February 21-2014
Foreign Minister Mohammad-Javad Zarif complained this week about Iranian officials who have embarked on a binge of verbal attacks on American State Department officials.
Majlis Speaker Ali Larijani, who is one of the most vocal officials constantly flaying the United States, also called on Iranians just to ignore what the Americans say about Iran—presumably like the United States just ignores what Iran says about America.
The Iranian rhetorical assaults are simply ignored in the United States and the rest of the world but are given extensive coverage in the Iranian media. The reason for the sudden splurge of often-personalized attacks isn’t clear, but some think the point is to undermine support for the negotiations with the United States by portraying American diplomats as nasty, untrustworthy and uncultured people who hate Iran and Iranians.
That would in turn make Zarif’s job that much more difficult.
But on Sunday, Zarif said recent US official statements “against” Iran should simply be ignored because Americans have always talked nonsense about Iran.
Zarif told state television officials the US always repeated its “old position” and has not provided any new or attractive policies on Iran over 35 years of frictions between the two countries.
He said, “Iranians have always demonstrated that such words have no value and are not accepted.”
Zarif pointed to Majlis Speaker Larijani’s statement that anti-Iran comments by the United States should not be paid any attention and that “these words are not new and the US has always spoken like this.”
Zarif didn’t cite any specifics. But in the last few weeks, Iranian officials have complained loudly when US Secretary of State John Kerry repeated the decade-old US refrain about all options being on the table for dealing with Iran.
They also went into a frenzy after US Under Secretary of State Wendy Sherman told Congress that tough sanctions forced Iran to come to the negotiating table.
Most recently, there were many complaints when the State Department issued a statement urging Iran to free Mir-Hossain Musavi and Mehdi Karrubi, the 2009 losing presidential candidates.
A number of analysts questioned the good sense of giving extensive publicity to those remarks in the Iranian media. “Most Iranians believe sanctions forced Iran into talks and Reformists are delighted to see that Washington hasn’t forgotten about Musavi and Karrubi,” said one.
The “all options are on the table” refrain may be different, however. Iran cites that as evidence the United States is a warmonger, even though the phrase is just a hollow one, devoid of all meaning. If all options really were on the table, then abject surrender to Iran would be there.
Even President Rohani has joined in assailing the “options” remark. In his speech on the occasion of the revolution’s 35th anniversary, an occasion when Iran’s conservatives are appealed to, Rohani said, “I say explicitly to those delusional people who say the military option is on the table that they should get new glasses…. Our nation regards the language of threat as rude and offensive.” That was rather strong language, not to mention undiplomatic language, to apply to Kerry.
