Rafsanjani missile tweet draws fire from Khamenei
After Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei criticized Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani for appearing to criticize Iran’s missile program, a number of analysts attacked Rafsanjani.
In a March 30 speech, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, criticized those who think “the world of tomorrow is a world of discourse, not missiles,” declaring it “treasonous” if uttered knowingly. Khamenei’s reference was a not-so-veiled response to a March 23 tweet by the media team of Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.
Hours after Khamenei’s speech, and a week after the original tweet, the Twitter account issued a correction, claiming that the original tweet had only contained part of Rafsanjani’s comments. According to the revised tweet, Rafsanjani had originally said, “The world of tomorrow is the world of the discourse of the Islamic Revolution, not intercontinental ballistic missiles and atomic weapons.”
