Inciting Genocide – Absolutely—- but What about Crimes Against Humanity?

On Wednesday June 20th, 2007 the U.S. House of Representatives passed a resolution demanding from the United Nations to charge the Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad with violating the 1948 Convention on Genocide, as he has called for destruction of Israel. Article 2 of the Convention defines genocide as the acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.

 And article 3 calls the following acts punishable:

• Genocide;
• Conspiracy to commit genocide;
• Direct and public incitement to commit genocide;
• Attempt to commit genocide;
• Complicity in genocide.

Ahmadinejad has called for destruction of Israel in a number of occasions. His famous declaration was: “As the Imam (Ayatollah Khomeini) said, Israel must be wiped off the map.” It is nauseating that the Ohio Congressman Kucinich and some appeasers of the Iranian regime try to explain how “wipe off the map” does not really mean “wipe off the map” in Farsi and Ahmadinejad only means regime change in Israel. Let’s look at two direct quotes from Iran’s official sites from Khomeini himself: “We must all rise, destroy Israel” and “Israel must be eradicated from the page of history.” As someone who is fluent in both Farsi and English, I testify that “wipe off” (the word in Farsi) really translates to “wipe off” meaning “eradicated” and nothing was lost in translation. The leadership of the Islamic Republic as a whole, from the so-called “pragmatist” former President Rafsanjani to the “reformist” smiley face former President Khatami all believe in this ideological pillar of Islamic fundamentalism.

Coincidentally, the House resolution was passed on June 20th. This Day bears great significance for Iranian people. On June 20th, 1981 Khomeini’s regime brutally attacked peaceful demonstration of more than 500,000 Iranian people in Tehran. Thousands were arrested. Young girls and boys were executed within few weeks. Their pictures appeared in the State-run newspapers calling on their parents to claim the body of their loved ones from morgues.

In July 1981, Time magazine ran an article entitled: “Terror in the Name of God”. Its focus was on twelve girls who were brutally executed by the government of Iran because they took part in a demonstration for democracy on June 20th, 1981. The following is a paragraph out of this article:

… The Islamic judge who sentenced them—Ayatullah Mohammadi Gilani—did not even know who they were. The twelve girls, the oldest 18, the others under 16, refused to identify themselves in court. When Gilani asked their names, each in turn replied, “Mojahed” (member of MEK/PMOI). To the question “Child of?” each replied, “The people of Iran.” Gilani solved the problem of identifying the girls by having them photographed. Then he consigned them to the firing squad. Islamic guards led the dozen girls to the courtyard of Evin Prison in Tehran…As the guards began to blindfold them, the girls started chanting, “Death to fascism! Death to Khomeini!”…Three days later, the clergy-controlled newspaper Ettela’at printed the girls’ pictures with a terse message asking the parents to call for the bodies…

On June 20th 1981, the clerical regime in Iran began an unprecedented massacre against its own citizens. 120,000 political prisoners have been viciously murdered since then; tens of thousands of them women who courageously stood up to tyranny. Slightest voice of dissent was – and continues to be – crushed. Crime against humanity, as defined in International law consists of: acts of persecution or any large scale atrocities against a body of people, as being the criminal offence above all others. By any international standards, atrocities committed in large scale by the leadership of Iranian regime against Iranian citizens are crimes against humanity. How can Mr. Kucinich and the rest of mullah’s apologists wash this one away and find an alternative definition for “massacre”?

Ahmadinejad and the rest of the clerical leadership in Iran must be condemned by the United Nations Security Council and should be charged and taken to the international tribunals for inciting genocide as well as crimes against humanity.