Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in his first Persian language interview broadcast into Iran Saturday, appeared to offend many young, educated Iranians with comments that they said revealed how deeply out of touch he is with Iranian society.
While Netanyahu, in the interview with the BBC's Persian TV service, repeated familiar talking points–dismissing the power of Iran's new, more moderate president Hassan Rouhani and arguing Iran should not be allowed to retain a nuclear enrichment capability–it was his assertion that Iranians are not free to wear jeans and listen to western music that set off a social media firestorm.
Netanyahu to #BBCPersian: “If people of #Iran were free they could wear jeans, listen to Western music and have free elections”
— Bahman Kalbasi (@BahmanKalbasi) October 5, 2013
Iranians inside and outside of the country took to Twitter to mock the assertion, using the hashtags #jeans and #Iranjeans to send the Israeli leader photos of themselves wearing jeans and listening to music on their Apple devices, with messages expressing both humor and offense.
Tehran-based Iranian journalist Sadegh Ghorbani took to Twitter Saturday to offer to send Netanyahu photos of Iranians wearing jeans and listening to western music on their iPhones if, as he said, Israeli spies had not been able to provide that:
2day i'm wearing jeans,I can send my photo 4 #Netanyahu if his spies in #Iran didnt see ppl who wear jeans & listen Wsongs by their iPhones! — Sadegh Ghorbani (@Ghorbanisadegh) October 6, 2013
Ghorbani subsequently announced on Twitter Sunday that many Iranians were using the #jeans hashtag to protest the Israeli prime minister's distorted understanding of their sartorial choices.
Jeans Protest! many #Iran-ian users started twitting with #Jeans hashtag & tagging @netanyahu in response 2 his remarks about Jeans & Wsongs — Sadegh Ghorbani (@Ghorbanisadegh) October 6, 2013
BBC Persian journalist Bahman Kalbasi reported both the Netanyahu interview and the on-air and social media response:
Watch: Wave of critisim and mocking of Netanyahu by Iranian audiance of #BBCPersian on air right now. http://t.co/DjKwyIqxEP
— Bahman Kalbasi (@BahmanKalbasi) October 5, 2013
More reax 2 BiBi #BBCPersian INT: “PM of #Israel sends all these spies here (#Iran), why not ask them 2 send back a few pics of our jeans?”
— Bahman Kalbasi (@BahmanKalbasi) October 5, 2013
RFE/RL journalist Golnaz Esfandiari also tracked the Iranian social media response to Netanyahu's comments:
Iranians launch humorous social media campaign: “Mr. Netanyahu, we do wear #jeans in #Iran” by @javadOftadeh http://t.co/WdNq6HIkag
— Golnaz Esfandiari (@GEsfandiari) October 6, 2013
An Iranian woman using the handle @miiilik welcomed Netanyahu to her room, with a photo of a few dozen pairs of denim stacked in the center of her closet:
Hi @netanyahu welcome to my room شلخته هم خودتی #IranJeans pic.twitter.com/wMTohg461e
— میلیک (@miiilik) October 6, 2013
وضعیت فعلی هشتگهای داغ روی نقشه #ایران #jeans #iranjeans #جین pic.twitter.com/JeKHvvruWx
More reactions from around the Iranian social media universe:
— Nima Akbarpour (@nima) October 6, 2013
.@netanyahu My countrymen wear blue jeans and they listen to Western music and they are amazing and don't you dare patronize us! EVER!
— prrrsiankitten™ (@prrrsiankitten) October 5, 2013
Not a surprise to see #Netanyahu that much wrong ab #Iran'ians. He said in UNGA that they shouted 'Death To Jews' after revolution. False.
— Hadi Nili (@HadiNili) October 6, 2013
@netanyahu. sir, I listen to #charlieparker and #frankzappa, wear jeans and vote. #bbcpersian #iran #israel @BahmanKalbasi
— Ali Mardan (@matjundel) October 5, 2013