Iran's Obsession with the Jews

Denying the Holocaust, desiring another one.
by Matthias Küntzel
02/19/2007, Volume 012, Issue 22

On December 12, 2006, Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad personally brought to a close the infamous Holocaust deniers' conference in Tehran. A strange parade of speakers had passed across the podium: former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke, the nutty followers of the anti-Zionist Jewish sect Neturei Karta, and officials of the neo-Nazi German National party, along with the familiar handful of professional Holocaust deniers. Frederick Töben had delivered a lecture entitled "The Holocaust--A Murder Weapon." Frenchman Robert Faurisson had called the Holocaust a "fairy tale," while his American colleague Veronica Clark had explained that "the Jews made money in Auschwitz." A professor named McNally had declared that to regard the Holocaust as a fact is as ludicrous as believing in "magicians and witches." Finally, the Belgian Leonardo Clerici had offered the following explanation in his capacity as a Muslim: "I believe that the value of metaphysics is greater than the value of history."
If this motley crew had assembled in a pub in Melbourne, nobody would have paid the slightest attention. What gave the event historical significance was that it was held by invitation, at the Iranian foreign ministry: on government premises, in a country that disposes of the world's second-largest oil reserves (after Saudi Arabia) and second-largest natural gas reserves (after Russia). And in this setting, the remarks quoted above provoked not dismissive laughter, but applause and attentive nods. On the walls hung photographs of corpses with the inscription "Myth," and others of laughing concentration camp survivors with the inscription "Truth."
The
Tehran deniers' conference marks a turning point not only because of its state sponsorship, but also because of its purpose. Up until now, Holocaust deniers have wanted to revise the past. Today, they want to shape the future: to prepare the way for the next Holocaust.
In his opening speech to the conference, the Iranian foreign minister, Manucher Mottaki, left no doubt on this point: If "the official version of the Holocaust is called into question," Mottaki said, then "the nature and identity of Israel" must also be called into question. The purpose of denying, among all the Nazis' war measures, specifically the persecution of the Jews is to undermine a central motive for the establishment of the state of Israel. Auschwitz is delegitimized in order to legitimize the elimination of Israel--that is, a second genocide. If it should turn out, however, that the Holocaust did happen after all, Ahmadinejad explains that it would have been a result of European policies, and any homeland for the Jews would belong not in Palestine but in Europe. Either way, the result is the same: Israel must vanish.
This focus explains why the conference's sponsors attached so much importance to the participation of a delegation from the Jewish sect Neturei Karta. Although it does not deny the Holocaust, the sect welcomes the destruction of Israel. That objective was the common denominator uniting all the participants in the conference. In his closing speech, Ahmadinejad formulated it with perfect clarity: "The life-curve of the Zionist regime has begun its descent, and it is now on a downward slope towards its fall. . . . The Zionist regime will be wiped out, and humanity will be liberated."

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Negev farmer Shai Dromi released to house arrest

The Beersheba District Court released Negev farmer Shai Dromi, who was arrested in December and charged with killing a Beduin trespasser on his property, to house arrest on Sunday.

Dromi will remain under house arrest until the end of the proceedings against him.

The farmer's arrest nearly two months ago has sparked numerous protests among southern settlers, who claim that Beduin thieves who run rampant in the area pose a danger to local farmers.
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Glorious Jihadi Linkage

Wow, in what's sure to be a first for the history of Snapped Shot, I'm, well, proud to announce that one of the photographs in our cache has officially been included in an online article over at al Jazeera, the Voice of the Jihadis. Of course, it goes without saying that my link to their article does not indicate that I condone or accept their message in the least, but it's still amusing to note that they're using we Kuf'r infidels to supply their every propagandistic need. See my original story for details which al Jazeera sees fit to leave out.

Exit question: Anyone have any suggestions of more appropriate images to replace al-Jazeera's direct link? I'm thinking of something a little bit more suitable... Do we do it? Or do we just leave the image as-is and ululate over the Pure Pwnage potential?

Update: Ah, what the heck? They should know better than linking to remote images directly anyway. Al Jazeera has officially been pwn3d!

I've saved PDFs of both stages, which I'll post eventually. Until then, clicky on the screenies for much joy.


Before and after

New exit question: Does this make me evil? In either case, I offer this to you as my utmost effort towards promoting peace and stability.

As of 11:54 EST, the "corrected" graphic is still up and visible on the story. I'll be waiting anxiously for it to "suddenly" be "disappeared."

Update: As the illustrious (and most observant!) Bryan Preston points out, this is Al Jazeera newsmagazine, not Al Jazeera the international news network. Not that you'd be able to tell any difference by the content, but that definitely explains why I didn't recognize the styleguide right away. Duly noted, and thanks for the tip, Bryan!

Oh, and 17:00 EST, alternate graphic is still up and live. Cute!

Update: A record-setting day for Snapped Shot. We've had over 11,000 pageviews since the story broke at noonish Eastern time, and while things've dropped off a bit, the server stayed under pretty heavy load all night. This does mean that we're within a hair of the much-coveted (at least, by me) 100,000 Visits metric, and will certainly have passed the 150,000 Pageviews metric by midnight. Does this mean that Snapped Shot is officially in the blogosphere now? I sure hope y'all are enjoying it, in either case!

One thing that we did discover through this whole shindig is that Snapped Shot is currently running on a broken disk which is threatening us with imminent failure, so again—and I do hate to ask, but I hate being an inconvenience to Phill even more—if you have a few dollars to spare, please help Phill keep Snapped Shot up and running!

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Quote

“There are no jokes in Islam. There is no humor in Islam. There is no fun in Islam. There can be no fun and joy in whatever is serious."

- Ayatollah Khomeini

´The Arabs Want the Overpass to Collapse, to Keep Jews Out´

MK Eldad: The Mughrabi Gate struggle is not over a bridge, but over the principle of Jewish presence.


Knesset Member Aryeh Eldad (National Union) says that if the State of Israel is not able to carry out safety maintenance work at the Western Wall plaza, "it means that we are on a dangerous path towards disappearing from the political map of the Middle East."

Speaking with Arutz-7's Hebrew newsmagazine, Eldad said, "The struggle is over the preservation of the only Temple Mount gate left out of Wakf [Muslim Authority] hands and in Jewish hands."

"The Arabs actually want the Mughrabi Gate passway to collapse," Eldad said, "so that they will be able to close the only gate that is under Jewish control. That will end the era of Jewish visitation rights to the Temple Mount. They have been waiting for this for a long time, and that's why they don't want us to refurbish it."

The bridge in question leads from the plaza leading to the Western Wall up to the Temple Mount, and is considered a safety hazard in its current condition. Israel's Antiquities Authority is carrying out archaeological works there in anticipation of its refurbishing. Arabs around the country have taken advantage of the situation to accuse of Israel of trying to destroy the Temple Mount complex, and have called for a response sharper than the previous intifadas.

"It's true," Eldad said, "that the original sin was when the Jewish People, immediately after the Six Day War in 1967, ceded its hold on the Temple Mount in an unholy alliance between the Chief Rabbinate and Moshe Dayan - each side for its own reasons - but now the danger is that the Arab sovereignty on the Temple Mount will spill over to the Western Wall plaza, and from there to other places."

Then-Defense Minister Dayan, just days after Israel's liberation of the Old City, informed the Muslims running the Temple Mount that they could continue to run the mosques there - and later went further by preventing Jewish prayer all over the Mount.

"It was evident that if we did not prevent Jews from praying in what was now a mosque compound," Dayan later wrote, "matters would get out of hand and lead to a religious clash... As an added precaution, I told the chief of staff to order the chief army chaplain to remove the branch office he had established in the building which adjoins the mosque compound."

Eldad said that the Arabs' objective is to acquire a "veto right" over what the State of Israel can do on its property, wherever the Arabs feel the area is a "sensitive and explosive holy Moslem site." He noted that the Arabs openly demand the rights of a national minority in a joint state. "Israel cannot allow itself to live under threats and blackmail every time it wants to do something necessary or in keeping with our national and historic rights."

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Muslim worshippers stone their own buses

Following the afternoon prayers at the Temple Mount a group of approximately 150 Muslim Israeli men and women threw rocks at the buses that had been sent to take them home.

A crowd chanted, "Allah is great," while pelting the buses which were waiting near the Rockefeller Museum.

Police forces were accompanying the worshippers and said that no additional incident occurred during or after the prayer service.

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