Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the 1979-1981 U.S. Embassy Takeover

Soon after his election as president of Iran, on June 25, 2005, pictures of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad emerged showing him as a hostage-taker. An Associated Press photograph showed a man looking very much like a younger version of today’s Ahmadinejad holding a blind-folded man, apparently five days after the U.S. embassy in Tehran was seized on November 4, 1979.

Five former American hostages confirmed that Ahmadinejad as one of their captors. William J. Daugherty, a former intelligence officer, said he saw Ahmadinejad 8 to 10 times at the start of his captivity: “I recognized him right off.

About Daniel Pipes

Daniel Pipes is director of the Middle East Forum and a columnist for both the New York Post and The Jerusalem Post. His website, DanielPipes.org, offers an archive of his published writings and a si

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