Several myths regarding Iran stand in the way of reaching a peaceful relationship with that country. Much of the concern that Iran may attack Israel, if it successfully develops nuclear weapons, rests on the avowed statement by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that “Israel must be wiped off the map.”

However, Juan Cole, a University of Michigan Professor of Modern Middle East and South Asian History stated that, “Ahmadinejad did not say he was going to ‘wipe Israel off the map’ because no such idiom exists in Persian. Instead, he did say ‘He hoped [Israel’s] regime, a Jewish-Zionist state occupying Jerusalem, would collapse.’”

This is consistent with statements by Iran’s foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki. Speaking at a news conference, he denied that Tehran wanted to see Israel “wiped off the map.” “Nobody can remove a country from the map. How is it possible to remove a country from the map? He was talking about the regime,” Mottaki said.

“There is a huge chasm between the correct and the incorrect translations,” says Shiraz Dossa, a professor of Political Science at St. Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia, Canada. “The notion that Iran can ‘wipe out’ U.S.-backed, nuclear armed Israel is ludicrous.”

During an interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos last April, Ahmadinejad declared that the Islamic Republic of Iran would recognize the State of Israel if the Palestinians signed a two-state peace deal with Israel. Exactly a month later Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu responded, “If Israel does not eliminate the Iranian threat, no one will.”

It has been stated repeatedly that an aggressive Iranian government represents a danger for the region and for the U.S. Facts, however, do not substantiate such an interpretation. More frequently than not, Iran has been the recipient of aggressive actions, particularly by the U.S.

Iranians cannot forget that it was foreign intervention, particularly by the British and the U.S. that destroyed democracy in Iran, whose consequences they suffer until today. In 1953, actions by the CIA were instrumental in overthrowing the democratically elected government of Iran’s Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh.

In 1988, the U.S.S. Vincennes shot down an Iranian civilian airliner over the Strait of Hormuz toward the end of the Iran-Iraq war. Two hundred ninety passengers were killed, including 66 children, ranking it the seventh among the deadliest airliner fatalities. According to the U.S. government, the Vincennes crew misidentified the Iranian Airbus A300 as an attacking F-14 Tomcat fighter.

Although a settlement was reached between Iran and U.S., then Vice-President George H.W. Bush stated, “I will never apologize for the United States of America, ever. I don’t care what it has done. I don’t care what the facts are.” The Vincennes captain received the Legion of Merit, and the crew was awarded Combat Action Ribbons.

The U.S. staunchly supported the Shah of Iran’s regime, despite its brutal repression of the Iranian people. According to Stephen Kinzer, author of All the Shah’s Men: An American Coup And The Roots of Middle East Terror, fears by the Iranians of more U.S. intervention in the internal affairs of their country led to their taking American diplomats as hostages.

During the Iraq/Iran war from 1980 to 1988 the U.S. supported Saddam Hussein, even though Iraq initiated the war and the U.S. had knowledge of his regime’s use of chemical weapons.

Both the U.S. and Israel have repeatedly threatened military action against Tehran, in flagrant violation of the UN Charter whose Article 2 states, “All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the purposes of the United Nations.”

Although fear of aggression by Iran has been often cited as a justification for war against that country, an ad hoc group of Israeli academicians and peace activists issued an statement on August 6, 2008 that says, “…it is clear that the main source of the immediate danger of a new, widespread war stems from the policies of the Israeli government and the flow of threats from it, backed by provocative military maneuvers. After serious consideration, we reiterate our position that all the arguments for such an attack are without any security, political or moral justification.”

Iran’s intention to develop nuclear weapons has also been given as a justification for an attack on Iran’s nuclear sites. However, speaking at the World Economic Forum in May of 2008, Dr. Mohammad ElBaradei, a Nobel peace laureate and head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) stated, “We haven’t seen indications or any concrete evidence that Iran is building a nuclear weapon and I’ve been saying that consistently for the last five years.”

Developing a civilian nuclear program is Iran’s inalienable right and, if some predictions are true, it may also become a need in the near future. There are indications that Iran’s oil resources are fast depleting and Iran may become a net importer of oil a decade from now, according to the Campaign against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran (CASMII).

Writing in the Jerusalem Post, Douglas Bloomfield quotes Keith Weissman, the former Iran expert at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) as saying that although Israel’s worries about Iran getting a nuclear weapon are understandable, the Iranian leaders “are not fanatics and they are not suicidal. They know that Israel could make Iran glow for many years.”

As President Barack Obama has repeatedly stated, diplomacy should be pursued in dealing with the Iranian government. Such an approach should include security assurances to the Iranian government that it will not be attacked and putting a stop to US efforts to undermine that country’s leadership. A linguistic equivalent to the Gulf of Tonkin incident should not be the excuse for attacking Iran and unleashing chaos in the region, if not in the whole world.

Cesar Chelala, a foreign correspondent for the Middle East Times International (Australia), writes extensively on human rights issues.