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I must admit…when I first heard that the Iranian president was to speak at Columbia University while in New York, I was neither taken back nor expecting any significant outcome. As in times past, I figured that the American press would engage in the usual freak-show escapades that have been a staple to the media coverage that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad loves to bask in. With his circus clown antics that only add to the shock value of his rhetoric, it was only a matter of time that ill-conceived comparisons to absolute tyrants like Hitler, Mussolini, or Pol Pot were once again bestowed upon a completely powerless neophyte that is nothing more than a press secretary in his own country. Yet, I figured that, maybe, just maybe, this could be one of the few opportunities that the world can see how shallow and illegitimate this man truly is.It was somewhat curious to me why Ahmadinejad would even expose himself to such unfiltered questioning to begin with. For what it’s worth, the Iranian president has never engaged in any such debate or forum that was either not mildly censored or scripted outright. However, being that this speaking engagement was hosted by one of the world’s most prestigious international relations programs, I became optimistic that for once, Ahmadinejad would be put to task on his abysmal failures as the President of Iran, rather than appealing to his alter ego as being some esoteric vanguard for Islamic unity. Sadly, I was wrong.Up until Monday’s forum, Columbia University president, Lee Bollinger, became the target of a media blitzkrieg by the American, Israeli, and the European press for hosting the Iranian president. However, I had some cautious optimism, hoping that the man at least possessed a nominal understanding of Iran’s internal problems, mostly which are economic, and that he might very well use these as ammunition against Ahmadinejad’s constant grandstanding. Yet once Bollinger began his introduction, I, like many of my compatriots understood that the University president would be just another pawn in Ahmadinejad’s publicity stunt. Bollinger’s gratuitous musings about Iran’s egregious record on human rights, Ahmadinejad’s Holocaust denial, lack of free speech within the country, or Iran’s nuclear ambitions played right into the Iranian president’s hand. After his verbal assault upon the Iranian president, which had no useful purpose, Bollinger ended his speech by saying, “I am only a professor… and today I feel all the weight of the modern civilized world yearning to express the revulsion at what you stand for. I only wish I could do better” [1].Well Mr. Bollinger, had you more than two neurons in your brain and understood that your wanton tirade and puerile behavior only cast shame upon yourself and your university all the while making a victim out of an otherwise useless figurehead, you could have “done better”- much better.What the American and Israeli press have yet to realize is that Ahmadinejad’s evocation of taboos like Holocaust denial steer away from the crucial issues that he fears the most and constantly tries to avoid. To date, none in the media, outside of censored journalists within Iran, have confronted him regarding these. Had Bollinger understood the dynamics that allow Ahmadinejad to remain unscathed, he could very well been instrumental in cracking the “Robin Hood” persona that so many in the Muslim and Developing World have of the Iranian president.Whether it was willful ignorance about Iranian politics or some outside element that drove Bollinger to waste such an opportunity, had he raised issues that relate to the concerns of the average Iranian, Ahmadinejad’s tenuous veil of legitimacy would have been completely torn apart not only amongst his dwindling constituency within Iran but also in the broader region. While focusing on his outlandish statements that most always elicit futile knee-jerk reactions, Bollinger should have resigned to four basic questions that strike at the very heart, soul, and principle of why Ahmadinejad was elected and, more importantly, why the Islamic Republic was formed in the first place. A more effective method of questioning would have been as follows:“Your Excellency, our audience today desires for you to respond to a few basic facts about your country…
First Question: In 1978, approximately 72 rials (Iranian currency) equaled one US dollar. Today 9,317 rials amount to one US dollar [2]….Why?
Second Question: It is stated by many environmental groups that Tehran is one of the most polluted cities in the world, where roughly 3,600 people die in a single month due to the hazardous air quality [3]. What is your response?
Third Question: According to the International Monetary Fund, Iran has one of the highest, if not the highest rate of 'Brain Drain' in the world, with an estimated 150,000 people exiting Iran per year [4]. What is your response?
Fourth Question: Your neighbors, the regional countries that surround Iran, such as China, India, Azerbaijan, Turkey, Israel, and the UAE, are all experiencing economic booms. What is the current state of the Iranian economy?”
Imagining a stuttering Ahmadinejad with no answers, cringing while the cold sweat beaming from his forehead stained his cheap suit would have exposed him as an incompetent leader whose depredation of his nation’s human capital and natural resources robbed it of its rightful place in the world. Yet the umbrage shown to him on that college stage, once again, lionized the Iranian president in the Muslim world for his resistance against American infiltration and influence in the region. Although one would never be able decipher this in the Western media, Arab and Muslim news outlets like that of Al-Jazeera, who traditionally do not convey a favorable picture of Iran, severely criticized the US for disrespecting a Muslim head of state and clearly empathized with Ahmadinejad. Due to the fact that the Doha-based news outlet is widely viewed from North Africa to Asia, the predominant Muslim world read Ahmadinejad’s performance at Columbia as a mock trial which he came out as the clear victor, further legitimizing the Iranian president as the only Islamic leader with the courage to stand up to the US.At a time when US objectives should be making every effort to sway Muslim public opinion over to its side, American stupidity has morphed the Iranian president into the Persian Bon Jovi.Is it not sad that it is the West who actually has something to offer but is incapable of advertising it while ascetic Iran becomes the subject of the third world encomiums?
[1] http://www.columbia.edu/cu/news/07/09/lcbopeningremarks.html[2] http://www.farsinet.com/toman/exchange.html [3] http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6245463.stm BBC January 9, 2007[4] http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6240287.stm BBC January 8, 2007
By REZA ZARABI
As in the days of Noah....
