BEIRUT, Lebanon — Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, told the American people on Wednesday that he was certain they detested President Bush's policies — his support for Israel, war in Iraq and curtailed civil liberties — and he offered to work with them to reverse those policies.
The call came in the form of a six-page letter in English addressed to "noble Americans" that discussed "the many wars and calamities caused by the U.S. administration." It suggested that Americans had been fooled into accepting their government's policies, especially toward Israel.
"What have the Zionists done for the American people that the U.S. administration considers itself obliged to blindly support these infamous aggressors?" Ahmadinejad wrote. "Is it not because they have imposed themselves on a substantial portion of the banking, financial, cultural and media sectors?"
This was the latest public step by Iran's president to promote a dialogue with the United States. He wrote a letter to Bush in May, calling on him to shift his policies and open a discussion, but it was dismissed by the White House as irrelevant to the central issue dividing them — Iran's nuclear program. Then Ahmadinejad challenged Bush to a public debate, also dismissed by the White House.
On Wednesday, the administration's reaction remained unchanged.
"This is a transparently hypocritical and cynical letter," Nicholas R. Burns, undersecretary of state for political affairs, said in Washington about the latest letter. "It reflects a profound lack of understanding of the United States."
Since his election as president of Iran in June 2005, Ahmadinejad has pursued an aggressive and outspoken foreign policy, relying on the bully pulpit of his position to make up for the limited powers of Iran's presidency and becoming the face of Iran to the world.
His refusal to end enrichment of uranium and his calls for the destruction of Israel have won him few friends in the West. But they have led to increasing popularity across the Muslim world and in particular among Arabs.
Ahmadinejad offered a litany of sharp attacks on American policy — calling, for example, for withdrawal from Iraq. And he once again highlighted a central demand of Tehran: that it be treated as an equal by Washington.
But William Beeman, a linguistic anthropologist from Brown University, also said that Americans should recognize that the letter did represent an overture. "Iran is saying, 'We want to have a dialogue with you,"' he said.