Obama and Kerry have apparently abandoned Robert Levinson in Iran

I wrongly presumed on Saturday that FBI agent Robert Levinson would be one of the Americans freed in the "prisoner swap" announced that resulted in the freedom of four other Americans. He was not. And no one is sure why:

Robert Levinson, the former FBI agent who vanished in Iran in 2007, was not included in the weekend’s prisoner swap because he is not believed to be in Iran, said Brett McGurk, the administration’s point person on the swap.

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“As we said in 2011, we have reason to believe he’s not being held in Iran so it’s a different case,” he said Tuesday. McGurk said he brought up Levinson’s case during “every single round” of the talks with Iranians and would continue to do so with the newly opened channels. “This was the first substantial engagement we’ve really ever had with that element of the (Iranian) system,” he said. “I think my Iranian counterparts, safe to say, I may have been the first American they’d really ever met.”

Now you might wonder why I say Obama and Kerry have abandoned Levinson if he's no longer in Iran. It may be true that right now they don't have a play available that would get Levinson free. But if he disappeared in Iran in 2007 and he didn't die right then, then the Iranians were at least in control of him at some point and if nothing else they know who they handed him over to. I believe it's highly unlikely that no one in the Iranian regime has connections that can tell them where Levinson is or what happened to him. But as usual when it comes to dealing with their BFFs the mad mullahs, Obama and Kerry never do anything that might agitate Iran or put it in a bad light. Their instinct is always to concede, appease and excuse Iran's behavior. There are people who think conservatives should not criticize the deal Obama made to get the hostages home because, hey, the hostages are home! As if people like me would prefer that they still be in Iran. No, the problem is that Obama didn't insist on the release of the hostages as a condition of the nuclear deal, and that should have included Levinson. He and Kerry should have put it on Iran to do whatever was necessary to find out where he was and get him back so he could be among those returned to the U.S. And when Iran claimed they didn't know how to do that, Obama and Kerry should have called bullshit on them and told them to figure it out. But it was more important to them to get this deal, even if the terms were not beneficial to the U.S., than it was to get these guys home. Now that the nuclear deal is in place, the sanctions are lifted and we've sent our own prisoners back to Iran, what incentive does Iran have to do anything to help with Levinson? We've already played all our cards. We have nothing left. All we have ahead of us is for Iran to ratchet up their violations of the deal, at which point Obama and Kerry will further backtrack on their claims of "snapback sanctions" and all that. Iran is now completely in charge and has no reason whatsoever go find Levinson or send him home. That's why I say Obama and Kerry have abandoned and betrayed Robert Levinson. It was more important for them to buddy up to a terrorist Islamic state than to rescue this American.

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