Iran’s Vice President Makes Anti-Semitic Speech at Conference

By THOMAS ERDBRINK
June 26, 2012
NYT
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/27/world/middleeast/irans-vice-president-rahimi-makes-anti-semitic-speech.html
TEHRAN — http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/iran/index.html?inline=nyt-geo \o More news and information about Iran. \t _blank Iran’s vice president used the lectern of an international antidrug conference here Tuesday to deliver a baldly anti-Semitic speech, blaming Judaism’s holy book, the Talmud, for teaching how to suck blood from people and for causing the spread of illegal drugs around the world. 
European diplomats in attendance during the speech by the vice president, Mohammad-Reza Rahimi, expressed shock. Even Iranian participants in the conference, co-sponsored by Iran and the United Nations, privately wondered at the Iranian government’s motivation for allowing such a speech, even given its longstanding antagonism toward Israel. More than 25,000 Jews live in Iran and they are recognized as a religious minority, with a representative in Parliament. 
The speech seemed bound to further isolate Iran just days before a new set of onerous Western economic sanctions, notably a European embargo on Iranian oil, is set to be enforced because of the longstanding dispute over – HYPERLINK http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/iran/nuclear_program/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier \o Recent and archival news about Iran's nuclear program. \t _blank Iran’s nuclear program, which Iran says is peaceful and Western nations and Israel suspect is a cover to develop the ability to make http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/science/topics/atomic_weapons/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier \o More articles about nuclear weapons. \t _blank nuclear weapons. 
Mr. Rahimi, second in line to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said the Talmud teaches to “destroy everyone who opposes the Jews.” 
The “Zionists” are in firm control of the illegal drug trade, he said, asking foreign dignitaries to research his claims. “Zionists” is Iran’s ideological term for Jews who support the state of Israel. 
“The Islamic Republic of Iran will pay for anybody who can research and find one single Zionist who is an addict,” Mr. Rahmini said. “They do not exist. This is the proof of their involvement in drugs trade.” 
What made his remarks even more striking is that Iran’s fight against illegal drugs is one of the few issues in which the Islamic Republic can count on Western sympathy. Iran’s battle to stop the flow of drugs coming in from neighboring Afghanistan has often been mentioned as a potential field of cooperation during negotiations between world powers and Iran over the country’s nuclear program. 
Several Iranian ministers gave politically neutral briefings of the impact of the drug trade on the country. Antonio De Leo, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes representative in Iran, praised the Islamic Republic for being a “key strategic partner in the fight against drugs.” 
Mr. Rahimi, who spoke after Mr. De Leo, told stories of gynecologists killing black babies on the orders of the Zionists and claimed that the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 was started by the Jews, adding that mysteriously no Jews died in that uprising. 
He said the Talmud teaches the Jews to think they are a superior race. “They think God has created the world so that all other nations can serve them,” he said. 
Halfway through the speech, Mr. Rahimi said there was a difference between Jews who “honestly follow the prophet Moses” and the Zionists who are “the main elements of the international drugs trade.” 
A European diplomat said afterward: “This was definitely one of the worst speeches I have heard in my life. My gut reaction was: why are we supporting any cooperation with these people?” 
But the diplomat, who declined to be identified by name or country, defended his presence at the conference. “If we do not support the United Nations on helping Iran fight drugs, voices like the one of Mr. Rahimi will be the only ones out there,” he said. 
One Shiite Muslim cleric, a judge, said that he was appalled by the speech. The judge, who also requested anonymity because of his sensitive position, said the world must ignore Mr. Rahimi and he hoped that Mr. Rahimi and Mr. Ahmadinejad would disappear after the presidential elections in 2013. “We all need to be patient for some more months.”