Iran Media Put Words in Biden’s Mouth

October 25, 2024 

The Iranian media often tamper with the news to make it conform to state propaganda. It did that again recently when many news outlets in Iran reported that President Biden had confirmed claims by the Islamic Republic that its April 13 missile attack on Israel was a major success that was “devastating.” Biden said nothing of the sort. The quote was made up. Biden did use the word “devastating,” but he did not say the Iranian attack was “devastating, he said it “could have been devastating,” the exact opposite of what Iranian media said.

The news coverage in Iran cited Biden’s May 25 speech at the ceremonies for this year’s graduating class at the US Military Academy at West Point, New York. In that speech, Biden cited “Iran’s recent unprecedented attack on Israel.” He lauded the unified response to the attack, saying, “We swiftly ended what could have been a devasting attack, and we deescalated the conflict, when it easily could have gone the other way.” But that’s not what the Iranian media reported. The speech was quoted in both the Farsi and English media in Tehran, but we will cite just the English media to avoid any problems with translation.

Both the Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA), which is the official state-owned news agency, and the Mehr News Agency, used exactly the same story, one presumably lifting its text from the other. In their English language reports, both said: “Without referring to the Israel bloodshed of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, the US president praised the role of the American army in defending the Zionist regime. ‘Iran’s massive drone and missile attack on Israel was devastating. And I appreciate the US military for responding quickly and helping Tel Aviv to defend itself against the attack’.” The sentences within quotation marks, however, do not appear in Biden’s West Point speech.

The Tehran Times also carried a story, though it avoided carrying a full quote. It said, “While refraining from directly addressing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in Gaza, the president commended the swift response of the American military in aiding Tel Aviv against Iran’s assault, describing it as ‘devastating’.” A day later, IRNA carried a one-paragraph story that correctly said, “US President Joe Biden has pointed out that if it was not for the US’s assistance, Iran’s attack against the Israeli regime could have been ‘devastating’.” That story did not say it was correcting the previous day’s story.