- Iran: Eight Prisoners Hanged on Drug Charges
- Daughter of late Iranian president jailed for ‘spreading lies’ - IRAN: Annual report on the death penalty 2016 - Taheri Facing the Death Penalty Again - Dedicated team seeking return of missing agent in Iran - Iran Arrests 2, Seizes Bibles During Catholic Crackdown
- Trump to welcome Netanyahu as Palestinians fear U.S. shift
- Details of Iran nuclear deal still secret as US-Tehran relations unravel - Will Trump's Next Iran Sanctions Target China's Banks? - Don’t ‘tear up’ the Iran deal. Let it fail on its own. - Iran Has Changed, But For The Worse - Iran nuclear deal ‘on life support,’ Priebus says
- Female Activist Criticizes Rouhani’s Failure to Protect Citizens
- Iran’s 1st female bodybuilder tells her story - Iranian lady becomes a Dollar Millionaire on Valentine’s Day - Two women arrested after being filmed riding motorbike in Iran - 43,000 Cases of Child Marriage in Iran - Woman Investigating Clinton Foundation Child Trafficking KILLED!
- Senior Senators, ex-US officials urge firm policy on Iran
- In backing Syria's Assad, Russia looks to outdo Iran - Six out of 10 People in France ‘Don’t Feel Safe Anywhere’ - The liberal narrative is in denial about Iran - Netanyahu urges Putin to block Iranian power corridor - Iran Poses ‘Greatest Long Term Threat’ To Mid-East Security |
Friday 20 April 2012Netanyahu, Iran, the Holocaust and Wiesel’s rejoinder
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu marked Holocaust Remembrance Day by talking about ... Iran: "I believe in our ability to defend ourselves," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said during the ceremony. "People who dismiss the Iranian threat as a whim or an exaggeration have learned nothing from the Holocaust. To cower from speaking the uncomfortable truth – that today like then, there are those who want to destroy millions of Jewish people – that is to belittle the Holocaust, that is to offend its victims and that is to ignore the lessons." So did Michael Oren, the Israeli ambassador to Washington, in a speech today at the commemoration ceremony at the Capitol. (I have the prepared remarks; if there are significant differences with the remarks as delivered, I will update): Consider this: Eighty years ago, the world was scarcely in the mood for confrontation. People were weary from the devastating losses of a recent war. Economies were in crisis. Unemployment was high, foreclosures commonplace. People were focusing inward,grappling with their own problems. Meanwhile, a radical militant movement dreamt of regional and global domination. Headed by a Supreme Leader, the movement burnt books and crushed its democratic opponents. It amassed vast arsenals of advanced weaponry and invaded neighboring countries. The radicals played on their nation’s injured pride and stressed its racial superiority. The movement denigrated the Jewish people as a cancer that had to be cut out. Today, too, there is such a radical regime —- in Iran. It also has a Supreme Leader. It also butchers its democratic opponents, supports terror, and seeks regional and global hegemony. The Iranian regime similarly espouses racism. It denies the murder of six million Jews by the Nazis while pledging to murder another six million -- in Israel. And to achieve its abominable goals, Iran is developing military nuclear capabilities and the missiles to deliver them. Elie Wiesel is not happy with such comparisons. Asked specifically by Globes, the Israeli business daily, about Netanyahu's tendency to draw the Iran-Holocaust comparison, he says: Iran is a danger, but to say it will create a second Auschwitz? I don't compare anything to the Holocaust. One more thing about Oren's speech, at least as prepared: I don't know of any Iranian leader "pledging" to kill six million Jews. I have heard leaders hoping that Israel disappears and, when asked for details, envisioning a kind of mass Jewish exodus. These "hopes," of course, mask threats. But for precision's sake, they have not specified an Iranian role in bringing about this exodus, nor have they suggested that it would involve murdering the entire Jewish population of Israel. Source: JTA |