Jackson Free Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Secretary of State John Kerry pitched the administration's controversial nuclear deal with Iran before a skeptical House Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday, pushing back against the allegation it would ease crippling sanctions forever in exchange for temporary concessions on weapons development.

"Iran has cheated on every agreement they've signed," said Rep. Ed Royce, the panel's chairman. With Kerry, Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz and Treasury Secretary Jack Lew waiting to testify, he asked if Tehran "has earned the right to be trusted" given its history.

Across hours in the witness chair, Kerry said "nothing in this deal is built on trust. Nothing."

He said that under the deal, Iran is "permanently banned" from developing a nuclear weapon, and many of the restrictions imposed would be in place "not just for 15 or 20 years, but for the lifetime" of its nuclear program.

As a result, he said, the United States will be able to "verifiably ensure" the nuclear program remains peaceful.

Kerry spoke as the administration picked up support for the deal from Rep. Sander Levin, D-Mich., a strong supporter of Israel who referred to his Jewish background in announcing his decision.

"I believe that Israel, the region and the world are far more secure if Iran does not move toward possession of a nuclear weapon," he said.

The congressional hearing was the second in as many weeks for Kerry and his Cabinet colleagues. Faced with Republican majorities in both houses, their objective was to line up enough support for Obama among Democrats in what is all but certain to become a veto fight this fall.

Congress is expected to vote in September to prevent Obama from lifting sanctions imposed previously by lawmakers, a step that would likely cause Iran to walk away from the agreement. Obama has said he will veto any bill along those lines, and Republicans will need a two-thirds majority in both houses to override his objections.

Apart from Royce, the panel's senior Democrat expressed reservations about the plan. Rep. Eliot Engel of New York said he has "serious questions and concerns about this deal."

Engel is a strong supporter of Israel, which vociferously opposes the deal. Iran has said it wants to wipe out Israel.

Kerry was peppered with questions from Republicans who expressed concerns about the effect on Israel of a deal, access to a military base south of Tehran, the timing of sanction relief, the fate of four Americans held against their will in Iran and more.

Kerry responded with what has emerged as the administration's all-purpose answer: That the United States and Israel would be worse off if Congress scuttles the deal.

"If Congress rejects this, Iran goes back to its enrichment. The ayatollah will not come back to the table. The sanctions regime immediately falls apart," he said.

"We will have set ourselves back, folks," he said, predicting that future diplomatic agreements will become extremely difficult to achieve if other nations believe lawmakers would override them.

Rep. Dana Rohrbacher, R-Calif., compared the Iran deal unfavorably to former President Ronald Reagan's decision in the 1980s to negotiate arms control deals with the Soviet Union.

He said Reagan also denied the Communist government hard currency and supported democratic movements around the world, and as a result "the Soviet Union fell apart."

By contrast, he said, Obama's approach would "empower the mullahs in the long run" and create "more chaos, more likelihood of the war because they are supporters of terrorism and hatred of the West."

Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., countered Rohrbacher, saying there was "a lot of fiction" in the Republicans' charges. He said Obama has chosen to deal with the overriding issue of nuclear weapons in the Middle East.

The hearing unfolded as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a pro-Israel lobby, dispatched hundreds of its members to prod lawmakers to disapprove of the deal.

On the other side of the issue, seven former U.S. diplomats and State Department officials sent a letter Monday to leaders in Congress urging them to support the pact.

"We believe that without this agreement, however, the risks will be much higher for the United States and Israel," the letter said.

While lawmakers debated the implications of the deal, officials from member nations of the International Atomic Energy Agency told The Associated Press that Iran may be allowed to take soil samples at the Parchin military complex that is suspected as a site of nuclear weapon research, but only under monitoring by outside experts.

The officials said stringent oversight of the soil-sampling could include video monitoring. The samples would be analyzed by the agency for traces left by any nuclear experiments.

The disclosures come from IAEA member nations and are tasked with following Iran's nuclear program. They demanded anonymity because their information is confidential. The IAEA had no immediate comment.

The ability of international officials to gain access to Parchin has emerged as one prominent issue in the congressional debate

Tehran insists Parchin is a conventional military area with no link to nuclear tests. In recent years, it has carried out major construction and paving at the site where the alleged experiments took place, while refusing dozens of IAEA requests for a visit.