Iran and Syria hit back at Bush

The Guardian:

The Syrian and Iranian governments reacted angrily yesterday to George Bush's vow to confront them over their alleged harbouring of terrorists and pursuit of weapons of mass destruction. ...

Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, denounced the United States as "like one of the big heads of a seven-headed dragon", menacing his country under the direction of "Zionist and non-Zionist capitalists".

"Bush is the fifth US president seeking to uproot the Iranian nation and the Islamic Republic of Iran. Carter, Reagan and father Bush and Clinton failed. This president will also fail," the Associated Press quoted him as saying.

The response from Damascus also reflected growing nervousness at Mr Bush's intentions. "Freedoms cannot be exported by tanks and planes, death and destruction," said Syria's information minister, Mehdi Dakhlallah.

"Everyone knows that Syria is cooperating in fighting terrorism, but the definition of terrorism cannot be selective and based on ideology and politics," he said. ...