The Holocaust — And the Jews — in Iran
Iranian media coverage of the Holocaust has increased 100 percent, thanks to a miniseries that represents the first non-Holocaust-denying television program to air in recent memory. “Iran’s version of ‘Schindler’s List,’” according to the AP, Zero Degree Turn follows the story of fictional character Habib Parsa – who is based on the stories of several Irainian diplomats during WWII, who administered counterfeit Iranian passports to Europe’s fleeing Jews.
The mere existence of the TV series is astounding, given Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s recent Holocaust denial conference – not to mention the country’s fraught relationship with Israel (embodied in Ahmadinejad’s promise to “wipe” Israel “off the map”).
Caught in the middle of all this has been Iran’s own Jewish population. Most people probably assume that the country no longer has any Jews around, but its Jewish population of 25, 000 represents the second largest Jewish community in the Middle East. And as
And it’s possible that the show is meant to assuage that specific community. “The show’s appearance now may reflect an attempt by Iran’s leadership to moderate its image as anti-semitic and to underline a distinction that Iranian officials often make – that their conflict is with Israel, not with the Jewish People,” claims the AP.
And it’s not just in conferences and diplomatic halls that Iran has displayed an attitude that puts Jews on edge and questions the Holocaust’s historicity. Indeed, many in the population participated in a government-sanctioned a national cartoon contest that awarded prizes to submissions that best mocked the Holocaust. School children were then bused to a museum, where the winning drawings were exhibited.
On the face of it, Zero Degree Turn seems to be turning the tide of anti-semitism and Holocaust denial. The AP gleaned valuable testimonies from various Iranian viewers of the miniseries that suggest a burgeoning sympathy for the Jewish plight. “Once, I wept when I learned through the film what a dreadful destiny the small nation had during the world war in the heart of so-called civilized Europe,” said Tehran bank teller Mahboubeh Rahamati. Similarly, grocery store owner Kazim Gharibi commented: “Through this film, I understood that Jews had a hard time in the war – helpless and desperate, as we were when Iraq imposed war on us.”
While some Iranians are finally willing to acknowledge the horrors of the Holocaust, they’ve immediately put that change of perspective to use in claiming that Israel is comparable to Hitler. So, for a country that once looked askance at the true history of the Holocaust, Zero Degree Turn has become acceptable programming only because it forges this connection.
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