The Ugandan leader relates a story about a meeting he once had with the Iranian president at the time, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
“When I went to Iran, and there was the man who was president at the time, the one before the current one – Ahmadinejad – I told him about this biblical story,” he says, meaning the stories linking Jews to the Holy Land. “He was telling me the Jews are not from the Middle East, but from Europe. I said no, I have my Bible, I had my Bible with me, I showed it to him.”
Museveni relates that Ahmadinejad “didn’t know at all.
Former Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in July 2013 (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban)
“In the Bible it talks about the Persians and Midianites. I said where are the Midianites? I know you are the Persians. But where are Midianites? He didn’t know.”
The point is, he says, “There is a lot of ignorance. Sure, I don’t want to tell my Arab friends and our Iranians friends that you are all mentioned in the Bible.”
He also notes, as an aside, that “Ugandans believe you are Christian… they don’t know that you are the grandchildren of Abraham.”
— Raphael Ahren
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