French President François Hollande rejected anti-Israel comments made by Iran’s Supreme Leader and claimed they only complicate the matter at hand.
While speaking to members of a nationalist paramilitary group in Tehran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called Israel ”the rabid dog” of the Middle East that aims to cut down Iran’s reputation.
He also declared: “Zionist officials cannot be called humans; they are like animals... The Israeli regime is doomed to failure and annihilation.”
Khamenei also attacked France’s tough stance on a potential nuclear deal, saying it showed that ‘’French officials were “not only succumbing to the United States, but they are kneeling before the Israeli regime”.
The French government’s spokeswoman Najat Vallaud-Belkacem told reporters the French President thought the name-calling was “unacceptable.”
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) said the latest harsh rhetoric coming from Iran’s supreme leader “casts an ugly pall” over the nuclear negotiations currently taking place in Geneva.
‘’Ayatollah Khamenei’s harsh rhetoric against Israel and the United States is yet another indication that the Iranian regime has not moderated its stance toward the West. On the cusp of a deal in Geneva, the Iranian leadership has thumbed its nose at the world with a statement that brings into sharp relief its belligerence and bellicosity toward the West in spite of its efforts to extend an olive branch in negotiations on the nuclear issue,’’ said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director, in a statement.
‘’The rest of the members of the P5+1 should follow President Francois Hollande’s stern condemnation of the Ayatollah’s words,’’ he added.
World Jewish President Ronald S.Lauder said that the only thing preventing Iran from going nuclear is France.
At a gala dinner Tuesday night honoring Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel and his wife Marion, Lauder said : ‘’Tomorrow the meetings with Iran resume in Geneva and frankly only France stands between us and a nuclear Iran.’’
“But the rest of the world is silent,” he added.
He also mocked the US point person in the Geneva negotiations of the P5+1 with Iran, Wendy Sherman.
“The chief US negotiator in Geneva is a person named Wendy Sherman, she was the point person who negotiated with Kim Jong-il to keep North Korea nuclear power free, and we all know how well that turned out,” Lauder said.
He continued, “Iran is racing to complete a nuclear bomb, even as they promise to erase Israel from the face of time, and the world is silent,” he said. “Just as the West gave up Czechoslovakia to Hitler in Munich in 1938, we see what is happening again and the world is silent.”
“I will never trust a flimsy piece of paper signed by a tyrant,” he said.
European Jewish Congress (EJC) President Moshe Kantor called on European leaders participating in the Geneva negotiations ‘’to demand a reversal of the program as the country’s leaders continue to threaten the Jewish State with annihilation.’’
“Khamenei is still the puppeteer, and while the puppet may have changed, the goals haven’t. His hate speech should serve as a clarion call for the world powers to push back the Iranian pursuit of weapons of mass destruction further from reality,” Kantor continued. “Any regime which calls for the destruction of another nation should be severely sanctioned by the international community.”
“Now is not the time to loosen the pressure on Iran. The courageous and principled position of France in this matter must be utilized as a prototype for concerted and collective action by all European states.” Kantor said.
He also noted that there was a key role for Britain and Germany in adding to a united European front to gain back the pressure that was successfully built on Iran over many years.
“Only when the aggressive and belligerent Iranian rhetoric has stopped and the active pursuit of weapons of mass destruction has been reversed should there be any talk of concessions, not the reverse.” Kantor said.

by: Yossi Lempkowicz