In a speech before the ?The World Without Zionism? conference last week, the President of Iran stated Israel should be ?wiped off the map.? He forewarned that any Islamic country co-existing peacefully with Israel would suffer the fury of the Islamic State. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad reminded his audience that the once unthinkable had already occurred: the autocratic Pahlavi regime in Iran had been overthrow, the Soviet Union had fallen, and the bitter enemy Saddam Hussein was on trial for his life in neighboring Iraq . To the joyful appreciation of his audience, he implored them to imagine a future where both the US and Israel would also join these vanquished political entities.

President Ahmadinejad?s speech was given to a domestic audience, but it has justifiably caused an international uproar. US policymakers, as well as all other world leaders, must view the outrageous words of the Iranian President through two contexts: the domestic environment in Iran and Iran?s pursuit of nuclear weapons.