PrintSeptember 20, 2007
Ahmadinejad to Defy NYPD and Visit Ground Zero (updated)
This may turn out to be a non-story. And we don't want to blow a gasket for no reason. But the Iranian mission to the United Nations has told the Secret Service that President Ahmadinejad has rejected the recommendation of the NY Police Department and will visit Ground Zero on Monday, at 10:00 AM:
A law enforcement source says the Iranian mission to the United Nations has informed the Secret Service that the Iranian president intends to visit Ground Zero Monday at 10 a.m.I wrote this yesterday on my own site:
The source says regardless of the NYPD's rejection of the request for a Ground Zero tour, Iran's president and his entourage will be accompanied by a Secret Service protective detail, a detail provided to all heads of state when they visit the United States.
I’ve been wracking my brain trying to think of what anyone could imagine would be a bigger insult to the dead of 9/11. Yassar Arafat laying a wreath in Shanksville? How about Nasty Nasrallah being invited to tour the new wing of the Pentagon, rebuilt after the attacks?I am almost too mad to write or think coherently. I feel like screaming in rage and weeping at the same time.
There is no imagining what would be a bigger insult because there wouldn’t be one. The fact is, there is no more wrenching, rage inducing, fist-through-the-wall event that could take place in this day and age than allowing the President of a state that equated the 9/11 attacks with our attack on Hiroshima to visit Ground Zero.
It would be no different than if we had allowed Tojo to visit the Arizona Memorial.
And I say to hell with diplomatic niceties and protocols. If I were in the Secret Service, I would resign rather than shepherd this terrorist supporting scum to Ground Zero. No agency connected with the United States government should have a hand in facilitating this sacrilege.
If they try to go through with this visit, I hope it will fail. I can't believe the people of New York City will allow this to happen. Right, left, liberal, conservative, Democrat, Republican - it won't matter. They will rise up en masse to protest this affront to human decency and prevent this genocidal, Holocaust denying, terrorist enabling scum from defiling a site where so many lost their lives as a result of terrorists who share Ahmadienjad's view of the west and of the United States.
Or have we lost the capacity to care and will New Yorkers (and the rest of us) simply shake with impotent rage at the injustice of it?
I think our reaction to this event will say much about America and whether we truly have the capacity to fight to protect ourselves and our way of life. Given the people's apathy about politics at present, I am not very hopeful that anything the people do can stop it.
Thomas Lifson adds:
I have no doubt that Ahmedinejad will get nowhere near Ground Zero. It is no trick at all to assemble a crowd well into the tens of thousands or higher in midtown and/or lower Manhattan. You can count on the media providing wall-to-wall coverage of any possible attempt at this visit. If I were in New York City, I would certainly be blocking the streets.
But I am very worried about what else Ahmedinejad has in mind. Imagine, for instance, a suicide bomber detonating himself amidst the crowds. Or a rooftop sniper. Or a provocation of mob violence, designed to demonstrate to the world that America is a violent out-of-control country.
Make no mistake: Ahmedinejad may be crazy by our standards, but he is very smart, and has a science-related PhD. He knows how to think strategically and implement multi-stage plans like a chess player. He is up to no good with this. It seems likely this is more than a one-step plan to tweak our deep feelings.
