Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei evoked the Holocaust when he tweeted out a graphic, “Palestine Will be Free. The Final Solution: Resistance until Referendum.” Khamenei’s embrace of a Nazi-era slogan was no accident. Not only Iranian hard-liners, but also so-called reformers such as former President Mohammad Khatami have dabbled in Holocaust denial and revisionism.
Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif sought to diffuse Western outrage at his boss’s embrace of a Nazi-era slogan in a follow-up tweet: “Disgusting that those whose civilization found a'”Final Solution’ in gas chambers attack those who seek a real solution at the ballot box, through a REFERENDUM. Why are US and West so afraid of democracy?”
It’s time to call Khamenei and Zarif’s bluff. On April 1, 1979, millions of Iranians flocked to the polls to vote on a simple question: “Do you want an Islamic republic?” He claimed 98.2% of Iranians voted yes and lauded the Iranian people. “By casting a decisive vote in favor of the Islamic republic,” he then addressed the nation, “you have established a government of divine justice, a government in which all segments of the population shall enjoy equal consideration, [and] the light of divine justice shall shine uniformly on all.”
Forty-one years later, it is doubtful Iranians feel the same way. Khomeini never defined “Islamic republic,” and what he delivered was a dictatorship, a human rights regime worse than that of the shah’s regime, and economic morass. Zarif’s bluster suggests he is not afraid of democracy, so why not organize a new, internationally monitored referendum with a simple question: “Do you favor ending the Islamic republic, disbanding the office of the supreme leader, and convening a constitutional convention to establish a new, democratic order?” Fifteen years ago, many Iranians proposed such a solution, but it floundered against the backdrop of the second-term Bush administration’s deprioritization of the practice of democracy.
Khamenei and Zarif, however, were writing not about their own country, but rather about Israel and the Palestinians. A Palestinian state, however, has long been on the table. In 2000, Israeli and Palestinian negotiators hashed out a deal, only to have Palestinian Chairman Yasser Arafat refuse it without any counteroffer. Then, in 2008, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert offered Arafat’s successor, Mahmoud Abbas, Palestinian independence, a shared Jerusalem, a limited but symbolic right of return, and territorial swaps giving Palestine more than 100% of the area of the West Bank and Gaza. Abbas, now in the 15th year of his four-year presidential term, turned down that offer without any counter and also rejected the Kushner Plan, even though much of the Arab world appears ready to move on with regard to their relations with Israel.
Perhaps, then, a second referendum can add clarity. The Quartet can organize a referendum for Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza based on the Olmert parameters. If the Palestinians support such a state over the cynicism of their leaders, grant it. And if they refuse, one can conclude Palestinians’ rejection of Israel’s right to exist trumps their own desire for independence.
Khamenei and Zarif are right. Referendums can bring clarity. Surely, if they have confidence both in their popular legitimacy and in the Palestinian people’s willingness to subordinate their desire for freedom to Abbas’s kleptocracy, they would have nothing to fear from allowing their people an internationally supervised referendum.
Michael Rubin (@Mrubin1971) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and a former Pentagon official.
