The foreign policy of the Mahmoud Ahmadinejad administration was the policy initiatives towards other states by the former President of Iran, as different from past and also future of the Iranian foreign policy. Ahmadinejad's tenure as president came at a time of greater conflict, rhetorical or physical, than his predecessors. In following this there were various measures, external or internal, that led to his policy changes. This was primarily a division between relations with states of the Western world (led by the United States) and the rest of the world (countries such as Venezuela and the Arab countries of Lebanon and Palestine).