Appearing before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, a senior State Department official explained that Secretary Pompeo's 24 May emergency notification on arms sales was spurred by "the significant increase in the intelligence threat streams related to Iran; the clear, provocative and damaging actions taken by Iran's government; and the need to respond to military capability requests from our partners". He also offered his endorsement of the CENTCOM commander's assessment describing "the threats posed by Iran as clear, compelling, very real and possibly imminent".