Readers coming on the letter by Dr Denis MacEoin (March 2) on Iran and Israel and the supposed words of Ahmadejinad must not be misled into presuming this is the letter of a humble Farsi scholar impelled by truth. In fact, Dr MacEoin is a longstanding hasbara activist of an Israel-right-or-wrong bent, who can sometimes make even such as Melanie Phillips seem almost, if not quite, moderate. Ever ready to accuse the radical Islamist of fanaticism, or the critic of Israeli policy of anti-Semitism, Dr MacEoin is no stranger to fanaticism himself.
Witness for one instance his four-page harangue to the Jerusalem Post of August 6 last year, where in an open letter to Tony Blair he calls on him - at a time when all but America and Britain were calling for a halt to the carnage - to "stand firm" against calls for a ceasefire; "I have seen documents that suggest al Qaeda already possess nuclear materials," he asserts, claiming that though Israel is "one of the most open and just democracies in the world", radical Muslims "think they can destroy Israel, win back Spain, and impose shari'a law in Europe". The noble Mr Blair is finally addressed thus: "It may or it may not be your destiny jointly to lead the free world in this clash of civilisations. But I ask you to hold firm now and in the future, not just here in Britain, but in the Middle East."
One turns with some relief to the sanity that there is no such figure of speech in Farsi as the phrase "wiped off the map". As Professor Juan Cole has noted, Ahmadinejad was quoting Ayatollah Khomeini - who died in 1989 - and Cole renders the quotation as "this regime of occupation in Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time". So it seems we are not quite dealing with the rabble-rousing rhetoric of genocide and war. But who cares about the truth, when a fiction is much more suited to one's policy? - Tom Leonard, 56 Eldon Street, Glasgow.
Denis MacEoin reinforces my point about people, some by mistake, some not, mixing the issues of the belief that the Zionist state is unsustainable with that of genocide of the Jewish people.
A map of the world 100 years ago would be barely recognisable to the assortment of nation states we have now. Borders have come and gone, but the important thing is that people have remained. There is a growing movement among people of all faiths and political persuasions that challenges the orthodoxy of the two-state solution. One state - Jew, Muslim and Christian living side by side - is a legitimate proposal to solve many of the intractable issues in the region.
Whatever you think of that, it is an argument to engage with. To accuse anyone that raises it of having genocidal ambitions is quite a leap. Dr MacEoin also rehashes a quote attributed to Hassan Nasrallah which originates with the Daily Star in Lebanon. The newspaper believes that the reporter who filed the interview fabricated the quote, and in all likeli-hood did not even interview the Hizbollah leader at all. One must wonder that if the genocidal ambitions of Iran and allies are so clear, why all the contortions and fabrications?
- Osama Saeed, 31 Arlington Street, Glasgow.
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