Persicus Maximus

The outspoken Rabbi, is known as an authentic Jew,to simplify his status and philosophy, read his statement below; "It has come to our attention that on Sunday, March 20, at 12:00 p.m., in front of the Iranian UN Mission at 633 Third Avenue, corner of 40th Street in Manhattan, certain rabble-rousers plan to hold a Megillah reading with the purpose of insulting the Iranian president and heating up tensions. Authentic Jews will be there to register their protest against these troublemakers, as well as express their pain and sorrow at this insulting and provocative behavior, which is a part of an approach that can have catastrophic consequences. "The portrayal of the Iranian president as an anti-Semite and hater of the Jewish people is patently false. In Iran, Jews and Judaism are treated with the honor and respect. The Zionists, ever since the founding of their movement, have adopted a policy of terrorizing and vilifying anyone who does not go along with their political line. B...

Later on, Ambassador Radji, also voices his direct complaint. On Wednesday November 29, 1978, he writes in his diary: “I send off a letter of protest to the BBC in which I say that, being able now to monitor the Persian Service’s transmission, the Embassy is “frankly astonished at the undisguised bias that is an ever-present feature of its broadcasts and the compromising light in which they place the Government effort to restore stability.”69 Radji then gives insight into other Iranians of influence who were getting together to put pressure on the BBC’s Persian Service. The next day, Thursday November 30 he writes: “Seyyed Hussein Nasr, the new head of the Empress’s Private Bureau comes to see me at the office. Although he doesn’t quite say so, I gather he is in London to make use of his university contacts to enlist pressure from academic circles against the BBC.” 70 Another anti-BBC campaigner is the Iranian millionaire, David Allainace. Radji writes in his memoirs of November 6 1978...

From the mid-60 to mid-70 the Shah was increasingly regarded as an unrivalled ambitious dictator, a devoted ally of the US and benefiting excellent relations with the international community. Iran was portrayed in the western press as enjoying full prosperity and economic growth. His ambitions took him so far as to begin to plan the well-known costly celebrations of 2500 anniversary of monarchy in Iran. The Iranian Ambassador to the UK, Parviz Radji, writes in the introduction to his book “In the Service of the Peacock Throne”: “Indeed the Shah saw the 1973 boom in oil prices – for which he was the prime mover – as the moment to realize his grand vision of Iran, as a grand force to be reckoned with economically as well as militarily. Massive expenditure was taken beyond the human or infrastructural capacity of the country. These were the seeds of the gigantic economic dislocation that was to become increasingly apparent after 1976.”48 Movements against the Shah were growing both inside...

The Persian Service and Oil Nationalization After the war had ended, a period of reform and democratization ensued in Iran and with the departure of Reza Shah; the parliament became increasingly a major centre of decision-making. Political parties were formed each with their dedicated fractions inside the parliament, and often with their own preferences about foreign powers by now constituting the British, the Russians and the Americans. Although the British had their own parliamentary support, they were going through perhaps the worst period of their relations with Iran in as far as being out of favor with the majority of reformists. Foreign Office documents indicate clearly the tension in diplomatic exchanges and the type of adverse publicity they had to face in the Iranian press. The details are outside the boundary of this research but the main reasons for strong anti-British sentiment included the role they had played in occupying the southern ports in 1940, the removing from powe...

The BBC entered World War II unsure of its role. Britain was in a state of total war with every resource focused on winning the battle against the Axis powers. BBC archives recounts the story of the first days thus: “Managers at the fledgling corporation debated whether the BBC should report the conflict objectively - or contribute to the war effort by broadcasting morale boosting propaganda. By the autumn of 1940, Britain was suffering almost nightly bombardment from German planes. On 15 October a delayed action bomb hit Broadcasting House in London. It landed in the music library at 2010 GMT and exploded 52 minutes later, killing seven people. Listeners to the Nine o'clock news heard the announcer pause, and then continue reading.”3 In the summer of 1943 the BBC's two "War Reporting Units" – were set up comprising of teams of seven containing a mixture of reporters, producers and engineers. The BBC created the title War Correspondent for Richard Dimbleby who covered...

Abstract ..... The Persian Service of the BBC WS broadcasts to Iran and also to Afghanistan and Tajikistan where the majority of population speak Persian – referred to as Farsi in Iran, Dari in Afghanistan and Tajiki in Tajikistan. The Iranian Diaspora also received the Persian broadcasts in Short Wave and at times Medium Wave in a variety of European and Middle Eastern countries. Its web page – which began in 1996 – is one of the most visited in Farsi language. However, it was blocked in Iran in January 2006. The BBC’s own web page describes the role of language services as follows:1 “The Empire Service first broadcast on short wave radio in 1932. Its aim was to develop international communications to Britain’s overseas territories. In the run up to World War II, the Foreign Office began funding BBC language services to counter the growing international propaganda of the Axis powers. From its start, the Service’s editorial independence from the British government was safeguarded, as i...