Iran's Final Solution for Israel

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Preface from Andrew Bostom's new book "Iran's Final Solution for Israel."

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    Authors Preface

    With great fanfare, and giddy expectations of continued diplomatic success, the so-called P5

    +1 interim agreement was announced on November 24, 2013.p1

    Ostensibly, these negotiationswere going to eliminate Irans ability to produce nuclear weapons, and constrain the regimes

    hegemonic aspirations, including its oft-repeated bellicose threats to destroy the Jewish State of

    Israel.

    Less than three months later, punctuated by cries of down with the U.S.and Death to

    IsraelIranians took to the streets en masse, February 11, 2014, commemorating the 35th

    anniversary of the 1979 Islamic putsch, which firmly re-established Irans legacy of centuries of

    Shiite theocracy, transiently interrupted by the 54-year reign (r. 1925-1979) of the 20th

    century

    Pahlavi Shahs. p2Celebratory statements by moderate Iranian President Rouhani claimed Iran

    would pursue its nuclear program forever, and decried Western economic sanctions, designedspecifically to forestall Irans nuclear weapons producingcapability, as brutal, illegal, and

    wrong. p3Major-General Yahya Rahim Safavi, a senior military aide to Iranian Supreme Leader

    Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, threatened that any Israeli effort to pre-empt Irans relentless pursuit ofnuclear weapons, meant for Israels annihilation, would be countered by retaliatory destructionof the Zionist regime by Hezbollah forces of Iran and the Lebanese Hezbollah. p3Simultaneous

    triumphal commemorative pronouncements (from 2/11/14) included: p4

    Iranian Defense Minister Hossein Dehquanis declaration that Irans test firing ofballistic missilesincluding a long-range ballistic missile with radar-evading

    capabilitieswas (somehow) an appropriate response to unfounded allegations by the

    U.S.

    Iranian Navy Commander Admiral Habibollah Sayaris confirmation that Iranianwarships had been deployed toward the territorial waters of the U.S. Atlantic coast. The

    good Admiral announced: Irans military fleet is approaching the United Statesmaritime borders, and this move has a message. Like the arrogant powers that are

    present near our maritime borders, we will also have a powerful presence close to the

    American [maritime] borders.

    Moreover, within eight-days after Irans 35th

    anniversary celebrations of its retrograde Islamic

    revolution, the following stories were reported:

    Irans chief P5 + 1 negotiator, Muhammad Javad Zarif derided (unusually candid)comments by U.S. lead negotiator with Iran, Wendy Sherman, that if Irans nuclear

    program was only for peaceful purposes, the Islamic Republic does not need the

    fortified, underground uranium enrichment center at Fordow, or its plutonium heavy-water reactor at Arak. A defiant Zarif, referring explicitly to Shermans observations,

    opined, Iran's nuclear technology isnon-negotiable and comments about Irans nuclear

    facilities are worthless and there is no need to negotiate or hold talks about them.p5

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    Irans Deputy Foreign Minister, Abbas Aragchi stated Iran would not capitulate topressure from the U.S. and the five other world powers to dismantle anyof its nuclear

    facilities. p6

    Iran rejected the U.S. contention that its ballistic missile program must be included as akey component of negotiations on a permanent nuclear agreement. Abbas Aragchi statedon Iranian state television: The Islamic Republic of Iran's defensive issues are neithernegotiable nor subject to compromise. They are definitely among our red lines in any

    talks. We won't discuss anyissue other than the nuclear dossier in the negotiations.p7

    Despite such brazen Iranian intransigence, White House National Security SpokesmanCaitlin Hayden revealed the Obama Administration would not interfere with Iransburgeoning oil sales, which are generating billions of additional revenues as economic

    sanctions collapse in the wake of the P5 + 1 interim deal. p8

    Ayatollah Khamenei, during an address on Iranian television, February 17, 2014, insistedit would be impossible to resolve the nuclear issue, per U.S. expectations. Heclaimed Iran had been insulted by a U.S. Senator who takes money from Zionists in

    order to go to the Senate and curse the Iranian nation.Khamenei reminded hisaudience, the Americans are the enemies of the Islamic Revolution and of Iran. They arethe enemies of the flag that you hold high, and these [negotiations] will not bring an end

    to this enmity.p9

    President Rouhani, at an ancillary meeting with Palestinian Parliament Speaker SalimZanoun on Wednesday 2/19/14, held during the Organization of Islamic Cooperation

    Inter-Parliamentary Union in Tehran, stated, One of the wishes of the Iranian nation isliberation of the Holy Quds [Jewish Jerusalem, Israels capital]the Palestinian nation

    and the entire Muslim world will find a serious solution to this occupation through unityand integrity.p10

    These, and many comparably alarming developments since the P5 +1 deal was announced (see

    Chapter 1), epitomize the abject failure of a delusive and dangerous policymaking mindset I have

    dubbed, The Trusting Khomeini Syndrome. This Syndrome is named after infamous

    Princeton International Law Professor Richard Falks February 16, 1979 essay, TrustingKhomeini, dutifully published in the The New York Timesp11The parlous denialborn of

    willful doctrinal and historical negationismevident in Falks February, 1979 essay, now shapes

    formal U.S. policy toward Iran, merely updated as Trusting Khamenei. I further maintain that

    the sine qua nonof this crippling mindsetbowdlerization of Islamcurrently dominates

    policymaking circles, running the gamut from Left to Right. The late Islamologist MaximeRodinson warned 40-years ago of a broad academic campaignwhich has clearly infectedpolicymakers across the politico-ideological spectrumto sanctify Islam and the contemporaryideologies of the Muslim world. p12A pervasive phenomenon, Rodinson ruefully described the

    profundity of its deleterious consequences: p13

    Understanding [of Islam] has given way to apologetics pure and simple.

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    A prototypical example of how this mindset has warped intellectually honest discourse about

    Iran by conservative analysts, was published February 17, 2014 in The Weekly Standard. p14The

    essayist decried what he saw as misguided appropriation of Cold War era paradigmswishfulthinking built around imagined Cold War analogieseven by members of the Israeli security

    establishment, let alone their Obama Administration counterparts. p15Although correctly

    dismissive of the sham notion that Iranian President Rouhani and his crowd are moderates, theessayist also insisted Irans ayatollahs have somehow perverted Shia Islam with the statetakeover of religion. p16He then ads, the older quietist school [ostensibly of Shiite Islam] still

    has many adherents. p17These glib, distressingly uninformed pronouncements on Shiite Islam

    are immediately followed by the authors own Cold War era comparisons:p18

    What produced a change in Soviet behavior was the willingness of the West, led by the

    United States, to fight the Cold War on the groundand the willingness to fight it

    ideologically. Reagan, after all, did not allow his desire for negotiations to prevent himfrom saying the Soviet Union was an evil empire

    Thus we have a pathognomonic illustration of the authors imagined Cold War analogiesviews published in a flagship conservative/neoconservative journal, p19and shared by a broad

    swath of like-minded conservative analysts.

    What Ronald Reagan understoodand articulatedwas characterized elegantly by RobertConquest, the nonpareil historian of Communist totalitarianisms ideology, and resultant mass

    murderous depredations. p20

    The Soviet Union, right up to the eve of its collapse, was committed to the concept of an

    unappeasable conflict with the Western world and to the doctrine that this could only be

    resolved by what Foreign Minister Andrey [Andrei] Gromyko described as officially as

    one could imagine, in his 1975 book The Foreign Policy of the Soviet Union, as worldrevolution: The Communist Party of the Soviet Union subordinates all its theoretical

    and practical activity in the sphere of foreign relations to the task of strengthening the

    positions of socialism, and the interests of further developing and deepening the world

    revolutionary process. One could hardly be franker.

    President Reagans seminal March, 1983 speech to the National Association of Evangelicalsincluded this gimlet-eyed description of the totalitarian darkness at Communisms ideological

    core: p21

    they [Communists] preach the supremacy of the state, declare its omnipotence over

    individual man, and predict its eventual domination of all peoples on the Earth.

    Reagans address also invoked Communist apostate, Whittaker Chambers. Chambersown 1947

    book review of Rebecca Wests The Meaning of Treasoncompared the violent fanaticism of thetwentieth centurys secular totalitarian systems adherents, to the votaries of Islam. p22The

    modern totalitarians expressed new ideas which were violently avowed,and p23

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    the hallmark of their advocates was a fanaticism unknown since the first flush ofIslam.

    Does Chamberss analogy between Islam and Communismutterly ignored in the

    February 17, 2014 Weekly Standardpolicy analysis p24have doctrinal and historical

    validity?This critical question can only be answered when other related questions pertaining toIslamin its Shiite Iranian context, and more generally (i.e., within the predominant Sunnisect)are put forth, and addressed. Those relevant questions conclude the Preface. The

    remainder of this bookmaterials from Chapters 1-3, and the Conclusions sectionwill answer

    them.

    Here are the questions:

    What is the Sharia? What are the uniquely Islamic institutions of jihad, and its corollaryinstitution, dhimmitude, and how do these institutions relate to the Sharia? What are the

    similarities and differences comparing Sunni (the [vast] majority sect of Islam) and Shiite

    (Shiism being Islams largest minority sect) doctrine on jihad and dhimmitude? What is theShiite doctrine of najis? What are the major antisemitic motifs in Islams canonical textsthe

    Koran itself (i.e., as glossed in the major Koranic commentaries, classical and modern), as well

    as the Traditions of Islams prophet, Muhammad, and the nascent Muslim community? What

    are the similarities and differences comparing Sunni and Shiite eschatologyend of timestheologyand how central are the Jews to this doctrine (i.e., what is their described role, and

    fate?), from the Sunni and Shiite perspectives? How were these doctrines applied in Iran, and

    what was their effect upon the Jews of Iran, between the 16th

    , and early 20th

    centuries? Are theseliving doctrines, espoused andpresentlyapplied in contemporary Iran? For example, has the

    Sharia been applied in Iran since 1979 (especially vis--vis non-Muslims), and what is its current

    popularity in the Islamic Republic (as measured objectively, not anecdotally)? Most

    importantly, how is Irans historical application of these doctrines, in aggregate, to itsJewish minority population, relevantand manifestin the contemporary Islamic

    Republics posture toward Israel, and the U.S.?

    What is takiya (taqiya; taqiyya), and what was the treaty of al-Hudaybiyya (al-Hudaybiyyah),

    and how might both be very relevant to the interim P5 + 1 agreement?

    Who was Shah Ismail, and what was his attitude towards Irans Jews? Who were Mohammad

    Baqer Majlisi, Sayyid Muhammad Sadiq Husayni Shirazi, and Hussein [Hossein] Ali Montazeri,

    and what were their views on jihad, dhimmitude, and najis?

    What isAl-Mizan fi Tafsir al-Quran(The measure of balance in the interpretation of theKoran), who was its author, and what views are espoused in this monumental 20th

    century

    work, on jihad, dhimmitude,and the Jews?

    Finally, returning to The Weekly Standardessayists allusion to the quietist school of Shiite

    Islam and its many adherents, p25what is Shiite quietism, who are exemplar Shiite

    quietists, and what are theirviews on the Sharia, jihad, dhimmitude, najis, and the Jews?

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    Andrew Bostom,February 26, 2014

    References

    p1.Text of Iran-Powers Nuclear Deal, Obama and Zarif Statements About Irans Nuclear

    ActivitiesAl Jazeerah, November 23, 2013http://bit.ly/18AJEFvp2.Ariel Ben Solomon, Rouhani says nuclear program forever as Iran marks anniversary of

    Islamic Revolution,Reuters, February 11, 2014http://bit.ly/MHtyzK;For discussion of Shiite

    theocratic rule before and after the Pahlavi Dynasty, see Chapter Three, The Dhimmi Conditionfor Iranian Jewry Under Shiite Theocratic Rule: A Half-Millennial Past as Prologue, herein.

    p3.Ben Solomon, Rouhani says nuclear program forever as Iran marks anniversary of Islamic

    Revolution

    p4.Ibid.

    p5.Oren Dorrell, Nuclear talks with Iran headed for collision in Austria, USA Today, February

    17, 2014http://usat.ly/1e33PYK

    p6.Iran says it won't scrap any nuclear facility,Associated Press, February 18, 2014

    http://fxn.ws/1c1nyby

    p7.Jay Solomon, Iran Nuclear Talks Turn to Missiles, The Wall Street Journal, February 18,

    2014http://on.wsj.com/1gV3EDm

    p8.Adam Kredo, Iranian Oil Exports Soar as Sanctions Collapse, The Washington Free

    Beacon, February 14, 2014http://bit.ly/1jhk0Xdp9.Irans Supreme Leader Khamenei: I Am Not Optimistic about Nuclear Talks; US Will

    Continue to Be an Enemy, The Middle East Media Research Institute, Clip No. 4154, February17, 2014http://bit.ly/O8ZdeZ

    p10.Rouhani: Iranian Nation Aspiring Liberation of Holy Quds, Fars News Agency, February19, 2014http://bit.ly/OaY32u

    p11.Richard Falk, Trusting Khomeini, The New York Times, February 16, 1979.

    http://bit.ly/1coIBJM

    p12.Maxime Rodinson, The Western Image and Western Studies of Islam, in The Legacy of

    Islam, edited by Joseph Schacht, with C.E. Bosworth, 1974, London, p. 59.

    p13.Ibid.

    p14.Elliot Abrams, A Misleading Cold War AnalogyDont count on containing Iran,

    The Weekly Standard, February 17, 2014, Vol. 19, No. 22http://tws.io/1aNr2Dm

    http://bit.ly/18AJEFvhttp://bit.ly/18AJEFvhttp://bit.ly/18AJEFvhttp://bit.ly/MHtyzKhttp://bit.ly/MHtyzKhttp://bit.ly/MHtyzKhttp://usat.ly/1e33PYKhttp://usat.ly/1e33PYKhttp://usat.ly/1e33PYKhttp://fxn.ws/1c1nybyhttp://fxn.ws/1c1nybyhttp://on.wsj.com/1gV3EDmhttp://on.wsj.com/1gV3EDmhttp://on.wsj.com/1gV3EDmhttp://bit.ly/1jhk0Xdhttp://bit.ly/1jhk0Xdhttp://bit.ly/1jhk0Xdhttp://bit.ly/O8ZdeZhttp://bit.ly/O8ZdeZhttp://bit.ly/O8ZdeZhttp://bit.ly/OaY32uhttp://bit.ly/OaY32uhttp://bit.ly/OaY32uhttp://bit.ly/1coIBJMhttp://bit.ly/1coIBJMhttp://tws.io/1aNr2Dmhttp://tws.io/1aNr2Dmhttp://tws.io/1aNr2Dmhttp://tws.io/1aNr2Dmhttp://bit.ly/1coIBJMhttp://bit.ly/OaY32uhttp://bit.ly/O8ZdeZhttp://bit.ly/1jhk0Xdhttp://on.wsj.com/1gV3EDmhttp://fxn.ws/1c1nybyhttp://usat.ly/1e33PYKhttp://bit.ly/MHtyzKhttp://bit.ly/18AJEFv
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    p15.Ibid.

    p16.Ibid.

    p17.

    Ibid.p18.Ibid.

    p19.Ibid.

    p20.Robert Conquest, The Dragons of ExpectationReality and Delusion in the Course of

    History, 2005, New York/London, p. 135.

    p21.Ronald Reagan, Remarks at the Annual Convention of the National Association of

    Evangelicals in Orlando, Florida, March 8, 1983http://bit.ly/1hqbwfj

    p22.Andrew Bostom, Whittaker Chambers, Communism, and Islam, in Andrew Bostom,

    Sharia Versus Freedom, 2012, Amherst, N.Y., p. 500.

    p23.Ibid.

    p24.Abrams, A Misleading Cold War AnalogyDont count on containing Iran

    p25.Ibid.

    http://bit.ly/1hqbwfjhttp://bit.ly/1hqbwfjhttp://bit.ly/1hqbwfjhttp://bit.ly/1hqbwfj