Rep. Peter King: US Should Expel ‘So-Called Iranian Diplomats’
By John Bachman and Steve MalzbergNewsmax
January 10, 2012
Iran's recent outrageous acts prove that the rogue nation is “attempting to once again test us,” says New York Rep. Peter King, who spoke exclusively with Newsmax about the death sentence issued Monday to a U.S. Marine veteran convicted of spying.
The sentence against Amir Mizaei Hekmati, 28, is just the latest issue to inflame tensions between the United States and Iran.
“We have to treat this as more than a provocation. We can never say we are going to leave any American behind,” King said.
“There’s absolutely no evidence that this former Marine was involved in anything illegal whatsoever. He was visiting his grandparents. He’s an Iranian American. This is very common, for Iranian Americans to visit their grandparents in Iran.
King, who is chairman of the Homeland Security Committee and also serves on the House Intelligence Committee, said the United States long ago should have expelled “so-called Iranian diplomats” from this country.
“The great majority of these people are not diplomats. They are thugs, they are intelligence officers . . . and they are here to plot against the United States,” King said.
The Republican congressman insisted that the recent foiled plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the United States proves his point.
“In doing that, it would have not only killed a foreign ambassador on U.S. soil in our nation's capital, they were intending to blow up a very popular and crowded restaurant in Washington, D.C. Hundreds of Americans could have been killed as well. That is an act of war against the United States.”
Unless the United States takes more decisive action to stop Iran’s increasingly aggressive tactics, King said, Iran will “continue to test us.”