NBC’s Engel: Israel to Use Its Friends in Congress to Fight Iran Nuke Deal

[rush transcript]
GUTHRIE: “You have been watching President Obama live from the White House announcing the terms of a historic landmark deal with Iran to freeze in place its nuclear program, its long pursuit of a nuclear bomb. This is something that he will have to work very hard to get through Congress. He also faces skepticism around the world already anticipating that opposition he addressed many of those concerns but argued this is a deal that makes the world safer, cuts off every pathway for Iran to a bomb and is not based on trust but base on verification regime, inspections that will be very vigorous. Let’s get right  to NBC’s Richard Engel, he is in Tel Aviv, Israel, where the prime minister has not been shy already and saying that this is a deal that is a historic mistake, to use his words. Richard what do you hearing?”
ENGEL: “Prime Minister Netanyahu has been vocal already, flooding the internet with statements in Hebrew, in English even tweeting in Farsi saying that he is absolutely opposed to this deal. Some of those statements saying, ‘Iran will receive hundreds of millions of dollars which will be able to fuel its terror machine, its expansion and aggression in the Middle East and throughout the world. Iran is about to get a safe pathway to a nuclear weapon.’ The Israeli defense minister said, ‘This agreement is bad. It rewards deceit, terror and war-mongering. The mere thought of reaccepting the chief terrorist regime into the family of nations is beyond belief.’ And it is not just Israel that is not convinced by the deal, believes that Iran will cheat, that it will be rewarded for bad behavior. There is a very similar feeling in many of the Gulf countries who are experiencing at the moment a proxy war right on their borders with Iran. So, there will be opposition to this and the Israeli government has said it plans to use its friends in Congress to fight this deal.”