Rouhani accommodates Iran's Jewish students

[shaayecanaan]

Thanks to the government of President Hassan Rouhani, as of Feb. 4, Jewish students officially no longer have to attend school on the Sabbath. This is an important step by the Rouhani administration to welcome Iranian Jews.

There are numerous reasons why my family left Iran in 1987, but an important one was the decision by the Iranian government that year not to officially recognize the holy Sabbath as a religious day off for Jewish students. There was no choice: The Iranian school week ran from Saturday to Thursday so we either attended school on the Sabbath or we were failed and had to repeat the year.

Much like politics in Iran, views and policies relating to Iran's Jewish community are full of paradoxes and contradictions. One of the more interesting paradoxes relates to Ali Younessi, Rouhani's special assistant on issues regarding religious minorities. Younessi has been the point man behind Rouhani's positive outreach to Iran's Jewish community. This is the same Younessi who was in charge of Iran's Ministry of Intelligence when it accused 13 Jews of spying for Israel — charges that were thought of as being highly dubious. Today, Younessi is even visiting synagogues and unveiling memorials to Iran's fallen Jewish martyrs in the Iran-Iraq war.

One of the more depressing paradoxes is that while Rouhani’s government tries to show respect to Iran’s millennia-old Jewish community, parts of the regime are doing the opposite by planning to hold a new Holocaust denial cartoon competition in Tehran.

This will be the second Holocaust denial cartoon competition. The first one was held in December 2006, soon after then-President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called the Holocaust a myth. Unfortunately, Ahmadinejad is not the only person to make such a reference to the Holocaust. Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei made a similar statement in February of the same year.

http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/02/iran-hassan-rouhani-iranian-jews.html

[Jefferson23]

1. I'm with him, I hope it continues to get better too. It is a shame when anyone decides

an issue that has an impact on the means by which a group is accommodated or not,
rather tit for tat thinking, so to speak.

“Whenever in the US or Europe they allow Friday to be a holiday for the sake of Muslim children, then we'll do this for Jews,” he said.


Good news, for a change...thanks.

[King_David]

8. "planning to hold a new Holocaust denial cartoon competition in Tehran"

Is "good news, for a change"?

How so?

[6chars]

17. what would happen if someone entered a picture of the prophet you know who

denying the holocaust?

[leveymg]

2. Iran has their offensive cartoonists and so does France.

They have enemies in common.

[Fred Sanders]

3. Under President Rouhani, Iranian Jews Find More Acceptance

http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-features/1.628577

"More than a thousand people trekked across Iran this past week to visit a shrine in this ancient Persian city, a pilgrimage like many others in the Islamic Republic — until you notice men there wearing yarmulkes.

Iran, a home for Jews for more than 3,000 years, has the Middle East's largest Jewish population outside of Israel, a perennial foe of the country. But while Iran's Jews in recent years had their faith continually criticized by the country's previous governments, they've found new acceptance under moderate President Hassan Rohani.

"The government has listened to our grievances and requests. That we are being consulted is an important step forward," said Homayoun Samiah, leader of the Tehran Jewish Association. "Under former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, nobody was listening to us. Our requests fell on deaf ears."

Most of Iran's 77 million people are Shiite Muslims and its ruling establishment is led by hard-line clerics who preach a strict version of Islam. Many Jews fled the country after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Jews linked to Israel afterward were targeted. Today, estimates suggest some 20,000 Jews remain in the country."

[King_David]

4. If they want to leave Iran , the Jews should be allowed to leave,

Shalach et ami and all that still applies....

[azurnoir]

5. Are Iranian Jews being forced to stay in Iran?

I've seen that claim made here before but never anything that backs it up

[King_David]

9. Why would they stay?

Maybe miss out on the world famous new "planning to hold a new Holocaust denial cartoon competition in Tehran. " ?

[azurnoir]

11. maybe they stay because they're Iranian? Maybe they stay because they love their country?

you seem very anxious for Jews to make aliyah so much so that I must ask are you planning to also?

[King_David]

12. You may ask , sure

But be it as it may if the USA had a Government Sponsored Holocaust denial conference I would most certainly be doing Aliyah ... Pronto.

[azurnoir]

13. well according to Malcolm Hoenlein there is US antisemitism from the "top down"

sort of trickle down antisemitism

There is “top-down anti-Semitism” in the US, said Hoenlein, and, much like in the United Kingdom, it is “the poison of the elite that trickles down into society.”

http://www.timesofisrael.com/american-jewish-leader-danger-of-anti-semitic-spillover-in-us-criticism-of-israel/#ixzz3SGQESJuY

[King_David]

14. And ?

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

20. So you'll be packing your bags?

[sabbat hunter]

18. I think that most of the

Jews that are left are anti-zionists. They do not believe that there should be an Israel until the Messiah comes.

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

19. Links, dave, links?

[nazzzz]

15. Of course they can leave, Iran is not North Korea

Of course not. They can leave whenever they want. Many have moved to Israel and the states and some choose to stay. you never found anything to back it up because it is very incorrect information.

[King_David]

16. Iran is far worse than North Korea

Iran murders , tortures, and kills Gays regularly.

Iran government is run by homophobic, medieval, evil fucks.

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

21. Why the sidestep, dave?

Last edited Fri Dec 18, 2015, 09:57 PM - Edit history (1)

The subject was about Persian Jews, but you decide to switch into something about "Gays" in your words.

Continuity please.

[King_David]

22. Talking about Gays and Gay rights is like waving a red rag to your face...

Do you know that Democrats are not homophobic?

Can you please cut this Gay bully shtick out?

This is 2015

Leave this Gay hatred of yours for your other right wing sites...

For fucks sake quit this homophobic rants and stop your bullying .....


http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1134&pid=113572

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

23. The subject was Persian Jews, dave. Once again you were the one

who strangely switched gears, probably sensing a losing argument once again, and decided to bring up...in your words "Gays."

But please stop calling me a hater of the LBGTQ community since not only is that patently false, but I believe, IMHO, that this is a slip-shod dog whistle attack on your part.

So did you want to get back to duscussing Persian Jews and your unsubstantiated claims that they are forced to stay where they are?

[King_David]

25. ....

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1134&pid=113572

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

26. So you painted yourself into a corner,

decided to wrongly call me a homophobe without so much as an ounce of proof and now have run off?

[King_David]

6. He needs to do much much more:

Since Rouhani took office last year, Dareini writes, “Jews say they have been heartened by the support they’ve received. His government agreed to allow Jewish schools to be closed on Saturdays to mark Shabbat, the day of rest. Rouhani also allocated the equivalent of $400,000 to a Jewish charity hospital in Tehran and invited the country’s only Jewish lawmaker to accompany him to the United Nations General Assembly in New York last year.”

However, continued skepticism of the Iranian regime’s true intentions is warranted. A report issued in March this year, several months after Rouhani came to power, by Ahmed Shaheed, the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Iran, noted that “under the law, religious minorities, including recognized Jews, Christians and Zoroastrians, also face discrimination in the judicial system, such as harsher punishments than Muslims for certain crimes, and are barred from serving as judges.”

Saba Farzan, a German-Iranian journalist and the Executive Director of the Foreign Policy Circle, a Berlin-based think-tank, told The Algemeiner that the AP article “misses many key issues about how difficult circumstances are for the Iranian Jewish community.”

“Iranian Jews have to constantly distance themselves from Israel and Zionism, their synagogues are literally falling apart and discrimination against them is run by the Iranian state – Jews can’t become civil servants under the Islamic Republic,” Farzan said. “Things might have improved a little bit, but anti-Semitism is a founding pillar of the Iranian regime.”



http://www.algemeiner.com/2014/11/26/expert-challenges-associated-press-report-on-iran-jews-says-anti-semitism-is-founding-pillar-of-regime/

[shaayecanaan]

10. good old algemeiner

such as harsher punishments than Muslims for certain crimes

Irony abounds.

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

24. Weren't you just calling Algenheimer crap the other day?

Why use them now?

Curious.

[leftynyc]

7. A second Holocaust denial cartoon competition?

I'm guessing none of these cartoonists have to worry about getting shot, beheaded or have a fatwa put on their heads for this. I hope nobody is expecting anybody to jump for joy that the Iranians are acknowledging the Jewish sabbath.