U.S. Politics Online: A Political Discussion Forum - View Single Post - Iranian state TV runs series on Holocaust in primetime

Ainoow · #1 (**permalink**) 10-15-2007

Quote:

Even as President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denies or questions the Holocaust, Iranians have been glued to their TV sets watching the concluding episodes of a 22-part, government-financed docu-drama in which an Iranian saves his Jewish sweetheart from the Nazi death camps. Not only is the Holocaust not denied or questioned, its Jewish victims are treated with unambiguous sympathy.

In Zero Degree Turn, a half-Iranian, half-Palestinian named Habib Parsa falls in love with a French Jewish girl while studying in Paris. Later, as an official at the Iranian embassy, he arranges to issue Iranian passports to the girl and her mother and send them to safety in Tehran.

Director Hassan Fathi says the story is based on Abdol Hussein Sardari, a real-life charge d'affaires at the Iranian embassy in Paris, who saved some 1,000 European Jews by forging Iranian passports so they could exit the country in an exodus of Iranian Jews back to Iran.

That's fine, but why would Iranian TV air such a series--Ramadan is the prime month for television viewing--if Ahmadinejad is so hostile to Jews and denies the Holocaust? State television in Iran is entirely controlled by the highest authority in the land, Supreme Leader Ayatullah Ali Khamenei.

No doubt Ahmadinejad finds questioning of the Holocaust a convenient way to stir up support for his anti-Israel campaign. In one swoop, he can suggest that Jews made up or exaggerated the Holocaust, that the Holocaust unjustifiably led to the expulsion of Palestinians from their homeland, and that Europeans, not Muslims, are responsible for any harm done to Jews. Simple messages like these play well to Ahmadinejad's domestic base of religious and poor Iranians and to an audience of Israel-hating Muslims around the world that he seeks to mobilize for international stature.

But in the next breath, Ahmadinejad himself will point out that he has no problem with Jews, only with Zionists. As the Wall Street Journal's Farnaz Fassihi wrote, one of the aims of the series was "to draw a clear distinction between the government's views about Judaism -- which is accepted across Iranian society -- and its stance on Israel."

Nonetheless, it is interesting that Iranian TV would give such prominence to a Holocaust series so soon after Ahmadinejad created a storm of controversy with his remarks denying the Holocaust. Knowing how Khamenei strives to keep balance in Iran's policies, and how upset he reportedly was that Ahmadinejad's inflammatory statements needlessly heightened the West's confrontation with Iran, it's possible that the Leader sought to demonstrate Iran's other face. When it comes to Iran, it pays to take a closer look at the country's intricate politics before rushing to conclusions.

Iran TV's Holocaust Series - The Middle East Blog - TIME

I can only hope this will help a lot of Americans realize that actually they know very little about Iran outside from what the 'official channels' want them to know/believe about it.