Newly inaugurated Iranian President Hassan Rouhani spoke to the United Nations General Assembly this evening. Expectations were high after a series of tweets written by Rouhani cemented conventional wisdom that Tehran was offering a new tone, while an op-ed written by Rouhani and published in the Washington Post promised new policies.
Rouhani’s speech, in contrast, left many reviewers cold. A reference to “warmongering pressure groups” triggered eyerolls, but the overall tone and tenor of the speech also seemed in contrast to Rouhani’s more promissory language:
Seemed like there was a lot more language of conciliation in Rouhani’s op-ed than there was in that speech.
— Ali Weinberg (@AliNBCNews) September 24, 2013
@AliNBCNews I would definitely agree Ali. Speech seemed more angry, condemning U.S. for war-mongering than the op-ed, that’s for sure.
— Susan Crabtree (@susancrabtree) September 24, 2013
That was a bit more defiant that I expected.
— Jonathan Schanzer (@JSchanzer) September 24, 2013
In short: the tone of his tweets did not match the spirit of his speech.
— Jonathan Schanzer (@JSchanzer) September 24, 2013
On a substantive level, Richard Haass, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, tried to read Rouhani’s tone as an index to Iranian politics:
combative tone of #Rouhani UN address, lack of positive signal to US or specifics, point to strong opposition in #Iran to nuc compromise
— Richard N. Haass (@RichardHaass) September 24, 2013
Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) had this weekend strongly warned engagement proponents to be wary, and U.S. lawmakers speculate that intervention by Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei squashed a potential handshake between Rouhani and President Barack Obama.
[Photo: The Daily Conversation / YouTube]