BERLIN/JERUSALEM (EJP) --- Outspoken Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said he is still considering attending the football World Cup finals in Germany in June, despite widespread opposition by groups protesting his questioning of the Holocaust and Israel’s right to exist.

In an interview with the German Der Spiegel newspaper published on Monday Ahmadinejad also reiterated his doubts that the Holocaust ever happened and blamed “Zionists” for drumming up opposition to him entering Germany.

The article, a rare interview with a western publication, was the cover story of Der Spiegel’s magazine and ran under the headline “The man the world is afraid of”.

Since Iran qualified for the World Cup finals tournament, which begins on June 9, there has been debate over whether the Iranaian leder should be permitted to attend. This heightened after he made comments calling for Israel to be “wiped off the map”.

No ban

Iran plays its first match against Mexico on 11 June in Nuremberg, the city famous for holding rallies in support of German dictator Adolf Hitler and then hosting the post-WWII war trials where Nazis were judged and convicted by an international court.

In the interview Ahmadinejad, believed to be a football fan, said: “My decision depends on a lot of different things. Whether I have time, whether I want to and some other things."

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FIFA, the organisation which runs the World Cup, has already said it has no authority to prevent Ahamadinejad coming. And despite condemnation of his comments by German government officials, no official ban has yet been put place.

Commenting on the controversy over his attendance of the World Cup, Ahmadinejad said: “I was not at all surprised because there is a very active worldwide network of Zionists, also in Europe.

When asked about his views on the Holocaust, in which six million Jews were killed alongside thousands of gypsies and homosexuals, Ahmadinejad refused to change his opinion.

“I believe the German people are prisoners of the Holocaust. More than 60 million were killed in WWII,” he said. “The question is: Why is it that only Jews are at the center of attention?"

Holocaust doubts

Expressing his doubts on the validity of historical evidence on the extent of the murder orchestrated by the Nazis, Ahmadinejad added: “"In Europe there are two opinions on it. One group of researchers who are by and large politically motivated say the Holocaust happened. There is another group of researchers who have the opposite view and are by and large in prison for that."

Apparently speaking on the behalf of Iranians, Ahmadinejad said that if the Holocaust did happen then Israel has no right to exist as Europe should create a country for the Jews.

"We say if the Holocaust happened, then the Europeans must accept the consequences and the price should not be paid by Palestine. If it did not happen, then the Jews must return to where they came from."
The comments were condemned by the Rabbi Marvin Hier, the dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre in Los Angeles, one of the main instigators of the campaign against Ahmadinejad attending the World Coup Hier said: "On a day when the pope is in Auschwitz to remind the world of the horrors of the Holocaust, Ahmadinejad questions it again. For him to be at the World Cup and sit in a VIP seat would be a desecration of the memory of the Holocaust.”