"Iranian Official Calls to 'Wipe Out the Zionist Regime'" http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/190543

"A chillingly detailed guide to "the proper way of eliminating Israel" – tweeted out by Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei – is threatening to throw nuclear talks with Tehran into chaos" http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/ayatollah-ali-khamenei-twit...

"Israel should be wiped off map, says Iran's president" http://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/oct/27/israel.iran

Re Hezbollah

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hezbollah

"Lebanon's Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah acknowledged Tuesday for the first time that his militant movement received financial and material support from Iran, but denied it took instructions from the Islamic Republic."

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/02/07/us-lebanon-hezboll...

http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/.premium-1.637...

http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/10/24/hezbollah-ready-to-d...

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Terrorism/hizbol...

Two points:

1. The twitter account does not really belong to Khamenei. There is no mention of it on his official website and no blue check-mark.

2. We all hate Ahmedinejad. He did a lot of things that ranged from awful, like destroying our economy, to stupid, like eliminating daylight saving time one year only to bring it back the next year, or merging two universities in the course of a week and changing his mind about it several months later.

In addition to being stupid in his actions, he was stupid about what he said. You can say he had a bit of a faux pas problem, like a certain current US politician, but much worth. For example, after his first speech in UN general assembly, he was caught on tape saying that "I felt an aurora of light engulfing me as I gave my speech", apparently mistaking the spotlight with something more supernatural. For the whole 8 years, he was a living, talking, (and unfortunately) governing joke. We learned not to take a single word out of his mouth seriously early in his term.

Quoting him regarding Iran's foreign policy is some sort of out-of-context quote or selection bias. He said a lot of stupid things. Don't take him seriously.

The Twitter account is a direct mouth piece for Khamenei.

It's five years old, has almost 100k followers, Iran has never denied its legitimacy, and pretty much every major news outlet refers to it as being legitimate. It's beyond obvious that it is theirs.

"The unverified Twitter account, widely accepted as the mouthpiece of the Ayatollah's social media campaign, often posts diatribes against the West and Israel to its more than 91,000 followers."

http://www.cnn.com/2014/12/29/world/meast/ayatollah-tweet-ab...

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/dec/28/ayatollah-ali-k...

No reason to hate Ahmedinejad more than the rest of the masks that Khamenei puts over his face. Mismanaging universities is a fine old tradition of the Revolution.

None of your sources demonstrate a "goal to essentially kill everyone in Israel". In particular the "wiped off the map" Ahmadinejad quote has long been proven a mistranslation and yet is still pushed by the warmongers years after the fact.

You stated (in rhetorical question form) that "Iran [is] still backing numerous terrorist organizations", yet your links only refer to Hezbollah. Where are the "numerous" organizations?

Also it is pretty disingenuous to dismiss anything done by other countries. Hezbollah? They're small potatoes compared to the greatest terrorist organizations on earth, namely western militaries. If Hezbollah has killed 1000s the militaries of the west have easily killed 100x that.

FWIW, it's safe to say that (like many countries in that part of the world), Iran isn't particularly fond of Israel still being around.

I think it's safe to say that it's no coincidence that Saudi Arabia is treated favourably by us ("the West") than Iran, when Saudi Arabia generally doesn't object to whatever Israel does while Iran would prefer to see it gone.

Also, while we're talking theocracies: Iran (and Hezbollah) is a Shia while Saudi Arabia (and various groups we like to think of as terrorist organizations) is Sunni. Shia and Sunni generally don't get along very well and Saudi Arabia hates Iran's guts.

But googling for "Iran Saudi Arabia" I just noticed the Guardian went ahead and saved me the trouble of spelling this out any further: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/28/iran-sa...

Eliminating the "Zionist regime" would require destroying Israel. What do you suggest Iran's plan for doing that is, other than killing vast numbers of Israelis?

When did I dismiss anything done by other countries? I didn't. You're not only misquoting me, but failing like so many others in this thread when it comes to logical separation. Because I say X, does not mean I also say Z or agree with Z or deny Z - if I say Iran is an oppressive theocracy, that does not mean I claim that Napoleon didn't do terrible things while invading Russia.

Iran supports lots of terrorist organizations. They backed and financed terrorism against US targets in Iraq as one obvious example, but they're active all around the world and have been implicated in supporting terrorism in numerous countries.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/may/30/feds-say-ira...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_and_state-sponsored_terror...

"In July 2012, The Times of India reported that New Delhi police have concluded that terrorists belonging to a branch of Iran’s military, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, were responsible for an attack on 13 February 2012, during which a bomb explosion targeted an Israeli diplomat in New Delhi, India, wounding one embassy staff member, a local employee, and two passers-by. According to the report, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards may have planned other attacks on Israeli targets around the world as well"

"Iran supplies political support and weapons to Hamas,[14] an organization classified by Israel, the United States, Canada, the European Union and Japan as a terrorist organization."

"Iranian proxies killed an estimated 1,100 US troops in Iraq.[35] In addition, insurgents supported by Iran reportedly committed acts of terrorism"

"Aggrey Adoli, Kenya's police chief in Kenya's coastal region, said on 22 June 2012 that two Iranians, Ahmad Abolfathi Mohammad and Sayed Mansour Mousavi, believed to members of Iran's Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force,[39] were arrested and suspected of being involved in terrorism."

http://www.cfr.org/iran/state-sponsors-iran/p9362

http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/markaz/posts/2013/11/21-iran-...

http://www.state.gov/j/ct/rls/crt/2012/209978.htm

https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/html/pdf/Iran-Testimony-...

>Eliminating the "Zionist regime" would require destroying Israel

No it doesn't. A "regime" is a synonym for a government. Ironically your previous link to Khomeini's plan for getting rid of the "Zionist regime", refutes your point. (The interesting part about that article is if you read the "controversial" document, it really is, more or less, pretty mild. In contrast you read Netanyahu's comments about the document and you'd think it was Mein Kampf)

As for all the talk of "terrorism" the word is so politically charged as to make it almost worthless. All your links to "terrorist" activities are, as I said previously, small potatoes. Israel uses "terrorist" tactics against Iran, Iran uses "terrorist" tactics back. U.S. uses "terrorist" tactics against Iran, Iran uses "terrorist" tactics back. I'm not sure what else you would expect.

And suppose they were funding the most egregious "terrorist" organization in the world, what's your point? What does that have anything to do with the article? Don't the poor serfs get enough of the war mongering propaganda through the myriad of other channels? Do you really need to echo it here?

Eliminating the government of Israel would require destroying the country of Israel, which would very obviously require killing vast numbers of Israeli citizens.

Feel free to now explain how Iran would wipe out Israel's government, while not killing huge numbers of Israelis.

I don't regard any terrorism as small potatoes, no matter who does it. I think it's unfortunate you hold such a view.

What's my point? My point was obvious: I replied to a parent comment that claimed Iran was moderate. Iran is the exact opposite of moderate, they're an oppressive theocracy that supports terrorism globally. And they're regarded by pretty much every first world country as being a leading State sponsor of terrorism.

>Eliminating the government of Israel would require destroying the country of Israel, which would very obviously require killing vast numbers of Israeli citizens.

>Feel free to now explain how Iran would wipe out Israel's government, while not killing huge numbers of Israelis.

Because no government in the entire history of the world has ever fallen without the extinction of its citizens. /s

Perhaps if you read the Khomeini document you referenced you could answer your own question.

>I don't regard any terrorism as small potatoes, no matter who does it. I think it's unfortunate you hold such a view.

The "small potatoes" comment is one of comparison, not of acceptance.

>What's my point? My point was obvious: I replied to a parent comment that claimed Iran was moderate. Iran is the exact opposite of moderate, they're an oppressive theocracy that supports terrorism globally. And they're regarded by pretty much every first world country as being a leading State sponsor of terrorism.

The term "moderate" is a term of comparison. So despite your disingenuous claims of "logical separation", in order to make a judgement call of whether Iran is "moderate" it must be compared to other countries. Hence my "small potatoes" comment. If Iran's "terrorism" makes it the "exact opposite of moderate" then many of the first world countries you refer to must be off the spectrum.

Moved. (Previously HN was not letting me reply to your deeper comment)