Iranians mock Netanyahu over jeans comment Published duration 7 October 2013

image caption Jeans are readily available in Tajrish Bazaar in Tehran

Iranians have used social media to mock Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, after he suggested they were not allowed to wear jeans.

In an interview with BBC Persian TV Mr Netanyahu said that if Iranians were free they would wear blue jeans, and listen to Western music.

Hundreds of Iranians both in Iran and abroad reacted on social media sites.

Many posts showed mainly young Iranians wearing jeans and listening to Western music, some in comic poses.

Others mocked up scenes from ancient Persian history with the protagonists wearing denim.

Jeans are not banned in Iran, where an Islamic dress code requires women to cover their hair and wear modest outer clothing. Some Western music or Western-style music is tolerated.

Jeans not bombs

One picture on social media sites showed a young boy in jeans whispering into the ear of the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Another is a doctored photograph of Mr Netanyahu's address at the UN last year in which he drew a red line across a sketch of a bomb, to warn that Iran was moving closer to the metaphorical "red line" of gaining enough highly-enriched uranium for a nuclear bomb.

In the mocked-up picture, widely-shared on Twitter , the bomb has been replaced with a picture of a female figure wearing jeans, with the Israeli prime minister appearing to draw a red line across the thighs.

In the BBC Persian interview, broadcast on Friday, Mr Netanyahu said that Iranians "deserve better" than their current government:

"I think if the Iranian people had their way, they'd be wearing blue jeans, they'd have Western music, they'd have free elections."

The Israel's prime minister also said that the lives of Iranians could get worse if it gained nuclear weapons.