Chavez opposes Ahmadinejad on Israel

[Warren Stupidity]

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who maintains warm ties with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahamadinejad, said Friday in a television interview that he opposed Ahmadinejad's call to "wipe Israel off the map."

"I don't agree with statements…I don't support causing harm to any nation," Chavez declared.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1173879103152&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

How is that possible? Our hate-Chavez folks need to get on this right away.

PS: the linked article is 90% anti-Chavez editorializing.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

1. For the people you mentioned, this thread doesn't exist.

Neither do the Jerusalem Post article, or Chavez's statements.

[robcon]

2. Are we anti-Chavez people supposed to cheer?

I don't care what that tin-pot dictator thinks of Israel or Iran.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

3. Unfortunately I don't have the search function available. Some help from others here would be nice.

I did find this via Google (definitely not the best way to search DU): http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x2322705#2325952

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

4. Some more:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=2146153#2146583

[Name removed]

5. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[1932]

7. Unless he's saying something that you can spin into anti-Chavez BS.

I wouldn't be surprised if we went back in the archives here and discovered that you have cared and posted on what you thought Chavez thought about Iran and Israel...when you thought that you could impute the President's anti-Israel statements on Chavez.

And if this, in fact, isn't what you care about when forming your opinions, why don't you state some of the actual reasons you think Chavez is a dictator, and maybe we can disabuse you of a few other misinterpretations.

[TomClash]

13. Dictators usually are not elected four times in contested elections nt

[happydreams]

25. robCON doesn't even know the basics. May I call you CON for short?

You know Hugo is no dictator.

[ProudDad]

30. I don't care what anyone who's

too afraid to activate their profile says.

[yurbud]

37. yes, why couldn't he be elected like our friends Pinochet, Baby Doc, Montt...

oh wait, they weren't and Chavez was.

Chavez doesn't have a problem with the United States. He has a problem with the business interests that are trying to continue the neoliberal rape of his country.

Unless you are one of the idle rich, you would probably be better off living under someone like Chavez than Bush or some other Chamber of Commerce boot-lick.

[Beacho]

39. You mean ELECTED tin pot dictator

right?

[ronnie624]

6. Actually,

There has never been a "call" from Ahmadinejad to "wipe Israel off the map".

The fact that Chavez repeats this refrain, demonstrates the power of propaganda.

[Warren Stupidity]

8. That is a fair point.

However Ahmadinejad's inflammatory statements are well cataloged. Why defend him or the theocracy in Iran when they are just wrong? Ahmadinejad appears to function as a lightning rod, sent out by the ruling council to say stuff to piss us off on a regular basis while they continue their back room negotiations with us over nukes, Iraq, oil, etc. It is all a game, and I am not too fond of either side.

My comments were a reflection of the repeated talking point we have seen here from our cabal of Chavez haters that we too should hate Chavez because he is all buddy-buddy with Ahmadinejad, Ahmadinejad being the closest thing to The Evil Saddam that we have left as we don't mention OBL anymore. Chavez did indeed establish closer relations with Iran - we have forced every nation left on the planet that is not openly subservient to our imperial ambitions to seek each other out for mutual aid. Democratic socialists do not have much in common with theocrats, except in this case both nations have much to fear from our heavy iron fist.

[Judi Lynn]

9. Who EVER is in a position of power there, unless he becomes a puppet, like the Shah,

is going to get the same treatment, with undoubtedly the same kinds of things attributed to him, and the same kinds of destabilization efforts launched the moment he comes into view. They were trying to ruin this guy even before he was elected.

Everyone who appears to think of his own people first is going to go right to the top of the enemies list, with no exceptions.

Right-wing demons DO mean you are the enemy, if you don't sell yourself to them, and they have typically hidden the truth in idiot remarks like "You're either with us or you're with the terrorists." Everyone they don't like is "the terrorists," even though this administration is the one with the torture & mass murdering record.

[cali]

42. Oh for the love of pete

"right wing demons"? You sound just like Ahmadinejad. Your defence of him is absurd. He's a holocaust denying theocrat. That's not right wing spin. That's the simple truth. And as I'm sure you don't believe me, check out what Juan Cole has to say. It's essentially the same. And yes, the admin has a putrid record, that doesn't mean that other governments don't as well. And the treatment of women and gays and lesbians in Iran is horrendous. But hey, now that you've defended Ahmadinejad, you can defend Russia's actions in Chechnya and how about China's human rights record and its actions in Tibet. I know! You can tell us how the Janjaweed are demonized by the right.

One can recognize that others beside the US and Israel are terrible human rights abusers without supporting military action. At least you can if bother using a modicum of critical thinking skills.

[ronnie624]

10. I have always enjoyed your posts,

but please, do not make false accusations against me. I have never defended the theocracy in Iran. In fact, I am absolutely opposed to theocracy of any sort. My interest is in the truth.

[Warren Stupidity]

11. Not what I meant, sorry for the confusion.

What I meant was why bother with the 'lost in translation' issue with Ahmedinjad? Yes his statements get taken out of context and get deliberately mistranslated, but he also has said some really awful things, and then you get boxed into looking like you are defending the awful Iranian theocracy, even if you aren't. It is a tough problem though, as we have to do some defending of that regime to counter the hate-Iran propaganda being used to justify the pending attack against Iran. Sorry if it ended up looking like a personal attack. That was not my intention.

[ronnie624]

16. Not a problem.

The confusion is probably a result of my limited time, as well as my poor typing skills, which do not allow me to fully express my thoughts.

Anyway, the rabid Chavez haters and those who lie about Ahmadinejad on behalf of the U.S. corporatist political structure, will not be convinced of anything. They clearly have an ideological ax to grind. They have been presented with the truth, over and over again, and within hours, they are repeating the same lies on a different thread.

It is my belief that the truth must be spoken, even in the face of overwhelming opposition.

[TomClash]

14. This is wrong

Translated from Farsi by Natila Fathi of the New York Times from the October 26, 2005 speech by Ahmadinejad to an Islamic Student Associations conference on "The World Without Zionism:"

"Our dear Imam (meaning Khomeni) said that the occupying regime must be wiped off the map and this was a very wise statement."

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/30/weekinreview/30iran.html?ex=1174276800&en=c0781ecfc59e1fc7&ei=5070

[ronnie624]

18. Deleted.

[IndianaGreen]

12. The Jerusalem Post is a rightwing rag owned by Hollinger International

The former head of Hollinger, Lord Conrad Black, is being prosecuted for illegal financial dealings. He even used corporate funds to pay for a breast augmentation surgery for his wife, a former Israeli airline stewardess. He is an unabashed defender of Israel-can-do-no-wrong.

The rightwing is so furious at Chavez, that they even enlisted the aid for Abe Foxmann of the Anti-Discrimination League, to hurl to anti-Semitic libel at Chavez. When all things fail, get the gullible "pro-Israel" American Jews to join some rightwing crusade, whether it is anti-Chavista or prowar against Iraq, Iran, or Syria.

[Warren Stupidity]

15. Even so - this is the only coverage at all of Chavez's remarks.

I noted that they article was 90% anti-Chavez opinion spew. Our media couldn't even get up enough courage to go that far.

[Amonester]

17. Yep. The Reichwing is Furhious because Chavez plans to nationalize

his own country's oil for the benefit of his own country's middle-, and lower-classes, instead of for the benefit of the BFEE'$ top 1% havemore$.

Same for Iran's oil (as it was, and still is for Iraq's).

I'm surprised many here 'still' believe the obvious Reichwing BS propagandist$...

[daleo]

33. To be fair to Barbara Ameil, she was much more than a stewardess

She spent many years in the Canadian and British media, as a right wing shill for most of that time of course. She was a much smarter and erudite version of Anne Coulter (in my opinion better looking too, although I know that's not really relevant).

[amagusta]

19. FYI: Ahamdinejad never said, "Israel should be wiped off the map."

A. said, "The regime currently occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time." He was quoting the long dead Ayatollah Khomeini, who made this statement in the context of the ultimate disappearance of the Soviet Union and the Shah's regime, both of which vanished relatively non-violenly. The remarkable thing here is that this demonization of Ahmadinejad has even infected his friends.

Here's Juan Cole's translation from May of 2006:

http://www.juancole.com/2006/05/hitchens-hacker-and-hitchens.html

Ahmadinejad defined Zionism not as an Arabi-Israeli national struggle but as a Western plot to divide the world of Islam with Israel as the pivot of this plan.

The phrase he then used as I read it is "The Imam said that this regime occupying Jerusalem (een rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods) must from the page of time (bayad az safheh-ye ruzgar mahv shavad)."

Ahmadinejad was not making a threat, he was quoting a saying of Khomeini and urging that pro-Palestinian activists in Iran not give up hope-- that the occupation of Jerusalem was no more a continued inevitability than had been the hegemony of the Shah's government.

[Judi Lynn]

21. Thanks for posting this. I've heard it multiple times but couldn't remember the words

well enough to find it.

Quite a bit of difference between the two, and there's no surprise in this, after hearing it from the horse's mouth that mistranslations are literally encouraged in politically useful situations.

It seems there's a rabble which is always there to be whipped into a frenzy if you tell them someone doesn't like their country. Their response is always automatic, just like Pavlov dogs. They NEVER double check, just to make sure. That would be treasonous. They WANT to believe what they are told, and will go after you if you question it.

[cali]

26. Actually, despite

Juan Cole's assertion, Ahmadinejad has made numerous truly ugly comments about ridding the world of Israel, not to mention his Holocaust denial. And many of those comments were made after May of last year. It's truly splitting baby fine hairs to try and defend Ahmadinejad on that point. (Just recently he call Israel Satan). The west certainly plays up Ahmadidnjad's inflammatory comments for their own purposes, but he does a fine job of discrediting himself. Your kindly interpretation of his remarks is just laughable. And no, I'm firmly against ANY military action against Iran, period. So, don't bother with the question.

[Jim Sagle]

29. In other words, Israel would be wiped off the map.

How stupid do the Palestine Firsters on this board think we are? He said it, we know it, and that's the end of it.

BTW, good on Chavez. That WAS what the thread was about before it got derailed.

[ohio2007]

38. That's kind of like the Catholic Pope statement on Islam

Where he quoted a 15th century king that said Islam isn't a good thing to have around.

But many in the Muslim world didn't see it like that with their demand for an apology.

[nick303]

40. I wish to see that Israel neither

vanishes from the page of time nor is wiped off the map. However in this case I will give Chavez credit for saying the right thing.

[paulk]

20. well, good for Chavez

In that he understands there is a political liability in associating with whackjobs like Ahamadinejad.

[TheConstantGardener]

22. First of all Ahmedinijad never said that...

That's a mistranslation used to slander him.

Plus, his hyperbole is common among Iranian leadership and usually doesn't mean anything. He doesn't even control the foreign policy of his country.

[Warren Stupidity]

23. Sort of beside the point.

My only point in posting this (and it was a slight point) was to contrast what Chavez actually says and does with how the rightwing propaganda machine tries to portray him.

The talking point is "Chavez loves Ahmedinijad" the reality is that Chavez works with Iran and Iran's president Ahmedinijad, as they are both independent oil producing nations opposed to US imperial hegemony.

[Judi Lynn]

24. They never show the photos of Chavez meeting with the leaders of the OTHER oil producing

countries, do they? They have only shown him meeting Ahmadinejad, and Hussein, and have down-played the fact that ALL the oil producing other countries do business together and meet with one another on a regular basis.

Strange, cheap propaganda tactics, for sure!



Of course the warped, simplified version of reality works well for right-wingers, doesn't it?

[scarletwoman]

27. Great pictures! Thanks for posting them! Venezuela is a member of OPEC, after all.

Of course the leaders of OPEC nations -- which includes Iran -- meet with each other!

When bush meets with Hu Jintao, the president of China, does everyone start screaming that bush is a communist sympathizer?

sw

[daleo]

34. Chavez has the bearing of a statesman in those photos

Not all national leaders (ahem Bush ahem) can say that.

[Judi Lynn]

35. I think I may sense what you're saying, possibly.

[daleo]

41. Those photos make the point well.

Especially the Chinese door. :rofl:

[confludemocrat]

36. The innacurate quote is at the heart of this matter-it is not beside the point

your intended point is of negligible worth if the misquote is left unchallenged even in passing

Chavez is cozy with (figuratively speaking) an ax murderer, but they don't agree that ax murdering is a good thing. Wouldn't an innacurate assumption of ax murdering loom larger than that they don't agree on the subject?

[Joanne98]

28. This makes perfect sense to me. Chavez isn't interested in "wiping

people off the map" He just wants to clean up the corruption and help the poor. A truly evil idea in this world today... Everybody should read, "Confessions of an Economic Hitman". It's been US policy for decades to bribe or kill any leader of a Latin American country who GASP tries to help the poor. And you know what? It's fucking over.

[smalll]

31. Even Hugo, in the pocket of AIPAC.

What a DINO! Next he'll tell us he supports keeping impeachment "off the table" and WON'T tell us that homosexuality isn't immoral.

You just can't count on anyone these days.
:sarcasm:

[Jim Sagle]

32. Rumor has it that he's Joe Lieberman's new best friend.

I read that on the Internets somewhere, probably on DU.;-)

[UTUSN]

43. Sorry my hate-Hugo-ito self took so long to GET ON THIS!!1

".... ...denouncing the summer's war in Lebanon, accusing Israel of a 'new Holocaust.' ...."

I was LATE because I was busy DISABLING MY PROFILE!!1 (Like 'Homeland Security' can't find me at DU.)