Louis Farrakhan, Leader of the "Nation of Islam", Declares His Support of Iran's Nuclear Program and Claims that Since the U.S. Administration Ignored His Warnings, "the Time for the Chastisement of Allah Is Here"

Following are excerpts from an interview with Louis Farrakhan, leader of the "Nation of Islam", which aired on Al-Jazeera TV on March 18, 2007:

Louis Farrakhan: I believe that my teacher, Elijah Muhammad, came as a warning to America, on account of the evils that it committed for 400 years, against millions of black slaves. He came as a warning to America that its policies around the world will bring upon it the fate of ancient Egypt, Sodom and Gomorrah, ancient Babylon, and ancient Rome - that this was coming to America. I am an extension of Elijah Muhammad.

When I said my time is up, I meant that warnings can't go on forever. I have warned President Bush, I have warned his government, I have warned his people, and I have warned my own people. The time for warnings is up, and the time for the chastisement of Allah is here.

[...]

Interviewer: Mr. Farrakhan, are you still being accused of being antisemitic, and if that's so, by whom and why?

Louis Farrakhan: Are you a Semite?

Interviewer: Yes, I'm Arab.

Louis Farrakhan: Am I against you? Am I against Muslims? No. Are the Jews that came out of Europe Semitic? Who are the Sephardic Jews? Are they Semitic? Am I against them? Who has segregated them and the Ethiopian Jews? Is it not the Europeans? The real antisemites are those who came out of Europe and settled in Palestine, and now they call themselves the true Jews, when in fact, they converted to Judaism.

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Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction. He was no threat to his neighbors. If he were a lion, he had no teeth. His paws had no claws. He never shot down one American or British plane, which flew all over Iraq for twelve years. Iraq had lost its power to protect its own sovereign airspace. So when America went to war with Iraq, and called it "Shock and Awe," and used all these weapons against Iraq, it was committing murder, in order to get the oil of Iraq, to establish a democracy – that's lying and murder.

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It is anti-Islamic to bomb a mosque, so what Muslim who studies the Koran would bomb a mosque, whether he is Shiite, or Sunni, or Sufi, or Hanafi, or Hanbali? No Muslim would destroy even a synagogue, a monastery, or a church, much less bomb another mosque. Where is the hand of the Mossad in all of this? Where is the hand of the CIA in all of this? I didn’t mis-describe the administration of the United States. They are liars, and they are murderers, and they are guilty of heinous crimes, and they should be removed, for they have violated the constitution of the United States of America, and have violated the peoples of the world.

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Iran should not be denied the human right to knowledge. Atomic knowledge should be in the arsenal of knowledge of every nation, and if Iran wants to use atomic knowledge for peaceful purposes, she's in accord with international law. But the fear of America is Iran's attitude to Israel, and the cornerstone of America's foreign policy is the protection of Israel. So they don't want Iran to have atomic knowledge. But Iran is saying: "I'm going to get that knowledge. I'm going to use that knowledge, so that we will no longer be dependent on oil." Now, America, of course, is a powerful bully. I heard Vice-President Cheney say that all options are on the table. They're not frightening Iran. If Iran believes in Allah, and if Iran believes in the power of Allah, Iran can't be frightened by America. You can't frighten a true Muslim.