Jerusalem Post editor Brett Stephens reports on a cordial dinner at Davos with the foreign minister of Iran, Kamal Kharrazi, which ended on a jarring note:
…The time has come for questions from the floor. I have mine: If Israel withdraws to the June 4, 1967, lines, would Iran recognize Israel? I’m guessing he’ll answer yes.
Of course, he does not. Land that’s occupied must be returned to its rightful owners, he says. And he means all the land, reciting the history of Iran’s dissent in 1947 from the UN’s partition plan. That Israel had diplomatic representation in Iran during the period of the shah is glossed over: Evidently, he does take us for fools.
“The final solution to the dispute,” Kharrazi concludes, “is a one-state solution.” As is his habit, the words are carefully chosen.
I’m hoping against hope that no one will be foolish enough to believe that Kharrazi– a highly-educated man– was unaware of the historic connations of the phrase “final solution.”
