In short: after the recent elections, 21 nations publicly criticized Iran, 26 nations publicly congratulated Ahmadinejad, and the remaining 144 members of the United Nations (besides Iran) made no public comments on the elections.

All 118 members of the Non-Aligned Movement have signed a statement declaring support for Iran's nuclear program. At least 7 non-members have also publicly expressed support (Armenia, Azerbaijan, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Turkey), bringing the total to at least 125.

So perhaps Iran is at risk of alienating an international minority, but certainly not the majority. See my blog for sources and further details.

On the other hand, on the nuclear issue we are even more hypocritical. Iran has been literally surrounded by two terrifying and dangerously mismanaged US wars, while simultaneously being openly threatened by Bush/Cheney/Rice, AND given the very clear example that similar nuclear states are never, ever threatened like that.

Israel only demonstrates covert nuclear programs are condoned and are fair play, despite lofty US anti-escalation rhetoric . They have the example that Iran MUST have nukes to be taken seriously. N. Korea has the bomb and can never be threatened with invasion. Similarly India. The US actually GAVE Pakistan the technology- a strong unspoken signal- who then transferred it to N. Korea and to Iran itself previously! It goes without saying that Pakistan has never been threatened with hawkish talk, though I fail to see how they are different than other countries we have threatened or invaded. The lesson is- what US policy states and what it does (or allows) on the ground, are two very different, almost opposite things.

And the message to Iran is clear- they must either develop nukes or dismantle their state and submit to neo-liberal policies. It seems very clear to me that Iran has been forced to accept those choices. Looking objectively at Iran's past and present, how could anyone be surprised at their actions?

Israel hiding nukes in Golan, Syria claims

It's EXTREMELY unlikely that the wonks @ the US State department or ANY US academic institution that studies these matters will even give a minute to researching this claim, because IF they thoroughly pursued it, they'd surely find U.S. and French nuclear technology as it's underpinnings… NOT AQ Khan's purloined tech notes.

…and NO academic weapons proliferation researcher would receive a grant, funding, an academic's literal lifeblood, to do the research… for reasons that should be quite obvious.

Either ban ALL nuclear weapons, or allow them to proliferate freely.

Any other method of dealing with the issue STINKS of hypocrisy.

Samuel Colt made everyone in the "wild West" 'equal'. Kalashnikov did it for the rest of the world, and, if we pick that path, nuclear weapons will eventually make all the nation-states equal in a nuclear stalemate that could be broken at any time in any of these ways.

http://www.iranian.com/main/blog/azadeh-azad/iranian-people-changed-quds-day-iran-day

The Iranian anti-regime protesters ripped down a Hezbollah sign yesterday as the crowd cheered them on:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzt4zOYatvY&feature=player_embedded

I know you're not going to publish this but at least view it for yourself to add to your knowledge.

http://www.iranian.com/main/node/81770

http://www.iranian.com/main/node/81704