It is difficult, if not impossible, to have a coherent discussion of foreign affairs during an election year.  As I argue in my new book, Losing Hurts Twice as Bad:  The Four Stages to Moving Beyond Iraq, politics is the eternal enemy of strategy.  National interest always takes a back seat to partisan political interests until campaigns come to an end.

Unfortunately, world events always refuse to wait for our elections to be over.  How rude.

Yosemite Sam: the ideal candidateGenerally speaking, electoral pressures encourage candidates toward the irresponsible.  Fearful of looking weak, candidates struggle to out-macho each other at every turn and prove to the electorate that they are the one most able to keep the country safe.  Wisdom and prudence simply do not garner as do many votes as do belligerence and bombast.  Most Americans, it often seems, would rather vote for Yosemite Sam than George Kennan.

We certainly see this dynamic at work in this election cycle.  Last month, a remote, rather inconsequential conflict in the Caucasus was elevated by both campaigns into a test of Western mettle against the re-arming Russian bear.  Never mind that there are no U.S. interests whatsoever at stake in South Ossetia and Abkhazia; if the presidential candidates are to be believed, the fate of the world lies in the balance.

The same dynamic will unfold this week as President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran comes to New York to speak at the United Nations.  His visit has provided a good opportunity for hawks to remind us all of how much danger we are in from the possibility of an Iranian nuclear bomb.  Michael Ledeen of the American Enterprise Institute tells us that Ahmadinejad is in love with death.  A bipartisan group of foreign policy notables reminds us that "everyone needs to worry about Iran."  Sarah Palin may have been the first candidate to jump on board the be-very-afraid bandwagon, arguing that Ahmadinejad "must be stopped," but she will not be the last.

It may prove very difficult for the United States to resist the temptation to elevate the backwards, medieval Iranian regime into our next enemy du jour.  Iran may be the main state sponsor of terrorism in today's world, and its government certainly continues to espouse a rather extreme form of Islam, but it need not be a threat to the interests of the United States.  The Iranian economy is a basket case; its military, little better.  The Islamic Republic may be able to stave off collapse for as long as petrodollars keep flowing in, but they will not be able to mount anything resembling a serious challenge to U.S. power.  They are important only to the extent that we make them so.  Wise policy, therefore, would ignore them, which we could begin to do once we got out of Iraq.

Instead there will be serious pressures from right-wing circles in the United States in coming months and years for military action to prevent the Iranians from developing nuclear weapons.  Tehran has been "six months away" from an atom bomb since I was in junior high; nevertheless, today there is reason to believe that they may actually be drawing fairly close.  Cooler heads may suggest that such a move may well be inevitable, and that the United States would do better to try to determine how it will deal with, rather than prevent the emergence of, a nuclear Iran.  Not only are the military options unlikely to work, they are also unnecessary. 

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: He ever fails to communicate.One of the great truths in international politics is that small countries and big countries never really understand one another.  The weak cannot ever fully trust the strong, since one mistake can lead to the destruction of their country; the strong, on the other hand, don't understand the level of paranoia that their overwhelming power creates in the weak.  It is only by keeping this in mind can we comprehend the dynamics of the relationship between Iran and the United States.

Iran has seen its neighbors to the east and west attacked and quickly conquered.  It has made a series of diplomatic overtures, which were apparently answered with its inclusion on the "axis of evil."  Its economy is in shambles, with most sectors centrally controlled and remarkably inefficient.  About ninety percent of its population receives its income from the state.  Both unemployment and inflation rates are in the double digits.  Iranian military spending rose dramatically following the U.S. attack on Iraq, but it still is only around $10 billion per year.  The United States, by comparison, spends around $750 billion, once the costs of Iraq and Afghanistan are factored in.  Any war between the two would last about a half hour, and both sides know it.  Perhaps it is little wonder, then, that Tehran has decided to seek the ultimate equalizer, nuclear weapons.

The United States sees in Iran an expansionist, irrational Islamic fundamentalist state that is actively trying to dominate the Persian Gulf.  Its President is an old-school populist demagogue, fond of denying both the Holocaust and the existence of homosexuals in his country.  They support terrorist groups in Lebanon and Israel, and actively work to undermine Iraqi democracy (and kill U.S. troops).  These kinds of actions are the mark of an enemy, a state certainly not to be trusted with nuclear weapons because unlike rational states, there is no guarantee that Iran can be deterred.

However, as my book explains, those foreign policy analysts who call themselves "realists" see no reason to believe that that the Iranians will prove to be much different from any other state.  The theocrats in Iran have the same main priority as any other ruling group:  self-preservation.  Never before in the history of the world has any country committed suicide.  No leader has ever worked his or her way up the ladder of government to achieve the top position only to kill himself and his countrymen.  Gross miscalculation has of course occurred - Saddam Hussein comes to mind - never but intentional national suicide.  Nuclear weapons tend to concentrate the mind, virtually eliminating the possibility of miscalculation.  Leaders know that if they use these weapons, they will be destroyed in an overwhelming response.  Any Iranian use of nuclear weapons would be suicidal, not accidental.  And entirely unprecedented.

Were they to get a nuclear weapon, the leaders of Iran would not launch it against Israel unless they were prepared to see their rule, and their desire for a Shi'ite power bloc, come to an end.  Giving a bomb to Hezbollah or Hamas would be the functional equivalent of using it, because since nuclear explosions leave radiation "signatures" that can be traced back to the point of their origin.  There would be no possibility, therefore, to deny how these groups got their bombs, and Tehran (or at least the regime) would still face retaliation.  Realism therefore counsels that even theocrats would act rationally with the ultimate weapon, no matter how much bluster emerges from Tehran.  What Iran does is far more important than what their clownish president says.  And overall, Iran - like every country - tends to act in accordance with its national interests.  Destruction of the state is certainly not one of those interests.

But we are getting ahead of ourselves.  Iranian nuclear weapons are not inevitable.  In fact, if we were truly interested in seeing their program shut down, we would get our troops out of Iraq post haste.  Our presence in Iraq ironically makes an Iranian bomb more likely.  Defense planners in Iran make the reasonable calculation that the only thing that could prevent them from meeting the same fate as their neighbors is a nuclear deterrent.  It is entirely rational that they would want one, and it would be the goal of any Iranian regime, whether it be a democracy or theocracy, as long as the threat posed by the United States seems to be so high. 

We will probably have to wait until this election is over to have a rational discussion of foreign policy.  Until then, we can hope that the candidates will not feel the need to follow through on their ridiculous campaign statements once they get into office.  The willingness to flip-flop away from irresponsibility is no vice.

Christopher Fettweis, author of Losing Hurts Twice As Bad, is guest blogging on Jewcy, and he'll be here all week.  Stay tuned. 

Commonly, the laws of war in Judaism are understood through the categories of milchemet mitzvah (commanded or holy war) and milchemet r'shut (optional war). These two categories-supplemented at times by the category of milchemet hovah (obligatory war), are helpful in outlining the acceptable and/or unacceptable practices of deploying violence on a massive scale. This is usually the first place that people turn to when trying to think about Jewish notions of just and unjust war.

I want to argue that this specific body of halachah or Jewish law is irrelevant to the contemporary discussion. To find moral insight about the justice of war in the Jewish tradition, one must turn to a less well trod part of the halachic field. A more technical and, in certain ways, legally more sophisticated halachic discussions reveals that these parts of halachah are embedded in a (by definition) particularistic and, at times, chauvinistic tradition. Yet, it is possible to extract a halachic claim from its particularist context by embracing rather than ignoring the specifics of that context.[2]

Continue reading...

Jeffrey Goldberg steps into the debate over the nature of Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's incendiary remarks about Israel, to call out Harvard Professor Stephen Walt of 'Walt-Mearsheimer' (in)fame(y) for downplaying the idea that Ahmadinejad is "inciting to genocide" (Walt's terms) in Israel. For reasons that a Persian speaker will readily comprehend (and a sufficiently deterimined non-sokhbako could figure out), I'm going to refer to the Iranian president by his nickname among his adoring people, 'Ahmaghinejad,' from here on out.

Goldberg's check and mate many times over is a tranche of Ahmaghinejad quotes, Call Him 'Ahmaghinejad' Or 'Avaleenejad': Iran laughs at, not with himfrom the notorious "wipe off the map" comment of October 2005, to a statement just this month, all of which are variously loathsome vamps on the old "Israel must cease to exist" standard. I've noted here at Jewcy before that Ahmaghinejad's "wipe off the map" remark of October 2005 is a mistranslation; my objections to repeating it are 1) it offends me as a student of Persian and 2) given the enormous supply of sickening comments from Ahmaghinejad re: Israel, of which Goldberg usefully provides a small but still representative sample, there isn't even a pragmatic rationale for persisting in mistranslating the remark. (We have an idea of what Ahmaghinejad says about Israel publicly; imagine what he says in private.) I'd hope Goldberg would credit the idea that, however merited objections to Walt and Mearsheimer are, fealty to the correct use and translation of Persian doesn't entail being an apologist for Ahmaghinejad.

The question, of course, is how best to interpret the comments. It's not a straightforward task, since Ahmaghinejad's speeches are littered with quotes from the Ayatollah Khomeini and from medieval Persian poets that involve idioms that don't correspond to anything in English, so figuring out what he meant involves either learning the language, or doing some careful inductive guesswork and hoping for the best.

Although I haven't been able to track down the originals of all the quotes Goldberg reproduces (there might be links on the Ahmadine-blog, in case somebody is willing to pore through the archives), I've looked at a few, and they have a number of recurrent features. Ahmaghinejad rarely if ever refers to Israel by name, but rather as رزیم اشفالگار (rezhim-e eshghalgar), the 'occupying regime', of which the first word is an obvious western import that only has a narrow, technical meaning referring to a particular governmental apparatus (generally, as in English, in pejorative tones). By contrast, the Persian words for 'country' and 'nation' in a broader, non-technical sense are کشور (keshvar) and ملت (mellat), respectively. Moreover, the stem of the key verbs in Ahmaghinejad's proclamations of Israel's doom (at least, in the ones I've looked at) is always شدن (shodan) rather than کردن (kardan). This is a major, not a minor semantic difference: the latter is used in active and indicative constructions; the former is used in passive and subjunctive constructions. Which means that, on strict semantics, Ahmaghinejad has been expressing either a belief that Israel will cease to exist or a desire that it will (or both), rather than stating a policy objective.

Now, none of this suggests for a moment that the narrow semantic values of Ahmaghinejad's declarations of the impending destruction of the state of Israel completely exhaust the messages he was communicating (that's the first lesson of practical linguistics). And the upshot of the fact that Ahmaghinejad, strictly speaking, fastened his attacks on the Israeli "regime" rather than Israel or the Israelis, and that he never explicitly signed on to the project of bringing about the destruction of that "regime," isn't that Ahmaghinejad was really talking about flowers and candy and has gotten a rough break in the Western press. On the contrary, it simply goes to show that a politician is a politician no matter where he's from, and what distinguishes even deranged racist ignoramus politicians from deranged racist ignoramus non-politicians is that the former will speak calculatingly, as the politicians that they are. So even though Ahmaghinejad isn't literally pledging the Iranian state to a policy of genocide, he is personally endorsing an event --- the destruction of the Israeli government --- that would very likely entail the slaying of large numbers of Israelis.

Furthermore, Walt's term 'incitement' is (unintentionally) spot-on. When a leader "incites violence," he or she seldom does so by literally telling those under his or her influence to go out and kill, injure or maim anyone (we would call that "ordering attacks," not "incitement to violence"). Rather, incitement standardly consists in pushing just the right buttons to spur violence while maintaining a veneer of deniability. And that, plainly, is part of what Ahmaghinejad has been communicating, i.e.: "While I, the terribly important president of this holy state don't have the time or inclination to get my hands dirty, it sure is about time somebody did something to remove the regime occupying Qods from the pages of time and history."

There's just no other plausible way of interpreting the comments while being simultaneously faithful to both semantics and to the pragmatic implications that enable us as human beings, rather than artificial intelligence, to communicate with one another. Call me crazy, but I have a feeling that if, say, an Afrikaner politician mused about how black rule in South Africa is shortly coming to an end and pre-emptively endorsed a campaign of violence and intimidation against Africans without literally pledging to be a part of it, nobody would have a difficult time understanding what was up.

But the heinousness of Ahmaghinejad's incitements immediately raises the question of just what influence he has, and this is where I break with Goldberg. Permit me this Godwin's law violation, since I'm committing it only to strengthen the case I'm arguing against. Suppose that Hitler had had all the beliefs about Jews that he did in fact have, desired to exterminate the Jewish people, etc., but lived out his days as a penurious mediocre landscape painter in Munich never committing so grave a crime as jaywalking. His beliefs themselves wouldn't be any less vile under those circumstances, but in such a scenario, the fact that he held those beliefs just wouldn't be very important. Indeed, it's a matter of simple statistical probability that there have been untold numbers of people whose personal antisemitism and genocidal fantasies were more virulent than Hitler's on some sort of one-to-one comparison of beliefs, but we just don't and shouldn't care about such people. What made Hitler a menace was not only the evil of his ideology, which on its own couldn't do anything, but also his control of the most powerful war machine in world history up to that point.

That's why fretting over Ahmaghinejad's remarks about Israel is a waste of energy, even as it's good to stay alert to the casual antisemitism that excuses such remarks but would never countenance equivalent incitements against other groups . Maybe --- maybe! --- there are some irredentists in Gaza or the West Bank whose Shi'ism is strong enough to overcome the hatred of Persians they've been taught since childhood, who don't recognize what a laughingstock Ahmaghinejad is in Iran, and who take the clear message of his remarks to heart. But how many such people could there be, who will engage in terrorism against Israel because of Ahmaghinejad, but wouldn't have otherwise? I strongly doubt it would take very many hands to count them all.

As for the significance of Ahmaghinejad's remarks for the Iranian government and Iranian society, it's basically non-existent. Despite the fact that his title is "President" --- as I'll continue to point out again and again --- Iranian state power is completely in the hands of the small circle of clerics around Ali Khamenei. Any power Ahmaghinejad exercises is at Khamenei & co.'s discretion, and can be rescinded on a whim. Indeed, as observers of the Iranian political scene well know, Khamenei's loathing of Ahmaghinejad is nearly as strong as that of educated Iranian society at large. Khamenei has barely tolerated Ahmaghinejad's presence in the government because he represented a significant, boorish segment of the Iranian "electorate" --- a term I bracket with scare quotes both because the pool of Iranian voters is not representative of the country, and the elections in which they vote do not have any practical effect on the composition of the real leadership. And now that Ahmaghinejad's buffoonery has destroyed whatever popular support he enjoyed, Khamenei and the clerics were swift to exclude him from the government in every respect except nominally.

To be sure, many of the interests the regime in Tehran is working to advance conflict with American interests, and the regime's suppression of liberal freedoms and abuse of women and homosexuals is abhorrent. Nonetheless, Khamenei et al., who do hold power, have demonstrated again and again that they are practitioners of realpolitik, unlike Ahmaghinejad, who is an apocalyptic fanatic but fortunately doesn't hold power.

And in fact, the United States and Israel have some significant interests in common with Iran. (Those Zionists who long for the days of the Shah can fill in the details of why Iran is Israel's only natural ally in the middle East.) American and Israeli strategic interests and security are threatened by militarized Sunni extremists; and so are Iranian strategic interests and security. Some of the worst disasters in western and central Asia that could befall the United States and Israel are the takeover of Iraq by Wahhabist fanatics, the recapture of Afghanistan by the Taliban, the Talibanization of Pakistan, or any combination thereof; those would arguably be even greater disasters for Iran. And the Iranian regime wants to preserve its power, which in practice will mean delivering economic prosperity; likewise, the US wants Iran to scuttle its nuclear research and militarization, and holds important keys to helping Iran achieve prosperity. And just to conclude scratching the surface, the Iranian people themselves, whatever the positions of their government, are decidedly pro-Western and pro-American.

These features of Iran's polity and society and of the international relations picture by no means guarantee that diplomatic engagement with the Islamic Republic will be successful; but they do nonetheless come with some welcome sureties. As long as Iran is controlled by Ali Khamenei, the chances of a first strike on a nuclear power with massive deterrent capabilities (e.g. the US or Israel) are effectively null. Such a strike would be suicide, and the actual Iranian regime, as opposed to its court jester, is not suicidal. Moreover, the foundation already exists, and indeed has existed for decades, for engagement with Iran not merely at the highest strata of the government, but with the Iranian people themselves. Say what you will about Zbigniew Brzezinski --- but don't dare say it about the recently departed, much beloved William Odom --- they had exactly the right approach for dealing with Iran, and helpfully put Ahmaghinejad in his rightful, unserious place in the process.

As Brzezinski elaborated in a recent appearance on Morning Joe (sorry, no transcript available), applying the model of long-term cultural penetration through semi-official outreach like Radio Free Europe, encouragement of consumerism, exposure to the fruits of western liberties, etc., that was so successful in weakening the Iron Curtain, has even stronger prospects for success in Iran, where popular affinity for Western and indeed American values is pervasive. Iran certainly presents a major foreign policy challenge, and even if it poses no existential threats, its sponsorship of anti-Israeli terrorism is intolerable.

But stamping our feet won't do anything about that, and coming to a correct moral judgment about Iranian support for Hezbollah and Mahmoud Ahmaghinejad's eliminationist fantasies is not even the beginning, let alone the end, of policy to curb the Iranian threat. In particular, devoting vastly more attention than he deserves to an antisemitic circus act who can only be relevant to the future of US- and Israeli-Iranian relations if Americans and Israelis elect to make him relevant, threatens to obscure the full picture, in which engagement with Iran, in addition to being a challenge, is also an enormous opportunity.

From: Adam LeBor

To: Shmuel Rosner

Dear Shmuel,

Thanks for your thoughtful response. Once again you raise some good points, the most crucial of which is the Big Question: the United Nations -- Angel or Satan? The case for the prosecution is heavy indeed: Bosnia, Rwanda and now, Darfur. And, as you say, the same mechanisms that prevented, and prevent, any meaningful action on these crises still hampers any decision on Iran. No matter how many times the International Atomic Energy Authority warns that Iran is not co-operating over its nuclear programmes the UN seems powerless to act. Member states -- and especially the five permanent members of the Security Council: the US, Great Britain, Russia, China and France -- still act in accordance with their national interests and realpolitik triumphs over any hazy ideas of humanitarian internationalism. We live in a world of nation-states, and have done so since the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648, which set out the principles of territorial integrity and non-intervention.

Except when the opposite suits. Jumping back to Bosnia, you absolutely right toTreaty Of Westphalia: Where the trouble began point out that "Clinton didn’t really move in the Balkans until he was certain that political damage will be greater if he didn’t act, than the possible damage if he does." By the summer of 1995, it was clear that the daily humiliations that the Bosnian Serbs were meting out to NATO troops were severely damaging the western alliance's credibility and self-respect. Moscow was watching and laughing. Clinton finally pushed to bomb the Bosnian Serbs as much to save NATO as to save Bosnia. And here, once again, the UN's report into Srebrenica, provides an interesting footnote.

The war in Bosnia began in spring 1992. Western powers repeatedly argued that there was no mandate to intervene to stop the killing. But when NATO did finally bomb the Bosnian Serbs, they needed some legal authorisation. They found it in Security Council resolution 836 that mandated UN peacekeepers to "deter attacks" on the safe areas such as Srebrenica. Resolution 836 was passed in June 1993. For two years American, British and other diplomats had argued that this resolution (which they had more or less crafted) did not provide a mandate to intervene in Bosnia. But when NATO's credibility became the key issue -- instead of the lives of starving, ragged, Bosnians -- Resolution 836 was suddenly re-interpreted. A miracle! It did allow for intervention.

The pattern continues today. Let's focus briefly on Darfur as an example. For the past five years Sudan has been carrying out a campaign of genocide in Darfur. And yes, it is genocide. Contrary to popular belief, genocide does not mean mass extermination, either industrial, such as the Holocaust or, by hand, such as happened in Rwanda in 1994. It means the intentional destruction of a group. The group here is the civilian population of Darfur, of whom about 300,000 have been killed, or died of hunger or disease, and more than two million displaced from their homes. This campaign is thoroughly planned and executed by the Sudanese government, using its own armed forces and paramilitaries known as the 'Janjaweed.' Just as happened in the Holocaust, many of the victims die from the decisions of the 'desk-murderers,' in this case the Sudanese officials and ministers who deliberately obstruct relief and medical supplies to the victims.

Meanwhile China bankrolls Sudan, supplies its weapons and military equipment, and keeps the Sudanese economy afloat by buying its oil. The US, and to a lesser extent Britain and France, make a lot of noise about Darfur and the need to stop the killing. Even the Bush administration has talked tough on Darfur. It's to America's credit that unlike in Europe, where the left is obsessed with Israel/Palestine to the exclusion of almost everything else, there is a vocal Darfur solidarity movement. But one not powerful enough to actually influence policy.

The west is complicit in the genocide in Darfur. The key to stopping the slaughter inDarfur: The west could stop this, but won't Darfur lies in Beijing as much as Khartoum. Western diplomats would have you believe that China is some great, immovable behemoth, impervious to criticism and incapable of altering her policies. That's complete nonsense. China has never been as vulnerable: under the human rights spotlight during the preparations for the Olympics, its coming-out on the world stage.

Now is the time for sustained pressure from the United Nations, to get the peacekeepers into the field, to get the relief supplies to those whose lives depend on them. And for sustained pressure on China to stop bankrolling Sudan. Neither of these are happening. Western governments play safe with China because it is the biggest market in the world. We need to sell to China, sure, but China also needs our computers, aircraft and cars. But tragically, there is no political will to even use the leverage that we have.

Faced with these circumstances it's hard to be optimistic about any kind of meaningful reform of the UN. The new Human Rights Council, which replaced the discredited Human Rights Commission, shows how western concepts of human rights are being ever more marginalised. The council, whose agenda is dominated by Islamic and Arab countries, is obsessed with Israel. Only a handful of resolutions passed at the May 2008 session were concerned with specific countries. Four of these condemned Israel. Sudan, and Burma, for example, got one each.

We can doubtless look forward to more of the same, when, next year, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Cuba take their seats. Increasingly, it seems to me, that the United Nations, which was supposed to unite the world in a drive to protect human rights, is now the forum where human rights abusers find support and sustenance. All of which raises the question of why the west, and the United States in particular, which pays 22 per cent of the UN's budget, keeps funding hate-fests for those states who have diametrically opposed ideas to ours about the meaning of the words 'human rights.' I have always thought the UN could be reformed but increasingly, I am starting to have doubts. Perhaps it's time to start thinking about an "League of Democracies" after all.

Very best,

Adam

From: Shmuel Rosner

To: Adam LeBor

Dear Adam,

Thank you for your letter. I now see that it was probably an error not to first detail more of the stories highlighted in your book, and only then move to ask the grand-question of "the UN, an angel or Satan."

So now you corrected my structural mistake, and we can go back to this question. You say that you'd first like to see a "a system of internal UN accountability that calls to account those officials involved in the UN’s failures" – but that is not a real answer to my question.

Or maybe it is; if one wants to see more accountability at the UN headquarters, oneAli Khamenei: Can the UN stop him from going nuclear? can still see the benefit of having the organization function properly. However, this is not an obvious conclusion for the reader of your book. As you rightly blame the permanent five members of the Security Council for failing to meet their duty, you also reveal the incoherence that is inherent to the process necessary to achieving any goal through this paralyzed body.

Consider a problem that we're all familiar with by now, sanctions on Iran. Whether it is wise or not to sanction Iran, whether sanctions can really stop Iran from pursuing its nuclear goals, whether it is even necessary to stop Iran from achieving its goals – all these are beside the point. We are now looking at the mechanism at the heart of every decision reached by the UN, and what you've masterfully detailed in regard to genocide in Rwanda is repeating itself in regard to Iran: an inability to reach a decision and to act upon it decisively that originates with the domestic considerations of the different members, and their conflicting interests in dealing with the world.

In his book A War In A Time Of Peace, the late David Halberstam was quoting an interview with Canadian General Romeo Dallaire – the one commander that was left in the field in Rwanda whom you mention in your letter. "Rarely had a commander at such a tragic venue" writes Haberstam, "been so unsparing of himself, even though his superiors had not listened to his warnings." Here is what Dallaire had to say:

I haven't even started my real mourning of the apathy and the absolute detachment of the international community, and particularly the western world, from the plight of Rwandans. Because fundamentally, to be very candid and soldierly, who the hell cared about Rwanda? I mean, face it. Essentially how many people remember the genocide in Rwanda?... Who comprehends that more people were killed, injured and displaced in three and a half months in Rwanda than in the whole of the Yugoslavian campaign in which we poured sixty thousand troops and the whole of the western world was involved there?

So yes – in theory they are all against murder and rape and violence. I'm sure they are. But you'll have hard time convincing Dallaire that they care enough. Not enough for the Chinese to support a more robust response to stop the atrocities in Darfur, not enough for Russia to stop Slobodan Milosevic, and apparently, not enough for Bill Clinton to support a military response in Rwanda. Washington, wrote Halberstam, "wanted no part of Rwanda. The political fallout from Somalia had caused enough damage."

Damage – political damage at home. And Clinton didn't really move in the Balkans until he was certain that the political damage would be greater if he didn't act, than the possible damage if he did. Political considerations at home were always a decisive factor for any government. When the British government headed by Tony Blair was reluctant to deal with Darfur, you write, "several British members of Parliament began to press the Blair government, which had once proudly announced a new, ethical, foreign policy, on its unwillingness to take a robust stand."

Now, you highlight the fact that careers were not hurt by the failure to preventBill Clinton With Rwandan Children: Ballsy catastrophe, but why would they be if, as you write in the book, "the Secretariat takes its cues from the P5." On the one hand you blame the countries represented at the Security Council, but on the other hand – lacking the means to punish them for their deeds or lack thereof – you want the bureaucrats to pay a price.

So maybe the problem is with the way this system was devised. Maybe we should stop hoping that the UN will somehow miraculously improve, and be more realistic about it. Maybe genocide can only be stopped if someone is willing to pick up the tab and pay the price of stopping it. Maybe sharing the power in a parliament-like world institution is the less efficient way of dealing with the horrors of the world.

And if that is the case – no technical fine-tuning of the way the UN operates can fix the problem. This can only be fixed by an overhaul of the international system. It could be this old-new idea of League of Democracies now promoted by presidential candidate John McCain, or it could be a decision by powerful countries, like the US, or powerful organizations, like NATO, that preventing genocide is a cause important enough as to justify circumventing the UN. This means unilateral action – an idea that was discredited by the Iraq war and that people here have no appetite for.

My grim conclusion will be this: as soon as the next genocide starts to take shape, you can start working on your new book. Unfortunately, it will be very similar to the one you already wrote.

Best,

Shmuel

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: Iranians call him "Ahmaghinejad" (meaning "son of an ass") One more thing about Jeffrey Goldberg's interview with John McCain: It was an object lesson in how completely John McCain's position on Iran depends on blatantly lying. First and foremost, there is McCain's fixation on Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Ahmadinejad holds no power and has no influence in formulating policy except at the discretion of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei; and since Khamenei and the clerical leadership detests Ahmadinejad, he in fact holds no power and has no influence in shaping Iranian policy in any respect relevant to American policy. McCain had no excuse for not knowing that before Joe Klein confronted him with the facts two weeks ago, and he certainly has no excuse for repeating the lie after he has been publicly corrected. Yet there he went, presenting a case against diplomatic engagement with Iran that rests on the personal odiousness of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

What McCain has, in lieu of an excuse for continuing to lie about Ahmadinejad's importance, is a tactical rationale for doing so, namely that Ahmadinejad is a loon who says frightening things. (Indeed, he has said so many loony, frightening things that one would think McCain wouldn't have to resort to lying about what Ahmadinejad has said.) The evident goal is to scare people into voting for him by conning them into believing that Iran, like Nazi Germany and unlike any other foreign adversary of the United States in its 230 year history, is governed by an ideology immune to rational deterrence.

Note that even if that were true, what made Nazi Germany a threat that had to be defeated by war was the combination of its ideology and its possession of the most powerful war machine in human history up to that point. Hence McCain also lies endlessly about Iran's capacities, breezily mentioning to Goldberg that Iran, a nation without any nuclear weapons, existentially threatens Israel, a nation with a large nuclear arsenal. He lies about the scale of the Iranian threat relative to the Soviet Union, augments that lie by lying about his opponent's uncontroversially true observation that there is no reason for a national panic attack over Iran, and bolsters his case for a national panic attack by reference to his distinct lies about Ahmadinejad and his (non-)role in formulating Iranian policy. What's so pitiful about this mendacity is that Iran really does pose a major national security and foreign policy challenge --- not every threat has to be existential to count as a threat! --- which McCain's fabulism obscures.

Just as it obscures the tremendous opportunity the next president may have in light of Khamenei and the clerics' decision to geld Ahmadinejad and elevate his rival, Ali Larijani, as well as the general affection of the Iranian people for the United States (but wariness about blowhards threatening war). If he doesn't understand Iranian politics and can't be bothered to educate himself, the least McCain could do, for the sake of his own credibility, is quit trying to frame the election as a contest between experience and naivete.

The Straight Talk Skullcap Jeffrey Goldberg's interview with John McCain, like his interview with Barack Obama, was centered on Israel and US-Israeli relations. Both candidates would reverse the Bush administration's neglect of the Israel-Palestine conflict and take "a hands-on approach" to diplomacy in which they would be "the chief negotiator" (McCain's phrasing). Both made clear to the world that "if you’re waiting for America to distance itself from Israel, you are delusional...our commitment...to Israel’s security is non-negotiable" (Obama's phrasing). Both of them oppose Israeli settlements, albeit sotto voce e pianissimo --- McCain conceded in passing that the settlements "keep Israel and the Palestinians from making peace" (Goldberg's phrase), while Obama merely observed that "[s]ettlements at this juncture are not helpful." Yet both reckoned aggressive Israeli defense policy as a justified response to extraordinary circumstances rare if not unique on earth. In other words, it would take a microscope to find any substantive differences between their positions on Israeli security and on Zionism in general.

Their differences of rhetoric, emphasis, and temperament, however, are abundant. Obama mentioned McCain exactly once to Goldberg, in order to state his agreement with McCain about Hamas. McCain, on the other hand, squandered a good chunk of his interview time peevishly reiterating canned, content-free attack lines. He's "amused by Senator Obama’s dramatic change," noted with interest Obama's "naivete and inexperience on national security issues" and also that he "is totally lacking in experience," and even indulged a preposterous misinterpretation of Obama's remarks to Goldberg before Goldberg cut him off. Etc., yawn.

McCain's positive case for himself, moreover, rested on some real logical whoppers. He assured us that "I don’t try to divine people’s motives" in a sentence immediately succeeding an unequivocal declaration that what motivates Iran is "hatred." He'll leave it to someone "who engages in this psycho stuff to talk about" the intent of foreign adversaries, at the same time that his anti-terror policy rests entirely on reckoning the intent of Islamic radicals as something uniquely pernicious in the world. In particular, the capacity of Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran to execute their plans --- or lack thereof --- doesn't register as a factor on McCain's approach to the middle East. One would expect at least internal consistency in foreign and national security policy from someone whose candidacy begins and ends with the duration of his experience.

The final striking difference between McCain and Obama's Goldberg variations was the former's complete inability, and in its way, admirable unwillingness to try to win recognition as an honorary Chosen Person. (The depth and breadth of Obama's affinity for Jewish culture was stunning.) The closest McCain came to identifying with Jewish culture was touting his friendship with Joe "What's a little Hitler-loving between friends?" Lieberman and mentioning the Jewish authors he likes (Wiesel, Frankl, and Uris; emphatically not Philip Roth). McCain does have ample material to connect his own experiences to the historical experiences of the Jews, but they are so emotionally raw that it was both wise and tactful of McCain to decline the opportunity. Instead, the lesson he took from reading Frankl is that even in the Hanoi Hilton, things could still get vastly worse. Which is an awfully Jewish thought.

So what did the chatterers think? Michael Goldfarb is elated to see a "presidential candidate who publicly recognizes Philip Roth’s pretentious drivel for what it is." Meanwhile Foreign Policy and the Economist focus on McCain's aggressive hardline on Iran. Andrew Sullivan thinks the Jewy angle is more salient.

Ali Larijani (Right) With Javier Solana: It's almost as if diplomacy with Iran is worth a shot One can be forgiven for not noticing, in light of the earth-shattering revelations in Scott McClellan's book, that the Iranian Parliament, the Majlis, elected a new speaker this week, Ali Larijani, by a resounding 232 to 31 margin. Before joining the Majlis in March, Larijani had been one of two personal appointees of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei to the Supreme National Security Council, in which capacity he was Iran's chief international representative on nuclear technology policy. Before that, he was a candidate in the presidential election of 2005, and has been one of the chief rivals to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for the favor of Khamenei, for control of the conservative political coalition, and for power in Iran.

Now, there's no reason to lionize Larijani pre-emptively. His history suggests that he is far less reformist than say, Muhammad Khatami, whose presidency was a pretty big disappointment. But he is the leader of the pragmatist wing of the conservative coalition and not a raving loon like Ahmadinejad, so his elevation to the speakership of the Majlis is a fairly profound signal that Khamenei is displeased with Iran's strategic drift. Which means conditions exist for a reorientation of Iranian policy (especially if Larijani defeats Ahmadinejad in the upcoming elections in 2009).

What does all this mean for Americans? Firstly, that the next president will likely have an opportunity for diplomacy with Iran that hasn't existed since 2003, and if he (or she) squanders that opportunity without so much as trying to put a halt to Iranian nuclearization through negotiations, we'll all be that much less safe as a result. So it's probably worthwhile thinking about which presidential candidates have made a steadfast promise to make you less safe when and if you vote this November.

Secondly and relatedly, it's probably time for those people supporting the propagandistic charade that "talking to Iran" = "talking to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Holocaust denier" to feel a little agenbite of shame. Ahmadinejad's job was a combination of secretarial and ambassadorial duties, in which he could only exercise power at the discretion of Khamenei. Since Khamenei regards Ahmadinejad as a low-class dolt, Ahmadinejad has not exercised power on any matter of significance, let alone conducting Iranian foreign policy.

Thirdly and most importantly, willful mistranslations of a powerless figurehead aside, Khamenei and the Majlis' gelding of Ahmadinejad and elevation of Larijani is yet more evidence that the Iranian government acts rationally to satisfy its preferences, the most important of which is self-preservation. Which is a good thing to keep in mind when liars and hallucinators claim that Iran is a greater threat to US security than the Soviet Union was, because of some unique death-seeking quality of Iran's governing ideology. Also worth keeping in mind is that the fantasist school of Iran policy used to be the gang that denounced Reagan as a Chamberlainian surrender-monkey for talking to Mikhail "Hitler" Gorbachev.

How would our president inform the Knesset about this breaking news? It looks likeThe Golan Heights: Has Ehud Olmert already committed to returning them to Syria? the Olmert/Livni/Barak regime has been lured in by "the false comfort of appeasement," since they've decided to "negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along." Specifically, in what cannot be coincidences, news broke yesterday that the Israeli government is negotiating a cease-fire agreement in Gaza with Hamas (Egypt is brokering the talks), and then broke today that the Israeli government is in negotiations with Syria over a long-term peace treaty (with Turkey as brokers in that deal). The latter negotiations are the first time in eight years that Israel has attempted substantial diplomatic engagement with Syria, while the former is a profound volte-face on longstanding Israeli policy (now sustained with the charade of Ehud Olmert admitting publicly only that he is in talks with Egypt).

Jewcy has a few questions about the affair we'd like to find some answers to:

1) Given the president's recent public statements, do these latest moves by Olmert signal a repudiation of Washington? Or has the US government silently shifted positions without shifting rhetoric (see also this report from last spring that US pressure scuppered earlier efforts at Israeli-Syrian diplomacy)?

Ezzedin Choukri-Fiske of the International Crisis Group argues that US approval is essential for any negotiations to get off the ground, and so is pessimistic that anything can come of the talks before January 2009 at the earliest. Paul Salem of the Carnegie Endowment suggests a third route, namely, "The Americans are not obstructing it, but they are taking a wait-and-see approach. "The Bush administration doesn't want to give anything to the Syrians unless they give something first."

2) Apropos of which, did either side make any concessions before coming to the table?

Eyal Zisser of Tel Aviv University doubts that full negotiations could have resumed without an Israeli commitment to withdrawal from the Golan Heights. Shmuel Rosner argues that Syria's objective is neither talking to Israel or taking back control of the Golan Heights, but talking to the US and tightening control of Lebanon.

3) Speaking of which, any Israeli-Syrian negotiations are inextricably tied to the status of Lebanon, Hezbollah, and Iran. And at this particular moment, Hezbollah has essentially prevailed over the Lebanese government, thereby amplifying Iranian power and influence. What effect did that have on either the timing or the announcement of the Syrian negotiations?

4) And what about the Syrian side? Did Israel's strike at Syria's nuclear reactor last fall prompt Assad to come calling diplomatically? What about the chatter that surfaced recently in the Jerusalem Post to the effect that President Bush is determined to attack Iran before he leaves office? (The White House denies the report, though it isn't just opponents of the administration that are convinced an attack on Iran is coming.) Even if the rumors are bogus, might they still have been what spurred Assad to action?

5) What if any domestic political objectives is Olmert trying to achieve? His approval ratings are abysmal, which argues for some sort of popularity-enhancing diplomatic coup. But Olmert has given himself a very narrow line to walk: Israelis "prefer war over ceasefire with Hamas" by 56 to 33 percent, and though 57 percent favor negotiations with Syria, 54 percent oppose a Golan withdrawal that might have been (or might still be) a precondition for negotiations, and 70 percent believe "Israel cannot handle holding negotiations with both Syria and the Palestinians at the same time."

6) What about the roles of Turkey and Egypt? It used to be that the United States arbitrated all negotiations between Israel and its neighbors. Is Israel's new reliance on moderate governments in Muslim countries an expression of confidence --- i.e. Israel feels secure enough to engage in diplomacy without its strongest and only unequivocal ally present? Or is it an expression of desperation --- i.e. Israel feels it has no choice but to negotiate, and if the US won't be party, Israel will fall back on whatever alternatives it can find?

7) What does Israeli negotiation with Hamas, even through back-channels and without public acknowledgment, bode for Fatah and for Mahmoud Abbas in particular? If Israel comes to recognize Hamas as its negotiating partner over Palestine, de facto if not de jure, wouldn't such a development freeze the official Palestinian Authority out of its remaining claims to power?

In the glutted landscape of Jewish communal life, no institution blusters with greater pomposity than the Organization That Claims To Speak On Behalf Of The Jews (OTCSBJ). What’s most frustrating about the OTCSBJ is that it often speaks not on behalf of “the Jewish People” but of the tiny percentage of Jews who sign up for its email lists. Most notorious in this category is the Conference of Presidents (“American Jewry’s recognized address for consensus policy”), which clamored vociferously for an invasion of Iraq (see its "Daily Alerts" of cherry-picked panic from 2002 and 2003) despite the fact that a majority of American Jews opposed the invasion.

A relatively new OTCSBJ has entered the scene: The Jewish People Policy Planning Institute. Chaired by Dennis Ross, the JPPPI seeks to formulate an overarching “Jewish policy” with an eye towards strengthening the status of Israel as the “center of Jewish life.” As a sign of how it views the vitality of Diaspora Jewish life, the JPPPI has on its team the famed Israeli demographer Sergio DellaPergola, who clings to the widely-discredited National Jewish Population Survey of 2001, with its bleak outlook for Jewish life in America. After all, it's easier to promote Israel as the "center of Jewish life" if Jewish life everywhere else is falling apart.
Yehezkel Dror: Modern Day Jewish Prophet suspiciously resembles Larry "Bud" Mellman
Now the Founding President of the JPPPI, Yehezkel Dror, has written a stunning op-ed in The Forward about where he feels “the Jewish People” should head. Essentially, he argues, the "requirements of existence" must trump everything else. In light of Israel's (or "the Jewish People's") interests, Dror characterizes moral considerations as "political correctness and other thinking-repressing fashions." He singles out Jewish activism on China and on Turkey's genocide of Armenians, arguing that Jews must be supportive of China and Turkey, "or at least remain neutral," in light of Israel's strategic interests. Bewilderingly, he then takes the "end to morality" argument to the nuclear level:

Similarly, Jewish leaders should support harsh measures against terrorists who potentially endanger Jews, even at the cost of human rights and humanitarian law. And if the threat is sufficiently grave, the use of weapons of mass destruction by Israel would be justified if likely to be necessary for assuring the state’s survival, the bitter price of large number of killed innocent civilians notwithstanding.

Thankfully, Dror concedes that it's hard to define what constitutes "survival" ("there is much room for debate," he assures us. Gosh, thanks, Yehezkel!). But, he insists:

When important for existence, violating the rights of others should be accepted, with regret but with determination. Support or condemnation of various countries and their policies should be decided upon primarily in light of probable consequences for the existence of the Jewish people.

In short, the imperatives of existence should be given priority over other concerns — however important they may be — including liberal and humanitarian values, support for human rights and democratization.

If nothing else, Dror's outlook -- shared, presumably, by the JPPPI -- represents a remarkable devolution. Yesterday's popular Jewish cant about Israel ran along the lines of "Israel, and everything it does, is by definition moral." How far have we progressed if we no longer even pretend it's moral, instead insisting that morality itself must be relinquished as a vestige of an earlier age? What's more, we must weigh Israel's interests not only in discussions of the Middle East, but in ethical issues that come up anywhere in the world. Whatever the situation, says Dror, we risk imperiling the Jewish People's existence by aligning ourselves purely with morality.

One wonders how the term "survival" will be defined. With the proper argument, it can include not only nuking Iran, but rounding up all non-Jewish inhabitants of the West Bank (and hell, pre-Green Line Israel too) and shipping them off to the other side of the Jordan River. Slobodan Milosevic was interested in his people's survival too. Was he the intellectual and moral forefather of the JPPPI?

It seems almost providential that just last week, Albert Einstein rose from the grave to give us a warning about Jews and power. “As far as my experience goes," he wrote about Jews, "they are also no better than other human groups, although they are protected from the worst cancers by a lack of power.” Dror offers evidence that sixty years into what some people call "the Jewish return to sovereignty," it might be time for some chemotherapy.

Just Say "Sleaze": The JPPPI's Foxman and Kissinger -- Judaism's Moral Compass Just as importantly, with this op-ed, the JPPPI has shown that it has scant knowledge of "the Jewish People," most of whom do not base decisions, moral or otherwise, on the exclusive basis of what David Ben Gurion would wish for. But that won't stop the JPPPI from insisting it speaks on our behalf. In his description of the mission of the organization, Dror has written that "most Israeli policy-makers and also intellectuals and opinion-shapers, suffer from a lack of understanding, as well as ignorance about and misperception of, Diaspora realities, especially concerning the mindset and feelings of the majority of the younger generation." Let's see, how can we bridge this gap in understanding, especially with the "younger generation"? Hey, how about we propose an abandonment of morality whenever Israel is in the picture? That should work beautifully!

At least the JPPPI is consistent with other Organizations That Claim To Speak On Behalf Of The Jews. It's currently enjoying Stage Two of Jewish organizational process:

Stage One: Establish an organization that claims to represent "the Jewish People."

Stage Two: Espouse ideology that the vast majority of Jews would consider to be out-of-touch or morally execrable.

Stage Three: Lament, in limitless policy papers, the fact that so few Jews choose to "affiliate" with the organized community.

Stage Four: Go to Stage One.

Congratulations! You’ve managed to get through the first 2.5 weekdays. To help you get through the second half of your week, Jewcy is happy to present you with Hump Day Art. Think of it as an opportunity to devote your attention to the more cultural things in life, or at the very least, to zone out at your desk for a few minutes while you look at some pretty pictures.

Iranian street artist A1one recently teamed up with Israeli artists Inspire and Poe to create a series of works called “Evolution of Violence” showcased on the walls of Tel Aviv and Tehran.

Inspire writes, “We were all born creators...we have no need for systems of control which ultimately help to cause senseless violence to evolve within our cultures...You don't have to fuck people over to survive…”

Here are images from both cities.

Tel Aviv

Tehran

Last week: Sand in the Holy Land

She May Not Be Dressed Like a Diplomat: but she sure can negotiate some rocky terrain!First, they refuse to acknowledge Israel's existence. Then, they log on to a website that's doubly forbidden: Not only is it Israeli--it's Israeli porn. Who are these seekers of sexy skin? Oh, just a few hundred thousand (at least) Arabs in countries like Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Iraq, and if you ask me, they're exhibiting some kind of newfangled Madonna and the Whore complex. "I hate Israel and will beat her down...or at least, beat off to her lovely ladies!" The fact that some of these countries even go so far as to block the Israeli ".il" domain isn't slowing these sneaky porn rats down, either. Nosireebob: They're logging on in droves to a site called Ratuv, especially now that the site has been translated into Arabic, with lots of detailed descriptions and a veritable assload of free pics.

It happened like this: After installing software that identifies where users are logging on, the managers of Ratuv discovered that a large number of their visitors were in Arab countries. They decided that a lack of diplomatic relations didn't have to equal a lack of sexual relations, so despite not being able to accept money for video downloads from these countries, manager Nir Shahar set to work making the site as hospitable as possible. With the Arabic translations and extra free pics, traffic from these countries rocketed to 100,000 hits per week. The Ratuv team is currently looking into creating and registering a similar site in Europe or America, so that they can legally accept credit card payments from countries prohibited by Israeli law. They're also eyeballing the possibility of making films in which Arab and Israeli stars come together. So to speak. Talk about a forbidden fetish.

Perhaps there is something to the old adage, "make love, not war," after all. Someday soon, the ambassadors and diplomats of the world might just have names like Dick Long and Wendy Whoppers.

The Persianator: Jimmy with ArnoldThe new mayor of Beverly Hills is a Persian Jew.  This is a watershed moment: For decades Beverly Hills was a city populated and run entirely by Ashkenazi Jews, people descended from the Great Wave migrants who left Europe and straggled into Ellis Island in early 20th century. But America's entrenched Jewish population has recently swelled with the addition of all sorts of "new Jews" from places like Russia, Israel, and Iran.  They've got their own ambitions, their own priorities, and their own ideas about what it means to be Jewish in America. Delshad's mayorship sends a big fat honking message: The contours of American Jewry are changing. Get used to it.

Becoming mayor has put the spotlight on your background. Is that a good thing? A bad thing? Exhausting?

For my wife it is exhausting. If you ask her, it’s too much. But it’s what I expected, so it doesn’t bother me. I enjoy talking about my mission to elevate the status of Jews and Persians in America -- to bring more tolerance, more acceptance, more equality. Don’t say that all the Jews are like this, or all Iranians are terrorists.

I’m a typical Persian and a typical Jew. For example I'm the first mayor in the history of Beverly Hills to put a mezuzah on my door, which I did because I’m proud of my Jewish heritage. At the same time, I give interviews to Persian papers and magazines. I go on TV programs in Farsi. I encourage people in Iran to show their intolerance to that regime.

Are you in touch with the Iranian community?

Mayor of Beverly Hills: That's where he wants to be Yes, through TV. I go on many different programs. I get a lot of emails from people who are dissatisfied and want to get out.

What do you tell them?

To be vocal about their situation, and not accept the pressure that’s on them. If you accept everything they put on you, then they’ll keep on doing it. But if you force the government to take a stand, sometimes they have to take a position that would look very bad.

What kinds of positions?

Like if you and your wife are on a bus, and they separate you. They say, your wife goes on the back of the bus. Don’t accept it. Sit together, hold hands together. Let them take a situation like that and make it big. Show intolerance to their unjust way of running your life.

You left Iran in 1959, because you felt you had no opportunities as a Jew.

I grew up as Jew and I could only go to a certain level. It was a glass ceiling that you could never really break. I could become a good businessman or a doctor, but I wanted to be in politics and I couldn’t represent anyone other than the Jews. I wanted to be president of organizations, but I was being held back, so I decided to go to a country that gives me opportunity and freedom. I moved on to higher levels here, much more than I could have in Iran.

How old were you when you left?

Nineteen.

What made you decide to run for City Council?

Communism: It sucked to live under I became president of Sinai Temple, which was groundbreaking -- there’s never been a Persian or Sephardic president of any Ashkenazi temple like this -- so when that broke ground, and it felt good, I decided maybe I’d extend it to a higher level.

Right after 9/11, immigration officers asked all immigrants to come to their immigration office to present their visas and passports, to declare where they are. A lot of Persians who voluntarily went to show their visas were held for weeks at a time, almost like prison. They were victimized in Iran, and they left Iran, and they’re getting victimized again.

So they needed somebody to speak on their behalf. No senator or congressman would interfere with what was happening. So I said, that’s what I want to do. I decided to run for City Council, and after that I could become the mayor, and it made a difference. Forward magazine, I’m one of the 50 to watch. Can I ever imagine that?! So I must have touched people’s lives. I must have made a difference.

Why aren't more Persian-Americans involved in politics?

In Iran you are afraid to put your name on any list. The government will be watching. It’s like living under communism. You don’t want your name to be known by anybody. Because of that, those who came to America didn’t want anything to do with politics. It took me a long time to convince them to vote. As a result, they are involved now. I’m hoping that will set an example for Iranians, and other immigrants in America.

Is there racism against Persians in Beverly Hills?

There’s jealousy. Some people think that Persians all came from Iran with a lot of money, which is not true. A lot of them left everything they had. But Persians work hard here. They’re very intelligent. They are very educated. And so there is a resentment toward newcomers who are successful.

There was a controversy over the McMansions, and the City Council passed new requirements.

iranian, American flags: Why can't we be friends? Oh yeah.... A lot of Persians were building houses that were very large -- too big for the lots that they were on. Our City Council created a new commission to look at all new homes – whether Persians or non-Persians will live there – to evaluate whether the homes are in the character of the city and the neighborhood, and not too large.

What did you think about that?

I was very much in support of it. We didn’t want to stereotype people and say that all Persians’ homes are like this, but because of the commission and the architects' ideas on how to change the houses – change it here, change it there – people are happier with their finished homes than with the blueprints.

You didn’t feel like any of it was an underlying racism?

No, it was more of being new and not understanding. There was some jealousy involved -- like, how can they afford big homes like that?

Iranians didn’t come here poor, but they came with knowledge and education. If you come with education, you advance -- you open the doors.

What was it like for you, being here, during the 1979 revolution in Iran?

It was very tough because I was looked down on. It didn’t matter if I was a Jew or a Muslim -- they looked at me only as a Persian. I wore an American flag pin for years so everyone would see that I was proud to be an American. I shaved my moustache and my beard, so I won’t look like some of them. I wanted people to feel comfortable knowing me. My first name was Jamshid in Farsi, so I added Jimmy. So they’d be more friendly. It was very difficult for a long time.

Would you go back to Iran?

Not to stay. I tried to go back for a visit to take my wife and kids, but I lived in Israel when I was 16, so it was very difficult to go back to Iran because that hatred for Israel remains. If the regime changes, I would be happy to go back and visit. I would love to.

There’s talk now that maybe the U.S. will bomb Iran. What do you think?

Mahmoud: He's Da Bomb I’m not in favor of another war. I don’t think it’s good for America or Iran. But I think the situation can be handled through moratoriums and divestments from Iran’s businesses. I proposed divestment of all of our money from any companies that invest in Iran -- European or anything -- that are in the nuclear sector. And that proposal was passed by state of California, by the senate and the assembly; the governor signed it. I was the only mayor who promoted that. Mayors don’t usually have a foreign policy, but I wanted to get that message across -- you’re not dealing with Washington, but the people of America, who are very much against your regime and the nuclear bomb you are trying to develop.

Instead of building an atomic plant, Iran should build refineries. You don’t have refineries there -- less refineries than 30 years ago. No one would mind that. Refine your oil, run your country. It’s so obvious you’re not after energy; you’re after the power of a bomb in order to force other governments to follow you.

Who do you think they would say that to?

They would love to be able to control the Arab countries in the neighborhood.

How do you think there could be regime change in Iran?

America alone is not enough. If the Europeans put economic sanctions on Iran, then people will revolutionize -- if they have to stop working, stop getting paid.

Do most Iranians support Ahmadinejad?

No, not at all. They laugh at him.

But when he was here in New York, his respectability at home went up.

Sure, because stood up to a government -- because we gave him the freedom to say it. So people say, “Wow our president, a little guy, went over there and stood up to the big giants.”

It was totally wrong for him to take advantage of our freedom. He wouldn’t allow us to go over there and talk like that.

What do you like best about being mayor?

I can make people feel proud that somebody of their background and their culture reached a high position. People in Iran feel proud, people in Europe feel proud -- that’s the best thing.

What’s the worst thing about being the mayor?

The amount of calls I get asking for personal favors. Most of them have to do w