Did Ahmadinejad Really Threaten to Destroy Israel?
By Jesse Singal - Oct 1st, 2008 at 1:20 pmI second Dylan’s take on Iran hysteria, particularly the stuff about how people tend to assume Iran will act in a completely irrational, suicidal manner, but have one minor quibble: Dylan mentions that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that “Israel must be wiped off the map,” but there’s reason to believe this isn’t true.
Now, Ahmadinejad does say a lot of crazy things, and I’m not looking to condone the reign of a guy who has denied the Holocaust or suggest that Iran doesn’t pose a host of problems. But this is a legitimate translation question that has largely been ignored, and both Jewcy’s Daniel Koffler and Middle East megaexpert Juan Cole (full disclosure: I took a class of his at the University of Michigan) convincingly argue that Ahmadinejad’s words have been misrepresented.
To make a long story short, it looks like Ahmadinejad was saying he wants the “Zionist regime” (that is, the current Israeli goverment) driven out of power. This isn’t a friendly thing to say. It’s rather bellicose. But it’s a far cry from calling for the destruction of the state of Israel itself. Given how often this quote has been thrown out there by people who want to inflate Ahmadinejad and his power to the point where he represents a Hitlerian threat to Israel, the Middle East, and ultimately the West, the distinction between what he actually said and what he has been endlessly reported to have said is worth repeating once more.
“condone the reign of a guy who has denied the Holocaust ”
He has been on national TV in america saying it DID happen so people need to stop repeating this lie.
October 1st, 2008 at 10:03 pmThanks for posting this - I’m always afraid to publicly question the validity of the translation of the “wiped off the map” phrase.
October 2nd, 2008 at 12:08 pm