This year, the Shiite holiday of Ashura coincided with another Iranian national holiday: the anniversary of the takeover of the American embassy on November 4, 1979. Iranian leaders used the occasion to make clear their attitudes toward Israel and the United States and thereby respond indirectly to President Obama’s fourth personal letter to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei. The following excerpt, introduced and translated by A. Savyon, Y. Mansharof, and E. Kharazi, is from an interview with Ahmad Khatami, a close associate of Khamenei:

As Western [officials] say, “Even if the nuclear issue is resolved, the other issues will remain.” We too say that even if the nuclear issue is resolved, we will continue to say “Death to America,” because this motto is anchored in our faith. The Western side is the symbol of arrogance, and the motto “There is no God but Allah” is the repudiation of the arrogance. . . . This year, the chant of “Death to America” will be more fundamental and more profound than in previous years. . . . The claim that we use religious slogans to preserve the regime is wrong. The Iranian nation uses mottos from Islam and the Quran properly and appropriately. . . . Those who misunderstand [the religion] and are passive vis-à-vis America [i.e., Iran’s pragmatic camp] call this passivity wise. But it is not wise. It is humiliating. . . . The mottos “Death to America” and “Death to Israel” are taken from the tenets of the religion.

Commenting on the wave of anti-Hamas demonstrations in the Gaza Strip, Seth Mandel writes:

Gazans have not have been fully honest in public. There’s a reason for that. To take just one example, Amin Abed was nearly beaten to death with hammers for criticizing Hamas. Abed was saved by bystanders, so presumably the intention was to finish him off. During the cease-fire, Hamas members bragged about executing “collaborators” and filmed themselves shooting civilians.

Which is what makes yesterday’s protests all the more significant. To protest Hamas in public is to take one’s life in one’s hands. That is especially true because the protests were bound to be filmed, in order to get the message out to the world. The reason the world needs to hear that message is that Westerners have been Hamas’s willing propaganda tools. The protests on campus are not “pro-Palestinian,” they are pro-Hamas—and the people of Gaza are Hamas’s victims.