Well, this made my day:
In what can only be viewed as a notable departure from the country’s recent stance towards Israel, the Iranian government has tweeted its greetings to Jews celebrating their new year.
Jews are today celebrating Rosh Hashanah, a moveable feast. Marking the occasion, Mohammad Javad Zarif, the Islamic Republic’s foreign minister, tweeted: “Happy Rosh Hashanah.”
Christine Pelosi – daughter of Nancy Pelosi, the minority leader in the US House of Representatives – responded with a reminder of Iran’s alleged Holocaust denial. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the country’s president until this year, notoriously said that the atrocities of the Holocaust were exaggerated and that the “Israeli regime” should be “wiped from the map.”
Marking an even more ostentatious rejection of the former leadership, Mr Zarif – a US-educated career diplomat – replied: “Iran never denied it. The man who was perceived to be denying it is now gone. Happy New Year.”
Such a simple and welcome and needed gesture! At least someone has the good sense to tone it down.
In other news, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani announced that the foreign ministry will henceforth conduct nuclear negotiations with outside parties. Previously, those negotiations have been handled by the Supreme National Security Council, which is appointed by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei. These are encouraging signs coming at a perilous time.
God I hope that guy lasts.
OT, something else nice. Looks like Republicans are gonna regret calling the ACA, Obamacare. So far the good news are beginning to out-way the right wing nuttery.
“
No Rate Shock? Obamacare Premiums Lower Than Expected”
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http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2013/09/no-rate-shock-obamacare-premiums-lower-than-expected.php?
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Some setbacks, though. The minneapolis star tribune website (http://startribune.com) has a headline today making it sound like young people will pay an average of 300 a month for Obamacare.
Of course young people will mostly qualify for subsidies, and won’t pay near that much. It’s also not clear they were looking at bronze plans. But that is what passes for a headline these days.
At least here in Maryland, young people can also purchase “catastrophic” plans rather than a standard insurance plan. It’s basically what it sounds like: a plan with a very high deductible so that it’s only really covering catastrophic medical care. The premiums are nice and low, though.
If only Iran and the West could unpretzel themselves long enough for Iran to recognize that the Syrian conflict could be the moment for Iran to introduce itself as the dealmaker.
If only.
My understanding is that Iran has been ready and willing to cooperate with the US and the West upon a host of matters, including Syria and ‘anti-terrorism’, going on back at least to 9/11/01. And, of course, they cooperated with Reagan. They helped us in Afghanistan because they share an abhorrence with the West against radical Sunni extremists. They have seen Empire come and go and know the realpolitik of shared interests.
Actually, Iran is eating our lunch with their soft power offensive. This might be another backstory to the Syrian charade. Obama basically said ‘heh’ to the election of Rouhani and despite all the positive overtures from them, very little has filtered through the MSM. (Who cudda known, right?)
The whole lie of them wanting a nuclear device is so silly but you see it over and over again. It’s a brain numbing propaganda device to test our state of stupefaction. In reality, Iran is poised to become a powerful leader of the non-aligned movement and will be knocking on the BRICS door if they are given half a chance. Having a nuclear device would be very problematical.
Of course, having one available on short notice construction wouldn’t violate Khamenei’s prohibition now, would it?
Which makes this completely unneeded escalation of the Syria standoff and (unacknowledged) regime change via the Imperial Flyboyz even more inexplicable.
A Iran/US entente (or at least progress on the endless nuclear “program”) is the real prize. Plotting a path for Baathist liquidation two months after the Iranian election just squanders (another) possible opening with Iran. It’s almost like this is the real goal.
Who’s the Grand Strategist here? Paul Wolfowitz & Co? No, all the neocons thought about Iran strategy was Bomb ’em Next. But really, could we do more to increase tensions and put the thumb in Iran’s eye than take a side in Syria and then force their “win”?
Acc to Wikipedia under ‘Persian Jews’: ‘Iran hosts the largest Jewish population of any Muslim-majority country.[23] After Israel, it is home to the second-largest Jewish population in the Middle East.[15]’ Not v. big @ 9,000, but still …
Ah, the zombie lie that will never die.
Ahmadinejad, for all his many faults, never said that Israel should be “wiped off the map.” Mistranslated, and corrected. Of course the correction got no traction, because the quote was just too good not to use.
The fact that the immediate reaction of someone close to a high-ranking US politician was to piss all over a sweet, harmless gesture is a nice microcosm of how the US, for at least the last dozen years, has rejected out of hand countless Iranian overtures for a negotiated resolution to the two countries’ issues.
Culturally, Iran’s population is young, educated, and very pro-Western, especially in the cities (which have much of the country’s population); the conservative clerics’ support is largely in the countryside and faces the same demographic time bomb Republicans do here. A lot of Iranians love the USA. What they don’t like is our government, and given the covert (CIA field operatives, Stuxnet, etc) and occasionally overt (funding groups like MHK, either the CIA or Mossad assassinating Iranian scientists) war we’ve been waging for several years inside Iran, one can hardly blame them. We wouldn’t be too pleased if Iran was doing similarly aggressive stunts in our country, either. But they’re not. We are.
Yeah, but they still want nukes too as a national pride thing IIRC.
If a foreign country with thousands of nukes – and a similarly nuke-armed and war-happy ally a few hundred miles away – was telling us, backed by sanctions and efforts to overthrow our elected government (including funding armed guerrilla groups inside our borders), that they could keep all their nukes, as could their ally, but we couldn’t have any because we (having never invaded or bombed anyone, but having been invaded by another ally of this country 25 years ago at an enormous cost in lives) couldn’t be trusted with them, I imagine having the nukes would become a national pride thing with us, too.
Honestly, from that perspective, Iran would be on completely solid ground insisting to the global community that we can’t be trusted with nukes. And we’re the only country ever to have used them in war, to boot. (Nobody should be trusted with nukes, actually, but that’s a different issue.)
I’m not picking on you – not one American in 10,000 both is aware of the stuff in that top paragraph and would connect it to the issue of Iranian nukes. It’s amazing how many Americans are completely unable to put themselves in an adversary’s (or anyone else’s) shoes for a moment – a basic skill for any diplomat, negotiator or political strategist. It’s like we’ve been conditioned to think empathy is a bad thing or something. Hmm.
Debated how to answer this. I’ll go with my own ego first. To be thought of as someone who would not be aware or incapable of understanding their perspective troubles me greatly. Believe me when I say I knew all that. Yes I am that vain.
I’m not going to defend the use of nukes in 1945, save that perhaps the extent of the damage was a key incentive to the future non-use of nukes. Unfortunate, but humans often require a hard lesson before they can stop being stupid. But until the recent election it was problematic whether the government of Iran was truly elected in full. It’s also the case that the US has had nukes and never used from since that time, so we have hard evidence of US restraint in the matter even when maniacs like Bush/Cheney ruled, where Iran is an unknown quantity. As you said, a different point of view. This isn’t necessarily what I think however. A bit of Devil’s Advocate here.
My actual position is that Iran should be allowed to do anything the NPT allows. They are a full part of that treaty. Iran is not crazy, they have fanatical elements but have again and again acted in their national interests. Rational! Pakistan is at least twice as crazy and volatile and even Pakistan has avoided nuking anyone. Even India.
But even if it’s rational for the Iranian public to desire nukes, it’s still wrong. It’s wrong for the other countries to have them too (especially rogue nuclear states like Pakistan, North Korea, and Israel) including the US as you said.
On that last, does this mean anything? Will the Iranian SNSC just let the foreign ministry spin it’s wheels the over rule it? Are they giving Rouhani rope to hang himself from when they negotiate but AIPAC/Congress passes a resolution that Iran should be made part of Greater Israel?
Even the little bearded guy was pretty consistent in reserving his loathing for Zionists as opposed to Jews as a whole, so this is not a big change in stance vis-a-vis Israel or anything like that.