Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told Germans they should no longer allow themselves to be held prisoner by a sense of guilt over the Holocaust and reiterated doubts that the Holocaust even happened.

In an interview with Germany's Der Spiegel magazine, Ahmadinejad said he doubted Germans were allowed to write "the truth" about the Holocaust and said he was still considering travelling to Germany for the World Cup soccer tournament.

"I believe the German people are prisoners of the Holocaust. More than 60 million were killed in World War Two ... The question is: Why is it that only Jews are at the centre of attention?," he said in the interview published on Sunday.

"How long is this going to go on?" he added. "How long will the German people be held hostage to the Zionists?... Why should you feel obligated to the Zionists? You've paid reparations for 60 years and will have to pay for another 100 years."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and other leaders have said his previous remarks questioning whether the Holocaust happened were unacceptable. Denying the Holocaust is a serious crime in Germany punishable with a prison term of up to five years.

Six million Jews were killed by the Nazis and their allies in concentration camps.

In the rare interview with Western media, Ahmadinejad said if the Holocaust really happened Jews should be moved from Israel back to Europe.

"We say if the Holocaust happened, then the Europeans must accept the consequences and the price should not be paid by Palestine. If it did not happen, then the Jews must return to where they came from."


WORLD CUP

He said he was still considering going to Germany to support Iran in the World Cup despite protest stirred by a "worldwide network of Zionists".

Iran's first World Cup match is against Mexico in Nuremberg on June 11 two days after the tournament starts and German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble says he would be welcome to come because Germany wants to be a good host.

The invitation sparked protests from other political leaders and groups who said his anti-Israeli comments were unacceptable.

"My decision (on whether to go) depends on a lot of different things," said Ahmadinejad, a soccer fan. "Whether I have time, whether I want to and some other things."

He said he could not understand why his possible visit had caused such debate but was not surprised by the row.

"I was not at all surprised because there is a very active worldwide network of Zionists, also in Europe," he said in the rare interview with Western media that was published on Sunday.

Ahmadinejad's latest comments were condemned by the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles. Rabbi Marvin Hier, a founder and dean, called on Merkel to keep him out of Germany.

"On a day when the Pope is in Auschwitz to remind the world of the horrors of the Holocaust, Ahmadinejad questions it again," Hier said. "For him to be at the World Cup and sit in a VIP seat would be a desecration of the memory of the Holocaust."

Asked by Der Spiegel, in its cover story entitled "The man the world is afraid of", whether he stood by his earlier view the Holocaust was a myth, Ahmadinejad said: "I only accept something as the truth if I am truly convinced of it.

"In Europe there are two opinions on it. One group of researchers who are by and large politically motivated say the Holocaust happened. There is another group of researchers who have the opposite view and are by and large in prison for that."

Source:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060528/wl_nm/...ad_holocaust_dc

what a complete lack of understanding Israel this man has. some 10,000 Jews already were there. forcing a reverse migration is unconscionable. it was a British territory at the time they WON THEIR INDEPENDENCE. and it is older than his own puppetry of the People of Iran.

There were Jews in Persia before Muslims.

There were over 100,000 Mitzraim (Middle Eastern Jews) from Persia (sic. Iran) who had ancestors that never heard of Islam, and lived in Persia. They and their descendants never left for Europe, and were among the first jews from Persia, Egypt, and Jordan that were consolidating in the British territority due to insufferable conditions in hostile Arab countries.

Do these Mitzraim go back to Iran?
Where do the Muslims who took their land go?

Where do the Zoroastorians go?
oh, wait, the Persian Muslims usurpers killed most of them.
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However, I do find it absurd to hold the German historical lineage and research hostage, and think in part the holocaust has become mythical due to the sentiments of those who seek to force the idea to be unapproachable.

without preservation of the event and understanding of it, it leaves a gap in the German identity which some have no doubt filled with repression and rage, or excess and fantasy.

this has made the subject of the Holocaust unapproachable, yet unverifiable.

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"The History of Humankind is full of the greatest of atrocities, and one must be able to reconcile the existence of these with the greatest of achievments to find the wisdom therein. We do this so we may endeavor to try and prevent those same atrocities in the future of Humankind, and build upon the achievments."