Iranian lawmakers demand vice president resign over Israel comments

Tehran - A majority of the members of the Iranian parliament demanded Wednesday that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad make his deputy resign after making pro-Israeli comments, the website of the state television network IRIB reported. In a letter to Ahmadinejad, 200 of the 290 deputies condemned the recent remarks by Vice President Esfandiar Rahim-Mashaei as 'highly regrettable' and asked the president to condemn his comments. The vice president, who is in charge of cultural heritage and tourism, said Iran should be friends with both the Israeli and American people despite having political problems with the two countries. He emphasized this position again Monday. Rahim-Mashaei was summoned Wednesday by parliament for a special session to reply to 'questions, ambiguities and criticism' from the deputies over his comments. At the same time, Islamist students gathered in front of the cultural heritage organization and shouted slogans against the vice president, such as 'Shame on you,' 'Death to concession makers' and 'Resignation, resignation.' Reacting to Rahim-Mashaei's comments, parliament speaker Ali Larijani said Iran was no friend of the Israelis. Iran does not acknowledge Israel as a sovereign state, and, therefore, the deputies said, the Israeli people should not be acknowledged either but rather considered as living in the territories originally belonging to Palestinians. Iran has called for a referendum in what it calls the 'occupied territories' to clarify the future political situation there. Tehran said Jews should live besides Moslems but in a Palestinian, not Israeli land. Ahmadinejad, who had has earned himself international notoriety for his frequent verbal assaults on Israel, has voiced hopes for the eradication of Israel, demanding its relocation to Europe or Alaska, and also has expressed doubts about whether the Holocaust took place.