A video introduction to Iran's Jewish community
Iran's president wished them all a happy Rosh Hashanah this week.Iran and U.S. still seeking peace, despite Syria tension
A rare silver lining in a region full of bad news.A brief video introduction to Iran’s Jewish community (yes, really!)
And then there’s the other reason the tweets got so much attention: It seemed to take some people by surprise that, yes, Iran has Jews, maybe as many as 20,000 or 25,000. There’s not a whole lot written about them, but they seem to be much better off than many Americans might assume, given the anti-Semitic rhetoric from not just Ahmadinejad but many hard-line Iranians during the annual Quds Day event in Tehran.
The above video is a brief introduction to what’s left of Iran’s Jewish community (most of them left after the 1979 revolution), how they got there and how they’re doing. For a bit more on life for Iranian Jews under Ahmadinejad, read this 2009 column by the New York Times’ Roger Cohen.
ctual good news: U.S. and Iran still looking for peace, despite tension over Syria
Iran’s new president, Hassan Rouhani, waves after being sworn in at the parliament in Tehran last month. (Ebrahim Noroozi/AP)
Jasmin Ramsey of the Inter Press Service has sorted through the signals out of Iran since President Obama started moving toward attacking the Islamic Republic’s closest ally. Although it’s anybody’s guess what would happen if the United States goes through with strikes, Ramsey found that Tehran has seemed surprisingly intent on moving forward on possible rapprochement with the West. And she’s got the analysis to back it up.
One of the most telling data points is that Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, though far from condemning Bashar al-Assad for his alleged use of chemical weapons, has offered a surprisingly weak defense of the Syrian leader, who may well be Iran’s closest ally. Don’t expect Iran to change its policy on Syria — Rouhani opposes U.S. strikes, of course — but it’s striking that the Iranian president’s rhetorical support for Syria is softening as the United States moves toward strikes, which is exactly the moment you’d expect an Iranian leader to be most loudly backing Assad and condemning Obama.
And yet, Iran’s new leaders are not only resisting the pressure from internal hard-liners to take a strong stand against the United States, they’re actually sending even more signals of peace and compromise at the exact moment you’d expect them to do the opposite.
Obama started this dance when he first became president in 2009, sending two letters to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and signaling that he wanted to work toward a mutually acceptable peace deal. He was rebuffed – and forced to curtail his efforts after Iran’s violent 2009 crackdown on the opposition “green movement” – but a month ago Rouhani took office.
Rouhani immediately softened official rhetoric toward the United States and made one statement after another expressing his desire to compromise and and find peace. Then he appointed American-educated diplomat Mohammad Javad Zarif as his foreign minister. Zarif had a played a big role in the Iranian effort, in 2003, to quietly offer a peace deal to the United States (the effort was rebuffed by the George W. Bush administration). Ultimately, Tehran’s decision will be made by Khamenei, not Rouhani or Zarif, but the pieces are falling into place. And, as Ramsey documents, Iran’s president and his government have been pointedly avoiding lots of hard-line pressure to back away from their gestures of peace.
No one can be sure the United States and Iran will find peace, but if it’s possible, then this moment would seem like the best we’re going to get — and maybe have ever had in almost 20 years of trying. So it has deeply concerned some Iran-watchers in the United States, including those who support strikes against Syria, that the country’s potential intervention in a war that Iran sees as crucial to its national interests could kill our big chance at peace. And it’s possible that, ultimately, that will happen. But it implies a great deal about Rouhani and Zarif’s apparent desire for peace that they would still be pushing for it at this of all moments.
Obama's four big points on Syria
"People look to the United States and ask, 'What are you going to do?'"Obama demands Congress clarifiy U.S. military intervention in Syria and beyond
(AP)
Obama seeks global support on Syria
Even
as the president acknowledges opposition in his own country, he urges
world leaders to take punitive action against Assad regime.
