Ahmadinejad appoints leading anti-Semite as new official in charge of the press

Mohammad-Ali Ramin, a top advisor to Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and considered by many as ‘the brain’ behind the president's repeated Holocaust denial, has been appointed as the Iran’s new deputy culture minister, in charge of media and communications. Ramin is the regime's most hard-line Holocaust denier and anti-Semite. He currently serves as secretary-general of the Tehran-based World Holocaust Foundation, which was established at an international conference of Holocaust deniers in Tehran in 2006. A number of controversial figures, including former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke, attended that conference.

Ramin, who reportedly lived in Germany for a number of years, was quoted as saying in a 2006 interview with a an online newspaper that Adolf Hitler was Jewish and that Hitler's policies were aimed at bringing about the establishment of a Jewish state. In another interview with the ‘Shahrvand’ publication, Ramin said that he had never denied nor confirmed the Holocaust. "My slogan is: allow the claim of the Holocaust to be studied." He also expressed hope that one day when "Europeans will guarantee freedom of expression," the headquarters of his foundation could be transferred to Berlin.

On another occasion, he was quoted as dubbing Jews filthy people who spread lethal disease: "Through history, there were many claims against the Jews. They were the source of lethal disease such as the Plague and typhoid fever, because they are extremely filthy people." In his current post as official in charge of communications and the press, Ramin will be able to influence Iran’s media agenda.