Israel PM's appeal to Iranians backfires An Iranian couple walk through Mellat Park in the capital Tehran. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tried to take his campaign against the Iranian leadership directly to Iran's youth last week, saying that if they were truly free, they would be able to wear jeans, listen to Western music and participate in free elections. The problem is that Iranians do wear jeans and manage to listen to whatever music they want to listen to, just like anyone else almost anywhere, except maybe North Korea. That is to say, Mr Netanyahu's effort at outreach clearly backfired, as the Twitter universe lit up with retort. "@Netanyahu, here are my #Jeans and #Western music," wrote a user named Sallar, posting a picture of his stone-washed jeans and his iPad showing a pop album cover, and adding an insult to the Prime Minister's intelligence. Mr Netanyahu made his comments in an interview on Thursday with the BBC's Persian channel. "If the people of Iran were free, they could wear jeans, listen to Western music and have free elections," he said, in remarks dubbed into Persian. You, the Persians, will never get rid of this tyranny if it is armed with nuclear weapons. Mr Netanyahu also referred to the 2009 anti-government protests in Iran, in which dozens of people were killed after they took to the streets to dispute the re-election of president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He singled out Neda Agha-Soltan, a young woman shot dead during the protests. "I saw her choke in her own blood," Mr Netanyahu said. During the early years after the 1979 Islamic Revolution, jeans were regarded as a despicable symbol of the United States. Nowadays, though, they are just as ubiquitous in Iran as they are in the rest of the world. Mr Netanyahu, who has called Iranian President Hassan Rouhani a "wolf in sheep's clothing," told BBC Persian that Iranians "deserved better." "He represents a desire for change, but he wasn't elected in free and open elections," Mr Netanyahu said. But his message was overshadowed by what many in Iran saw as his dated and condescending view of the Iranian people. "What he says is real nonsense - we dress like Europeans here and we listen to Western music, too," said Sajad, 31, a student. We even make Western-style music here. That's an underground scene, but still.