Why Iran's Holocaust Denial Matters (more than you think)

     A couple of weeks ago was International Holocaust Remeberance Day, a day that was chosen because it is the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz (interestingly, Israel commemorates the Holocaust on a different day, related to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising). To mark the event many international leaders gave speeches and held ceremonies. President Obama, for example gave a very moving speech at the Israeli Embassy. But in Iran (at least among the leadership), it was used as another opportunity to deny that the Holocaust happened (as you can see here and here). While denying the slaughter of millions of people is heinous, Iran's underlying motivation is even more important.
     In order to understand the Iranian view we first have to briefly try and understand Iranian history. Iran, called Persia for most of its history, has a long and glorious past. 2500 years ago they had the largest empire in the world. It was a bastion of tolerance (including toward the Jews) and civilization. And this wasn't an anomaly. Throughout history Persia has frequently been a major power. And, as with many of their Arab neighbors, this impressive history makes their current second-class status hard to stomach. In particular, much of the middle east has a great deal of trouble with the fact that the Jewish people--the world's punching bag for 2,000 years--have established a (mostly) successful, modern state, while they have completely failed to do so. And just as many Germans refused to accept their defeat in World War I (and gave rise to the Stab-in-the-back myth), many Iranians refuse to accept the facts and believe there must be some other force at work.
     So here's the story the Iranians tell (or at least the story their leadership officially endorses). One way or another the Jewish people convinced the west that the Holocaust happened. As a result, the Europeans and Americans felt really bad, came to the Middle East and stole land to give to the Jewish people. And, due to guilt over the (non-existent) Holocaust the UN voted to create a Jewish state. So the Iranians are saying 1) Israel exists because of the Holocaust and 2) this Holocaust didn't really happen. When they deny the Holocaust, what the Iranian leadership is really saying is that the raison d'etre for Israel's existence is a fabrication. While this is deeply offensive, the bigger problem is that this reasoning seems like it could be used to justify an existential attack on Israel. Why would it be a problem to erase a country that never should have existed in the first place?
     I feel a little bit silly pointing out the fallacies in Holocaust-deniers logic, so I'll keep it short. First of all, the Holocaust happened. Duh. (As my dad likes to say, "otherwise, where did all those European Jews go?") But even if you believe that it didn't, and you believe there are no historical Jewish ties to the land, there's clear evidence of modern Jewish settlement in the land of Israel dating back to the second half of the nineteenth century, long before the Holocaust. And, secondly, there's clear archaeological and textual evidence of Jewish settlement in the land of Israel as early as 1000 BCE, and if you want to be unreasonably conservative, no scholar in the world would question that there have been Jews living here since at least Roman times. There's also solid evidence of Jews visting and/or moving to Israel throughout the last 2000 years (like the Spanish poet Yehuda HaLevy in the twelfth century for example). So both claims that Holocaust deniers make are patently false; but that doesn't make their logic--and the story it tells--any less scary.