Is the man delusional, suicidal, or a shrewd poker player?

 

The Iranian president Ahmadinejad sounds like he is shooting from the hip with no concern for proper diplomacy or regard for the consequences of his seemingly inflammatory statements. His declaration that the Zionist Entity, meaning Israel, should be wiped off the face of the map, and later, his suggestion that if the Europeans truly believe the accounts of the Holocaust, they should accommodate the persecuted European Jews by providing them with a homeland back in Europe where they belong, have caused tremendous controversies.

 

Even if we assume that his remarks in Farsi language have been deliberately distorted in translation to exaggerate their negative impact - a typical news media tendency - such rhetoric is unbecoming of a head of state or anyone who represents the official position of a government and a member of the United Nations. As we saw, the United Nations Security Council condemned his statements in strongest terms, and the German government is under pressure to consider breaking diplomatic ties with Iran.

 

Well; shame on Mr. Ahmadinejad to have callously vocalized what he and many others feel about the Jewish state but refrain from voicing such opinions from an official state podium.

 

The Iranian president was the mayor of Tehran for a number of years, obviously quite aware of the horrible air pollution problems over the Iranian capital; it is perhaps the worst in the world and the subject of great concern. The massive Alborz mountain range, reaching twelve to fourteen thousand feet elevation and stretching for a couple of hundred miles east to west, is causing a thermal inversion that traps Tehran's polluted air, making breathing difficult and causing widespread pulmonary illnesses. But, we never heard Tehran's former mayor, Mr. Ahmadinejad, declare that the Alborz Range should be wiped off the face of the map to remedy Tehran's hazardous smog problems.

 

Does Mr. Ahmadinejad really believe that wiping the "Zionist Entity" off the map or relocating it somewhere away from the Islamic lands is possible? His later comments on the sidelines of an Islamic conference in Mecca suggest that the European countries should have compensated for the genocide and suffering of the European Jews during the Holocaust by providing them with some homeland right there in Europe where they belonged, rather than dumping them in Palestinian and Arab lands.

 

He reiterated his comments about the Holocaust more recently by calling it a myth. What's the matter with the guy; doesn't he realize what hornets' nest he is poking his finger into?

 

Israel has demanded that the United Nations kick Iran out of the roster of member states for such remarks. Ironically, what the Iranian president implied was almost verbatim what the Saudi king Abdel Aziz Ibn Saud had said to Franklin D. Roosevelt on board the US frigate in the Red Sea during the WWII. Ibn Saud had wondered why the persecuted Jews of Europe were to be herded into Arab lands and not repatriated in their own original homelands and compensated for their losses by those who were responsible for their suffering. Roosevelt was impressed by that argument and, to the end of his life, refused to agree with the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine.

 

But now, after almost six decades, refusing to accept the existence of the state of Israel as a sovereign nation, and wishing that it could be moved away to Europe or America, is as meaningful as wishing away the Alborz Range from the north of Tehran. So, why did Mr. Ahmadinejad make such meaningless statements?

 

One explanation could be that he is under the same messianic delusions that have inflicted President George W. Bush, delusions that lead one to believe that one's divinely inspired wishes, no matter how unrealistic, will surely be fulfilled.

 

Or, perhaps, President Ahmadinejad is simply retaliating for all the nasty treatment Iran has been subjected to, primarily by the United States, believing the real culprit to be Israel; the tail that has been wagging the big dog across the oceans. Labeling Iran a member of the axis of evil, the chief supporter of international terrorism, and in violation of its nuclear non-proliferation treaty commitments, is to the Iranian administration and Mr. Ahmadinejad as deliberate a distortion of the truths as is denying that the Holocaust ever took place.  Quite clearly, he knows better; he might just be pissed off enough to fire back. Unlike open and quite real threats against Iran by the United States and Israel, denying the Holocaust and suggesting that Israel be moved to Europe or America don't carry any weight; so, why all the international fuss? Is it because Ahmadinejad doesn't buy into the sacredness of the Sacred Cow?

 

It is also possible that he is a master poker player trying to provoke his regional nemesis to open its hand. Here, he is again copying his counterpart in Bush when the American president valiantly challenged the Iraqi insurgents to "Bring it on". While the Arab neighbors are shaking in their boots and have already voiced their alarm over the Iranian president's cavalier remarks about Israel, Ahmadinejad has been behaving in such reckless abandon that might mean he is really up to something!

 

Could it be he realizes how important Iran's cooperation will ultimately be in stabilizing the situation in Iraq and Afghanistan? Perhaps he understands that the express ticket for America to extricate itself from the current quagmire in the Middle East must be endorsed by Iran. Perhaps he also believes that the Israeli regime would go to any length to keep America embattled in the region for as long as it serves Israel's grand agendas. So, Ahmadinejad might have figured, why not stir the pot and see what churns up; America doing what is best for America, or looking the other way and allowing Israel to engulf the region in a bigger inferno with America in it.

 

Whatever Ahmadinejad's motives, one thing is for sure: the likelihood of removing Israel from the face of the map to remedy Iran's international dilemmas is as much as making the Alborz Range disappear in order to solve Tehran's smog problems; like it or not, fair or unfair, they're both there to stay.

 

There are plausible ways of dealing with Tehran's suffocating smog problem, and the city municipality is taking measures to tackle the problem, or at least it should. By reducing the traffic congestion and regulating other pollutants the problem can become manageable.

 

In the international arena, and specifically with regards to the relations with the United States, crying foul and complaining about Israel's stranglehold over the American foreign policy in the Middle East, no matter how true, will not produce positive results for Iran or any other Islamic state in that region. So, if Israel and its influence in Washington cannot be simply wished away, sanity dictates that other means be adopted to go around, rather than through, the immovable obstacle to get to other side.