Presidency of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
While the U.S has linked its support for a Palestinian state to acceptance of Israel's "right to exist," Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has retorted that Israel should be moved to Europe instead, reiterating Muammar al-Gaddafi's 1990 statement. The U.S. has sent signals to Iran that its posturing against Israel's right to exist is unacceptable in their opinion, leading to increased speculation of a U.S. led attack on Iran's nuclear facilities. Even though Iran has denied involvement in Iraq, then-President Bush warned of "consequences," sending a clear message to Iran that the U.S may take military action against it. The Bush administration considered Iran to be the world's leading state supporter of terrorism. Iran has been on the U.S. list of state sponsors of international terrorism since 1984, a claim that Iran and Ahmadinejad have denied.
National Front (Iran)
On 16 January, the Shah left the country, amid rejoicing among the populace, and on 11 February, the regime collapsed and Ayatollah Khomeini became the political leader of Iran. At first the National Front supported the new Provisional Revolutionary Government and the establishment of the Islamic Republic. But the joint statement with Sanjabi notwithstanding, Khomeini "explicitly refused to put the same word, democracy, into either the title of the Republic or its constitution." Within a short time, it became clear that Ayatollah Khomeini's model of an Islamic society was modeled not on democracy, but on theocratic rule of Islamic jurists (or velayat-e faqih), and traditional Islamic sharia law.