Iran’s Ahmadinejad tells Trump in an open letter ” U.S. belongs to all nations”

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Iran's former hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is shown with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamanei
Iran’s former hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is shown with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamanei

Tehran, Iran (AP) — Iran’s former hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sent a letter Sunday to President Donald Trump, striking a somewhat conciliatory tone while applauding immigration to America and saying it shows “the contemporary U.S. belongs to all nations.”

It isn’t the first dispatch sent by Ahmadinejad, who has counted U.S. Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama among his pen pals.

But this letter, weighing in at over 3,500 words, comes as criticism of Trump over his travel ban affecting seven Muslim-majority countries including Iran mounts in Tehran. It also may serve to burnish Ahmadinejad’s image domestically after the nation’s Supreme Leader warned him not to run in Iran’s upcoming May presidential election.

In the letter, published by Iranian media outlets, Ahmadinejad noted Trump won the election while he “truthfully described the U.S. political system and electoral structure as corrupt.”

Ahmadinejad decried U.S. “dominance” over the United Nations, as well as American meddling in the world that has brought “insecurity, war, division, killing and (the) displacement of nations.”

He also acknowledged the some 1 million people of Iranian descent living in America, saying that U.S. policies should “value respect toward the diversity of nations and races.”

“In other words, the contemporary U.S. belongs to all nations, including the natives of the land,” he wrote. “No one may consider themselves the owner and view others as guests or immigrants.”

A judge later blocked Trump’s travel ban, and an appeals court refused to reinstate it. Trump has promised to issue a revised order soon, saying it’s necessary to keep America safe.

Entirely missing from the letter was any reference to Iran’s nuclear program. Under Ahmadinejad’s presidency, Iran found itself heavily sanctioned over the program as Western governments feared it could lead to the Islamic Republic building atomic weapons. Iran has long maintained its program was for peaceful purposes.

Iran under current President Hassan Rouhani struck a nuclear deal with world powers, including the Obama administration, to limit its enrichment of uranium in exchange for the lifting of some sanctions. Trump campaigned promising to renegotiate the deal, without offering specifics.

Ahmadinejad gave the letter to the Swiss Embassy in Tehran, which represents U.S. interests in Iran. The embassy declined to comment Sunday while American officials could not be immediately reached.

The letter comes ahead of Iran’s presidential election, in which Rouhani is widely expected to seek a second four-year term. While allies of Ahmadinejad are expected to run, he himself won’t after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warned him in September his candidacy would bring about a “polarized situation” that would be “harmful for the county.”

Ahmadinejad’s popularity in Iran remains in question. During his tenure, he personally questioned the scale of the Holocaust and predicted the demise of Israel. His disputed 2009 re-election saw widespread protests and violence. Two of his former vice presidents went to prison for corruption.

But Ahmadinejad offered Trump his own warning about how quickly time passes for leaders.

“Four years is a long period, but it ends quickly,” he wrote. “The opportunity needs to be valued, and all its moments need to be used in the best way.”

 

Associated Press

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22 responses to “Iran’s Ahmadinejad tells Trump in an open letter ” U.S. belongs to all nations””

  1. Danny Farah Avatar
    Danny Farah

    Talk about US Meddling in all the world but Iran sent 100’s and 1000’s IRGC members to Lebanon since the early 80’s. Iran is everywhere in Middle east and Asia trying to convert everyone or submit them to their wills. Even in Mexico hezbollah is involved in drug dealings and columbia and many other nations. what about meddling in Syria, Yemen and bahrain and shall i continue more. when did this nutcase wake up.. If it was not for Israel the khomeini would not be in power..let’s say they didn’t want a Shah of Iran be the power in the middle east. now they got someone else who is not only powerful but enemies at convenience..

    1. Without Iran, the entire south of Lebanon would be occupied by Israel.On the other hand, there is no such thing as free lunch, Lebanon has had Hezbollah every since.

      The ‘enemies at convenience’ is an astute observation but I don’t see a (direct) relation between the Ayatollah Khomeini coming to power and Israel. The Mosaddegh-Shah-Khomeini succession was an Anglo-American machination; each replacing the previous when they became disobedient.

      1. So they are not occupied by Israel but Iran instead. Seems counter productive. Iran is just another bunch of Islamic extremists only slightly different then sunni extremists.

        1. Iran did not invade Lebanon; Hezbollah is made up of Lebanese people. Israel invaded Lebanon for the sole purpose of stealing more lands and get the Litani river on the made-up pretext of the PLO. Unless you’re paid to do so, I don’t understand why you refuse to see the wrongs of Israel.

          1. your bs as usual

          2. The only usual thing is your lack of contradictory evidence.

          3. (offtopic) Media: the head of Saudi intelligence, visited Israel and the Falestinian Authority http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART2/866/333.html?hp=1&cat=404&loc=10 what contradictory to biased bs?

        2. This is Omega argument if the South is occupied by HA people that have their own laws, don’t pay rates, taxes or anything else, the police or army or the Lebanese people can not go into most areas occupied by HA they pulled the guns on the Lebanese people plus they have weapons stronger than most army’s run a state of their own. To omega it is fine be it HA or Syria or Iran, as long as it’s not Isreal.

          1. Can you show me where:

            – I suggested that the south should belong to either Iran or Syria?

            – Where I advocated violence or war towards anyone and/or Israel?

            How do I fail to see the reason why Israel invaded Lebanon when I started the very reasons? -> Additional theft of land and the Litani River on the made-up pretext of the PLO in Lebanon.

          2. Helen4Yemen Avatar
            Helen4Yemen

            Give me one good reason why the Ashkenazi is on Arab land?

          3. Is North Africa Orab land idiot?

          4. To get the hummus recipe, top secret.

      2. Hezbushaitan is rotting in Syria. It seems they wont come home in one piece.

        1. I don’t understand the relevance of your post but I take it it helped you vent out some fumes.

  2. I think Ahmadinejad is itching for a US visa. He knows the Iranians including the supremo don’t like him anymore and wants to get out as quickly as possible …so why not immigrate to the US like the other million Iranians .

    1. Danny Farah Avatar
      Danny Farah

      Yes i agree.. he likes trump because David Duke went to Tehran to visit him..and maybe the later will him get one after all. lol

  3. Helen4Yemen Avatar
    Helen4Yemen

    CHAPTER 5 Let Us Create A Maronite State in Lebanon
    Source: Israel’s Sacred Terrorism by Livia Rokach

    The February 27, 1954 meeting among Ben Gurion, Sharett, Lavon and Dayan has already been mentioned in connection with Israel’s invasion plans of Egypt and Syria. In that same meeting a concrete proposal was outlined to disrupt Israel’s most peaceful neighbor at that time, Lebanon. In this case, Israel’s hegemonic ambitions did not even pretend to wear the phony fig leaf of security or defense.

    Then he [Ben Gurion] passed on to another issue. This is the time, he said, to push Lebanon, that is, the Maronites in that country, to proclaim a Christian State.I said that this was nonsense. The Maronites are divided. The partisans of Christian separatism are weak and will dare do nothing. A Christian Lebanon would mean their giving up Tyre, Tripoli, the Beka’a. There is no force that could bring Lebanon back to its pre-World War I dimensions, and all the more so because in that case it would lose its economic raison-d’etre. Ben Gurion reacted furiously. He began to enumerate the historical justification for a restricted Christian Lebanon. If such a development were to take place, the Christian Powers would not dare oppose it. I claimed that there was no factor ready to create such a situation, and that if we were to push and encourage it on our own we would get ourselves into an adventure that will place shame on us. Here came a wave of insults regarding my lack of daring and my narrow-mindedness. We ought to send envoys and spend money. I said there was no money. The answer was that there is no such thing. The money must be found, if not in the Treasury then at the Jewish Agency! For such a project it is worthwhile throwing away one hundred thousand, half a million, a million dollars. When this happens a decisive change will take place in the Middle East, a new era will start. I got tired of struggling against a whirlwind. (27 February 1954, 377)

    The next day Ben Gurion sent Sharett the following letter:

    To Moshe Sharett The Prime Minister

    Sdeh Boker February 27, 1954

    Upon my withdrawal from the government I decided in my heart to desist from intervening and expressing my opinion on current political affairs so as not to make things difficult for the government in any way. And if you hadn’t called on me, the three of you, yourself, Lavon and Dayan, I would not have, of my own accord, expressed an opinion on what is being done or what ought to be done. But as you called me, I deem it my duty to comply with your wishes, and especially with your own wish as Prime Minister. Therefore, I permit myself to go back to one issue which you did not approve of and discuss it again, and this is the issue of Lebanon.

    ………It is clear that Lebanon is the weakest link in the Arab League. The other minorities in the Arab States are all Muslim, except for the Copts. But Egypt is the most compact and solid of the Arab States and the majority there consists of one solid block, of one race, religion and language, and the Christian minority does not seriously affect their political and national unity. Not so the Christians in Lebanon. They are a majority in the historical Lebanon and this majority has a tradition and a culture different from those of the other components of the League. Also within the wider borders (this was the worst mistake made by France when it extended the borders of Lebanon), the Muslims are not free to do as they wish, even if they are a majority there (and I don’t know if they are, indeed, a majority) for fear of the Christians, The creation of a Christian State is therefore a natural act; it has historical roots and it will find support in wide circles in the Christian world, both Catholic and Protestant. In normal times this would be almost impossible. First and foremost because of the lack of initiative and courage of the Christians. But at times of confusion, or revolution or civil war, things take on another aspect, and even the weak declares himself to be a hero. Perhaps (there is never any certainty in politics) now is the time to bring about the creation of a Christian State in our neighborhood. Without our initiative and our vigorous aid this will not be done. It seems to me that this is the central duty – for at least one of the central duties, of our foreign policy. This means that time, energy and means ought to be invested in it and that we must act in all possible ways to bring about a radical change in Lebanon. Sasson … and our other Arabists must be mobilized. If money is necessary, no amount of dollars should be spared, although the money may be spent in vain. We must concentrate all our efforts on this issue …….. This is a historical opportunity. Missing it will be unpardonable. There is no challenge against the World Powers in this ……..Everything should be done, in my opinion, rapidly and at full steam.

    The goal will not be reached of course, without a restriction of Lebanon’s borders. But if we can find men in Lebanon and exiles from it who will be ready to mobilize for the creation of a Maronite state, extended borders and a large Muslim population will be of no use to them and this will not constitute a disturbing factor.

    I don’t know if we have people in Lebanon-but there are various ways in which the proposed experiment can be carried out.

    D.B.G. (27 February 1954, 2397-2398)

    Sharett responded a few weeks later:

    Mr. David Ben Gurion March 18, 1954 Sdeh Boker.

    …. A permanent assumption of mine is that if sometimes there is some reason to interfere from the outside in the internal affairs of some country in order to support a political movement inside it aiming toward some target it is only when that movement shows some independent activity which there is a chance to enhance and maybe to bring to success by encouragement and help from the outside. There is no point in trying to create from the outside a movement that does not exist at all inside … it is impossible to inject life into a dead body.

    As far as I know, in Lebanon today exists no movement aiming at transforming the country into a Christian State governed by the Maronite community….

    This is not surprising. The transformation of Lebanon into a Christian State as a result of an outside initiative is unfeasible today . . . I don’t exclude the possibility of accomplishing this goal in the wake of a wave of shocks that will sweep the Middle East . . . will destroy the present constellations and will form others. But in the present Lebanon, with its present territorial and demographic dimensions and its international relations, no serious initiative of the kind is imaginable.

    The Christians do not constitute the majority in Lebanon. Nor are they a unified block, politically speaking or community-wise. The Orthodox minority in Lebanon tends to identify with their brethren in Syria. They will not be ready to go to war for a Christian Lebanon, that is for a Lebanon smaller than it is today, and detached from the Arab League. On the contrary, they would probably not be opposed to a Lebanon united to Syria, as this would contribute to strengthening their own community and the Orthodox community throughout the region …. In fact, there are more Orthodox Christians in Syria than in Lebanon, and the Orthodox in Syria and Lebanon together are more numerous than the Maronites.

    As to the Maronites, the great majority among them has for years now supported those pragmatic political leaders of their community who have long since abandoned the dream of a Christian Lebanon, and put all their cards on a Christian-Muslim coalition in that country. These leaders have developed the consciousness that there is no chance for an isolated Maronite Lebanon and that the historical perspective of their community means a partnership with the Muslims in power, and in a membership of Lebanon in the League, hoping and believing that these factors can guarantee that the Lebanese Muslims will abandon their longings for a unification of Lebanon with Syria and will enhance the development among them of a feeling for Lebanese independence.

    Therefore, the great majority of the Maronite community is liable to see in any attempt at raising the flag of territorial shrinking and Maronite power a dangerous attempt at subverting the status of their community, its security and even its very existence. Such an initiative would seem disastrous to them because it could tear apart the pattern of Christian-Muslim collaboration in the present Lebanon which was created through great efforts and sacrifices for an entire generation; because it would mean throwing the Lebanese Muslims into the Syrian embrace, and finally, because it would fatally bring about the historical disaster of an annexation of Lebanon to Syria and the annihilation of the former’s personality through its dilution in a big Muslim state.

    You may object that these arguments are irrelevant as the Plan is based on tearing away from Lebanon the Muslim provinces of Tyre, the Beka’a and Tripoli. But who can predict that these provinces will actually give up their ties to Lebanon and their political and economic connection to Beirut? Who can assure that the Arab League will be ready to give up the status that Lebanon’s affiliation confers to it …….? Who will vouch that the bloody war that will inevitably explode as a result of such an attempt will be limited to Lebanon and not drag Syria into the battlefield immediately’ Who can be sure that the Western Powers will look on as observers and will not intervene in the experiment before a Christian Lebanon will have been realized’? Who can guarantee that the Maronite leadership itself will not become aware of all the above considerations and will therefore back out of such a dangerous adventure’?

    …. There are also decisive economic arguments against it. We are not discussing the issue in 1920/21 . . . but 30 years later. Mount Lebanon has meanwhile integrated into one organic unit with the coastal plane of Tyre and Sidon, the Valley of Baalbeck and the city of Tripoli. They are commercially and economically interdependent and inseparable. Mount Lebanon was not a self-sufficient unit even before World War 1. . . . The annexation of the three regions plus the city of Beirut to the Lebanese State has rendered possible the creation of a balanced economy. A return to the past would not just mean a surgical operation but also a disintegration leading to the end of Lebanon. . . .

    I cannot imagine, even from this viewpoint alone, that any serious organization would collaborate with a plan that in my opinion would entail Lebanon’s economic suicide.

    When all this has been said, [I should add that] I would not have objected, and on the contrary I would have certainly been favorable to the idea, of actively aiding any manifestation of agitation in the Maronite community tending to strengthen its isolationist tendencies, even if there were no real chances of achieving the goals; I would have considered positive the very existence of such an agitation and the destabilization it could bring about, the trouble it would have caused the League, the diversion of attention from the Arab-Israeli complications that it would have caused, and the very kindling of a fire made up of impulses toward Christian independence. But what can I do when such an agitation is nonexistent? … In the present condition, I am afraid that any attempt on our part would be considered as lightheartedness and superficiality or worse-as an adventurous speculation upon the well being and existence of others and a readiness to sacrifice their basic good for the benefit of a temporary tactical advantage for Israel.

    Moreover, if this plan is not kept a secret but becomes known a danger which cannot be underestimated in the Middle Eastern circumstances-the damage which we shall suffer . . . would not be compensated even by an eventual success of the operation itself. . . .

    M. S. (18 March 1954, 2398- 2400)

    On April 24 a fleeting note in the Diary, informs us that “contacts with certain circles in Lebanon” had been discussed that day between the premier and some of his collaborators in the foreign ministry. The next time Lebanon is mentioned is on February 12, 1955: Neguib Sfeir, “an adventurer and a visionary” whom Sharett had known since 1920, had just paid a visit to the Israeli ambassador in Rome, Eliahu Sasson,……..apparently on behalf of Lebanon’s President Camille Chamoun. Lebanon would be ready to sign a separate peace if we accept the following three conditions: (a) guarantee Lebanon’s borders; (b) come to Lebanon’s aid if it is attacked by Syria; (c) buy Lebanon’s agricultural surplus. Sasson … suggested a meeting between himself and Chamoun during the latter’s next visit to Rome. (12 February 1955, 723)

    On May 16, during a joint meeting of senior officials of the defense and foreign affairs ministries, Ben Gurion again raised the demand that Israel do something about Lebanon. The moment was particularly propitious, he maintained, due to renewed tensions between Syria and Iraq, and internal trouble in Syria. Dayan immediately expressed his enthusiastic support:

    According to him [Dayan] the only thing that’s necessary is to find an officer, even just a Major. We should either win his heart or buy him with money, to make him agree to declare himself the savior of the Maronite population. Then the Israeli army will enter Lebanon, will occupy the necessary territory, and will create a Christian regime which will ally itself with Israel. The territory from the Litani southward will be totally annexed to Israel and everything will be all right. If we were to accept the advice of the Chief of Staff we would do it tomorrow, without awaiting a signal from Baghdad.

    … I did not want to bicker with Ben Gurion. . in front of his officers and limited myself to saying that this might mean … war between Israel and Syria.. . . At the same time I agreed to set up a joint commission composed of officials of the Foreign Affairs Ministry and the army to deal with Lebanese affairs. . . . [According to Ben Gurion] this commission should relate to the Prime Minister. (16 May 1954, 966)

    The Chief of Staff supports a plan to hire a [Lebanese] officer who will agree to serve as a puppet so that the Israeli army may appear as responding to his appeal “to liberate Lebanon from its Muslim oppressors.” This will of course be a crazy adventure…. We must try to prevent dangerous complications. The commission- must be charged with research tasks and prudent actions directed at encouraging Maronite circles who reject Muslim pressures and agree to lean on us. (28 May 1954, 1024)

    The “prudent actions” continued. On September 22, a mysterious incident occurred. A bus was attacked in Galilee, near Safad. Two persons were killed and ten wounded. Even before an investigation could establish where the aggressors came from (and there were, at that moment, three contradictory hypotheses), Dayan demanded a reprisal action against Lebanon. A Lebanese village suspected to be the attackers’ base had already been chosen. Its population would be evacuated in the night, its houses blown up. Sharett objected to Israel’s opening a new front along a border which had been totally peaceful since 1948. But this was exactly what Dayan sought: the destabilization of Lebanon and the search for a forerunner to Major Sa’d Haddad who declared a Maronite state in 1979. The fulfillment of his disruptive plans would have found an ideal point of departure in this terrorist action.

    Sharett, however, vetoed an immediate action. At this point the Israeli plot against Lebanon was suspended for other reasons. On October 1, 1955, the U.S. government, through the CIA, gave Israel the “green light” to attack Egypt. The energies of Israel’s security establishment became wholly absorbed by the preparations for the war which would take place exactly one year later. In the summer of 1956, in preparation for the Sinai-Suez operation, the close military and political alliance with France was clinched. It would last practically until the eve of the 1967 war, and would prevent Israel, especially following De Gaulle’s rise to power in France in 1957, from implementing its plans for the dismemberment of a country Paris considered as belonging to the French sphere of influence. Israeli bombings of South Lebanon, specifically intended to destabilize that country, were to start in 1968 after the 1967 war, after Dayan’s nomination as defense minister in Levi Eshkol’s cabinet, and after lsrael’s definite transition from the alliance with France to that with the United States.6 From that moment on, this unholy alliance was to use every possible means constantly to escalate terrorist violence and political subversion in Lebanon, according to lsrael’s blueprints of the fifties. All this, it is hardly necessary to recall, was hatched when no Palestinian guerrillas were remotely in view.7If anything, the difficulties Israel encountered throughout all these years in consummating its long-standing ambition to divide Lebanon and separate it from the Arab world constitute one more proof of the external and alien nature of these plots in respect to the authentic aspirations of the Lebanese people regardless of their religious faith.

    Source: https://msuweb.montclair.edu/~furrg/essays/rokach.html

    1. Your point is???

    2. Google is so amazing with lots of words. Just that words.

  4. (GT) During the exercise, the Navy of the Islamic Republic of Iran “Velayat
    95”, which is being tested new versions of missile systems “Nasr” and
    “Dehlaviye” were held in the northern Indian Ocean waters.
    “The tests cruise missile” Nasr “were held in the southern part of our
    territorial waters they became successful -. The missile hit the
    target,” – said the Iranian Defense Minister Gen. Hossein Dehkan.
    The first reports of a rocket are by 2008. “Nasr” can be launched from offshore, onshore and airborne platforms
    and designed to destroy ships with a displacement of up to 1,500 tons.
    “Dehlaviye” – modification of the Iranian anti-Russian complex “Cornet”. It was put into service in 2012. It is reported that one of its main objectives – to help fight the Iranian satellites Israeli armored vehicles

  5. (offtopic) Turkey closed by wall the half Syrian border

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