Tucker Carlson recently interviewed the president of Iran, Masoud Pezeshkian. For Carlson, such an interview is a big get, but not unprecedented, as he has also infamously interviewed Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The Pezeshkian interview was far from hard-hitting, particularly given the recent 12-day war between Israel and Iran and President Donald Trump’s decision to strike the mullahs’ most heavily defended nuclear development facilities.
Given the fact that Pezeshkian doesn’t speak English, a translator was needed, which made the interview between Carlson and Pezeshkian rather wooden.
What was clear throughout the interview was that Pezeshkian’s objective was to level blame for the war and recent American action against Iran onto Israel, specifically Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The issue of war was also of utmost concern for Carlson, who started his interview by asking, “There is a pause, or seems to be a pause, in the war between the United States and Iran. How do you think this will end? How would you like to see it end?”
As noted above, Pezeshkian answered by rejecting any notion that Iran was to blame for the war, particularly Iran’s refusal to give up its nuclear enrichment program as it seeks to develop a nuclear weapon. Instead, Pezeshkian claimed, “From the very beginning, it was the motto of my administration that I always adhere to, and that was fostering the national unity inside the country and also fostering peace and tranquility and friendship with the neighboring countries and with the rest of the world.”
To Carlson’s credit, he did note that Trump’s decision to bomb the nuclear sites was due to Iran’s refusal to give up its uranium enrichment. He then asked, “Would you be willing to give up the nuclear program in exchange for peace?”
Here’s where Pezeshkian launched into a blatant litany of lies. Claiming that the problem goes back to 1984, he accused Netanyahu of creating “this false mentality that Iran seeks a nuclear bomb.” He then denied that Iran has ever been interested in developing or obtaining a nuclear weapon, and that it has no intention of developing one in the future. Pezeshkian even laughably claimed, “it is religiously forbidden for us to go after a nuclear bomb.”
Pezeshkian also accused the International Atomic Energy Agency of being effectively hoodwinked by Israel.
When Carlson asked him if he would be willing to enter future negotiations with the U.S., Pezeshkian claimed a willingness, while at the same time spinning and pointing to Israel as an untrustworthy destabilizing factor that he cannot be assured won’t attack again.
Carlson also asked if Iran had terror cells within the U.S., which, of course, Pezeshkian denied, once again claiming that Iran was only interested in peace and tranquility.
As the nearly 30-minute interview wore on, it began to resemble little more than an Iranian propaganda talking-point session in which Israel was at fault for everything. Frustratingly, Carlson did not attempt to push back on any of Pezeshkian’s blatant lies, such as the claim that Iran has never killed an American or carried out a terrorist attack against us. The number of Americans that have been killed directly by Iran or its terrorist proxies over the decades is in the hundreds.
Clearly, though, Pezeshkian is banking on ignorance of Iran’s long history of funding terrorism to make such a bald-faced lie.
The truth is, the primary reason there has been so much unrest in the Middle East since 1979 is because of the Islamic revolution, which ousted the Shah and imposed the Islamic Republic.
Should Carlson ever get an interview with Netanyahu, the likelihood that he would ask such milquetoast questions and fail to press him on his answers is next to none.
What Carlson’s interview does serve to reinforce is that one cannot trust a single word that comes from that nation’s government. Judge Iran by its actions and history, not propaganda sessions.
