Ben Rhodes, Obama’s foreign policy guru, has been a relentless critic of Trump’s stance toward the Islamic Republic of Iran.
He recently tweeted “Trump’s administration has made every effort to manufacture a crisis with Iran,” declaring Trump “has created a major crisis by withdrawing from a Deal that was working, isolating the U.S., provoking the Iranians, risking both a resumed nuclear program and a war.”
Rhodes and other Leftists who are blaming Trump for ramping up tensions with Iran are ignoring that Iran has been working toward a war with the U.S. for decades.
“Death to America” continues to be chanted at Friday prayers in Iranian mosques, as well as at anti-American protests.
On November 2, 2015, a commanding majority of the Majlis, 192 of its 290 members, agreed to a statement declaring “Death to America” was not just a slogan: it had “turned into the symbol of the Islamic Republic and all struggling nations.”
“Death to America” continues to be chanted at Friday prayers in Iranian mosques, as well as at anti-American protests.
[caption id="attachment_178870" align="aligncenter" width="722"]
Groups of people in Tehran attended a demonstration to condemn the US hostile policies and mark the anniversary of the American Embassy takeover back in 1979. (Wikimedia Commons)[/caption]
A communal desire to destroy the United States and commit mass murder of its citizens is within the Islamic Republic of Iran’s very identity.
As Obama and Rhodes concluded their nuclear deal with Iran, regional political analyst Ali Wambold pointed out the Constitution of the Islamic Republic “proclaims ‘the ideological mission of jihad,’ which it defines as ‘extending the sovereignty of God’s law throughout the world,’ through Iran’s Army and the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.”
Thus, he said, “to treat with the Islamic Republic over the particulars of its weaponry while failing to address the very purpose of its bellicosity is delusional. The so-called Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action does nothing to change the fact that, in plain Farsi, Iran is committed to world conquest by Islam, with its clerics as warlords. Those to be conquered include America (the ‘Great Satan’), Israel (the ‘Little Satan’) and the Sunni-led Gulf States.”
"Have no doubt… Allah willing, Islam will conquer what? It will conquer all the mountain tops of the world.” – Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
In July 2005, then–Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said essentially the same thing:
“The message of the Revolution is global, and is not restricted to a specific place or time. Have no doubt… Allah willing, Islam will conquer what? It will conquer all the mountain tops of the world.”
Was this just a pious hope for the success of Islamic proselytizing?
Hardly, given Ahmadinejad’s reference to the Islamic Revolution, the violent movement that had brought the Islamic Republic of Iran into being in 1979.
Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has emphasized that Iran’s foreign policy was “based on Islam and stems from the aspirations and goals of the Revolution.”
[caption id="attachment_178871" align="alignnone" width="1600"]
Ben Piven, Flickr, CC[/caption]
Khamenei’s predecessor, Ayatollah Khomeini, said from the beginning the goals of that Revolution were global:
“We shall export our revolution to the whole world. Until the cry ‘There is no god but Allah’ resounds over the whole world, there will be struggle.”
The Iranian politician Mohsen Rezaei once told a cheering Iranian crowd:
“We will build a force that will demolish the enemies of Islam, continue the path of our great prophet Muhammad, and raise the flag of Islam in all corners of the world.”
Journalist Elaine Sciolino noted in her 2000 book Persian Mirrors: The Elusive Face of Iran that a neon sign in Tehran’s Mehrabad International Airport reads, in English, “In future Islam will destroy Satanic sovereignty of the West.”
Iran’s commitment to world conquest in the name of Islam—and to the defeat of America in particular—precludes lasting peace with the United States.
Iran’s Brigadier General Qolamhossein Qeib-parvar of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has declared:
“There are only two things that would end enmity between us and the US. Either the US president and EU leaders should convert to Islam and imitate the Supreme Leader, or Iran should abandon Islam and the Islamic revolution. If they are not going to turn Muslim, we are not going to abandon Islam or the revolution either. But I do not know why some people believe that some day we will make peace with the US and start relations with them.”
On September 23, 2015, two months after the nuke deal was finalized, Khamenei published an article entitled “The Idols Will Be Shattered,” illustrated with a drawing of the Statue of Liberty shattered in pieces.
In it he declared:
“The idol of the soul, the idol of pride, [and] the idol of sexual lust; the idol of tyranny and subservience; the idol of global tyranny [that is, the U.S.]; the idol of sloth and irresponsibility; and the other idols that shame the precious human soul—a plan that will spring forth from the depths of the heart will shatter them.”
Iran’s commitment to world conquest in the name of Islam—and to the defeat of America in particular—precludes lasting peace with the United States.
In January 2014, the Chief Commander of the IRGC, Major General Mohammad Ali Jafari, boasted that “Islam’s leaders have long ago prepared us for a great and decisive confrontation… The sun of America’s imperialist civilization is nearing its setting.” He claimed “the US will never understand the Islamic Republic of Iran’s offensive scope.”
Offensive, not defensive.
The deputy commander of the IRGC, Hossain Salami, said in May 2015 that Iran actually wanted war with the United States:
“We have prepared ourselves for the most dangerous scenarios and this is no big deal and is simple to digest for U.S.; we welcome war with the U.S. as we do believe that it will be the scene for our success to display the real potentials of our power.”
All this was well before Donald Trump became President, and much of it came while the nuclear deal was being negotiated, or soon after it was signed.
Ben Rhodes and others claiming Obama brought peace with Iran and that Trump destroyed it are banking on the American people not knowing the true intentions and activities of the Islamic Republic.
Luckily, the White House is currently occupied by people who are not so deceptive.
Robert Spencer is the director of Jihad Watch and a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. He is author of The Complete Infidel’s Guide to Iran, as as well as the New York Times bestsellers The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades) and The Truth About Muhammad. His new book is The History of Jihad From Muhammad to ISIS. Follow him on Twitter here. Like him on Facebook here.
