On what basis does Iran deny the Holocaust?

Great Debates
1

I know there have been threads on this subject before but I was wondering if anyone knows WHY Iran denies so forcefully the Holocaust. Appearently they are getting ready to launch a “Holocaust conference” to look more deeply into the event…while still being convinced that its just a European plot to justify Israel.

For debate: How wide spread is this view in Iran? Do a large percentage of people REALLY think that its all a European plot to justify Israel? Why…where does that come from? Is this widely believed outside Iran…say in the ME in general? Is this taught in their schools as a ‘myth’ (in Iran…in the ME)? What are implications of this attitude?

Feel free to discuss any other aspects of this troubling attitude (or feel free to discuss why its not troubling at all).

-XT

2

Hell, I see people HERE thinking that the idea of reestablishing Israel began with the Holocaust.

3

they are holding a conference on the Holocaust ? Pray tell me what for? Does anyone really feel the impact of the Holocaust anymore. Hopefully our sympathy specifically for the Jews, does not wear thin, but I tell you, our sympathy for the Jews is a 20th century phenomenon, something Jews haven’t experienced ever in their history, and that is why I think the Holocaust is very important to them. And the enemies of the Jews, and I’m cofident that history will bear me out has been fairly consistant since the Exodus.

So America, which reacts to deep ugly sins of the past, finally realizes it needs to adjust their attitude towards Jews. That was because of the Holocaust. (perpetrated by an ethnic group at the core of the concept of white supremacy)Yet a lot of us are beginning to wonder that the enemies of the Jews know this too. Thinking like a fucked up fanatic intelligent muslim he might realize that the way to break the tenuous support for Israel is to undermine the core of the reason for US support.

Anyone who supports a homeland for the Jews in the midst of an reasonably hostile world needs to know that this time is not for ever.

Enemies like Iran need to be taken very, very seriously.

4

I think because they are crazy fuckers pretty much covers it. Which is why it worries me that they could eventually have the Bomb.

From my experience in Yemen, I’ve heard similar (keep in mind it’s not something I’d bring up in normal conversation, so the few people I hear this stuff from may be the ones who truly believe it and are more likely to talk about it). But then I’ve also heard that the CIA props up the Yemen government (I don’t know why as President Sallah received 97% of the vote in the last election), that the remains of giants were found in the vicinity that proves some biblical story (evidence was an obviously doctored photo someone had picked up from the web), and that Chinese people eat babies (more photos from the web and baby humans in case you misunderstood. No I am not joking)…All this from people who mostly have university degrees and have been educated in places around the world. I shudder to think what the local people believe who never leave their villiages and have limited education.

I think people really fail to understand the fundemental differences in culture, education, and opportunity between here and the West. I think the biggest difference is the degree of skepticism we have. In the West if we see something that looks odd we tend to question it, here is doesn’t seem to be the case. Part of it results from , imho, a lack of emphasis on critical thinking skills. They aren’t taught to question things as we are from time we first enter school. It is only introduced later maybe in secondary school, or university. Please understand I am talking degrees of difference, not absolutes. And none of this reflects on intelligence. It is just the differences between the environments that we were raised in.

5

The “conference” and the recent remarks by Iran’s president are purely political. They are intended to keep alive the notion that the Jews invented the story of the Nazi atrocities (or inflated their actual numbers) for the purpose of bribing/coercing the fledgling Western European dominated United nations into “giving” land to the Jews on which to create Israel.

It is basically revisionist history for the purpose of propaganda.

That said, it is widely believed in the Middle East. When we first decided to make Pakistan our ally so as to have potential land access to Afghanistan, there were several stories published that related the news that many of Pakistan’s top military and senior government officials believed that the Holocaust was a fiction.
Throughout the last few years, it has become pretty evident to people reading background news stories that a considerable number of government and military officials in Egypt, Jordan, Yemen, Kuwait, Turkey, and other nations believe that the Holocaust is either a fiction or an exaggeration. (Note that a 65 year old official would be too young to have actually seen news stories published at the time the camps were opened or the Nuremburg trials were held. There are several entire generations who have heard only the dismissive tales rather than the truth.)

If Iran can hold a “conference” in which they simply reiterate the standard anti-semitic lies, it will re-inforce the views already held by very large segments of the population while giving an “academic” stamp of approval to those lies.

6

One of my employees told me a story about his grandfather who lived in that time. They lived in a small villiage outside of Sana’a. The person at the market told them to stock up on oil for their lamps and stoves. Why he asked? Well, there is this war somewhere up north that is making it hard to get supplies. Apparently, that was the extent of their knowledge about WW2 until sometime after it was over.

7

The short answer is that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is Pat Roberts to the 10th power (with an army). A week doesn’t go buy that he doesn’t say something that isn’t totally nuts. In a country that just got it’s first private bank he managed to lower their stock market by 30% with a couple of sentences. He views the market as the work of the devil and suggested executing some of those involved. He believes the next (final) prophet is about to arrive and that the timetable can be influenced (Islam’s version of Armageddon).

In a country where they often end parliamentary sessions with chants of “death to America” it is unnerving to think of them acquiring nuclear weapons. His vilification of Israel and the desire to destroy it would certainly fit into an acceleration of Armageddon in order to bring forth the 12th prophet.

8

He doesn’t have an army. The Iranian presidency has no command and control authority over the Iranian military.

That article isn’t awful, but it is rather speculative ( and it does make an outright error when it says all Muslims believe in a Mahdi - not all do, not even all Shi’a - for example the Zaidi sect of Shi’ism reject the idea entirely ). At any rate Ahmadinejad has very limited real power. The article notes:

The main rift is no longer between “reformists” and “hardliners”, but between the clerical establishment and Mr Ahmadinejad’s brand of revolutionary populism and superstition.

Which is a bit simplistic ( the “reformists” are still there, just pushed into the background and lines between factions aren’t always that clearly drawn ), but okay for shorthand. But there is no question who comes out on top in such a confrontation - there is a reason Iran is referred to as a theocracy.

Yeah, maybe - he certainly seems nutty enough. Then again, maybe not. I don’t think any definitive proof of that has been shown - that slightly sensationalistic article certainly doesn’t. But again from the article:

The prospect of such a man obtaining nuclear weapons is worrying.

He won’t. He’s the President of Iran - he will never have control of military assets barring a successful coup/second revolution decided in his favor.

Anyway count me as among those that those with real power are far more pragmatic. They may rattle sabers till the cows come home, but I think they are no more likely to nuke Tel Aviv than Pakistan is to hit New Delhi ( i.e. it is possible, but only under extreme duress ). I think they know what the consequences would be to a nuclear exchange.

At any rate, worrisome it may be ( and is, honestly - I’m not partial to the mullahs myself ), it is also almost certainly inevitable. For most everybody. I’m more likely to sweat some staff sergeant tyrant in some little African nation getting the Bomb and sadly some day we may have to.

As to xtisme’s op, pretty much what tom said.

  • Tamerlane
9

Is there anything to indicate that the clerics who run the country are in disagreement with him?

I would think the more countries who have the Bomb the more likely it will be used eventually.

10

I think jews have played the holocaust card way to many times. I personally am fed up with ever more films about jews in WWII. Justifying Israels existance should go beyond what happened 60 years ago. If all Israel had to justify its existance was the holocaust then they would deserve to be razed… but I think the fact that they have a pretty well working society and country… that they are prosperous should be ample reason for Arabs/Islam to stop denying Israel’s existance. They would be better off getting over it.

Why do so many keep denying the holocaust I don’t know. My guess is political expediency and self justification. Its politically beneficial for these guys to bash Israel. The same way its for American politicians to bash Terrorists… etc… My reaction is that the Iranian president is trying to divert attention from more pressing internal problems and mismanagement. Familiar tactics no ?

I certainly understand why many would say that the holocaust was exagerated. Its been overdone time over time. I visited a concentration camp where jews were “only” 20% of the inmates. Too much spotlight on jews… and too little on what other people suffered. Still arguing if it was 2 million or 6 million jews isn’t that relevant… its millions of people anyway ! The holocaust was real… degree of deaths varying or not. Its silly to deny it.

11

Must be those Jewish owners of television station hey ?

Never in all my time on the SDMB have I read a poster consider that there is possible justification for wiping out a people. What if all that Israel had going for them is that they are prosperous and have a working society?

Why, because they have the facts? Or is it because they just hate Jews.

12

Israel was never intended to be a refugee camp for WWII survivors was it ? Especially after the war was over. Millions of other people were displaced of all sorts of beliefs and ethnic minorities. I don’t see the US or Europe rallying behind a Gypsy nation or a Kurdish nation nowadays… why ? Politics played a strong part. Israel certainly didn’t come into existance in nice circumstances as far as palestinians are concerned… but now that its done and over… let the Israelis live there. The holocaust as the sole reason for Israel would be enough for you ? (Cold analysis of course… )

I doubt the Iranians and Arabs care for facts… its all about hating Israel. Facts seem to be a rare commodity for policy decisions lately.

13

Oh and sorry if I sound callous to the plight of the Jewish people… but its how I see it. It happened it was horrible… but its shouldn’t justify certain things. The idea of giving them a homeland was nice and such… but its been a major problem for world peace ever since. Though I blame that more on the US and Europe than the Jews. Using the Holocaust for politics 60 years ago or nowadays is wrong no matter who does it.

14

I can think of no less than 5 times I’ve read a poster calling for a genocide of Palestinian people or of an Islamic people from the Middle East.

“Sheet of glass” ring any bells?

15

Rashak, it’s as much a creation of the breakup of the Ottoman Empire as anything. There were ‘enough’ Jews in Israel before WWII, who owned the land in the area, to be significant. People had been buying it from absentee owners for decades. (And, in fact, the Palestinians who lived there were mostly tenant farmers on the lands of the absentee owners.) After WWII, the Brits had to turn a undefined land into countries. I don’t know why they made Israel so horribly distorted, but they did. I suspect they didn’t want the Jews to survive, either.

So, specifically, this is the fault of the British.

Not that there were a whole lot, but there were a good amount.

This was entirely without British help. And with a good amount of British hinderance. So, by this point, they were a really large part of the population entirely on their own.
By around 47, when they finally established the state, the population doubled again.
So you have over a million tougher than nails, pissed off, heavily armed Jews in the area.
It wasn’t a matter of giving them a homeland. It was a matter of them building it on their own.

16

“Revisionist history for the purpose of propaganda” fits pretty well. Add in a dose of religious extremism, a heaping helping of scapegoating for political advantage and a dash of bull goose lunacy, and you have a recipe for Iran’s leadership.

Congratulations, this is your best output since “Jews stick out like a sore thumb and have lots of money.”

Iran’s president does stuff like this (a “holocaust conference”) because he knows that to a varying extent, he will always find an appreciative audience.

17

Since I am unable to provide a specific cite proving that no doper has called for genocide, would you care to provide a cite backing your assertion. “Sheet of Glass” does not ring any bells.

18

I am not going to dig up the link or name the poster after this long a time, but folllowing the WTC/Pentagon attack one poster claimed that the U.S. was going to turn Afghanistan into a sheet of glass (the effect fo massive nuclear assault) and indicated that the attack would be the appropriate response.

19

Someting to do perhaps with all the Holocaust Denial going on in the world? Mostly I see a big noise about the holocaust only after some crackpot or other goes off the deep end with yet another holocaust denial.

As to the roots of Israel – E-Sabbath pretty much nailed it… Jews were interested enough in establishing a homeland in Palestine by the turn of the 20th century (Herzl). By the end of WWI, we were vocal enough to elicit the Balfour Declaration from the newly conquering British (Nov. 2, 1917). We were fighting the British (and the local Palestinian polulation) for independence in earnest by the 1930’s. David Ben-Gurion issued the famous quote that “(we) would fight the war as if there was no White Paper and fight the White Paper as if there was no war” during WWII (White Paper == Immigration quotas and continuous whittling down of the Homeland the Jews were to receive under the aforementioned Balfour Declaration)

By 1948, when the British ceded their Mandate in Palestine and the state of Israel was declared within the Partition boundaries agreed to by the UN on Nov. 29 1947, the Jewish population of Palestine was about 650,000. This despite repeated and vigorous attempts by the British to stem the influx of Jews (many of them fleeing Europe and the Holocaust – hence perhaps the preceived tie.) Within the next 4 years, as soon as immigration was unlimited, this population was trebled by the huge influx created by the forced exodus of nearly all Jews from Arab coiuntries.

20

Hhhhmmm… never heard about that effect of a massive nuclear assault… is it true ? I’ve seen the result of concrete under high temperature going jade like color. Interesting.

As for the topic… I’m not denying the holocaust in case your implying so. Just why it keeps being so important in issues where it shouldn’t. Examples being Israel. I’m well aware of how Israel came to be… and I don’t think the holocaust is the main reason. It helped naturally.

Still I see the Iranian president doing the same things Bush & Co. are doing. Demonizing the enemy and basically rallying people around a common enemy. Politics at its worse… I’m actually surprised it works. If I’d criticize Israel I’d do it around how they treat palestinians or something else.