Mohammad Khatami

Iranian propaganda, compliments of CNN: Ex-Iranian leader blames Bush policies for terrorism.

U.S. foreign policy is furthering terrorism in the Muslim world, and negotiations are the only way to resolve the impasse over Iran's nuclear ambitions, former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami told CNN while on a two-week visit to the United States.

The reformist leader is widely viewed as moderate compared with new President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. As president, Khatami favored stronger U.S. ties.

In an interview Sunday with CNN, Khatami said American policies have "only increased, and will only increase, extremism in our region."

In the interview, he also broke with his hard-line successor by saying he does not call for Israel's destruction.

But he defended Iran's support for Hezbollah, calling the Lebanon-based militant group a resistance organization. And though Hezbollah used Iranian weapons in its recent war with Israel, Khatami denied that Iran contributes to violence in the Middle East.

A "reformist" and "moderate" who doesn't support the destruction of Israel yet somehow does support Hezbollah whose purpose is the destruction of Israel? Yeah, right.

Here are some informative articles about Khatami. From The New York Sun editorial page: Khatemi at Harvard.

The John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, fresh from having established itself as a headwater of anti-Israel agitation, is choosing to mark the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attacks in an astounding way — by hosting Mohammed Khatemi, a former president of Iran, an enemy state levying a terrorist war against America. Mr. Khatemi has been invited to speak on, of all things, "Ethics of Tolerance in the Age of Violence." The title insults the intelligence of all those who would attend. What in the world is a man who presided over the July 9, 1999, crackdown on Tehran University, where hundreds of students were arrested and tortured, doing speaking about "tolerance" at a university? ...

• Mr. Khatemi told CNN in January 1998, "The impression of the people of the Middle East and Muslims in general is that certain foreign policy decisions of the United States are in fact made in Tel Aviv, and not in Washington." ...

• Mr. Khatemi told CNN, "I regret to say that the improper American policy of unbridled support for the aggression of a racist, terrorist regime does not serve the United States interest, nor does it even serve those of the Jewish people." ...

• Mr. Khatemi has spoken of "the criminal Zionist regime." ...

• In April 2001, the official Islamic Republic News Agency quoted Mr. Khatemi as saying, "As a parasite, Zionism is founded on the fallacious concepts of superiority and the transgression of human rights."

From Front Page Magazine: : Just Say No to Khatami by Ken Timmerman.

Just one year into his term, his intelligence service murdered in horribly brutal fashion Darioush and Parvaneh Forouhar, leaders of the Iran Nation’s Party, then the best-organized opposition in Iran. The following year, Khatami quashed the student rebellion that began at Tehran University among INP members and sympathizers including Marzeporgohar (Iranians for a Secular Republic) and quickly spread to 18 other cities across Iran.

That was just the beginning of a crackdown on domestic dissent that occurred on Khatami’s watch and on his orders. ...

In 1984, as minister of culture and Islamic propagation, he presided over the creation of Hezbollah, Iran’s proxy army of terrorists in Lebanon and elsewhere. He thought that was exactly what the Islamic Republic of Iran needed to do to expand its influence around the world.

As president, Khatami never opposed Iran’s development of nuclear weapons technology, or long-range ballistic missiles to deliver them. On the contrary, it was on Khatami’s watch that Iran accelerated its once-secret nuclear weapons development, and flouted its success to the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The latter two links are via Iran Press News.

UPDATE -- Sept. 5: From MEMRI of a 2005 interview with Khatami: Iranian President Khatami: I Expect No Change in US-Iranian Relations; We Love Hizbullah; Chirac Told Us He He Never Called to Disarm Hizbullah. (via Iran Press News)

Posted by Forkum at September 4, 2006 06:21 PM