Facts and attitudes about Iran

Submitted by Yuriy (United States), Jun 25, 2007 at 00:43

Moshe, I'll have to argue with almost every word of your post, argue with facts.

You call Iran a "rogue" state. The fact is that Iran is in quite normal relations with most nations of the world; moreover, Iran has been attracting foreign invenstments, including that from the EU countries, in dozens of billions. Here's a link to the study by the American Enterprise Institute: http://www.aei.org/IranInteractive/

You call Iran an "outlaw" state. Apparently, she is presently in no breach of any international law. Whether same can be said about Israel is a question.

You say Iran "has repeatedly declared its commitment to destroy the Jewish State.." I am not aware of this. There has been a discussion about the translation of the Ahmadinejad's words about "wiping off the map"; apparently, he used neither "wipe out" nor "the map", nor there was a declaration of a "commitment to destroy", and the phrase can hardly be regarded as a threat of an attack. Please see an expert's take on the expression here: http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/jonathan_steele/2006/06/post_155.html

You wonder who would sympathize with Iran in the case of an Israeli attack on her. The matter of a fact is that many will. Indeed, polls show that most Europeans will. Here's a little collection of links about the popular views of Israel, US and Iran in the world.

Oct 2003 poll in EU: Israel is named the most dangerous nation, with 60% of EU respondents. http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1076073,00.html

"41% of British people said the US presence in Iraq represented a great danger to world peace, with 34% citing Iran as a big threat."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,1797771,00.html

A gigantic internet survey (over 700 000 participants) in 2003 put USA as the most dangerous nation to the world peace; USA scored 87%, Iran 6%.

http://www.time.com/time/europe/gdml/peace2003.html

A 2006 poll in EU names USA as the most dangerous country (Israel must have been excluded from the poll, after the 2003 scandal); 30% of respondents name USA, 23% name Iran.

http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/index.cfm/fuseaction/viewItem/itemID/13028

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