Tehran's murderous candour - The National Post

[editor]

Tehran's murderous candour

Editorial
The National Post (Canada)
October 27, 2005

So much for the hopeful conceit that Iran's new President is a misunderstood social reformer rather than a militant anti-Western zealot. And so much for the theory that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons merely to defend itself from Iraq and other powerful neighbours.

Speaking on Wednesday to a conference in Tehran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that Israel must be "wiped off the map." Even by the mad mullahs' standards, it was an unusually bloodthirsty statement. But we are glad he said it -- for it shows the world what the stakes are in the battle to block Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.

The comments were hardly non-sequiturs. On Dec. 14, 2001, former Iranian president Hashemi Rafsanjani said much the same thing in a speech at Tehran University. And, of course, the late Ayatollah Khomeini regularly called for the destruction of Israel.

Nor is the creation of a new Holocaust a fringe view in Iran, apparently. The conference Mr. Ahmadinejad appeared at this week bore the eerie title of "The World Without Zionism." The audience, composed of 3,000 hard-line students, chanted "Death to America!" and "Death to Israel!" Is there another nation on earth -- except, perhaps, North Korea -- where demanding the extermination of other nations is seen as a normal part of crowd behaviour?

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