Is McCain Building An Iran War Drum?

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) leaves a behemoth's footprint in Washington, DC. The mythical largesse of the organization was confirmed recently by the National Journal, which rated it the second most influential lobby, ahead of the AFL-CIO. AIPAC garners its reputation, in large part, because of an adept political team with a knack for attacking any politician who dares to utter criticism of US-Israel policy. AIPAC has also been credited with successfully pushing America into war with Iraq, a charge their members now dismiss as outlandish (AIPAC's former Director, Tomas Dine, joined the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq and Richard Perle has touted that the Iraq invasion would never have occurred without AIPAC).

While AIPAC might only have been one of the many who picked up a stick in 2002 to beat the drums of war, AIPAC appears to be among the few who are building a new drum with Iran sketched into the side. The prominence of Iran on AIPAC's agenda proceeds not from President Ahmadinejad's recent promise to "wipe Israel from the map" (which AIPAC attendees quote ad nausea), but instead from a long held belief that the Tehran government provides prodigious support and funding to Hamas and Hezbollah.

Kowtowing to an Israeli fear of Iran, McCain used the AIPAC forum to reinforce his three most dubious and dangerous policy claims. First, that Iran posses an imminent "existential threat" to both Israel and the U.S., despite the recent National Intelligence Estimate stating that 2015 is the earliest Iran could produce a nuclear weapon. Second, that direct presidential talks with adversarial nations render zero substantive benefits. And finally, that passing the kind of sanctions that burdened Iraq for nearly a decade would somehow promote Democracy instead of Totalitarianism in Iran.

The Real News's Aijaz Ahmad deconstructs McCain's speech in a two-part discussion:

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Comments

[mamacat]

Is he beating a drum? In his mind, yes, he is beating a drum. To everyone else, he sounds like a kid blowing a tin horn, and it is past the stage of being annoying.

[oldpotsmuggler]

Iran is a smallish country, in an oil rich neighborhood, with a smallish population. They threaten us how?

They're not stronger, smarter, richer, crazier, more suicidal, more dangerous, etc., than we or others of our "enemies" are. It's enough to make one wonder exactly what they've done to qualify as such a tantalizing target.

Oh yeah, they made fools out of our CIA a couple of decades ago!

[JonnyVerdorben]

The Persian word for map, "nagsheh" is not contained anywhere in his original Farsi quote, or, for that matter, anywhere in his entire speech. Nor was the western phrase "wipe out" ever said. The idiom "to wipe something off the map" does not exist in Persian. It's an English expression.

Dr Juan Cole, a speaker of Farsi and Professor at the University of Michigan writes:

"As most of my readers know, Ahmadinejad did not use that phrase [wipe Israel off the map] in Persian. He quoted an old saying of Ayatollah Khomeini calling for 'this occupation regime over Jerusalem' to 'vanish from the page of time.' "

Refs:

'Wiped off the Map' – The Rumor of the Century - by Arash Norouzi

http://www.antiwar.com/orig/norouzi.php?articleid=11025

Dr Juan Cole

http://www.juancole.com/2007/06/ahmadinejad-i-am-not-anti-semitic.html

Ahmadi Nezhad's original speech has been removed from his website, here:

http://www.president.ir/farsi/ahmadinejad/speeches/1384/aban-84/840804sahyonizm.htm

but it's been copied and is available here:

http://www.irandefence.net/archive/index.php/t-11027.html

.

[batguano]

Thanks for these important links. The power of the Israeli lobby in America, like AIPAC, et al, to falsify, manipulate and color our beliefs of who is our "enemy" and who is our "friend" is clearly shown by this deliberate mis-translation. Israel and their fifth-columnists in America have for many years largely controlled our "free press" to limit the truth about the occupation and the Palestinian struggle to end the repression, occupation, illegal colonization (settlements), collective punishment and abuse of ALL Palestinians by Israeli forces and "settlers".

After years of premeditated efforts to end our position as "honest broker" (on paper at least) and "get America into our fight" ( attack Iraq) by the Israelis and their agent lobbyists (AIPAC, AEI, JINSA, PNAC), it is no surprise that they continue that effort with the robust and continual ground work for a "pre-emptive" attack on Iran. This mis-quote among countless other false charges and propaganda, is part of the long-planned AIPAC/Neocon/Bush effort for "war without end" that is clearly NOT in America's best interests.

http://www.ifamericansknew.org/

[JonnyVerdorben]

You're quite welcome. My pleasure of course. That "wiped off the map" phony quote is just another American/israeli Establishment media Big Lie. They figure if they repeat it often enough people will actually believe it. I would urge you to challenge every commentator who trots out that "wiped off the map" fabrication and send him or her Arash Norouzi's piece

'Wiped off the Map' " The Rumor of the Century

http://www.antiwar.com/orig/norouzi.php?articleid=11025

Stress the point that the Persian word for map, "nagsheh" does not appear anywhere in Ahmadi Nezhad's speech. When various writers and editors place quotation marks around the invented phrase "wiped off the map" they are implying that is an actual quote. Ask him or her who he/she is quoting, since Ahmadi Nezhad never made that statement. There are many millions of people who know that so-called quote is a complete fake, yet the Establishment media continues to repeat it.

Cheers,

Jonny

[MajorKong]

Is McCain building an Iran war drum?

Short answer - Yes.

[batguano]

The ever growing power of this group of extremist fifth-columnists to subvert OUR foreign policy in their supposed interest, at the expense of OUR real interests, is a clear and present danger to the United States. AIPAC and the other numerous pro-Israel groups like JINSA, AEI, & PNAC also subvert our electoral process to such an extent that if a candidate does not kowtow to this group of war-mongers, they will be attacked in the most extreme vitriolic manner, witness their vicious attacks on Pres Jimmy Carter and professors Walt and Mearsheimer. ANY criticism of Israel or it's racist policies & occupation­/colonizat­ion (theft) of palestinian land is met with howls of outrage & the worn out charge of "anti-semitism". The ugliness of their attacks is representative of their mistreatment of the Palestinians under the brutal occupation and policies of collective punishment.
We must limit the power of these extremist agents of a foreign country and not tolerate any interference in our elections or foreign policy. Even now they plan an attack on Iran as part of the "war without end" strategy to cement their illegal colonization of the West Bank and ensure that there will NEVER be a viable Palestinian State or a real and fair peace, until they have accomplished their "god-given" theft of all the land and water of "Eretz-Israel". If any other country or special-interest group tried this subversion they would be run out of town on a rail!

[betz55]

Here, here, very well said Batguano.