Iran’s Four Decades of Anti-Americanism

(New York, N.Y.) – Today marks the 40th anniversary of the formal severing of diplomatic relations between Iran and the United States. The U.S. government cut off relations with the Islamic Republic after Iran seized the U.S. Embassy on November 4, 1979, and Iranian students held American diplomats hostage for 444 days.

Anti-Americanism is a founding principle of the Islamic Republic. As Iran’s Supreme Leader said last year, “As long as America continues its wickedness, the Iranian nation will not abandon ‘Death to America.’” “‘Death to America’ means death to Trump…and Pompeo. It means death to American rulers.”

The regime has also employed anti-Americanism as a tool to deflect from its own failures—for example the downing of the Ukrainian jetliner in January by Iranian air defenses and the mismanagement of the coronavirus. An Iranian lawmaker recently accused the United States of being behind the plane crash well after Iran’s armed forces took responsibility publicly. Iran’s supreme leader has also employed a conspiracy theory that the United States manufactured the coronavirus for use as a biological weapon while rejecting U.S. offers of assistance.

UANI’s resource, Anti-American Ideology, catalogues the history of the regime’s anti-Americanism. It documents the statements by Iran’s leadership, features an interactive timeline of hostilities directed against Americans, and explores the Islamic Republic’s long history of hateful anti-Western conspiracy theories.

 To explore UANI’s resource, Anti-American Ideology, please click here.

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