Iran: Obama's 'Sweet' Words Won't Score With Muslims

Supreme leader slams US before Obama speech
By Matt Cantor,  Newser Staff
Posted Jun 4, 2009 2:00 PM CDT
Iran: Obama's 'Sweet' Words Won't Score With Muslims
Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, speaks.   (AP Photo/Mehr News Agency, Sajjad Safari)

President Obama’s speeches may be “beautiful,” but it’s not enough to win over the Muslim world, Iran’s supreme leader said in his own speech today, Reuters reports. “The nations of this part of the world...deeply hate America because during many years they have seen violence, military interference, rights violations, discrimination" from it, said Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

“Nothing will change with speeches and slogans,” Khamenei said. Instead, he called for a change in US behavior, the BBC notes. “The terrorists kill one, two or 10 people, but you kill 100 or 150 people,” he said, complaining that the US is occupying Iraq and Afghanistan under false pretexts. He also called Israel “a cancerous tumor in the heart of the Muslim world” and said Iran “does not want nuclear weapons.”
(More Iran stories.)

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