Trita Parsi

And this is their money just to- This is their money.

So this is different.

You know, the story about how,

Obama released $1.7 billion when he signed the JCPOA.

The pallets of cash.

That is true, but that was very different.

That was not frozen money.

That was because there was a lawsuit between the United States and Iran since the beginning of the revolution, because during the time of the Shah, we're talking about 1977,

The Shah had ordered American weaponry.

I don't remember if it was airplanes or tanks or whatever, but he was the biggest purchaser of American weaponry back in the 1970s.

But between him paying for it and they're supposed to be delivered, the Iranians had a revolution.

They took 52 American diplomats hostage.

So the US clearly and understandably never delivered the weapons, but also never returned the money.

So the Iranians took the US to court in The Hague, International Court of Arbitration,

And the US was about to lose that fight.

So the Obama administration chose to settle it as part of the JCPOA.

It was only supposed to be 400 million, but because of interest, it added up to 1.7.

Here was the problem.

How do you transfer the money to the Iranians when you have sanctioned every Iranian bank?

Because of US sanctions, they actually had to put it on an airplane as cash and fly it to Switzerland, where another plane was on the tarmac, taking the money into that plane.