Dean spoke to Breitbart News at the “Free Iran” conference last month in Paris, hosted by the National Council for Resistance of Iran (NCRI) and the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI). 

During the interview, Dean said he believes that the term “radical Islamic terrorism” is a manufactured phrase “for political, domestic consumption in America.”

Dean also spoke about the nuclear deal, “I respect the president and I certainly didn’t oppose the deal but I don’t think it was ‘a good deal.’ That is, I think we did give away a lot more than we needed to. And I think the Iranians are the largest sponsor of state terrorism in the world. And they are making lives very difficult for a lot of our allies. So I didn’t oppose the deal. I think it had its pluses and minuses, and I think we’re not going to know, for a few years, whether the deal makes any sense or not. And interestingly, I think the president’s reputation — as a good or not-so-good president — will depend on what happens with that deal.”

According to Dean, “most Muslims are not terrorists. In fact, I teach a foreign policy course at Yale. I had three Muslims sit in from other countries. And they pointed out to the class that their families were at greater risk from Daesh [ISIS] than ours because they live with them every day, around the corner.  So I think it’s important for us not to crank up a religious war. That, of course, falls into the hands of Daesh. So I think to call it Islamic terrorism is really just more for political, domestic consumption in America rather than something that you’d want to do in the world. I think these people are thugs, and they’re murderers. I don’t give them a cause. I don’t believe — I think they’re crazy, I think they’re lunatics, pathetic lunatics.”

Dean concludes by saying, “ I think Iran is the farthest thing from an Islamic Republic, with some of the highest rates of execution in the world, torturing political prisoners, one of the worst human rights records in the world, a destructive force in the world. There’s nothing good about the Islamic Republic of Iran. And it’s not an Islamic republic; it’s a republic that’s been hijacked by thugs and murderers. And I think the legitimacy and the real government of Iran would be a secular government, which treated women equally with men.”