If anyone doubted that Holocaust denial was a central policy of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, he has put those doubts to rest. Take his response to the crisis that erupted in France following the October 16 beheading of Samuel Paty, a middle-school teacher who had shown his students cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammad. Khamenei waded in with his favorite reaction to any query on freedom of speech. In a letter addressed to the youth of France, Khamenei asked: “Why is it a crime to doubt the Holocaust? Why are people who write about this thrown into jails, but insulting the Prophet is allowed?”
Khamenei knows what he is doing. The poisonous brand of Islamism that he attempts to sell domestically and abroad relies on anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial. This is why Holocaust denial has been not an aberration but a constant in his long political career.
Khamenei’s Loyal Penman Links Quran to Holocaust Denial