Inside Israel’s secret operation to cultivate Iran’s former president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
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Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran’s former leader, was known for accelerating Iran’s nuclear programme and his anti-Israel views.
PHOTO: TODD HEISLER/NYTIMES
Mark Mazzetti, Julian E. Barnes, Farnaz Fassihi and Ronen Bergman
NEW YORK - In early 2024, the rector of a university in Budapest, Hungary, received a startling request from a top Hungarian government official.
The official told the rector, Gergely Deli, that Ludovika University of Public Service should hold a climate change conference and extend an invitation to an unlikely guest: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the widely reviled former president of Iran.