5 things Netanyahu forgot to tell the American people

Good article, except for the part at the end about former president Mohammad Khatami.

Here the writer becomes an Anti-Zionist-Zionist…

“Although many people are readily familiar with the former president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and his numerous belligerent outbursts against the United States and Israel, few may remember that his predecessor was a soft spoken scholar and theologian by the name of Mohammad Khatami, who ruled from 1997 to 2005.”

Ahmadinejad’s “belligerent outbursts”? The belligerent outbursts come from Israel, while the sanctions come from the USA and Europe.

Perhaps this writer didn’t listen to the Netanyahu speech that the writer is writing about.

As for Mohammad Khatami, the writer calls him a “liberal reformer.” The writer should have said neo-liberal “reformer.” The one and only purpose of no-liberalism is to widen the gap between the rich and the rest.

Khatami was a rich oligarch who sought to become richer at the expense of the lower classes. Khatami’s neo-liberal “reforms” meant mass privatization, tax cuts for the rich, tax increases for the poor, slashed social programs, slashed subsidies for the poor, decriminalization of financial fraud, and so on.

And, as with all neo-liberal “reformers” (Iranian or otherwise) Khatami was very pro-Israel. This, plus his attack on socialism, made Khatami popular with the West.

Khatami’s “reforms” caused so much poverty for the lower classes in Iran that in 2005 they elected Ahmadinejad, who was a genuine populist and anti-imperialist.

“During his two terms as president, Khatami, a popular liberal reformer, advocated on behalf of freedom of expression, tolerance and civil society. Suddenly, Iran’s foreign policy began moving from outright confrontation to conciliation.”

More nonsense. Is this writer a Jew? Khatami’s predecessor, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, was another rich oligarch, and another neo-liberal “reformer,” and another pro-Israel darling of the West. Rafsanjani wanted “tolerance, freedom of expression, civil society” meaning the freedom of rich Iranians to reverse the Revolution.

Iran, like Venezuela, has an upper class of rich elitists who endlessly push for neo-liberal “reforms” in order to widen the gap between themselves and the masses. Khatami and Rafsanjani were both elitist a**holes.

“Khatami’s groundbreaking work, however, was largely derailed after the United States, with the vocal support of Israel, opened up a wholly illegitimate invasion of Iraq (and despite global protests in Western capitals against the action), thus triggering a renewed wave of fear and anti-Western attitudes in Iran and elsewhere.”

Still more nonsense. Iran and Iraq had been enemies since Saddam Hussein stupidly took the U.S. bait and attacked Iran in September 1980, leading to a bloody eight-year war. The USA engineered this war to punish Iran for its Revolution, which had happened the year before.

Therefore Iran had no strong objection to the U.S. invasion of Iraq, especially since the USA’s main target was Iraq’s Sunnis. The U.S. invasion significantly strengthened Iran’s influence over Iraq.

What “derailed” Khatamai’s “groundbreaking work” was the poverty and inequality caused by Khatamai’s neo-liberalism. The poverty caused the masses to elect Ahmadinejad as president.

Ahmadinejad was a populist. A man of the people. When he was elected in 2005, the USA and Europe retaliated by imposing major sanctions on Iran. Sanctions that mainly hurt the lower classes in Iran, not the rich.