Insane Iran Leader - Germans Should Shed Holocaust Guilt
Monday, May 29, 2006
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2006/5/29/133317.shtml?s=et
Germans should feel no guilt over the Holocaust says Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who adds he doubts it ever happened.
Speaking to Germany's Der Spiegel magazine, Ahmadinejad said he doubted that Germans were allowed to write "the truth" about the Holocaust and added that he was still considering traveling to Germany for the World Cup soccer tournament.
"I believe the German people are prisoners of the Holocaust. More than 60 million were killed in World War II. . . . The question is: Why is it that only Jews are at the center of attention?" he said in the rare interview with a Western news organization that was published Sunday.
If he is wrong and the Holocaust did happen, Ahmadinejad said Jews should be moved from Israel back to Europe.
"We say if the Holocaust happened, then the Europeans must accept the consequences and the price should not be paid by Palestine. If it did not happen, then the Jews must return to where they came from."
According to the Washington Post, Iran's first World Cup match is against Mexico in Nuremberg on June 11, and German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble has said Ahmadinejad would be welcome to come because Germany wants to be a good host.
The invitation, however, sparked protests from other political leaders and groups who said Ahmadinejad's anti-Israeli comments were unacceptable.
Ahmadinejad revealed that he was still considering going to Germany to support Iran in the World Cup -- despite protests stirred by what he called a "worldwide network of Zionists."
Rabbi Marvin Hier, a founder and dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles, called on Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel to keep him out of Germany.
"On a day when the Pope is in Auschwitz to remind the world of the horrors of the Holocaust, Ahmadinejad questions it again," Hier said. "For him to be at the World Cup and sit in a VIP seat would be a desecration of the memory of the Holocaust."