control enduring the hardship of sanctions for the sake of Jihad, as are the majority of Persians in Iran convinced.
With the fall of Saddam and the destruction Of Syria ,an on going competition emerged between Shi’a Iran and Sunni Turkey to advance the cause of Islamism.
The appetite for violence is building up across the Middle East after the result of US elections showed a lenient Biden to be the winner.
Infidel says
Iran and Turkey are in a quasi-alliance, since both have a rivalry w/ not just Israel, but the Arabs as well. Turkey has quietly flipped all of Iran’s sunni clients in the region – Muslim Brotherhood and affiliates in particular. Sunni jihadist groups that had any qualms about having loyalty to a shi’a entity like Iran suddenly found Turkey. And as I noted yesterday, unlike Iran, Turkey is a regional superpower. When even Russia forces Armenia to do something against its own interests b’cos they want to retain Azerbaijan in their sphere of influence, that speaks of Turkey’s influence.
The real division within Islam is not, and in fact never was, sunni vs shi’a, since shi’as are just 5% of the world’s Muslims. The real division is b/w Arabs and non-Arabs. After all, Islam is the platform of Arab supremacy, and the Arabs therefore believe that only they have the divine sanction to lead Islam. Somehow, even the most devout of non-Arab Muslims have trouble digesting that, which is why one sees the leaders of not just Iran but Turkey, Pakistan, Malaysia all starting a jihad against ‘islamophobia’ in order to establish their own bona-fides as leaders of the ummah. It’s why the Saudis got furious w/ Pakistan and forced them to return whatever loans they had previously given of $2B. Right now, the Muslim world is split b/w the 400 million Arabs, who’re mostly supportive of Saudi Arabia (except of course Qatar, Yemen, Somalia, the Palestinians and the Libyan GNA), vs the rest of the world’s Muslims, which I think would be ~ 1.4 non-Arab Muslims.
In fact, I have a hunch that Arabs these days, particularly in the Gulf, probably regret their ancestors spreading Islam to non-Arab populations like the Iranaic, Turkic and Indic peoples, since there were a lot more of those than Arabs, and today, on the basis of that, they’re trying to wrest leadership of Islam from the Arabs, in violation of the sunnah. Note that the Saudis, Emiratis and their allies have stopped using their money to spread dawa abroad, not merely b’cos their own budgets are tight, but also b’cos Islamizing non-Arab people elsewhere only results in stronger challenges to the Arab ownership and dominion over Islam
Tony Naim says
I agree with you on the idea of ethnic divisions within Islam. There is not much love lost among Arabs, Persians and Turks. They all hate each other based on ethnicity. Yet
I do not discount the effect of religion as an isolated binding force among Muslims in the Middle East.
All Muslims share a nostalgia with respect to the “old glory” of militaristic past. As for Iran, it did become a regional superpower because it knew how to exploit the hatred Shi’a Arabs harbored toward Sunnis. Tribalism, ethnicity and sectarianism can all be dividing factors. However, of all 3, political Islam can also play as a unifying force to reckon with. Irrespective of ethnic background, political Islam remains a significant threat,
Infidel says
I’ll avoid terms like ‘political islam’ since there ain’t really a division b/w religious and political realms in islam.
As far as islam being a binding force, that’s only true when there is an overwhelming non-Muslim force present, and even then, it’s not always there. Like in WWI, the Brits succeeded in weaning the Arabs away from the Turks and revolting, reducing the Ottoman Empire to just Anatolia. Yeah, the Arabs, Turks and Iranians all have a nostalgia about their past glory, but it’s against each other, not a common ‘Islam vs the rest’ jihad. The Turks celebrate the myriad empires that they had from Agra to Istanbul over the centuries. The Iranians celebrate their empires, be it the Samanids in Samarqand to the Safavids in Isfahan. The Arabs celebrate the empires that they got immediately in the 7th century when they overran everything from Granada to Dabol.
However, Islam has rarely been a unifying factor, unless there was a major non-Muslim presence in an area. Like in India, sunnis, shi’a and ahmadiya had no problems uniting to demand a Pakistan, but only b’cos Hindus were the majority. In the Middle East, while the Arabs were united against Israel, Iran under the Pahlevis had nothing against Israel, and neither did the Kemalist Turks. Most glaringly, today, when China is busy w/ pogroms against the Uyghurs, nobody in the OIC – Arab, Turk or anyone else – is protesting Beijing.
Yeah, all of Islam can unite if faced w/ a threat, but right now, our withdrawal from the Middle East has taken away the Yankee target that they had, and encouraged them to turn on each other. The Turks see the Arabs as weak and the EU as effete (as they are), and are using the opportunity to unite as much of the ummah behind them. The Iranians, as this story notes, can no longer bankroll Hizbullah or the Houthis. The Arabs are seeing a major dip in oil revenues worldwide, and combined w/ the challenges they see to their leadership and domination of Islam, they’re less gung-ho about islamizing the rest of the world, and are happy to be on the US side on this. Essentially, it’s a struggle for the control of Islam that’s being played out b/w Ergogan and his pals Imran Khan and Mahathir Mohammed, vs the Arabs led by the Saudis. By staying out of it, we’ll help hasten an implosion in Islam
Tony Naim says
“By staying out of it, we’ll help hasten an implosion in Islam“
The rest of mankind have waited that implosion to take place for 1400 years. From the battle of Tours, France in 711 until the First World War.
Without American Presence in the Middle East, radical Islam will take over. If not Saddam, it will be Bin Ladden, or Al-Baghdadi, or someone else we have not heard of yet.
It is the ideology of “political Islam” that must be abolished. A task only America can achieve. When the right circumstances are ripe, certainly not with a Democrat in the White House .
gravenimage says
All of these Jihadists have been taken out–but I take your point, Tony.
Sadly, though, I don’t think that any Infidels have the power to change Islam.
Quazgaa says
Must say I’m happy with muslims at each other’s throat. I would encourage all parties to jihad away until they’re all with madame allah’s virgins.
gravenimage says
Iran’s Economy In Free Fall
…………..
Good to hear.
Andrew says
Heres hoping some of children of the Students who deposed The Shah will now depose these silly old smelly men in too tight turbans, as Iran was once a very rich and somewhat modern country with educated people and in the snap of a finger it went totally backward to the 7th century.
THIS is what muslims in Europe, and The West, want for the World…
Just look in the eyes of these turbaned men and tell me that they preach love!!!!.
Yeah, well Hitler loved Dogs,Children, and he was also a vegetarian, these islamic madmen are scumbags.
islamism and nazism are close bed fellows, and I do mean bed fellows…
No Muzzies Here says
No need to extend sympathy. The new US president will rapidly remedy this situation with the American peoples’ money.
Walter Sieruk says
If Rouhani is so very worried about Iran economy and he really believes that Allah the god of Islam is the one true God, then he should pray to this Allah about the economy of Iran. With this statement a number of things need to be made clear.
First, the god of the Qu ‘ran and Islam is not the same god and the God of the Bible and Christianity. As Allah is likewise the god Baal is. Second, , In the Bible it gives the account of the Prophet Elijah declared “If the Lord is God, follow Him; but if Baal be ,then follow him.” First Kings 18:21.[N.K.J.V.]
In other words follow one of the other. Not both .
Second, , many people say that the God of the Bible and the god of Islam are one the same. Is the majority always right? That’s not always the case. As an example the Christian pastor and scholar, Michael Youssef, who is also an Arab in his book entitled JESUS, JIHAD AND PEACE on page 69 informs the reader that “The name Allah comes from pre-Islamic times, and it corresponds to the Babylonian mane Bel or Baal. According to the Middle East scholar E.M. Wherry, pre-Islamic Arabs worshiped gods they called Allah. Both pre-Islamic Allah-worship and Baal –worship involved worship of the sun, the moon and the stars, which is why they are called astral religions. The crescent moon, the symbol of pagan moon worship, is also the symbol of Islam. It is printed on flags of many Islamic countries and placed atop minarets and mosques.”
Likewise, a former Muslim who is now a Christian, Dr. Daniel Shayesteh, who used to live in the Middle East but now he lives in America . In his book ISLAM AND THE SON OF GOD. On pages 7,8. Reads “Allah is the generic term for God in many Middle –Eastern cultures. Allah is identified as one of the 360 or so idols worshiped by the Arabian people for centuries before Muhammad was born. Many do not know that Allah was the good god of the Arabians. This explains the crescent moon found on minarets and mosques and the flags of Muslim nations. .. .Historic writings also identify Allah with Baal.” It’s also worth mentioning that the Bible condemns such astral religions. As in, for example, Second Kings 23:5. Therefore, now in modern times, it may be rightly said “If Yahweh Lord of the Bible , be the one True God follow Him. Yet if Allah the lord of Islam be the one true god then follow him.” The case is very clear cut.