Governments around the world expressed shock and scorn yesterday at the Iranian president's call for Israel to be "wiped off the map," and several summoned Tehran's envoys in their capitals for a reprimand.
However, Israeli calls for Iran to be suspended from the United Nations over the remarks by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were not immediately taken up by other nations.
In a speech on Wednesday, Ahmadinejad denounced Israel and said a new wave of Palestinian attacks "will wipe this stigma from the face of the Islamic world."
Citing the words of the founder of Iran's Islamic revolution, the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Ahmadinejad said: "Israel must be wiped off the map."
Israeli Vice Premier Shimon Peres called for Iran to be expelled from the UN. Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said Israel had not decided whether to ask officially for Iran's removal from the world body.
Israel's deputy ambassador to Britain, Zvi Rav-Ner, said it was unheard of for a UN member state to call "for genocide and wiping off of another member state of the UN."
On Wednesday, White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Ahmadinejad's remarks "serve to underscore our concern as well as the international community's concern about Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons."
Elsewhere, the Israeli army launched an offensive against Islamic Jihad militants yesterday, carrying out a series of airstrikes and arresting a top fugitive in what Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said would be a "broad and nonstop" response to a suicide bombing that killed five Israelis. The offensive will include airstrikes and artillery attacks in the Gaza Strip, and more arrests in the northern West Bank, where Wednesday's bomber came from, a military official said.
As a last resort, tanks or infantry could re-enter Gaza, which Israel evacuated last month. Israeli media reported that troops would also retake Palestinian towns, and conduct house-to-house searches. The threatened Israeli response to the bombing in the central town of Hadera ratcheted up pressure on Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas to confront militant groups. Abbas has refused to crack down on armed groups such as Islamic Jihad, fearing civil war. Sharon said the military operation was necessary because of Abbas' refusal to take action.
(The Associated Press)