Iran One Step Closer To Precipice

[Annie]

Not off the top of my head. But I did enjoy 1984, Brave New World and Animal Farm as involving books.

do you mean 'evolving?' You really think that was Wells goal?

 

[onedomino]

Iranian Paper 'Identifies' Students in Siege Photo
By Sam Knight, Times Online, and Michael Theodoulou

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-1677118,00.html

The Bush Administration said today that it is continuing to investigate allegations that the President-elect of Iran was involved in the 1979 attack on the US Embassy in Tehran, even as the photograph that triggered the controversy was further discredited.

The White House press secretary told reporters today that President Bush would not be surprised to learn (Not be surprised?!! Since we are paying billions for the CIA, DIA, NSA, and other organizations to prepare the President's daily National Intelligence Estimate, how does McClellan have the nerve to say that it would not be surprising to learn after the fact that the guy elected President of Iran has turned out to be a terrorist that took American hostages?) that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, elected as the new President of Iran last week, took part in the 444-day siege that ruined American relations with Iran.

"We continue to look into it and establish all the facts. I don’t think it should be a surprise to anyone if it turns out to be true," said Scott McClellan this morning, referring to allegations made by five American hostages on Wednesday that they remembered Mr. Ahmadinejad as one of their captors.

"Given the nature of the regime and his own past, I don’t think it should be surprising," said Mr. McClellan, who also repeated American criticisms of the recent Iranian elections, saying that "hand-picked candidates" had been allowed to run and that the elections were "well short of free and fair".

The continuing scrutiny of the White House stood in contrast to the increasing doubts surrounding the photograph that first prompted questions into Mr. Ahmadinejad's role in the embassy siege.

On Tuesday, Iran Focus, a London-based Iranian news agency opposed to the President-elect, circulated a well known Associated Press photograph of the crisis, which began in November 1979, saying that it showed Mr. Ahmadinejad holding the arm of an American hostage. (see image above)

But today, an reformist newspaper in Tehran, Shargh, said that the Iranian students shown in the photograph were Ja’afar Zaker, a militant who went on to die in the Iran-Iraq war, and a student known only as Ranjbaran, who was later executed for alleged links to an extreme opposition group. (How convenient!! Both the terrorists in the photo are alleged to be dead!)

As for the American hostage shown in the photograph, The Times learnt yesterday that he is Jerry J. Miele, who was working as a communications officer at the Embassy in 1979. Reached at his home today in Mount Pleasant, Pennsylvania, Mr. Miele, 66, declined to comment on the photograph but said: "I don't have anything to say about the new President of Iran, I don't want to cause any trouble." (What?)

Even though Mr. Ahmadinejad's role in the hostage crisis, let alone the photograph, has been widely disputed, not least by other hostage takers who led the capture of the embassy, more American hostages said on Friday that he could have been among their captors.

Barry Rosen, a former press officer at the embassy who now works at Columbia University told Reuters he had no direct memory of Mr. Ahmadinejad but supported another former hostage, former Colonel David Roeder, who said yesterday that Mr. Ahmadinejad had assisted interrogations of the hostages.

"I feel that if Dave says it’s so then it’s so," said Mr. Rosen.

Yesterday, Mr. Roeder and four other hostages said they were sure Mr. Ahmadinejad had played a significant role in the embassy siege.

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[Gunny]

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I honestly don't think it's him. The facial features -- nose & eyes -- don't match.

Either way, it matters little to me. This idiot is a bigger asshat than any revolutionary student. His claim to fame is being a hitman abroad for the Islamic Iranians.