Tehran Removes Anti-U.S. Billboards, Sparking More Debate Over Rouhani’s Foreign Policy

By Jason Rezaian, Sunday, October 27

TEHRAN — Supporters of hard-line conservative policies faced a rare public rebuke this week, as authorities ordered that new anti-American billboards be removed just days after they went up, sparking a new round in the debate over relations between Tehran and Washington.

Since taking office in August, Iran’s moderate President Hassan Rouhani and his foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, have made several unprecedented gestures toward the United States, including a phone call between Rouhani and President Obama. It was the first direct contact between presidents of the two countries since Iran’s 1979 revolution ousted the shah.

Such diplomatic outreach and the new government’s apparent attempts to quiet anti-U.S. rhetoric have confused and angered supporters of hard-line conservatives who call the United States the “Great Satan” and believe that relations with Washington are against the principles of the revolution.

The billboards, carrying the English-language slogan “The U.S. Government Styles Honesty,” depict a goateed Iranian official (presumably meant to resemble Zarif) sitting across from a U.S. counterpart who, under the table, conceals symbols of perceived American aggression.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/tehran-removes-anti-us-billboards-sparking-more-debate-over-rouhanis-foreign-policy/2013/10/27/51015cc2-3f15-11e3-ad86-5120269ae35b_story.html

The greatest of debates on this new Iranian foreign policy is taking place in Tel Aviv and the US neocon think tanks on how they can scuttle these 'godwill' gestures.