Farhadi's remarks to Israeli Paper about Ahmadinejad and Netanyahu anger radicals

March 25, 2017

Entertainment , Culture , Politics

Independent Aggregator of Iran-related News/Events, Kodoom.com: In a rare opening up about politics, Asghar Farhadi discusses peace between Israel and Iran, but then, under pressure from Iran's radical Islamists, claims he was unaware the interview would be published in Israel.

In the candid interview which was published on Israel's liberal paper Haartez, the Oscar winning film maker tells the Israeli interviewer that he is hopeful on peace between Iran and Israel but through people and not politicians: "The politicians don’t want to solve the problem because they have too much to lose. My only hope is in people, not the politicians .. [But people] are influenced by the media and the politicians. The politicians create the fear in order to create the need for their own legitimacy – and they’ve been successful so far, unfortunately.”

Then when the interviewer says "Benjamin Netanyahu is one example," Farhadi follows with "We had [Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad, too!"

A scene from The Salesman

In February, Farhadi refused to attend the Oscars ceremony when his film "The Salesman" won the Academy Award for best foreign language film. Farhadi’s short statement – read onstage by Anousheh Ansari, the first Iranian in space, and Firouz Naderi, the director of Solar Systems Exploration at NASA – said he was sorry he could not attend. “My absence is out of respect for the people of my country and those of other six nations who have been disrespected by the inhumane law that bans entry of immigrants to the U.S.,” it read. “Dividing the world into the ‘us’ and ‘our enemies’ categories creates fear – a deceitful justification for aggression and war. ... Filmmakers can turn their cameras to capture shared human qualities and break stereotypes of various nationalities and religions. They create empathy between us and others. An empathy which we need today more than ever.”

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