Smiles and Denials:Official Israeli and Iranian Statements Demonstrate a Double Standard

Burgas, Bulgaria - July 18, 2012
 

 Tehran, Iran - January 11, 2012

Reacting to the immediate Israeli accusations that Iran was behind the blast that killed Israeli tourists in Burgas, Bulgaria, Foreign Ministry spokesman, Ramin Mehmanparast, insisted, "The  Islamic Republic of Iran, which itself is the biggest victim of terrorism, considers any act that endangers the lives of innocent people in order to fulfill illegitimate political objectives as inhumane and strongly condemns it."

The official IRNA news agency quoted Mehmanparast as saying, "The Zionist regime, which had a direct role in the assassination of  our  country's nuclear scientists, is leveling baseless accusations to divert global attention to its own terrorist nature."

Despite incessant allegations - devoid of evidence, of course - of Iran culpability, the BBC reports that Bulgarian Prime Minister Boiko Borisov has consistently "declined to back Israeli claims that Iran and Lebanese militant group Hezbollah played a role."

A bogus story in the Times of Israel which claimed Iranian President Mahmoud had gloated over the Burgas bus bombing has been successfully debunked by both myself and BBC Persian correspondent Bahman Kalbasi.  Still, it may be illuminating to consider the differences between the actual Iranian response to the terrorist attack in Bulgaria that took the lives of Israeli vacationers and the Israeli response to the multiple murders of Iranian scientists on the streets of Tehran, often when they have been accompanied by members of their family, going to work, or dropping their children off at nursery school.

The targeted killings of Iranian professors and scientists have widely been considered to be the work of Mossad, either on its own or in conjunction with Iranian terrorist organizations.  Yet, in response to the murders, the Israeli government has never issued an official denial of responsibility.

On January 11, 2012, the day 32-year-old Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan was murdered in his car, Israel's top military spokesman, Brigadier General Yoav  Mordechai, posted on his Facebook page: "I don't know who settled the score with the Iranian scientist, but I certainly am not shedding a tear."

What possible "score" could be settled by killing a man who works at a nuclear facility that is fully safeguarded and monitored by the IAEA remains a mystery, especially considering that - as a Reuters Special Report affirmed earlier this year - "[t]he United States, European allies and even Israel generally agree on  three things about Iran's nuclear program: Tehran does not have a bomb, has not decided to build one, and is probably years away from having a deliverable nuclear warhead."

Responding to the murder of Ahmadi-Roshan, married and the father of a young son, Time Magazine quoted a "senior Israel official" smiled and said, "Yeah, one more.  I don't feel sad for him."

Confronted with the claim that Israel was responsible for the targeted killing, an anonymous Israeli official told The Washington Post, "It is not our policy to comment on this sort of speculation when it periodically arises."

During an interview with CNN shortly after Ahmadi-Roshan's killing, Israeli President Shimon Peres was also asked about Israel's involvement.  He replied dismissively: "Not to the best of my knowledge."

Meanwhile, Mickey Segal, a former director of the Israeli military’s Iranian  intelligence department, said, "Many bad things have been happening to Iran in the recent period.  Iran is in a situation where pressure on it is mounting, and the latest assassination joins the pressure that the Iranian regime is facing."

Ahmadi-Roshan's murder came the day after IDF Chief Benny Gantz reportedly told a Knesset panel that 2012  would be a "critical year" for Iran, not least of all because of "things that  happen to it unnaturally."

Now imagine if any of these statements had come from Iranian officials about Israel this past week.  And think what we'd be hearing if Iran's Foreign Ministry had yet to issue a statement about the Burgas bombing, with the claim that it is not Iran's "policy to comment on this sort of speculation."  Still, Iran's denials are dismissed as yet another instance of devious Persian duplicity, while Israel's smug silence is simply ignored, or even admired.

Of course, while denial doesn't mean absolution and silence isn't necessarily complicity, the double standards of international expectation, obligation, and suspicion when it comes to Israel and Iran remain as stark as ever.

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UPDATE:

July 25, 2012 - Addressing a United Nations Security Council meeting today, Iran's U.N. Ambassador Mohammad Khazaee stated, "It's amazing that just a few minutes after the terrorist attack, Israeli officials announced that Iran was behind it," adding, "We have never and will not engage in such a despicable attempt on [the lives of] innocent people."

Khazaee even suggested that Israel itself was behind the bombing.  "Such terrorist operation could only be planned and carried out by the same regime whose short history is full of state terrorism operations and assassinations aimed implicating others for narrow political gains," he said. "I could provide...many examples showing that this regime killed its own citizens and innocent Jewish people during the last couple of decades."

While such an allegation is surely reactionary and hyperbolic (the result, one can assume, of a frustrating week of unfounded and unsubstantiated accusations), it is nevertheless grounded in the fact that Israel has engaged in false flag operations many times before.

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