When crowds in Tehran chant “Death to America!” they don’t mean it personally, according to President Hassan Rohani of Iran.
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The presenter of 60 Minutes, Steve Kroft spoke to President Hassan Rouhani in Iran ahead of the progression of the US/Iran nuclear deal. Instead, the chant is merely symbolic of how Iran has opposed United States foreign policy since the start of the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Our people respect the American people.
Poitning to the president’s third visit to New York, Vice President for Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Hojjat al-Islam Majid Ansari said yesterday that, “Rouhani will attend the UN General Assembly Summit in order to defend the image of Islam on behalf of Iranians”.
“When the people rose up against the shah, the United States aggressively supported the shah until the last moments”, he added. In Syria, Iranian-backed groups, including the Iranian-supported Lebanese terror group Hezbollah, have also played a major role in suppressing moderate rebel movements aligned against the Assad regime.
“Folks is not going to forget these matters. We can not forget the past, but at the same time our gaze must be towards the future”, he said. “But he is angry over the bad remarks coming out of the United States, so he wants to wait if the deal works before he allows relations to get better”.
Following the revolt, 52 U.S. embassy workers were taken hostage by Iranian extreme pupils and held them for over a year. During the Iran-Iraq war between 1980 and 1988, the United States remained close to the aggressor, Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, despite the deaths of up to a million Iranians, many through chemical weapon attacks.
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The move comes in the aftermath of the agreement forged in July between Iran and world powers over Tehran’s nuclear program, a deal that observers believe has highlighted a political divide within the Iranian establishment. But he expressed hope that various economic openings such as the resumption of tourism and trade will help to bolster goodwill and a further thaw in relations between the longtime adversaries.
