We assure you, brothers, as well as the entire world, as we did in the past, that
we aspire to establishing good relations of neighborliness with the neighboring states,
particularly Iran, and Iraq has no ambitions on the Iranian territories; we did not at
all intend to launch war against Iran or expand the circle of struggle with it beyond
the limits of defending our rights and sovereignty. We tell those blinded by vanity in
Iran, and those who were driven by their suspicious motives, and those moving them
in public or secretly from the imperialist, Zionist and opportunists [sic] powers that
they must benefit from the past days’ lessons when our valiant army restored Zayn
al-Qaws, Sayf Sa’d and our border posts as brave and faithful men.
We call on them to respond to the voice of right and justice, which calls for main-
taining relations of good neighborliness with Iraq and the Arab nation and relin-
quishing every inch they usurped from the territories of Iraq and the Arab nation.
Only in this way can they serve their people, if they are really faithful to them. Only
in this way can they prove that they are real revolutionaries and not agents for the
colonialist and Zionist powers, that they are not racist, backward usurpers who har-
bor hatred and hostility for the Arab nation and that they are not trying to instigate
sedition among the Arab ranks in order to divide and weaken this nation in accor-
dance with or in implementation of the Zionist design.
We say before you, before the Arab nation and before the entire world, that we
have unmasked the false face by which the ruling clique in Iran came to power. This
clique has used the face of religion falsely to expand at the expense of the Arab sov-
ereignty and the nobler Arab interests. This clique has used the face of religion to
foment sedition and division among the nation’s ranks despite the difficult circum-
stances through which the Arab nation is passing and despite the Arab nation’s struggle
against the Zionist aggression and the imperialist powers.
This face of religion is only a mask to cover the Persian racism and a buried resent-
ment for the Arabs. The clique in Iran is using this face of religion to flame fanati-
cism, resentment and division among the peoples of this area to serve the designs of
world Zionism, whether this clique realizes it or not.
Some of the circles that are moved by this clique have different motives—and this
is now not the time to discuss these motives—these circles say that Khomeini differs
from the shah. They ask: Why do you deal with Khomeini in this way? We answer
them: We honestly hoped that Khomeini would be different from the shah in his posi-
tions on our national and pan-Arab causes, particularly the cause of the occupied Arab
territories. We gave him enough time to prove whether he was really different from
the shah or not. Yet he and those ruling with him in Iran these days have proved that
they are no different from the shah in their expansionist ambitions and in their racist
stands toward the Arabs. They have unjustly maintained all the Iraqi territories which
the shah occupied and maintained—the three Arab islands of Greater Tunb, Lesser
Tunb and Abu Musa. They have even renewed the expansionist calls which the shah
relinquished under the pressure of the Arab will. As for Iraq, they refused even to return
the territories which the shah agreed to return according to the 1975 agreement.
Brothers, when we speak with pain of the Iranian regime’s racism and of its aggres-
sive stands, we cannot forget to highlight with great appreciation the stands of good
men among the Iranian peoples, the Persian in particular, for we harbor amity towards
them. We also have bonds of friendship with these peoples and hope that they will
survive the ordeal they are now enduring.
428 IRAQ AND THE GULF WARS