Columbia Disgraces Itself with the Iranian Terrorist in Chief

The invitation by Columbia University to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran beggars belief and brings one of America's foremost institutions of higher learning into disrepute. Columbia's distinguished President, Lee Bolinger, defended the invitation as being in keeping with "Columbia's long-standing tradition of serving as a major forum of robust debate." Of course, that is nonsense. Does anyone seriously believe that Columbia would invite a politician or scholar who denied that American slavery ever took places, or alleged that its effects on African-Americans was benign and exaggerated? Would Columbia host a Grand Wizard of the KKK who called for black African nations to be 'wiped off the map'? And yet, Ahmadinejad is far worse. Not only has he denied the holocaust and called repeatedly for Israel's total destruction, he has gone beyond words and worked hard to put his plan into action. Ahmadinejad's Iran is one of the world's foremost sponsors of international terror, especially the Hezbollah posse of killers, and is now hell-bent on building thermonuclear weapons with which he might just accomplish what Hitler could not, the annihilation of half the world's Jews with the push of a single button. Ahmadinejad is also directly responsible for the murder of untold numbers of American troops in Iraq whose killers, according to reams of reports, he is arming and funding.

Two years ago, Harvard President Lawrence Summers lost his job for insinuating that women were not as intellectually competent in math and science as men. Yet, Ahmadinejad provides over a government that brutally suppresses women, inflicting corporal punishment if they so much as go out in the street without a head covering. But none of this has prevented him from being feted by American academia.

When I read of the holocaust, I often ask myself how the world allowed Hitler to rise to prominence. After all, humanity bore continuous witness to the hatred and venom that spewed sewer-like from his evil tongue against Jews. Did the nations of the world not isolate him as soon as he began frothing at the mouth? But in light of Ahmadinejad being invited on his last visit to address the Council on Foreign Relations, and Columbia University on this trip, I now get it. Whatever Hitler said, nobody took him seriously. They treated his rantings as a tasteless form of benign entertainment. They found him darkly amusing. And it took the incineration of six million Jews and the destruction of much of Europe to discover that ultimately the joke was on us.

In light of Columbia's invitation, it is fair to ask what indeed Ahmadinejad needs to do in order to be seen for his true colors? Stated differently, what evil must the President of Iran perpetrate in order to incur a much-deserved boycott? Since calling for the annihilation of the Jewish state is not enough, one would assume that President Bollinger would require him to actually kill a few Jews in order for the invitation to be rescinded.

But wait. He's already done that, and not just a few. Via his proxy Hezbollah, he's killed a whole lot of Jews. So how many is the cutoff before Columbia denies him a platform? Ten thousand dead Jews, one hundred thousand? Six million?

It is time for the world to boldly declare the clarion call of a new generation: no tolerance for intolerance. Any man, woman, or child whose essential message is one of hatred, racism, or anti-Semitism will be isolated, boycotted, and closely monitored. The perversion of the idea of freedom of speech to allow incitement to racial violence makes a mockery of all those who laid their lives down to protect this most important of all freedom's principles.

One can only imagine the thinking of our brave soldiers in Iraq. Here they are, dying for the freedom of complete strangers who don't even seem to appreciate their sacrifice. That's bad enough. But then they hear of how their most sworn enemy, the Iranian President who gives guns and explosives to terrorists who blow them up, is going to preach to American University students. We all remember how, during Vietnam, there was the vast disconnect between pampered students on campus who tried to burn their administration buildings down in protest of a war that poorer Americans who couldn't afford College were forced to fight. It strikes me that this is nearly as bad. Pampered Ivy league students will accord respect to a man who is silently killing American troops rather than protesting his visit to the UN that would bring these students real honor.

My father is currently in Iran (yes, you heard me correctly). He grew up in Isfahan and left in the early 1950s. Now, in his seventies, he wanted to see his remaining family and his old boyhood haunts. I too would love to see the country where my Jewish ancestors lived for two and a half thousand years, since the destruction of the First Temple. As a lover of antiquity, I would cherish viewing the great sites of one of the world's greatest civilizations. But not while Ahmadinejad is president. Not while a country once so enlightened has now grown so dark. And not while a people once so authentically religious now blaspheme G-d and their great faith by electing a leader that is an abominable killer.

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach is currently in Israel filming a new TV show, 'Shalom in the Holy Land.' His upcoming book, "The Broken American Male," is about to be released by St. Martin's Press. www.shmuley.com

Comments

[Alvin4NY]

I'm not the President of Columbia University hosting an event that will be seen and heard around the world, who's words and actions will be documented, and used repeatedly by a media to INSTRUCT a tone. (basically giving everyone in attendance permission to mock and laugh, and not take seriously the words of the guest.) I am a global citizen outraged at the bad manners of someone who should know better. When you invite someone over to your house for dinner, you don't start the evening by throwing a drink in their face the minute they walk in the door. It's hard for the guests to focus on the meal, the taste of the food, the conversation, or anything else that follows. Bad manners versus good manners is not that difficult for some to understand.
If you want to find the irony in the tone of my comments, knock yourself out.

[Alvin4NY]

The Rabbi uses the term "abominable killer" to describe President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - but I ask, what makes him "abominable"? How is our own country, with our bombastic Bush/Cheney leading us down the path of righteous self-destruction, any different? The United States can't hide it's compliance or hypocrisies anymore regarding foreign policy. In the information age, all they can do is buy up media outlets and continue to try and control the masses with propaganda. Our "shock and awe" approach to Iraq, sealed our own fate in terms of how we look to the rest of the world. We don't need the U.N. - we don't need the advice of other world leaders - we have never considered for a minute the value of Iraqi life after our invasion, and we continually think in the terms of "US" and "THEM" - the voice of the American people is absolutely useless and unwanted in terms of our IMPOTENT Congress.
Frankly, I was more appalled at the tone and content of the introduction of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - would that asshole have uttered those same types of words to Bush, as Bush tries to downplay the situation in Iraq- the dangerous position our troops are in daily, or the Billions of dollars that have been WASTED - ? All of the pundits made a point out of noting how the audience laughed when President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad downplayed homosexuality in his country, and how effective the laughter was in removing the power of his words. So why hasn't anyone done this to Bush, when he's standing there at a Press Conference saying that we're "Kicking ass in Iraq" - where is the laughter? If everyone in the front row would just bust up and knee slap when he said it-- why not? Bush would come undone, and the little man behind the curtain would probably spontaneously explode! (as it is, there must be much, much eye rolling going on at the typical Bush Press Conference) Why simply dole out the insults to other foreign leaders? Spread it around, share the blame, dirty hands abound!

[LeoMarvin]

Alvin4NY said: "Frankly, I was more appalled at the tone and content of the introduction of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - would that asshole have uttered those same types of words to Bush[...]."

May I point out the irony that you would complain about someone else's tone?

[Lon]

Columbia would certainly have invited an important figure on the world stage to speak even if he called for black African nations to be wiped off the map (although the incoherency of calling for that points at the difference between what Ahmadinejad has said, and what he is accused of saying).

It is unlikely that he will give the kind of fiery speech that will lead to his downfall. Despite the constant accusations to the contrary, he seems to be neither crazy nor an idiot.

His attitude towards the holocaust has not been to deny it, but to deny its relevance to jewish claims on traditionally muslim land. Similarly the idea that he has called for dropping a nuclear bomb on Israel is fictional. He has called for Israel to revert to an arab state. This is not exactly original in the arab world.

It will be interesting to see what he does say at Columbia because it will tell us something about how he wants to present Iran to the world.

On a separate note, he is not a tinpot dictator because he is not a dictator. The president in Iran does not hold that much power. He is more figurehead than dicatator.

[LeoMarvin]

Lon said: "His attitude towards the holocaust has not been to deny it, but to deny its relevance to jewish claims on traditionally muslim land."

Oh really?

"Bollinger opened by aggressively taking on Ahmadinejad's past statements about the Holocaust.

'In a December 2005 state television broadcast, you described the Holocaust as the fabricated legend,' he said. 'One year later, you held a two-day conference of Holocaust deniers.'"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6945933,00.html

[disgustedcitizen]

I'm sorry to disagree, but I believe Columbia Univ was correct to invite Ahmadinejad to speak at the University. I understand that the man is a tin pot dictator, and perhaps even a bit insane. However, to paraphrase Sun Tzu "Know your enemies..." and how better then to listen to what they have to say, no matter how delusional. Let him talk and learn from his words.

[dtrobert]

I'm also curious as to why there isn't a groundswell of indignation, headlines in the NY rags, etc.. for the visit by members of the extreme-right hate-blog FreeRepublic to the white house.

[FranciscoDeVictoria]

There are presently two hostile occupations in the Middle East at the moment: the American occupation of Iraq, which followed the American invasion, and the Israeli occupation of Palestine, which followed a campaign of ethnic cleansing and propaganda that began even before 1948. The U.S. is in obvious violation of numerous applicable treaties and rules of international law in the region, as is Israel; to cite just one example, neither state complies with the nuclear nonproliferation treaty. In the case of Israel, that's because it, unlike Iran, has never been a party to it. But even if Israel had been a party, it would still be out of compliance because of the 200 or so nuclear warheads it has introduced into the region (no one else there--neither Syria, nor Lebanon, nor Egypt, nor Iraq, nor Iran, nor Afghanistan, nor Libya, nor Saudi Arabia, nor Yemen etc. has ever introduced even one such device there). The U.S. is a party to the treaty, but it is out of compliance because it has made essentially no effort to eliminate its nuclear arsenal, as it is required to do by the terms of the treaty. If the rabbi can't find a better reason to attack Columbia's critical interest in what Ahmedinijad has to say than what he has said in the past, why hasn't he denounced any number of Israeli and American leaders for their continuous and cynical disregard for the rules of international law that protect all of us on Earth?

[FlowerGirl]

A very thoughtful and informed response. I hope that before we are led into disaster by our "friends" who haven't been such friends when one checks the record. I wish we had a more moral approach to others.
I also wish my felow countrymen would see what criminal enterprises those groups like the Heritage Foundation, American Enterprise Institute, American Israeli Affairs Committee, etc. are. What they advocate is simply the total destruction of our Constitution, the reversal of our basic principles, and all in order to support a vicious bigotry that isn't even our own.

But in any case, I would point out that in addition to our being out of compliance with the NPT,(while international inspectors have said that Iran is), our government is violating our own laws when it gives aid to nuclear armed Israel.
How far are we from compliance? In addition to our failure to make any effort to eliminate our nuclear arsenal, one of Bush's first major actsd was tgo fund the development of more!
But there are those who will believe the lies concocted by the likes of that Office of SpeciaL Plans which "proved" that Iraq had all kinds of WMDs.
America, alas, all your wisdom, how it loveth to fly away!

[dryfactoidobotanoid]

"Yesterday's enemy is becoming today's ally."
- Abraham Herschel

[Plowboy]

Calling for Zionism and a Zionist state to be eliminated is not the same thing as calling for the elimination of a people. A multiethnic America suits some of us. And it would have pleased the majority of the people in Palestine when one group used its political to get its undemocratic way.
Calling for the rectification of that wrong is not even equivalent with calling for the bombing of Iran back to the stone ages. But I'm sure that you know that.
It has been a long time since Iran invaded another counntry. How long has it been since your country did?

[LeoMarvin]

His country IS Iran. Next time try reading the post before demonizing the author.

[srmorris]

I am not a fan of Ahmadinejad, and I find his views on Jews and the Holocaust more than offensive. However, our democracy is based not only on a policy of free speech, but on the premise that the American people are capable of differentiating between right and wrong, good and evil, truth and lies.

You asked if we would have allowed, a Grad Wizard of the KKK or Hitler to speak at one of our great institutions. My answer is absolutely yes. Let them say their ideas openly where they can be discussed and, hopefully destroyed. Ideas of racism and intolerance grow more powerful in the dark.

It is the Hitlers and Ahmadinejads of the world who suppress free speech, who are afraid of anyone who disagree with them. We must have the courage to hear that which we hate, to learn from everyone, even an enemy.

And if Ahmadinejad is a great enemy, a rising Hitler, than we must not under any circumstances close our ears to him (as most of the world did to Hitler in the 30s) instead we must listen carefully to everything he has to say, learn his ideas, his plans and, hopefully, his weaknesses.

We must, in the words of Sun Tzu, Know our enemy as we know ourself.

[CriminallySane]

Will you have the courage to put this up?

Ahmedinijad is a troublemaker, no doubt. He's a Holocaust denier, a "neighborhood nuisance", and some might say, a nutcase.

That said, like anyone else of that ilk, his ideas will fall of their own accord given an airing.

That you would prevent him from speaking, and letting those ideas fall on their own, as the will, speaks more about you and the weakness of your own character and ideas than it does his.

[seatech1]

Rabbi
I think you don't understand why the students were protesting the viet nam war. It was about the way the war was being waged, and how, for years, our forces were prevented from doing the things necessary to win it. So if we are not going to fight it to win, then get out. Our politicians were allowing the deaths of our soldiers without allowing them to win, in the end. It was disingenuous, to say the least. The students, and the voters, saw it as a never-ending conflict.
If we had fought it in a determined manner (like in WWII), we would have seen much more public support, including the students.
And remember, Rabbi, we had a draft back then. Many of those students would have to fight, once their deferments were over. They were not as detached as you might think.

[locanicole]

I find it truly offensive when Iraqui's lack of gratitude for our sacrifice for their freedom is brought up...I dont think they had the total destruction of their infrastucture in mind...nor the daily fear of 'will I make it home from work or the market', or in the case of children, 'from school' (if there is one). People without hope of a future will fight back, and not necessarily in a constructive manner. Ahmadinejad is a figure head that was put forth by the Mullahs..until someone who is more moderate becomes the Grand Ayatollah the world and the Iranian people will have to put up with him. There has to be some type of dialogue, even if he is full of it...

[dtrobert]

I didn't hear any Jewish leader complain about the multiple visits of various Saudi dignitaries, or the warm welcome given by AEI to Ahmad Chalabi, an international criminal, or to the visits of Chinese dignitaries (China is responsible for some of the worst crimes against humanity recorded since the last world war).

Ahmadinejad is an asshole, but frankly, I find it pretty interesting that Jewish leaders only come out of the woodwork when Israel is threatened...

[LeoMarvin]

You've got that backwards. Find a gathering that protests Chinese human rights violations, or Saudi, or even Israeli, and you'll find plenty of Liberal Jews in attendance, Rabbis included. But when Israel is threatened, the only people we liberal Jews see by our side are conservatives, mostly neo and Christian. Our liberal Gentile friends are nowhere to be found. It's a real test of our principles to remain associated with a political movement that judges Israel by such double-standards and holds it in such open contempt.