Well, the home page of the Simon Wiesenthal Center Web site proudly features the story of Ehud Olmert's speech hammering Iran among other things, which received no less than 16 standing ovations from Congress. That just about says it all, but there's more.
The SWC did issue a press release yesterday <http://www.wiesenthal.com/site/apps/nl/content.asp?c=fwLYKnN8LzH&b=312458&content_id={FF2E589C-0C66-449A-8A9A-6FFE0A44B0D4}¬oc=1> confirming that the minority dress code story was false, though it included no mea culpa and sounded rather proud that "Last week, the Simon Wiesenthal Center asked the Secretary General of the United Nations to investigate a National Post op-ed piece written by Amir Tahiri stating that religious minorities would be required to wear color patches delineating their religions."
Kenneth R. Timmerman -- the Executive Director of the Foundation for Democracy in Iran (FDI), an organization at the forefront of the campaign for regime change in Iran -- was commissioned by the SWC to write propaganda against Iran, Libya, and Syria: "A ground-making study on the unconventional weapons programs of Iran, Libya, and Syria, commissioned by the Simon Wiesenthal Center in 1992, won applause from Democrats and Republicans alike," as he boasts on his own Web site: <http://www.kentimmerman.com/bio.htm>. So, it's been a long-standing campaign for both Timmerman and the SWC.
Iran sure is a far larger prize than Iraq -- the only nation in West Asia and North Africa modern enough to be a credible contender for regional leadership and yet, unlike Egypt and Jordan, is not quite sold on America and Israel -- for Washington and Tel Aviv, who no doubt long for the second coming of the Shah. -- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/> <http://mrzine.org> <http://monthlyreview.org/>