Reprinted from NewsMax.com
Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2005 12:55 a.m. EST
Iranian Cleric: Muslims Could Nuke Israel
Ruling Iranian cleric Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani declared Friday that the Muslim world could survive a nuclear exchange with Israel - while accomplishing the goal of obliterating the Jewish state.
"[The] application of an atomic bomb would not leave anything in Israel - but the same thing would just produce damages in the Muslim world," Hashemi-Rafsanjani said, in quotes picked up by the Iran Press Service.
"If a day comes when the world of Islam is duly equipped with the arms Israel has in possession, the strategy of colonialism would face a stalemate," he posited.
Analysts told IPS that Mr. Hashemi-Rafsanjani’s speech, delivered at a Tehran prayer service, was the first time that a prominent Islamic leader openly suggested a nuclear attack against the Israel.
Six weeks ago, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told a "World Without Zionism" conference that Israel should be "wiped off the map."
Last week, United Nations nuclear watchdog Mohammed ElBaradei said Iran would be able to produce nuclear weapons in a matter of months.
(Man this guy is big trouble!)
bttt
He doesn't seem to take into account the effect OUR nuclear weapons will have on his "little corner of the world".
I've often thought the Middle East would look better as a little bit of glowing glass!
Wonder if Rafsanjani's looked at a map lately. There are hundreds of thousands of Palestinians living cheek-to-jowl with the Israelis. To say nothing of Israeli Arabs. But then Rafsanjani's not Arab so maybe that's his idea of acceptable damage. In any case, the odds seem to be increasing that parts of Tehran will be very quiet neighborhoods for the next several millennia.