Iran's Ministry of Islamic Guidance and Culture said it has not recognised a neo-Nazi group that recently claimed its website had been registered "according to the laws of the Islamic Republic of Iran".
"The website was only registered [in the ministry's list of approved websites] by an individual," Mehdi Sarami, an official of the ministry, told the Tabnak news portal on Saturday. There was no mention of the neo-Nazi group in the registration form, he said.
The ministry was criticised last week by Tabnak, which is affiliated with the conservative politician Mohsen Rezaie, for unblocking the group's website (irannazi.ir), which discussed Nazi ideology, principles and beliefs and the "Fuhrer's character, thoughts and speeches" in its various forums.
The ministry's censorship body blocked the neo-Nazi website soon after it was created on August 23, unblocked it a month later and has again blocked access since Monday.
The website had published statements by an obscure neo-Nazi group that calls itself Iran Nazi Society. It is the only "significant and reliable Nazi website in Iran", Behrouz, the administrator of the website, claimed in a note on the inauguration of the website.
"Why has the Culture Ministry given permission to the so-called Iran's Nazi Society…. We hope the authorities have an appropriate explanation for that," Tabnak said in an article last week titled "Expansion of Activities of Nazis and Racists on .ir [internet] Domains" and asked whether the activities of "this extremist cult" had been approved by the authorities.
Iran blocks access to millions of websites, including those affiliated with opposition and dissident groups, ones with explicit sex-related material as well as social networking sites such as Facebook.
The authorities have not offered any explanation for blocking the neo-Nazi group's website, but the group believed the country's Jewish community was responsible. After being blocked on the internet in Iran the first time, the group claimed in a statement that it had been blocked "just for insulting religious minorities, ie, the Jews".
"Only 17 days after [the creation of the website] we were targeted by these creatures and got into trouble as a result of personal complaints of Jews," the statement said.
Adherence to Nazism has a long history in Iran. The Iran National-Socialist Workers (Sumka) group was established in 1952 by Davoud Monshizadeh, an Iranian professor at Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich, who had served with the SS.
The militaristic, pro-monarch and anti-communist Sumka was strongly opposed to the popular premier Mohammad Mosaddegh, who was ousted by a British-American coup in 1953. The group never went beyond establishing a minor support base among university students. A group calling itself Sumka still exists alongside some other small and obscure neo-Nazi groups but little is known about its membership or activities.
"Neo-Nazis share some traits and beliefs, mainly their denial of the Holocaust and hatred of Israel, with hardliners such as the country's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, but there is a big difference between them. Neo-Nazis, who may or may not be religious, hate the Jews as a race but Islamic hardliners direct their anger at Israel and those who support Zionism, but not Judaism as a religion because the Quran recognises them as a legitimate religion too," said a political analyst in Tehran, who requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.
Iran is home to about 25,000 Jews, the second largest Jewish community in the Middle East after Israel. Its history in Iran goes back 2,500 years. Judaism has been recognised as a "legitimate religious minority" along with Christianity and Zoroastrianism in Iran's Constitution. Insulting religious minorities is banned by the country's press law, which applies to internet content.
The small but lively Iranian Jewish community, which has its own representative in the Iranian parliament, strongly protested when Mr Ahmadinejad publicly denied the Holocaust. The atrocities against the Jews during the Second World War were "historical reality", they said in letters printed in the monthly magazine published by the Jewish Association of Tehran.
Iran's religious establishment and Mr Ahmadinejad distinguish between adherence to Judaism as a religion and Zionism, which they say is only the ideology of the state of Israel. The Iranian Jewish community strongly refutes any affiliation to Zionism.
msinaiee@thenational.ae
hall of shame
SUNDERLAND 2002-03
No one has ended a Premier League season quite like Sunderland. They lost each of their final 15 games, taking no points after January. They ended up with 19 in total, sacking managers Peter Reid and Howard Wilkinson and losing 3-1 to Charlton when they scored three own goals in eight minutes.
SUNDERLAND 2005-06
Until Derby came along, Sunderland’s total of 15 points was the Premier League’s record low. They made it until May and their final home game before winning at the Stadium of Light while they lost a joint record 29 of their 38 league games.
HUDDERSFIELD 2018-19
Joined Derby as the only team to be relegated in March. No striker scored until January, while only two players got more assists than goalkeeper Jonas Lossl. The mid-season appointment Jan Siewert was to end his time as Huddersfield manager with a 5.3 per cent win rate.
ASTON VILLA 2015-16
Perhaps the most inexplicably bad season, considering they signed Idrissa Gueye and Adama Traore and still only got 17 points. Villa won their first league game, but none of the next 19. They ended an abominable campaign by taking one point from the last 39 available.
FULHAM 2018-19
Terrible in different ways. Fulham’s total of 26 points is not among the lowest ever but they contrived to get relegated after spending over £100 million (Dh457m) in the transfer market. Much of it went on defenders but they only kept two clean sheets in their first 33 games.
LA LIGA: Sporting Gijon, 13 points in 1997-98.
BUNDESLIGA: Tasmania Berlin, 10 points in 1965-66
At a glance
Global events: Much of the UK’s economic woes were blamed on “increased global uncertainty”, which can be interpreted as the economic impact of the Ukraine war and the uncertainty over Donald Trump’s tariffs.
Growth forecasts: Cut for 2025 from 2 per cent to 1 per cent. The OBR watchdog also estimated inflation will average 3.2 per cent this year
Welfare: Universal credit health element cut by 50 per cent and frozen for new claimants, building on cuts to the disability and incapacity bill set out earlier this month
Spending cuts: Overall day-to day-spending across government cut by £6.1bn in 2029-30
Tax evasion: Steps to crack down on tax evasion to raise “£6.5bn per year” for the public purse
Defence: New high-tech weaponry, upgrading HM Naval Base in Portsmouth
Housing: Housebuilding to reach its highest in 40 years, with planning reforms helping generate an extra £3.4bn for public finances
In Full Flight: A Story of Africa and Atonement
John Heminway, Knopff
Honeymoonish
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Dr Amal Khalid Alias revealed a recent case of a woman with daughters, who specifically wanted a boy.
A semen analysis of the father showed abnormal sperm so the couple required IVF.
Out of 21 eggs collected, six were unused leaving 15 suitable for IVF.
A specific procedure was used, called intracytoplasmic sperm injection where a single sperm cell is inserted into the egg.
On day three of the process, 14 embryos were biopsied for gender selection.
The next day, a pre-implantation genetic report revealed four normal male embryos, three female and seven abnormal samples.
Day five of the treatment saw two male embryos transferred to the patient.
The woman recorded a positive pregnancy test two weeks later.
Paatal Lok season two
Directors: Avinash Arun, Prosit Roy
Stars: Jaideep Ahlawat, Ishwak Singh, Lc Sekhose, Merenla Imsong
Rating: 4.5/5
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
NO OTHER LAND
Director: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal
Stars: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham
Rating: 3.5/5
yallacompare profile
Date of launch: 2014
Founder: Jon Richards, founder and chief executive; Samer Chebab, co-founder and chief operating officer, and Jonathan Rawlings, co-founder and chief financial officer
Based: Media City, Dubai
Sector: Financial services
Size: 120 employees
Investors: 2014: $500,000 in a seed round led by Mulverhill Associates; 2015: $3m in Series A funding led by STC Ventures (managed by Iris Capital), Wamda and Dubai Silicon Oasis Authority; 2019: $8m in Series B funding with the same investors as Series A along with Precinct Partners, Saned and Argo Ventures (the VC arm of multinational insurer Argo Group)
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Thank You for Banking with Us
Director: Laila Abbas
Starring: Yasmine Al Massri, Clara Khoury, Kamel El Basha, Ashraf Barhoum
Rating: 4/5
The specs
Engine: 2.0-litre 4-cylturbo
Transmission: seven-speed DSG automatic
Power: 242bhp
Torque: 370Nm
Price: Dh136,814
Mubadala World Tennis Championship 2018 schedule
Thursday December 27
Men's quarter-finals
Kevin Anderson v Hyeon Chung 4pm
Dominic Thiem v Karen Khachanov 6pm
Women's exhibition
Serena Williams v Venus Williams 8pm
Friday December 28
5th place play-off 3pm
Men's semi-finals
Rafael Nadal v Anderson/Chung 5pm
Novak Djokovic v Thiem/Khachanov 7pm
Saturday December 29
3rd place play-off 5pm
Men's final 7pm
The specs
Engine: 3.0-litre six-cylinder turbo
Power: 398hp from 5,250rpm
Torque: 580Nm at 1,900-4,800rpm
Transmission: Eight-speed auto
Fuel economy, combined: 6.5L/100km
On sale: December
Price: From Dh330,000 (estimate)