Is the new Iranian president truly an exterminator?
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s diatribe against Israel and the United States was made against a backlog of muddle, infighting and weakness. YOU can’t sow the wind and not reap a hurricane. Thus Saeed Leylaz, an Iranian economist, the day after Tehran’s stockmarket plunged to its lowest level for two years in response to worldwide condemnation of a venomously anti-Israel (and anti-American) speech by Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, on October 26th. Mr Leylaz bleakly notes a discrepancy between running a country and pursuing transformative ideals. His message may be lost on Mr Ahmadinejad. The president’s description of Israel’s occupying regime as a disgraceful blot that should be wiped off the map recalled a time, after the revolution of 1979, when Iran’s leaders competed to sound outrageous. The inexperienced and unworldly Mr Ahmadinejad probably had no idea that his comments would provoke such revulsionor lead Tony Blair, Britain’s prime minister, to muse that he might have to do somet
