emoodz.com » Bush on Iran: More Lies!

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Bush on Iran: More Lies!

Submitted by moodz on Friday, 23 February 20077 Comments

Bush on Iran
There’s an old saying in Tennessee. I know it’s in Texas, probably in Tennessee, that says: “Fool me once…”
[pause]
“… shame on…”.
[pause]
“Shame on you…”
[pause]
“If fooled, you can’t get fooled again.

The Bushisim above is my personal favorite; it was all that came to my mind as I read an article after another about the very probable military strike on Iran.

I along with the rest of the world had to live through a long orchestrated buildup of propaganda and lies to rationalize a military attack on Iraq. Like it’s insistence that Iraq carried and manufactured WMDs it is now leading an international campaign that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons.

Turning a blind eye to the International Atomic Energy Agency confirmation of not finding evidence that supports the on going claim that Iran is building nuclear weapons. (Source)

Iran is now also accused of supporting the Iraqi Insurgency and supplying them with money and ammunition. Saturday’s New York Times cited information gleaned from “interrogation reports” from Iranians and Iraqis captured in the recent U.S. raid on the Iranian embassy in northern Iraq. They allegedly indicated money and weapons components are brought into Iraq over the Iranian border at night. If those people indeed provided such information, query what kind of pressure, i.e. torture, might have been applied to encourage their cooperation. Recall the centerpiece of Colin Powell’s 2003 lies to the Security Council about ties between Iraq and al Qaeda came from false information tortured out of Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi.

Another card the Bush administration keeps playing, maybe not so publicly at least, is that of Iran being a threat to Israel. Casually referencing to the ever so famous Ahmedinjad’s quote of calling to “Wipe Israel off the map” which is apparently yet another erroneous translation of what Mr.Ahmedhnjad actually said. I quote:

So what did Ahmadinejad actually say? To quote his exact words in farsi:

“Imam ghoft een rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods bayad az safheh-ye ruzgar mahv shavad.”

“That passage will mean nothing to most people, but one word might ring a bell: rezhim-e. It is the word “Regime”, pronounced just like the English word with an extra “eh” sound at the end. Ahmadinejad did not refer to Israel the country or Israel the land mass, but the Israeli regime. This is a vastly significant distinction, as one cannot wipe a regime off the map. Ahmadinejad does not even refer to Israel by name, he instead uses the specific phrase “rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods” (regime occupying Jerusalem).

So this raises the question.. what exactly did he want “wiped from the map”? The answer is: nothing. That’s because the word “map” was never used. 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. Yet we are led to believe that Iran’s President threatened to “wipe Israel off the map”, despite never having uttered the words “map”, “wipe out” or even “Israel”. (Additional Details & Source)

The whole concept of Iran being a threat to the region is just packed lies, I lived to witness two wars/invasions carried out by the Bush administration both were nothing but a total failure by all measures. Maybe I will live to see yet another one.. Just maybe

7 Comments »

amal said:

..I couldn’t agree more..
Now that Iraq’s been occupied, it’s time to bully and conquer Iran..
Will it happen? I don’t know, I don’t think so.. but then again, we never saw Iraq being beaten and seized before March 2003..
It’s so sad to live in a time when you know that anything can happen..

- 23 February 2007 at 3:22 pm

Dubh said:

I wonder where we got the idea that he said that?

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/archive/archive?ArchiveId=15816

or here: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/11/weekinreview/11bronner.html?ex=1307678400&en=efa2bd266224e880&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

“If Mr. Steele and Mr. Cole are right, not one word of the quotation — Israel should be wiped off the map — is accurate.

But translators in Tehran who work for the president’s office and the foreign ministry disagree with them. All official translations of Mr. Ahmadinejad’s statement, including a description of it on his Web site (www.president.ir/eng/), refer to wiping Israel away. Sohrab Mahdavi, one of Iran’s most prominent translators, and Siamak Namazi, managing director of a Tehran consulting firm, who is bilingual, both say “wipe off” or “wipe away” is more accurate than “vanish” because the Persian verb is active and transitive. “

- 23 February 2007 at 8:10 pm

moodz said:

@Dubh:
Really thrilled to have you back here, as for the quote.. The Guardian’s Jonathan Steele cites four different translations, from professors to the BBC to the New York Times and even pro-Israel news outlets, in none of those translations is the word “map” used. The closest translation to what the Iranian President actually said is, “The regime occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time,” or a narrow relative thereof. In no version is the word “map” used or a context of mass genocide or hostile military action even hinted at.

The acceptance of the word “map” seemingly originated with the New York Times, who later had to back away from this false translation. The BBC also wrongly used the word and, in comments to Steele, later accepted their mistake but refused to issue a retraction.

- 24 February 2007 at 3:29 am

Dubh said:

The NYT cites the President’s own translators from his official website. That trumps any blathering from Juan Cole et al.

Please direct me to the NYT article where they backed away from the quote.

- 26 February 2007 at 5:32 pm

moodz said:

@Dubh:
NYT did not exactly “back away” from misquoting the president per se, but instead the usage of the word “map” which apparently has no exact word to word translation in Farsi.

It was not more than a part of the column (here) where they excused such use and practically turn the tables back to their side really.

I guess it comes to the matter of which translator to trust after all.

- 26 February 2007 at 5:55 pm

Dubh said:

Moodz,

That was the same article I referenced above. It cites one apologist for every tyrant in the Muslim world and the other who works at a paper the NYT declares left-leaning. (That would put them somewhere to the left of Trotsky).

Bottom line: The President of Iran’s own translators used “wiped off the map”. If his own handpicked translators cannot be trusted I don’t know who can.

- 28 February 2007 at 10:51 pm

Kurt said: