They best the State Department could come up with was is Khamenei’s comments are “not helpful.”
Via Time of Israel:
Jerusalem is “unpleasantly surprised” that, as of Thursday afternoon, the Obama administration had not unequivocally condemned vicious anti-Israel statements made Wednesday morning by Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, senior Israeli officials told The Times of Israel.
In an address to an assembly of tens of thousands of Basij militiamen, Khamenei declared that Israel was doomed to fail and characterized the “Zionist regime” as the “sinister, unclean rabid dog of the region.” He also said Israelis “cannot be called human beings.” Footage of the event showed the crowd shouting “Death to America” and “Death to Israel.”
At a meeting Thursday morning with Jewish leaders in Moscow, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said today’s Iran reminded him “of the dark regimes of the past that plotted against us first and then against all of humanity,” and thus had to prevented from attaining nuclear weapons. “The real Iran is what the leader of Iran, Khamenei, said yesterday,” said Netanyahu. “He called Jews ‘rabid dogs’ and said that they were not human. The public responded to him with calls of ‘Death to America! Death to Israel!’ Doesn’t this sound familiar to you? This is the real Iran! We are not confused,” said Netanyahu.
Khamenei delivered the speech hours before the resumption of talks in Geneva between the P5+1 countries and Iran on thwarting Iran’s rogue nuclear program.
To Israel’s dismay, the speech did not prompt an immediate condemnation by the United States, the officials said Thursday. On Wednesday, in response to a reporter’s question, Stat Department spokesperson Jen Psaki merely called the comments “not helpful.” She said, in full: ” I think at this point in the negotiations, things are certainly sensitive, and certainly we are focused on moving all sides towards a successful outcome. Certainly, you’re all familiar with how we feel about Israel – they’re our close ally, a close friend, we are very focused on their security – one of the reasons that we’re so committed to these talks. Obviously, comments like these [by Khamenei] are not helpful, but we still believe that both sides are negotiating in good faith. We still believe that we’re closer than we were going into Geneva, and we still feel that we have an opportunity to move forward on a diplomatic path with the Iranians, and I would feel pretty confident in saying that the other P5+1 members feel the same way.”