Hatred, Lies, and Violence

Copyright 2014 by Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick, New
Jersey.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright
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Materials.
Library of Congress Catalog Number: 2013042981
ISBN: 978-1-4128-5400-9
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Israeli, Raphael, author.
Hatred, lies and violence in the world of Islam / by Raphael Israeli.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4128-5400-9 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. AntisemitismArab
countries. 2. ZionismForeign public opinion. 3. JewsForeign public
opinion. 4. IsraelForeign public opinion. 5. Public opinionArab
Countries. 6. Arab-Israeli conictInuence. I. Title.
DS146.A67I57 2014
305.892401767dc23
2013042981
Ubi solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant
(Wherever they sow desolation, they call it peace)
Tacitus, Historia
Contents
Foreword ix
Introduction: Te Nature of Lies: Hoaxes, Wishful Tinking,
Envy, Denial, Self-Righteousness, and Conspiracy Teories 1
1 Lies Generated by Hatred: Political and
Religious Sources 19
2 Truth-Bending Propensities of Politics and
Political Ideologies 99
3 A Sample of Manufactured Libel against the Jews
in the Arab and Muslim Media 115
4 Te Distribution of Lies and Hatred: Mosques,
Education, the Media, Internet, Poetry, and
Folk Songs 191
5 Distribution of Libel, in Defense of Lies 203
6 Te Palestinians as the Arab Prototype of Lie
Manufacturing 227
7 Iran: Te Extremist Shiite Example 273
8 Turkey: Te Non-Arab Muslims Entering the Fray 299
Conclusion: Are Hatred and Lie Propagation Reversible?:
Summary Reections 325
Bibliography 333
Analytical Index 339
Foreword
ix
Ayn Rand has made in her great classic novels, Te Fountainhead
and Atlas Shrugged , the seminal distinction between creators, who are
the prime movers and the doers, on whose instincts, stamina, diligence,
determination, rebelliousness, and restlessness rests the progress of
society and humanity (such as Roark, Rearden, and Dagny); and the
second-handers who feed on them and hate them for that (such as
Toohey, Jim Taggart, and most others). Even on the international arena
prime movers among countries, such as America in the world, or Israel
in the Middle East, attract most of the international scorn for their
success, which constantly reminds the others of their own impotence.
Tus, the second-handers face two options: either to elevate themselves
to the level of the doers by emulating them, befriending them, and col-
laborating with them in recognition of their achievements, or to battle
against them, to demean them, demonize them, boycott them, destroy
them, and delegitimize them, so as to remove from their horizon the
successful counter-example of their own failures, and put an end to
their own humiliation. Exactly as Rands masterful narratives follow
this pattern of behavior and action on both sides of the divide, so on
the international arena, one can detect similar molds of conduct, which
lead the doers and movers to do, innovate, and move forward, while
the second-handers watch with envy and sink themselves in hatred,
in lie manufacturing, in violence, and in rationalizations to try in vain
to salvage their self-respect and self-image.
Since the execution of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad in 2005, it
seemed that the persistent image of a latter-day Saladin, the Muslim
hero who can challenge the Christian world and defeat it, had been
removed from popular imagery in the Arab and Muslim world, for it
seemed that there was no other candidate worthy to inherit his mantle
after the thirty-year long era of Saddams mythical and charismatic
leadership had revolved. Before him, it was legendary Gamal Abdel
Nasser, who ruled Egypt from 1952 until his death in 1970, and was
Hatred, Lies, and Violence in the World of Islam
x
crowned as the undisputed leader of Arab nationalism, who had won
that renown to which lesser leaders such as Hafez Assad, Yasser Arafat,
Hassan Nasrallah, and Muammar Gadda had also furtively aspired.
Since the 2000s, a new seeming candidate has emerged, in the form
of egomaniac Teyyip Erdoan, the prime minister of Turkey, who
has been hailed in the Arab world as the new reincarnation of that
Muslim hero, though like Saladin, he is not an Arab. All these leaders,
who professed an intense hatred of Jews and Israel, who by her own
inventiveness, initiative, success, and ingenuity has accomplished many
acknowledged achievements in spite of her minor size and dearth of
resources, have also presided over the most intensive fabrication of
lies to justify and rationalize their hatred to Jews, Zionism, and Israel,
both vis--vis their own populations and the outside world, so as to
concoct the underpinnings of their strategy of delegitimation of Israel.
Te intensity of hatred toward Jews and Israel in the Islamic world,
which is only matched by the volume of lies manufactured to express
it, is articulated daily in one part of the Islamic world or another, where
gross acts of libeling them with all manner of abominable crimes have
become routine. Unlike Western countries, where libel laws can be
sustained in court so as to restrain the spread of false accusations, in
most Islamic lands these acts are encouraged by whatever authorities
are in place, or simply ignored and allowed to pass. For example, on
April 23, 2013, the International Central Committee of the Global
March to Jerusalem held a preparatory meeting in the Egyptian capital,
Cairo, where Members of the Central Committee and representatives of
national and international committees representing a large number of
countries from dierent continents attended the meeting. Te o cial
communiqu of the meeting stated:
Te Committee discussed the ongoing Zionist crimes and threats
against the city of Jerusalem, its people, and holy sites. It expressed
grave concern about the Judaization and alteration of the citys sancti-
ties. Te Committee also pointed to the racist policies adopted by the
occupation toward the Palestinian citizens, which are intended to force
them out of Jerusalem in a process of ethnic cleansing. Te Israelis aim
was to evacuate the citys Arab residents and replace them with Jewish
settlers. Te attendants discussed a wide range of issues, which included
decisions and measures to guarantee the success of the Global March
to Jerusalem. Te March is scheduled to commence on Friday, June 7,
2013, which coincides with the forty-sixth anniversary of the occupa-
tion of the eastern part of the city. Te March will depart from all the
Foreword
xi
Palestinian cities toward the closest point to Jerusalem. At the same
time, people in the neighboring countries will walk toward Jerusalem
or the closest cities in their countries to it. Te Global March will be
popular and peaceful. It will express solidarity with Jerusalem and
Palestine and a rm the necessity of popular measures to liberate them
from Zionist racism. Te March will also denounce all Zionist crimes
and violations against the holy city, its inhabitants, and its identity.
At the end of the meeting, the Central Committee agreed to:
Establish the March as an annual occasion of solidarity with the
Palestinian people for the defense of Jerusalem and its holy sites.
Highlight through this March the issue of the holy city and to place
it at the top of the agendas of the popular forces in the world.
Encourage all popular committees, organizations, and solidarity
groups around the globe to exert their utmost eorts to work for the
success of this March and its accompanying activities.
Call upon all forces and individuals in Palestine and Jerusalem to
take part in these national activities under a central slogan which is:
All people of the world demand the liberation of Jerusalem ... all
the people of the world demand an end to the Zionist occupation of
Palestine.
Call for o cial authorities in all the countries involved in the
activity to facilitate the March and work to achieve its political aims.
A rm the importance of Egyptian involvement and the role of all
popular powers in facing the occupation and Judaization projects
targeting the city of Jerusalem and threatening its Islamic and
Christian holy sites.
Hold the occupying power, Israel, responsible for the consequences
of its continuous crimes against Jerusalem on the stability and peace
of the region and the whole world. It also a rms that the Israeli
crimes against Jerusalem, Palestine, and their inhabitants constitute
a crime not only against the Palestinians, but also against humanity.
1

Among the signatories of the statement were well-known anti-war
and self-hatred lled activists and American Arabs, such as Dr. Amir
Maasoumi, Dr. Hatem Bazian, and others, such as Noam Chomsky,
Susan Abulhawa, Uri Davis, and Rev. Jeremiah Wright, for whom
political conviction has always preceded the statement of truth. Not
only do the millions of tourists who visit Jerusalem see for themselves
daily the unparalleled momentum of progress, freedom, and prosperity
of the inhabitants of the city, where the Arab population has trebled
(from 75,000 to 230,000) under the forty-ve years of Zionist crimes
and ethnic cleansing, but also the medical, social, and urban services,
xii
standard of living, and high employment of this thriving city have never
been so widely available. Paradoxically, the more the city prospers, the
more Arabs, Muslims, and their allies seek to undermine Israeli hold
on it by increasing the pace of lie manufacturing in, around, and about
it. One does not have to investigate to dig up the truth, but just look,
watch, listen, and read statistics. Moreover, prejudice, hatred, and the
manufacture of lies about Jews and Zionism, look more and more like
the Nazi anti-Semitic propaganda of the 1920s and 1930s that preceded
and were the prerequisite for the degradation and dehumanization of
the Jews, which made them a free prey for genocide. Some extreme
Muslim militants, such as the Iranians, the Hizbullah, and Hamas, do
not hide their sympathy for such practices. If one refers to the United
Nations Convention against Genocide (1948) as a working denition
for genocide, the intention and threat to embark on such practices is
part and equivalent of genocide itself. Tus, as renowned Shoa and
genocide researcher Yehuda Bauer has shown, one of the lessons of
the Holocaust is that fanatic ideologies, such as the Communist, the
Nazi, and the radical Islamic, which are prone to mass murder, must
be fought, deterred, and prevented at all costs.
2

In a curious way, the peace loving activists in the West, who usually
belong to the extreme left, nd themselves acting in concert on the
anti-Semitic and hatred of the Jews front, with the most fascist right-
wing followers in their countries, and with the most reactionary au-
thoritarians in the Islamic countries. Hatred of the Jews has proved
a stronger point of convergence between them than the many other
deep ideological divisions that set them apart. For example, some of
those anti-Israel and anti-Jewish leftists who signed the statement cited
above, and purportedly profess democracy, had no compunction about
also supporting the Turkish Mavi Marmara otilla of 2010, which was
assembled and dispatched by the fanatic Islamic organization, the IHH,
with some of those European leftists participating, and with the en-
couragement of the authoritarian regime of Erdoan, who at the same
time that he supports the dissident Muslims of Gaza also oppresses
peaceful demonstrations at home and incarcerates journalists who do
not follow his line. Tis worldwide collaboration between Jew haters
of all sorts, creeds, and trades also explains the exponential growth of
Jew hatred on the internet, with thousands of new hatred sites added
every year, thus by far outpacing Jew hatred in the traditional media,
written, and electronic, and making the combat against them all that
more di cult.
Foreword
xiii
Tus, this volume, which owes a great deal to my research assis-
tants, Adi Shiran and Minjung Kim, who have left no stone unturned
in their diligent collection of the materials, and activated the deepest
crevices of their prolic brains in their organization of them, has set
out to investigate the journey of the lies from the time they are uttered,
through their tortuous peregrinations via political, clerical, media, ed-
ucation, and other state-sponsored channels and manipulations, until
they take their shape as o cial propaganda that does not recoil from
establishing fallacies and fantasies as fact, rumor and speculation as
narrative, conspiracy theories as unfolding events, and fabricated lies
and hoaxes as truth. Beyond mapping out the mechanics of the spread
and distribution of this propaganda in the Arab and Islamic worlds,
which usually absorb these calumnies without criticism, investigation,
or questioning, three case studies are provided to illustrate the prem-
ises of this study: the Palestinians, who have a direct stake in battling
Israel and overwhelming it by propaganda; Turkey, who now claims
the leadership of the Arab and Sunnite Muslim worlds in view of the
Saladin phantasmagoria that has taken over Erdoans thought; and
Shiite Iran, which provides a more extreme example of both hatred and
disregard for fact and history, to accord with its militant and mystical
brand of Islam.
Jerusalem, Spring 2013
Notes
1. http://gm2j.com/main/blog/2013/04/27/gmj-icc-the-people-of-the-world-
demand-the-liberation-of-jerusalem/
2. Yehuda Bauer, Te Impossible People (Hebrew), Nahar Books, BInyamina,
Israel, 2013, p. 279.

Introduction: Te Nature of
Lies: Hoaxes, Wishful
Tinking, Envy, Denial,
Self-Righteousness, and
Conspiracy Teories
1
It is said that while victors write history books that celebrate their
valor and the myths of their heroes, the losers write books of poetry,
nostalgia, and vindictiveness, which mark their victimhood and reect
their self-righteousness in the face of defeat.
1
Te latter, who belong to
the category of the second-handers in Ayn Rands categorization, and
waste much of their time hating and stereotyping the creators who
humiliated them by routing them or by providing a counter example
of success to their own impotence, must invent, propagate, instill, and
absorb a whole range of compensating devices to ll the gap that sep-
arates them from their rivals, from outright hoaxes and common lies,
to conspiracy theories in which they end up believing themselves. In
this fashion, not only their own cultural and scientic development is
stied, as their youth are indoctrinated at best, incited at worse, with
few critical exceptions, to accept the fabrications as fact, but the adopt-
ed culture of stereotypes and the digested patterns of hatred, hostility,
and violence also end up forging new generations, which will perpetuate
the hatred and make international disputes between the hating and
the hated, such as in the Arab-Israeli conict, ever more intractable.
Many denitions have been suggested for hatred: emotional, eco-
nomic, social, and psychological or as an attachment.
2
Te di culty in
dierentiating between various motivations arises from the stunning
fact that while the impoverished dwellers of the south American favelas
2
express their resentment in increased criminal activities, for example,
they do not blow up buses and restaurants with their innocent users
who have nothing direct to do with their plights, the Palestinians do.
So, beyond the anger, deprivation, degradation, humiliation, or the
simple envy of the haves, there must be some additional motives that
push people to hatred, acts of violence, and to manufacturing lies to
justify their deeds, such as cultural upbringing, religious tenets, and
authoritarian rulers who serve as models to their ruled and encourage
their acts. For example, when Teyyip Erdogan was the Mayor of Istanbul
in the 1990s, and was incarcerated for religious incitement, anti-Sem-
itism in Turkey was subdued and relations with Israel attained their
peak. But when he was elected Prime Minister in 2002, his anti-Israeli
rhetoric caught up with his public and permitted the Mavi Marmara
aair in 2010. Similarly, the Shah of Iran maintained excellent relations
with Israel and the Jews of Iran ourished, but upon the advent of
Ruhollah Khomeini, who dubbed Jews the enemies of Allah, those
attitudes were reversed overnight until under Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
until Iran and its Hizbullah operatives, became the most virulent and
violent enemies of Jews and Israel. Similarly, one cannot compare the
dominant stature of Arafat at the helm of the Palestinians, as he was
himself a revolutionary who dipped his hands in terrorism, to the more
subdued conduct of Abu Mazen, his successor, who enjoys the comfort
of his position but shuns combat, and is content with iconizing PLO
terrorists and murderers, since the leader could no longer serve as the
model himself.
Basically, as we focus on the Arab-Israeli conict, which itself has
been increasingly metamorphosing into an Islamic onslaught against
Judaism and Jewry (as part of their resentment against the West)
3
, we
are talking about two dierent worlds and worldviews that run so far
apart of each other that they are bound to generate misunderstandings,
fears, suspicions, and hatreds, which must nd their rationalizations
in lie manufacturing. One day of January 2001, at the height of the
Second Palestinian Intifada (20002003), the Israeli press carried the
picture of a procession in Ramallah, which paraded a donkey wearing a
Jewish prayer shawl and sporting on its forehead a Star of David in the
shape of a swastika, with Palestinian police standing by and applauding
the parade. Te Israeli public was deeply shaken, regarding this act of
profanation and abuse as a continuation of the torching of the Jewish
synagogue in Jericho and Josephs tomb in Nablus, which had been
conceded to Palestinian protection under the Israeli-Palestinian Oslo II
Introduction
3
Agreement, during the initial stages of that upheaval. In all those
cases, what transpired was a Palestinian determination, born out of
frustration and hatred, and made explicit in violent acts, to express
their hostility to Jewish religious symbols, knowing full well the hurt
and anguish they would cause among the Israeli public. Conversely, the
angered Israeli readership of the papers was reminded that, when in
1997 a young Jewish settler in Hebron had held up a poster in public,
in which the Prophet Muhammad was reviled by the drawing of a pig
in his proximity, she was duly arrested by the Israeli police, tried for
anti-religious incitement, and incarcerated for three years. Her outra-
geous deed, which rightly provoked Muslim rage, was duly condemned
across the board by Israeli politicians and clerics, who understood the
sensitivity of such provocations. Israelis had therefore expected, in vain,
to see a similar reaction of the part of the Palestinian authorities and
their religious hierarchy. Moreover, Israelis had expected the Palestin-
ians to protect those Jewish sites as they had undertaken in their Oslo
II engagement under which Israel had withdrawn from those places.
Tose desecrations, committed while the Palestinian police was idly
watching, nally helped remove the readiness of Israelis to evacuate
any more territory or to put their faith in Palestinian commitments.
4

Little did both sides know, in those days when the Intifada kept
escalating, that Muslim anger would acquire a universal momentum,
as the Cartoon Aair broke out (20052006) sweeping Scandinavian
countries and much of Europe into a campaign of apologetics. Tis
only increased Muslim rage and brought to bear the Muslim conviction
that while their faith is untouchable and above any human attempt to
denigrate it, other creeds, especially the Christian and the Jewish, must
recognize their subservient status and accept it, and punish within
their jurisdiction, anyone who dares to defy, denigrate, or insult Islam,
threatening that any violation of that understanding would be taken
as Islamophobia or racism, the most dreaded accusation in modern
Western culture, and violently attacked accordingly. Te fact that
Iran, a member of the United Nations (UN), openly threatens to erase
from the map another member state (Israel), or that a Spring-grown
Muslim head of state, like Muhammed Mursi, following his Holy Book,
his preachers, and spiritual mentors, calls the Jews descendents of
monkey and pigs, based on a verse of the Word of Allah, is beside the
point. For, as no one persistently protests against those outrageous
utterances by Muslim political leaders, some of whose countries had
signed peace with Israel; especially when, at the same time, Christian
4
churches are being attacked and burned throughout the Islamic world,
they become accepted as routine and as proof of their validity. Outrage
is rightly raised in the West, and more so in the Islamic world, only
when some Israeli fanatics, who are persecuted by law and rejected by
public opinion from wall to wall, commit a criminal act of desecrating
a mosque, which the Islamic world takes as proof of the incendiary
nature of the Jews and their state. In consequence, hostility increases,
violence abounds, and Islamic love to hate (to borrow an expression
from Bosnian Nobel Prize recipient Ivo Andric
5
), comes to its full-blown
manifestation, on the footsteps of noted Muslim historical Jewish hat-
ers, like medieval Prophet Muhammad and celebrated writer Jahiz, or
like modern timers Hassan al-Banna, Sayyid Qutb, Ayatollah Khomeini,
and Yussuf al-Qaradawi.
Te phenomenon of poking a Jew in the eye in order to demean him
by diminishing his national and religious symbols has been currently
seen publicly repeated in the entire Islamic world, when Israels national
ag and/or the e gies of its leaders are burned in demonstrations,
usually in conjunction with American ags, thus establishing a ritual
whenever and wherever dissatised Muslim mobs gather to air their
frustration against Israel or the Jews. More ominously, even more
respectable gatherings, such as the commemoration by the Egyptian
Lawyers Association of the peace their country signed with Israel in
1979, have adopted the same ritual. After the change of government in
Egypt, and other Muslim countries for that matter, in the wake of the
Spring
6
, this phenomenon has worsened, as the Israeli Embassy (as well
as the American) have come under some vicious attacks that can be
connected with the escalating hatred toward the West, the Jews, and
Israel across the Islamic world. Tose Muslim crowds are angry and
frustrated, we are told; therefore, we are asked to understand them.
Te deprecation of Jews as such in the Arab thinking and media is not
new; it has deep sources in Arab and Islamic tradition, accompanied
by the fortunes of the Middle East conict since its inception. It has Is-
lamic, anti-Semitic, and specic roots, but the century-old Arab-Israeli
dispute of modern times, which has created confrontational situations
between the parties, has added to its acuity.
Evidently, in a conictual state of aairs, no one expects the parties
to love one another or even develop empathy toward one another.
However, even in a state of hatred where there is contempt and deni-
gration of the rival (like the French and Germans through two world
wars and the Americans and Japanese in the Pacic War), there must be
Introduction
5
some measure of respect for fact and reality, for otherwise one begins
to project on the other ones own defaults and to indulge in such an
exercise in self-delusion as to end up harming oneself and ones own
interest. One remembers the rst day of the Six-Day War on June 6,
1967, when the Egyptian leadership lies to its own people and the rest
of the world, claiming that its air force had destroyed Israels and its
armies were advancing on Tel Aviv, while in fact, they lay in tatters.
What did they gain from that, except for bringing shame and disgrace
against themselves? One may take the basic deciencies of the enemy
and inate them so as to score propaganda points, but when one invents
facts and events that never were, one necessarily creates a devil larg-
er than life, in which case no accommodation is possible or desirable.
Because then, one becomes irrevocably trapped in ones own rhetoric
and instinctively abhors any settlement or reconciliation that the sa-
tanic rival who proved the victor may oer. Ten, the enemy becomes
the culprit for any misery suered, often leading to the Kafkaesque
reversal of cause and eect, which generates the creation of lies, and
provides the rational underpinnings of the resulting hatred. For
example, Germans hate America and Russia for the destruction they
brought upon their country in World War II, but many of them tend
to ignore that it had been that hatred, accompanied by aggression and
untold violence, which had triggered the war and provoked that killing
and destruction in the rst place. Similarly, the Turks and Hamas hate
Israel for its killing of innocent Palestinian people in Gaza, but they
deny that it was their explosion of hatred and murder toward Israel
and Jews that had produced Israeli retaliation in the rst place, which
they end up dubbing as aggression.
Journalist Andrew Higgins wrote a piece for the Independent on
June 13, 1989, a few days after the Tiananmen massacre in Beijing,
entitled Te Triumph of the Lie, in which he lamented the fact that
a political lie was made to prevail in China in those days, and life went
on as if nothing had happened. He had noticed amidst the mayhem in
that Square that a woman who must have been mad because only mad
people are so inclined to show their grief in public that she stood in
front of the Bank of China, in a side street leading to the square, facing
steel-helmeted soldiers of the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA, which
could also stand for the Palestine Liberation Army in a Middle East
context), holding in her hand a scrap that carried the name of some
beloved relative who was killed in the massacre that the Chinese au-
thorities pretended never happened. Te soldiers threatened her with
6
their guns, grabbed that piece of paper from her, thus foiling another
counter-revolutionary plot. Higgins says that while the womans mes-
sage went unsaid, the Chinese state had no di culty to project its own
version of the events, making Joseph Goebbelss point that if a lie is big
enough and repeated often enough, people start believing it, and even if
they do not they will be sure to repeat the party line when communist
cadres come to question them on the correct facts and elicit from
them patriotic and bombastic statements that laud the state and its
institutions and denigrate its enemies. Naturally, the author reminds
us, it will be only that mad woman who will persist in forgetting those
lines, or some deranged man who will continue to unfurl his banner
of protest, or scream abuse at passing-by troops.
7

Te sane among the crowds, says the author, will continue to wait for
the storm to pass, for the terrible normalcy of mass arrests to come to
an end, amidst shrill propaganda and obedient silence. For while those
who had the means, and the passports, had already ed the country,
and others sought shelter in foreign embassies, most of the hapless rest
had no choice but to cow in silence, observing the truth turned on its
head, accusing the victims and praising the oppressors
8
. For indeed, the
news programs had shown soldiers who were attacked by the crowds
and incinerated live, but the thousands who were massacred vanished
from the screens. Te writer concluded that while he read the banners
Saluting the Peoples Liberation Army on the very balcony of the
hotel from which he had watched dozens of people mowed down by
machine guns, he could only muster a sinister sarcasm in response:
Salute the security forces! Salute the police! Salute the armed militia!
9

We have here a striking illustration of the power of propaganda in
totalitarian and authoritarian regimes, as much as they pose as of
the people and by the people, which can hardly countenance dis-
sent, where no investigative reporting is known or allowed, where no
measure of truth or reason matter, and where the lie is allowed to be
perpetuated. For when such societies discover the benets they stand
to reap from deception, they become so enamored with it that they
are in no mood to let go. Te hell with the truth, which goes on being
hidden, with hardly anyone mad enough to hail or to proclaim it.
For, as Hamilton Gibb once remarked about Arabic speech in general,
the words passing through no lter of logic or reection, which might
weaken or deaden their eect, go straight to the head.
10
Another keen
observer of the Arabs, an Arab himself, has put it in dierent words:
Arabs delight in playing with words ... and in their tendency to t the
Introduction
7
thought to the words, rather than the word to the thought.
11
When
a lie is nationally adopted as benecial, then everyone is mobilized
to sustain it: doctors issue a davits that things happen that did not,
politicians repeat their lies that amount to incitement, in their media,
which shape public opinion rather than reect it, and intellectuals and
scholars, who hardly merit that epithet, are recruited to manufacture
facts, history, and archaeology, and even invent citations to deni-
grate the enemy that is on the sight of their barrel at any particular time.
Jonathan Swift (16671745) wrote an essay on Te Art of Political
Lying. His brilliant sarcasm is as vigorous and biting today as it was
three centuries ago:
Sometimes it is produced a monster and licked into shape. At other
times it comes into the world completely formed and is spoiled in the
licking. It is often born an infant in the regular way, and requires time
to mature it.; and sometimes it sees the light in its full growth, and
dwindles away by degrees... Here it screams aloud at the opening of
the womb, and there it is delivered with a whisper. When it comes
to the world without a sting it is stillborn whenever it loses its sting,
it dies ... It can conquer kingdoms without ghting, and sometimes
with the loss of a battle. It gives and resumes employments, can sink
a mountain into a molehill, and raise a molehill to a mountain ..., can
wash a blackamoor white, make a saint of an atheist, and a patriot of
a proigate; can furnish foreign ministers with intelligence, and raise
or let fall the credit of a nation ...
Few lies carry the inventors mark, and the most prostitute enemy
to truth may spread a thousand without being known the author.
Besides, as the vilest author has his readers, so the greatest liar has
his believers; and it often happens that if a lie be believed for only
one hour, it has done its work, and there is no further occasion for
it. Falsehood ies and truth comes limping after it, so that when men
come to be undeceived, it is too late. Te jest is over and the tale has
had its eect: like a man who has thought of a good repartee when
the discourse is changed or the company parted; or like the physician
who has found out an infallible medicine after the patient is dead ...
Considering that natural disposition in men to lie, and in multitudes to
believe, I have been perplexed what to do with that maxim so frequent
in everybodys mouth, that truth will at last prevail ... Here we are
under the inuence of such counsels and persons, whose principle it
is to corrupt our manners, blind our understanding, drain our wealth
and in time destroy our constitution ... while truth, which is said to
lie in well, seemed now to be buried there under a heap of stones ...
I shall endeavor to undeceive or discover those deluded or deluding
persons who hope or pretend it is only a short madness in the vulgar,
from which they will soon recover; whereas I believe it will appear to
8
be very dierent in its causes, its symptoms, and its consequences;
and prove a great example to illustrate the maxim I lately mentioned
that truth (however sometimes late) will at last prevail.
12

Lies usually consist of making false statements, with an intent to
deceive; but what is the yardstick of truth that we use to measure a lie,
falsehood, deception? Truth, just like wisdom, justice, and beauty, is in
the eye of the beholder. Often, the Rashomon approach is used precisely
to avoid confrontation with these words, which are often looked upon
in relative terms, or as politically or diplomatically incorrect.
13
A lie
does not mean only the reversal or denial of the truth, which when
repeated often enough, and insistently enough, becomes true in the
eyes of its propagators, but a systematic manufacturing of veriable
delusions, and the fabrication of histories that never were, geared
to elevate oneself and deprecate the enemy. In the rst category, one
is reminded of the carefully cultivated hoax in the Arab world of the
legendary map hanging on the Knesset wall, which allegedly depicted
the coveted boundaries of Israel from the Nile to the Euphrates. Tere
are Arab members of the Knesset, who are reputedly no friends of the
Jewish state, and who could conrm as rst-hand witnesses the vanity
of that claim. But the Arabs would not let fact confuse them. Te entire
idea of the Arabs was to prove to their own people, and to the world,
the boundless territorial aspirations of Israel, so as to inject into the
Arab minds the dangers emanating from Israel, and inspire fear and
hatred toward it. In other words, exactly as hatred inspires lies, it also
works the other way around, thus constituting a vicious circle where
cause and eect get blurred.
When President Anwar El Sadat visited the Knesset in November
1977, some of his entourage asked to see that map, and they could not
be convinced that it had never existed. After that, Palestinians started
to dig up another proof of their contention by claiming that the two
blue stripes on the Israeli ag represented those two rivers (Nile and
Euphrates), and they could not be convinced by the simple truth that
they symbolized the Jewish prayer shawl, that same artifact that they
desecrated in Ramallah when they paraded during the Intifada a donkey
wearing it. At about the same time, Yasser Arafat presented in a press
conference the Israeli coin of a dime (10 agr) that carries an ancient
historical seal, as proof of the territorial ambitions of Israel. Tis
might be termed a delusion, a deception, a cheap propaganda trick, a
conspiracy theory, and what have you. Or take another example where
Introduction
9
most of the Muslim and Arab press deny the Holocaust in various de-
grees, and wont allow in movies like Schindlers List , which attest to its
veracity, or documentaries on the death camps to disturb their denial.
Conversely, the Holocaust deniers in Europe, like Robert Faurisson
and Roger Garaudy, are welcomed as heroes in the Arab world. David
Irvings loss of his case denying the Holocaust in a London court was
ignored by most of the Arab and Muslim world. What all this amounts
to is to heap upon Jews and Israel all the blames of the world, in order
to overwhelm them with delegitimizing accusations, and to ignore and
discard any argument in their favor, which might bring them sympathy.
Tis is denial, spitefulness, and wishful thinking.
Every one of the lies spread against Jews and Israel, mainly by
Islamic and other totalitarian regimes (but not only), ts into many
of the following categories: common lies, hoaxes, wishful thinking,
envy, denial, distortions, forgery, self-righteousness, deception, delu-
sion, self-deception, spitefulness, and conspiracy theories. Te most
abominable lie about the Jews has been around for the past millenni-
um and more, and it is encompassed within the blood libel, which
when almost nally extirpated from Western society in the twentieth
century, has either found its permanent place among Muslim nations,
which keep repeating it unabashedly,
14
or gained new expressions in
Western countries like Sweden, which has defended the right of one
of its journalists to libel Israel with stealing organs from Palestinians
for its own transplants, in the name of freedom of speech. Te same
country would condemn its citizens for racial incitement or for Shoa
denial, in spite of the limitation on the right of expression involved.
Tere can be psychological, historical, and political explanations
to Jew hatred in the world, but nowhere else is that pathology of Jew
hatred so deeply rooted as in the Islamic world, where it became a
second nature, hence the main instrument and the main cause for
manufacturing and spreading lies about Jews and Israel, sometimes
euphemistically dubbing them: anti-Zionism. More often than not,
the manufactured lies are so enormous and persist over so many years,
that they come to cover more than one of the major categories of lies
listed above.
When the Arab countries, supported my most Islamic people of the
world, in deance of the UN Partition plan of 1947, invaded Israel the
day it was declared, many expected an easy victory over edgling Israel,
whose tiny size, poor equipment, and seeming imsiness did not augur
well for her ability to withstand that onslaught. Instead, Israel was not
10
only able to survive, but it also ended up controlling at the end of the war
larger territories in Palestine than assigned to her in the Partition Plan.
Te depth of the Arab frustration and humiliation for their defeat in
the war corresponded to the summits of their arrogant self-condence
on the onset of the hostilities. But in those early days of 19481949,
and contrary to the later 1967 rout, when they understood their defeat
and undertook to redress it, it was their refusal to take cognizance of
the facts, and their persistent denial of the consequences thereof that
blurred their view and distorted their reasoning. In a culture of shame
and phantasmagoria, where words replace action and wishful thinking
reality, Israels rmness and survival were ignored as non-existent, and
the delusion set in as regards its imminent disappearance. Arab leaders
promised their people that after the failing rst round, which was due
to corruption, treason, and faulty ammunition, the next round
was around the corner to redress all wrongs.
And with each one of the ve upcoming rounds and their resulting
defeats, the Arabs felt that they had sunk deeper into helpless and
inextricable hatred and wrath. For they could either try to elevate
themselves to the level of Israel and then try to defeat it, or desist
from their hostility and settle the dispute. Tey tried indeed a rapid
process of development, but still according to UN charts, they keep at
the bottom of the heap, while Israel continued to make such a prog-
ress as to bring her to European standards, and to keep her per capita
gross domestic product (GDP) ten times higher than in the environing
Arab countries. Tese achievements only deepened Arab and Muslim
resentment toward Israel, for her very successes accentuated Arab
failures and triggered more hatred. Teir only recourse, then, was to
destroy Israel, so as to remove the humiliation she caused, or to force
her into such withdrawals and other concessions, under the pretense of
a peace process, as to weaken her, disinherit her, and delegitimize her
into oblivion. Successful and westernized Israel, like the West itself, is
deeply hated by the Arabs and the Islamic worlds. It is in the nature of
things that the backward and the poor should detest those to whom they
cannot resemble; therefore, Israel and the West are always intertwined
in their eyes. One can hear in campuses around the world that both
are Neo-Colonialist, or Neo-Imperialist, enemies of Islam and of the
Tird World. In those demonstrations, the Israeli and American ags
are always burned in tandem, because for them Israel is the corrupting
Western arm in the heart of the Arab and Islamic world, that does
the ground work of undermining Islam, or corrupting its youth with
Introduction
11
foreign values, music, pornography, and permissiveness. Hence their
commitment to ght them both relentlessly and ruthlessly, even at the
price of self-perdition.
One of the major themes used by the Arabs and Muslims to justify
their hatred and violence toward Jews, Israel, and the West has been
their claim that injustice was done to them (they demand a peace
with justice), as if justice were absolute and not in the eye of the be-
holder. Justice ( adalah in Arabic) is for the Arabs linked to the notion
of balance between the two saddlebags on the camels back, short of
which the camel cannot march at length to cross the desert. Justice is
also connected to honor, and the maintenance of honor hinges on the
mans ability to protect his property and his women, and on his proven
capacity to retrieve them if they are violated. Otherwise, his reputation
is irretrievably compromised. Tus, ones honor is constantly on the
line, and it is tested by a mans daring in the service of his honor. An
Arab will not rest until the wrong done to him will be redressed and his
property is recuperated. Ten, justice is done, and one can go back to
functioning normally. For example, only the killing of a woman who has
desecrated the family honor can stop the process of family humiliation
and permit its male members to return to normal.
Hatred toward the perceived wrongdoer to the point of wishing his/
her violent elimination becomes then the requisite retaliation against
him, pending the redress. Since, except for the obvious cases of honor
violation, which require violent retribution, there are no objective
criteria to dene the feeling of right and wrong, or when ones honor
is encroached upon, they hinge in each case on the subjective sense of
the wronged individual. For example, when the Palestinians or other
Arabs demand justice, they mean their justice, that is the return of
their rights and property as they perceive them, regardless of whether,
why and how, others might advance disclaimers in historical, legal,
logical, or human terms, for all these are irrelevant. For Arabs and
Muslims, they rst have to get full satisfaction, in accordance with
their sentiments and convictions, their rights must be recognized and
stated, and only then might they show generosity and give something
back out of their own volition, not as a result of coercion or force. And
until that is done, hatred with its attending fabrication of lies, is con-
stantly blasted against the bearer of injustice. For example, the Turkish
provocative otilla into Israeli waters in June 2010, which was geared
to break the Israeli blockade on Gaza that was approved by the UN
as legal, and used force to attack the Israeli enforcers of the blockade,
12
only remembered that its nationals were killed when they tried to use
force to scuttle the blockade. Tey demanded apology and damages
from Israel, who foolishly submitted to the pressure, thus justifying
Turkish violent but illicit interference. By thus collaborating with the
Turkish outrage, which disregarded the UN siding with vindication of
Israels position, Israel permitted it to perpetuate the unjust unilateral
concept of Islamic justice.
Te Iranians deny the Holocaust, and organize international confer-
ences to celebrate the end of the Zionist entity, whilst it is alive and
kicking, and registers world-recognized economic and technological
advances. Te Palestinians, like the rest of the Arabs, keep repeating
that the Holy Land in general, and Jerusalem in particular, with its
inner sanctum, the Temple Mount, which have a recognized Jewish
history of three millennia, have nothing to do with Judaism or Jewry,
and that they are the exclusive patrimony of the Arabs and Muslims
since they were occupied by Islam in the seventh century AD. To in-
clude in that patrimony the Two Jewish Commonwealths, covering
the rst millennium BC, they have also systematically Arabized the
ancient Canaanites and despoiled the Jewish people of any history
or heritage on its land. Since the land was Islamized by conquest, it
became a waqf (holy endowment) land, never to be parted with or
negotiated away. Hence, for them, their right of return is not only a
human and political need, but also a religious duty that imposes on
them to struggle and pay any sacrice so as to snatch the land from its
usurpers who have subtracted it from their dominion. Tis is partic-
ularly valid with regard to the Haram al-Sharif (the Temple Mount),
which was the very site of the Prophet Muhammads mystical nightly
journey ( isra ) and ascension to Heaven ( miraj ). Tus, only after this
right of theirs is recognized and fullled, as a matter of course, may they
evince ex-gratia generosity and allow others to collect some crumbs
from their table. Until then, all means are allowable to retrieve the loss,
by peaceful means if possible, through violence if necessary, for in any
case, its holy character prescribes jihad.
The category of self-deception that blinds the perceptions of
self-deceiving haters has been dealt with in Dan Ariely,
15
for whom
self-deception is a useful strategy for believing the stories we tell, in
the process fooling oneself as one tries to fool others. He, for example,
tells the story of someone trying to impress his date by lying to her that
he is a pilot, but on his next ight as a passenger, he was already giving
advice to the airline pilot how to land more adroitly, so convinced he
Introduction
13
became in his own delusion. Self-deception can either stem from a
desire to maintain a positive self-image, or to gain the upper hand in a
game of one-upmanship with a rival (e.g., when Palestinians ascribe to
themselves descent from the ancient Canaanites, so as to dethrone Jews
from their claim of antiquity on the land). However, this self-sustaining
pride and high morale emanating from the old is beautiful axiom can
be rather devastating when reality, science, history, and truth come
crashing in. Ariely also observed that:
Human beings are torn by a fundamental conflictour deeply
imagined propensity to lie to ourselves and to others, and the desire
to think of ourselves as good and honest people. So, we justify our
dishonesty by telling ourselves stories about why our actions are
acceptable and sometimes even admirable. Indeed, we are pretty
skilled at pulling the wool over our own eyes.
16

In a study carried out at the University of California, Los Angeles,
17

it was found that pathological liars had less gray matter in their brains,
something typical of psychologically impaired people. One possible
interpretation was that since pathological liars had fewer brain cells in
their prefrontal cortex, where distinction is made between right and
wrong, they nd it harder to take moral considerations into account,
thus nding it easier to lie. Yaling Yang and her team also found that
pathological liars had considerably more white matter, which links the
gray matter together, and therefore, they are able to make more connec-
tions between associations and memories that are stored in their gray
matter. All this amounts to saying, according to Ariely, that higher brain
connectivity may make it easier for any person to lie and at the same
time think of itself as an honorable person of integrity. For, the more
connected brains can aord more ways and avenues to interpret things
and spill over into the world of conspiracies, delusions, self-deception,
and rationalization of dishonest acts. Although, he does not call it by
name, Ariely nds a silver lining to this pathology by identifying in it
an element of increased creativity, since this is what it takes to create
extra-natural phenomena like delusions, conspiracy theories, decep-
tion, and lies. Imagination, we should remember, has two derivatives:
the imaginative, which we characterize as positive creativity; and the
imaginary, which is detached from reality and brings us closer to the
world of lies.
However, lest we slide into the abject world of racism, let us make
clear that those observations made by Yangs research team applied to a
14
general American population, and were meant to indicate the universal
dispersion of their ndings. It is evident nonetheless, that certain cul-
tures at certain times may evince more of this pathology of lying than in
other times at other places. For example, Jew hatred and warmongering
under Nazi Germany, which necessitated widespread lying for self-jus-
tication, did not persist on that scale after the de- Nazication process,
which clearly indicates that this matter of obsessive lying is not innate
and not imprinted in the genes, but rather a matter of acquired knowl-
edge, perceptions, attitudes, or in short- education and upbringing. We
shall see in the coming pages dramatic examples of all those sorts and
varieties of lying, which are instilled through educational systems, the
media, and now more and more through the Internet and social media
(Facebook, Twitter, talkbacks, blogs, chats, and the like), into the new
generations by their Jew-hating and Israel-boycotting governments,
which have made the Islamic world, in conjunction with the extreme
leftists and the fanatic rightists in the West, the present world center
of demonization of Jews and their country.
Another useful denition made by Willard Gaylin is the one covering
the emotional aspect of hatred thus:
A sustained emotion of rage that occupies an individual through
much of his life, allowing him to feel delight in observing or inicting
suering on the hated one.. It is always obsessive and almost always
irrational ... Te feeling of hatred is simply an intense form of anger,
like rage ... It starts as annoyance, irritation or pique and extends to
its extremes in rage and fury ...
18

We have seen much of that denition applicable after the September
11 events, when throughout the Islamic world, throngs of people grossly
exhibited their jubilation in public while in New York, Washington, and
the rest of the civilized world consternation, pain, and fear dominated
the scene. Scapegoating, which is the process of putting the blame for
the hatred on the shoulders of the hated, as was the Nazi accusation
that put the responsibility of World War II on the Jews, and for the Twin
Towers horrors on America and Israel for the humiliation of Islam,
was a way to wash the hating parties hands clean on the one hand, and
continue to indulge in jubilation over the suering of the hated on the
other. Gaylin, who regards Jews as the quintessential scapegoats, views
that as the reason for their continued demonization throughout histo-
ry, and one might add to the present day, when Israel, the state of the
Jews, embodies Jewish evil. If we add to that what Gaylin has correctly
Introduction
15
identied as the ability of Islam to create hatred by converting normal
populations into crusaders for a cause, then we have some plausible
explanations for much of the hatred proered today toward Israel and
the Jews in the contemporary world.
19

Jews have traditionally been the victims of stereotyping, calumny,
and violence, based mostly on manufactured lies stemming from hatred.
Te centuries-old blood libel, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion , and
the World Jewish Conspiracy, which have practically disappeared in the
Western world due to legislation that forbids racism and incitement,
have unfortunately survived in the Islamic world, which due to its con-
tinued hatred to Israel and the Jews, has neither limited that gushing
hatred in their media and o cial statements, nor done anything to
eradicate those lies. Te Hamas state in Gaza for example, in whose
Charter it cites liberally from the Protocols and the other anti- Semitic
nonsense, is also on record as vowing the destruction of Israel, in
concert with Irans Ahmadinejad, who together with his repeated vow
to erase Israel o the map also indulges in anti-Semitic rhetoric and
reassures the world that there was no Shoah. True, Jewish synagogues
are still occasionally set on re and Jews are blamed for excessive
political and nancial power, but the style of hatred has changed due
to the internet where lies and accusations are spread instantly and
widely, and no longer need state-controlled media to conquer the cy-
berspace. Su ce it to read in detail the horrors that unfolded during
the UN-sponsored Durban Conference (2001), and the incredible
amount of hatred generated by the Muslim participants and their
supporters, to realize how international that plague has become.
20
Two
days after that Conference, September 11 happened. Certainly, that
enormous horror had been prepared many months in advance and
was not necessarily the direct result of it, but it unfolded as a logical
sequence to it and it reected the general mood in the Islamic world,
which rejoiced over it.
A report prepared for the Global Forum for Combating Antisem-
itism
21
provides in harrowing detail the characteristics of the new
internet threat of rapid and uncontrollable diusion of hate speech
and incitement in the thousands of Islamic sites that burgeon daily.
One of the most blatant example of the online hatred in that report
was the Google Earth where Israel was littered with orange spots,
thus representing that country as Palestinian localities evacuated and
destroyed after the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, namely as born out of co-
lonial conquest, rather than the return of its people from exile. Tis is
16
a sort of replacement geography advanced by internet, instigated by
an intense hatred and geared to delegitimize and demonize Israel to the
point of wishing its extinction.
22
[Other hatred-inspired internet sites
included Holocaust denial, blood libel, conspiracy theories with some
extremely aggressive ones urging the use of violence against Jews, like
Kick a Jew Group from the United States, Punch a Jew in the Face
group from Australia, Kick a Ginger Group on Facebook and the
Bored of Studies student Webside, also from Australia, which all host
anti-Jewish propaganda and hate groups.
23
Some of these hate groups
use games to appeal and recruit the young generation into hating and
attempting to physically hurt Jews and Israelis. Tese games originate
in the main from the Arab and Islamic world, although they also have,
unfortunately many anti-Semitic partners and collaborators throughout
the world in general.
Of particular concern in our context is the rise of anti-Israel and
anti-Jewish activity not only by the Arab and Muslim countries where
these campaigns of incitement are often sponsored by the governments
and their media, and educational systems that they control, but also by
the Muslim minorities in Western countries, which import with them
to their host cultures their bigotry and hostile attitudes toward the Jews
and Israel from their countries of origin, and supplement them with
the outbursts of violence in the Middle East in accordance with the
fortunes of the Arab-Israeli dispute. Indeed, after every clash between
Israel and the Arabs, immigrant Muslims and their local anti-Semitic
partners join hands in attacking Jews and vandalizing Jewish property.
Of course, the larger the Muslim community, the more daring and
vicious its onslaught on the Jews and Israel and its manifestations of
hatred toward them. France, with its highest rate of Muslims in the
Western world (some 10 percent) has also registered the highest level of
anti-Jewish violence in 2012. Jewish Commemoration sites, cemeteries,
and Jewish property were the targets of serious attacks, including re
bombing. In the Netherlands, for example, the apartment of a Jew living
above a synagogue in Amstelveen, was broken into and set alight. But
the increase of desecration of Jewish sites was also observed in Poland,
which should have known better due to its World War II experience,
and in Hungary and Italy.
Notes
1. See the magnicent examples brilliantly exposed in Wolfgang Schivelbuschs,
Te Culture of Defeat (New York: Picador, 2001).
Introduction
17
2. See WIllard Gaylin, Hatred: Te Psychological Descent into Violence (New
York: Public Aairs, 2003), Chaper 2, 1729.
3. Al-Qaidas communiqu following the September 11 events expressly spoke
about the their aspiration to blunt Americas arrogance and curtail the
stature of world Jewry.
4. See the entire story in R. Israeli, Te Oslo Idea: Te Euphoria of Failure (New
Jersey: Transaction, 2012).
5. Ivo Andric, Te Bridge over the Drina , was translated and published inter-
nationally into many languages.
6. It has been the contention of this author that, unlike conventional wisdom
which dubs it the Arab Spring, though it has no signs or aims of Arabism,
the Spring phenomenon in fact extends to enough non-Arab but Islamic
countries, such as Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Somalia, and even
Mali, to merit the epithet of Islamic. See R. Israeli, From Arab Spring to
Islamic Winter (New Jersey: Transaction, 2013).
7. Te Independent , June 13, 1989
8. Ibid.
9. See the Independent , June 13, 1989. Cited by Philip Kerr, ed., Te Penguin
Book of Lies (New York: Viking, 1990), 53132.
10. H. Gibb, Trends in Modern Islam (Chicago, 1947), cited by John La n, Te
Arab Mind (London: Cassell, 1975), 56.
11. E. Shouby, Te Inuence of the Arabic Language on the Psychology of the
Arabs, Te Middle East Journal V (1951): 293
12. Jonathan Swift, Te Art of Political Lying, Te Penguin Book of Lies , op.
cit., 15556
13. See e.g., this authors, Poison, Modern Manifestations of a Blood Libel
(Lanham: Lexington Books, 2002).
14. See R. Israeli, Te Blood Libel and its Derivatives (New Brunswick: Trans-
action, 2012), especially Chapter 4, 11766.
15. Dan Ariely, Te (Honest) Truth About Dishonesty (Harper Collins, 2012),
Chap 6 Cheating Ourselves, 14162.
16. Ibid., 16566
17. By Yaling Yang and her team. Cited by Ariely, Ibid., 16869
18. Willard Gaylin, Hatred, the Psychological Descent into Violence (New York:
Public Aairs, 2003), 34.
19. Ibid., 22425
20. See Phyllis Goldstein, A Convenient Hatred: Te History of Antisemitism
(Brookline, MA: Facing History and Ourselves, 2012), 340-.
21. Andre Oboler, and David Matas, Online Antisemitism: A Systematic Review
of the Problem, the Response and the Need for Change (Jerusalem, April
2013).
22. Ibid., 1214
23. Ibid.

Lies Generated by Hatred:
Political and Religious
Sources
19
1
In matters of hatred toward Jews, Arab children and many other
Muslim infants for that matter are imbued with large doses of it
through their mothers milk. Te infamous passage from the Book,
which is cited in sermons in mosques throughout the Muslim world
and repeated by Muslim clerics and political leaders, like President
Mursi of Egypt, and which depicts Jews as descendants of pigs and
monkeys, a-priori lends justication to any monstrosity attributed to
Jews. We understand today that Prophet Muhammad had pronounced
those derogatory words for the Jews when they rose against his au-
thority in Medina at the outset of his political career there. But today,
when they are repeated ad nauseam throughout the Muslim world
in Friday sermons by journalists and politicians out of any context,
they serve no other purpose than disparaging the Jews and insulting
them. What is that if not hatred toward the Jews, irrational as it may
be and anchored in religious belief, which renders it immutable? Tat
derogatory reference in the Book, which is seconded by many others,
1

has had a profound and lasting impact on Muslim thinking, behavior,
social norms and the education of their children, and not necessarily
in areas of conict with Israel or adjacent to them , sometimes even in
parts of the world that have never seen a Jew.
Te blind hatred and contempt toward Jews in the world of Islam has
also instigated Muslims to manufacture lies, to weave conspiracies, and
to cultivate delusions, among them the most incredulous which only
Muslims can believe them. Examples abound: after the September 11
horrors, Muslims across the globe, including those in the United States
and the most educated among Muslims, seized upon the rumor that
the Mossad or the CIA were the authors of that act of terror to cling to
20
it and to produce evidence to that eect: that Muslims are not able
to commit something terrible like that; that most of the employees in
the Towers, who happened to be Jewish, were absent that day because
they had been tipped o by the perpetrators, or that the control tow-
ers at the airports had been taken over by Israeli or Jewish elements.
On another occasion, Israelis were accused by Egyptians of having
attracted sharks to the Sharm al-Sheikh waters o Sinai in order to
ruin the Egyptian tourist industry; or they were charged of distributing
toys loaded with explosives to kill children, or that they inltrated an
aphrodisiac chewing gum into Arab and Muslim countries in order to
corrupt feminine morality there; or that they fought Palestinians with
ammunition made of depleted uranium, or that they massacred Arabs
and Muslims or tried to hurt the productive organs of their youth so
as to sterilize them, and an entire series of unlikely stories of the ajaib
genre
2
. Modern times and instant mediatic technology permitting to
verify every claim on the spot did nothing to blunt their appetite for
these stories or to tire from fabricating them. Absurd as they sound to
Western ears, they are much in demand in the world of Islam, where
they are manipulated into propaganda, incitement, and indoctrination.
Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the now famous Somalian Muslim refugee who
immigrated to the Netherlands and was instantly catapulted to prom-
inence there when she was elected to Parliament, recounted in one
of her many press interviews the religious indoctrination process she
underwent in her country of origin in her youth. Her history teacher,
Sister Aziza, used to take the class for an outing to the Iranian embassy
and to promote a Muslim revolution. Gradually, the girls in her class
started to physically cover themselves. She herself took to wearing the
hijab and to admire the Muslim Brotherhood. Aziza started to use
the yahud (Jews) word. One day she said: You all sit up and listen.
She showed the girls a magazine from Iran (a Muslim Shiite, not an
Arab Sunni country) with pictures of dead people, piles of bodies and
blood, and said: look what the yahud have done to the Muslims. Te
pictures were Iranian propaganda. Tey were taken from the Iran-Iraq
war, showing Iraqi soldiers killing Iranian citizens. Tis is what the
Jews have done, and Saddam Hussein was an agent of the Jews, Sister
Aziza taught. She instructed the kids how to pray: You hold your hands
together, and you say: Allah please protect us from evil, Allah please
keep us healthy, Allah please take care of my mother and my father,
Allah please destroy the Jews. Hirsi Ali pursued her tale:
Lies Generated by Hatred
21
For me, yahud [Jews] was not the same as human. Its the enemy.
Its Satan. I remember a joke, well, it wasnt even a joke, from the
time I was a very little girl. We were in Riyadh and Jedda when
the oil boom started. Tey were trying to build an oil pump; the
construction project went on forever. At last, when the project was
done, they opened the top of the pump, but instead of oil, water
came out. And I remember my mom saying: See, the Jews are at it
again. And I think about the three most horrible insults you could
think of in my world. Te insults were yahud, shuri, and hanis.
Shuri means a communist. Hanis means gay. You guys are used
to laughing at it, but its really not a laughing matter. Because its no
longer just the Saudis who think like that. Tese ideas are spreading
throughout Islam and all over the world to people who never met
Jews, who know nothing about Israelis or what Israel represents. In
1993 I went to Antwerp with a friend. Te friend said, We are now
in the Jewish neighborhood and pointed at an Orthodox Jew. And I
lost my breath and said: Jewish?! Is he Jewish?! Wait, where? Where?
You see, I needed to visualize this huge fantasy of evil that I had in
my head. And then he showed me a few people walking around and
asked, What exactly were you expecting? I looked around and
said, Can you tell me, if a kid has two hands and two legs and hes
walking, are there children who are Jewish as well? And my friend
responded: Yes, there are Jewish children as well. At that moment I
felt something else inside me, that said it was shameful to voice what I
had felt. I had to suppress that. So in 1993 I didnt talk about it again.
It was in 1994, during history class, when I rst saw pictures of what
happened in the Second World War. I was coming from Somalia, and
similar things started to happen in my country, along with Rwanda,
Sudan, Liberia, Sierra Leone ... Tere are many things I learned at
that time in history class, but the story of the Holocaust made the
biggest impression on me. I went to all the Holocaust museums. Ive
been to Yad Vashem twice. As I understood it, the Holocaust wasnt
just the story of the Jews ... I dont know if this goes for everyone, but
knowledge enlightened me ... As a Muslim, I belong to the universal
tribe. Every human individual, regardless of his beliefs, faith, sex,
deserves to live and is equal. My criticism is of religion, especially
Islam, and not of Muslims. Terefore, my criticism of Islam is not
a rejection of Muslims. It is the idea of race that makes us destroy
each other. You have to change your mind and learn to accept the
other. My case is to convince fellow Muslims. I call myself Muslim not
because I believe in Allah any longer, but I come out of that culture,
and I want to ght to modify that culture, and create a culture of love
and human rights ...
3

If this was the case for remote Somalia, which has had other more
serious problems to tackle and many more important values to impart
22
to its miserable children, how much more so for Arab, Turkish, or
Iranian children who are exposed, day in day out, to the bombardments
of hatred and lies in their state schools, among their families, on their
media and in their streets. Hirsi Ali s enlightenment after her move
to Holland, puts in perspective much of the education to hatred to
which those innocent children are exposed in the Muslim world and
which bears no necessary relationship with deprivation or poverty
(Hirsi was from a well-to-do background). Add to that the universality
of anti-Semitism in Islam (she heard the same derogation of the Jews
in Saudi Arabia and then among European Muslims); the power of
stereotypes and cultivated myths (Hirsi had never seen a Jew in either
Somalia or, even much less likely, in Jedda); the fallacy of attributing
these attitudes to the Arab-Israeli dispute (Somalia never was a party to
it); and the lumping together of Jews and Israel as an inseparable entity,
Muslim protestations to the contrary notwithstanding, and one begins
to comprehend what we are talking about. Hirsi later also understood
the systematic Holocaust denial current among Muslims, became a
perennial visitor to Israel and to the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial
in Jerusalem, and grew to castigate Muslims for the atmosphere of Jew
hatred that they cultivate in their midst . Much of the virulence against
Jews in the Muslim world is attributable to the constant ow of hatred
and lies propagated among Islamic societies.
4

In the Arab and much of the Muslim worlds, there has been no let up
in this regard. Teir publics are permanently inundated by biased infor-
mation and one-sided propaganda emanating from their authoritarian
governments, who have not educated them to think freely, to gather
information from many sources, and make judgments for themselves.
And the o cial version of news in those countries, where propaganda
takes precedence over knowledge, universally, exclusively, and constant-
ly transmits and diuses the versions crafted by the governments in
place, which invariably demonize the Jews-Israelis-Zionists, impute to
them the most horrible monstrosities, heap on them the most horrible
accusations, and attribute to them the most evil intentions. History is
also re-written and tailored to suit the evil nature of the Jews in daily
columns, in scientic books, encyclopedias, not to mention Friday
mosque sermons and political speeches made by unscrupulous clerics,
scholars, politicians, and writers. Citations are invented that have
no source to draw from, without concern for the false reporting to
the readers or the distortion of the minds of children and youth who
will grow in error, bereft of intellectual curiosity and fortitude, and
23
accustomed to their narrative instead of to the truth. Arab media
generally have no compunction about distorting reports, inating
negatives, and attenuating positives when Israel or Jews are concerned,
lest the stereotypes they are harnessed by their governments to prop-
agate be corrected. Rumors and accusations that Israelis are killers of
children spread diseases around (this is particularly ironical due to
Israels world-famous medical care aid brought to developing countries,
especially in Africa, while the blaming countries are themselves sunken
in disease), undermine governments and diuse corruption, and are
quick to travel in the Islamic world and adopted, lock stock and barrel,
without critique or verication. Conrmed reports about a scientic
invention by Israelis or Jews, an Israeli sports team that won a medal or
a championship, or any international distinction awarded to Israel, like
a Nobel Prize, or aid brought by Israel to Arab patients and children, is
sure to disappear from the Arab news reports lest, Allah Forbid, Jews
might appear in a positive light and contribute toward the attenuation
of the Arab and Muslim hatred toward them.
No wonder then that children in kindergartens in Gaza are prone
to vow for Islamikaze careers when they grow up, and for their mates
to watch television programs of the o cial Palestinian Authority, or
of Hamas Television, in which even popular international cartoon
gures render Palestinian kids heroes who devote their lives to ght
the Zionist enemy, and the latter are dubbed the scum of the earth
whose sacred duty of all Palestinians it is to blowup. Te infamous
Muhammed al-Dura case, which became cause celebre in France
during the Second Intifada (20002003), after it was proved in court
that it had been jointly staged by a French Television channel and
the Palestinian Authority, with a view of demonizing Israel, provides
ample evidence of this manifestation of hatred. In Arab lore, Jews and
in consequence Israelis and Zionists are accused of racism, bigotry,
corruption, undermining the world order, wielding international power
on the media and nances, desecrating Muslim holy places, occupying
Arab lands, and discriminating against their own new immigrants; their
leaders are seen as devious monsters, their foreign policy as aggressive
and expansionist, threatening the peaceful Arab nation and Muslim
world, accumulating a dangerous nuclear arsenal, and striving for the
demise of the Arabs and Islam. As regards the Palestinians specically,
not only is usurpation of their rights invoked, together with the claim
of their occupation, their exploitation, and their persecution, but false
genocidal accusations are also occasionally raised against Israel. In the
24
meantime, Israel and Zionism are routinely charged of eliminating
Palestinian culture in order to replace it by the Jewish-Zionist one, and
of diminishing the Islamic prevalence in Palestine and other occupied
territories.
5

Tis image of the Jews, Zionism and Israel, which is cultivated in the
Arab and many Muslim media worldwide, at the exclusion of anything
positive that may be said about them naturally channels public opin-
ion toward a very deep-seated hatred toward those entities, which is
becoming gradually irreversible, even in the countries that have signed
peace with Israel, like Egypt and Jordan, or used to be Muslim mod-
erates, like Turkey, Qatar, Morocco, and the Emirates, which sharply
shifted their relative openness toward Israel the moment the rst re-
ports of Israels atrocities in the Gaza War (2009) started to lter out.
It seemed that the infrastructure of hatred entrenched in the Islamic
world toward Israel was there all the time, and all it needed was a trig-
ger to re-launch it with ever greater vigor. Admittedly, even in many
European countries where that same sort of anti-Israeli hostility was
aired on the same occasion of the Gaza War, it was connected, at least
in part, with the wrath of the Muslim minorities in the West, which are
fed by the same disinformation, hallucinations, and hatred that they
brought with them from the Islamic world, and continue to update
their background education from the Arab and Muslim media or from
the anti-Semitic European media. In sum, the Jews, who were tradi-
tionally depicted in despicable terms in Islam, continue to be portrayed
stereotypically in Arab and Muslim writings, in cartoons, and in the
electronic media, with the related extreme expression of disgust and
hatred. Two brief illustrations will make the point:
1. I am in no way preaching hatred or praising it as a way of human
behavior. But the hatred individual or society must examine them-
selves so as to understand why it is this way, since no society or in-
dividual can be hatred in such a way [as the Zionists] for no reason
... I will give you an example of how hatred for the Zionist entity
takes root in the soul of the Arabs ... I once attended an interna-
tional conference on road accidents in the military, held in Paris
... With me was my colleague ... whose mood changed when he
was informed that a man who stood next to us ... was a transpor-
tation o cer of the detested Zionist entity ... My colleague raged,
swearing that he would not stand next to this criminal, talk to him
or enter the hall in which he was sitting ... He did not calm down
until I swore to him that I did not know the nationality of that man,
25
because he was in the company of o cers from all over the world,
and I myself was incapable of standing next to someone whose
hands were dripping with the blood of innocent Arabs ...
Tese are our enemies and our hatred towards them is rooted in
our souls, and the only thing that can remove it is their departure
from our lands and the purication of their delement of our Holy
Places ...
6

2. An editor of the Egyptian weekly, al-Usbu , described a dream he
had had, in which he was delegated by the Egyptian government to
serve as the bodyguard of Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, on
his o cial visit [also in the dream] to Cairo. Te scene of the dream,
starting with a pig [pointedly abhorred by Jews and Muslims alike]
took place at the airport: After a short while the pig landed; his
face was diabolical; his hands soiled with the blood of women and
children; a criminal who should be executed in the public square.
Should I remain silent as many others did? Should I guard this
butcher on my homelands soil? All of a sudden, I forgot everything:
the past and the future, my wife and children and I decided to do
it. I pulled my gun and aimed at the cowardly pigs head. I emptied
all the bullets and screamed: Blood vengeance for the [Egyptian]
POWs! Blood vengeance for the martyrs! Te murderer collapsed
under my feet. Ten I realized the meaning of masculinity and
self-sacrice. Te criminal died. I stepped over the pigs head with
my shoes and screamed from the bottom of my heart: Long Live
Egypt ! Long Live Palestine! Jerusalem will never die, and never will
the honor of the nation be lost! I kept screaming at the top of my
lungs until my wife put her hand on me. I woke up from this most
beautiful dream and decided not to surrender to humiliation ...
7

Tese perceptions of Israel also dictate the choice of items that the
Arab and Islamic press publishes about the Zionist state as well as the
interpretations they lend to them. Political controversies as well as
political factions in Israel, for example, are seen not as arising from
political conicts within a democratic system, but as a sign of dissent,
disintegration, and failure to achieve unity. Former generals serving
in the Israeli government do not signify a normal and legitimate way
for people to move from one sphere of activity to another, like Gen-
erals Marshall, Eisenhower, Haig, and Powell in the United States,
but are proof of the militarization of Israeli society or the martial
mentality of its leaders. Te careful screening of facts and outright
fabrication of data that t their negative image of Israel, sometimes
generate contradictions that the Arab media choose to ignore. For
26
example, while the Arabs keep repeating that neither Arab or Muslim
tradition ever called for hatred of Jews as such, their verbal and graphic
depictions are the most contemptible one could imagine; while they
assert that the Jews in their midst had always enjoyed equal rights,
their leaders are exhorted to improve the treatment of their erstwhile
Jewish minorities to allow for their return to their native lands, which
they had abandoned in favor of immigration to Israel. When Israel
develops industry in the Arab sector under her rule, she is accused
of scheming to alienate Arabs from their lands, but Israel is also ac-
cused of preventing industrial development in that sector in order to
keep it backward. When Israel takes a rm stand against Palestinian
terrorism, she is accused of oppression, but when she shows leniency
and exibility, the Arabs claim that this was a maneuver to gain world
sympathy for its occupation of Palestinian land.
As long as matters are not settled to their tune, the Arabs and
Muslims feel humiliated. Tis is the reason why every time they are
close to the conclusion of a set of negotiations after Israel has made
far-reaching concessions for the sake of peace but short of total sur-
render to their demands, they back down and retreat from the negoti-
ations. Israeli negotiators, and many a Western observer, are stunned
in disbelief, unable to comprehend how their interlocutors have once
again missed another opportunity. Instead, they would wait to obtain
the whole thing, without concession or compromise on their part, for
the sake of satisfying their honor and sense of justice, rather than bend
to the humiliation of accepting the part, which would signify that they
have reconciled themselves to injustice. Justice is for them whole and
indivisible, so they educate their children to claim it all and to deny
their rivals any part of it. When they report to their own people about
their clashes, debates, or arguments with Israelis or the West, there is
never an understanding of the others pain, sensitivity, loss, or ambition.
Conversely, there is in Israel and in the West a whole political camp that
sympathizes with the Muslims and even supports them, diuses their
grievances, and expresses them in the media. No trace of that is found
on the Muslim side, and if there should be one saint who would dare,
he would be condemned, arrested, or even gunned down or executed
as a traitor, so uniform is the wall of hatred and so unacceptable is
the understanding of the rival. In moderate Egypt and Jordan, for
example, who have signed peace with Israel, anyone who maintains
links with it or comes out in favor of peace and normalization with it,
is excommunicated by his community and, more ominously, excluded
27
from his trade union, which means in eect that he is denied the right
to make a living due to the unforgivable sin of reconciling with the
enemy, in spite of the assumption that he should have no longer been
considered an enemy after the peace was signed.
After every Muslim-instigated incident, clash, act of terror, or hos-
tility against the West or Israel, Muslim spokesmen are invited to voice
their grievances in the Western media, where the inicted damages
and casualties are reported and debated, while the Muslim media
(except Al-Jazeera ) almost never interview any Israeli or American, or
anyone critical of them, and they disregard the casualties and damages
inicted on the others, or they even rejoice in public when they learn
about them. Tey always present Israel and America as the aggressors
who pester the life of innocent Muslims for no reason, and cultivate
the feelings among their compatriots and their coreligionists that they
are the eternal victims who can do no wrong. Te very notion of being
a refugee, which is perpetuated by Palestinians for generations, with
Muslim encouragement as if it were a permanent status, became a state
of mind that reects their sense of victimhood. As they are the poor
and eternal victims, the whole world owes them everything. Tey make
children, but the United Nations (UN) has to feed them. Te poverty
and density of their camps, from which they make no eort to exit,
are for the United States and the rest of the Western world (not the
Muslims, not even the rich among them) to resolve. Te Palestinian
Authority has built thirteen dierent security apparatuses, and the
separate Hamas government is building many more, but it is the donor
countries of the West that have to nance them. Tey are dipped in
corruption and in ine cient government, but it is the rest of the world
that has to foot the bills. It does not occur to them that if they had rolled
up their sleeves and applied themselves to work, to pursue the road of
construction and peace, they would have solved all those problems in
the past decades, instead of perpetuating them and throwing the blame
on others. Nor does it occur to the donors that if they had refrained
from sustaining the victimhood with their donations, the refugee status
would have been obliterated. Donations and humiliations go hand in
hand: the recipient depends on the donor, but aches and hates him for
that dependence and is humiliated by it.
Te theme of humiliation widely reverberates throughout the Arab
and Muslim discourse with the world as well, especially the United
States, which is considered Israels main sustainer. For some Arab
writers and thinkers, Israel is considered a launching pad for taking
28
over Muslim holy places, Judaizing Muslim land, killing, maiming
and imprisoning innocent Muslims, and conquering more Muslim
territories, so as to form a Western base to diuse Jewish corruption,
westernization, humiliation, enslavement and exploitation of Muslim
society
8
. Conversely, a Kuwaiti columnist, Ahmed al-Baghdadi, while
lashing out at Arab regimes who persecute their own intelligentsia ,
and positing the Arabs and Muslims as masters of terrorism, justied
the aggressive reactions of the West, which has turned to humiliating
Arabs and Muslims and rejecting them from its midst ... Islam does
not tolerate others opinions and even undercuts its own intellectuals
at a time when the heretic West and Israel do not practice that kind
of terror.
9
In a letter to America, published in the Hamass Al-Risalah
in Gaza after September 11 (2001), the message is clear:
Oh America, the sword of oppression, arrogance and crime !!! Do
you remember how you smashed mans humanity? Do you remember
how you mistreated the Blacks under your aegis? Can you describe
for us the humiliation, disgust and contempt you meted out to those
unfortunate people, whose only sin was that they were born to black
parents? ... Tey were born free, but were enslaved in your virgin
land ...
America, re-examine your decisions to cast hundreds of veto votes
[at the Security Council of the UN, in Israels favor], with a view of
denying humanity its rights. Look at your humiliated face, and check
whether it is not due to those votes. Tis will teach you to stand by
justice and by the righteous, even if they are weak, and then perhaps
the dust of humiliation will be removed from your sad face ...
10

Tus, in a fascinating reversal of projecting their own feelings that
justify their Jihad against the West even at the price of misery and
humiliation,
11
their yearning is revealed for humiliating the West
and Israel in return, violently if possible, insultingly for lack of better,
because only counter-humiliation, born out of hatred, can remove the
traces of humiliation. Tese manifestations of humiliation and the con-
stant need to remove them by retaliation in kind have been part of the
Arab psyche since their defeat of 1948, and the resulting hatred toward
their enemies. But then, they were also cognizant of their inability to
inict defeat and to humiliate others in their turn. It is noteworthy
that since the 1973 War, when they construed its results as a victory,
and more so in the two Lebanese wars (1982, 2006), and with the rise
of the oil prices, the terrorist attacks that they inicted on Israel and
worldwide, their smashing victory against the Soviets in Afghanistan
29
(19791989), and the Israeli withdrawals from Lebanon and Gaza (2000
and 2005, under the pressure of Hizbullah and Hamas, respectively),
they perceive their ability to inict humiliation as having gained the
upper hand. Tis feeling has been reinforced by what they construe as
their victory against the United States in Iraq and Afghanistan, both
of which have allowed the rise of Islamic rule, and even more so as a
result of the Islamic Spring, which has swept away Americas allied
dictators and substituted for them Islamic leaders. After they had won
the war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan two decades earlier
(with American help), they now boast of having overwhelmed the
other super power too.
Ultimately, for the Muslim world, humiliation, the supreme mani-
festation of hatred, should be the fate of the Jews (and other non-be-
lievers), as prescribed in the Holy Quran, not of Muslims, and the
present situation where these norms have been reversed ought to be
addressed and redressed. Saudi clerics, who usually deride Arab na-
tionalism and pan-Arabism,
12
insist that there is no way to defeat the
descendents of monkeys and pigs, namely the Jews, unless the road
of Jihad is embraced. Tey say that as long as the Palestinians ght for
their orchards, namely their material belongings and false nationalism,
they will not achieve much, and therefore, they ought to go back to
their Islamic faith and ght in its name. Tey counsel their audiences
to learn from the ways of the Jews:
We have to realize that our defeats by the Jews are due to the fact
that they did not let the Islamic umma confront them ... Tese were
defeats of Arab regimes which did not raise the banner of Islam ...
Should our lost [sons] revert to the Truth, then the Jews shall return
to their wretchedness and humiliation that they were doomed to [by
the Holy Book]. Ten, when the ignorant wake up, nothing can rescue
the Jews, they will never see victory, as long as they profess mistaken
notions, heretic curricula and a humiliating peace ...
13
.
Tere is nothing that exemplies and advertizes the humiliation that
the Arabs and other Muslims painfully experience more than Israeli,
Western, and other non-Muslim presence in what they regard as occu-
pied territory, be it Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan, Kashmir, Andalusia,
and the like, hence the urgency of expelling the occupiers from those
lands in order to cleanse the spot of humiliation. Jihadi movements, like
Al-Qaida, Islamic Jihad, and Lashkar-e-Taiba, emphasize the recourse
to Jihad to achieve this goal. Te way Islamic ideology gave rise to the
30
Islamikaze , and more so the way Islamic society rose to the defense
of Islamikaze attacks, rst against Israel and then against Western
countries and against some Islamic countries deemed too supportive
or docile toward the West, counsels us to try to understand the psy-
chological make up behind them, beyond the themes of humiliation
and hatred discussed above. Also in need of explanation is the fact that
at the same time that there is great delight felt in the Muslim camp,
in spite of the many expedient attempts to hide the phenomenon and
explain it away, when Israelis or westerners are murdered en masse ,
there is also a sense of a great shock and consternation in the face of
the vigorous US or Israeli counterattacks. Because when Muslims at-
tack and sow death and destruction, that is mere defense against the
aggressors, for the sake of the global prevalence of the Pax Islamica ;
therefore, no counterattack is deemed justied, which would always
be deemed aggressive by denition, thus deserving retaliation and so
on ad innitum.
In its own lands, where it feels weaker materially, though it boasts
its moral superiority, the Islamic world shows awe, if not respect, to-
ward the West (and Israel), and at the same time, feels humiliated by
it scientically, technologically, militarily, economically, and culturally.
Te frustration at the Muslims inability to match up to the strong,
especially since they had been themselves the prevalent culture in the
past, also creates elements of confrontation and hatred between the
two. Tis is a confrontation because unlike Western culture, which, at
least in theory, accepts others for what they are, frustrated Muslims
are eager to destroy the other bearers of strength rather than try to lift
themselves to their level. Frustration generates shame, and aggression
and hatred are used to displace the shame. Several areas of compari-
son may be suggested, which point out to the dierences between the
two cultures, and can help explain why Muslims and the West do not
perceive the world in the same fashion, and therefore, it is so di cult
to devise ways to compromise and coexist. Israel used to be isolated
in its understanding of the Islamic enmity toward it, but now that the
confrontation has widened and grown global, more and more civili-
zations are drawn into the circle of those who try to crack the genetic
code that characterizes Muslim societies and tries to explain their
hatred, the lies they produce, and the occasional outbursts of violence
they manifest when given the opportunity. For there must exist an
underlying explanation for the numerous cases of Western or Jewish
hostages held by Muslims arbitrarily (e.g., Americans in Lebanon,
31
Afghanistan, Iraq; French in Mali; Jews in Pakistan and Lebanon; and
Israelis in Iran, Lebanon, etc.)
Te Attitude toward Human Life and Death
While Islam does not permit suicide of the faint-hearted individual
who runs away from the di culties of life and enjoins him to face up
to his fate and count on Allah, the Muslim fundamentalist champions
have found a way to sanctify death as martyrdom, and to idolize
it to such an extent as to turn it into a desirable pursuit, sanctioned
by Allah, Islam, the precedents set by the Prophet, and his tabiun
(followers). Gradually, on the footsteps of the medieval daiyun , the
revived ideas of sacrice and the Shiite ideal of suering under the
Khomeini Revolution, and their application in the Iran-Iraq War and
then by Hizbullah in Lebanon, against the United States and Israel; and
then through the adoption of those ideas by extremist Muslim radicals,
such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad; they developed as a popular, eective,
and universal strategy of warfare among other Muslim ghters, espe-
cially the Palestinian nationalists of the Tanzim and the Aqsa Brigades
in their Intifada against Israel. Finally, Muslim women and children
were brought into the widening circle of Islamikaze, which, though
still limited to hundreds and potentially appealing to thousands, nds
wide support among tens of thousands of clerics, columnists, politi-
cal leaders, and professionals, including some enlightened (by their
standards) intellectuals; and hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of
sympathizers who cannot contain their adulation for them and express
their sentiment openly in public.
One can therefore no longer speak exclusively of the war declared by
militant Islam against the West and the Jews, but of a growing circle
of support in the Muslim public in general for the radicals, especially
when they can show positive results to their credit. One of the most
harrowing and callous manifestation of this attitude to human life
has been the dragging of teenagers and women by Palestinians and
Hizbullah into their relentless battles of terrorism against Israel and
the West. More recently, in the second Lebanese (2006) and the Gaza
asymmetrical wars (2008 and 2012), extensive use of civilians as hu-
man shields has become a linchpin of Hamas and Hizbullahs strategy.
Even more frightening has been the execution of rivals during the civil
wars, which has engulfed some Islamic countries during the events of
the Arab Spring that erupted at the beginning of 2011. Syrian rebels,
who are supported by the West, have been executing public prisoners
32
from the Assad troops that they captured, while Assads forces have
been erasing entire neighborhoods with tens of thousands of their in-
habitants in the major Syrian cities; Iraqi Sunnites are eliminating their
Shiite compatriots, in the process erasing Shiite holy places; in Pakistan
and Afghanistan, droves of victims line the streets as either part of
election campaigns or just wanton murder. In no civilized country
is this sort of mass murder such a matter of course as in these Muslim
countries. If there is such a free for all murderous mood vis--vis ones
own compatriot and coreligionist Arabs and Muslims, how much more
so when it comes to enemy victims: Jews, Christians, and westerners?
Tis attitude toward human life has other dark aspects to it, both
internal, within the Muslim community, and vis--vis the enemy.
During the Intifada of the Palestinians, or the insurgency of the Islamic
Groups in Algeria; for example, we have seen massive slashing of throats
of other Arabs/Muslims just for belonging to the other camp, or for
suspicion of collaboration with the enemy, be it domestic or external.
Tis was done without any concern for human life, for the families of
the murdered, or for the destructive impact on the minds of innocent
civilians and children who grow up to accept, as a matter of course,
massive use of murder and hanging in public squares before their eyes,
which blunts their human sentiments. How much more so when the
victims are the hated Jews or Americans, as the repeated celebrations
of their death, or the mutilation of their corpses have shown. Tis is
accompanied by a sadistic display of wounds, blood, lynching, abuse of
the bodies of the dead, dragging corpses in the streets, and the chants
of the on looking crowds, who watch maddened by this orgy of cru-
elty, violence, and inhumanity. Funerals for their own favorite dead in
combat, or as a result of targeted elimination by their enemies, or of
the remains of Islamikaze bodies, are also accompanied by shouts; mass
hysteria; shootings in the air; huge processions where the body of the
dead is arraigned by the masses out of control and tossed from hand
to hand; vows of vengeance for the life of the departed martyr and for
his replacement by many others who would volunteer in his footsteps;
and the like. Compare that to the funerals of the victims of terrorism,
in the United States or Israel, or any civilized society, which are silent
and dignied, intimate, and inward-turning, and you have one of the
keys to comprehend the dierence between the two cultures. If this is
the situation with regard to Muslims-to-Muslims, how much more so
when foreign enemies are concerned! We have seen the chilling scenes
of indiscriminate blowing up of unsuspecting civilians in restaurants
33
and cafes, the cold-blooded murder of passengers in buses, airplanes,
and check-in counters, and the shooting of passers-by in streets and
of hostages on a scale and with a frequency unknown in other times
and other cultures, except perhaps the rare exceptions of the Mongols
and the Nazis.
What is more disconcerting and harrowing is the jubilation of the
masses of Muslims in support of such massacres, and the learned
rationalizations that many clerics, intellectuals, and public opinion
makers produce to justify them.
14
But that is not all: enemies can be
abducted, killed, murdered, tortured, and jailed indenitely, and no
information about them is given to the families, no access to them is
allowed to the Red Cross or anyone else; expensive prices are extorted
for just releasing any piece of information about their whereabouts or
their putative fate. No other culture in modern memory has behaved
so cruelly, so inhumanely, and so obtusely with captured enemies and
their loved ones. Tey know the sensitivity and concern in the West
for human life, and therefore, they exploit captured enemies to the
maximum, either by keeping silent, thus raising the price of the extor-
tion, or by hiding behind non-governmental organizations such as the
Hizbullah in Lebanon and the Hamas in Palestine, or the Islamic Jihad
in Syria and anonymous captors, for example, those who abducted and
executed Daniel Pearl in Pakistan only because he was Jewish in order to
escape responsibility. We have also witnessed live on television the use
of bare hands to tear Israeli soldiers to pieces and then the exhibition of
the blood-soiled hands of the murderers to boast before an approving
public seized by inhuman frenzy and demanding more cruelty. We have
seen Israeli teenagers ambushed by Arabs and their skulls appallingly
crushed by rocks or against boulders, and left to lie in the open. Te
worst part of all this is that when the Arab authorities are confronted
with these inhumane situations, they condemn these acts of murder
of innocent civilians on all sides, as if there were two sides to this story
and as if these were natural calamities without murderers that could be
identied, called to task, and prosecuted by justice. Quite the contrary,
the murderers are often celebrated by their authorities and the public,
which supports them.
Tis callousness in the attitudes of Muslims toward their victims is
supplemented by the horrendous re-enacting of scenes of murder, as if
they were sublime human experiences worth replaying and memoriz-
ing and models with which to educate their public and for their young
generation to emulate. Tis, of course, goes a long way to demonstrate
34
how cold-bloodedly these murders are planned, and that they are not
spur-of-the-moment acts of frustration by some ill-fated or desper-
ate Palestinian or Al-Qaida member. For, when the scene of an Israeli
caf or a paper model of an Israeli bus is carefully and meticulously
reconstructed in a public place at the heart of an Arab or Muslim city;
ying paper-limbs of Israeli children, dripping with blood, are hung
around as part of the scene; explosions are replayed and whines of dying
victims are amplied for the impact of their despair; and all this to the
frenzied cries of joy of the assembled masses, including children, then
something is decidedly sick in the psyche of this society. If no amount
of explanation or justication can excuse the horrible acts of murder
themselves, where the murderers become hallowed martyrs, how much
more so the sheer madness of reproducing those acts, once and again,
as if a recorded reel is replayed in a slow motion to satisfy the sadism
of its producers. Tere are reports of Nazi murderers who delighted
in projecting on screens to their private audiences their feats of mass
murders, but even they did not stoop so low as to screen them, let alone
replay them in detail, to the wide public. Only now do we understand
that those reenactments are akin to, and a possible extension of the
terrible tazieh ceremonies celebrated by the Shiites at large during the
Ashura Day, where the Believers relive the suering of Imam Hussein
in Karbala by inicting pain and injuries on their bodies. But while the
Shiites exhibit a masochistic sense of identication with their Imam and
their own kin, out of their own volition and without inicting pain or
damage upon others, the Hamas scenes express their hatred toward, and
sadistic joy at the suering of, their enemies, especially if they are Jews.
A new addition that threatens to descend on the civilized world is
the Muslim radicals menace to use non-conventional weapons for mass
extermination, as if the mass killings of satanic proportions, by their
hand-made mechanical means, were not su cient to quench their thirst
for blood. Palestinians and Hizbullah, Al-Qaida and Ansar al-Islam,
are known to have experimented with gas and poisons contained in
the shells and bombs they use against Israeli civilians. Te best sign
of what is coming is when they begin, in a process of projection, to
impute to their enemy what they plan to do to it. Te massacres that
they perpetrate or plan against others, which for them are licit and to
be expected, become in their minds the crimes, atrocities and massa-
cres that the enemy did or will do. As they were experimenting with
gas and poison, they spread the rumors about Israeli use of depleted
uranium in the territories, like NATO in Kosovo, or of poisoned
35
sweets and HIV positive virus contamination of Palestinian children.
Tis means that before they use those materials for mass killings, they
wish to inject in the minds of the world that they were not the rst and
that they only responded to the massacres carried out by Israel and
the Jews with American connivance. Te eyes of the Arab world were
for long hopefully directed to Saddam Hussein until his defeat, to see
what kind of arsenal he could deliver against America and Israel. No
public voice was heard in the Muslim world, attempting to dissuade
him from that folly, for any moral reason, with a view of restricting the
loss of human lives, and even not for the practical reason of avoiding
a devastating loss to his people. More recently, the genocidal threats
against Israel and the Jews, by Irans President Ahmadinejad, at the time
that he is preparing his nuclear arsenal to achieve that goal,
15
does not
arouse any objection or condemnation in the Islamic world, except in
the context of the dangers posed to their own regimes by Tehran. For,
if the Twin Towers constituted for Muslims a big success, so much
more so the lesson that Saddam was about to teach the West, and after
him Ahmadinejad. Hamas and Al-Qaida, as well as Egyptian Muslim
radicals, have actually been adding their voices to those in Iran who
threaten Israel and the West with poisoning their waters or infecting
them with viruses.
16
It is only hard to see who will be left to be brought
under Muslim dominion, in accordance with the fundamentalists
dream, if and after the nuclear, chemical, and biological annihilation
of the enemy is complete.
Intolerance Built into the Culture
Bernard Lewis has made the point that unlike other civilizations
that are essentially regional, Islam and Christianity have, by their very
pattern of expansion, become universal and exclusive in the sense that
not only do they consider themselves the fortunate recipients of Gods
nal revelation to mankind, and therefore it is their duty to bring it to
the rest of humanity, but that the clash between them becomes inevi-
table.
17
However, while Western culture has generally forsaken the use
of violence to spread its message (unless it feels directly threatened)
and pursues it by ways that the Muslims regard as devious (mission,
the pop culture of jeans, fast food, pop music and coca-cola, televi-
sion, cinema, alcohol, etc.), militant Islam and its supporters do not
shun violence, as the Islamikaze phenomenon has been dramatically
evincing. In other words, the humanistic idea of tolerance of the other
in Western culture, which has come to mean that the other is accepted
36
as is, without value-judging him, has become predominant, and has
paved the way to the free market of ideas that prevails in the West
today. Tat thinking has not only permitted the renouncing of force,
at least in principle, to spread Christianity, democracy, free trade, and
other Western ideas, but has also allowed for Islam and other creeds
to compete on its turf, without ever suspecting that the competition
would ultimately become over the turf itself. Moreover, since the West
accepted the idea of separating the Church from the modern secular
state, the faith has become the domain of the individual while the public
square was made impervious to it. In the Islamic world, practically all
the secular governments, which for the most part lack legitimacy,
must pay lip service to Muslim militants, at times by even including
them in their governments. Even so, the militants appear as the most
popular claimants of power, and if allowed to operate as political parties,
like in Lebanon and Palestine, can often show their mettle and gain
access to government. Terefore, no Muslim turf can be made neutral
toward other faiths, and the frequent use of violence against them
goes a long way to prove that, day in day out. To this day, while Islam
can build its houses of prayer anywhere in the world, other faiths are
prevented from doing so in some Muslim territory. And while tens of
thousands of Europeans have freely converted into Islam, any Muslim
who would entertain a thought to convert is considered a heretic or
apostate and dealt with accordingly by capital punishment.
Furthermore, Muslim radicals regard the defeat of their own
illegitimate governments at home, as they have demonstrated during
the bloodshed of the Spring, as a prelude to their restoration of the
universal Caliphate of all Muslims, and therefore treated the Western
governments who protect, aid, and sponsor the dictators in place as the
direct enemy of the Muslims. From their point of view, then, not only
is Western culture despicable in its own right and faulty due to its
own deciencies, but it also invaded their turf in order to subvert it and
undermine it from within, until it falls o like a ripe g. It is the West
that came to them, not they to it. Tis creates a paradox, nevertheless,
for while Muslim militants decry the Western cultural invasion, which
is worse in their eyes than the physical invasions of the medieval
Crusades, they and their less militant coreligionists at the same time
crowd the queues in front of American, Australian, and European
Embassies and Consulates across the world to gain visas of entry into
those bastions of Western values that they love to hate. Some explain
their quest as a simple will to study in the West, especially value-free
37
technical professions, which are not soiled by Western thinking,
ignoring the fact that Western learning and protracted sojourns in the
West by necessity will have an impact on them, to the point that they
would at the end elect to stay and become Western; others wish from
the start to improve their economic lot by immigrating to the West, but
once they get there, they congregate around their kin and constitute
fertile grounds for Muslim dawa (Call, Mission); still others, the likes
of Sheikh Bakri and al-Masri in Britain in previous decades, who have
declared their intention to transform the West rather than adapt to it,
have migrated to the West as refugees, because there was no other
place left as a safe haven for them in their countries of origin, and the
West was generous enough to accommodate them, ultimately to its
own detriment.
Paradoxically, it is the adherents of the latter category who place
themselves at the forefront of Muslim radicalism in the West and who,
beneting from the hospitality and social welfare arrangements in their
host countries, recruit local converts or already naturalized Muslims
for training abroad for indoctrination at home and for activities in the
Path of Allah. It is they who were tolerated by societies against whom
they are operating ideologically, who are the least tolerant toward their
hosts. Teir objective is loud and clear: to Islamize their host societies
and let Islam take them over. If until now, under the decisive impact
of the integrationists, namely Muslims who wished to assimilate into
society, t into its political, economic, and social institutions and be-
come part of it culturally if not religiously, the penetration of Muslim
radicalism into the West has begun to change these trends around.
More and more Muslims rebel against their host cultures and demand,
as full-edged citizens, that their original culture be recognized as a
component of the national makeup; that state symbols (e.g., the cross
in Scandinavian national ags) be altered to become inclusive of them,
and that mosques, foreign Muslim languages, and Muslim education
should be subsidized by the state, thus changing the social and political
makeup of their host countries. All this emanates not only from the
absolute conviction of the Muslims that Allahs message to them, being
the most recent is also the most updated as it were, but also that their
way to Allah is the only valid one.
However, in contrast to Christianity, the other universal monotheis-
tic religion that claims the same, the Muslims did not preclude force to
enforce their beliefs and to save the Indels from themselves, by their
own volition if possible, and by violence if necessary. Terefore, when
38
they speak of tolerance they mean some sort of temporary measure
of accommodation toward the Indel, who has clearly been born into
an inferior creed, until Islam is strong enough to prevail. Te miscalcu-
lation of Al-Qaida on September 11,2001, and before and after that of
the Hizbullah, the Hamas, and the Islamic Jihad, was that they thought
Western societies, including Israel, were so ripe for their demise that a
shocking trauma, or a series of smaller but frequent and consistently
growing blows, would in the end overwhelm the enemy. Tus, every
time the enemy responds forcefully, or in more unconventional ways
than expected by Muslims, like the Americans in Afghanistan or the
Israelis in the West Bank or Lebanon, or Gaza, they cry, Foul game!!
Tis is not how the enemies of Islam are supposed to behave; their very
resistance to their subjugation by Islam is regarded as blasphemous
for its failure to recognize the will of Allah, and their retaliatory strikes
against Islam are seen as signs of distress and despair, which augur
their approaching end; hence, the stepped-up activities by Muslims
to speed that process up, and bring it to its conclusion, so on and so
forth. Tat point of view does not recognize the right of the attacked
for the sake of Allah to self-defense. Te Muslims can, and indeed
are called upon, to expand, conquer, kill, enslave, dominate, and rule
for the entire universe is theirs to be included in Dar al-Islam , but
woe to those who resist that noble process that is entrenched in the
Will of Allah, and if they do, they are decried as aggressors, killers
of civilians and children, arrogant, and perpetrators of massacres.
Tus, any hideous attack upon Western enemies, even when it in-
volves innocent lives, as in the Twin Tower case, is inevitable, blessed,
well deserved, a great success, and causes masses to jubilate and
writers to sing its praise throughout the Muslim world, while every
retaliation is lamented, condemned, and blasted as unjustied, out
of proportion, cruel, wanton massacre, and proof, if proof was
needed, of the enemys inherent evil. Te idea of fair play, of attack
and counterattack, and in consequence of casualties inicted on both
parties to a conict, is misunderstood in Muslim circles. Even the
issue of aggressive and defensive warfare is foreign to them because
the Muslim denitions of warfare do not follow the accepted objective
norms prevailing in the West, but strictly abide by the subjective rules
drawn by Muslim jurists who have formulated Muslim political theory
and international relations.
18
According to these rules, any attack by
non-Muslims on Muslims is inherently illegal and immoral, and there-
fore, it is incumbent upon all Muslims to assist their co-religionists,
39
regardless of what they did to provoke the attack. Conversely, any
Muslim attack on the West, for example, since it can be justied as a
defensive war against the heretical West, or as an act of self-defense
against the spiritual invasion of the West, or as a battle to repulse the
enemy from Dar al-Islam (e.g., Palestine, Andalusia, Kashmir, and
Southern France), is eo ipso a just war that all Muslims are called upon
to sustain. In other words, once a war against the enemy had been
entitled Jihad, and any of the latter examples justies a Jihad, the
arena is wide open for war. Guerilla warfare, or Islamikaze terrorism
and the like, which are the tools of the asymmetrical wars, are means
of warfare that are hallowed in Islam, with all the attending ideological
and doctrinal elaborations attached thereto.
Te West has no standing in these denitions and what it says or
thinks does not matter because the Islamic position is Allah-inspired
and Sharia- dictated, which means that it is beyond discussion, compro-
mise, debate or concession. Terefore, while external wars in the West
are considered quantitative issues (over territories, interests, assets),
and when they are terminated, then compromise, concessions, and
negotiations are led until an agreement emerges; and when it does, it is
binding on the parties who signed the treaty, ceasere, or convention; in
Islam, the wars are qualitative (over ideas, doctrines, justice, redress
of wrongs, retrieval of rights, Allahs Jihad etc), and are never termi-
nated until the victory of Islam and the imposition of its rule is brought
about. And when an agreement is signed under duress (like after a
military defeat), it always derives from the precedent of Hudaybiyya,
which was established by the Prophet, namely that the agreement is
temporary ( hudna = armistice), and it is to be violated at the rst op-
portunity, when Muslims feel they have regained superiority, or have
found new ways of warfare that the enemy is unable to counter (like the
Islamikaze). Sulh (peace-cum-reconciliation) can be concluded only
under the terms of a Pax Islamica , when the non-Muslim has accepted
the hegemony of Islam and submitted to its rule.
19
Tis is the reason
why Muslim authorities in Egypt and Saudi Arabia justied the Camp
David Accords of 1977, as well as the Oslo Accords of 1993 in terms of
a temporary, Hudaybiyya-like truce, which is open-ended and reversible
if and when the circumstances so allow. Like the Prophets precedent,
these agreements were only necessary in order to extort concessions
from the enemy, but once they are made and cashed, they no longer
necessarily bind. Islamic interest is then the key concept in that cul-
ture, which does not include respect for the Roman law of contract,
40
and the international treaties and conventions that derive from there.
Tis was exemplied once again during and after the asymmetrical
wars of Lebanon and Gaza, which were initiated and led by Muslim
militants. Tis worldview, where rules of war and peace do not apply
equally on the belligerents and clearly benet the Muslims while they
are expected to obligate only the non-Muslims, is the very reason why
the Muslims see themselves free to violate their agreements, while
they constantly accuse their adversaries of violating all agreements
and commitments, at a time when they themselves faced no reproach
because they had never expected to live up to their commitments in
the rst place, while their adversaries, who were truly obliged by them,
were expected to keep them to the letter.
Tus, when the Palestinians, for example, committed themselves in
Oslo (another Hudaybiyya, in the words of Arafat), without reserve or
qualication, to end terrorism and violence in general, not to introduce
to their territory any category of un-allowed weapons, to maintain their
armed force at agreed levels and under one command, to put an end
to incitement against Israel and the Jews, and to arrest terrorists and
pursue them in justice or extradite them; as a prerequisite to receiving
more territory from Israel and advancing into the peace process, they
remembered only the Israeli part of the agreement, and when not
fullled, they heaped all the blame on Israel, while their consistent
violations of their main commitments did not matter. Tey became
accustomed by the Rabin government to the fact that they could break
their commitments, but that Israel, for fear of arresting the peace
process, would swallow all violations and proceed with its one-sided
concessions, and so it was. But when a new Israeli government came
in, which made further Israeli concessions in accordance with the
peace accords contingent upon Palestinian parallel implementation,
they cried Foul game! once again, and that brought the process to a
dead end.
Intolerance based on a concept of superiority, whereby the superior
does not have to conform like the inferior, is apparent also in the daily
conduct in the Muslim world toward other religions. Rampant are the
instances where Christian churches are burned down in Egypt, Nigeria,
and Indonesia, and synagogues are attacked and destroyed by Palestin-
ians (notably the Joseph Tomb in Nablus and the Jewish Synagogue in
Jericho during the Intifada), and by Muslims throughout the Western
world since the outbreak of the second Palestinian insurgency in late
2000, but rare are the occasions where Muslim mosques are attacked
41
by anyone anywhere. Te Muslims do not take this, and the fact that
they can build their mosques anywhere in the West, as an indication of
Western tolerance and acceptance of the other, but as a sure sign that
no one dares to resist Islamic expansion while they, in their countries of
origin, can curtail or totally prevent the construction of any Christian,
let alone Jewish, houses of prayer. Muslims can be the inhabitants of
any country in the world, including the Christian world and Israel, on
whose doors they knock for immigration or right of return, but they
would not, by law, allow any Jew into Saudi Arabia or Jordan. What is
more, they still dub the countries to which they wish to immigrate as
racist for not completely surrendering to their will, while Jews and
Christians are severely restricted in various areas of the Muslim world.
Tis suggests to them, once again, that while the whole universe is their
domain as of right, other faiths are not, by their very nature, entitled
to the same rights in the lands of Islam.
No country in the West witnesses its citizens following the shameful
scenes, currently seen in the Muslim world where American and Israeli
ags and the e gies of their leaders are burnt ritually as a matter of
routine, save when Muslim communities in the West practice that same
ritual (Muslim communities in the West, are also practicing the same
ritual that they importa from their native countries). But no sustained
burning of Arab or Muslim ags or e gies is known as a phenomenon
in the West or in Israel. Once again, the inability of the Muslim world
to accept as their equals the national symbols of others is striking, at
a time when the West respects theirs as a matter of course, and when
it does not, Muslim violence ensues, as it happened with the Cartoon
aair of early 2006. Tis, far from awakening the consciousness of the
Muslims to their own intolerance, in contrast with the publicly adver-
tized and exhibited Western tolerance toward them, on the contrary,
has conrmed them in their belief in the hegemony of their faith and
symbols that no one dares to challenge, at a time when they openly
defy, with impunity, other creeds and symbols. Tis has encouraged
the Muslim communities in the West and in Israel to demand the right
to construct their mosques, or to perform their Friday rituals, in places
known as holy sites to other faiths. On Temple Mount in Jerusalem
they built their mosques on a site that they knew was the holiest for
the Jewish creed, they transformed many churches and synagogues
into mosques during their conquests and expansion, and turned every
occupied land into a waqf (Holy Endowment) that cannot revert to
non-Muslims.
20
But woe to anyone who dares to turn a mosque into
42
another house of prayer, or to occupy land that is or was Muslim, for
that is intolerable. More recently, new challenges rose when Muslims
began to illegally construct a mosque on the grounds and in deance
of, the Basilica of the Annunciation in Nazareth, to squat for the Friday
prayers near the main cathedral of Florence, and to deny any historical
rights to the Jews over Temple Mount, thereby declaring to Christianity
and to Judaism, in Lewiss memorable words: Your time has passed.
Now we are here. Move over.
21
Tis is not exactly tolerance.
Incidentally, and signicantly, the verse from the Quran that Bernard
Lewis mentioned in connection with the inscription in the Dome of
the Rock, to wit: He is God, He is One. He does not beget, He is not
begotten, which was meant to reject the basic dogma of Christianity
about God and His Son, when the Muslims took over Jerusalem in the
seventh century, was also inscribed on the temporary tent mosque in
front of the Annunciation that awaited the building of the permanent
mosque, obviously with the same intention and meaning. Coupled with
the denial of Jewish rights on Temple Mount, this signies, in the eyes
of the Muslims, that they intend to indeed supersede both Judaism
and Christianity, as Islam had taught them of old; hence, the hatred of
the Muslims to the construct Judeo-Christian tradition, which they
regard as a passing episode in history, once the Seal of the Prophets,
Muhammad, had dispensed to humanity the latest divine message
that is Islam. Your time has passed. Now we are here is not only the
statement of a factual chronological sequence, but also a declaration
of mastery, dominance, hegemony, and exclusivity, backed by the will
and the power to make it happen in the real world. For, a creed that
was designed by Allah to replace all others and to bring all humanity
under its aegis cannot be expected to tolerate other faiths, let alone
competitors for the same world constituency on the same sites.
Te Eternal Victims
In stark contradiction to the dreams of world dominion that they
entertain, Muslims tend at the same time to regard themselves as eter-
nal victims of the West that they hate and want to displace, but whose
help they need and implore; and they rationalize this contradiction by
the plots and conspiracies constantly woven around and against them,
as if the West had no other concerns than them, or could not do very
well without their lachrymose complaints. First and foremost for them
is the need to explain to themselves and to the world why and how
they, who had pioneered civilization and sciences in medieval times
43
and had caused Europe to tremble and fear their successive mighty
empires, found themselves without preparation, warning, or transition
at the bottom of the civilisatory heap and of the hierarchy of world
powers when the modern era dawned. For a shame society like theirs,
it is di cult, nay impossible, to take responsibility for their deeds and
to devise a policy of adaptation that could help them pull out of the
quagmire, for that would amount to admitting the deciencies of their
culture, the stiing restrictions of their faith, the pipe-dreams of their
leaders, and the insu ciencies of their social systems. Tus, rather than
admitting their inabilities and seeking succor elsewhere, it is easier to
project their own ill-will on others, masquerade their jealousies and
bigotry as revivalism, and accuse the all-powerful West, the colonizer
and imperialist of yesteryear, of all their ills, including their demise,
suering, backwardness, population explosion, dictatorial rule, corrup-
tion, and what not. Tey do not want to recall that when they were the
powerful, the conquerors, the colonizers, and the imperialists, they did
not stop one moment to ask themselves what they were doing to their
conquered peoples and civilizations that they gradually decimated.
Arabs and Muslims have resources, human and mineral, a great tra-
dition of learning and a vast ambition to restore themselves to where
they were before they began slipping in the modern era. But their
self-inicted deciencies in government, economics, and antiquated
social structures do not permit them to take o. Perhaps, most stiing
of all is the array of dictatorships of all sorts, monarchical and republi-
can, one-party and military juntas, rulers who were never elected and
self-imposed presidents for life. Illegitimate rule spawns corruption,
helplessness, and hopelessness, and the near nonexistence of civil so-
ciety and non-governmental organizations and voluntary associations
with the necessary clout to ll in when the government is decient,
make change di cult and nearly impossible. Uncontrollable poverty
and population explosion are hardly the requisite processes to arrest
these trends. When allowed to operate, Islamists often step in to ll the
gap, but they are closely monitored or harnessed to the regimes goals,
and therefore, their operations are often circumscribed and cause them
to become part of the problem instead of the solution. In this state of
aairs, where the Western world, and Israel at their doorstep, advance
and increase the gulf between themselves and the poor Muslim world,
an eye-poking gap is observed on television screens and in neighboring
Israel daily, which prompts people to nd refuge in self-victimization:
it is not their fault; it is the fault of others. Tis state of mind is aided
44
in those societies by the dependence of the commoner on his corrupt
government for food subsidies, for employment, for education and
social services, for development, and for the individuals well-being.
But the governments are incompetent, illegitimate, bent on staying in
power, and lacking in a blueprint for resolving the ever-aggravating
problems of their countries and societies.
Te stronger the regimes, by virtue of the modern weaponry, which
aords them a superior power of enforcement, the more disaected
are the populations who sense that their governments interests are not
theirs; all the more so, since the maintenance of the rulers in place is
often made possible by their Western allies who provide the money,
the economic aid, the weapons, and the food that keep this explosive
situation from getting worse and from blowing up in the Wests and
the regimes faces. Another paradox develops: because when they are
dispossessed, unemployed, and hopelessly classied as have-nots, the
masses in those countries not only are victims of their rulers and their
Western allies, and, therefore, feel entitled to demand that both
provide for their needs, but the more they receive to sustain them-
selves and ascertain their survival, the more humiliated they become
for that dependence, the more enraged they are by it, and the more
violent-prone they grow as the only way to air their frustration that
only keeps increasing. In other words, the West and the local govern-
ments, who are held jointly responsible for the poverty and frustration
of which the masses are the victims, not only are expected to alleviate
the burden of the impoverished and the disadvantaged, but when they
do so are all the more resented and likely to become the targets of the
frustration. Tis is a no-win situation that inter alia causes massive
departures of immigrants to seek their livelihood or the implementation
of their revolutionary dreams elsewhere, notably in the West. Osama
Bin Laden, for example, was no less enraged against his own Saudi
government, which is sustained by its alliance with the United States,
than against America and Israel. If it is so with a Saudi system, which
is not needy, and a Bin Laden who is not impoverished, how much
more so with other Arabs and Muslims where both government and
people are in dire poverty!!
Te eternal victims also believe not only that everyone owes them
everything and they themselves are exempted from any self-strength-
ening eort, but also that they can use violence to redress the wrong
done to them. So, for example, Palestinians who have been living on
handouts and sacks of our from United Nations Relief and Works
45
Agencys (UNRWA) for Palestine Refugees in the Near East for the
past sixty years, and where their population in the squalid refugee
camps has quadrupled since then, believe it is the duty of the world to
continue to feed them indenitely. Tey make children and the West
has to take care of them. Tey have resisted all attempts at resettlement
in their host countries, which are also Arab and Muslim, but prefer to
leave the refugee problem seething, and to continue to depend on the
worlds goodwill for survival, rather than force the refugees to take
up a constructive life and end their refugee status. Tey maintain the
illusion of the right of return in their refugee standing, which is the
ultimate victimhood, and they are not about to relinquish it. What is
more, the United States and other Western countries that shoulder the
brunt of the UNRWA budget are also the most hated and threatened
by the Muslim radicals who feed from their hands. If they had learned,
if they had been willing to learn from Western nations and Israel how
to absorb refugees in their own territory and put them on a produc-
tive track, rather than to implant in them hatred the mentality of the
eternal victims, much of the bitterness and frustration that engender
violence and terrorism could have been spared. And this is not only a
matter of money or of development (Bin Laden and Saudi Arabia being
the ultimate example), but a matter of culture. If one is educated to
not accept any handouts, to rise on his feet and help himself, to shed
the feeling of victim and be proud of a self- made and self-sustaining
livelihood, then ones dignity is restored, the humiliation eaced or
diminished, and the paralyzing jealousy and stiing apathy replaced
by aspiration, ambition, and striving.
No wonder then that among Palestinians, a high ratio was found
to support terrorism, which is for them, to be sure, the right of the
eternal victim to both avenge his situation and to have it redressed.
How exactly this will happen, they do not say, unless they think, as part
of their world of delusions that we shall address below, that they can
bring the West to submission or destroy Israel and replace it. Tere
is also no wonder that Al-Qaida, the Hamas, Hizbullah, and the rest
rationalize their wild terrorism as retaliation for their humiliation
and victimhood by the strong, the arrogant, and the powerful who
had rendered them victims. Terefore, while their terrorism is to be
understood in their eyes, and justied as the cry of the desperate
victim, any Western counterattack or defensive act must be construed
as aggression against and massacre of the eternal victim. Tey insist
that for every one of their orgies of killing, one must seek the roots
46
and comprehend the reasons, and address the causes, exactly as for
every burning of a church or a synagogue; however, if a mosque is hit,
or Muslim children are injured, even incidentally, that is intentional
murder, desecration, and blasphemy. For that reason, they do not
recognize the dierence between intentional damage and collateral
casualties. It is the result that counts, no matter what the intention
of the enemy planners may have been. America and Israel are always
children killers, heretics, aggressors, arrogant, and perpetrators of
massacres. Americans killed Iraqi children by preventing food and
medicaments from reaching them, even if it was Saddam who preferred
to purchase weapons or compensate the families of the Palestinian
Islamikaze, rather than import food and drugs for the sick. Te dead
corpses of the Iraqi children were there for display, for if they are clearly
the victims, then the Americans must be their killers.
Tus, a reversal of roles is eected, whereby the West and Israel
become the terrorists and the Muslims the victims thereof; it is the
West who terrorizes the Muslim world and is arrogant and condescend-
ing toward it, and the Muslims merely act in self-defense. Hence, the
failure of Muslim countries, including in their Kuala Lumpur Islamic
Conference of June 2002, let alone in international gatherings, to accede
to the Western denition of terrorism, which is, in essence, the use of
violence against innocent civilians to attain political goals. Tey refuse
to relinquish the mantle of victimhood to others, so terrorism is what
is done to them, not what they do to others. Tey struggle at all inter-
national forums to show that the Palestinians and Hizbullah cannot be
considered terrorists, no matter what they do, because they ght for
liberation from occupation; many of them also rationalize the Twin
Tower horror as liberation from the choking American tutelage, or
a message to the real terrorist, which is America (or Israel for that
matter), or a lesson to the arrogant, or a new mode of warfare against
the threatening and aggressive West; or the desire for death of the
audacious Islamikaze martyrs, matching up to the desire for life and
comfort of the cowardly and decadent West. Tat is also the reason
why they remind America of its own terrorist attacks against Hiroshi-
ma and Nagasaki, proof that what matters is not what is done, to whom
and under what circumstances, but who does it. Victims of the world,
Unite!!!, if, of course, America or Israel is the reason of your misery.
Other victims, such as the Americans murdered on September 11, or
Indians obliterated in Kashmir, or Israelis who are blown apart in pizza
parlors, or in the bus on their way there, are not victims in the eyes of
47
Muslim radicals, and more and more in the eyes of plain Muslims in
general, even if Muslims are the recognized and avowed perpetrators
of the terror in all those cases. Te victims of terror do not deserve
compassion because they had brought that upon themselves, or better,
have concocted it themselves in conjunction with the CIA or the Jews,
or the Mossad. Te wide acceptance of those theories of conspiracy,
including among intellectuals and opinion makers, adds to the univer-
sal sense of victimhood that is rampant in the Islamic world. Another
important corollary of this attitude is that, while in the Judeo-Christian
tradition martyrs are usually the victims of external aggression inict-
ed on them in the pursuit of their faith; in Islam, it is the perpetrator
of the aggression, who also immolates himself in the process, who
becomes the Islamikaze martyr. In other words, it is not he who suf-
fers death or torture or misery on his way to martyrdom, since he had
chosen that course avidly and advisedly, but he who must kill in order
to gain his place in the hierarchy of martyrdom. Tis dramatic shift
from those who were killed in battle or by accident and thereby became
martyrs in classical Islam to the Islamikaze intentional mass killing
of others in order to go to Paradise and enjoy the seventy-two virgins
promised by the Quran is the mind-boggling thought that ba es the
West today.
Self-Delusion, Fantasy, and the Real World
Te proverbial Arab enamoring with words, to the point of ecsta-
sy, has been studied by scholars, such as Gibb and Patai, and found
to be related to the strength of the Arabic idiom, as exemplied in
the Quran, in the ancient Arabic poetry of the time of the Jahiliyya
(pre-Islamic period of ignorance), and in the subsequent Arab and
Muslim literature. Te ability of the word to move people and to in-
cite them to action, a key element in the training of the Islamikaze , is
supplemented by a rich world of fantasy, which dees rational analysis,
and in which wishful thinking replaces facts, and mantra-like slogans
supersede policy (Jerusalem will be liberated by one million shahids ;
if the Israelis do not like it, they can drink the waters of the Gaza
Sea/the Dead Sea), and the unpleasant is denied as if it did not exist
(No Muslims have committed the Twin Tower murder; the Israelis/
Jews did). For that reason, commitments are ignored, as if they had
never been undertaken (Oslo, smuggling in weapons by Palestinians,
arresting terrorists), promises are forgotten the moment they are made
(to stop incitement and terrorism), slogans are coined and repeated
48
(Israelis inject HIV positive to Palestinians; Oslo is like Hudaybiyya),
propaganda and incitement thrive (the Karine A and Santorini weapons
smuggling never took place; Israelis and Americans are children killers),
boasting ones exploits (Egyptian democracy is more authentic than
Israels) and denigrating the enemy are rife (the Jews are cowardly, the
descendants of monkeys and pigs), lies are made up to cover up de-
ciencies (Palestinians economic suering is due to Israels policies, not
to terrorist activities by the Palestinians), and denial is exercised when
one is faced with facts (no Karine A existed, no blowing up of the Twin
Towers took place). History is invented (Palestinians are the descen-
dants of Canaanites), false analogies are made (Palestinian leaders are
comparable to the founding fathers of America), facts are denied (the
Holocaust, or involvement in terrorism), and self-embellishment and
self-aggrandizement are sought (the future belongs to Islam, the Wests
demise is imminent) for consolation. Palestinian and other Arab and
Muslim textbooks for children tell the entire story with such eloquence
that not much needs to be added.
22
But enough examples will be cited,
especially in connection with Islamic terrorism, incitement to it, and
its praise after the acts of murder, to illustrate the main assumptions
of this chapter.
Each of the fantasies undergoes several stages: rst the fabrication
of a web of lies that has no relation to facts, and which Muslims think
that if repeated often enough, it becomes a reality, in which they begin
to believe themselves, even when they cannot prove it. Because no
rules of evidence apply to them and because what matters is the man-
ufacturing of facts and the diusion of such in their midst and across
the world, which swallows the stories unsuspecting that hoaxes of that
dimension can be invented and out of belief that even if the Israelis or
the Americans did not do it, it is likely that they would because it
is in their nature. A classic case in point is the blood libel against the
Jews, which was repeated by the Minister of Defense in Syria (Mustafa
Tlass) and reiterated by nearly all Muslim media without criticism. In
the same vein, the Palestinian delegate at the Commission of Human
Rights in Geneva, of all places, could stand up and accuse the Israelis
of injecting the AIDS virus into Palestinian children, or Arafat could
lambaste the Israelis for spreading poisoned sweets to kill Palestinians,
or the Saudis and Egyptians could claim that Israel had distributed an
aphrodisiac among Muslims, which increased the sexual appetite of
women in order to corrupt their morals, or that the Israeli armed forces
used depleted uranium bullets to harm the Palestinians. During the
49
Battle of Jenin in AprilMay, 2002, for example, a Palestinian father
was produced on television cameras, crying and weeping for his nine
children who had perished before his eyes and whom he had seen
with his own eyes under the rubble. Tat was in line with the Palestin-
ian claims of 5,000 and then 500 massacred Palestinians. A very
horrible and heart-tearing experience indeed, except that all nine chil-
dren were fortunately found safe and sound. Perhaps, the most chilling
hoax that was fabricated by the Palestinians, actively supported by all
Arabs and Muslims, and passively accepted by much of the European
press, was the Poison Aair of 1983, when the Israelis were blasted
for poisoning Palestinian schoolgirls in Jenin, and then in other areas
of the West Bank, with a view to sterilizing them before their age of
reproductive activity and thus battle against Palestinian demography.
Tese condemnations were made throughout the press of the world,
and even when it was proved that the poisoning was a case of mass
hysteria, what professional medicine recognizes as hyper-ventilation,
the accusations did not recede.
23

Any condemnation goes, and when the accuser is not held respon-
sible for providing evidence or spreading lies, accusations and libel
become cheap and risk-free, and everyone can indulge in them at will.
Self-delusion operates on other levels as well. Convinced in the righ-
teousness and exclusivity of their Islamic universal message, Muslims
cannot understand why the West and Israel pursue them, do not let
them act with impunity in the Path of Allah, or wage war against them.
For the message of Allah is clear and unambiguous, it declares the Jews
monkeys, it forbids Muslims to befriend Jews and Christians,
24
enjoins
the Muslims to kill Unbelievers wherever we nd them,
25
to murder
them and treat them harshly, ght and slay the Pagans, seize them,
beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem;
26
then,
what do the Indels complain about? Tat word of Allah was intended
against them, and they cannot deny or resist it, because Allah himself
said it, and that is written, word for word, in His Divine Messagethe
Holy Book that applies to all humanity. Tey also believe that Allah
and His Messenger had announced that it was acceptable for Muslims
to go back on their promises and obligations with Pagans and make
war on them whenever Muslims nd themselves strong enough to
do so;
27
or that Allah had taken away the freedom of belief from all
humanity and relegates those who disbelieve in Islam to Hell,
28
calls
them untouchable and impure,
29
and orders His followers to ght
the Unbelievers until no other religion except Islam is left,
30
and so on.
50
Ten, why should they spare non-Muslims, make any agreement with
them, or honor any of their commitments to them?
Te hard-core Muslims are therefore shocked that the West battles
them and resists them, instead of submitting to them and recognizing
that Islam is their only salvation. We have seen appeals to President
Bush to convert to Islam and astonishment at his procrastination to
do so. Tey cannot comprehend how and why Westerners are failing
to see the light and do not hurry into the fold of Islam. In their world
of delusion, they already see thousands of Americans repenting for
their previous obdurate misunderstanding of Islam, and their coming
to tears when they listen to the Words of the Quran recited to them.
Teir worldview, which cannot accept a plurality of creeds, cannot
also understand why they themselves, the disseminators of the good
of Allah and His message, should be held in low esteem, feared, and
persecuted by the West. All they did on September 11 was the fulll-
ment of the Word of Allah:
For them [the Unbelievers], garments of re shall be cut and there
shall be poured over their heads boiling water, whereby whatever is
in their bowels and skin shall be dissolved and they will be punished
with hooked iron rods.
31

Unbelievers will not only have to live in disgrace in this life, but in
the Day of Judgment He Shall make them taste the penalty of burning.
32

To have precipitated the Day of Judgment upon the victims of terrorist
massacres was therefore nothing anomalous, just the early fulllment of
the Word of Allah. Ten, the stage of denial sets in, as Muslims realize
the outrage they caused and the havoc that their delusions have im-
pelled them to commit. Be they acts of terror against Israel, the Karine
A weapon smuggling, or the September 11 horror, Muslims rst of all
denied they ever did, intended, knew, or participated in those acts, par-
adoxically while at the same time evincing unrestrained jubilation about
them. In their stage of denial, they wish both to dissociate themselves
from the atrocities they had committed and to enjoy their results at
the same time. Te rst major terrorist act against Israel, committed
at the height of the Oslo euphoria in mid-1994, for example, when
twenty-one young Israeli soldiers were murdered, was immediately
denied by Arafat, who had no knowledge of it, and as proof of
his innocence, denounced the act. In an interview to Israeli media,
he speculated that it must have been the deed of the Israeli security
51
services who were interested to wreck the Oslo Agreements. Why
wreck them, when the Rabin government who signed them was in
power, full of goodwill and leniency toward Palestinian violations,
and eager to show to his suspecting constituency in Israel that they
worked. Arafat did not explain. His conspiracy theory and instinctive
sense of denial was stronger than any rational consideration he might
have invoked. When the Achille Lauro was hijacked by Palestinians in
the Mediterranean in 1986, and an American citizen was murdered on
board and callously tossed into the sea, the seajackers retired to Port
Said where they were arraigned, but President Hosni Mubarak denied
that he had any knowledge of the mastermind of that terrorist act, at
the same time that he gave him shelter in his country. Te aair of the
ship Karine A, which in early 2002 was seized by the Israeli Navy in
the Red Sea, illicitly carrying weapons to the Palestinians, under the
command of one of Arafats associates, was totally denied by Arafat
and the Palestinian Authority as an Israeli plot. Ten, when presented
by the facts and when the shipment of weapons was exposed to world
media, Arafat said that he had no knowledge of it personally, and only
when he was confronted with the documents he had personally signed,
did he have no choice but apologize to President Bush.
In the aftermath of September 11, similar patterns of behavior were
detected in the Muslim world. In spite of their joy that they could not
contain, Muslims from Pakistan to America, from Egypt to Afghanistan,
denied that any Muslim could commit such horror, because it was pa-
tently against the compassion and tolerance of Islam, and verses were
cited in support of that contention, such as that Islam was opposed to
compulsion in faith, or to the execution of innocent civilians, unless
they challenged Islam or humiliated it. (Since the perpetrators claimed
that they were humiliated by America, their acts were then justied).
Tey also contended that an act of terror of such proportions could not
possibly have been planned, let alone executed, by any Muslim state or
organization, thus exonerating themselves in advance, even if that im-
plied their admitting their incompetence in carrying out operations of
such a scale. Even as the evidence was being gathered and divulged of the
al-Qaida involvement, and demands were mounting for its indictment,
they continued to insist that unless America provided decisive and
undisputed evidence for Muslim involvement, it was wrong on the part
of the West to smear the entire Muslim world, (which was opposed to
terrorism, as we know, in any case), on account of the yet unproven
52
deeds of the few. So, the roles were again reversed: the Muslims, who
needed no evidence for their delusions and never stop to reect on the
irrationality of their accusations against the West and Israel, suddenly
became scrupulous about evidence, when the accusations are laid at
their door. So, they found themselves pledging that should any evidence
emerge of Muslim involvement, the culprits ought to be pursued to
Muslim justice, and dealt with according to Muslim legal procedures,
which meant in eect exonerating Muslims altogether.
But the facts kept pressing at the door, and when the Muslim claims
of innocence became ludicrous in the eyes of world opinion, the
stage of projection and laying the blame on others began. As in the
cases where Israelis were accused by Palestinians of provocations in
mounting terrorism against their own citizens in order to blame the
innocent and peace-loving Palestinians, or of concocting the Kar-
ine A arm smuggling in order to smear the Palestinian impeccable
reputation of law-abiding and of respect for its commitments,
the Muslim world orchestrated a campaign of projection on others of
the evils of September 11. First, it was claimed by Muslims in Egypt
and Pakistan, and America and Saudi Arabia that the Jews, the CIA,
or the Israeli Mossad did it, with countless indications indicting,
successively or simultaneously, either or all of them. Again, becoming
suddenly meticulous about data gathering and the provision of con-
clusive evidence, they began to fabricate piecemeal fantastic stories
about Israelis or Jews who had been pre-warned and evacuated the
premises of the Twin Towers prior to the blast, or the takeover of
control towers by suspect elements, also presumably Jewish, who
collaborated with the hijackers, or other hoaxes that never cease to
raise our admiration for the boundless imagination of their inventers.
Indeed, even though the reality of Muslim daydreaming is not itself
limited by imagination, it proves to us to be more fantastic than their
fantasies. From the concept of imagination, we often use the positive
derivative of the imaginative, but they are bent on the imaginary,
which seems to ll their world and satisfy their emotions. In this Kaf-
kaesque world of the unreal, only non-Muslims are supposed to be sin,
and therefore, anything projected on them is either true, or could be
true even if it is not proven.
Tis is the foundation of the vicious and sustained campaigns of den-
igration and diminishment of the West and the Jews in Muslim circles,
countries, and societies that we commonly call incitement and that is
the prerequisite for terrorism against them. Incitement often means
53
delegitimation of the enemy, making them look corrupt, decadent, an
inherent enemy of Islam and Allah, and therefore deserving of annihi-
lation through terror. To that end, any means is suitable, even inventing
lies, making up false quotations from nonexistent sources, like the
citations by Palestinians in their text books of passages that never
were, which prove the Jewish conspiracy, its evil, and its ill-intentions
against Islam and the rest of humanity; or the ritual repetition of the
blood libel as a fact of history, or liberal quotations from the forged
Protocols of the Sages of Zion as true documents, etc. It seems amazing
to us that they care little not only for the truth as long as it serves their
goals of libeling Israel and the West, but even less about educating their
children on falsehoods and training them to consider imaginary texts
as citations.
33
In May 2002, when the Israeli armed forces launched
their Defensive Shield Operation against terrorist bases in Jenin, which
was led extremely carefully and sparingly with regard to civilians, the
Palestinians immediately shouted: Foul Game! Tey had conducted
a series of murderous attacks against Israeli civilians, and blown up
one hundred of them within one week, including during the Passover
Seder in April 2002, where entire families were wiped out (29 killed in
all), and that passed in the Palestinian public as a matter of routine; but
when Israel decided to root out the bases of terror in the West Bank,
immediate accusations of aggression and massacres began, echoed
by the Arab and Muslim press, (and also by the European press), and the
numbers of massacred people kept increasing, reaching the peak of
5,000 according to Saeb Arekat, the Chief Palestinian negotiator. Ten,
it turned out that only fty Palestinians were killed in that center of
terror, and for the most part amid very heavy ghting where twenty-two
Israeli ghters lost their lives. Tere was no massacre, in short.
Similarly, when the Americans opened their counterattack against
the Taliban, and thoughtfully attempted not to harm civilians, to the
extent possible, in the process, and even dropped signicant quanti-
ties of food to sustain them during the ghting, it was the stories of
massacres of innocent civilians, poisoning of the dropped food par-
cels, the intentional bombing of schools and food depots, the cruel
arrest of Taliban POWs, and their transport to Guantanamo where
they were treated inhumanly like the Nazis would, that dominated
the Arab and Muslim reporting of the operation, not the intentional
atrocities committed by the Taliban themselves and their supporters.
Like in the Jenin massacre that never was, in the Second Lebanon
War of 2006 and the Gaza War of 20082009, never were the acts that
54
the Hamas and the Hizbullah did to trigger the ghting mentioned.
For the Arab and Muslim audiences in all these cases, the story was
not about reporting a balanced truth, where the evils, intentional or
incidental, and motivations of both parties were recounted, and where
the cause and eect sequence had to be explained, of horrendous
terrorist attacks against civilians, which had to be retaliated against
and rooted out, but only about the callous and senseless American
and Israeli aggressive attacks against civilians, without reason or
cause, just to satisfy the evil instincts of Bush and Sharon. For them,
vilifying, debasing, calumniating, and libeling their enemies was the
only way to delegitimize them as inhuman predators, so as to pave the
way for future additional terrorist attacks against them. Projecting on
the enemy, by heaping lies and pipe dreams against him, by the way
of pure and primitively simple incitement, however, does not only
permit his delegitimation and encourages more attacks against him,
but also, more signicantly, belies and exposes the hidden dreams of
what the Muslims would do to the Americans and the Israelis, if they
could. Projection-cum-incitement, therefore, reveals to the West what
fate is awaiting him, should the Muslim world win this confrontation.
Wasnt it the Secretary General of the Arab League, Azzam Pasha, who
declared on the day the Arab armies invaded nascent Israel in 1948 in
order to eliminate it that a massacre would ensue that the world had
never seen since the Mongols? He meant a massacre of the Jews, ex-
actly as the Muslim terrorists mean and implement today, but instead
of piecemeal by terrorismin one big stroke.
Tus, while Americans and Israelis, in their reprisals in self-defense,
have espoused the strategy of saving civilian lives to the extent possible,
and would rather ght surgically, at the risk of their own casualties, to
minimize the enemys civilian losses, rather than blanket-bomb entire
cities or population centers, Muslim terrorists act dierently. Teir
stated aim is to maximize civilian casualties in the enemys ranks,
as evidenced in the Twin Towers and in the massive explosions in
crowded civilian places in Israel, where nails and bolts are added to
the bombs for maximal eect, and sometimes, poisonous substances
are tucked on to the bombs for added damage. In other words, while
the West operates with a considerable restraint of its forces, for fear
of their devastating impact, Muslim terrorists act with the maximum
unleashing of their power, something that leads to the fear in the West
that they would not hesitate to use unconventional weapons if they laid
their hands on them. Tat is exactly the soft-belly of the West that ties
55
in with its concern for human life for due process of law and restraint
in using power, which the Muslim terrorists who are not shackled by
those limitations seek to exploit and strike at. To make that happen,
roles are once again reversed: We are not the terrorists!!!, You are!!!,
they shout at the West. For, what Muslim martyrs do in terms of wanton
killing, is not only justied, because it is in the Path of Allah, but by
delegitimizing the West as terrorist itself, the ght against it is called
for, and to be fought by all means available to the Muslims, precisely
those that the West has restrained itself from using.
Dialoguing with Others
Some nave minds in the West have come to believe that dialogue
and negotiations with Muslim radicals can and will alter those attitudes
and lead to coexistence between Muslims and their rivals. Te problem
is that dialogue has been treated in the West as if it were a real policy,
whereas it is in fact a non-policy, designed only to ll an awkward
vacuum and to make royalties, like Prince Charles, and legislators feel
virtuous for doing something. But while Europeans have regularly
entered a dialogue with Muslims in good faith, fully intending to nd
common ground with their often unruly Muslim interlocutorsfor
the Muslims, dialogue means something else entirely. For them, it
signies the submission of a lesser culture and religion to their own
superior one. Muslims hope to inspire in the Westerners and Israelis
conversion to an Islamic view of the world. Anything short of that is
regarded by them as an abject failure of dialogue, and a signal to re-
sort to threats of violence or acts of terrorism. Tey are well-practiced
at both, while the Westerners have literally become pushovers at this
stage in their history. Except for the United States, they hardly believe
that anything is worth ghting over. Nor do they have a stomach for
a ght of unlimited duration. Tey would rather capitulate than in-
vestigate in depth the meaning of tolerance, understanding, dialogue,
and peace to Muslims. Te problem today lies in the juxtaposition of
a resurgent Islam on the one hand, and a self-deprecating West on the
other, unsure of itself, its values, or even what it stands for. Its people
have made a virtue of instant self-gratication, and therefore, they
invest next to nothing in the futurehence, they have stopped having
children. Teir preferred way of life amounts to a credit card culture.
Tey want everything, and they want it instantly. Never mind that their
governments no longer raise su cient funds from taxation to cover
exorbitant welfare entitlements, or that a bleak nancial future awaits
56
tomorrows pensioners. In short, the West has become a disgrace to its
own heritage, in sharp reversal of its fortunes when, at the turn of the
twentieth century, the Muslim Ottoman Empire was considered the
sick man of Europe, and was therefore no match for a condent West.
US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was onto something apart
from the obvious when he distinguished between old and new Eu-
ropeexcept that in their eagerness to grab some (necessarily short
term) economic benets after emerging from Soviet control, the head-
long rush of new Europe to join the EU will inevitably contaminate
them with the prevalent Western disease. Tere is another drawback to
this constant resort to dialogue. It lulls the Western populations into
believing that their governments are doing something constructive to
avert violence or threats of violence in the future. In reality, nothing
could be further from the truth, for this non-policy simply serves to
embolden and concomitantly empower those Muslims whom West-
ern governments have chosen to act as intermediaries with the wider
Muslim community. Invariably, Western governments have elected
these Muslims largely because they are the activists and therefore
are prominent in the community, while the governments comfort
themselves with the injudicious belief that these gures represent
moderate Islam, or that dealing with Muslim governments can justify
departure from the standard norms of justice, as the scandalous release
by the Scottish authorities, in mid-2009, of the Lockerbie culprit has
illustrated. However, these Muslims have been known Europe long
enough to have learned to tailor their vocabulary precisely according
to whom they are facing across the table. Tey speak the language of
peace, reconciliation, and goodwill to Westerners, and reserve their
true thoughts and beliefs for fellow Muslims. In other words, they have
learned to work the system, admirably so.
In eect, these moderate Muslim leaders gradually extract one
concession after another from Western policymakers, rendering
dialogue a one-way street. Tey enter each session with the full in-
tention of testing the limits of the concessions they can extract, and it
is a rare Western government minister who would risk disappointing
themor else the headlines in the papers the following day would be
sure to iname the Muslim community. Herein lies the value of the
worldwide Muslim penchant for overreacting to every perceived slight,
real or imagined, by demonstrating their rage loudly and violently.
Temperament comes into play here too (watch the shifting moods of
Muammar Qadda as he is courted by the West and the concessions
57
he gets from it), for unlike other peoples who experience anger or
humiliation, many Muslims are either unable or unwilling to contain
those sentiments. One has only to recall the Arafat-orchestrated days
of rage in the early stages of the Intifada against Israel to understand
that, in sharp contrast to Westerners, Muslims make a fetish of cele-
brating their anger. Such an uncontrolled behavior is unthinkable in
the West, but not because of lack of provocation against it, particularly
since September 11. Funerals too are manipulated to vent wrath and
fury, emotion, general mayhem, and impromptu rie shooting. Te
total and shameless lack of dignity, even at what should be a somber
occasion, is jarring to Western eyes. Bodies are held aloft and bounced
along the route, in a manner that would be regarded as disrespectful
to the deceased in other cultures. Bodies have been known to fall o
the stretcher amid the melee, and other processions turning chaotic
as was recorded for posterity in the case of Irans Ayatollah Khomeinis
funeral. Irans ambassador to Copenhagen, Ahmad Danialy, making
his rst public appearance in Denmark since being recalled by the
Iranian Foreign Ministry in January 2006, following the Cartoon aair,
addressed a public gathering and noted that
the crisis had hurt the feelings of the Muslim world and caused a great
deal of concern. Now after the lapse of this period of unpleasant and
bitter experience, I am very pleased to witness a beautiful and jovial
gathering of the erudite and learned here in Copenhagen. . . . Te
conference is a step in the right direction for improving relations. Te
truth of the matter is that the world needs to direct new attention
to one fundamental principle and that is: Respect for the sanctity of
religions in all places and at all political, cultural and social levels....
34

And this happened when the Ambassador was aware that the
damage, killing, and destruction was caused by Muslim violent dem-
onstrators worldwide, not by the cartoons, and of how his President
speaks about eliminating Jews and Israel, how his clerics deprecate
Christianity and other faiths, and how the Iranian regime supports the
burning down of Jewish synagogues in the West Bank and in European
cities. But if the purpose of the conference was not to elicit a mutual
reconciliation but only to introduce the Prophet (the Muslim one, not
all the rest), the proper way, then why should we expect any care or
concern, on the part of Muslims, for any faith except the Islamic one?
Te following conference in the United Arab Emirates, organized by
the Tabah Foundation, brought sixty young people from Denmark and
58
the Arab world together, under the banner of Te Search for Mutual
Understanding, namely that the Danes should learn to respect Islam,
never mind their own beliefs and culture. Te delegates discussed a
range of issues that the Cartoon crisis revealed as sore points between
religious Muslims, and secular Western culture, such as freedom of
expression and the role the media can play in hindering or facilitating
global understanding. Te four-day conference, held in Abu Dhabi,
exceeded the expectations of Jeppe Bruus Christensen, chairman of
the Danish Youth Council, who naively and prematurely declared: I
dont think we should underestimate how important this is in the Arab
world. It has gathered a great deal of attention. What he did not realize
was that his statements were interpreted throughout the Arab world as
a desperate attempt by Denmark to apologize for its horrible deed,
and as a capitulation to Muslim demands. It did not earn Denmark
any credit, but only scorn and contempt. Christensen felt that the two
groups managed to understand each other and accepted mutual
criticism, but he failed to comprehend that the Muslim goal was to
assert its victory, not compromise, because its system cannot recognize
that it can be at fault, unlike other (lesser) faiths. Tus, his feeling that
the whole exercise has been very constructive and positive, and that
we have been able to agree upon common values, such as having the
right to criticize each other, would have been in vain had he read the
Arab reports of the conference. Other participants from Denmark and
the Middle East were more sober and realistic when they merely agreed
that the conference underscored the need for bridging the gaps that
the conict had revealed, and that We have to accept that there are
areas where we remain distant from each other. Moreover, to illustrate
the depth of that gap, some Muslims continued to consider Denmark,
which is one of the most open, tolerant, and hospitable countries of
the world, to be a racist and closed country.
Much closer to the reality was the evaluation by some Danish par-
ticipants who heard their country being deprecated, albeit that it could
be the model of tolerance for the entire Islamic world, when they said
that we have to acknowledge that thats the way its going to be for
some time. Te conference also gave young Muslims the chance to
meet their Danish counterparts and test the images presented by the
media in their countries. Its been very important for me to obtain the
human aspect. To meet people and hear their opinion instead of seeing
it in the media, said a nineteen-year-old Egyptian who admitted that
preconceived notions, such as the Danes hate us, were di cult to
59
reject, but the conferences people-to-people approach helped. Another
Arab youth, from Saudi Arabia, where Danish goods were initially boy-
cotted, said that he was surprised in a positive way about the Danish
young people, for Tey were much more open and understanding
about our culture than I had expected. But was he about theirs in the
same way? He acknowledged that while dialogue and respect had been
established at the conference, transferring the experience to his home
country could prove di cult. He explained: Well be challenged when
we come back to our countries, because some people have dierent
attitudes. Tey use a dierent approach than dialogue, but we still need
to work to spread the message that it is possible to live in this world
together.
35
One wishes he were right.
Te Danish queen, Margrethe, more reective than the British Royal
House, stated that Islam poses a challenge both globally and locally,
and the challenge should be taken seriously. In her published biogra-
phy, based on interviews between the Queen and the books author,
journalist Annelise Bistrup, the Queen a rmed that
Tere is something impressive about people, whose existence is
immersed in religion from dawn to dusk, from the cradle to the
grave ..., but it is a challenge, which we need to take seriously. We
have admittedly ignored it for too long. Because we are tolerant and
a little lazy, I dont nd it easy at all. Nor especially pleasant.
36

Unlike other royals and politicians who make gratuitous declara-
tions just to please their Muslim citizens or to placate their wrath,
Queen Margrethe has studied Islam through her archaeological
pursuits and says that she does not feel entirely unprepared to enter
the debate. Tere is something fascinating about people who go to
such lengths to surrender themselves to a religion. But there is also
something frightening about the all-encompassing side of Islam, she
said, and then courageously added, Te challenge must be met, at the
risk of getting some less attering labels attached, for there are some
things we should not meet with tolerance. When we are tolerant, we
should be careful to note whether it stems from convenience or con-
viction. Queen Margrethe explained that her nation and the West
stand at a crossroads, but it needs to be recognized that crossroads
often only reveal themselves when they are crossed. She warned that
one doesnt always turn out to have taken the right road. But we have
at least realized that we cannot let ourselves be shooed o by things
that frighten us. We cannot compromise our notions of justice and
60
legitimacy. Queen Margrethe pointed out that her interviews with
her biographer Bistrup brought up forgotten memories that could be
worthwhile for others, especially young people, to hear. She was most
certainly referring to the seeming nonchalance with which the worriless
young generation looked upon their multi-cultural states that were
being subsumed by Islam.
Loyalty, Statecraft, Law, and Order
Part of the friction between the Muslim minorities in general, and
the Muslim minority in Israel (20 percent) in particular, and their host
societies, arises from the Muslim attitudes toward the state and the
rule of law, and from the social and family ties and loyalties that they
cultivate in their midst. At the most fundamental level, they experience
a great di culty in interacting with democratic state institutions that
are remote and impersonal, sanctify the individual and the secular, and
discount the religious and the aective links of the clans and the fam-
ilies. For them, custom and tradition, social conventions and a culture
of shame, which are governed by personal relationships and the rule
of the notables, take precedence over state law and cold un-negotiated
rules of conduct imposed on them by the alien culture that surrounds
them. Hence, the very dierent Muslim notions of right and wrong,
just and coercive, legitimate and unlawful, which make for the failed
states their culture is accustomed to, and the ensuing clashes between
them and their host societies.
While the democratic principle was posited by Giuselmo Ferrero as a
prerequisite for legitimacy of rule, Muslim regimes cannot by denition
subscribe to it, hence their di culty to comprehend it and deal with
it in the Democratic countries where they live or in their interaction
with democratic countries. Indeed, Islamic regimes as well as Islamic
movements, regard democracy Western-style as inimical to the rules
of Islam. For them, Sharia Law is the best of systems. In classical Islam,
the acceptance of the ruler was performed through the baia (the oath
of allegiance) in the public square, which was then ruthlessly translated
into popular legitimacy, and any insurgence challenging it was deemed
rebellion against the legitimacy of the ruler. But it was evident that the
genuine legitimacy of the ruler (Caliph or Sultan) remained based on
the capacity of the autocrat to enforce the Sharia Law and protect it.
Today, Muslim rulers may use the terms democracy, human rights,
elections, and such, but they profoundly misunderstand them. It is
not that they understand and manipulate them, in line with Ferreros
61
typology of fraudulent democracy typical of fascist regimes; they
only seem so to Western minds who cannot imagine that others fail to
comprehend what is obvious to them. Tere is a link between legitima-
cy and succession. Mubarak or Qadda have succeeded themselves
many times and they regard themselves as legitimate, though no rival
would dare or be allowed to run against them. Tey cannot be opposed
during an election, genuinely believing that opposition and competi-
tion, the trademarks of Western democracy, are signs of division and
controversy, which are inimical to the rule of unity. Tey sense that
since they were overwhelmingly chosen, unopposed, by 95 percent
of the masses, that is their base of their legitimacy.
We speak in the West of the people as the sovereign and the source
of legitimacy. Islam hails Allah as the only sovereign of the universe and
brands any attempt to impute sovereignty to humans as shirk , namely
imparting divine qualities to anyone other than the Almighty. As this
is seen as blasphemy deserving of capital punishment, Muslim radicals
do not recognize most governments in the Islamic world, and are par-
ticularly incensed by monarchs who dub themselves sovereign, for the
only form of government acceptable to them is the Caliphate where the
Caliph was the Vicar of the Prophet, not a sovereign in his own right.
In their view, Allah, the Sovereign, has already dispensed to humanity
the most perfect of legal codesthe Quran and the Sharia , and for any
human to pretend that it can be ameliorated via parliamentary legis-
lation would also amount to blasphemy. In the West, consensus is the
fruit of political bargaining based upon a give-and-take process between
political, ethnic, religious, linguistic, and cultural groups, or lobbies of
particular interests, which recognize the relativity of the truth and the
need to balance the various interests in order to arrive at a social pact
that governs the state and social institutions, like the maintenance of
law and order and enforcement thereof. Muslims, however, especially
the radicals among them, have enormous di culties in compromising
or striking deals of this sort because for them, the Truth is one and
eternal, an either-or-aair, anchored in a demand for everything now.
Since most governments are regarded as anti-Islamic, often violence is
encouraged against them, be they in Islamic countries and much more
so in Western countries and Israel, which do not recognize Islam yet
as part of their legitimate system.
Tis problematic Muslim view of Western democracies as not totally
legitimate due to their ignorance of the Divine Law decreed by Allah
is precisely what has prompted many a Muslim leader in the West and
62
in Israel to declare that his purpose is to introduce Sharia Law into the
countrys system. In some violent Muslim demonstrations in Western
capitals, one often notices signposts declaring: We hate democracy.
Te capitulation of some government, judicial, and clerical o cials in
this regard in some European countries and in some Israeli circles has
caused Muslims to further raise their voices against the existing West-
ern order and clamor for more Muslim legislation. Open statements
by some of their spiritual leaders that they have come to change the
Western world, not to submit to it, not only make the existing order
dispensable in their eyes, but they also endeavor by demonstrations,
use of violence, and acts of terror to hasten its demise and substitute
for it the Pax Islamica of their dreams. Hence the frequent clashes
between Muslim communities in the world, Israel included, and the
forces of order, of which Jews are often the victims. Te problem is not
only the illegitimacy in their eyes of non-Muslim government, but also
the tribal and family loyalties in Muslim society, which make for their
social atomization and for the shift of their political loyalty from their
country to their religion, community, family, clan, tribe, people, persona
of the tribal, or religious leader. Tat creates frictions with their host
societies in their attempts to preserve their age-old customs and ways
of conduct to the point that they threaten to make their host countries
ungovernable and arouse the non-Muslim local majorities against them.
When those populations come to realize that their democratic, free,
and open societies were abused by the Muslim minorities, they might
turn against them, in self-defense and alter their status altogether.
Te old Bedouin adage saying, I am against my brother; my brother
and I are against our cousins; our family is against the rest of the clan;
I and my clan are against the rest of world, which has been a societal
constant of the Islamic world, seems to have crossed the oceans and
transplanted itself into Western society, Israel included. Te states of
which Muslims have become citizens do not provide the glue to link
their new citizenry to them, hence the constant unrest among Muslim
communities who have failed to become integral parts of their coun-
tries. So, instead of contributing to the security, prosperity, creativity,
and welfare of their state, they often become a security hazard and a
societal burden, which is resented by the majority which shoulders the
burden. Te high percentage of crime among Muslim residents in all
Western countries where they reside, way out of proportion to their rate
in the population, especially the ideological crimes such as terrorism,
undermining of the state institutions, reluctance to pay their taxes and
63
dues, and focusing of sucking from the state their service without lifting
a nger to its welfare, is more indicative of this turn of events than the
petty crimes against property, which can be attributed to economic
disadvantage. It does not appear to them that acting in contravention
to the public order, which is not theirs, and opposing, at times violently,
their own country against its sworn enemies (like the Hamas and the
Hizbullah by Israeli Muslims) is in violation of any legal or moral rule.
Teir yardsticks of justice, order, right, fairness, and rightful conduct
are the Muslim ones that are non-negotiable and absolute. For example,
it would not occur to them that in any conict involving Muslims and
non-Muslims, the latter, including in their own country or residence,
may also be right or entitled to defend themselves. If Britain battles
against terrorism in Iraq and Afghanistan, or Israel in Lebanon or Gaza,
they do not deserve the right of self-defense, and thus counterattacks
against it by their own Muslims, who are the natural allies of all other
Muslims, are to be expected and justied.
Take, for instance, the troubling question of honor killing among
Muslims in non-Muslim lands, or of forced marriage on under-age
women, as an extension of the custom from Muslim lands. Muslims feel
it is their women who are in question, so what right does the Western
state have to interfere in their private aairs? Tese are some of the
problems that will face Israel in the future, with regard to its Muslim
minority, in view of the mounting arrogance and self-condence of the
Muslim minorities in the West, which learn one from the experience
of the others. Te problem is that while in other places in the West
Muslims constitute between 2 percent (in the United States) and 10
percent (in France) of the population, in Israel they already make up
more than 20 percent. When a hating minority is not ready to submit
to the rules of the country (e.g., in England they proclaim: We hate
democracy, in Sweden and Greece they want to ease the cross from
the national ag, and in Israel, they wish to de-Zionizeand de-Judaize
the state, there is not much left for any compromise of accommodation
between the host and the guest cultures.
Te International Disposition of the Muslim World
Te limited circle of the Arab world, which pits 320 million Arabs
against Israel and determines the fortunes of war and peace in the
Middle East, has been inuenced, and increasingly so, by the growing
impact of the wider Muslim circle, which encompasses some 1.5 billion
believers. While, in the era of the conventional wars, Muslim countries
64
supported the Arabs but were not directly involved in the Middle East
conict, the new reality of asymmetrical wars nds much more involve-
ment of the Islamic world. Not only the Islamic bomb of Pakistan has
been invoked as part of the Middle East equation, but also the Iranian
nuclear and missile power, and occasional threats voiced against Israel
in the Indian sub-continent or in Southeast Asia, and even a vocal
alignment of Turkey with the Arabs and Hamas since the Islamic Party
came to power there in 2002. One of the most blatant manifestations of
this shift, which has widened the circle of the conict at the same time
that it rendered it amorphous, evasive and hard to pin down and deal
with, has been the increasingly open and violent anti-Semitic sentiment
prevalent in the Islamic world. In view of the fact that anti-Semitism has
erupted publicly once again in Europe, inter alia under the impact of
the immigrant Muslim population there,
37
Muslims around the world
do not feel inhibited any longer to advertise their own.
Te mounting involvement in the Middle Eastern conict of Muslim
regimes, like Iran, and more so of Muslim movements like Al-Qaida,
Laskar-e-Taiba , Hizbullah, and Hamas, Islamic Jihad and others, which
have elaborated an anti-Western and anti-Israeli ideology and a reli-
gious rationalization for the upheaval they are causing, has added an
international dimension to this already di cult dispute. For if previous-
ly conventional wars required the direct, but limited and well-dened,
playing of regular armies, like the expeditionary forces of Iraq in 1948
and 1973, or of Moroccan troops in 1973; the era of asymmetrical wars
involves irregular forces, informally recruited, and stealthily hauled to
the frontlines, or otherwise illicitly operating in any arena of their choice
worldwide, like Al-Qaida against Israeli interests in Europe, Africa,
or Asia; or the Hizbullah against Israeli embassies in Latin America,
or Laskar-e-Taiba against Israeli presence in India or in Kashmir. For
this reason, the global Jihadi movement and its ramied activity will
be a growing concern to Israel as it faces the world Islamic resentment
against it. Let us explore some facets of that danger and the discourse
they use to express it.
Te Islamic world has been a world apart in terms of modern West-
ern thought: democracy is not a system they aspire to because it runs
counter to the more of less authoritarian regimes they are accustomed
to; when they demand justice, they mean Islamic justice that is not
exactly ours; tolerance to them is not unconditional acceptance of the
other as is; terrorism is what others do to Islam, not the other way
round; pluralism is altogether unheard of; ending a conict can only
65
be done via victory, not a compromise; sovereignty belongs to Allah,
not to the people; legislation is not the prerogative of humans but of
the Divine Will, of which they are the latest and most updated repre-
sentatives and interpreters; Western values amount to corruption and
blasphemy; logic and reason must follow the Muslim ways of think-
ing; they expect and demand respect for Islam but easily dispense of
respect to other faiths; they regard their own shouting and abuse as a
show of force, and their foes dignied quiet and restraint as evidence
of weakness; everybody owes them everything, but they owe no one
anything; they view their attacks on others as lawful and legitimate,
but any act of self-defense by non-Muslims is nothing but aggression.
Tese ideas have again gained the upper hand in the public square of
most Islamic countries, because most existing regimes are illegitimate,
and Islam seems as the only viable alternative that is able and willing
to contend for predominance and power.
Almost since its inception, Islam has recognized the division of
humanity into three categories: the Muslims, the People of the Book
(initially Jews and Christians and then extended to include others) and
the Pagans who knew no God. Te lands of the globe were similarly
divided into two domains: Dar-al-Islam (the Abode of Islam), and
Dar-al-Harb , (the Abode of war). While, for practical purposes these
categories are no longer operative because they would otherwise throw
international relations into chaos, in the circles of Muslim radicals,
both those in power and those in opposition to the rulers in place, this
terminology has been revived and widely used to analyze internal and
external aairs in accordance with the requisites of the Sharia , namely
the Holy Law of Islam. But one has to realize that the religion of the
radicals is one and the same as classical Islam, and its vocabulary and
symbolism are identical. Terefore, when their statements or deeds
are apologetically condemned by other Muslims as non-Islamic, this
is merely a blanket statement calculated to skirt the embarrassment
caused by the excesses of their coreligionists. Since Sharia submits
to eternal and Divine laws, it cannot be abrogated or amended at the
whim of anyone. It is either applied more or less strictly, as do the
radicals, or its, partly or wholly, ignored by many Muslims who have
elected modernity over medieval, outdated concepts and practices.
Te dierence is then only in the degree of enforcement, for they
are all aware and caring about the tenets of their faith, but may be
lax about the implementation of some of them, even as they insist of
their Muslim identity and commitment. Te radicals just display their
66
burning passion for full implementation, here and now and at almost
any cost.
38

Yusuf al-Qaradawi, a Muslim radical sheikh in exile from his native
Egypt and now living in Qatar, regularly appears on Al-Jazeera network
to expound his ideas and deliver fatwas (new decrees that for his fol-
lowers become law). He is also the President of the European Fatwa
Council, namely the recognized authority of all European Muslims, to
ponder on their problems, religious or otherwise, and deliver verdicts
that are seen by many as authoritative and enforceable. In one of his
pronouncements, he recommended to his followers to continue to
battle the Jews. Tey will try to defend themselves, but you will get
them ultimately. For the Jews will hide behind trees and rocks, which
will announce out loud: a Jew is hiding behind me, come and kill him.
Tis will be the prerequisite for the coming of the Day of Resurrec-
tion.
39
Tis commandment is an oft-repeated tradition of the Prophet
(a hadith ), recurring ad nauseam in Islamic writings and cited in full
in the Charter of the Hamas. But hardly anyone wonders how it is
that the followers of the Prophet, who feel insulted at every step of the
way for whatever is said of him or against him, and are even ready to
indulge in violence in retribution to any insult of his honor, are not
incensed by this hadiths appeal to wanton and indiscriminate murder
of the followers of another faith, by those who claim to represent a
religion of peace and tolerance. Sheikh Qaradawi has made some
stunning statements not only about politics but also about social is-
sues that hardly qualify him or his followers as moderate. He said, for
example, that
[John] Kerry who ran against Bush in the 2004 elections, was support-
ed by homosexuals and nudists. But it was Bush who won, because
he is Christian, right wing, tenacious and unyielding. In other words,
the religious overcame the pervert. So we cannot blame all Americans
and westerners. But unfortunately, because the westerners ... want
to atter these people on account of the elections, disaster strikes.
In order to succeed and win the elections, he atters these people,
rather than saying to them: No you are sinning against yourselves,
against society, and against humanity. Tis is forbidden.... Lesbians
and homosexuals should be punished the same punishment as any
sexual pervert, the same as any fornicator. Te schools of thought
disagree about the punishment. Some say they should be punished like
fornicators, and then we distinguish between married and unmarried
men, and between married and unmarried women. Some say both
should be punished the same way. Some say we should throw them
67
from a high place, like God did to the people of Sodom. Some say we
should burn them, and so on,. Tere is disagreement. Te important
thing is to treat this act as a crime ... Lesbianism is not as bad as
homosexuality, in practical terms.
40

If these are the envisaged punishments to be meted out to Muslim
sinners, what is in store for the Unbelievers who were deemed as sinning
toward Muslims! One of the most respected Deobandi scholars believes
that aggressive military Jihad should be waged by Muslims in order
to establish the supremacy of Islam worldwide. Justice Muhammed
Taqi Usmani argues that Muslims should live peacefully in countries
such as Britain, where they have the freedom to practice Islam, only
until they gain enough power to engage in battle. His views explode
the myth that the creed of oensive, expansionist Jihad represents a
distortion of traditional Islamic thinking. Usmani sat for twenty years
as a Sharia judge in Pakistans Supreme Court, and has been an advis-
er to several global nancial institutions. Polite and soft-spoken, he
revealed to Te Times a detailed knowledge of world events and his
words, for the most part, were balanced and considered. He agreed
that it was wrong to suggest that the entire non-Muslim world was
intent on destroying Islam. Yet, this is a man who, in his published
work, argues the case for Muslims to wage an expansionist war against
non-Muslim lands. Usmanis justication for aggressive military Jihad
as a means of establishing global Muslim supremacy is the climax of
his book, Islam and Modernism. Te work is a polemic against Is-
lamic modernists who seek to convert the entire Quran into a poetic
and metaphorical book, because, says he, they have been bewitched
by western culture and ideology. Te nal chapter delivers a rebuke
to those who believe that only defensive Jihad is permissible in Islam.
He refutes the suggestion that Jihad is unlawful against a non-Muslim
state that freely permits the preaching of Islam. For Usmani, the ques-
tion is whether aggressive battle is by itself commendable or not. If it
is, he contends, then why should the Muslims stop simply because
territorial expansion is considered there days as bad? And if it is not
commendable, but deplorable, why did Islam not stop it in the past. He
answers his own question thus: Even in those days, aggressive Jihads
were waged ... because they were truly commendable to establish the
grandeur of the religion of Allah. Tese words are not the product
of a radical fanatic, and they come from the pen of one of the most
acclaimed modern scholars of Islam.
41

68
Tere is no prospect of resisting and surviving this wave of renewed
Muslim proclivity for confrontation and triumphalism unless one
denes facts and events unequivocally and sets ones mind on facing
them without recoiling. No other groups of people, no adherents of
any other faith have so relentlessly vowed to destroy Western cul-
ture in general, and Israel in particular, as modern Muslims have.
Te repeated pledges of Irans Ahmadinejad, who has nothing to do
with the Arab-Israeli conict, to wipe Israel o the map for purely
Islamic reasons, have perhaps blunted the sensitivity of world peace
and human rights champions, who, beyond the ritual statement that
this is unacceptable, have done nothing to oust the culprit from the
international community of civilized nations or to discontinue their
business with him. Tere are plenty of poor and frustrated people in
the favelas of South America, the shack cities of Asia, and the jungles of
Africa. But in none of them is this unstoppable desire to kill westerners
and Jews as evident and manifest as in the case of Muslims and their
Islamikaze vanguards. Western countries have tried in vain to skirt the
issue of Islamic terrorism in the hope that it might disappear. But it
did not. Only a clear Western denition of what constitutes terrorism,
which has to be announced, not negotiated, can indicate the decision
of civilized nations to stand fast against this aggressive mood that
nurtures Jihad. In Muslim eyes, terrorism is what is done to them, like
the United States in Iraq, NATO in Afghanistan, Israel in Palestine and
Lebanon, and India in Kashmir. What Muslims do is only self-defense,
so they can never be accused of terrorism, meaning that any violent
act committed by Muslims is justied by denition because they are
oppressed, humiliated, and frustrated by the Western rivals. While
the West pursues the means-oriented criterion to dene terrorism,
namely that regardless of the goals or motives of terrorists, noble as
they may be to them, innocent civilians cannot be harmed intention-
ally and indiscriminately, and Muslim countries systematically reject
this concept. For them, in the struggle against tyranny and injustice,
all means are acceptable and none of them is deemed illicit. For the
citizens of Western countries and Israel, who share the unjust and
tyrannical regimes of their countries, cannot be deemed innocent,
and are in their thinking permissible.
For many Muslims, there is even a Quranic justication for terrorism
( irhab ) against Unbelievers, since the Holy text prescribes to Muslims
to sow irhab in the hearts of the enemy. And since the enemy is iden-
tied as Israel or the West in general, that in itself provides a doctrinal
69
rationalization of terrorism. Iran, Pakistan, Syria, the Palestinian
Authority, and others continue to give shelter to terrorists, but they
are rather proud of doing that, and no longer embarrassed. For the
Iranians, Al-Qaida, the Hizbullah, the Hamas, and such, encouraging
terrorism is simply a practical manifestation of their doctrinal convic-
tions and commitments. One should not be fooled by this double talk,
which reects the Muslim state of mind. Even when they dispatch or
post-factum approve of acts of obvious terrorism, which they call mar-
tyrdom, that is, praiseworthy and religiously sanctioned deeds (like
Islamikaze) for the sake of Allah, that cannot be, by denition called
terrorism, which is a downgraded and damnable mode of action in
the West. Tat is the reason why whenever a major terrorist attack by
Muslims is perpetrated against the West or Israel, there is jubilation
in the Muslim street, regardless of the numbers of innocent civilian
victims. Tat is also the reason that UN attempts to come to a unied
denition of terror in order to optimize the world battle against it has
fallen on death ears, as long as all Muslim countries insist that resis-
tance against occupiers is not terrorism, and when they admit it is,
then it is of the worthy martyrdom kind. Muslims reserve to themselves
the right to dene who is an occupier, be it Israel in Palestine, India
in Kashmir, Russia in Chechnya, the United States in Iraq, NATO in
Afghanistan. In a Muslim conference in Stockholm, Qaradawi made
his dierentiations, specifying that Islamikaze attacks (what we erro-
neously call suicide bombings, and consider the epitome of terrorism)
are not only permitted in Islamic law, but condoned and recommend-
ed. His main arguments were summed up in a major Arabic medium
published in London.
42

In view of their understanding of the present state of aairs, Muslim
militants have drawn several lessons and they prepared a blueprint for
the confrontation with the West, which in its gradually emerging details
is proving quite popular with the masses of Muslims in general, who
are in no mood of compromise and accommodation. Te sense that
Allah has been blessing their venture is so deeply rooted in their hearts
that they fear no fatigue, and they do not recoil from implementing
their plan even if, or precisely because, there seem to be obstacles and
di culties on the way to realization. For Allah had tested in the past
many of his followers and he ultimately ensured their victory, as one
of his many names ( al-Nasser the Victorious) connotes. Victory is
sought and nothing less. Te Muslims who wish to confront the West
and Israel are equipped with the requisite faith, zeal, and enthusiasm,
70
as the acronym of Hamas (the Islamic Resistance Movement) indicates;
they are boundlessly devoted to Allah, as their various Hizbullah (Party
of God) groups profess; are determined to pursue their dawa (Mission,
Call) the world over, as many of their organizations mention; are intent
to wage a merciless Jihad in their peaceful messages demanding sur-
render are not heeded by their enemies, as many of their associations
(Islamic Jihad) remind us; and lastly, many of them are coordinated
by the main base ( Al-Qaida ), physical and spiritual, which used to
train candidates for Islamikaze, nance their operations, plan their
schemes, and initiate the time and place of their spectacular strikes.
Admittedly, after the temporary defeat of the Taliban in Afghanistan,
Al-Qaida is no longer what it was, and its activities have been largely
decentralized, but the ame was not extinguished as evidenced by the
spectacular comeback of the Mujahideen in the elds of Qandahar,
Helmand, and Jalalabad.
Te main components of the Muslim blueprint can be summarized
as follows:
1. Te West must be defeated, or at least weakened, frightened, and
put on the defensive. For not only does the West corrupt the Muslim
world with its debauchery, permissiveness, alliance with certain
Muslim countries and its value-less societies, but by its posing a
luring alternative to young Muslims, with its immodest dress, co-ed
education, pop music, pornography, mixed partying and frolicking,
alcohol, and Western movies, it threatens the next generation of
Muslims. Naturally, militant Muslims, with the acquiescent silent
support of conservatives, dread the prospect of their societies
slipping from under their grip and supervision. Terefore, they
enlist for their endeavor any Allah-fearing Muslim, who though not
necessarily of their a liation, is concerned, like them, about the
rapid drift of the young toward modernity and the West. Tis matter
is particularly acute in the Palestinian territories, where they daily
frictions with the Israelis make them more prone to such a deviation
from traditional Muslim norms.
2. A rst step toward the goal of defeating the West is to cultivate the
rift between pro-Arab, pro-Muslim Europe, on the one hand, and
Zionist-controlled America on the other. Tus, while both belong
to the evil West, it is imperative to go easy on Europe for now
due to its assistance, both directly to the Muslim world, and indi-
rectly by diminishing Americas power and somehow keeping it in
check. Tis policy has proven a success for the time being, inasmuch
as the European Council has been openly favoring the Palestinians
71
over the Israelis despite American misgivings, while the Muslims
have succeeded in enlisting the European to their side in the
Balkans (in Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia). Te Muslims have even
managed to engage the United States in implementing jointly
with NATO those European Muslim designs. Te change of
government in the United States, with the seemingly more engag-
ing policy of Obama on the one hand, and the schism within the
Palestinian people between the West-supported Palestine Liberation
Organization (PLO) and Muslim- supported Hamas, seem to dictate
new adaptations of this policy orientation.
3. Europes turn will come after America is driven out of its hegemonic
status in the world and Israel is eliminated. Muslim radicals speak
about their own reconquista in Europe, rst of the territories that
used to be under Muslim rule (Andalusia, Southern France, Sicily)
and then the rest of the continent. A special awareness of this turn
of events has been evident among North African immigrants into
Europe who are conscious of the historical reversal that has been
underway. Indications of such a scheme dawned on the Europeans
on the morrow of September 11, after which several major Islamic
terrorist strikes were foiled in Paris, Strasbourg, and Brussels.
Al-Qaida bases and undercover lodges exist in practically all Euro-
pean capitals and can be activated when time comes, as has been the
case with the many terrorist attacks in Spain, England, and Germa-
ny since. Part and parcel of preparing for the showdown in Europe
has been both testing the ground for the eventual Muslim takeover,
rst of the vestiges of Spanish colonial rule (Ceuta and Melilla) and
some islands in the Mediterranean, and increasing the numbers of
Muslim migrants to Europe. Te upward of thirty million Muslims
in Europe of the 27 members today, who constitute between 5 and
10 percent of the population in virtually all European countries,
hasten to take up political rights individually, and then will begin to
demand cultural and group rights. Only the reversal, of late, of the
liberal multi-cultural policies in countries like Holland and England,
may begin to check that trend.
4. And above all, the United States, which by its military and economic
power not only dominates the West and leads it but also attempts
to battle Islam into submission (at least until Obamas advent to
power), protects Israel and serves its purposes, and produces and
disseminates the decadent sub-culture, which arouses the wrath of
Islam. Te United States is deemed to be the rst model of em-
ulation for youth all over the world, including Muslims, and this
circumstance is purported to be the reason for all the ills of the
world. If America cannot be reduced to submission, then at least it
72
can be battered, threatened, humiliated, and weakened, to the extent
that it would no longer be able to protect its citizens and its interests
around the world. Te rationale and purpose behind this outlook is
so that its many allies, primarily Europe, Israel, and the illegitimate
Muslim regimes it sustains, would no longer trust the UN and rely
on it. America is also singled out by the militants for being the only
power that can and is willing to block eectively the fulllment of
their schemes. Hence, the hatred of America, rst and foremost,
which is decried by the slogans and the propaganda statements
of the militants, and also by the massive acts of terror committed
against it.
5. Pending the anticipated Muslim victory, much long-term ground-
work is required, which the Muslim radicals wholeheartedly support
and initiate and even push Muslim governments and Muslim
individuals to fund. Te list is long: recruiting new converts in the
West; lending nancial support to families of martyred Islamikaze;
raising money, either through bogus charitable organizations in
the West, to be used against it, or from donor states or individuals
(Saudi Arabia and wealthy Sheikhs in the Gulf ); erecting mosques
and Islamic centers and madrasas in world capitals and signicant
concentrations of Muslims worldwide, ostensibly for Muslim popu-
lations in the West, but diverting their use to conversion programs,
indoctrination, and the diusion of hatred and propaganda; and
recruitment of Islamikaze for martyrdom operations. Tey also use
the funds to strengthen already Muslim countries of the periphery,
like Central Asia, Indonesia, and raising Muslim consciousness
among the Muslim minorities of Nepal, Tailand, India, Israel,
Europe, and America. It is the fruit of such endeavors that supports
the Taliban in the madrasa s of Pakistan, the Shiite fanatics in the
religious schools of Qum in Iran, the Hizbullah in the Lebanese
elds of opium, the Islamikaze terrorists in Afghanistan, and the
mosques of Europe and America, from whence emerged the
planners and executors of September 11.
6. Jews, and by inference Israel and Zionism, have to be eliminated,
as Bin Laden, Iran, Hamas, and Hizbullah have vowed. Tey are
accused of having invaded the lands of Islam in Palestine, estab-
lishedthe Zionist state, which in eect tore o a valuable piece of
Dar-al-Islam and turned it into Dar-al Harb , which requires Jihad
for retrieval. Te Jews constitute a Western salient in the midst of
Islamic society, which they intend to corrupt and undermine from
within. Te Jews stand accused of desecrating the holy places of
Islam in Jerusalem with a view to insulting Muslims. And, most
dangerous of all, they act as the American agent in the Middle East,
73
hence their close links to Washington, to the extent that makes
it hard to determine who is subservient to whom. For all these
reasons, Jews are targets not only in their Israeli state, but world-
wide, as the frequent attacks against them, throughout their world
diasporas, have demonstrated.
Andre Malraux, the great French luminary of the rst half of the
twentieth century, saw before most others the coming of the aggressive
wave of Islam in the contemporary world. It is worthwhile citing his
immortal words:
Te violence of the Muslim rise is the great phenomenon of our era.
Underestimated by most of our contemporaries, it can be compared
to the beginnings of Communism under Lenin, and the full extent
of its impact is still impossible to predict. At the beginning of the
Marxist Revolution, the belief was prevalent that problems could
be patched up by improvised solutions. But neither Christianity nor
organizations of employers or employees could nd the answers.
Similarly, the world does not seem today able to face the problem
of Islam, which seems to be even more di cult to confront. Maybe
the limited French aspect thereof could be tackled if there were a
real statesman around to deal with it. Te impression is that various
forms of Muslim dictatorship will prevail in the Arab world. When
I say Muslim I do not think necessarily of religious, but of civil
structures emanating from Mohammeds doctrine. Already now, the
Moroccan Sultan , as well as President Bourguiba [of Tunisia],are
acting as dictators of sorts. It may be that current problems could
have been patched up if they had been undertaken in time ... But it
is already too late. Les miserables have nothing to lose any more,
they will prefer to preserve their misery within their Muslim com-
munities, and their lot will probably remain unchanged. We regard
them from a western angle, but they will probably prefer their own
future to the welfare that we pretend we are able to bring them. Black
Africa will not stay for long indierent to this process, and all we can
do is to become cognizant of the gravity of this phenomenon and try
to postpone its breaking point.
43

Perhaps since Nazi Germany, no amount of vitriol was poured on
the Jews as such, not only Israelis and Zionists, as has been the case
in the past few years by Arabs and Muslims, beyond what emanates
from strictly Islamic sources. We have heard nauseating repetitions of
anti-Semitic attacks in the high echelons of Islamic politics, not only in
intractable Iran and pre-Spring Syria and their underlings, but even in
the Egyptian and the rest of the Arab mainstream press, which freely
74
expresses its hatred toward the Jews, shamelessly recounts its lies and
fabrications as history, avidly quotes from the Protocols of the Elders
of Zion that never were, and retells with a sadistic delight that can only
match its joy at the carnage in the Twin Towers,
44
the blood libels
45

of which Jews have been accused. Tis, of course, reects the vitriolic
attitudes toward Israel and Zionism, because if the Jews are evil, then
by nature, their state and their movement of national liberation can
only be equally evil. Not one voice is there to stand up to the calumni-
ators and intercede for ceasing that orgy of hatred, even in Egypt and
Jordan, decades after their peace treaties with Israel. All one has to
do is to rummage through the hundreds of hate sites that are fed by
Muslims and Arabs across the world, to realize the width and depth
of anti-Semitic sentiment in the Muslim world, which has so poisoned
Muslim minds in recent decades, that it is doubtful whether peace
treaties are able to overcome it.
Tere has also never been any society since the Nazis that so cul-
tivated and boasted of its hatred toward the Jews, as Muslim society
today. Its preachers denigrate and humiliate them, incite against them,
justify massacres against them, and associate them with America and
the evil West. Reasons for this contemporary outburst of hatred, which
has been also manifest throughout some circles of the democratic
West where Jewish and Muslim communities live side by side, emanate
perhaps from the reality in which Jews represent the successful middle
class that has made the West prosperous. For the Muslims, it is painful
to admit that Jews succeeded where they have failed, and the jealousy
in this regard cannot be contained or suppressed. Te same jealousy
at Israels success, as a neighboring society and a state, compared with
their continued state of backwardness, feeds their intense hatred and
generates stereotypes and pipedreams of destroying it. Tey compen-
sate themselves by their prophecies about the cowardly Jews who in
the end of days will run away and hide from the Muslims who will seek
their destruction. Tere is no need, as some counsel, for Israel (and the
West for that matter) to go into any soul-searching and to dig up the
reasons (there must be reasons, right?) for this hatred, anymore than
there was one when the Jews were made the scapegoats of the Nazis,
and were murdered for what they were, with the burden of the guilt
accruing to them. If anything needs to be investigated, it is the sick
minds of the anti-Semites, today and of old. It would be worthwhile to
enumerate some traits of character of the Muslims, which make them
so prone to accuse others in general.
75
Muslims and Arabs are fond of Hitler and of citing him, and they
miss no opportunity to analyze scientically the reasons for his
victimization of the Jews. Tey also expectedly nd the Jews themselves
guilty, therefore words like reason and cause have been depleted
of their meanings when they voice those recriminations, and one is
dragged to the realm of the incomprehensible and the irrational. But
then, side by side with that, the Holocaust that the Jews were accused
of having brought upon themselves, is vehemently, and again scienti-
cally, denied, and the Jews are coarsely relegated to the role of the Nazis
themselves in their dealings with the Palestinians. Such a web of lies,
presumptions, pretenses, denials, and contradictions only the modern
Arab and Muslim mind could create. In any case, the delegitimation of
the Jews, of their state Israel, and Zionismtheir movement of national
liberationis so thorough, total, and irreversible, as to turn them into
the target of the coming Islamikaze massacres, a fate that they deserve
a-priori. By turning their hatred of Jews into a pathological phenome-
non, as inseparable from their own being, they immunize themselves
against any human compassion. Otherwise, it is hard to understand how
crowds would jump from joy in Palestinian and Egyptian streets, at the
sight of Jewish children blown to pieces, or entire families wiped out
in one stroke of madness. Tey have turned so obtuse and cruel when
Jewish victims are concerned that it I necessary to remind them, from
time to time, that they are evil to pursue civilians and murder them in
streets, restaurants, and buses; even more evil are those who rejoice
with them, and they must be excluded from the human race. If they
call their massacres Jihad, and their murderers martyrs, that does
not mitigate their crime; on the contrary, it discredits the faith that
motivates them and the God in whose name they act. But the Muslim
radicals judgment is blunted by hatred, to the point that they can no
longer dierentiate between good and evil, human or inhuman.
Radical Muslims profess the evil of indiscriminate killing, which
is dictated by their blind hatred, even if they should themselves be
consummated by its re in the process. Tey have no use for facts (for
example the Holocaust), nor respect for values (the mass-murders
they commit without a hitch), nor concern for the victims. Because
only they, the ghters of Jihad, who are awaited in Paradise, count,
and anyone in their way should be eliminated. Tey turn their own
plight onto the Jews and accuse them of their own backwardness, op-
pression, and poverty; and they impute to Zionism the oppression of
freedom of which they themselves suer. Only a twisted mind beyond
76
repair can accuse the Jews of the Twin Tower massacre, which they
begin to believe themselves, and spread that lie as a fact, around the
world. On Tursday night, the eve of the Friday prayer day for pious
Muslims, March 6, 2008, a lone Muslim gunman from East Jerusalem,
who was employed by Israel and enjoyed the services oered by its
city government, surreptitiously made his way into a yeshiva (Jewish
religious school) in the heart of the Jewish neighborhood, and opened
gun re on unsuspecting teenage students who were rehearsing the
end of the month portion of the Torah and Talmud that they were
routinely studying and debating. Eight of them lost their lives, many
others were wounded more or less seriously, until a passing-by reserve
soldier, who had incidentally graduated from the same institution a few
years earlier and was alerted by the shooting, rushed to the reading
hall of the library where the carnage was unfolding and put an end to
the massacre. Tat rampage was not the initiative of a lunatic and lone
hatred-lled man, or the idea of a hallucinating misguided fanatic, ex-
actly as the perpetrators of September 11 (2001) in New York and July 7
(2005) in London, even if locally grown, were the satanic messengers
of worldwide Muslim organizations bent on murder and destruction.
Te next day, the well-to-do family of the killed murderer erected a
huge tent at the entrance to their house to accommodate the Muslim
well-wishers who began streaming by the hundreds to greet the be-
reaved family, not to present condolences, for his feat of hitting their
enemy at its heart, thereby attaining the hallowed status of shahid
(martyr). To boot, the mourners hoisted the ags of Hizbullah and
Hamas on the tent, all under the open eye of the Israeli forces of order
and the liberal attitude of non-interference with the lives of the Arab
Muslims in Israels capital city. Soon, the Hamas took credit for that
senseless massacre, driving any sensible human being to wonder why
a young man of twenty-one, about to wed a wife within three months,
would take that harrowing step and destroy his own life and his future.
It could not be economic want, personal despair, momentary madness,
or a family rift. It was simply hatred, inspired by the relentless Muslim
education to despise the unbelievers, demonize them, and dehu-
manize them to the point of making their lives cheap and unworthy
of respect. It was more important to harm them than to bring relief
to himself. But it must be more than that, for that horric act, like the
many other acts of terror and killings that we witness in the Muslim
world, or emanate from it, day in day out, does not explain in full the
intensity, the unbearable ease, and the persistence of these unending
77
and revolting manifestations of contempt and abuse of human life. Two
weeks later, another Arab from East Jerusalem, who was employed by
an Israeli contractor in the west part of the city, seized a bulldozer on
his site and went into a rampage in the city shoving people and cars,
including a bus full of horried passengers, until he was gunned down
by passers-by and police. Within two more weeks, that same horrible
act was repeated in another street of Jerusalem by another young Arab
of East Jerusalem, also using the same tool of shoving people and cars
with the bulldozer he was supposed to operate on his construction site.
He too was gunned down by armed citizens and police. Tis begs
the question: why should such a succession of murders of innocent
civilians be pursued by young men who were employed and living
quite comfortably in the outskirts of the city and were holding Israeli
identity cards, which they had sought for their own wellbeing in the
rst place? Why would they take the risk of depriving their fellow Arabs
from such jobs that no Israeli would trust them to hold in the future?
What other explanation is there of this successive orgy of murders than
hatred of Jews? Maybe, the answer lies in the theory voiced by French
philosopher Jean-Claude Milner that todays anti-Semitism does not
originate from old people, but from youth, and thus, it is not likely to
disappear but rather to become stronger, so it is the anti-Semitism of
the future.
46
Judging from the widespread indoctrination in the media
and textbooks for the young of the Arab world, such indoctrination
is more likely to be perpetuated there in the future than among the
youth of Europe that Milner was talking about. More often than not
we are now talking about the same youth who are indoctrinated by the
same people who draw from the same sources. In these outbursts of
anti-Semitism by Muslim youth, there is also an element of contempt
and abuse of other faiths, as when in the rst case cited above that same
Muslim murderer indiscriminately shot and ripped to pieces Torah and
Talmud books, which the students were consulting and which they left
stained with their blood when they fell to the bullets of the assassin.
And save for a few human and courageous voices of reason in Kuwait,
the mood in the Arab/Muslim world was not one of consternation,
sorrow, shame, or embarrassment, but when it was manifested at all,
as in Gaza and among other Muslim circles, it was one of jubilation
at the sight of the feat that their great hero had achieved in that
religious school at the heart of the enemy.
It was as if a Jew, or a Christian, burst into a madrasa at the heart
of the Muslim world and massacred students bent on their study. Can
78
anyone in a civilized country imagine any sign of jubilation at that
carnage? Te rest of the Muslim world was busy with its own domes-
tic massacres where people in countless thousands are eliminated on
a daily basis in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Sudan, Iraq, and many other
unreported places where human lives do not count. Expectedly, when
the killings, intentional or incidental, are committed by non-Mus-
lims, as in Iraq or Israel, they are invariably dubbed as aggression or
murder against Muslims, which in every case reaches the scope of
a massacre or a holocaust. But the many more Muslims who are
slaughtered by other Muslims and whose deaths cannot be directly
blamed on the West are simply disregarded and discounted and no
grief seems to accompany them or any account taken of them. So, the
real massacres by car-bombs and by Islamikaze assassins, of Afghani
Muslims by other Muslims, Iraqi Sunnites against Shiites, Iranian
Shiites against Sunnites, or Pakistani Taliban against their own kin, or
Hamas adepts in Gaza against their Palestinian brethren from the PLO,
go unnoticed and unreported. What imports for Muslim propaganda
is not how many Muslims are killed, but who kills them, regardless of
the reason or the justication for it.
Anti-Semitism is an irrational phenomenon, which has defied
denition, let alone explanation or justication in the past two mil-
lennia. Yet, the entire eld of study of anti-Semitism has attempted
for generations to analyze it by rational tools. For example, if we say
that murdering Jews is the result of anti-Semitic contempt and hatred,
then how to explain the massive physical elimination of other Muslims
by their coreligionists: black Muslims by Sudanese-supported Muslim
Janjaweed in Darfur, or the widespread cases of mass killings in the
Arab and Muslim world, like Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, the Palestinian
Authority, the Yemen, Algeria, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and all the rest?
Te inescapable conclusion is that the trigger-happy Muslims who
are propped by Jihad, external or internal, and their innate disregard
for human life, renders execution, capital punishment, beheading,
hanging, mass murder, mutilation, and torture an acceptable norm of
conduct. Implementing Sharia rules in domestic penal law is in itself
the best indication of the low value of human life in their eyes. When
this worldview is practiced against Jews, it is rationalized as anti-Semi-
tism against other westerners, as vengeance, self-defense, reaction to
Western arrogance, humiliation, or desecration of Muslim values;
and against others by any amount of other trumped up justications.
Underlying all those instances is the burning desire by Muslims to
79
impose by force their ideals and rules of conduct, both on their own
nationals when they are viewed as apostates, thus deserving death,
and certainly on their rivals and enemies, who are often considered
as enemies of Islam and Allah, and therefore are equally deserving
of annihilation. No debate, negotiation, compromise, or argument is
possible with this will of Allah, and therefore no perceived oense or
deviation from these rules is tolerable or forgivable.
It is often claimed that this strict interpretation of Islam with its
abuses, including anti-Semitism, is only the lot of fanatic, radical,
fundamentalist Muslims, usually quantied as some 15 percent of the
1.5 billion world Muslims, as if that were a dierent faith embracing
dierent principles than those followed by the rank-and-le Muslims.
In fact, we are talking about the same one creed, which upholds Sharia
law to various degrees, but those who do not follow it to the letter, as
in any other religion, are not adepts of an alternative moderate Islam,
the one that is sometimes dubbed religion of peace, to distinguish
from the faith of aggressive extremists. Te truth of the matter is that
no such separate Islam exists, though there are certainly many truly
moderate Muslims, who have broken away from the bloody road of
Islamic Sharia , especially when they conveniently moved to the West,
and could from a safe distance criticize the killings in their original
countries of those dubbed there apostates, or traitors, or attack
the phenomenon of the Islamikaze bombers against Westerners and
Israelis, or the culture of death that is cultivated in many Islamic lands,
or indeed the unbridled anti-Semitic calumnies that are rife in their
own culture. But they have yet to produce an alternative doctrine and
worldview that could rival o cial Islam and posit a creed and a set of
rules that can attract Muslims to relinquish the Sharia and embrace
another way. If they did, they would no longer be Muslims in the eyes
of established Islam. Moderate Muslims often accuse the radicals, who
are in fact the common Muslims who behave in accordance with the
accepted rules championed by the Sharia , of having hijacked Islam or
distorted its real meaning, or misinterpreted it, and they in turn are
condemned for having abandoned the path of Allah and having been
corrupted by Western ideologies. But it is the standards of the former
that prevail in the Islamic world.
One can simply watch the mass demonstrations in the streets of
Gaza, Quetta, Casablanca, Durban, and Jakarta, or in the Muslim
neighborhoods in Paris, London, Marseille, Amsterdam, Sydney, and
Toronto and realize how much alive, universal and popular are the
80
Muslim slogans and rampages that are performed daily against Jews
by Muslim masses of men, women, children of all walks of life, and in-
cluding their lay leaders and clerics, of all ages. Are they all radicals?
No, they are simply Muslims, and the common denominator that links
them together in their hatred of the West and the Jews is Islam, standard
Islam, under the justication of the Sharia , which is promoted by their
Imams. While some moderate and courageous Muslim individuals will
fortunately always be there to save the honor of Islam when they raise
their lone voices against the abuses perpetrated in the name of their
faith, the mainstream in the world of Islam, including westernized and
modern professionals and intellectuals, will always be there to glorify
in mirth the killings of westerners and Jews, to write or broadcast in
exhilaration in favor of the Islamikaze, and distribute in jubilation
sweets in the streets to celebrate the death of Americans or Israe-
lis. Te champions of the spurious distinction between the so-called
Islamist minority, and the peaceful Muslim majority, who become
entrapped in their reluctance for a carpet condemnation of Islam lest
they be accused of Islamophobia or racism (as if Islam were a race), if
they are non-Muslim; and of treason if they are, are also enslaved by
another distinction of their own making, which has equally no leg to
stand on. Tat is Judeophobia, a parallel to Islamophobia, to distin-
guish from anti-Semitism, which is universally condemned in those
circles, as it is no longer in vogue, at least not in public. Tey explain
to us that Islam has never been anti-Semitic, proof of their ignorance
of Islamic sources, while the current dislike of Jews is no more than
Judeophobia, which has no historical roots and has been a modern, cir-
cumstantial, and eeting phenomenon that does not warrant uncalled
for anxiety. If anti-Semitism is reduced to Judeophobia, it would merely
become a junior counterpart of Islamophobia, and a lesser evil than
anti-Semitism, and therefore less objectionable and more acceptable,
on par with Islamophobia, as a modern phenomenon in Western
society. Generally speaking, they would simplistically argue: how can
Muslims, and especially Arabs, themselves Semites, be anti-Semitic?
It is exactly this war of words, which has been engineered to ob-
fuscate substance and increase the currency of Muslim terminology,
while at the same time depriving the Jews and their supporters from
their traditional arsenal in the battle against anti-Semitism, which
we will have to tackle and clarify here. Can anyone explain in what
way the Quranic condemnation of Jews as descendants of pigs and
monkeys, which is routinely and universally preached to Muslims
81
(not necessarily radicals) by their clerics in both the Islamic world
and Europe, is Judeophobic and not anti-Semitic? Is this hallowed
Quranic reference, eternal as the Word of Allah, a circumstantial
and eeting pronouncement? To say so would be a blasphemy. It is
used by Muslim clerics, as a matter of course, in such moderate and
pro-Western countries as Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, as a con-
tinuation of the traditional way of demonizing and dehumanizing the
Jews in order to facilitate their annihilation. What more would it take
to call this a blatant anti-Semitism? Words were created to transmit
conventionally agreed upon meanings. If each actor chose to lend to
his words a dierent signicance or accuse the others of distorting
their meaning, then we would no longer be able to call a spade a spade
or communicate with others. Anti-Semitism is the millennial irrational
hatred of the Jews, and it has been called so since the onset of modern
research on this sinister issue in the nineteenth century. No amount
of masking, manipulations with words, and creation of parallels to
dilute that terminology can succeed, exactly as no coupling of the
unique term Holocaust with Armenians or Darfurians (incidentally
both perpetrated by Muslims) can blunt the poignancy of the Jewish
Holocaust or rob it of its uniqueness. No wonder, then, that the most
frequent manifestations of anti-Semitism these days, both among
Muslims everywhere and their anti-Semitic allies in Europe, has been
Holocaust denial, meaning that that devalued term in the eyes of the
deniers has acquired a generic usage for all sorts of massacres, and the
hated Jews cannot even claim to have acceded to the honor of having
been the unique victims thereof.
Anti-Semitism in the core Islamic world, which exports its teachings
to the Muslim peripheries and diasporas, consists of three layers whose
combination determines the conduct of Muslims at any given time in
any given place. Te rst is the immense anti-Jewish literature, which
is enshrined in Quranic verses, in the hadith stories, in accounts of the
sirah (the biography of the Prophet) and in treatises of jurisprudence,
which have the force of law. Te second is the massive Christian an-
ti-Semitic literature, which was adopted by Muslims in later centuries
as a result of the interaction between the two civilizations. Te third is
the wealth of reports and commentaries, which accompany, day after
day, the fortunes of the Arab-Israeli dispute, and tends to intensify or
quiet down in accordance with the swing of the war-and-peace pen-
dulum, which frequently reverses it both ways. All three layers have
become indistinguishable and have merged into one major cataract of
82
hatred and calumny, which submerges all the compartments of Judaism,
Zionism, and Israel without distinction.
Numerous in volume and overwhelming in content are the Quranic
passages, which serve as the basis of Muslim elemental anti-Semitism
and which have become the building stones of the massive propaganda
that shapes the minds of young Muslims everywhere. What is striking
is that at the same time that the foundational texts of Islam a rm their
basic contempt and hatred toward Jews (and Christians), they now
nd it expedient to deny this fact, and this denial has served many
non-Muslim apologists of Islam in their attempt to hide, obscure, or
otherwise dwarf this innate trait of Islamic history. Tis at a time when
the Quran and hadith s (traditions of Muhammad) have numerous
passages that proclaim enmity toward the Jews who are declared to be
deceivers, conspirers, and killers of Muhammad (by poisoning him). As
Mark Durie has written, Islams foundational texts express hostility to
four religious groupings: Jews, Christians, Pagans, and Muslim rene-
gades. Jihad is mandated against all four of these groups, and whereas
the rules of war are more merciless against the pagans and Muslim
renegadesfor only Jews and Christians are being allowed to keep
their faith after Islamic conquestof the two Peoples of the Book it
is the Jews who attract he most intense expressions of hatred. Tere is
less anti-Christian sentiment in the Quran and hadith s than there is
anti-Jewish sentiment, and in Muhammads biography his dealings with
the Jews of Arabialeading to a genocide of Jewish tribes in Medina,
and the bloody conquest of the Jewish oasis of Khaybarloom much
larger and are much more negative than his dealings with Christians.
47

Take for example the Islamic daily prayers, which include repeated
recitations of al-Fatihah , the opening chapter of the Quran. In these
few verses, every Muslim prays that members of his faith be guided
on the straight path of Allah, not like the Christians (those who have
gone astray) or the Jews (those who incur Allahs wrath). Tis simple
contrast, namely while Christians have lost their way, Jews have fallen
under the anger of Allah, neatly summarizes Islams attitude to the Jews.
Te standard commentators, al-Jalalayn (the Two Jalals), as well as
Ibn Kathir, whose tafsir (commentary) is popular among English-speak-
ing Muslims, explain in almost the same terms the distinction in their
discussion of al-Fatihah :
Before these two paths are the paths of the Christians and Jews, a
fact that the Believer should beware of so that he avoids them. Tis
83
signies that while the Jews abandoned practicing the religion, the
Christians lost the true knowledge. Tis is why anger descended
upon the Jews, while being described as led astray is more appro-
priate of the Christians. Tose who know, but avoid implementing the
truth, deserve the anger, unlike those who are ignorant. Te Christians
want to seek the true knowledge, but are unable to nd it because
they did not seek it from its proper resources. Tis is why they were
led astray. We should also mention that both the Christians and the
Jews have earned the anger and are led astray, but the anger is one of
the attributes more particular of the Jews. Allah said about the Jews,
Tose (Jews) who incurred the curse of Allah and His wrath ([Sura]
5:60). Te attribute that the Christians deserve most is that of being
led astray, just as Allah said about them, Who went astray before
and who misled many, and strayed (themselves) from the right path
([Sura] 5:77). Here Ibn al-Kathir is explaining that, whereas Christians
are merely ignorant, Jews know the truth but deliberately reject it,
thus making themselves objects of Allahs wrath.
48

Durie also reminds us that this libel, which is repeated in every
observant Muslims obligatory prayers, several times a day, shows that
Islams rejection of the Jews is not peripheral or negligible. Many years
ago, Durie, an active priest in Melbourne, Australia, was personally
surprised to discover hatred of Jews among the Muslims of Indonesia,
a country that has had virtually nothing to do with Jews in its history.
When Ali Amrozi, the mastermind of the mass murder in Bali, cried
out threats against Jews at his sentencing in a Balinese courtroom; this
was not because he had ever met a single Jew. His hatred was purely
theological. So, in spite of the reality of denial, which is shared by
some Jews who could not free themselves of their dhimmitude , Islams
anti-Semitic legacy is persistent and tenacious. Durie also attests that
his friend, Dr. Daniel Shayesteh who was one of the Iranian founders
of Hizbullah, became a Christian after he ed from the Ayatollahs
murderous regime. Shayesteh explains in his testimony the hatred of
Jews, which he absorbed as part of his Muslim upbringing in Iran, and
the intention of the Iranian revolutionaries to destroy Israel. Indeed,
the visceral hatred that shaped Hizbullahs dreams of conquest and
destruction has not died out, and continues to plague the world.
49

Take, for example, the infamous passage from the Book, which
is cited in sermons in the mosques throughout the Muslim world
and which depicts Jews as descendants of pigs and monkeys. We
understand today that Muhammad had pronounced those derogatory
words of the Jews when they rose against his authority in Medina at the
84
outset of his political career there. But today, when they are repeated
ad nauseam throughout the Muslim world on Friday sermons, out of
any context, they serve no other purpose than disparaging the Jews and
insulting them. What is that if not anti-Semitism, irrational as it may
be? Tat derogatory reference, which is seconded by many others,
50

has had a profound and lasting impact on Muslim thinking, behavior,
social norms, and the education of their children, and not necessarily
in areas of conict with Israel or adjacent to it, sometimes even in parts
of the world that have never seen a Jew. Andrew Bostom begins his
copious volume on Islamic anti-Semitism by a well-tailored survey of
the theological, historical, and juridical origins of Islamic anti-Semitism,
including the Holy Quran, the Hadith and the Sirah (the hagiography
of the Prophet); he proceeds to an insightful description of the dhim-
mis in the main lands of Islam, to test the theory of the cited sources
against the practice of Muslim rulers, in the entire area spanning the
Middle East, North Africa, the Iberian Peninsula (Andalusia), and the
Ottoman Empire. Te picture one gets from these documents reverses
in a dramatic way many of the ill-conceived and misjudged information,
which had attempted in the past to ascribe to the lands of Islam a much
more benign and idyllic image of their (mis)treatment of the Jews. Inter
alia , the coalition between the Palestinian Mufti of Jerusalem and the
Nazis during World War II is conjured up by the author to summarize
this introduction. Ten, the author delves in considerable detail into
the main sources of the body of Islamic jurisprudencethe Quran
and the Hadith , complemented by the Sirah where an abundance of
references, usually uncomplimentary but rather derogatory, are made
to Jews, collectively known as Israiliyyat (Israelites stories). Tis is a
trove of anti-Jewish stereotypes that have become the Sharia -based
uncontested Truth about the People of the Book. Tose accounts
are invariably cited in sermons during Friday prayers, thus assuring
their universal diusion among Muslim constituents and the constant
poisoning of the souls of young and adult Muslims alike, something
that makes their fundamentally negative attitudes to Jews and Israel
unchangeable. Tis extremely important collection from the holy
sources is supplemented by the thinking and judgment of the most
authoritative Muslim jurists whose every word has been awaited and
avidly digested by Muslim constituencies the world over. Te great me-
dieval masters such as Tabari and Jahiz, are reinforced by more recent
ones such as the Egyptian Tantawi and Egyptian in exile Qaradawi,
who represent the two poles of established Islam and popular Islam in
85
our contemporary Sunni world, though they agree among themselves
more often than not.
Finally, an impressive selection of observations made by prominent
Western scholars (Bernard Lewis excepted), and eye-witness reports
made by travelers, consular representatives, journalists, and writers
about the condition of the Jews in Arab lands is conjured up to lend
their backing to the basic, and well-documented thesis of the author,
which the anti-Semitic record of the Islamic world rather leaves much
to be desired. All in all, one can hardly exaggerate the vast importance
of this volume, which will henceforth become indispensable for any
student of Islam, of Judeo-Islamic relations, of anti-Semitism in partic-
ular and of hate-literature in general. It also provides the indispensable
background to comprehend the underpinnings of the New Muslim
Anti-Semitism, whose new avenues of hatred have come to be ex-
pressed most virulently by Ahmed Ahmadinejad, the President of Iran,
who again raises the specter of annihilating the Jews and their state.
Te paradox implied in the saying that the media achieve immediacy,
especially the widespread use (and abuse) of internet sites to diuse
the venom of radical Islam globally, has extended its applicability to the
growing Muslim populations in Europe who have become among the
chief proponents of anti-Semitism in the West today. Te old and stale
anti-Jewish stereotypes that appear in classic European anti-Semitism,
and have been copiously replicated in Arab and Muslim anti-Semitic
writings, have of late eected some new twists, concurrent with the
enhanced anti-Semitic mood in the West. Teir main sources of inspi-
ration have not changed dramatically, and they sustain their leaning
on Muslim scriptures (dubbing the Jews the descendants of apes and
swines, etc.), their borrowings from the Christian themes of Blood
Libel, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion , the world Jewish conspiracy
and the idea of poisoning in various forms caused by Jews; and their
dependence on the fortunes of the Arab-Israeli conict, in the process
parading anti-Semitism as anti-Zionism or anti-Israelism.
Te new twist consists in operationalizing the old stereotypes and
the anti-Semitic vocabulary of old into concrete acts to enhance the
monstrous image attached to the Jews, and take action to check the
wild and uncontrollable conduct of the Zionists and the Israelis, to
the point of declaring the desirability of their liquidation and preparing
the tools of mass destruction to achieve that goal. Te areas where
this new operationalization of anti-Semitism works are varied and
widespread. Here we can only briey address several of them, before
86
we reach some tentative conclusions. Tey are, rstly, using Christians,
both in the Middle East and in Europe, many of whom have succumbed
to the dhimmi state of mind, to denigrate Jews and Zionism; secondly,
to expand the range of Jew-haters and hate-mongers from obscurantist
clerics to vast strata of mainstream intellectuals and professionals;
thirdly, to encourage anti-Semitism as a legitimate tool to combat Israel;
fourthly, to prominently add to the old Christian anti-Semitic themes
also a pathological Holocaust denial; fthly, to perfect the theme of
poisoning to new heights, in line with the world of hallucinations
where many Muslims dwell; and nally, to vilify the Jews to such an
extent as to ll all crevices of the Muslim soul with a paranoiac con-
tempt and disgust of the Zionists and Israelis, so that the overt Jewish
appellation is somehow prudently circumvented.
Many of the anti-Jewish stereotypes among the Muslims are import-
ed from Western Christianity, while others are Muslim-made, but both
parties liberally borrow from each other, through the intermediary of the
Eastern Christians in the Muslim world, who master both cultures and
traditions, including as regards anti-Semitism, and who have not been
reformed by the far-reaching concessions made to Judaism by the Catho-
lic Church. Furthermore, during the al-Aqsa Intifada , which has pushed
the Islamikaze martyrs ( shuhada ) to the forefront of the Palestinian
experience, some Christians found them comparable to Christs mar-
tyrdom even as they invaded the Nativity at the height of their violence:
We kneel before the Palestinian people in the Nativity. He starves and
thirsts, but he is steadfast.... Te one who said I am hungry when
he was on the Cross was our Lord Jesus himself.... Our Palestinian
people in Bethlehem died like a crucied martyr on the rock, guarded
by Israeli soldiers armed from head to foot, who have no compassion,
love, life or tolerance.... Te Jew has a principle from which we suer
and which he tries to impose on people, and that is the principle of
Gentiles. To him, the Gentile is a slave. Tey give the Palestinians
working in Israel only a piece of bread, and tell them: this piece of
bread that you eat is taken from our children, and we give it to you so
you will live as free men in your land, but as a proletariat and a slave
in Israel, to serve us .... Te Protocols of the Elders of Zion are based
on this principle, and anyone who reads the Protocols feels that we
are in this period with the Jews.
51

When one peruses through Arab and Muslim publications and
media, one cannot help notice that the scope of anti-Semitism has
been expanding beyond obscurantist clerics or fanatically nationalistic
87
elements in those societies, and has come to embrace also supposedly
liberal, enlightened, and professional mainstream milieus. In that
discourse, the interchangeability between Jews, Zionists, and Israelis
is unmistakable when all three are alternately threatened of outright
extermination. An Egyptian, Dr. Adel Sadeq, a senior psychiatrist by
profession, who often bashed President Bush and the West for their
ignorance of the Arab psyche, had no qualms about ghting Israel to
the nish, more than two decades after his country signed peace with
it. He wrote:
What is happening now indicates that Israel will not exist for ever. We
as Arabs must know that this war will not end ..., and anyone who
deludes himself that there will be peace must understand that Israel
did not come to this region to love the Arabs or to normalize relations
with them.... Either the Israelis or the Palestinians, there is no third
option.... Tere are no Israeli civilians, they are all plunderers, for
history teaches this. I am completely convinced that the psychological
eect [of the Islamikaze] on the Israeli usurper will be his realizing
that his existence is temporary. . . . Remove the Apache [combat
helicopters] from the equation, leave them one on one with the Pal-
estinian people with the only weapon being dynamite, then you will
see all Israelis leave, because there is not even one Israeli among them
willing to don a belt of explosives.... We will throw Israel into the sea,
there is no middle ground. Coexistence is total nonsense.... Te real
means of dealing with Israel directly is those who blow themselves
up. According to what I see in the battle arena, there is no other way
but the pure, noble Palestinian bodies. Tis is the only Arab weapon
there is, and anyone who says otherwise is a conspirator.
52

If statements of this sort are made by mainstream opinion makers,
often graduates of Western universities and bearers of Ph.D. titles, es-
pecially in such moderate countries as Egypt and Saudi Arabia, how
much more so in the Muslim fundamentalist circles where license is
given to the most abominable Judeo-phobic rhetoric. At the heart of
the Egyptian establishment and consensus, for example, is the weekly
October , founded and edited by one of the most virulent anti-Semites
in the Arab worldAnis Mansour
53
who was a close associate of
President Anwar Sadat. Tis is what a retired general, Hassan Sweilem,
had to say in that journal, taken straight from the Protocols of the Elders
of Zion and the Hamas platform:
Along history, since Emperor Justinian and down to Hitler, Europes
rulers had been trying to rid themselves of the acts of violence, barba-
88
rism, corruption, conict mongering and other deeds that Jews were,
and still are, in the custom of doing in European societies ..., like, for
example, their domination of monetary systems, treasuries, banks and
commercial monopolies, which has caused widespread bankruptcy
and economic destruction. Tey also diuse drugs, prostitution, trade
of women as sexual slaves, and alcohol. Tey have also monopolized
the gold and precious stone trade, paid bribes to rulers and extorted
them throughout history.... Te Jews stood behind wars and internal
strife, and that caused European rulers to expel them and kill them.
For example, the Crusader armies, passing through the Rhine basin
on their way east, massacred them and burned their houses as an act
of repentance to their God. When the Crusaders entered Jerusalem,
they collected the Jews in a synagogue and burned them live. Teir kin
in Russia suered a similar fate.... Tey were expelled from France,
England, Germany, Hungary, Belgium, Slovakia, Austria, Holland, and
nally from Spain, after they underwent the Inquisition trials for their
conspiracy to penetrate Christian society like a Trojan horse.... Te
Jewish conspiracy to take over Europe generated civil revolutions,
wars and internal strife.... Te Cromwell Revolution failed in 1649
England, following the Jewish Conspiracy to drag England into several
wars in Europe.... Ten the French Revolution broke out, which the
Jews had planned, based on the rst conference of their rabbis and
interest-loaners that had been convened by the rst Rothschild in
1773 in order to take over all the world resources.... Tat conference
adopted 24 protocols, including the uprooting of the belief in God
from the hearts of the Gentiles, distracting people by distributing
among them literature of heresy and impurity, destruction of the
family and eradication of all morality ...
54

Tis goes on ad nauseam , evincing the primitive, delusive, and
bigoted minds of the writers and of those who facilitated those heaps
of utter nonsense to gain respectability by being published in a truly
respectable medium. Te Jews were credited in that October article
with putting Napoleon on the throne and then of causing his demise,
of the 1775 war between Britain and the nascent USA, of establishing
the Bank of America in 1881 with a view of controlling the wealth of the
edgling United States, and then of kindling the re of the American
Civil War. He told how the Protocols were written in 1770 by a German
rabbi, nanced by Rothschild, again in order to destroy all governments
and religions, spread anarchy and revolution, trigger wars, take over
the wealth of nations, spread corruption among the youth, and control
rulers by implanting in their governments Jewish ministers and advis-
ers. Tis mainstream sick mind goes on: the Jews ordered the start of
World War I, and got the United States to get involved by spreading
89
the rumor that an American ship had been sunk by the Germans.
During that war, they prepared the grounds for both Communism and
Nazism, as a follow-up to the work done by the Jews Marx and Engels
half a century earlier when they circulated the Communist Manifesto
in London. Eventually, Communism and Nazism took over power and
came to confront each other, exactly as the Jews had planned. World
War II erupted due to the limitations imposed by the Allies on the
Germans in Versailles, by order of the Jews, thus pushing the Germans
to revolution and to the rise of Hitler. Te Jews also brought about the
fall of the Ottoman Empire and they were to reap the fruit thereof by
concentrating all wealth in their hands.
55

Tis repulsive verbiage, which also includes the claim that the Jews
caused the Great Depression in order to pave the way to World War
II, is not innocently geared to disclose great new historical ndings
to the world, for educational or didactic purposes, but primarily to
discredit the Jews and point to the dangers they pose to the world,
thereby implying that the Jewish state is as dangerous to world peace
and therefore illegitimate. Tese calumnies, part of which had been
concocted for centuries in Europe and were imported to the Middle
East and then re-exported to the West, are not believed by Muslims
to be a tool of propaganda because they are so much replicated and
repeated that their forgers end up believing them as conventional wis-
dom and documented history; and because there is almost no decent
intellectual, researcher, or scientist in the Muslim world who would
dare to contradict them or question their validity, rationale, veracity,
and the authenticity of their detail, lest he be considered a traitor
to the Arab/Islamic cause. So, forged citations, made-up facts, fake
sources, trumped up accusations, and all manner of other hoaxes, for
which one can be prosecuted in civilized countries and serve prison
terms, become widespread currency in Islamic countries, for the most
part with impunity (either on the part of peer scholars or by the state).
Te innocent and misguided masses, who have neither interest in the
facts nor any way to learn them beyond the propaganda they are ex-
posed to, take that nonsense as gospel and as a legitimate way to battle
Israel and the Jews.
Islamikaze bombings by Palestinians against Israel have often been
rationalized in terms of anti-Zionism and encouraged against the
background of the pathologically vilied Jews, who have earned the
onslaughts against them due to their schemes and the dangers they
pose to the world. An Egyptian columnist, for example, preceded and
90
followed by many others, specically urged the Islamikaze to step
up their operations against the Jews, and called upon more Muslim
volunteers to join the murderers. His imagination is gruesome in its
detail and inhumanity:
... with every blow struck by al-Aqsa Intifadah , my conviction grows
stronger that I, and those like-minded, have been right all along, and
I am still right in my belief that the despised racist Jewish entity will
be annihilated. Contrary to others, however, I am not ashamed to
speak about driving them into the sea, to hell or to the trash heap
where they belong ... I maintain, and Allah is my witness, that the
annihilation and defeat of the Israelis, after which there will be no
resurrection, does not require all those things. All that is required is to
concentrate on acts of martyrdom, or what is known as the strategy
of the balance of fear. ... Let us do some mathematical calculations:
250 Palestinians have signed up for martyrdom operations, and it is
not impossible to raise their number to 1000 throughout the Arab
world ... i.e, one dai out of every 250,000 Arabs. Te average harvest
of each act of martyrdom is 10 dead and 50 wounded. Tus, 1000
acts of martyrdom would leave the Zionists with at least 10,000 dead
and 50,000 wounded. Tis is double the Israeli casualties in all their
wars with the Arabs since 1948 [sic].
56
Tey cannot bear this. Tere is
also the added advantage, not noted by many, of the negative Jewish
emigration, which as a result of 1,000 martyrdom operations, will
come to at least one million Jews, followed by the return of every Jew
to the place whence he came ... I am signing myself up as the rst
martyr from Egypt and declare that I am ready to commit an act of
martyrdom at any moment. I will place myself under the command
of Hassan Nasrallah, the Hamas, Islamic Jihad and any other Jihad
movement....
Never in my life have I asked Allah for money, honor or power. All
I have asked, all I ask, all I will ask, is that Allah allow me to become
a shahid and grant me the honor of reaping as great a harvest as
possible of Israeli lives ...
57

Tis rabid anti-Semitic hatred, which unabashedly proclaims its
genocidal aims in a mainstream journal, without encountering the least
resistance or objection from fellow writers, the authorities, the media,
the public, human rights groups anywhere, and in a country that had
signed a peace treaty with Israel more than two decades earlier, naturally
did not remain isolated in other Islamic media. In Iran, the hub of Islam-
ic violence and support for terrorism against Israel, reports came out
about funds raised to support Palestinian suicide operations against
Israel, and about promises from Tehran to Islamic Jihadists that their
91
nancial sustenance would no longer be channeled through Hizbullah
but disbursed directly to them.
58
Israel is perceived by them as a danger
to the entire region, not only to the Palestinians, and Imam Khumeini
was cited as determining that the goal of this virus [Israel], that was
planted in the heart of the Muslim world, is not only to annihilate the
Arab nation, therefore the solution is to annihilate this virus, for there
is no other treatment.... Te Islamic states and the Muslims should
initiate the annihilation of this den of corruption in every possible way.
It is permitted to use charity money for that purpose....
59
Similar calls
to annihilate the Jews have become routine in Muslim mosques as
well as in the writings of Saudi and other Muslim writers.
60

Even though Holocaust denial is not new in Muslim countries, and
sponsoring lecture tours by infamous revisionist historians (Robert
Faurisson, Roger Garaudy, and David Irving) has been going on par with
prohibiting the projection of Schindlers List within their boundaries, it
seems that since the eruption of the al-Aqsa Intifada (September 2000),
this has become one of their favorite pastimes. Tey do it not out of
concern for historical truth, but simply to sustain their long-standing
accusations against the Jews and turn the blame of terrorism against
Jews by blasting them for using organized terrorism to cultivate that
legend [of the Holocaust] and turn it into a fact which ties down the
hands of historians.
61
Te Jews are also condemned for forging his-
tory, an accusation of long date since the inception of Islam, aided
by the constant refutation by scientic articles which have proven
that never were there gas chambers, or that the numbers of the dead
were signicantly lower.
62
Some Muslim media even claimed that
far from being hurt by World War II, Jews on the contrary proted
from it, for had Japan and Germany won the war, the Jews could not
have continued to blackmail the Gentiles with their lies.
63
Abu Ma-
zen, the moderate successor of Arafat in the Palestinian leadership
also joined this cacophony of Holocaust denial in his infamous doc-
toral thesis, written in Communist Moscow and published as a book
in 1984.
64

From denying the Holocaust, or diminishing its horrors, to accusing
the Jewish victims of Nazism as having conspired with it against their
own people, as Abu Mazen did, the road is short to defending Hitler
against the oences caused him by the Jews and their supporters.
Following Western and Israeli protests to the Egyptian government
regarding the unbridled sympathy for Hitler that is current in the
92
Egyptian and Arab press in general,
65
the government daily Al-Akhbar
relented for a while but could not contain its irresistible fascination
with Hitler for long, and soon reverted to it with vengeance. Tis time
a cleric from Al-Azhar, Mahmud Khadr, entitled his contribution in
Defense of Hitler, and used the occasion to bash not only Israel and
the Jews but also the hated West:
. . . Hitler and many of his ministers took their own lives so that
they would not have to see the faces of the old ape, Churchill, and
the big bear, Stalin, who would sentence them to death with no one
to defend them.... Each one of them has a right to his defense ...,
but Hitlers executioners took his right away and attributed to him
crimes, whether he committed them or not. I do not know what would
have happened to Roosevelt, Churchill and de Gaulle, had Hitler
won. Perhaps the crimes for which they deserve the death sentence
would have been much worse than all that Hitler had done.... But
all of Hitlers crimes and infractions were forgotten, except for the
crime that was exaggerated and blown completely out of proportion,
thanks to the insistence of world Zionism to continue to stoke the
re. Te reason for this was the emotional need of the sons of Jacob
to extort Germany and to eat away at its resources. It is amazing that
Westerners, who are entitled to their own thinking, to conrming
or denying anything, including the existence of the Prophets of Al-
lah, cannot address the Jewish question, or more precisely the false
Holocaust, whose numbers and scope they have exaggerated, until it
has reached the level of the merciless destruction of six million Jews,
only because Hitler saw them as an inferior race unworthy of living
next to the Germanic race, which must rule the world.... Anyone
who knocks on this door is accused of the most horrible things, and
is tried in all Western courts for anti-Semitism ..., for two reasons:
one is due to Zionist control of thinking in the world and the degree
of oppression of thought by the Zionist propaganda apparatus in those
nations. No one can oppose this oppression for fear of going to prison
or having his livelihood or reputation threatened.... Te second is
the fear that the lies of Zionism would be exposed if the subject of
the Holocaust is investigated factually and the logical conclusions are
drawn.... Te rst dubious fact is the number of six million Jews who
were burnt in the gas chambers. Did they have children or families
who demanded compensation, or did Zionism see itself as their heir?
If we assume that everyone had an average of ve family members,
this would bring the number of the Jews aected to 30 million. It is
certain that many Jews escaped before the ship sunk, that many of
them survived, despite the so-called extermination and burning. Tis
would mean that the number of Jews in Germany amounted to 60
million, although the total number of Germans was never reached
this many.... Even if we cross o one zero from the six million and
93
we are left with a tenth of this number, it would still seem exaggerated
and would have to be investigated ...
66
.
It is di cult to imagine that the writer did not know the numbers of
Germanys population during the war, or that most of the exterminated
Jews were not German but Polish, Baltic, or Soviet, or that since entire
Jewish families, often over three generations, were decimated, no heir
was left behind to claim damages. All these harrowing manipulations
of numbers, of which Abu Mazen was also guilty and which have no
leg to stand on, are pages taken from the books of Shoah deniers and
have no other purpose than to diminish its dimensions and accuse
the Jews of its ination. A follow up of that line of thought has been
to show that Hitler had no reason to exterminate so many Jews, so in
fact, he did not. But deniers of the Shoah , including Arabs and Mus-
lims, are caught in the contradiction of both diminishing its numbers,
in order to relegate the horror to a footnote in history as Jean-Marie
Le Pen would have it, but at the same time explaining and blowing up
the threat that Jews posed to the Germans, hence the imperative
to eliminate them.
Te repetitive use of the Protocols and the Blood Libel in the Arab
media, especially the manufacturing of new popular telenovelas and
other documentary series on television during the peak-watching
month of Ramadan, create the ambience in which any calumny against
the Jews is readily believed and repeated in other media as well, not
least in countries such as Jordan and Egypt, which have supposedly
made peace with Israel. In this atmosphere, the most abominable lies
spread about the Jews are picked up and diused, and the masses are
only too eager to absorb them, and further spread them around as
facts, without investigation or critique. Te most virulent kind of hoax
of this sort, which easily catches up and propagates, are the stories of
poisoning that are attributed to the Jews, and certainly originate from
the well-poisoning calumnies inherent in European anti-Semitism. One
could hear Yasser Arafat often attributing to Israel the distribution of
poisoned sweets among Palestinian children in order to maim them,
or the use of depleted uranium in bullets that quell the Intifada in
order to sexually incapacitate Palestinian ghters and thus contribute
to diminishing their numbers. At the height of this campaign, the
Palestinian representative in the Human Rights Commission in Ge-
neva, a doctor Abdallah Ramlawi, accused Israel of injecting the HIV
virus into three-hundred Palestinian children in order to impair their
94
reproduction organs. When Israel sent its experts to Egypt to develop
high-tech agriculture in the Nile Delta area, with astounding results,
reports abounded in the press that the Jews had no other purpose in
coming to Egypt, which did not need them and could itself teach them
what agriculture was all about, than poisoning the soil of Egypt and
destroying its age-old and advanced farming. Papers also recycled
ad nauseam the allegation that Israel distributed, through the Arab
world an aphrodisiac, chewing gum geared to raise the sexual desire of
Muslim women in order to lead them astray. But perhaps, the greatest
hoax in this regard, which was constructed by Palestinians and then
built up by other Arabs, Muslims, the UN, the European press, and
even the Red Cross, and became cause celebre during the months of
MarchApril 1983, was the story of poisoning school girls in the
Jenin district, which was then under Israeli rule. Against all available
evidence, and in spite of the fact that a number of o cial investigations
were launched by Israel and international bodies, which produced no
incriminating ndings, the story reverberated across the world, until
proven false.
67

But even then, no one outside Israel found it necessary to castigate
the manufacturers of the hoax. Te end result was that the Palestinians,
and other Arabs and Muslims for that matter, discovered that splashing
mud on Israel could go on with impunity, and they pursued their prac-
tice wholeheartedly. It is interesting to note that the depleted uranium
story and the AIDS injection hoax followed the girls-poisoning episode.
After the September 11 (2001) horror and the onset of the Anthrax
panic in the United States, the scientic Egyptian journal al-ilm , turned
the tables on the United States and Israel, accusing them of the most
hideous war crimes, including the use of non-conventional weapons
of mass destruction. With regard to Israel and the Jews, this is what
this scientic publication had to say:
... In the summer of 1949 cholera spread throughout Egypt, following
the establishment of Israel in 1948. Egyptian documents indicate that
the disease originated from Israel.... Te US used germs in Vietnam
and against North Korea and China.... Biological weapons research
is being conducted by Israeli universities. Prior to the October War
(1973) they injected birds with germs and released then above Jordan,
Palestine and the Suez Canal.... Te US and Israel keep biological
weapons at American bases; if they were to be used, they would
destroy half the population of the area under attack. Some of this
weaponry makes women miscarry.... Also, Jewish tourists infected
95
with AIDS are traveling around Asian and African countries with
the aim of spreading the disease.... It is no coincidence that the US
is the only member of the UN that has not signed the agreement on
punishment for the collective annihilation of people ... Israel con-
tinues to use germ warfare to destroy the Palestinian people on its
occupied land, thus challenging the international community ...
68

Tese materials are so repetitive, steady, omnipresent, prevalent,
and diused among all strata of Arab and Islamic society that they are
regarded as a matter of course. Children are educated in their light,
the educated adults read or write about them in the press, clerics
preach them in mosques, politicians occasionally refer to them in their
public addresses, and the media, written and electronic, abound with
them. To the point that they have become part of the infrastructure
of education and socialization in those countries. Te hierarchies in
those societies, including those who have signed peace with Israel, do
nothing to criticize the writers, much less to call them to task or to
prosecute them. Quite the contrary, the authorities turn a blind eye,
some of them blinking in approval, which in turn is interpreted as
o cial backing for these atrocious pronouncements. In turn, these
writings, especially those emanating from Egypt, which is considered
the cultural hub of the Arab world, are widely read, cited, and appre-
ciated and create a mood of expectation from more writers to produce
such vitriolic pieces. One has to admit, nevertheless, that the leniency
with which Israel deals with these matters, not insisting on their total
elimination as prerequisite to any diplomatic exchange, in itself unwill-
ingly contributes to their persistence. It is not enough to demand that
an end be put to incitement against Jews in Muslim countries, but that
a mechanism for monitoring those abominations and acting upon its
ndings must be devised, if we can hope that the vitriol might decrease
one day to allow for a reconciliation of the hearts to occur between Israel
and its neighbors. We remember that when Jrg Haiders party joined
the Austrian coalition, the Israeli government reacted so swiftly that
the Ambassador of Israel in Vienna was recalled, even though Haider
recanted on his pro-Nazi statements. In the case of the Arab leaders,
clerics, intellectuals, and columnists, the anti-Jewish vitriol is much
stronger, more threatening, widespread, and persistent, but o cial Is-
rael dares not say or do anything against it. Te Holocaust denier, Abu
Mazen, has become Israels moderate, peace-loving partner while the
Arab media, even in the countries that signed peace with Israel, pursue
96
their anti-Semitic campaigns unabated, while their rulers who could
control them if they wished to, look the other way. How then can they
or the rest of the world take Israels protests seriously?
Notes
1. See e.g., Suras 2: 61, 4: 4446, 4: 16061, 9: 3031, 5: 64, 5: 82 and more.
2. Tis is an Islamic medieval literary genre, which told imaginary stories
of remote kings, peoples and countries that were told by story tellers to
satisfy the curiosity of the audiences, which could neither travel nor read
for themselves.
3. Gitit Ginat, Freedom ghter, www.haaretz.com, May 18, 2006.
4. See R. Israeli, Muslim Anti-Semitism in Christian Europe: Elemental and
Residual Anti-Semitism ( New Jersey: Transaction, 2009).
5. For details of such accusations, see R. Israeli, Peace is in the Eye of the
Beholder ( Berlin and New York: Mouton, 1985).
6. Al-Riyadh , Saudi Arabia, November 22, 2001.
7. Al-Usbu , Cairo, February12, 2001. Cited by Al-Quds al-Arabi ( London),
February13, 2001. Translated by MEMRI, No 188, February 22, 2001.
8. Qiraa Fiqh al-Shahada, ( Readings in Islamic Martyrology) was published
in 1988 as a special addendum to Al-Islam wa-Filastin (Islam and Palestine)
that appeared in Nocosia, Cyprus, and has been the ideological supporter
of the Palestinian Islamikaze operations against Israel. See Ibid. June 5,
1988, 7.
9. Akhbar al-Yaum, Kuwait, November 3, 2001.
10. Al-Risalah, Gaza, September 13, 2001. Cited (in Hebrew) by MEMRI, Terror
in America, No 1.
11. Al-Gumhuriyya, Cairo, October 7, 2001. See MEMRI 289, October 19,
2001.
12. Cited in R. Israeli, Islamikaze etc ., 290.
13. Ibid.
14. See R. Israeli, Islamikaze etc., Chapter 1, 1132.
15. Former President Rafsanjani spoke of using a nuclear bomb against Israel.
See Iran News, Kayhan an d al WIfaq, December 15, 200 1. Memri, 325,
January, 2002. See also Al-Shab, Egypt, September 23, 2001.
16. Al-Qaida Spokesman, Suleiman Abu Gheith, in an article titled In the
Shadow of the Lances, and also Ayman al-Zawahiris article in Al-Mujahidin.
For both, see Memri , June 12, 2002.
17. Bernard Lewis, How did the Indels Win? National Post , June 1, 2002 .
18. For the most comprehensive and authoritative study to date, see Majid
Khadduri, War and Peace in Islam ( Johns Hopkins, 1967).
19. See Moshe Sharon, Hudna and Sulh in Islam, (Hebrew), Nativ, (Summer,
2002).
20. See repeated references to this in the Charter of the Hamas, See R. Israeli,
Islam and Israel ( University Press of America), Chapter 7, 12370.
21. See Bernard Lewis, op. cit.
22. e.g., Raphael Israeli Identity and State-building: Educating Palestinian
Children after Oslo, Journal of Terrorism and Political Violence ( Spring
2002) .
97
23. See R. Israeli, Poison: Modern Manifestations of a Blood Libel ( Lanham and
New York: Lexington Books, 2002).
24. Quran, Sura 5:51.
25. 2: 191.
26. 9: 123.
27. 9: 5.
28. 9: 3.
29. 5: 10.
30. 9: 28.
31. 22: 1922.
32. 22: 9.
33. e.g., Raphael Israeli Identity and State-building: Educating Palestinian
Children after Oslo, Journal of Terrorism and Political Violence ( Spring
2002) .
34. Cited in R. Israeli, Te Islamic Challenge in Europe (New Jersey: Transaction,
2008), 39.
35. Ibid.
36. Ibid., 4142.
37. See R. Israeli, Muslim Anti-Semitism in Christian Europe ( Transaction,
2009).
38. See for details, R. Israeli, Islamikaze etc... , especially, Chapter 2, 3370.
39. Le Point, 1727, October 20, 2005, 37.
40. Interviews with Sheikh Qaradawi, Homosexuals Should be Punished like
Fornicators, but their Harm is less when not done in Public, Al-Jazeera,
June 5, 2005. Taped on video by Memri 1170, June 5, 2006.
41. Andrew Norfolk, Our Followers must live in Peace until Strong enough to
wage Jihad, Te Times, September 8, 2007.
42. Al-Sharq al-Awsat, July 19, 2003. Tese passages are translated and sum-
marized in R. Israeli, Muslim Minorities, in the Modern States ( New Jersey:
Transaction, 2009), 1013.
43. Andre Malraux, June 3, 1956. Cited in Valeurs Actuelles ( Paris, December
2001).
44. See R. Israeli, Islamikaze: Manifestations of Islamic Martyrology ( London:
Frank Cass, 2003).
45. See R. Israeli, Blood Libel and its Derivatives (Transaction , 2012).
46. Claude Meyer, Interview with Jean-Claude Milner, the author of Te Crim-
inal Inclinations of Democratic Europe, in Actualites Juives Hebdo, No 823,
December 11, 2003. Cited by Manfred Gerstenfeld, Antisemitism: Integral
to European Culture, Post Holocaust and Antisemitism, no 19 (April, 2004):
4, published by the Jerusalem Center of Public Aairs.
47. Mark Durie, On Islamic Antisemitism, ICJS Research , Melbourne, June
23, 2008.
48. Ibid.
49. Ibid.
50. See e.g., Suras 2: 61, 4: 4446, 4: 16061, 9: 3031, 5: 64, 5: 82, and
more.
51. Al Manar Television, Lebanon-Hizbullah, April 24, 2002.
52. Iqra Television, Saudi Arabia and Egypt, April 24, 2002. See Memri 373,
April 30, 2002.
98
53. For some of his most harrowing condemnations of the Jews, see R. Israeli,
Peace is in the Eye of the Beholder ( Berlin and New York: Mouton Publishers,
1985), especially the concluding chapter.
54. October , June 17, 2001.
55. Ibid.
56. In fact the amount of Israeli casualties has long surpassed the 20,000 mark,
that is, four-fold the authors estimate.
57. Al-Usbu, Egypt, May 28, 2001. Memri 224, June 4, 2001.
58. Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, London, June 8, 2002.
59. Al-Manar Television, Hizbullah, Lebanon, June 2, 2002.
60. Al-Mustaqbal Lebanon, March 19, 2002; Al-Ukadh, Saudi Arabia, Novem-
ber 22, 2001; Al-Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, November 22, 2001.
61. Al-Wafd (Egypt), February 13, 2000; al-Ahram, April 19, 2000; and the
Egyptian Gazette, April 20, 2000.
62. Al-Ahram, December 30, 1999.
63. Al-Hayat, January 31, 2000; Al-Akhbar, January 26, 2000, A l-Ahram, April
18 and May 17, 2000; Te Egyptian Gazette , April 17, 2000, and more and
more.
64. Te Secret Ties between the Nazis and the Zionist Movement Leadership
(Arabic), Dar Ibn Rushd, Amman, 1984.
65. See R. Israeli, Peace is in the Eye of the Beholder ( Berlin: Mouton, 1987),
especially 3334, 231, 326 and more.
66. Al-Akhbar, May 27, 2001. See Memri 231, June 20, 2001.
67. See R. Israeli, Poison: Manifestations of a Blood Libel (New York and Oxford:
Lexington Books, 2002).
68. Al-Ilm (Science) Egypt, November 2001, Memri 322, December 28, 200

Truth-Bending Propensities
of Politics and Political
Ideologies
99
2
History writing has always been faced with the perennial questions
of truth versus history, fact versus perception, and the interaction
between all those concepts. Is truth something factual that happened
or an event that unfolded, or is truth the way people relate to those
happenings? Is truth culture-bound or is it universal? Is it an objective,
measurable quantity, or a subjective value-laden quality? Is what his-
torians tell us the Truth, or is every narrative presented to and by the
historian an aspect of the truth? Can history, fact, and truth be related
by anyone objectively and independently of values and perceptions?
What is more operationally true: something that happened but people
dismiss as insignicant, or something that did not happen but occupies
the center of their concerns and activities?
When Israelis were stunned on the Eve of Passover 1983 by the
spreading rumors that Palestinian girls in the West Bank were poisoned
by some unknown agent,
1
they were incredulous at rst, then defensive
about it all, and nally outraged at the broadsides against them not only
by the Arabs, but also by the world media. Tey felt hounded, all over
again, by the specter of anti-Semitism, blood libel, and persecution, and
helpless to make themselves understood. Te Arabs in general and the
Palestinians in particular, in whose domain it all happened, felt victims,
as usual, to the machinations of their Israeli occupiers. Teir fears were
genuine, for they touched upon their sense of despair and the fragil-
ity of their national existence, in the aftermath of the 1982 Lebanese
War, in which they lost their Lebanese launching pad against Israeli.
Te rest of the Arabs were, understandably, all too happy to indulge
in yet another opportunity of Israel bashing, and they embarked on
it wholeheartedly, taking the Palestinian narrative of the story as the
100
true point of reference. Te Europeans, and particularly the French,
who had masterminded, sponsored, and executed Arafats extrication
from Lebanon, following the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)
debacle there, reported the Palestinian grievances against Israel and
seemed to lend credence to them. Other Europeans, who were more
skeptical and inquisitive about it at rst, were also swept by the facts-
speaking-for-themselves syndrome, and ended up seriously question-
ing Israels mode of behavior and moral standards. Te Americans,
more sympathetic to the Israeli plight, in spite of their visible moral
outrage at the wrong that was reported as being done to the Palestin-
ians, showed more of a sense of balance than the others. But no one
seemed at that point to question the chain of events as reported in
the media, nor attempted independent investigations as would bet
solid investigative journalism, in order to establish the facts. So, as the
events unfolded, mixed with blunt accusations and unfounded rumors,
and radiated around the world, inated and amplied according to
each countrys taste, propensity, or political needs, various versions
crystallized, a true Rashomon story, with no internationally authori-
tative or credible agent stepping in to impose a unied and acceptable
to all tales.
At the end, when international experts got into the matter and in
fact embraced the Israeli version that it was a mass hysteria of Pales-
tinian youth,
2
almost no reporter, much less politician and diplomat,
apologized for having tainted the reputation of an entire country by
their lazy and ill-founded libelous reports and statements, which
meant in fact that not the objective truth prevailed, but the bigoted
and biased reports in the press, on the United Nations (UN) podium,
in Arab and Islamic chanceries, and on television screens. Te hoax
became a fact and almost no one had the decency to retract what was
falsely said against a whole nation, as long as it served his political aims.
But in the process world organizations such as the Red Cross and the
World Health Organization who delved into the matter, either refused
to publish their exonerating ndings vis--vis Israel, or argued that
the Palestinian victims of their own hoax were, in any case, aected
by the poison of occupation. Namely, it was no longer important or
relevant to nd the facts and deal with them, but to bend them to their
political biases. Even Jeane Kirkpatrick, the staunch supporter of Israel
who served at the time as the American Ambassador to the UN, was
swept by the prevailing hostile mood in the UN and scolded Israel for
the deeds it did not do.
Truth-Bending Propensities of Politics and Political Ideologies
101
One can reverse the conventional wisdom that what was not shown
on the screen did not happen and claim that what is shown on the
screen did happen even if it did not in reality. Te Poison Aair of
1983 indeed showed that the orchestrated press attack on Israel for an
event that was later proven as a mammoth hoax, did create a reality
that had nothing to do with facts on the ground. It also proved that
politics and political bias, which are used by politicians and bigots
to bend the truth, can also be a tool in the hands of journalists and
their editors to manipulate the truth. Without the press and the other
media, the political statements of politicians have no readers and no
echo; therefore, one has to recognize that the media are an active par-
ticipant and partner in spreading lies and bigotry, as was the case with
the Poison Aair of 1983. Tis inuence of the media was recognized
as a factor in the diusion of the hoax, by all commissions of inquiry
and the independent researchers who tackled the issue. When the hoax
developed and spread in the West Bank of Jordan, it came against a
fertile background that lent itself to this sort of anti-Israel bashing. In
the previous summer, Israel had launched its incursion into Lebanon
in order to uproot from there the PLO bases, which were pestering
the lives of Israeli inhabitants in the Galilee. At that time, the PLO
ghters and their Muslim fundamentalist allies, aided by Syria and
the Soviets, were termed by the Western media as progressives,
while the Christians who opposed them, with Israels assistance, were
dubbed reactionaries. A German reporter could tell his readership
that the city of Saida was razed to the ground by the Israeli navy,
while in eect all movie theaters, department stores, and hotels were
operating at full scale, and the streets were as busy with tra c as any
middle size European city. Being the headquarters of the PLO in the
area, the city was certainly damaged during the ghting, but nothing
even remotely close to the descriptions in the media. Te reporter
probably had Dresden or Berlin in mind, while the damage was closer
to London or Coventry.
3

Figures were also quoted from PLO sources or simply trumped up,
at times in spite of their absurdity. For example, in June 1982, the PLO
announced that 600,000 refugees were eeing southern Lebanon as a
result of the Israeli incursion, which is almost double the entire pop-
ulation of that area. A gure of 10,000 killed Lebanese was also often
quoted without anything to substantiate it. Pictures were broadcast and
printed of mosques and hospitals partly hit by Israeli bombs, but some
forgot to mention that they had been turned into military positions or
102
strongholds, which produced hellish re, while hiding behind innocent
patients and worshippers; or pictures of wounded teenagers, neglecting
to mention that they were part of the RPG kids, trained by the PLO
to re those anti-tank missiles against Israelis. Incidentally, the same
tactics were pursued by the Hamas during the 20082009 Israeli in-
cursions into Gaza, in retaliation to their previous seven-year shelling
and bombing of Israeli towns and villages along that strip. However,
there was no sign in those pictures in the Arab press and the Western
press of those days that condemned the Israeli incursion lock, stock,
and barrel of the miles of underground tunnels, dug by the PLO to store
weapons for the sustenance of their daily attacks against the Galilee,
or in preparation for terrorist raids against Israeli towns and villages.
Tere were no pictures either of Israeli children who had lived for years
in underground shelters to escape those attacks, which had triggered, in
the rst place, the Israeli mopping up operation.
4
Te one-sided reports
where only the damages caused by Israel were reported, but not the
killings and destruction that occasioned them, of course distorted the
truth, leaving the watchers and readers with the clear impression that
innocent Palestinians were attacked by Israel for no reason. Reporting
on a boxing match by depicting only the blows inicted by one party,
and not the other, of course becomes an insignicant story of shadow
boxing.
One of those pictures, which impressed the world and shaped its
negative bias of Israel, was repeatedly shown in European television
networks, was of a Palestinian father carrying in his arms the corpse
of his killed daughter, an early version of what was to recur on French
Television during the 2000 Aqsa Intifada with the Muhammed al-Dura
aair.
5
But the sequence of that picture, shown on Israeli television but
never aired in Europe, shows the little girl getting out of her fathers
embrace and walking in apparent good health to his side. Another
scene, also diused ad nauseam in the European networks, sports a
Lebanese woman begging something from an Israeli soldier. Te jour-
nalists caption was that the woman was asking, Until when will you
kill us? while the soldier who was indierent to her suering simply
smiled and shrugged his soldiers in total apathy. An Israeli technician
who spoke Arabic got hold of the soundtrack and deciphered the dialog
between the two:
Te womanWhen are you going to rid us of those thugs? (meaning
PLO terrorists who had forced themselves on the Lebanese population
103
in the south since the 1970), to which the Israeli soldier reacted with
a smile, a shrug of his soldiers and an apologetic: sorry, it is not up
to me!
6

In August 1982, UPI circulated worldwide the picture of a little
seven-month-old baby girl, who had lost her two arms in an Israeli
bombing raid. Te world was understandably shaken by that horror,
as it had been by the burning Vietnamese child after an American na-
palm bombing more than a decade earlier, which was later identied
as the turning point in that war. President Ronald Reagan placed the
picture of that girl on his desk, as she came to symbolize Israeli hor-
rors in Lebanon, which he too condemned. But the Israeli Director of
the Ministry of Health, Baruch Modan, who was to play a role in the
Poison Aair a year later, sent a special task force to Lebanon (some-
thing the Americans never did to redress their napalm-bombed
victims), to nd the girl and inquire about the circumstances of her
wounding in order to help restore her physical capacities. Te child,
a boy, was located and found to have suered some burns, and one of
his arms was bandaged, but he had both arms, neither was amputated.
UPI, apprised of the facts, did recognize its mistake publicly on August
24, 1982, but the damage to Israels image became irreversible. Only
several of the papers who published the pictures found it necessary
to rectify their misreporting, and the Washington Post , which was
one of those few, printed its apology on page 14, while the original
picture had been splashed on page 1. On August 2, the US News and
World Report published the picture of a woman in Beirut, crying over
the death of her son on his toms, as a result of the Israeli invasion.
But the Arabic inscription on the tombstone simply stated that Khaled
Ballaty died on August 10, 1980, two full years prior to the Israeli
incursion.
7

Te campaign of misinformation, if not of disinformation, took its
toll on the perception of Israel by Western public opinion. During this
sequence of events, and in spite of Israels protests at the distortion and
one-sidedness of the reporting, Western media, notably the French,
were inundated by letters to the editor on behalf of individuals, or-
ganizations, trade unions, politicians, and others who were outraged
by Israels barbaric conduct. French President Francois Mitterand, a
self-proclaimed friend of Israel, went as far as comparing the bombing
of Beirut by Israel to the Nazi wiping of the village of Oradour in France
during the war, explaining to the Israelis that this time they had gone
104
too far. Te comparison was rejected out of hand by the President
of Israel, who explained that while besieged Beirut was stued with
thousands of Palestinian PLO ghters who were vowed to the destruc-
tion of Israel, and had in fact committed hundreds of murders in Israel,
and were armed to the teeth and launching missiles at Israeli civilians.
Oradour had been inhabited by peaceful and unarmed civilians, who
fell prey to Nazi murderous policy of retaliation against hostages,
where an act of resistance harmed the occupation armies of the Reich.
But the comparison, once made, was never retracted and it stuck with
public opinion.
Te very negative image of Israel in the press persisted during the
three-month long Israeli siege of Beirut, which was geared to extract
from it the PLO ghters who had taken refuge there after they were
uprooted from Southern Lebanon by the Israeli operation. It came to
a crescendo following the Sabra and Shatilla massacres of September
1982, where Christian allies of Israel murdered Palestinians in those
two refugee camps, and the blame was squarely put on Israel, because
self-agellating Israelis took that blame upon themselves by establish-
ing a commission of inquiry, which regarded Ariel Sharon, and other
Israeli high o cials as guilty for not having foreseen that the Christian
Lebanese were capable of slaughtering their Palestinian enemies. Had
these uniquely high moral standards been followed by other nations,
the terrible massacre of Srebrenica, committed by Serbs against the
Muslims of Bosnia during the Bosnian War (19921995)
8
one decade
later, while the Dutch military were looking, should have provoked
the dismissal of the top brass of the reputedly impeccable political and
military leadership of Holland. But no, nothing happened, not even an
apology. Te world media did not take those massacres as yet anoth-
er manifestation of the animosity, which had nurtured the Lebanese
civil was for years, before Israel intervened in it in self-defense, but as
another crime committed by Israel, although it was totally innocent
from it. Since the Christians were allied of Israel, it was her to blame,
not the murderers themselves. Conversely, the image of Arafat and the
PLO war boosted, not only as the victims of Israel and its Christian
allies, but also as the valiant ghters who had withstood the Israeli
siege and were evacuated from Beirut aboard French battle ships while
ashing V signs for victory, with Israel watching helplessly, while it
could have prevented that evacuation easily. After that, Arafat was
triumphantly received in Paris and the Vatican, while Israels image
was at its lowest ebb.
105
Te Poison Aair in the West Bank broke out merely six months after
these events. No wonder then that the same media that bashed Israel,
often unjustly, during the Lebanese War were only too predisposed
to take up the same themes again of Israels cruelty, occupation, and
genocide against the Palestinians, its policy of expansion at the expense
of the oppressed Palestinians, and all the rest. While the above may
explain the anti-Israeli bias in the European press during the Poison
Aair, which grossly distorted the facts and the news reports, and gave
birth to outright lies as explained above, one word should be said of
the eects of those publications on the unfolding of the Poison Aair
itself. One study was completed to date that specically addresses this
issue from a Western perspective, which investigated the role of the
media in the two cases of mass hysteria in Massachusetts (Norwood
1978 and Templeton 1981), which unfolded very similarly to the West
Bank Aair and were very close to each other in time.
9
Indeed, after
examining the major and local newspapers in New England and the
localities concerned, the researchers came up with such headlines as:
Mother and Children sat in the waiting room, wide-eyed and fright-
ened, or Te children simply began falling like dominoes, which were
both not only factual, but also emotionally loaded. What was more,
the article in question was printed side by side with unrelated write
ups about local environmental pollution, which unwittingly created an
association of the two phenomena in the minds of the readers. Pictures
were also published in some papers, showing tearful, frightened chil-
dren, who were aected by the illness, or parents waiting outside the
hospital emergency room. None of the media pinpointed a special cause
for the outbreak (in the case of the West Bank it was clear that Israeli
mischief must have been the cause), and the community was split in its
view as to whether the mystery illness resulted from a psychological or
an unidentied organic agent. At any rate, some important conclusions
were drawn in that research, which threw light on the participation of
the press in creating and diusing the West Bank Hoax and in distort-
ing the minds of politicians and journalists and anyone else who was
politically disposed to embrace anti-Israeli bigotry:
1. Although media coverage often reects the heightened emotional
climate during outbreaks of mass hysteria, it may have less impact
on the course of the epidemic than suggested by other research-
ers, but this does not mean that the media have no eect on the
anxiety or the beliefs in the community. Te classic example cited
106
is Orson Wells 1938 War of the Worlds radio broadcast; although
announced as a ctional play several times during the program, it
spread panic throughout the country and millions were convinced
that the Martians were actually landing. So, in both the cases of the
Martian landing and the West Bank Poison, there was an outside
enemy who was perceived as intruding into their social fabric, and
the hysteria was directly related to it. In Massachusetts, by compar-
ison, all accepted that it was an internal aair that they had to deal
with, therefore they deemed it controllable, and that removed much
of the fear. As the West Bankers and New Yorkers were struck by
some unfathomable outsiders, the press sided with them against
the common enemy.
2. Te report of the ndings revealed that the information transmit-
ted by picture had more impact than that conveyed by print. Tere
seems to be a causality between the second outbreak of the epidemic
in the West Bank, or of the secondary outbreaks thereof, and the
number of diused pictures. Te explanation is that the symptoms
of mass hysteria are characteristically spread by sight, and the pub-
lished images of aected patients may trigger the same symptoms
elsewhere, especially among young persons.
3. Pre-existing concerns in the community, which are spread by the
media could contribute to the epidemic. In the West Bank, the
outbreak occurred in a setting of high political and psychological
tension.
4. On the question on why the media get involved in epidemic illness
outbreaks, the authors of the study had this to say:
Te medias di cult task is to condense complicated and intricate
information into stories which occupy limited amounts of space
or time. Tey have, therefore, the need to simplify the complex,
overlook grey zones and make issue appear black and white.
Te media have the secondary task of turning a prot by selling
newspapers, ad space, sponsor time etc. Both tasks lead to the
tendency to sensationalize caricature and focus on worst case,
attention-grabbing hypotheses to explain events, thus making
news of events that might otherwise attract no attention. Why
should people be concerned about a few youngsters fainting and
getting stomach aches unless there is a ploy to poison them, or
their mysterious illness is caused by a chemical pollution? Te in-
cidents themselves may not be newsworthy, but the attribution of
a severe cause, more ominous than the actual severity of the illness
suggests, makes them news. As the time course of the reporting
about the outbreaks display, media interest stops abruptly once
the newsworthy cause is no longer an issue.
10

107
Tese conclusions clearly corroborate both hypotheses of the media
inuence on cases of mass hysteria, although the extent of that inu-
ence is debatable in non-conictual situations, like in Massachusetts.
Tey clearly establish that the media, especially the visual ones, do
have an impact on the diusion of the epidemic; and that the media
perpetuate, as long as they can, the newsworthiness of the epidemic, in
order to serve their own interest or political leanings. But in the West
Bank where these two assumptions were admirably at work, there was
also an Israel to blame, which extended the newsworthiness until the
Atlanta Center exonerated the scapegoat. And when it became evident
that Israel was not involved, and on the contrary made every eort
to expose the malaise and help remedy it, nor was there any poison-
ing in the rst place, then the accusations of the press shifted to the
occupation, the general welfare of the population under oppression,
in order to justify, post factum , as it had done a priori , the falsehood
of intentional poisoning by Israel. Except that the Arabic and Islamic
press in general does not need this kind of logical meandering to nd
rationalizations and justications for anything. Te condemnation of
Israel, which can do no good, is taken as a matter of course, and the
Poison Aair of the West Bank, which was taken up immediately by this
press, without hesitation or question mark, was from its point of view
just the latest manifestation of Israels evil, which was to be expected.
Te Arab masses had been indoctrinated for years about the evils of
Jews, Israel and Zionism, therefore the Poison Aair, was only one of the
long record of Israeli horrors, which by nature bathed in unscrupulous
considerations and harrowing deeds. It was no coincidence that in the
communiqus released by all Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian authorities
regarding this event, reference was always made to We told you, or
as has been Israels wont, or we always knew, or we knew, but now
Israel has attained a new low, etc.
Another feature of Arab and Muslim reporting in general is that in-
vestigative reporting did not exist then, and it only made its appearance
in the Jazeerah network that was launched in the mid-1990s. Even there,
all criticism is allowed except for the persona of the Qatar monarch,
which owns the channel and hosts it in its capitalDoha. In those days,
and this is very much the case still today, once a slogan was emitted by
some party, or an Arab communiqu is issued by an Arab country, or
the Arab League, one was bound to hear it repeated ad nauseam by all
Arab and Muslim media and writers and government. Te media did
not reect public opinion in those countries, because there was none,
108
but shaped it by ukaz of the governments, who also dictated the Friday
sermons throughout the entire land. Only the voice of the dictator
counted, and the media, which were either owned by the governments
or guided by the authorities, had to toe the line or else, for any dissent
was considered subversive and combated accordingly. Unlike the media
in Western liberal democracies, which are assumed to reect various
shades of voices or inclinations of particular constituencies, the media
in the Arab world of those days (which are admittedly beginning to
change since the Arab Spring), reected a uniformity characteristic
of totalitarian regimes, where the only allowed voice was that of the
ruler. For the ruler comprised among his arrogated prerogatives his
right to teach his people and direct them on what a sound policy of a
righteous leader ought to be. And once that policy was spelled out, no
one would dare to question it.
Te Arab and Islamic media, predictably and understandably, de-
vote much more space to Israel and the Arab-Israeli dispute than to
any other single topic, especially so the Palestinians, whose national
existence and daily livelihood depend so much on their Jewish neigh-
bor. Te two parties have become so obsessed with that they publish
detailed statistics of each other of the others security, economy, polit-
ical system, military power, etc. It would be futile to try to show that
one sides view of the other is more authentic, scientic, or closer
to the truth than the others. Because Arab perception is unquestion-
ably regarded as Truth by the Arab and Islamic world. Terefore one
must turn to the description of the continuity of Arab and Palestin-
ian perceptions of Israel and the Jews, as they are reected in their
media, and made the Poison Aair, and other delusionary narratives
credible in their eyes. Jews in general are constantly perceived in
the Arab media as incorrigibly and hopelessly corrupt, evil, greedy,
immoral, intriguing, and unconcerned with anyone except them-
selves. Amazing descriptions of Israeli soldiers cavorting in the Aqsa
Mosque, or conducting sexual orgies in the Tomb of the Patriarchs
in Hebron, are not arguments one should even try to refute. Tey will
probably in Arab history books like the veried fact that the bitter
waters of the Zamzam wellspring in Mecca are the sweetest in the
world, or that Jerusalem, in traditional Jewish perception is the navel
of the world. For, what seems pure slander to Israel, is the authentic
Arab perception of it, and so is the dierence of perceptions between
the Israelis and the Arabs as regards the Poison Aair. More recent-
ly, the PLO leadership, which says that it wishes to make peace with
109
Israel, went into a campaign of praise and aggrandizement of some
of its national heroes, while Israel is outraged by that abject attitude
toward terrorists who blew up civilian buses, hotels, restaurants, and
other public places and caused thousands of deaths. One wonders
under these circumstances how Palestinian authorities who promote
killings of innocent civilians can cultivate a new generation of peace,
if their youngsters are encouraged to follow in the footsteps of those
model heroes. In that kind of totalitarian regime, the ruler wishes to
capture the attention of his people by launching any delusory statement
that might please them, and after much indoctrination, that narrative
becomes so much part of the truth that he himself begins to believe
in it, and even when he wants to retract it (e.g., for the sake of peace)
he nds himself trapped in his own webs of lies that he can no longer
reverse.
Jonathan Swift (1745) had written a classic essay on The Art
of Political Lying. He asserted that the political lie is sometimes
born out of a discarded statesmans head, and thence delivered to be
nursed and dandled by the rabble.
11
He wrote that the lies are pro-
duced as a monster and licked into shape, but at other times they
come to the world completely formed and spoiled by the licking. But
sometimes lies know a noble birth, but it must come to the world
with a sting, for without a sting they are still born, and whenever they
lose their sting they die. Such miraculous creatures as lies are destined
to great adventures, they can conquer kingdoms without ghting,
and sometimes with loss of a battle. Tey can sink a mountain into a
molehill, and raise a molehill to a mountain; preside many years over
at committees of elections, can wash a blackmoor white, make a saint
of an atheist and a patriot of a proigate. Tey can furnish foreign
ministers with intelligence and raise or let fall the credit of a nation
. . . He found nonetheless an essential point wherein a political liar
diers from other liars: that he ought to have but a short memory,
which is necessary according to the various occasions he meets with
every hour of diering from himself and swearing to both sides of a
contradiction. He presented the image of a great man, whose genius
consisted of nothing else but an inexhaustible fund of political lies,
which plentifully distributes every minute he speaks, and by an unpar-
alleled generosity forgets, and consequently contradicts, in the next half
hour. Te audience to those lies has only one remedy, concludes Swift,
just to suppose that they had heard some meaningless and inarticulate
sounds:
110
Few lies carry the inventors mark, and the most prostitute enemy
to truth may spread a thousand without being known the author.
Besides, as the vilest writer has his readers, so the greatest liar has
his believers; and it often happens that if a lie be believed by only
one hour, it has done its work and there is no further occasion for it.
Falsehood ies, and truth comes limping after it, so that when men
come to be undeceived, it is too late. Te jest is over, and the tale has
had its eect: like a man who has thought of a good repartee when
the discourse is changed or the company parted; or like a physician
who has found out an infallible medicine after the patient is dead.
Considering that natural disposition in many men to lie, and in
multitudes to believe, I have been perplexed what to do with that
maxim so frequent in everybodys mouth, that truth will at last prevail.
Here has this land of ours, for the greatest part of twenty years, lain
under the inuence of such counsels and persons, whose principle
and interest it was to corrupt our manners, blind our understanding,
drain our wealth and in time destroy our constitution ... While truth,
which is said to lie in well, seemed now to be buried there under piles
of stone ... I shall endeavor to undeceive or discover those deluded
or deluding persons who hope to pretend it is only a short madness
in the vulgar, from which they may soon recover; whereas I believe
it will appear to be very dierent in its causes, its symptoms and
its consequences; and prove a great example to illustrate the maxim
I lately mentioned that truth (however sometimes late) will at last
prevail.
12

After three centuries, Swifts words are as vigorous and universal
as they were at the time they were written. In the West Bank, the lie
was born in a great noise, but it lost the sting and died. Falsehood did
y swiftly, but it took time for the truth to come limping along. Te
remedy was found, where the objective medical international reports
were aired, but only after the patient had died, that is the irreversible
damage to Israel was done. Indeed, a few hours, or days, of diusion
of the lie su ced to poison the air, and it may take years to repair that,
if ever, judging from the lingering accusations and suspicions against
Israel that are still circulated thirty years later among Palestinians.
Tis is proof, once again, of the immortality of the classics, which
dominate the time that lasts (like the Bible), compared to the false
newspaper reports whose validity elapses with time. Given that lying
is endemic to human nature, and political lies have been a constant of
both domestic and international politics, there is something puzzling
nonetheless when lies are focused on Jews, both in the Christian and
Muslim world, and through Christianity also in modern Japan.
13
It is
111
not only the persistent story of anti-Semitism, which in its darkest
moments caused massive massacres of Jews as a result of diused lies
such as the Protocols of the Elders of Zion , Te Blood Libel, the manu-
factured accusations of Jewish mischief, or the Nazi propaganda, which
culminated in the Holocaust; but also the specic cases of anti-Jewish
persecution and calumniation, such as the Dreyfus Aair in turn of
the century France, of the Beilis aair in Russia a few years later, and
lately the West Bank Poison Aair. One can, in eect, wonder what has
prompted Arab and Western media to report in such a minute detail all
the suering of the Palestinian girls, purportedly at the hand of Israel,
with an emphasis on intoxication by a mysterious gas, contaminat-
ed water, and coca cola mixed with toxic substances, with direct or
indirect incrimination of Israel in general, or of the Israeli army, the
settlers, all sorts of mysterious emissaries, secret laboratories, and
chemical and biological experiments in particular.
One can also wonder why once the hoax became apparent, the whole
aair disappeared from TV screens? As if when Jews were deemed
poisoners, that is newsworthy, but when they are exonerated, that does
not t very well with the cardboard structure that the media had helped
create and was now foundering before their eyes. Even the media that
had not participated in the construction of the hoax, pursued their
reticence after its discovery, as if the principle of neutrality, both ways
were more important than the truth. Only the Israeli press, and the
New York Times , which publicly recognized its partiality in the coverage
of the aair, continued their outcry after all the others had forgotten
about this whole aair. Professor B. Aktzin, a prominent political sci-
entist at Hebrew University, remarked that in the United States, while
public opinion was persuaded that the Israeli government had not
been involved in any poisoning, rumors, and suspicions persisted that,
some extremist Jews may have perpetrated the crime. He invoked a
discussion he had held some sixty years earlier, in which a Russian had
told him that he was sure that not all Jews killed Christian boys during
Passover for their matza, but perhaps, it is possible that some fanatic
Jewish sect, such as the Hassidim, did engage in such practices.
14
No
such suspicion has been raised in anyone of the other worldwide cases of
mass hysteria. In those other cases, there was a search for an individual
criminal who was suspected of the misdeeds, until the event turned
out to be diagnosed as a mass hysteria. But in the West Bank, it was
the entire Jewish community, the whole of the Israeli nation that were
112
placed on the culprits bench, and very few cared to exonerate them
when the hoax was revealed.
Te source of this special preferential treatment meted out to Jews
merits to be explored, not only because of the specter of the revival of
anti-Semitism and the blood libel in the contemporary world in general
and the Islamic world in particular. Te Poison Aair, together with the
recurring calumniations of Israel and the Jews throughout the Islamic
world as shown in this volume, points to the innate hatred toward the
Jews, based on Islamic Judeophobia, but reinforced by borrowings from
classic Christian anti-Semitism, as the source of this negative treatment,
which continues to manifest itself very extensively in the three case
studies that are detailed in the book. In both the classic Islamic and
Christian-based sources of hatred toward the Jews, it is now clear that
since they possess no leg to stand on, they are principally founded on
manufactured lies, which become over the years a doctrine believed by
its own propagators, thus perpetuating it as the truth and is therefore
not likely to be revised, corrected, or redressed.
Notes
1. For the full story, see R. Israeli, Poison: Manifestations of a Blood Libel
(Lanham: Lexington Books, 2002).
2. Te independent investigation by the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta,
in fact, supported the explanation oered from the outset by Professor
Baruch Modan, a world-renowned epidemiologist, who was at the time the
director general of the Israeli Ministry of Health. But his explanation was
rejected in disgust by Arabs and Muslims as an attempt by the culprit to
hide the evidence of his crime, and discarded in irony by the international
media who knew better than him since they had seen the evidence by
the eyes of their own reporters: a yellow substance spread on the sills of
the windows of the schools where the poisoning happened. Te fact that
it was pollen from surrounding pine trees did not change the minds of the
converted bigots. See 12026, ibid.
3. For details, see R. Israeli, Te PLO in Lebanon: Selected Documents (London:
Weidenfeld and Nicolson, and New York: St Martins Press, 1983), which
documents PLO activities during that war in southern Lebanon.
4. Ibid.
5. See the whole stoty in R. Israeli, Te Blood Libel and Its Derivatives (New
Jersey: Transaction, 2012), 1718, 11213 and 229.
6. Israeli, Poison , op. cit., 150.
7. Ibid.
8. R. Israeli, Te Blood Libel , op. cit., 83.
9. G. Small, and J. Borus, Te Inuence of Newspaper Reports on Outbreaks
of mass Hysteria, Psychiatric Quarterly (Winter 1987): 26978.
10. Ibid.
113
11. J. Swift, Te Art of Political Lying, in Te Penguin Book of Lies , ed. Philip
Kerr (New York: Viking), 1990, 152.
12. Ibid.
13. See David Goldman, and Masanori, Miyazawa, Te Jews in the Japanese
Mind (New York: Free Press, 1995).
14. Jerusalem Post , April 13, 1983.
A Sample of Manufactured
Libel against the Jews in the
Arab and Muslim Media
115
3
While hatred toward the Jews had become a worldwide Chris-
tian phenomenon in the medieval world, and spread together with
Christianity to the Americas and the far corners of the universe, the
non-Christian world had remained more or less immune to it (except
that of the Islamic kind) until the modern era, when it was embraced
by Islamic and Asian cultures, even where there were almost no Jews.
For example, in modern Japan, where Christian and some native Jap-
anese cults staunchly support Israel and entertain a very high regard
toward the Jews, one can nd many writings and statements parroting
the world Jewish conspiracy, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion , Jewish
control of the worlds nances and media as proof of international
Jewish inuence and rule of the world. But unlike the anti-Semites,
who cite that evidence as an evil conspiracy, some of those Asian
sects naively provide those examples as demonstrations of Jewish
talent, capacity, and positive human inuence that are worth studying
and emulating.
In contemporary times, where Israel has to a large extent substituted
for the Jews as the target of anti-Semitism, hatred has shifted to new
forms of calumny, either about infanticide of Muslims, particularly
Palestinian children, or as novel derivative manifestations of the blood
libel. In all cases, this has become a way of systematically diusing lies,
which through repetition and auto-suggestion often grow into a new
prevailing conventional wisdom that political correctness does not
allow to violate. Tis propaganda becomes a worldwide indoctrination
via the internet, using anti-globalization slogans and other ideological
mantras, such as those equating Zionism with racism, or demoniz-
ing Israelis to such an extent as to render credible and plausible any
116
horror imputed to them. For example, in connection with the pervert
accusations against Israel in 2001 Durban, which many decent nations
found necessary to dissociate from, the UN automatic vote against Is-
rael by force of the Muslim voting bloc, in conjunction with their Tird
World allies, the universal campaigns of demonization against Israel
following every measure it takes in self-defense (like the Gaza War
in 20082009, the UN-sponsored Goldstone Report, and the hostile
Turkish otilla in Summer 2010), all smack of virulent anti-Semitism,
and constitute new manifestations of the blood libel, under the guise
of anti-Zionism. Recurrent in that discourse is a peculiar vocabulary
where all the acts of terror against Israeli civilians are labeled as legit-
imate resistance, and all Israeli reprisals as crimes and massacres.
Hence also the reversed denition of terrorism, which dubs as terror-
ist states the United States and Israel who have retaliated to Muslim
terrorism, and which justies violence against civilians when it serves
a worthy Muslim cause. Tus, by denition, one can only dierentiate
between Muslim just causes and Western faulty ones, not between
cases where innocent civilians are hurt or not. Te goal is important,
not the means to attain it.
In view of the universalization of hatred and lies against Jews, it is
no longer necessary or helpful to map out the widespread diusion of
this plight country by country, though it is clear that in the West in
general it has perhaps receded in severity if not in intensity, while in the
Islamic world it has been on the ascent. Today, as the key to capture the
worldwide centers of anti-Semitism, one would have to explore various
international organizations, chief among which is the UN and its many
agencies, and other forums like the Organization of the Islamic Con-
ference, the Arab League, the Group of 77, the Organization of African
Unity, and a myriad of Islamic blogs that are cultivated either in or by
Muslim countries and establishments, or by Muslim minorities and
groups, of all variants of Islamic ideologies and doctrines, following all
political and religious convictions, that are often aided by the media
in their original countries or, as in the case of Muhammed al-Dura on
French Television, can enlist Western media to support their propa-
ganda eort in the West. Te two extant ideas that are linked to the
blood libel and nd extensive expression in both Muslim propaganda
and in the occasional support Western media lend to it, are: the Jewish
innate hatred of human kind, born out of the doctrine of the elected
people, which connotes ethnic superiority (hence racism); and the
accusation of murder of non-Jewish children, in our case Palestinian
Libel against the Jews in the Arab and Muslim Media
117
children, that has been hurled against Israel by many Muslims states,
not least of which has been Recep Tayyip Erdoans Turkey since his
Islamic party came to power in late 2002, just one year after Durban.
Te traditional Western accusation of the blood libel, for example,
was based on the assumption that Jewish doctrine, as it transpires in
the Talmud, as they keep repeating in their ignorance, ignoring the
strict Jewish prohibition to consume any blood, legitimizes murder of
Christians and consumption of their blood, that is, on the criminality
of the Jews and their innate cannibalism. Te Islamic world picked up
that calumny, and any operation conducted today by Israel, in defense
of Israeli civilians, is automatically dubbed a crime (e.g., the manhunt
of two top Hamas murderers in Hebron on October 8, 2010, after they
had ambushed and killed four Israeli civilians, who were driving at night
to their home in Beit Haggai a month earlier). Te murder was hailed by
Hamas as an act of bravery, but the punishment by retaliation against
the murderers was condemned by Muslims as a crime. Even the sup-
posedly more moderate Palestinian Authority has joined the chorus of
accusers of Israel as a criminal in that case, exactly as it did following
the Gaza Operation in 2009 (which it had supported, in view of the
enmity between the two factions). Turkey did not lag behind, labeling
the Gaza Operation and Israels move against the Turkish otilla, which
wished to violate Israels blockade, as a crime. Israeli cannibalism is
inferred by such expressions as the blood thirsty Israelis, meaning
that literally, and not in the conventional metaphorical sense, or when
cartoons describe Israeli leaders as literally drinking the blood of Pal-
estinian children. It was the Nazis who brought this accusation to its
paroxysm when they termed the Jews hereditary criminals, in order
to justify their extermination. Because if crimes are no longer imputed
only to individuals, and criminal nature becomes the trait typical to
a nation or an ethnic group, then better get rid of the entire group if
ones wishes to eradicate the evil from its root.
Te same thinking has been inherited in our days by Muslim fanatics
like the Iranians, Hamas, Hizbullah, the Muslim Brothers, Al-Qaida,
and the like. But this does not mean that the West became totally clear
of these horric prejudices. In the contemporary twenty-rst-century
world, the map of anti-Jewish hatred and the lie manufacturing relat-
ed to it follows closely the international map of anti-Israeli sentiment
and anti-Semitism. It goes without saying that the Arab and Muslim
countries have taken the lead because they are the most immediately
and perennially in conict with Israel, hence the fabrication of horrors
118
imputed to Israel is the most current and repetitive, from political
platforms of parties and organizations, to clerical sermons in mosques,
and by politicians like Erdoan or Assad, or movements like the Hamas
and Hizbullah, who wish to build on the hatred they can inspire in their
publics against the Jews and Israel, to launch lethal attacks against the
Jewish state. Not far behind them are some Scandinavian countries,
notably Sweden and Norway, where hostility toward Israel has reached
such heights that libel stories are rife, the most notorious of them being
the hateful but spurious charge by a Swedish journalist that Israel killed
Palestinians to use their organs for transplants. Tis false accusation, on
a scope in par with blood libel, which in civilized nations would have
been found punishable by law, was repeated by many Swedish media,
while the government refused even to issue a statement distancing itself
from it. In France and Britain, the nations that in the past took the lead
of the battle against anti-Semitism, it has become almost fashionable
in literary salons and in high-society social encounters, to repeat that
kind of accusation, mostly based on BBC reports, against Israelis and
Zionists, as a matter of course. What has changed is the target of
the accusation (not directly and expressly the Jews), but their modern
manifestation- Israel.
Zionism, the movement of national liberation of the Jewish people,
which for the past century has lent impetus to the revival of Jewish
nationhood in its land, and has grown into one of the most successful
nation-building ventures of modern times, has been manipulated by
Arab and Muslim propaganda, often aided by Western media, into
the status of a reviled and much abused ideology on the world stage,
so as to make of it a repulsive scarecrow to combat Israel. Much of
this distortion has unfolded within and with the assistance, or at least
complicity through silence, of the United Nations, that very world
organization that was supposed to legitimize emerging nations in
the post-colonial world. And so, while God-forsaken tribes in remote
places, that only few know how to locate on the map, have attained
recognition and acclaim, the national movement of the ancient Jewish
people on its antique land, has become the nemesis of the Arabs, the
Muslims, and much of the Tird World. Worse, it has been so thor-
oughly demonized and de-legitimized that in Arab/Muslim circles it
has grown tantamount to the paradigm of evil.
It is easy to understand that the more the Arabs/Muslims feel frus-
trated by their inability to catch up with Israel in the eld of develop-
ment and technology, the more inclined they are to blame Zionism.
119
Tey cannot exhibit any envy toward a hated, though supremely
successful, ideology; therefore, they abhor it and wish to destroy it. Tey
found unexpected new allies in their endeavor: not only Muslim leaders
like Mahathir of Malaysia, who in the presence of fty-seven Islamic
Heads of States launched a vitriolic onslaught against the Jews and
Zionism, and won the standing ovation of all of them, including those
who had signed peace with Israel; but anti-Semitic groups among both
the liberal left and the radical right in Europe and in North America
added their voices to the Arab cacophony, making their vitriol appear
anti- Zionist, namely acceptable and mainstream. For it has become bon
ton in many educated circles in Europe to blame Zionism for all the evils
of the world, and the shitty little country of Israel, which has won ten
Nobel Prizes in the last decade, more than all Europe combined, as the
mover and shaker of the world conspiracy that dominates the globe.
So much so that following the disaster of September 11,2001, the
Saudis who authored that horror, like other Muslims from Pakistan to
Morocco, immediately sought to put the burden on the Jews or the Zi-
onists because only they possessed the evil mind to produce such a har-
rowing plot, and mastered the organizational skill to mount the attack in
all its frightening e cacy. Lakhdar Brahimi, that product of the military
junta of Algeria, who was thrust by Ko Annan upon the grotesque
task of constructing democracy in Iraq, and then by Ban Ki-moon
ending the rule of tyranny, also blamed Zionism for all the problems
of the Middle East. Whether relevant to his task or not, he could not
resist the temptation to share with his fellow Muslims his inborn
antipathy to Zionism, and instead of relieving him of his job, the Secre-
tary General simply intimated that it was his envoys personal opinion
to gratuitously splash mud on a member state. No apology followed,
of course. Tis had become a normative discourse in the UN after all.
No wonder, then, that Muslims, no longer satised with using Zion-
ism as a punching bag, began deploying it as a scarecrow to attack each
other, to blame, frighten, and menace by waving it in each others face.
Osama Bin Laden accused his Saudi Kingdom of yielding to Zionist
America in a subservient role, while the Princes who rule that medieval
country compete with each other in tracking the terrorist wave that has
been shaking the foundations of their regime back to its Zionist roots.
Te implication is clear: if Zionists stand behind the plot to de-stabilize
the country, then they must have common cause with Al-Qaida, which
seeks the same. Zionism is everywhere: exactly as the Hamas Charter
accused it of scheming the founding of Communism and Capitalism
120
at the same time, it can also bear the blame of serving the two sides of
the Saudi divide: the Royal House and its Al-Qaida nemesis; trembling
King Abdullah and his prospective heirs, who are no longer certain
of the stability of their inherited throne, and their arch enemy Bin
Laden and his successors who are scheming the end of Saudi mon-
archy from the mountain caves of Western Pakistan. From now on,
one should beware of using Zionism, for it can mean one thing and
its reverse. If you are threatened of Zionist collusion, it may be for
or against anything imaginable; if you are accused of Zionist collabo-
ration, it may work for or against you; it all depends upon who says it
and for what purpose. Te safest, it may turn out, would be to sit on
the Zionist seat itself, so that no one could suspect you of collusion or
collaboration with it.
It is no coincidence that the question of Israels posture and reputa-
tion in the world is viewed by Muslims as pertinent to its legitimacy.
Tey understand that a weak, disarmed, and bullied Israel can bring
it more easily and more rapidly to its demise, because no one wants
to sustain a temporary or eeting entity. A strong and internationally
robust Israel, on the other hand, which can boast a sound economy,
world acclaim for its military, intelligence services, scientic and tech-
nological prowess, and a dizzying pace of development against all odds,
would be that much more di cult to delegitimize, to eliminate or to
calumniate. Hence, Arab Economic boycotts Israel to hurt its economy;
the military and political siege around it to isolate it; terrorist attacks
to discourage the ow of foreign tourists and investors and new immi-
grants into it; its constant harassment with threats of war and violence
to deect its creative attention and sap its energies; and its libel via
demonization and outright lies in an eort to tarnish its reputation
as a strong and high achiever and successful contributor to the world
community, far beyond its size and location. Te Muslim and Arab
dismal failure to attain any of those goals over the more than the past
half century has only galvanized their determination to redouble their
eorts and try to achieve, via smearing, vilication, and calumniation,
what they could not achieve by war.
Smearing, vilication, and calumniation have the inescapable eect
of moving their bearers to violence and killing. During the Intifada
in 2000, numerous were the cases where Jewish holy sites were set
aame by incited Palestinian mobs, an Israeli teenager was lured by a
Palestinian girl to Ramallah, and was there ambushed and murdered.
But the most infamous story, which had held the Israelis in suspense
121
for a few years, unfolded when two unarmed Israelis headed to camp,
to fulll their army reserve duty, and accidentally drove into the Pal-
estinian town of Ramallah. Tey were seized by a mob and beaten up.
Te Palestinian police then took them to their station. After a few
minutes, they turned them over to the mob, which murdered them
and tore their bodies apart. Some of the police participated. By chance,
a television news crew from Italys main channel caught much of this
on tape, and it was shown on air. Te Palestinian Authority reacted
angrily and threatened to pull the television stations credentials. At
this point, the reporter wrote a humiliating letter of apology, which was
published, abasing himself and insisting that he was on the Palestinian
side. Tere is a record of atrocities on the Palestinian side, which are
documented over many years. Tese include hundreds of terrorist
attacks and the deliberate murder of civilians. Some of them can be
mentioned in passing:
Te attack on the Munich Olympic games and the kidnapping and
murder of the Israeli athletes; we now know this to have been an
o cial PLO operationTe takeover of one of the holiest of all
Christian sites, the Church of the Nativity, in Bethlehem, by Fatah
gunmen, bullying the priests and nuns, while turning the church
into a military base for shooting at Israelis. Rather than being jailed,
these men were allowed to leave the country and now live in Italy
on a 2000 Euro a month pension. (And theyre demanding a pay
increase.)
Te seizure of the cruise ship Achille Lauro as a PLO operation
which included the murder of a Jewish elderly wheelchair-bound
passenger, Leon Klinghoer. Intercepted radio communications
between PLO leader Yasir Arafat and the gunmen showed his direct
complicity, and his direct radio communication with President
Mubarak, to seek asylum in Port Said, was also intercepted, proving
collaboration between all those peace-lovers. Several low-level
gunmen were imprisoned in Italy but gradually let go over the years.
Tere has been a conscious and organized (though decentralized)
Palestinian strategy to create false charges and to launch murderous
attacks on Israeli civilians as a form of asymmetric warfare. Te domi-
nance in Western media, publishing, and universities, to a large extent,
of a post-Marxist ideology that sees Tird World (mainly Islamist) rad-
icals as the new proletariat, romantic revolutionaries ghting the very
societies that have given so many benets to those who extol enemies of
democracy and freedom, has blown wind into the Islamic acts of hatred
122
and terror. Western guilt at past racism and imperialism ironically thus
empowers historic anti-Semitism, Judeophobia, and Israelophobia, as
well as contempt for their own societies, including an alienation from
Christianity, a hatred for capitalism (even the liberal, state-regulated
variety), and a loss of identity with their own people and nation. At
times, physical intimidation, the threat of violence against those who
criticize Islamists, or the loss of access for reporters who write about
their crimes were present. In Europe, this means throwing away pro-
fessional standards and abandoning large elements of free speech in
return for pretending to be heroic in battling the non-existent power
of a supposed pro-Israel lobby.
At the same time, psychological intimidation dominates the scene.
Any criticism against anyone who is Muslim or Arab can be quickly
called racism though a religion isnt a race and almost all Arabs are
Caucasian. Tere is also a Catch-22 here. Since non-Westerners were
historically stereotyped as behaving brutally, when some of them
actually do so, you cant mention that, because it seems a return to
that attitude of superiority associated with racism and imperialism.
And, nally, money. In Britain, a scandal involving Saudi Arabia was
recently hushed up lest it endanger commercial relations. And then
came the news that the release of the Lockerbie bomber seems to be
linked to Britain getting oil contracts with the Libyan dictatorship,
which was also tremendously repressive of its own people. Vice never
ourishes more than when it can portray itself as virtue. Te result is
that the Wests senses for understanding the world are simultaneously
gagged and blindfolded. Changing this situation is di cult; dening
whats needed is simple: honesty, not ideological predetermination to
ignore evidence that runs contrary to the Politically Correct. Serving
a higher political cause is no excuse. For scholars and journalists,
honesty, reason, and a fair, realistic representation of the facts is the
highest possible cause. At any rate, the causes being served are dread-
ful, anti-freedom ones. And when you reward the villains, you give
an incentive for more people to behave that way, and encouragement
for the malefactors to go even further in their crimes. Israel may be
the canary in the coal mine, but the miners are the people of Western
democracies and, equally important, Tird World peoples hopes for a
better life not at the hands of corrupt tyrants, ruinous ideologies, and
bloodthirsty extremist revolutionaries.
1

Tese background thoughts help explain why when a Swedish
journalist libeled Israel with harvesting organs from Palestinians to
123
transplant in Israelis, the Swedish Foreign Minister, Carl Bildt, not only
kept silent, but he refused to distance himself from this odious accusa-
tion. Tereupon, Israel denounced Swedens outrageous silence on that
Israel Defense Force (IDF) organ harvest article, and diplomatic strain
kept rising over Bildts refusal to condemn that report, citing press
freedom, for fear that it should become a reference for the Arabs to
base their anti-Israel hatred and propaganda. Te article claimed that
the organs were sold to an international criminal gang in New Jersey,
which includes several members of the American Jewish community, as
well as one Levy Izhak Rosenbaum, who faces charges of conspiring to
broker the sale of a human kidney for transplant. Israel also expressed
fear that the article could lead to violence against Jews and that Israel
believes the responsibility for cooling tensions over the article lied with
the Swedish government, and stressed that it was imperative for Sweden
to resolve the crisis before the countrys Foreign Minister, Carl Bildt,
visited Israel on September 10, 2009. Te meeting had been sched-
uled before the article was published; o cials in the Swedish foreign
ministry told local news agencies, and that it would now be used to
address the escalating tension between the two countries. To add insult
to injury, the Swedish government distanced itself from the statement
by its ambassador to Israel, in which she criticized the article, saying
that the condemnation was solely the judgment of the embassy [in Tel
Aviv], and designed for an Israeli audience. Tat comment came in a
statement released by the Swedish Foreign Ministry. Te article in
the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet is as shocking and appalling to us
Swedes, as it is to Israeli citizens, had said Ambassador Elisabet Borsiin
Bonnier upon the release of that article. Just as in Israel, freedom of
the press prevails in Sweden, Bonnier said. However, freedom of the
press and freedom of expression are freedoms which carry a certain
responsibility.
2

Te expected reverberations of that crisis in the Arab and Muslim
worlds were not far behind, since it was a bonanza for them that a
respectable European nation found it expedient to smear Israel in public
with such abominable claims that even the Palestinians had never dared
to utter. Suddenly, it became indisputable for the Palestinians to charge
all the horrors they could imagine as emanating from the evil Zionists,
with the backing of that impeccably neutral country, whose integrity
was beyond question, and who was also constantly supported by other,
equally impeccable, European nations, such as the Netherlands or Den-
mark. Te Palestinians understood that since Israel has been singled
124
out in international bodies for smear, libel, and scorn, it was expedient
to ally to other nations who were ready to condemn the Jewish people,
for anything, thus acquiring respectability for their cause. It is from
this standpoint that the Swedish blood libel directly served the interest
of the Arabs, even if the other countries in question did not mean it
to be so. During the Sabra and Shatila crisis in 1982 Lebanon, when
Christian phalangists murdered dozens of Palestinians in that refugee
camp, Israel established a commission of inquiry, which, with a Jewish
self-incriminating twist, decided that since that territory was under
Israeli responsibility during the Lebanon War, the ultimate guilt rested
with her; she dismissed her Minister of Defense, Ariel Sharon; the Chief
of Sta, Rafael Eitan; the Chief of Intelligence; and numerous other
high o cials, and naturally drew upon herself the wrath and criticism
of the world. When a few years later the same scenario repeated itself
in Srebrenica during the Bosnian War (19921995), with the Dutch in
charge of that area, while the Serbs slaughtered the Muslims, no one
came forward to take responsibility, no one established a commission
of inquiry, and no one was charged or dismissed. But in Lebanon, the
burden of the blood libel, where Christians massacred Muslims and
the Jews were charged of responsibility, played out, partly thanks to
Israels self-incriminating frenzy, and other nations rushed once again
to single it out of all nations. In the meantime, the blood libel contin-
ued to spread when Palestinians and even Algerians complained about
Jews harvesting Algerian Kids Organs.
3

To gauge the extent and scope of the damage done to Israel by that
blood libel, the depth of the anti-Semitic sentiment it awakened, and
the irreparable setback done to the cause of peace, which, Sweden
professes, one ought to look at the reactions to that episode worldwide,
especially in the Arab world, not only to the two parties immediately
concernedIsrael and Sweden. Moderate Palestinian Prime Minister
Salam Fayyad, for example, demanded the establishment of an investi-
gative committee to determine the truth of the allegations, consisting of
the Palestinian Authoritys (PA) foreign, interior, and health ministers,
4

while the Arab League demanded the establishment of an international
investigative committee.
5
Following are excerpts from some of the re-
actions to the aair in the Arab press. Te Palestinian Prisoners Aairs
Minister, Issa Qaraqe, demanded that legal action be taken against
Israel, and claimed that Israel kept the bodies of Palestinians in order
to experiment on them and remove their organs, and later buried the
bodies in secret cemeteries. He said that Te Palestinian governments
125
decision to form an investigative committee on this issue is an excellent
and correct one, in light of the many testimonies and considerable
evidence indicating that Palestinian shahids (martyrs) were returned
to their families with organs missing. Demonizing Israel before any
investigation had been undertaken, and then taking legal steps against
it in order to delegitimize it, have become the characteristics of the
new Arab struggle against it with a view to cast it beyond the pale of
nations. Te Minister emphasized that In light of this decision, it is
important to begin taking testimonies and collecting information,
proof, and medical records in preparation for the next step, which
is taking legal action against the Israeli government at international
courts, [and suing it] for the inhuman war crimes it is committing even
against the dead ... Te Palestinians have the right to accuse Israel of
holding corpses for the purpose of harvesting organs or performing
medical experiments upon them. Burying these corpses in secret
cemeteries is an attempt [on Israels part] to conceal the evidence of
the crime and avoid a [criminal] investigation. Israel returns the bodies
many years later when they have turned to dust, and nobody knows
what the bodies underwent [immediately after] death ... Israel is the
only country in the world that has secret cemeteries ... It is forbidden
to visit them or investigate them, which strengthens the assumption
that serious [crimes] have been and are still being perpetrated against
our Palestinian shahids .... I call to establish a special judiciary body
worldwide, especially in the Arab world, not only to the two parties
immediately concernedIsrael and Sweden.
Similar claims were advanced by Abd al-Nasser Farwana, director
of the department of statistics in the PA Prisoners Aairs Ministry,
who is himself a former prisoner.
6
Nashat al-Wahidi, coordinator of
the Gaza-based Movement for the Defense of Palestinian Prisoners
and member of the Gaza Popular Committees secretariat, stated that
Israel performed experiments upon the bodies of deceased Palestin-
ians, and stole their organs in order to transplant them in the bodies
of sick settlers. Israel, he added, has been keeping bodies in unbetting
conditions for thirty years, and refusing to return them to the families,
though it denies these facts.
7
Tis is maybe what Carl Bildt meant to do
when he refused to refute that claim, but it was obvious that the Arabs
were just waiting for these fresh ideas to be emitted into the air in
some Western country, in order to seize upon them and elaborate on
them with visible delight, without incurring the risk of being accused by
the west of anti-Semitic libel. Other Arabs started to dig up all manner
126
of explanations and rationalizations to lend a scientic tone to their
phantagorasms, as long as they could thereby bash Israel.
Palestinian columnist and former prisoner Tahsin al-Halabi, who
resides in Syria, explained that Israel stole Palestinian organs (now, it
is established as fact, and no need for investigation any more) because
Jewish religious law forbade taking organs from the bodies of Jews.
Te rabbis in Israel, he wrote, forbid the Jews in Israel and in the
world to give up their organs when they die, and based on the tenets
of their faith, [which appear] in the Talmud, they believe that remov-
ing organs from the bodies of Jews is a violation of the religious laws.
Tat is why the [Israeli] hospitals, and especially the commanders of
the Israeli army, call to obtain organs in another way, not from Jews ...
Te hospitals recognize the need to change the rabbis outlook, [and
convince them] to permit the religious and traditional Jews to donate
organs ... Some rabbis who are considered relatively moderate have
permitted to transplant organs taken from a non-Jew in the body of
a Jew ... With the advent of advanced medical machinery, surgery
[procedures] and medications, organ tra cking has become a prev-
alent [phenomenon] in the world, and that is why Israel can tra c in
organs at the Palestinians expense, and thanks to the presence of the
occupation army among [the Palestinians].
8

Having based their imaginary claim on credible Western sourc-
es, the Arabs could now turn a full circle and locate the origin of the
blood libel back in Christian sources, where Muslims are now merely
drawing from, making common cause with Christians. A writer for
the Hamas in fact claimed that the Jews used to butcher Christian
and Muslim Children and to use their blood for Passover Matzos . Tis
now accorded with the New Crime that Has Been Exposed, he said.
Wael Abd al-Razzaq al-Manaama, who writes on a Hamas-a liated
website, implied then that the Jews stole Palestinian organs just as
they had butchered Christian children in Europe in order to use their
blood to bake matzos : History has probably seen hundreds of cases in
which Jews kidnapped and butchered Christian and Muslim children
in order to take their blood and mix it into the dough from which they
made their Passover matzos . It happened in Britain, France, Germany,
Spain, Switzerland, Italy and other countries, where the Jews lived in
isolation out of fear of mixing with the other nations. Tis caused all
the worlds peoples and governments, without exception, to hate them
for their crimes. He linked that atrocious deed with the recent history
of the Middle East, unabashedly claiming that
127
Te colonialist countries, led by Britain, wanted to get rid of the
Jews, and therefore worked to build them a national homeland on
Palestinian soil ... an entity that was doomed to die from the moment
it was born . . . Now a new crime, which is not unlikely, has been
exposed, to join the long roster of the Zionists crimes against our
jihad-waging Palestinian nation, [namely the crime of ] stealing the
organs of Palestinians that have been killed ... [Tis act] contravenes
all the international charters that defend human [dignity] in life and
in death ...
Lets think back to the rst intifadah , which started in 1987 ...
Usually, when [the occupation forces] managed to get their hands on
a body [of a Palestinian], they would take it to the Abu Kabir patho-
logical institute, on the pretext of doing an autopsy to ascertain the
cause of death. Te body then stayed [there] for a few days or even
a week before the family could retrieve it and bury it. In that period,
dozens of family members testied that when they received the bodies
of their sons, [they found] them to be stued with cotton wool after
the enemy had sutured them from top to bottom and from side to
side.
9

Te circle of Israels well-wishers kept reactions in the Arab World
gathering rage and bursts of threats. Following the publication of Bos-
troms article in Sweden, the Egyptian Doctors Union announced that
it would organize an Arab and international campaign to condemn
Israels stealing of Palestinian organs. Union o cial Abd al-Qader
Hijazi explained that the removal of organs, which could only be
performed by medical experts, contravened every international and
humanitarian norm, as well as the ethics of the medical profession. He
added that the Jordanian doctors union had approached the Egyptian
union with a request to coordinate their actions in condemning the
Israeli doctors who were committing these crimes.
10
Tese were not
politicians or just a mob. Tey were all scientically educated to look
for evidence, to investigate and inquire, and yet, none of them did. Te
opportunity to bash Israel prevailed over any other consideration. Tat
is what happens when the mood for a libel is all set. In mid-September
2009, Donald Bostrom, the instigator of the libel, visited a series of Arab
countries that wished to honor and encourage him. Te rst stop on
his tour was Algeria, where he received a warm welcome from Abd
al-Aziz Balkhadem, representative of President Abdelaziz Bouteika.
Algerias journalists union awarded him the Courageous Journalism
Award and a $5,000 prize
11
. Hussein Saqer, columnist for the Syrian
daily Al-Tawra , wrote: Tese reports ... prove to what extent the
128
Zionists thirst and yearn for murder, destruction and terrorism. Tey
also prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the history of our enemy,
the [Zionist] entity, is based on the destruction of the other and of his
life-spirit.
12
Nevermind that 200,000 Algerians were slaughtered by
their own people during the civil war in the 1980s and 1990s.
In an editorial, the Saudi daily Al-Watan , to which the entire idea of
freedom of the press is alien, called to praise the Swedish government
for refusing to condemn the publication of Bostroms article:
Te courageous position taken by the Swedish government, which
champions [the cause of ] free speech, especially when it comes to
Israel, is [a position] worthy of support ... One of the important steps
in the struggle against Israel is breaking the global media legitimacy
that [Israel] has gained, and [utilizing] the option of criticizing and
attacking it in the media ... [so as to] double the impact of reports
[like Bostroms]. Te Israeli-Arab conict has clearly become a media
conict, and there is no denying the considerable inuence that the
media and world public opinion have in determining the direction
taken in resolving the conict ... Te crucial thing is to subject Israel
to intense [public] pressure. Te Arabs lack many of the tools neces-
sary to generate this pressure, but the West does it for us from time
to time, and we must take advantage of such opportunities.
13

Sweden, a respectable country, found itself then as the champion,
the collaborator, and the model of the darkest and most retrograde
nations of the Arab world, apparently to the delight of both parties. So
comfortable that association of anti-Semites was, that none of them
had the decency to apologize, even after Bostrom himself recognized
that he had no evidence for his libel and he even sort of apologized.
But his audiences, especially in the Arab world, failed to register his
half-hearted apology. Prizes were no longer showered on him, but he did
not return those that had been conferred on him under false pretense.
Te rm support he got from his government (except for his Ambas-
sador in Israel), did not induce him to alter his conduct, let alone the
indierence of the heads of the European Union (EU) and the leaders
of other democracies in the West who were expected to raise their
voice of protest. To close the debate, Syrian TV organized an experts
panel in its studio, which conrmed that Israel was indeed behaving
like a Shylock who traded in organs. But since no evidence came up
either in Sweden or in the Arab world to substantiate the libel, eyes
were turned to the far away disaster in Haiti, which was too far away
and too chaotic to verify, so as to erode the favorable reputation that
129
Israel was gathering in the world due to the medical aid she brought
to the devastated island.
14
Te well-known facts were, as announced
and praised by former President Clinton, who presided over the rescue
operation on the stricken island, that the Israeli eld hospital, was the
rst to establish itself on the ground and assist hundreds of patients.
Neither Sweden nor the Arabs, who could aord much more than
Israel to extend help, did much; they were busy calumniating those
who did. Tis atrocious accusation was not divorced from the Swedish
one, to be sure:
Israel is aiding the people stricken by the Haiti earthquake. Tis is
a wonder unto itself. But the real reason is to steal organs from the
corpses of the Haitian dead, in the greatest catastrophe this poor
country has ever witnessed. Once the reason is known, there is no
need to wonderthe Israeli delegation, which came to Haiti under
the pretext of helping these fate-stricken people, exploited the tragedy
and the suering of the Haitians, by stealing their human organs for
tra cking. Tis was conrmed by American activist T. West, who
documented this heinous crime and posted the lm on Youtube . Te
lm shows Israelis engaged in stealing organs from the earthquake
victims. It seems that the [Israeli] entity of killing, destruction, and
terrorism, which has become skilled in killing women and children
in ice-cold blood, is now expert in stealing human organs and traf-
cking in them. For years, human organ tra cking has been on the
rise in Israel. Te work of the tra ckers has become an international
trade, with o ces in Europe and Africa. Tis has brought Israel to
the third place in the world in organ tra cking. Swedish journalist
Donald Bostrm, who visited the occupied territories, conrmed, in
a report published by the Swedish paper Aftonbladet , that the occu-
pation soldiers were kidnapping Palestinian youth in the West Bank
and Gaza, and were returning them to their families as sti corpses,
after having ripped out their organs. In addition, the Israeli authorities
force Palestinians sentenced to death to sign documents consenting to
organ donation after they are hanged. Te Swedish report linked these
acts to the Jewish network that was caught last July in the American
city of New Jersey, and to the rabbis who were accused of tra cking
in human organs, in Israel and other countries ...
15

But that was not all. Te moderator, Dr. Jassem Zakariya, a Professor
of International Relations, Damascus University, added his wisdom to
the panel: Of course, he said, when we watch the scenes in this ne
report, Shakespeare immediately comes to mind ... Shylock, yes. As we
see, the Jew has not changedespecially the Zionist Jews, who are now
gathered in the so-called Israel, which is the largest concentration in
130
history of war criminals, who committed crimes against humanity. Tis
is how they will be remembered if they continue with this. He went on:
Of course, the fact that the tragedy of the Haitian people benets them
is undoubtedly evidence of the imminent end of this entity, because
this is the ultimate crime. Tey began with our folks in Palestine
with the prisoners, the wounded, and the martyrs. Tey began with
terrible crimes, through which they established their entity. To this
day, they persist with their crimes, while the loathsome image of the
Jew, the Zionist, the alien who came as an invader, an occupier, makes
another appearancethis time in Haiti, not Palestineso the whole
worldanyone with a heart, ears, eyes, and insightcan realize that
these people are the enemies of all mankind, not just of the Palestin-
ians, the Arabs, and the Muslims. Tis is a very important matter at
the very time we are witnessing the dignity, courage, and humanity of
the besieged people of Gaza, who make donations to Haiti ... Tis is
civilization, this is Arab identity, this is history, while these [Israelis]
are just a bunch of murderers and criminals. Tey have never been
anything else, and therefore, they will pay the price, sooner or later.
16

All manner of NGOs, evidently some of those which sought to lynch
Israel at the UN Human Rights Conference in Durban in 2001, and then
at Durban II (and possibly III, IV etc.), did not leave the Arabs and the
Swedes on their own in their job of calumniation in which they excelled.
When allegations that Israel harvested Palestinian organs surfaced,
and were posted on the UN Human Rights Council website in the
form of a statement written by an NGO, they never left the arena. In
eect, the International Organization for the Elimination of all Forms
of Racial Discrimination (EAFORD) accused Israel of ethnic cleansing
and massacres before it moved on to the issue of what it called dead,
kidnapped and killed Palestinians. It specied that:
Teir [Palestinian] human organs, as reported in the press, can be
a source of immense wealth through illegal tra cking in the world
market. Israeli physicians, medical centres, rabbis and the Israeli
army may be involved ... After Israeli physicians remove organs they
think marketable, the soldiers bury the bodies in graves that carry
only numbers and no names, or place them in sealed caskets and
deliver them under curfew conditions to the families and supervise
the digging of the graves and burial
17
.
Tis atrocious libel was accompanied by an equally horric appeal to
inscribe these horrors at the United Nations Human Rights Councils
(UNHRC) website. EAFORD called for a boycott of Israeli physicians
131
and medical centers. It also asked the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-
moon to report on the matter to the Security Council, and to demand
that it be sent to the International Criminal Court for action. EAFORDs
statement, along with that of other NGOs, could be found on the
UNHRC website in a section for documents, which were submitted for
the councils thirteenth session, which was taking place in March 2010
in Geneva. NGOs regularly submit documents to the UNHRC relating
to matters under debate. In that session, the council was debating the
human rights situation in the Palestinian territories, not once in Dar-
four, where hundreds of thousands perished, or in Iraq and Afghanistan,
where entire states were being destroyed, nor in any Arab or Muslim
state, where more people perish than seek human rights. Te fact that
the allegations were on the site was rst publicized by UN Watch in
Geneva, which sent a protest letter to the UN High Commissioner
for Human Rights and the Councils president. It complained that the
council and the commissioners o ce, however unwittingly, helped to
propagate an anti-Semitic libel by publishing [the EAFORDs charges]
as an o cial UN document, wrote UN Watch Executive Director
Hillel Neuer. He called on the UN council and high commissioner to
immediately cease circulating this racist, hateful and inammatory
text to the ambassadors and other delegates of the UNHRC. Neuer
told Jerusalem Post that the UNHRC in the past had asked UN Watch
to change the language in documents that UN Watch plans to submit,
including in this session where UNHRC asked UN Watch to edit their
words with reference to Iran and Libya. Never were calumniators of
Israel asked to edit out their hateful and untruthful propaganda against
Israel. If UN Watch cant use the word regime when talking about
Iran, then one would think that a blood libel would be unacceptable
in international discourse either, Neuer said.
18

Tat was an almost exact replay in the UN of the 1983 Poison Aair
on the West Bank. So, it seems that Israels calumniators on that outra-
geous world stage never tire or relent, even when they run out of new
ideas and have to copy, once and again, their old tricks. To round the
role of the UN in propagating anti-Semitism in general and the blood
libel in particular in the service of Arab and Muslim countries, one
should say something about such UN activities as the Human Rights
Commission/Council, and the various moves against discrimination
and racism there, where, ironically, the bluntest violators of civil rights
like the Arabs, the Iranians, and their allies set the rules of the game,
and do everything they can to distill the role of those organizations
132
into their essentially antiIsraeli operations. We will touch here only
upon those aspects of that activity that concern directly blood libel.
In the next chapter about the blood libel in the Islamic and Arab
world, a wide-ranging discussion will analyze the Poison Aair and
its repercussions, and the mechanics by which a libel without a leg to
stand on could, by the sheer numbers of the fty-six Muslim states,
which would automatically support anything anti-Israel, be adopted
in UN forums to the debit of Israel and almost never to its credit, as if
it were the worst nation on earth in terms of human rights. If it were
not for the United States, which, out of a sense of decency, almost sin-
gle-handedly, and sometimes aided by Canada and Australia, prevents
those UN institutions from completely weighing in against Israel, and
for some Western nations who at least keep neutral out of respect for
their American ally, Israel would by now turn a total outcast. In the
beginning of November 2010, for example, UNESCO in Paris, charged
with cultivating and preserving sites of cultural heritage, decided that
two ancient Jewish places, the Tomb of Rachel near Bethlehem, and
the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, were Muslim mosques and
Palestinian sites, which had to be evacuated by Israel. Never before
was UNESCO charged with determining the outcome of conicts be-
tween nations, and never was it authorized to act as the arbiter between
dierent national or cultural claims. Any member of UNESCO knows
that the Jewish claim antedated the Islamic one by many centuries, and
that today it was up to the negotiating parties to come to a consensus,
on how to use the site, not up to the UNESCO Council, which knows
nothing beyond its own politics, to determine political rights of access
and spiritual claims of culture and religion.
Since Islams debut on the world stage, however, Muslims have made
it their routine custom to expropriate the holy sites of others. When
Muslim conquistadors rst invaded Jerusalem, they called it Bayt
al-Maqdis , their adaptation of the Hebrew Beit Hamikdash the Holy
Temple. Al-Quds, the contemporary Arabic contraction for this original
appellation, daily highlights the very Jewish heritage that Arabs now
take inordinate pains to obliterate. Teir latest claim is that the very
inclusion of the Hebron and Bethlehem tombs among Jewish heritage
sites will somehow compromise Muslim freedom of worship. Te irony
is that Arab notions of freedom dont extend to others. One hundred
years ago, Yitzhak Ben-Zvi (in time Israels second president) and his
wife Rachel Yanait Ben-Zvi, hiked to Hebron. Each described, in sep-
arate books, how they were barred from the cave. Ben-Zvi wrote: Te
133
entrance to the Patriarchs Cave was prohibited to non-Muslims. Jews
were allowed to climb no higher than the seventh step in the courtyard.
Only brave-hearted Jewish women dared enter, masquerading in Arab
garb and their faces veiled according to Arab custom. Rahel recalled:
Hebrons Jewish women would sometimes inltrate the cave veiled and
costumed like Arabs. Only by stealth could they pray at our forefathers
tombs. When Hebrons Arab fanaticism escalated, Jews were forbidden
even to glance into the cave. Hate spewed from the Arab guards eyes
and from Arab worshipers who brushed against us on their way in.
We arrived at the steps and stood silent. I refused to climb the seven
permitted stairs. Te insult was too searing.
19

In a similar vein, the HIV blood libel aair, one of the many where
the UN yielded to its Islamic majority and did nothing to balance it or
search truth and fairness, was triggered when, after the Poison Aair of
1983 discussed above, which passed without any chastisement for the
Arab calumniators, it became apparent that in UN forums, any charge
against Israel would be registered regardless of its invalidity, or absurdi-
ty. In the UN, no one apologizes for anything, politics overtake decency,
alliances can overwhelm any obstacles, and those who neither belong to
a bloc or group of countries nor are represented by a strong lobby are
doomed to be crushed by all the rest. In the wake of the Poison Aair,
things remained hanging uncertainly in the air. For despite the world
turmoil caused by that hoax, the accusations heaped against Israel at
all instances of the UN; and in spite of the international investigations
that had cleared Israel of all suspicions, there was no retracting of any
initial false accounts after the truthful chain of events took hold; nor
was any rm moral stand adopted by any member of that body against
the calumniations, when they turned out to be contrived, even as it
was the Western press, which took an active part in manufacturing
and diusing the hoax and in smearing Israel. But since no stand was
taken, the world has been witnessing since 1983 a whole string of fake
accusations of well-poisoning emanating from various quarters. First,
Israeli farming experts, who established farms in Egypt as part of the
implementation of peace between the two countries, to help increase
productivity, were charged by opposition press of importing with
them germs to poison Egyptian lands and destroy their fertility; then,
the Arabic press was replete with stories of a poisoned chewing gum
that was being distributed through Arab lands by Israelis in order to
cause disease; some of those reports specied that the chewing gum
was geared to increase sexual appetite among Arab women so as to
134
corrupt them morally. Finally, in March 1997, the Representative of
the PLO at the UN Human Rights Council, made the following speech
before the Council:
... the crimes of genocide committed by Israeli occupation authorities
against the Palestinian people, are many and varied, starting with the
massacre of Deir Yassin in Palestine in 1948, the Sabra and Shatilla
massacres in Beirut in 1982, and recently when the Israeli authorities
infested by injection 300 Palestinian children with HIV virus during
the years of the Intifadah . Tese reports have been conrmed by the
Israeli newspaper Yedioth Aharonoth last January
20
.
Tis was not a report on a street riot or a sports event, where the de-
scription of the rival parties is good enough. Tis is a life or death matter,
which touches upon the physical and moral existence of other nations,
an event that can tarnish the image and national consciousness of
an entire nation for generations, if proved correct. Terefore, one ought
to be responsible and cautious when one reports about such things.
Te libel in question was made up and propagated by the Palestinians
four years into the Oslo Process, which was supposed to facilitate
contacts and agreements toward a permanent settlement between the
parties. It was based on a press report from Cairo, in the authoritative
Al-Ahram daily of January 23, 1997, which cited an unnamed Palestin-
ian observer, referencing the Israeli evening paper Yedioth Aharonoth.
Al-Ahram had the decency to retract, four days later, on its front page,
the entire story, admitting that it was false, and that nothing of the kind
had appeared in the Israeli newspaper, but Ambassador Ramlawi was
not impressed by the retraction, and he used the UN forum to reiterate
the calumny. No one in that august gathering, except for the sole Israeli
representative and the delegate of the Christian Solidarity International,
David Littman, stood up to refute the falsehood. Te recurrent theme
of hundreds of poisoned Palestinian children, as in the Poison Aair of
1983, could not have escaped unnoticed,
21
but the newsworthy genie
of the calumny was out of the bottle and no one, either from the UN
or the press, did anything to dispel or disprove it.
Now, unlike the media in various countries, which have propagated,
in their own styles, certain aspects of the Poison Aair, with particular
emphases reecting their own or their countries interests, the UN
would have been expected to remain impartial. But that organization
is the sum total of its membership, not an independent arbiter of the
objective truth, if there is one, and does not represent a sovereign reality.
135
It is the worlds largest arena of competition between ideologies, lobbies,
and interests, and the widest grounds for arm-twisting, bargaining, and
horse trading. So, beyond serving as the loudspeaker for the positions
of the strongest, that is, those who command the plurality of automatic
votes, the UN is of little help to clarify issues or to mediate their solu-
tion. It is more a stage of confrontation, a forum for ganging up against
a designated victim, and a battlefront against foes and detractors than
a serious caucus for deliberation, argumentation and rational decision.
When a major issue like the libelous Poison Aair reached the UN, its
treatment was manipulated in such a way that in any case Israel would
stand to be blamed. For, from the start, before any investigation was
launched, it was politically correct to condemn Israel, to threaten her
and to escalate sanctions against her. But when the Aair proved a
hoax, no mechanism of apology and compensation existed in the UN,
and Israel remained aggrieved, without any guarantee that another
hoax and another calumny would not be manufactured against her
the next day. And sure enough, this is what is happening all the time.
A typical course of events of this sort was reported in the UN Year-
book as describing the sequence of what happened in the Poison Aair:
Te alleged mass-poisoning of Palestinian schoolgirls in the West
Bank was the subject of several communications in 1983. Following
informal consultations, the President of the Security Council made
a statement on April 4 [1983] requesting the Secretary General to
inquire into the problem and report on the ndings. In pursuance of
that request, the World Health Organization (WHO) conducted an
independent investigation. On March 29, Jordan transmitted to the
President of the Security Council a letter from the same date from
the Deputy Permanent Observer of the PLO, alleging that more than
a 1,000 Palestinian schoolgirls in the West Bank had been poisoned
as part of a new phase in Israels campaign against the Palestinians,
and calling on the United Nations to form an international medical
committee to investigate, document and report on the poisoning.
Te illness among Arab schoolgirls in the West Bank was the subject
of a number of other communications. On March 30, the Chairman of
the Committee on Palestinian rights stated that local residents believed
the illness had been induced by some kind of poison, perhaps gas, in
the girls classrooms. Pending results of investigations, by International
Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the United Nations, among
others, the Chairman urged the Secretary General to exercise his
o ce to ascertain the full extent, cause and perpetrators of that event.
By a letter of 31 March, Iraq, as the Chairman of the Arab Group,
requested an urgent Security Council meeting to discuss the situation.
136
On April 3, Israel rejected the charges by Iraq and Jordan as un-
founded, and asserted that extensive clinical, laboratory and envi-
ronmental analyses by Israeli medical authorities had yielded no
traces of poisoning. Nevertheless, it added, the Ministry of Health
had requested international health authorities, among them WHO,
to assess independently the causes of the phenomenon.
On April 4, the Security Council President issued the following
statement on behalf of the Council members:
Te members of the Security Council have met in informal con-
sultations with great concern on April 4, 1983, to discuss cases of
mass-poisoning in the occupied Arab territory of the West Bank ...
Te members request the Secretary General to conduct independent
inquiries concerning the causes and eects of the serious problem of
the reported cases of poisoning and urgently to report on the ndings.
By a letter of April 5, Israel rejected the Councils statement, as-
serting that it did not take into account the investigations by Israeli
medical authorities and other medical teams, and that it contained
an unwarranted reference to cases of mass poisoning; the request
for an independent inquiry by the Secretary General was therefore
unjustied.
In pursuance of the Security Councils request of April 4, the
Secretary General submitted on May 10 a report indicating that he
had contacted the Director General of WHO and had requested that
an independent inquiry be conducted. In his report annexed to the
Secretary Generals report, the Director General gave an overview of
WHOs investigations and ndings. In his conclusions he stated that
the WHO inquiry had not been able to indicate any specic cause of
the reported health emergency; however, the initial medical records
and interviews with cases in the rst outbreak, and with local health
and other authorities, suggested that an environmental agent could
have provoked at least some cases.
Te Director General recommended that, in view of the anxiety
under which the population lived in the occupied territories, and
given the susceptibility of girls during adolescence, everything possi-
ble should be done to protect the local population from unnecessary
alarm. For that purpose, WHO presence should be made available in
the event any suspected recrudescence of the ill-dened health emer-
gency, so that all be reassured. He added that although it appeared
unlikely that the patients would suer any signicant sequelae , there
should be provision for clinical follow-up by WHO, should any of
them or their families so request.
Referring to the Director Generals conclusions as well as to the
ndings of several other medical authorities, Israel, in a letter of 25
August, stated that they were fully corroborated by the conclusions
137
reached in medical literature on similar phenomena in other
countries. Israel noted with regret the Councils silence on the matter
since the publication of the Director Generals and other reports.
22

Against the background of this horrible hateful blood libel against
one of the UN members, the reports of the Director General and the
Secretary General stand as insensitive, convoluted and unfair. For
there was no outright rejection of the calumny hurled at Israel, which
had triggered the investigations in the rst place, and no castigation
of the calumniators, nor a demand that they should apologize for their
libel and retract their libelous complaints against Israel from the UN
records. Instead, only an admission that WHO, unlike other teams of
experts, were unable to indicate any specic cause of the reported
health emergency. Te signicance is far-reaching: that there was an
emergency, whose causes the WHO could not determine, and therefore
the putative culprits are to be blamed, for somebody must have caused
the emergency and take responsibility for it. Moreover, the putative
victims, namely the fake patients, were to continue to have an open
channel to hurl their blame again, even after it proved to be a hoax,
should they suspect any recrudescence of that ill-dened health emer-
gency. In other words, the Palestinians were invited to complain again
against Israel, at their whim, for they were under a state of anxiety,
and therefore, Israel would be susceptible for blame indenitely into
the future. Like in classic anti-Semitic blood libels, the victims of the
calumny become responsible for it and the calumniators get rewarded
by having their victims constantly placed on the culprits bench. But
when WHOs report demanded a permanent presence in the West
Bank, so as to assure a rapid dealing with a new health emergency,
one could understand why they remained ambiguous in their conclu-
sions, hoping to increase their scope of authority and operation as a
result of that false crisis.
Te UN lack of moral spine, whose Secretary general must ply to
the will of member states such as Iran, Sudan, and the Muslim and the
Arab groups, instead of shaping a moral, fair, and awe-inspiring policy,
like in the times of Dag Hammarskjld in the 1950s, has depleted the
UN of its ideals and turned its general secretaries into hapless self-in-
terest-seeking o cials, who would do anything to keep the voting
members satised so as to be reelected to the lucrative post. Te rst
two general secretaries were Scandinavian, and they were strong,
idealist, well-educated, and leaders. But after them, there was a long
138
string of nobodies originating from supposedly neutral countries, where
their personal and political insignicance made them electable. Only
in one case, Waldheim, who was a Nazi in his youth in Austria, could
an exSecretary General be promoted to the rank of President of his
own country. All the others, U Tant, Perez de Cuillar, Butrus Ghali,
Ko Annan and probably also Ban Ki-moon, sank into oblivion after
they shed their secretarial clout. Tat is the reason why when an Ah-
madinejad threatens to erase Israel o the map, he is invited to speak
to the UN, and is received by the Secretary General, who instead of
sanctioning him for threatening another member state with annihila-
tion, simply and meekly makes it known that it is unacceptable. Tere
is no evidence that the dictator was ever impressed beyond furtively
smiling to himself, and to his aides and audiences, at this show of dis-
mal helplessness.
Not only the o ce of the Secretary General has been desecrated by
the lack of moral spine, but the entire structure and function of the UN
has been compromised. For defamation of member states, as we have
seen, does not trigger other members to stand up courageously and
ght; more often than not, complicity by silence, harsh wordings, like
in Durban or in the General Assembly, or the Human Rights Commis-
sion, or nice but insignicant wordings while seeking consensus among
the members of the Security Council, or arm twisting and threats,
or surrender to group policies, take precedence over open debate,
fair deliberations, free judgment, or just verdicts. Tese drawbacks
have not only eroded the image of the UN but also widely opened the
oodgates of libel and calumnies to be diused and upheld in other
UN-related bodies. When, for example, in 1991, the General Assemblys
own resolution against Zionism, adopted in 1975, was abolished, there
remained enough Arab and Islamic detractors of Israel to oppose the
abrogation, for they preferred their commitment to defamation to the
truth. In the poison aair, the Arab and Muslim countries were aided
by the silence of most other nations, even after the ndings became
clear, so they felt no urge to withdraw their initial accusations against
Israel, which had proved false, and they elected, on the contrary, to
continue to whip them up whenever the opportunity arose.
Another sad exemplication of the weakness of UN procedures and
of the strength of calumniators there on the one hand, and the hypoc-
risy of the rest on the other hand, has to be reported in the context of
the HIV blood libel against Israel in Geneva in 1997. We have already
mentioned that once the Arab poison libel of 1983 was swallowed
139
by the world with impunity, its authors learned that they can replay
the same trick at will. No representative of any country (the United
States was not a member then) at the Human Rights Commission,
which was supposed to safeguard the right of all nations to be free
from defamation, stood up to reject the abominable libel advanced by
the Palestinian delegate. In fact, following the protest lodged by the
representative of the Christian Solidarity International, an NGO, not a
member, Mr. Miroslav Somol, the Czech representative in Geneva and
the Chairman of the 53rd Session of the Commission, sent a letter to
the Israeli representative, which was circulated as an o cial document
of the Commission, stating:
I share your feeling about such a serious allegation made without
evidence, on the basis of a newspaper article. From the context of
the situation and information generally available, I assume that the
speaker should be aware of the fact that these allegations have proved
completely false.
Tis unfortunate case reminds me of a very similar allegation made
towards your country in 1991 in the Commission on Human Rights.
Already at that time, my predecessor ... expressed the conviction
that declarations provoking racist discriminatory sentiments must
not be tolerated in the Commission ...
23

But the story did not end there. Te Arabs, incensed by this unex-
pected breach of the traditional UN pattern, which had allowed them to
calumniate Israel without refutation, demanded to meet the Chairman
of the Commission and made their reservations about his out-of-order
outburst of fairness. He had to apologize to them for his infraction, in
a letter to Palestinian ambassador, Ramlawi, the author of the calumny:
I should like to refer to the meeting I had with a delegation of dis-
tinguished Arab Ambassadors headed by the Chairman of the Arab
group, regarding my reply to the Ambassador of Israel concerning parts
of the statement you made in the Commission on 11 March, 1997.
I am personally very sorry for any harm this may have caused you.
It was certainly not my intention to do so.
Although I consider it my prerogative as a Chairman to react to
the letter of the Ambassador of Israel, I did not realize that it would
have been better to consult with the Bureau [of the Arab Group]
before undertaking such action. I will bear this in mind in the future.
Please be assured, Mr Ambassador, that it is my rm intention and
duty to continue to be an impartial Chairman of the UN Commission
on Human Rights.
With my highest consideration ...
24

140
Te UN and its institutions, which were taken over by the sheer plu-
rality of Arab countries (22) and Islamic nations (57) and intermittently
supported by all manner of coerced or threatened third world states,
or by eeting and illusory interests of Western European politicians,
or by emerging Asian powers that depend on petrol, have continued
to persecute and libel Israel at will. Te latest manifestation of this
attitude has unfolded during the Gaza War, which took place from
December 2008 to January 2009, and once again has exhibited on the
world stage the built-in inequities that have plagued that organization
in the post-Hammarskjld era. As long as it was the Palestinian Hamas
from Gaza, which bombarded Israel obliging one million inhabitants to
live in shelters, and causing an exodus from Israels border towns, which
was taken by the world as a normal state of aairs. But when, following
repeated warnings, inaction of the UN and the rest of the Internation-
al community, many casualties, and the extension of the bombings
by missiles and rockets into Israeli towns in the interior (Ashkelon,
Ashdod, Beersheba etc.), Israel decided to respond, all international
hell broke loose. For Israel could react, in the protection of its citizens,
principally in either of two ways: targeted elimination of identied ter-
rorists, or a conventional military campaign, which, by nature, causes
death and destruction. Both options were defensive in nature.
Te rst option, which depended on an up-to-date and precise intel-
ligence, was surgical in essence, which meant the elimination of teams
of terrorists in Gaza on their way to perform their acts of bombing or
shelling from an open eld or, worse, from the roof or the entrance of
a public building, so that Israel could not respond. When successful,
such counter attack from the air eliminates the perpetrators, but un-
fortunately also entails collateral casualties and damage. Te US and
NATO forces have registered to their debit many thousands of such
a collateral casualties in Kosovo, Serbia, Iraq, Afghanistan, and other
arenas of warfare, but that is beyond reproach. But when that happens
with Israelis, then all those hypocrites accord in a cacophony of protest
and self-righteousness, accusing Israel of an excess of force, or of ille-
gal executions of the murderers. Te United States has been searching
for Bin Laden for years in a bid to eliminate him and his gang, in the
process blanket-bombing Tora Bora and causing massive damage and
casualties, and before that, it had tried to eliminate Saddam and Hitler,
with similar consequences, but unsuccessfully. However, when Israel
eliminated heads of the Hamas, who pose a much more immediate
danger to her existence, then suddenly legality, dierentiation between
141
the military and civilian wings of those terrorists, and proportionality
came into question. Tere were times when Hamas people blew up
buses and restaurants in Israel, eliminating many dozens of victims, at
times wiping out entire families. Did proportionality mean meting out
the exact same horror on the Hamas, that is, blowing up a restaurant or
a bus in Gaza and killing the same number of people? Israel never did
that, though it could be less costly to her to do so by an aerial surgical
operation.
Western powers do understand that Muslim terrorists bombard
haphazardly with the purpose of causing as many casualties as pos-
sible, and they care little about protecting their people from retalia-
tion, while Israel, like them, wishes to minimize civilian casualties by
targeting directly the perpetrator terrorists, though collateral damage
cannot be avoided. Nevertheless, when Israel retaliates, they all state
the unacceptability of Israels actions and its need to abide by pro-
portionality and spare the civilian leadership (are Bin Laden or Mullah
Omar military?). Tey seem to care more about the real estate that
Israel destroys in its retaliation, in an attempt to save life, than about
the human loss caused by the act of terror, which called for reprisal,
and by the reprisal itself. Tey also understand that there is no other
way to pre-empt acts of terror but by eliminating their authors, for
their victims cannot count either on their punishment by their Hamas
authorities, which instigate them to act, or on their extradition for
punishment elsewhere. Only fear of elimination can restrain them in
their activities or move their authorities to rein them in. But for the UN
and the powers who act exactly likewise in their own wars, retaliation
by Israel remains unacceptable; for them, one has to suer in silence
and exercise the right of self-defense only provided it does no damage
to anyone and causes no casualties to any party. Such a luxury is yet
to be invented by UN aces.
Te second option of conventional warfare to destroy the terrorists
nests and eliminate their infrastructure is much more complicated
and danger-ridden for both the terrorists and whoever launches op-
erations against them, because of the asymmetry between the parties.
Hamas in Gaza and Hizbullah in Lebanon predicate their strategy on
the assumption that they act within civilian population, stockpile their
weapons in civilian apartment houses, position their weapons in or on
public buildings such as schools, mosques, hospitals, UN structures,
and the like, and if and when re is returned, it inevitably hits those
institutions, causing casualties and outrage. Te alternative is to yield
142
to this strategy, let terrorism ravage you and sit idle while your country
and your people are being systematically worn out. And when one has
to react, like in the case of the Gaza War, following the seven years of
consistent bombing of Israeli towns, with thousands of bombs, shells
and rockets, then an outcry is heard from the UN and its hypocritical
members, while they did not do much previously to avoid making the
raid imperative. Terefore, the choice one makes is between defending
oneself despite the damage and the casualties, and despite the unpop-
ularity and libelous charges involved, or sitting idle and watching ones
country losing its defenses and the security of its people, though gaining
the sympathy and praise of the world.
Since Israel has learned the lessons of pre-war Czechoslovakia, which
was shamelessly sold out to Hitler by Britain and France in Munich, for
the sake of the illusory peace in Europe, Israel and its people, the main
victim of the Holocaust caused by the war that ensued, will not sacrice
themselves for an equally fake peace in the Middle East. Hence the
inevitability of war and more war, as the Hamas, the Hizbullah, and
their allies in Syria and Iran reject all peace moves and processes, with
all the libelous charges against Israel that the Arabs and Muslims will
voice, with intermittent support of others in the UN, who will again
sound scandalized by the excess of power, the unwarranted killing and
destruction, etc. Tey forget that in the war that they will have caused,
violence is a virtue, not a drawback. Why else would people build up
their arsenals and wage war if not to use their weapons, all the more
so in self-defense? Sure enough, any of Israels moves will be termed a
massacre at best, a genocide at worse; all Arab military stockpiles,
including the thousands of missiles they showered on Israel, will be
described as defensive weapons, their ghters as civilians, their
military fortications and smuggling tunnels as civilian habitations of
innocent civilians, their casualties as martyrs, and Israel, of course,
as the immoral and cruel aggressor. In short, a string of blood libels
and false accusations can be expected to be hurled at Israel.
Within weeks of the operation launched in Gaza, the President of
the Human Rights Council established a Fact Finding Mission to in-
vestigate the violations of human rights, especially the devastation of
Gaza by air raids and the killing of over one thousand Palestinians, who
were mostly identied by Israel as Hamas ghters, but by the latter as
innocent civilians. Headed by Richard Goldstone, a former member
of the South African Constitutional Court, the Mission comprised
three other members, all with seemingly impressive qualications:
143
a professor of International law in London, a former o cer in the Irish
armed forces, and a member of the Board of Directors of the Institute
of International Criminal Investigation. In addition, a special repre-
sentative of the Secretary General on Human Rights Defenders was
appended to the Mission. An analysis of the members remarks, from
several sources, indicate that their minds were made up (that is Israel
was guilty) before the investigation began. According to Goldstone,
the investigation was carried out according to investigative standards
developed by the UN, something that did not augur well for Israel in
view of previous experiences. During the Commissions month long
presence in Gaza, these methods, based on the Commissions own
words, were manifested in public hearings, which included testimony
of witnesses and experts, visits to Gaza, in which numerous meetings
and interviews took place, and analyses of video, photographic, and
satellite images. What the Commission did not state is that they were
accompanied on their visits by Hamas activists, and shown only what
Hamas wanted them to see. Tus, in eect, the Commissions report
was shaped by Hamas activists views of the matter. A quick look at the
last decade alone, and on the Palestinian front alone, would reveal
the prominence of the latter in this eort, which is designed to posit
the Palestinians, especially the moderates among them within the
PLO tendency, as the substitute to Israel, not its partner for peace. To
that end, they are hard at work to harness even science, history, and
archeology to that task. To wit:
February 2000, PA papers Al-Ayaam and Al-Quds reported that
Palestinians were experiencing hysteria and nervousness after
breathing in poison gas red by the Israelis.
January 2001, PA paper Al-Hayat al-Jadida reported that the aver-
age number of birth defects has increased in the Shafaa Hospital
in Gaza, and that such reports come from authoritative medical
sources. Birth defects have always been high among Arabs due to
family inbreeding between rst cousins and between uncles and
nieces. It is possible that since the rst Intifada (1987), which was
triggered in Gaza, the isolation of that territory has increased and so
did the relative marriages. But as usual, this is another occasion to
throw responsibility-cum-mud on Israel.
December 2002, reports ran in the Palestinian territories that body
parts of martyrs ( shahids ) were stolen by Israel to use in transplants
for its patients.
January 2004, large quantities of candies were thrown by Israel in
front of a school. A Palestinian medic reported that after he collect-
144
ed ten pieces of the poisoned candy, he felt the rubber glove he was
wearing begin to melt, and he experienced breathing di culties,
dizziness, etc. an approximate repeat of the 1983 Poison Aair dealt
with below.
January 2004, the hysterical atmosphere manufactured another
hoax: the PA TV reported that Israel was dropping from airplanes
bombs in toys in places where children played.
November 2005, rumors ran adrift that Israel was responsible for
the death of Yasser Arafat, whom it poisoned incrementally. Even
his transport to France for medical care did not quell the reports.
December 2008January 2009, an upsurge during the Gaza op-
eration of horror stories, in addition to the direct ones caused by
the operation, of all manner of criminal and genocidal means
used by Israel against the innocent civilian population, especially
children, 400 of whom perished during the war, a full third of the
entire list of casualties. Te fact that most of the population of Gaza
consists of children and that no provision was made by the Hamas
authorities to shelter them during the war, while the leadership was
hidden in well-protected underground bunkers, certainly accounts
for those numbers. In any case, these gures t well the blood-libel
of Jews drinking childrens blood, and the Hamas was well-tuned to
disseminate that propaganda.
August 2009, the hysteria across the Arab world aggrandized the
hoax manufactured in Sweden regarding, once again, the use by
Israeli hospitals of Palestinian organs for transplants to Israeli
patients.
An issue unto itself is the extent to which cartoons are used both in
the Muslim press (and the world at large), giving vivid and concrete
expressions of the libels against Israel in a way digestible and accept-
able by mass psychology. Hence the widespread resort to cartoon in
Muslim lands, where the these accusations have come to be treated by
the press in the context of the Arab-Israeli conict and in consequence
of its escalation. Apart from Mustafa Tlass, the Syrian Minister of
Defense who lent credibility to the blood libel by writing a doctoral
dissertation on the Damascus blood libel (1840) as a fact of history,
the Arab and Muslim press, like its Western counterpart, occasionally
uses cartoons to calumniate the Jews and Israel in the crudest and most
anti-Semitic terms. During the Gaza War, for example, genocide of
the Palestinians was cited as a manifestation of the blood-thirstiness
of Nazi-like Israel (NaZionism). In one, Sharon and Hitler are kissing;
in another, an Arab sits next to an Israeli who is reading from a paper
entitled Israeli Crimes on Gaza. He reads aloud: Power and fuel cuts,
food and medicine shortage, air strikes, border closures, what next?
145
Te Arab replies: Gas Chambers. In all this, the prevailing mood is
that war is waged against Israel, but Israel has no right to wage war,
even in its self-defense, and it is supposed, at all times, to facilitate
the food, medical, and fuel supplies to its enemies, to enable them to
sustain their attacks against it. In no other war, were the belligerents
expected to open the military lines for provisions to their enemies,
except in the Arab-Israeli wars. In 1949, Britain forced edgling Israel
to withdraw from the Sinai a rst time, in 1957, the United States did
this a second time, and in October, 1973, when Israel surrounded and
besieged the Tird Egyptian Army, which had invaded the Sinai, thus
turning the tide of the War, it was forced by the United States to let
the Egyptians go; lately, in the Gaza War, Israel was again forced by
Europe, the UN and the United States to lift the siege on Gaza before
the Hamas infrastructure was destroyed and the Israeli kidnapped
soldier was returned. Te Arabs have then come to believe that they
can never be defeated in war because the West will always stand to
rescue them diplomatically if they fail militarily.
As concerns more directly the manifestations of this anti-Jewish
and anti-Israel hatred in cartoon, attention should be drawn to the
following sample:
Al-Dustur (Jordan, March 22, 1994), a hideous Jew presents to a lady
that personies Zionist fanaticism a bottle of Palestinian childrens
blood, declaring that it was a present for Mothers Day to the most
precious mother in the world.
October 2000, the al-Dura hoax was staged near Gaza and distrib-
uted worldwide as a credible blood libel, which was sustained until
proven false by other media and the court system in French. But the
legend of the child al-Dura was cultivated in Palestinian folklore to
a point where it became not only the documented death of a child
martyr, but also a model for all Palestinian children to follow to
Heaven.
Sawt al-Kuwait (Kuwait, February 10, 1992), a Jewish cannibal
(presumably Sharon), after he consumed the bodies of the Arabs,
whose bones are left on his table, he plans to swallow the rest of
humanity that is represented by the map of the world printed on his
napkin.
Al-Ittihad (Egypt, March 9, 1992), a Jew is depicted drawing with a
straw the profusely pouring blood of the American people.
Al-Bayan (Bahrain, March 21, 1990), two ugly Zionist soldiers are
shown hacking to death a (presumably Arab) child. Mrs. Shamir
(the wife of the Israeli PM) is shown exclaiming: Pity that you are
wasting the blood of the child, I need it to bake Matzah.
146
Te cartoon that won rst prize in the 2003 British Cartoon of the
Year, PM Sharon is pictured eating babies, on his lap an election
ribbon urging people to Vote Likkud, and the caption reads: What
is wrong? Never seen a politician eating a baby before?
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert cradles a dead Palestinian baby
wrapped in a blanket marked GAZA. An Israeli ballot box is nearby.
As in the previous cartoon, this suggests that the murder of Arab
children is popular among the Israeli public, and that such murder
helps Israeli politicians to get elected.
An Arab parent cries over a child in a co n made in Israel.
As an echo of the well-known Holocaust photo of a Jewish child
holding his upraised hands in surrender to Nazi troops, a young
Arab boy hold his hands up in surrender to Israeli soldiers. Here the
soldier has a look of pleasure as he terrorizes the child.
A note from the US Department of State: In Bahrain, in June 2002,
the independent Al-Wasat daily published a cartoon depicting a Jew
impaling a swaddled baby on a spear.
Qatar, 2002, a Jewish devil (probably Sharon) walks over the
skulls of his victims. Its pitchfork has seven forks resembling the
seven-branch menorah that is the ancient symbol of Israel.
And so on and so forth, there has been an unceasing stream of false
accusations of blood libel, murder, and infanticide, both in Europe its
ancient birthplace and more so in the Muslim world, which has in-
herited that Christian abomination and has been perpetuating it and
elaborating on it in all kinds of unexpected ways, and drawing into its
orbit growing crowds of ignorant and incited masses in both cultures.
Te Davos incident, in which aggressive and insolent Prime Minister
Erdoan walked out angrily on peace champion President Peres of Is-
rael during their largely publicized debate, hurling at his face publicly
and wantonly the trumped up accusation of murdering Palestinian
children, will be remembered by world media as the most blatant ex-
pression of this turn of events. Te cartoons and their sustaining stories
and legends are being developed in blogs and internet sites and are so
often repeated as to lend to them the respectability of mainstream, as
they appear in the most respectable papers of England, Norway, and
an array of other widely read media.
Te classic blood libel in Christendom used to follow the same re-
curring pattern: on the eve of Passover, the kidnapping of a Christian
boy by the Jews and his murder, and his blood used for the Matza .
Tat story, which proved once and again spurious and libelous when
in modern Europe the authorities cared to investigate and publicly
condemn the false charges and to quell pogroms against the Jewish
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communities resulting therefrom, was picked up and developed in
the Arab and Muslim world so as to acquire ever more fantastic and
imaginary ramications. Moreover, the blood libel per se has become
only the generic term under which we can categorize other accusations
routinely hurled at Israel, which are all concerned with the poison that
Israel allegedly spreads in Arab and Muslim lands and populations,
as part of its putative desire to battle Arab and Muslim demography.
Paradoxically, Islam also prohibits the consumption of blood and
therefore the halal style of slaughtering animals for consumption
follows the Jewish style very closely, hence the mutual acceptance
of kosher in remote communities where no facilities are available to
prepare meat for consumption under the strictly prevailing dietary
laws of either faith. Except, that the salting of meat before cooking it,
in order to purify it from any vestige of blood, is required in Judaism,
not in Islam. Hence the suspicion that when Muslims adopted the
blood libel as a means to ght the Jews, that may have been a means
to demonize Judaism as contradicting its own laws against eating
blood.
Te mistreatment of Jews under Islam, especially in North Africa and
in Spain after the interregnum of the Golden Age, under the indepen-
dent Umayyad Dynasty, and in dierent parts of the Middle East that
fell either under the Mamluks of Egypt, or the Persian kingdom further
east, and later under the unifying Ottoman Empire, has been a matter
of some controversy. Scholars like Bernard Lewis, Marc Cohen, and
Moshe Maoz, have taken the more lenient attitude toward the various
Muslim regimes, pleading for understanding of the context of that era
when Christian attitudes toward their Jews were even worse. Others,
like Michael Curtis, Bat Yeor, and Andrew Bostom, have demonstrated
and solidly documented the sorry story of the extermination of entire
Jewish communities or their forced conversion under Islam. Te dif-
ference lay mainly in the terminology that those two schools are ready
to resort to when describing the very same Islamic societies that they
studied. Te former claims that anti-Semitism was particularly suited
for European Judeophobia, so Muslims could never be accused of
anti-Semitism. Even in the periods when Jews were persecuted and
decimated by Muslims, it was out of mere hatred of the Jews, but not
part of a systematic ambition to eliminate them. Te other claims
that, on the contrary, anti-Semitism was specically coined for hatred
of the Jews everywhere, and when one examines the history of Islam
since the days of Prophet Muhammad and to our days, one cannot
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escape the perennial theme of a visceral anti-Jewish contempt, hatred,
and dismissal, which could only be dubbed as anti-Semitism. Todays
mind-boggling fanatic hatred of the Jews and the open vow to their
annihilation comes not from Christendom but from Islamdom (Iran,
Hamas, Al-Qaida, Hizbullah, and a few others).
Be it as it may, the humiliating eect of the dhimmi status of the Jews
under Islam has been universally recognized as having generated such
a deep hatred and hostility toward the Jewish minorities throughout
Islamdom that anti-Semitism was a necessary outcome, whether the
terminology is accepted or not. Te anxiety and humiliation that went
on par with Jewish existence under Islam had always cried for reaction,
which began defensively, and ended up with total divorce from that
environment, which was totally unbearable that Jews were helpless to
alter. One has to account for the years of Islamic conquest, expansion,
annihilation of some existing Jewish (and Christian) communities, oc-
cupation, forced conversion, and cruel subjugation of the non-Muslim
communities that survived. When old Jews were beaten and humiliated
before the eyes of their grand children, when cataracts of rocks could
always land on Jews from nowhere, when my own peaceful Sunday
picnics could always be disrupted by beatings, or when Jewish Sabbath
and holidays could always be inexplicably interrupted by some Mus-
lim thug or incited mob, those were all daily and persistent parts of a
constant malaise, which undermined Jewish existence under Islam.
Te general picture, however, was much bigger and much more
painful than the persecuted Jews suspected. Especially debilitating to
the ill-informed minds of Jews in modernity were the grim reports
about the decimation of one third of the Jewish people in the Nazi cre-
matoria, to which the Arab and Muslim pro-Nazi Mufti of Jerusalem,
Amin al-Husseini, made a great contribution that stains his reputation
forever in the eyes of decent people in the world. No wonder, then,
that when the alternative loomed of an independent Jewish state, most
Jews of Islam, unhesitatingly rose in one sweeping messianic wave, and
moved there. Tey were simply tired, frightened, and disgusted from
centuries of oppression and humiliation, which explains their massive
and rapid departure from the land they had inhabited longer than the
Arab/Muslim invaders who subjugated them and rendered their lives
unbearable. Unlike in the Pesach Haggadah , where Gods command
was a major element in the liberation of all Jews from bondage, and
His messenger, Moses, was instrumental in leading that exodus out of
that cursed land, the Jews of Islam, who were enslaved, despised and
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marginalized, initiated their own saga, which was little reported and is
little known. Te irony is that after the Jews had been settled in Morocco
since the beginning of the Christian era until the Muslim conquerors
came to occupy and oppress them, and they have returned to their
home in the Land of Israel, they are now accused of occupying Arab
and Muslim Palestine. Similarly, other Jews of Egypt, Babylonia, Persia,
and North Africa, whose ourishing settlements preceded those of
the Arabs and the advent of Islam, were also compelled to leave their
ancient heritage and move to Israel, from which Arabs and Muslims
now wish to evict them.
Te Fez (Morocco) Chronicles, for example, which were recorded
for centuries by the rabbis and notables of the community, cannot be
matched by any other primary source for the detail and accuracy of
their reports. Had it not been for the horrors that were recorded day
in and day out, and for the survival of the Jews who wrote them de-
spite massive tortures, murders, and forced conversions, we would not
know anything of that sorry history, which matches the much better
known pogroms against the Jews in the Ukraine, Russia, the Baltics,
or medieval Western Europe. Moreover, those records would have
been countered by avalanches of denials by Muslims who loathe to
see their record stained. Already now, under the best conditions of the
memory conservation of the Holocaust, which is still fresh on decent
peoples minds, and whose survivors are still around to torment our
conscience, Holocaust denial has sadly become universal throughout
the Islamic world. Tere are shame cultures where politics precede
decency, and where saving face takes precedence over honest and
accurate accounting. Muslim cultures, which had, for centuries, been
preserving a self-image of protecting the Jews and living in harmony
with them, cannot simply face a catastrophic deprecation and denial
of their own writings and the positive legends they have been weav-
ing around their treatment of the Jews, whom they had in fact always
wished to preserve as dhimmis. Several examples of those chronicles
must be cited and commented upon to illustrate the taste of dhimmi
treatment under Islam .
In 1438, the Jews were expelled from the old city of Fez ( Fas al-Bali ),
and they built their mellah (ghetto). From that time on, at every inter-
regum when the heir to power was struggling against other contend-
ers to the throne, Jews were always the easy prey, with each party
demanding extra taxes, ransoms and protection money from them, all
the while committing massacres against them. In the years 15531555,
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for example, the rulers levied money from the Jews to nance their
domestic or internecine wars. When, in 1558, Muslim Turks invaded
Morocco, they killed the incumbent ruler and massacred Jews, raped
Jewish girls in the city of Sousse, took many Jewish prisoners back with
them, if they remained alive, as slaves, and those were probably convert-
ed to Islam. Admittedly, horrors were done by Muslims against other
Muslims too, killing them by the thousands and chopping their heads o
beyond measure. But those were the accepted norms of action against
invaders from the outside, or rebels against the rule from within, and
one can claim that there was no other way to repel the enemy or quell
a rebellion. But Jews did not belong to either of these categories: Tey
were native and preceded the Arab rulers, so they could not invade
them, and they never rose violently against the ruling dynasty, in spite
of the oppression that would have warranted such a rebellion. For one
thing, they were too weak, unarmed, and unhopeful of success. So,
the cruel intimidation, oppression, and outright elimination were not
used in defense against them, but, for some very specic ideological
reasons, were connected with the dhimma. When, in 1562, the Chron-
icle reports, two Jews of Meknes who quarreled with each other, they
had their arms amputated; that was well beyond a punishment that
would have been meted out to a Muslim, if at all, since there was no
oense to the rule. Tat severe punishment was not even mandated by
the king himself, despite its extraordinary severity; this goes to show
that the deep enmity against the Jews seeped all the way down to the
ranks. Under the conditions of those times, amputation meant almost
certain death. Tose two miserable Jews indeed agonized until their
death. Ten years later, in 1572, disaster fell upon the Jews of Marrakesh,
when the Seder night turned into a time of death.
Old-time events are emphasized here to counter the usual Arab
claim that Jews lived in peace and harmony until Zionists came to
disturb the order of things. In 1606, namely slightly prior to Zionism,
the Chronicles of Fez tell us of eight hundred dwellers of the mellah
who died of starvation after a vain search for food in the garbage piles;
so were they either condemned to starve within the ghetto, or to be
massacred if they ventured out of it. In this situation, six hundred
Jews had to convert to Islam to escape both starvation and murder.
Tis meant that it was not a state of general starvation, which reigned
everywhere, but that hunger depended on faith, and if, as in the days
of Torquemada, a Jew wanted to live or just to eat, he had to convert,
regardless of the Quranic verse so often cited to demonstrate Muslim
151
tolerance, and that Muslims are so fond of repeating that there is
no compulsion in religion. Many Jews were led to slaughter, some-
times their own children had to rescue them from those dilemmas by
converting, and others committed suicide and died as martyrs. In 1610,
the Jews were burdened by the ruler with a special tax of ten thousand
ounces of silver in payment for the rulers rescuing them from pillage
by other Arabs, as if the other Arabs were not his subjects or as if he did
not owe any measure of protection to the Jews who paid their regular
taxes as part of the dhimma. But since the Jews had no way to collect
that enormous sum within the one day that was allotted to them, the
sum was doubled. So bad was the situation and so insistent and cruel
the oppressor that the Jews had to cancel their Yom Kippur rituals in
order to busy themselves with the collection of money in order to satisfy
the tyrant. However, since that heartless oppressor was removed from
power by his brother, the newcomer demanded the same amount, and
the Jews were compelled again to abrogate their Tabernacle festival to
busy themselves with the collection of the funds.
Tus, many Jews were dispossessed of all their property and knew
the intimidation of starvation. Traders among them, who were on their
caravans way, were also robbed and maltreated. As if man-induced
calamities were not su cient, an epidemic of plague killed another
four hundred helpless Jews. On Hanukka of that year, merely a few
months after Yom Kippur and the Tabernacles, another ten ounces of
silver were levied on the Jews, who, in order to produce them, had to
melt the gold and silver ornaments and covers of their Torah scrolls,
an act of last resort and of ultimate despair. How pitiful and deeply
aggravating it was to them to see the Holy Book bare and naked, like
the community itself that stood on the verge of bankruptcy; add to that
the humiliation, shame, and grief that all its members shared. All these
extra exactions came in addition to the ten thousand ounces of regular
taxes, which were levied on the community annually, and to the wine
tax, which Jews had to pay in order to be permitted to produce for their
needs. During Purim, a few months later, while the Jews of Fez were
busy trying to respond to another exaction of eight thousand ounces
of silver, news of the city of Tedla came to further bring despondence
and spoil their holiday, to the eect that Arabs had destroyed Jewish
homes and burned fty scrolls of the Torah, two thousand books of
the Pentateuch, followed by three thousand more. Again on Pentecost,
the Arabs, having learned by then that the holidays were the most vul-
nerable days on which to squeeze the Jews, struck again. Te Arab
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governor of Fez demanded from the Head of the community another
twenty-ve ounces of silver, and the Jews had no choice but to conform
if they wanted to extricate their president from certain imprisonment
and death. Rabbi Saul Serero, the rabbi of the time who also kept the
records, wrote with bitterness: Had all the skies been parchment,
all the lakes full of ink and all the forests pens, they would not have
been su cient to write all our troubles in full. Tis picturesque and
somewhat exaggerated description, which cried out from the depths
of despair, was to repeat itself many times later in the Fez Chronicle.
At the same time, many synagogues were robbed and their trea-
sures stolen. Te members had to stand watch round the clock near
their houses of prayer, or pay protection money to thugs, to the point
that they were so impoverished that they could do nothing more and
decided to throw their lot in the hands of the Creator. Tis was done
via prayer, fasting, and bringing their babies into the synagogues; it
was hoped that the cries of the children would generate Gods mercy.
As a rule, the worst moments for Jews came during the transition
from a ruling king to his children, who fought for power; any one of
them who emerged victorious could blame his Jewish subjects for not
identifying with him from the outset, and exact from them taxes and
ransoms. Te Fez Chronicles are replete with the reports of the prayers
for rain, which were heard from every synagogue of the mellah , for
fear that if rains continued to be scarce, the Jews would be accused
and made to pay the damages as a consequence. In 1646, local troops
were directly involved in the destruction of the Fez synagogues, in
spite of all the bribes paid to the governor and his underlings to avert
the disaster. Te bribes su ced only to rescue the Torah scrolls, but
the houses of prayer were so utterly destroyed that they were found
comparable, in the eyes of the local rabbis, to the destruction of the
Temple. Terefore, lamentations were read and sung, as on the day of
the ninth of the month of Ab, which commemorated the destruction
of the Temple, the holiest place in the history of Judaism. On the next
Yom Kippur, the two colleges ( Beit Midrash ) of Torah learning were
also razed to the ground.
What was amazing, and may have attested to Jewish survival and
durability, was the expression due to our sins, which accompanied the
descriptions of those calamities, as if turning the guilt inward would
somewhat mitigate the disaster once the blame was not directed to
others but reected on oneself. Te Chronicle did not call for vengeance
or retribution, for such were considered impractical and unfeasible
153
against the powerful rulers and their incited and hateful crowds. In
return for the houses of prayer that were destroyed and the desecration
of Jewish holidays by the Arabs, full reliance on God who would take
our vengeance, and praises to Him for having preserved the Jewish
communities from total annihilation, were the prevailing themes in that
register of sad events. Accommodation with those horrible events, in
recognition that they could be worse, was due not only to a pessimistic
acceptance of ones lot for the misfortunes that occurred; there was also
in them an element of hope and optimism that not everything was lost
and that renewal and consolation could be seen looming ahead beyond
the murderous present. Indeed, in 1672, during the rst prosperous
years of the Alawite Dynasty, which rules until our days, such words of
comfort and faith in the future were recorded in the Chronicle; this was
under the generous and benevolent kingship of Mulai al-Rashid and
Mulai Ismail, who alternated between their ancient capital of Fes and
the newly established one in nearby Meknes. Jews were exuberant and
attached great hopes to the future, teaching us that in the long series
of massacres and forced conversions, robberies, and destruction, there
were also occasional intervals when the Jews saw the light. Even faint
stars looked bright to them against the backdrop of the very dark skies
they had grown accustomed to contemplate.
Either way, it became evident once and again, that Jews depended
for their very existence on their sycophancy toward absolute and cor-
rupt rulers, who legislated, enforced, and punished ruthlessly, all at
once. Jews became unfailingly aware, every day anew, of their misery
under this kind of oppressive rule and of the hazard of sitting atop a
bubbling volcano, which could burst at any time, without warning or
transition. In the year 1680, for example, while everyone was asleep,
the king decreed that all the inhabitants of the Fez mellah had to be
pulled out of their beds and sent to the surrounding elds, the very
same elds, which, on happier days, hosted their mimouna picnics
that followed the Pesach festival. Te reason was that a sword set with
precious stones had been stolen from his palace. Te horried Jews,
with their praying elderly, yelling infants, and their helpless sick, lay
on the cold and barren earth, not understanding either of what they
were guilty, or when that collective punishment would be abrogated.
Only when they were permitted to go to their homes, and when they
realized that nothing was stolen from their property in their absence,
did they burst into celebration for the miracle that was performed for
them, for they could remain alive, while the torment, the terror, and the
154
menaces heaped on them in the middle of the night were considered
normal. Moreover, the ruling king, Mulai Ismail, was considered
benevolent, and when one day, the news was released that he had just
escaped from falling prey to lions, they celebrated in great pomp and
ceremony, abstained from work, decorated the streets of the mellah
with silk materials, and donned their most festive dress. On that day,
they could even visit the royal palaces and enter the mosques with their
shoes on, as they jubilantly reported in their records of 1699. But, in the
same breath, they reported of Mulai Zaydan from the royal house in
Telalt, who stormed the mellah , taking as booty anything he and his
underlings found of worth, and imposed a ne of two hundred and fty
gold coins on that impoverished community. Tese were the two poles
of Jewish existence, which implied that the more the helpless Jews sub-
mitted and bent their heads down, the more mistreated and humiliated
they were bound to be at the hands of their rulers. Just for the privi-
lege of remaining alive, they would hold themselves grateful to their
oppressors for the generosity from which they had beneted. Tat
was, in essence, the status of dhimma , which we will have to clarify.
Tat recurrent horror only told the chronicles of a remote corner of
Islamdom. Similar scenes unfolded in Iran, Iraq, the Yemen, Egypt, and
wherever Islam ruled. From the onset of Islam in the 7th century AD, as
the new religion was expanding rapidly through quick conquest of the
entire Mediterranean basin and beyond, where ancient and exhausted
nations were disintegrating, the need arose of dividing humanity into
three categories, and the earth into two sorts of territory. At the center,
of course, stood the Muslims, the humans closest to the ideal, due to
their submission ( Islam) to the will of Allah. Te second category were
the Scriptuaries ( ahl-al-kitab ), namely people, like Jews and Christians,
who possessed a holy scripture that was recognized by Islam until it
was distorted and forged by its holders, and subsequently amended
and updated, as it were, by the revelations of Islam. As the years wore
on, and as the conquests were further expanded, other peoples too, like
the Hindus, were recognized as Scriptuaries. In the outer circle were
included the pagans who did not know one God. Te lands where those
peoples dwelt were dierentiated into the Islamic Dominion (or Pax
Islamica ), that is, the territory ruled by Islam ( Dar al-Islam ), regardless
of the composition of its population (for instance, the lands populated
by a majority on non-Muslims were still part of this category as long
as they were ruled by Islam); and the Dominion of War ( Dar al-Harb ),
namely the land that was yet to fall under Islamic rule. Evidently, for
155
practical reasons, these categories are not eectively operational these
days, for otherwise the entire system of international relations would
be chaotic, even more than it is today. But in the pre-modern world,
where there were neither public opinion, nor international organiza-
tions, or international rules of conduct, every civilization determined
its attitude toward others as it pleased. In pre-modern Morocco, as
in the entire Islamic world, the rules of conduct toward non-Muslims
were dened by Sharia law; that law was immutable and not given to
reforms, pressures, or the whims of the ruler, though some of them
did deviate from those severe laws, depending on whether they were
personally more fanatic puritans or open-minded benevolents. As a
rule, under the Malekite puritanism of the Moroccan rulers, especially
the Murabitun (Almoravid) and the Muwahhidun (Almohads) dynas-
ties of the eleventh to fourteenth centuries, the suering of the Jews
reached its apex.
According to Islamic political theory, after the Jihad wars generated
the expansive conquests and the enlargement of Dar al-Islam , the Mus-
lim ruler found himself managing the lives of three sorts of people: the
Muslims who occupied the masters position, the submitted Scriptu-
aries who were merely tolerated, and the Pagans who were compelled
to Islamize, or run away for their lives until they would be subjugated
in the next round of conquests, or would be killed. According to this
theory, only the rst two categories could dwell in the Muslim Caliph-
ate, while the pagans had to expeditiously determine their choices.
Tey were converted to Islam in their majority, as were many Jews and
Christians who could not tolerate their tolerated status. Te pace of
conquest was so dizzying that the occupied pagan peoples had little
time to ponder the new situation, and, in general, had to adapt to the
new rulers. But the Scriptuaries, whose scriptures were recognized, had
only to recognize Islams superiority, and were otherwise permitted to
maintain their religions under the status of dhimmi (protected) , and
to pay a special and demeaning poll tax, the jizya , in return for their
protection by the Muslim ruler. On the face of it, Muslim societies
in the Middle Ages were thus much more open and tolerant of Jews
than was Christendom. Tis has created the myth of tolerance and of
the Golden Age of the Jews under the Muslims, as if they (and the
Christians) had enjoyed total equality in the Muslim medieval world.
Te status of the dhimma (protection or dhimmitude) gained consid-
erable treatment in the Muslim judicial treatises of the Middle Ages. To
be a dhimmi not only signied an inferior class of the tolerated peoples,
156
in contrast with the privileged Muslim subjects of the Caliphate, but
also meant a lesser judicial stature (e.g., the evidence provided by a
dhimmi was worth half the Muslims, or the dhimmi was legally in-
capacitated to bear witness against a Muslim); an economic position
(certain dirty jobs and occupations were reserved for the dhimmis ); a
political rank: (Jews and Christians had no political rights and could
not be trusted to serve in government); and a cultural handicap: (the
dhimmi was always suspected of plotting dark schemes or mirroring
Satan). When Muslim children were disciplined by their parents for
their misconduct, the threat that Jews would be brought upon them was
often used. Tat was understandable because the Quran discouraged
any amicable relations with the Jews and the Christians. Many of the
limitations imposed on Jews and Christians were crystallized in what
came to be known as the Umar Regulations, and expressed the ambiv-
alent attitude of Muslims to the Scriptuary peoples: on the one hand,
they were tolerated and protected due to their holy scriptures, but, on
the other hand, they were to be humiliated and tormented due to their
forgery of the Word of Allah, unless they complied and converted to
Islam, as most conquered peoples did. But one has to emphasize that
the Regulations were often violated, for the better or for the worse. In
Muslim Spain, many Jews achieved grandeur, served among the highest
bureaucracy of the state, and distinguished themselves as professionals
and intellectuals of the rst degree. But in Muwahhidi Morocco and
Mamluk Egypt, Jews knew the worst periods of massacre and torment
in their history, even though they heeded the Regulations and paid
their poll-tax ( jizya ).
According to the Umar Regulations, Jews and Christians were not
allowed to build new houses of prayer, not even to refurbish those
destroyed during the Jihad wars of Muslim conquest, many of which
were converted into mosques. And when a permit to build was grant-
ed, it was with the provision that the church or the synagogue did not
stand taller than the nearest mosque. Who the master was and who
the subordinates were had to be evident at all times. Even at the end
of the twentieth century, and under Israeli rule, the Muslim majority
of Nazareth, which wished to a rm that the Christian predominance
of the city had revolved, demanded the right to build a mosque with
an eighty-six-meter minaret on the plaza of the Basilica of Annuncia-
tion, in order to dwarf the hitherto dominant structure of the Basilica.
By intervention of the government and the courts, that attempt was
aborted, but the Muslim message was clear: scriptuaries (due to Jewish
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rule they were not dhimmis ) can, under no circumstances, pretend to
dominate in what is legally a Dar al-Islam , even though a non-Muslim
rule has been temporarily prevailing there. Te Regulations also pro-
hibited the dhimmis from bearing arms or riding horses, those noble
animals being reserved for the noble Muslims only. D himmis were also
compelled to wear certain distinguishing items of clothing, to give right
of way to Muslims, not to raise their voice even when they were beaten
or humiliated. When they paid the poll-tax, their representative who
made the payment was slapped on his face and struck on his shoulder,
as if the Muslim ruler were not in need of those payments that were
nevertheless assiduously leviedand were often transgressed by addi-
tional exactions. In the fanatical edges of the Muslim world, like Iran
and Morocco, Jews (Christians had practically been eliminated there)
were not permitted to wear shoes in the streets, or allowed to go out-
doors when it rained or snowed, lest they contaminate the Believers
when they crossed them on their way.
Tere is no doubt that compared to medieval Christianity, which did
not tolerate any non-Catholic in its midst and activated its infamous
Inquisition to eliminate or expel Cathars, Jews, and other dissidents
in the West, and which committed the cruel pogroms against Jews
in Czarist Russia in the East, the Muslim world was more open and
tolerant; it absorbed Jewish refugees expelled from Christendom,
and generally did not persecute Jews and Christians in a systematic
manner. Tis was possible because while Christian society was uni-
compartmental and supposedly homogeneous, allowing no diversity
in its midst, the Islamic Caliphate was a bi-compartmental society that
recognized a place, secondary and subordinate to be sure, but never-
theless a protected ( dhimmi ) position within society. Evidently, under
the conditions of the time, Jews felt better protected under Islam than
in Christendom. But to jump to the hasty and incorrect conclusion
that they always lived in equality, harmony and peace under Islam,
is, unfortunately, a gross exaggeration. Te fact is that the moment the
Jews of Islam could leave their land, they did so, some to seek shelter
in the Western world, which had, in the meantime, undergone eman-
cipation, liberty, and modernity; while Islamdom, as a whole, did not
experience such developments; most decided to migrate to the newly
established state of Israel. It is true that most Muslim countries, main-
ly under the impetus of the colonial powers, have formally cancelled
the dhimma , but the built-in hatred and contempt of the Jews (and
Christians) did not relent. Te continuing Arab-Israeli dispute, and
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the revival of Islam and its norms, have contributed immensely to
the renewal of the traditional Islamic political thought, even though
Jews have practically left Islamic lands. All one has to do is to read the
platforms of Al-Qaida, the Hamas or the Hizbullah, to realize the full-
edged retrieval from oblivion of the anti-Jewish (and anti-Christian)
ideology and vocabulary, and their euphemistic demand to return the
Jews to their former state (of dhimmis ).
Te most insidious aspect of the dhimma , however, beyond the
humiliation and institutionalization of discrimination in the judicial,
political, economic, social, and cultural domains, has been the state of
mind of fatalistic submission of the dhimmis , born out of centuries of
inescapable persecution and oppression, on the one hand, and the mood
of sycophancy and identication with the oppressor, which turned this
state of aairs into an almost natural and immutable one, on the other.
In other words, while it has been possible to extricate Jews from the
dhimma , it is next to impossible to extract dhimma out of the Jews.
We have already described the mood of submission and sycophancy
that has characterized Jewish conduct during the dark ages of their ex-
istence in the various mellahs of Morocco. But even after their exodus
from that backward society, and their rootedness in the modern and
advanced societies that absorbed them, where liberty and security are
guaranteed, there is among them a lingering habit of praising the rulers
for their benevolence toward the Jews; it is as if Jews owed their right
of existence to those corrupt and absolute rulers who held thousands
of political prisoners in prisons without trial. Te parochial outlook of
judging rulers only according to their attitudes to Jews, and not on the
basis of their universal and human rights records, is what distorts the
thinking of those Jews who, in Israel, erect monuments to Moroccan
kings, or who have praised Moroccan monarchs, or participated in their
funerals, only because they were pro-Jewish, or accepted bribes to
let Jews leave their bondage there, or had otherwise collaborated with
Israel. Furthermore, this dhimmi outlook has insidiously penetrated the
domain of international relations, inasmuch as the political correctness
cultivated by the media, academics, and diplomats has imposed rules
of conduct that prohibit criticizing anything Islamic, including their
repressive regimes, their backward societies, their corrupt leaderships,
or their aggressive policies. We are surrounded by the legends of Islam
as the religion of peace, in the face of the record of Jihad, war, and con-
quest; of tolerant Islam, in the face of the persecuted and massacred
minorities and dissidents; of moderate Islam, while it is the more
159
militant trends that are prevalent. Te Rushdie syndrome, the hiding
of European politicians in their own lands from the wrath of Muslims,
the kowtowing and submission of Europe following the cartoon aair,
and the violence used by Muslims throughout the world; the fear of
newspapers and publishers to print anything critical of Islam; and the
whimpish supplications of the West to Iran to desist from its nuclear
program, which have been to no avail despite the sanctions imposed
by the West against Tehran, are all manifestations of this malaise. And
if one fails to conform to this dhimmi doctrine, one is dubbed racist
or Islamophobe.
All this was accepted as a natural calamity, and Jews under Islam,
in addition, praised the benevolence of theirs Muslim rulers, which
can only be explained by the spirit of dhimma , which utterly deformed
their minds and misguided their behavior. Dhimma , as practiced today
in the world turns out, then, to be an incurable and hereditary disease,
down to our own days. Te same Jew, Habib Toledano, who reported,
in the Chronicle of the year of 1699, the celebration of the rescue of
Mulai Ismail from the claws of lions, also whimpered in 1701 about
the troubles we experienced under Mulai Ismail, who exacted from
Moroccan Jews one hundred silver pounds for the conduct of his
wars. Of that, the Jews of Fez were to pay twenty-two pounds, such an
enormous sum that our hearts melted, our knees trembled, our hands
weakened, our eyes blurred, our bones broke ... and the joy of Pesach
turned into disaster. Many households did not read the haggadah , and
those who did, intoned it like a lamentation. Following all those levies,
pains, and whimpers, the Jewish community dispatched a delegation
to the Court, with gifts to express gratitude, and to appease the ruler,
who might be inuenced to alleviate some of that burden. But it was
all in vain, and they had to cry and pay. To collect that money, the
leadership imposed on the wealthy between six and ten thousand silver
ounces each; the rabbis, who generally were penniless, had to pay only
two thousand each. To get that sum, they again had to melt the silver
decorations of the Torah scrolls, but felt that this act was so demeaning
to the honor of the Torah that they refrained from reading from those
naked scrolls during the following feast of Pentecost.
In the 1704 Chronicle, more reports of robbery, taxes, and acts of
cruelty against the Jews were reported. One Jew, who had hardly been
married for a month, was abducted and burnt alive. Te local governor
who ordered the murder also sent his underlings to exact a ransom
for the dead Jew. Others visited the mellah every day to demand more
160
taxes and gifts, or to collect cones of sugar, silk materials, foodstus,
and clothing, as if the Jewish pockets were bottomless, and anyone
who had any authority or wielded any power saw himself entitled to
dip his hand and grab as much as he could. But when there was no
other source from which to pay, delegations of Jewish notables went
to the Court in Meknes to complain about this endless procession of
exactions. Te king ordered them ogged with lead-garnered whips,
until two of them died, and the rest of them were ordered burnt alive
in the lime furnace. But he reconsidered and elected to hold them hos-
tage until their community in Fez redeemed them with another twenty
pounds of silver. Jews who could not pay were arrested, and they either
died under torture or announced their conversion to Islam in order to
escape that hell. After all these horrors, the chronicler sang the praise
of Mulai Ismail at his death (1727), perhaps to signify that the other
leaders were worse. He was specically lauded for the security of trade
in his times, due to his ruthless security forces, and for his wisdom and
intelligence. And on the circumstances of his death, it was mentioned
that due to our sins, he fell ill and died, as if the Jews sins caused his
death, or that they should regret the passing away of the despot. Maybe,
they sensed that he was still better than his prospective successors.
Nothing could better illustrate the dhimmi state of mind. It was
founded on the miracle of the permanently imsy and threatened
existence, where the oppressed, who hardly maintained his breathing,
was overly grateful to his persecutors and God for his survival. He
thanked the Lord that he was not compelled to convert from his faith,
and that he could withstand the tortures, the hunger, the fears, and the
threats, which accompanied his existence. He thought that things could
always get worse. Sometimes, they did indeed. In the interregnum year
17901791, for example, the Jews were compelled to leave the mellah
for twenty two months, and upon their return from their shelters in the
mountains or in other cities, or from hiding places in town, they began
to build the ruins anew, to refurbish the walls that were breached, and
to rebuild their private as well as communal lives. After all this, the
great luminary, Rabbi Yehuda Ben-Atar, sang the praise of the Lord
for all the miracles He performed for us, in our benet. Let us sing in
gratitude to the Lord, for we should not be ungrateful. We have seen
with our own eyes and heard with our own ears, the miracles done to
us, just like the exodus from Egypt. Shortly thereafter, in 1793, the rule
again revolved, and the persecutions that were imposed, on Pesach
at rst, on the town of Tetouanwhose Jews were robbed of all the
161
provisions they had accumulated for the holiday, and where many of
them were killed, raped, burned, and despoiledspread to other cities
and lasted until Pentecost, seven weeks later, when nothing was left
to be despoiled, not even the honor of deowered Jewish women who
tried to cover their nudity with extant pieces of burnt Torah scrolls.
In the city of Oujda, the Jews who came out in festive Arab dress to
welcome the new ruler, instead raised his wrath because they were
indistinguishable from the Arabs in the crowd, so he ordered the right
ear of all Jews present, old and young, men and women, to be cut o
in order to tell who was who. Rabbi Shriki, a great scholar in Torah in
that generation, to whom a high position had been promised by the
king if he converted to Islam, was burnt alive while the cruel ruler
watched and sang. Other Jews were hanged alive by their feet at the
entrance to the mellah , for all to see and be struck by terror. Tat king,
Yazid Ibn Muhammed, was known in Jewish sources as arrogant and
a hater of Jews, like Haman from the Book of Esther, who delighted in
chopping o the heads of Jews and hanging them at the city entrance.
When his brother, Suleiman, took over the reign, the Jews regarded
him as saver and redeemer.
So, the lives of the Jews proceeded from one ruler to the next, one
more or less greedy, cruel and evil than his predecessor or his successor,
to the point that periods of slightly less duress (there were no good
periods) looked like a golden age. Namely, a king who did not indulge
in massive massacres, or frequently despoil the Jews, was adulated as
benefactor and benevolent. Te next century was not any better.
In 1811, a large-scale pogrom plagued the Jews of nearby Meknes,
many synagogues were burnt, with their books and scrolls inside,
and so many houses were destroyed that families were compelled to
spend the nights in the streets. Te Jews were afraid to decry the ruin
of their community or to eulogize the dead in public, lest the author-
ities suspect that they were being condemned. Despite the discretion
of the mourning, reports were passed to the rulers that Jews had built
new synagogues, something strictly prohibited under the Umar Reg-
ulations that prompted the authorities to destroy the new buildings
and impose nes for the violation of the rules. Only now, when I look
back upon my childhood, and as I am equipped with the learning and
experience of an educated adult, can I understand the deep sighs so
often sounded by Grandfather and Father, accompanied by the prayer:
May God pronounce our suering plentiful! When they repeated that
prayer, their voices were shaky and painful, as if the entire weight of the
162
universe rested on their shoulders. At the time, I never could fathom
their individual and communal agony, which was imprinted generation
after generation on their esh, and not only on their recollection, in
spite of the atmosphere of quiet, serenity, and normalcy, which they
tried to weave around us. Tat saga of suering not only was recorded
by the Jewish victims, but was also conrmed in the writings of their
oppressors, who saw no wrong in their doings; that was what the pre-
vailing rule of the Muslim masters, was supposed to mete out to the
inferior dhimmis.
Tat treatment of the dhimmis was enshrined not only in ancient ju-
dicial theory but also in modern practice. A fteenth-century Moroccan
scholar, al-Maghili, described the day of payment of the poll tax, which
was levied on Jews individually and on their community collectively:
On payment they [the dhimmis ] shall be assembled in a public place
like the suq [market place ]. Tey should be standing there waiting in
the lowest and dirtiest place. Te acting o cials representing the law
shall be placed above them and shall adopt a threatening attitude so
that it seems tothem, as well as to others, that our object is to degrade
them by pretending to take their possessions. Tey will realize that
we are doing them a favor (again) in accepting from them jizya, and
letting them thus go free. Ten they shall be dragged one by one (to
the o cial responsible) for the exacting of payment. When paying,
the dhimmi will receive a blow and will be thrust aside so that he will
think that he has escaped the sword through this (insult). Tis is the
way that the Friends of the Lord, of the rst and last generations, will
act towards their indel enemies, for might belongs to Allah, to His
Apostle and to the Believers.
25

Four hundred years later, at the end of the nineteenth century, an
Italian Jew, visiting Marrakesh, personally watched this similar scene
at the gate of the mellah:
Te Governor and the Judge planted their tents at the entrance to
the mellah and urged the Jews to proceed to the payment of the jizya
which they collected for the sultan ... I was also summoned, and since
I inquired whether strangers who enjoyed European patronage were
also obliged to pay their part, I was told that others had already paid,
therefore I agreed to conform too. After I paid the tax to the o cials,
I was beaten on my shoulder by the guards of the Judge [the act of
payment, which is a religious duty, is overseen by the Judges, but the
law enforcement is assured by the Governor]. I addressed the two
o cials and told them that I was under the protection of the Italians.
Tereupon, the Judge ordered the guards: remove the kerchief from
163
his head and beat him forcefully, and let him complain to whomever
he wishes! Te guards obeyed and beat me energetically. Tis kind of
attitude to a protected European subject only shows the local Arabs
that they can mistreat Jews without any fear of punishment.
26

Another European visitor to Morocco reported that dhimmis could
not possess Quran books or employ Muslim servants. In Marrakesh
of 1880, an old Jewish couple employed a poor Arab woman as a
house maid. When that was discovered, the old Jew, Jacob Dahan, was
ordered to be beaten to death by the Governor and his corpse to be
dragged in the streets by soldiers. Only a high ransom paid by the Jews
permitted his burial, but all his property was conscated. Marriage or
sexual relationships of Muslims with dhimmis was also punished by
execution, as was the fate of Jews who converted to Christianity and
vice versa, the rationale being that if a dhimmi decided to relinquish
his religion, his only option was Islam. In those days, Moroccan Jews
were prohibited from leaving the connes of the mellah wearing shoes,
for among Muslims, their being barefooted made their humiliation
obvious. Under Almoravid Ali ben-Youssef (11061142), the Jews were
forbidden from coming to the capital Marrakesh and staying overnight,
and if they disobeyed, they stood to lose their lives and properties. Jews
could also be executed if accused of condemning Islam or the Quran.
Any Jew who raised his hand against a Muslim, even in the course
of self-defense, had it cut o. Other horric reports testied of what
the dhimmis were forced to do in order to publicly demonstrate and
perpetuate their state of misery and humiliation. For example, when,
in internecine wars of succession in Morocco, heads of rivals were cut
o beyond measure, it was the Jews who were charged with emptying
the skulls from whatever brains were in them, to allow the victors to
hoist them on top of their long spears in their victorious parades. In
other cases where the victors wished to preserve the skulls of their
enemies, they forced the Jews, intentionally on their Sabbath day,
to salt the bleeding heads. One hypothesis places the salting as the
origin of the word mellah in that forced occupation, given that milh
is the Arabic for salt. Only due to the protests of Western consuls to
the sultan did Muhammed IV consent, in the nineteenth century, to
cancel this cruel practice. In the twentieth century, the dhimma was
abrogated by the French authorities, and many of its practices simply
disappeared, much to the displeasure and bitterness of the Muslims
who did not forget that they had been in total control of their Jews and
164
could manipulate them to their whim. When Muslims were, in turn,
under French occupation, against which they could do nothing, that
was their opportunity to displace their frustration to the Jews and take
revenge on them.
Abraham Almalih, the director of the Alliance Jewish Boy School in
Fez, wrote to the HQ of his organization in Paris in 1911, on the eve
of the French occupation:
I have the honor to acknowledge receipt of your letter, which also
included a message of Rabbi Vidal Serfati, requesting the intervention
of the Moroccan Foreign Minister, who is now in Paris, to abrogate
the current humiliating custom which forbids entrance of Jews to the
territory of the Kingdom, unless they are barefoot. Unfortunately, the
facts mentioned by the Rabbi are accurate, for the Jews are indeed
compelled to remove their shoes before entering the borders of the
Kingdom. Apart from the humiliation involved, it is unbearable that
our coreligionists should have to wait barefooted at the entrance to
the royal palace, which is damp and frozen in the winter, or brazenly
hot in summer. Rabbi Vidal himself, who is in the habit of going to
the Palace for the communitys aairs, or to interfere on behalf of
individuals, often returns sick after his prolonged waiting sessions at
the gate. I believe that it would be di cult to get the sultan to consent
for the Jews to come to the palace with their shoes on, because this
would be a far-reaching concession that his pride would not allow
him to make, especially that this stands in contradiction with the
image Muslims have of themselves and of the Jews.
27

Rabbi Vidal Serfati, in fact, did not say anything that was not known,
except to conrm that the draconian sanctions of the dhimma were well
in eect into the twentieth century, and would not have been abrogated
if not for the French occupation, which imposed the change in an eort
to civilize the territory it dominated in North Africa. Te reporters in
the Fez Chronicle had for generations recorded the exactions against
the Jews, which reached their peak under the Almohads (11301232),
that brought destruction to North African Jewry (and Christianity too).
Tey indeed slaughtered untold thousands, forced conversions, and
imprisoned the recalcitrant survivors. Te Jewish chroniclers, Abraham
Ibn Dawud, and the poet, Abraham Ibn Ezra, depicted, in harrowing
detail the events under the supervisory authorities of the Almohads,
who forced Jews to Islamize or to die as martyrs. Tose who converted
were kept under close supervision lest they reneged and secretly abided
by their faith. Teir children were taken from them and submitted to
Muslim education, an exact antecedent to what was to happen three
165
centuries later by the Spanish Inquisition or under the devshirme
system in the Balkans under Ottoman rule. Maimonides himself was the
most famous victim of that policy, when he ed Ahmohads conquest of
Cordova in 1148, found a temporary shelter in Fez, sometimes posing
as a Muslim, until he found a permanent refuge in Cairo, the Fatimid.
We were always proud of his heritage; we all heard of his greatness, but
we never asked why he ed, or had to hide and to run away from one
Muslim place to another. Only later did I understand that Moroccan
Jews were themselves stateless and in constant search for a permanent
turf, which always eluded them, because Christian Europe was worse
for them than Islamdom was; therefore, they could seek refuge only in
other Muslim lands. Maimonides was unique in his learning of Hebrew
and Arab culture, and was also a renowned doctor, so he could nd a
permanent shelter for himself, not as a persecuted Jewish refugee but
as a skilled and extremely learned and gifted individual, who easily
spanned Arab and Jewish cultures, as well as Western and Islamic.
Te great paradox is often cited that the giant and unique Maimon-
ides, who is often brought up as the paradigmatic example of the prod-
ucts of the Andalusian Golden Age of Islamo-Jewish coexistence and
cross-fertilization, himself became also the archetype of its failure, and
the most crushing manifestation of the utopia that was cultivated but,
as the whole, had no leg to stand on. Tat Arabs and Muslims needed to
cultivate this utopia for their self-image and propaganda needs, one can
understand if not accept. But when Jews themselves fall into this trap,
it is pitiful and self-defeating, and is the paradigm of dhimmi behavior.
Maimonides, who knew and understood the situation better than any
contemporary, said that the Ismailites (Muslims) have persecuted
us and discriminated against us, and no other nation has humiliated
and hated Jews more than them. Te hellish and nightmarish times of
Almohads, which remain incrusted in the memory of Moroccan Jew-
ry, were not completely abolished to this day, and no eort was made
by later dynasties to erase them completely. Moreover, we have seen
that even under the current Alawite Dynasty, which is supposed to be
benevolent and generous, there were very dark days of massacres and
cruelty toward its Jews. Namely, one has to take the Almohad period
as a yardstick to what would come after them, not as an extraordinary
aberration to an otherwise benevolent rule. For, during all the periods
when wars of succession raged, it was always the Jews who paid the
price, and the brief periods of let-up were the exceptions rather than
the rule in the long, sad, dangerous, and ultimately destructive existence
166
of Jews in North Africa. Solomon Cohen wrote about the heritage of
that most inhuman of dynasties:
Abd al-Mumin, who inherited the founder Ibn Tumart, conquered
Tlemcen in North Africa and killed all its inhabitants, including the
Jews, except for those who converted to Islam. All North African
cities, which came under Almohad rule, as well as all Spanish cities
they occupied, were submitted to massacres and spoilage. In Fez
alone, one hundred thousand people were killed, and another one
hundred and twenty thousand in Marrakesh ... Te Jews of North
Africa suered greatly under their yoke, many of them perished, oth-
ers converted their faith, and the rest did not dare to appear as Jews
in public ... Tis was also the fate of large swaths of territory which
they conquered in Spain between Tortosa and Seville
28

Tat entire register of horrendous events, under which generations
of Jews (and Christians) sueredsometimes more and sometimes
less, according to the time, the place, and the whim and zeal of the
rulerwas given legitimacy and consistency by the Muslim ideology,
which sanctioned it. O cially, under the new regimes of nation states,
dhimma was abolished, especially under the pressure of colonial powers
who imposed a more liberal order of things. But the notion of dhimma
has never disappeared in practice, because the power of the Sharia law,
which sanctioned the political theory of Islam, could never be overtaken
by any Western law. We have told the many mistreatments of Jews in
Morocco after the coming of the French, meaning that centuries of
Muslim hatred and contempt could not be erased by a few decades of
Western rule, especially since European colonial powers in Muslim
countries were not totally divorced from their own anti-Semitism of
the European brand. Furthermore, the Muslim revivalist movements
in the contemporary world are clamoring for the renewal of the same
imagery and terminology as existed in classical Islam, meaning that
the dhimma ought to again become part of the Muslim legal system.
Indeed, sermons in mosques, even political speeches and fundamental-
ist writings, posters and leaets, audio and video cassettes, demand this
revival and make it a popular quest for the new Muslim states. What
is di cult to comprehend is the conduct of Jews, who, after regaining
their sovereignty, are still under the grip of the dhimma. Some of them,
who had never experienced this humiliating status themselves, have
become enslaved by their nave quest to gain recognition by Muslims,
who fundamentally still despise them. Because, even though no more
than very few Jews still dwell in the lands of Islam and feed Muslim
167
hatred toward them, the fact that their kin have created a modern and
successful state that is the envy of Muslims, who cannot bear that their
formerly submissive dhimmis now occupy a place of honor among the
nations, cannot be a Muslim source of satisfaction to them.
In contemporary times, noted Arabist, Menahem Milson, stated at
a conference
29
that Arab and Islamic anti-Semitism is today the form
of anti-Semitism that poses the most danger to Israel and to Jews
everywhere in the world. Numerous anti-Semitic attacks by Muslims
in France and elsewhere in Europe, in recent years, have made it very
clear that the pernicious impact of this anti-Semitism is not conned
to Arab and Islamic countries. He started his presentation with some
preliminary remarks:
1. Arab and Islamic anti-Semitism is not a new phenomenon.
However, when it comes to Arab anti-Semitism, there are many
who prefer to look the other way. Until just a few years ago, Israeli
and Jewish academics and public gures have all but ignored it.
Tere have been a few exceptions of course (some in Israel, some
elsewhere), but these have been few. Te fear of being labeled anti-
Arab and accused of being Islamophobic has been enough to
keep the overwhelming majority of Middle East academic experts
away from this subject.
2. Te reluctance has not been only academic; it has also been quite
typical of people in the media and in politics to ignore Arab
anti-Semitism. One more possible explanation is psychological. We
must bear in mind that the entire Zionist enterprise was intended
to solve the problem of anti-Semitism. Hence, the discovery that the
hatred Jews thought they had escaped when they left Europe was
endemic in the Middle East, and was something many people pre-
ferred to suppress or deny. Tere is, perhaps another, more political
motivation behind the unwillingness to deal with Arab anti-Jewish
attitudes: the fear that the exposure of anti-Semitic sentiment on
the Arab side would reinforce political intransigence in Israel and
play into the hands of political groups, which oppose any territorial
concession on the part of Israel. However, it must be recognized
that shutting our eyes to Arab and Islamic anti-Semitism is not only
intellectually dishonest but also politically misguided. Countering
Arab and Islamic anti-Semitism is an indispensable part of Israels
struggle to achieve peace. A de-humanized image of the Jew forms
an impediment to peace and normal relations.
3. When speaking of anti-Semitism, it does not mean criticism of
this or that Israeli policy. Mere criticism of Israelwhether
168
justied or notis not anti-Semitism. We are talking here about
dehumanization and demonization of the Jews, and about the
expectation of Muslims that they will slaughter all the Jews at the
End of Time.
4. Te issue of contemporary Arab anti-Semitism is quite distinct from
that of Muslim attitudes to Jews and Judaism prior to the modern
era. While these two issues are interrelated in various ways, their
historical contexts are completely dierent, and therefore, they
should be treated separately.
5. Tere are those who claim that if you engage in exposing Arab and
Islamic anti-Semitism, you are guilty of Islamophobia. Tis is of
course a false charge. To expose Arab anti-Semitism is not in any
way to say that all Arabs or all Muslims are anti-Semitic. In fact,
this false charge has a purpose. It is intended to stop, indeed to
pre-empt, the struggle against Arab anti-Semitism and to provide
immunity to anti-Semites. Such manipulations should be rejected.
6. It should be emphasized that Arab anti-Semitic propaganda does
not distinguish clearly between Jew, Zionist, and Israeli; these three
concepts are often used in Arab and Iranian anti-Jewish publications
interchangeably.
According to Milson, based on his extensive studies of Arab and
Muslim Jew hatred, culled from publications and forums (newspapers,
magazines, television programs, Friday sermons in mosques, books,
and websites) over the decade of the 2000s, the Arab and Muslim an-
ti-Semitic campaign draws from both Islamic and Christian sources;
the latter also include Holocaust denial and equating Zionism with
Nazism. While Muslim sources are ancient and hark back to the times
of the Prophet Muhammad in Medina in the seventh century, where
he clashed with the local Jewish tribes and then expelled some of them
and massacred others, the rise of radical Islam during the last quarter
of the twentieth century has generated a massive intensication of that
campaign, lending to it a strong Islamic bias. For example, the inculca-
tion of the notion, anchored in the Quran, that Jews are descendants
of apes and pigs has become common throughout the Muslim world,
not only in mosques during the Friday sermons, but also in political,
intellectual, and scholarly writings, shedding doubt on their validity
and value.
30
Tat the Quran says that the Jews were so punished by
God because of their violation of the Sabbath, only adds irony to the
claim due to its built-in contradiction: if the Jewish faith is false, as
Muslim claim, then they should not be punished by God for violating
169
one of its tenets (keeping the Sabbath). Milson emphasized that this
insult should not be dismissed as a mere vulgar invective, nor should
the belief that God once turned some Jews into apes, pigs, or other
creatures, be considered merely as an indication of primitive magical
thinking. Repeated reference to Jews as despised beasts dehumanizes
them and provides justication for their destruction. Te following are
few examples of the use of this insult in a variety of forums. Saudi sheikh
Abd al-Rahman al-Sudais, Imam, and preacher at the Kaba mosque in
Mecca, the most important shrine in the Muslim world, said:
Read history and you will understand that the Jews of yesterday are
the evil fathers of the Jews of today, who are evil ospring, indels,
distorters of [Gods] words, calf-worshippers, prophet-murderers,
prophecy-deniers ... the scum of the human race whom Allah cursed
and turned into apes and pigs ... Tese are the Jews, an ongoing con-
tinuum of deceit, obstinacy, licentiousness, evil, and corruption ...
31

On another occasion, which shows that this image of the Jews has
pervaded the public consciousness, even that of children, the Saudi
satellite television station, Iqraa,
32
which, according to its website, seeks
to highlight the true, tolerant image of Islam and refute the accusa-
tions directed against it, interviewed a three-and-a-half-year-old real
Muslim girl about Jews, on a program called Te Muslim Womens
Magazine . Asked whether she liked Jews, the little girl answered, no.
Asked why not, she said that Jews were apes and pigs. Who said this?
the moderator asked. Te girl answered, Our God. Where did He
say this? In the Quran At the end of the interview, the moderator
said with satisfaction: No [parents] could wish for Allah to give them
a more believing girl than she ... May Allah bless her and both her
father and mother.
In view of the solid anchoring of these anti-Jewish stereotypes in
Quranic tradition, which is universally regarded in Islam as immutable
and indisputable due to its divine origin, generations of Muslims are
instilled with Jew hatred since young age, as Ayaan Hirsi Ali recounts
in her autobiography
33
. Tis not only taught by Saudi Wahhabi fanat-
ics, but even supposedly moderate Egypts establishment Al-Azhar
Universitys Fatwa Committee issued in 2004 a list of the bad traits of
the Jews, which became authoritative due both to its status as a fatwa
( religious verdict) and its source, Sheikh Atiyah Saqr, the Head of the
Fatwa Committee. According to the Sheikh:
170
Te Quran has specied a considerable deal of its verses to talking
about Jews, their personal qualities and characteristics. Te Quranic
description of Jews is quite impartial: praising them in some occa-
sions, where they deserve praise, and condemning them in other occa-
sions where they practice blameworthy acts. Yet, the latter occasions
outnumber the former, due to their bad qualities and the heinous
acts they used to commit ... the twenty bad traits are: fabricating,
listening to lies, disputing and quarreling, hiding the truth and sup-
porting deception, rebelling against the Prophets and rejecting their
guidance, hypocrisy, wishing evil on people, feeling pain at others
happiness and feeling happiness at others a ictions, rudeness and
vulgarity, murder of innocents, merciless and heartlessness, breaking
promises, cowardice and miserliness ...
34

Particularly relevant to the bigotry and false accusations emanating
from Jew hatred is Saqrs elaboration of the claim of the murder of
innocents, which he explains: it is easy for them to slay people and kill
innocents. Nothing in the world is dearer to their hearts than shedding
blood and murdering human beings. Tey never give up this trait,
even with the Messengers and prophets. Apart from the projection
on Jews of their own plight (massive murder of innocent people in acts
of terrorism, jubilation at the September 11 tragedy, breaking the Oslo
DOP by pursuing terror despite their promise to desist, etc.), we nd in
this horrible reasoning of character assassination, in a country that had
signed peace with Israel two decades earlier, the explanation for much
of the current anti-Semitic rhetoric in the Islamic world. When Prime
Minister Erdoan condemned Israel during the Gaza Operation, or
vented his wrath against it during the Flotilla crisis, he repeated, almost
word for word, the same accusations, as if copied from the textbook of
Al-Azhar. So did the daily communiqus emanating from all Arab and
Muslim countries that depicted those two conicts by showing the bad
innate qualities of the Jews, despite the fact that in both instances, they
acted defensively, and while doing so, they evinced a human sensitivity
unprecedented in warfare situations and in conictual confrontations.
Another common anti-Jewish charge is that the Jews, as part of
their penchant for persecuting prophets and rebelling against them,
conspired to assassinate Prophet Muhammad. One such attempt is
particularly notorious: the alleged scheme by a Jewish woman to kill
him by poisoning. Tis is as strong an accusation as the Christian one,
which for centuries had charged the Jews with the killing of Christ, and
for poisoning wells, with the consequences that we know. Tis sort of
charge transcends ethnic, cultural, and political conict and renders
171
it a deeply religious and God-ordained hatred, with a certainty for
harsh punishment by the unforgiving and awesome Allah. Submissive
Muslims, then, cannot aord to be any less harsh on the Jews, espe-
cially that Egyptian clerics like Sheikh Muhammad Sharaf al-Din can
aord to declare in a childrens show that the Jews are the People of
Treachery, Betrayal, and Vileness
35
. Many Arab and Muslim opinion
makers have been inciting against the Jews since, accusing them of
poisoning people, from Muhammad to Arafat, elds under the excuse
of agricultural aid, or water, as Arafats wife has accused Israel of doing
to the Palestinians, in front of Hillary Clinton, then the rst Lady of the
United States. Another very common anti-Jewish traditional motif is
Te Promise of the Stone and the Tree. According to a widely quoted
prophetic tradition ( hadith ), before Judgment Day, the Muslims will
ght the Jews and kill them. Te Jews will hide behind stones and
trees, and the stones and trees will call out, Oh Muslim, oh Servant
of Allah, a Jew is hiding behind me. Come and kill him. According to
this tradition, the world must be cleansed from Jews before the coming
of the Hour. All this means that demonization and disparagement of
the Jews is constantly accompanied by the recipe to cleanse the world
from their evil by eliminating them.
Since the Nazis had compared Jews to vermin, no one has dared to
use such a terminology until contemporary Islam took up that theme,
when a cleric stated that Jews are a virus resembling AIDS.
36
But worst
of all, and most relevant to this volume, is the theme of the blood libel,
which has cropped up even in the most important government news-
papers, and even in countries that have signed peace with Israel. Te
most notorious case of spreading the blood-libel myth is that Mustafa
Tlass, discussed in detail below. Tlasswho until 2004 was Syrias
vice-president and defense ministerpublished a book (1983) called
Te Matzah of Zion , in which he tells the story of the Damascus 1840
blood libel, except that he tells it as though the Jews were actually guilty
of committing the crime. Despite the clearly Christian source of this
calumny, some Muslim writers rehash and recycle the ritual murder
accusations, putting a new twist on them, claiming, for example, that in
honor of the Jewish holiday of Purim, Jews use human blood to make
their traditional pastries. Blood libel accusations in the Arab media
are most commonly encountered in the context of criticism of Israels
actions against the Palestinians. One instance of this caused the Paris
Supreme Court, in August 2002, to subpoena Ibrahim Na, editor of
the Egyptian daily Al-Ahram. Na was charged with incitement to
172
anti-Semitism and racist violence for having permitted the publication
of an article entitled Jewish Matza is Made from Arab Blood.
37
Te
article compared Israels activity in the occupied territories with the
1840 Damascus blood libel. It is worthwhile noting that the charges
against Na, who was the chairman of the Arab Journalist Union,
aroused a storm of protest and outrage throughout the Arab world.
Tey were described in the Arab media as intellectual terrorism, a
blow to freedom of expression, a Zionist attack on the Egyptian press,
extortion by the Zionist lobby in France, and even as an insult to
the entire Arab press,the latter charge being a testament to Nas
inuence and importance.
Political analysts on Iranian TV were swift to follow suit in backing
the same calumniations, when one of them stated that the Jews killed
children and used their blood for Passover.
38
In Ramadan 2003, during
prime-time hours, Hizbullahs TV station Al-Manar aired another
anti-Semitic series: a Syrian produced series called Al-Shatat (Te
Diaspora). Tis series purported to show Jewish life in the Diaspora
and the emergence of Zionism. It included gruesome scenes such as
the ritual murder of a Christian boy and the ritual murder of a Jew who
married a Gentile. Te series also shows how Amschel Rothschild, the
founder of the purported secret world Jewish government, instructed
his sons from his deathbed to start wars and corrupt society all over
the world, in order to serve the nancial interests and the political
goals of the Jews.
39
Curiously enough, even though according to the
Quran Jesus was not killed and therefore never was crucied, it became
strangely expedient for Muslim anti-Semites to hurl the accusation
against Jews the accusation of murdering Christ, probably to enlist
the support to their cause of the Christian Church. Tus, that charge
against the Jews has become standard in Arab anti-Semitic discourse.
One example: Arafats advisor Bassam Abu Sharif, referred in the Saudi
London-based daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat to the statue of the Virgin Mary
that was damaged by Israeli gun re during the siege on the Church of
the Nativity in Bethlehem, where Palestinian gunmen had taken priests
hostage and holed themselves up on the premises. He wrote, Te sad
smile of the Virgin Mary as she shields her son the Messiah did not
prevent the soldiers of the Israeli occupation from shooting at the face
of this Palestinian angel [i.e. Jesus] and murder the smile ... so as to
murder what they hadnt managed to murder throughout 2,000 years.
40
]
Tis is just one example of the way in which this Christian image is
put to use in present-day Arab propaganda. For Muslims to call the Jews
173
Christ-killers as part of anti-Jewish Arab propaganda is particularly
ironic because according to the Quran, Jesus was never crucied and
thus did not die on the cross. Te Christian belief that Jesus died on
the cross is considered by Muslims to be a blasphemous lie.
41
When the
senior Muslim jurist of the Muslim world, whose verdicts are heeded
throughout, Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, an Egyptian by origin, presently
residing in Qatar, repeats the same accusation, it is bound to guide large
crowds in the lands of Islam. He, who has repeatedly justied Islamikaze
acts of Muslim terrorism against Jews, has also stated for example that
Te Jews of today bear responsibility for their forefathers crime against
Jesus.
42
In the same vein of demonizing the Jews and their movement
of national liberation, Zionism, a self-contradicting strategy has been
adopted by Muslims when they at the same time deny the Holocaust and
claim that Zionism has in fact collaborated with the Nazis in order to
motivate European Jews to move to Palestine.
43
Another trend today in
the anti-Jewish propaganda geared to delegitimize Zionism is to equate
it with Nazism, an idea that came to its apogee when it was adopted
by the UN General Assembly in 1975. For even when that vote was
repealed in 1991 under American pressures, it remained valid among
Arabs and Muslims around the globe. Articles and public discussions
in the Arab world draw a similarity between the two movements. Tey
claim that just as the Nazis believed in the superiority of the Aryan
race, the Zionists believe that the Jews are the Chosen People. Tey
also claim that the Zionists, like the Nazis, maintain an expansionist
policy. Further, Israels treatment of the Palestinian people is equated
with the Nazis treatment of the Jewsor said to be even worse. Te
political signicance of these claims is clear: if the Holocaust never
happened, the Germans need feel no guilt toward the Jews; moreover,
the Germansand the rest of the Western worldowe the Palestin-
ians. Also, if Jews are now doing to the Palestinians what the Nazis
purportedly did to the Jews, then the whole international community
should ght Israel. Tis is where Arab anti-Semitism and Western
anti-Semitism interconnect, creating a strategic anti-Semitic axis.
Te Introduction of Blood Libel into the Islamic World
In this state of aairs, when Jews were humiliated in the extreme un-
der Islam and never feared as potential competitors, there never arose
any need to demonize them in order to diminish them, since they were
visibly diminished and miserable enough. Terefore, unlike in Europe
where the Jews were money lenders and often successful as traders,
174
and constituted a threat to the Christian majority, demonization was
necessary as a prerequisite to impute to them the blood libel. More-
over, while the Jews in Christendom were forever stained with the
blood of Jesus, the creation of the hoax of the ritual murder seemed
plausible enough to be accepted by the illiterate, superstitious, and
fanatic populace of medieval Europe. Tough in Islamic lore, there was
also a clash between the Jews of Medina and the Prophet, he ended
up massacring them for their betrayal, so no open account was left
unsettled between Islam and the Jews. So, not until 1840, when the
prosperous Jewish community of Damascus drew outbursts of jealousy
from their neighbors, was the specter of the blood libel raised in the
Islamic world, in that case within the connes of the Damascus vilayet
of the Ottoman Empire, the predominant Muslim rule of the time. And
even then, the whole aair was triggered and kindled by local Christians
who had imported it from Europe, and had nothing to do with Islam.
It is known that already one century earlier, in the 1750s, Christians
in Aleppo had already circulated the belief that Jews kidnapped and
sacriced Christian Children.
44

Tough many ramications and bifurcations of anti-Jewish bigotry,
and other manifestations of Judaeophobic hatred have taken hold in
the Muslim world since, together with the Protocols of the Elders of
Zion and world Jewish conspiracy that clearly draw from European
anti-Semitism, one must chronologically pinpoint the beginning of
that notion in the infamous Damascus Blood Libel of 1840, which
shook the Jewish world, the Christian world, and the Muslim world.
Te Jews, because just when they thought that that calamitous libel
was waning in its countries of origin in Christendom, it emerged
threateningly in Islamdom. Te Christians, when they realized that
the deep-rooted libel that they had cultivated for centuries, had now
transcended their boundaries and landed in countries under European
colonization or inuence. Te Muslims, because they found themselves
wielding another weapon in their war against the Jews, one with which
Europe was familiar. At the same time, as they came to believe in it as
we shall see, they were thwarted by this novel Jewish menace that they
had not imagined previously. Te Damascus aair was touched o by
the mysterious disappearance of an Italian Capucin friar and his native
servant in Damascus in February 1840. Te local Christians, supported
by the French Consul in town, Ratti-Menton, accused the Jews of the
murder of the two men to use their blood for the approaching Passover.
A Jewish barber was arrested and confessed under torture, implicating
175
another seven members of the Jewish community in the crime. Tey
were all arrested and tortured, two of them died under the interroga-
tion, one saved himself by embracing Islam, the others confessed. In
retaliation, sixty-three Jewish children were taken hostage by the Pasha
of Damascus, in order to force their parents to reveal the whereabouts
of the martyrs blood. Te entire Jewish community of the city was in
a state of panic. Mob violence ensued against the Jews.
45

Tat episode in Damascus was ended and the Jewish prisoners
released only through the intercession by famous Jewish gures in
Europe with Muhammed Ali himself, the ruler of Egypt and greater
Syria, in spite of his refusal to announce the Jews innocent or to order a
reopening of an o cial investigation. Te Jewish delegation headed by
Monteore also obtained from the Ottoman Sultan a rman (Imperial
Edict) explicitly denouncing the blood libel. Despite those measures
that brought the Damascus aair to a settlement, the malaise persisted
now that it had a precedent. In 1844, Muslims in Cairo accused the Jews
of murdering a Christian for his blood, but this time Muhammed Ali
stepped in to prevent violence and bring the calumniators to justice. In
1847, Lebanese Maronite Christians raised the blood libel against local
Jews, and their Greek Orthodox counterparts in Jerusalem brought the
same calumny against local Jews, accusing them of attempting to mur-
der a Christian child for ritual purposes. However, while none of these
last incidents ended in killings, their recurrence in Ottoman domain
in spite of the Sultans edict refuting the blood libel was an indication
that the scourge had taken root there. Indeed, later accusations of this
sort, especially in nineteenth-century Egypt, did generate localized
persecutions of Jewish communities and individuals. A letter by Jewish
notables in Damanhur, near Alexandria, in 1873, to the directorate of
the Alliance Israelite Universelle in Paris, tells that story:
On November 7, 1873, a child was found cast out in the street with
his virile member cut o. Te authorities, after having made the neces-
sary investigation, were able to discover through his father and mother
that it had been a dog that had taken o this organ. Te child was sent
to the local hospital for treatment. Unfortunately, however, there was
present at the inquiry a native named Bassiouni Bechara who, together
with the local doctor, incited the boys father to say that it was Rabbi
Moses Salomon, the local shohet ( Kosher-style slaughterer of animals
for consumption) who had done this wicked deed in accordance with
the custom of the Jews to commit acts of this kind. Te father of the
boy being in dire poverty and hoping to make a great prot from
176
this, consented to their counsel. As a result, poor Rabbi Moses was
summoned before the local magistrate who wanted to incarcerate
him before proceeding to anything else. However, seeing that he was
depressed by this development, he postponed the hearing for three
more days, notifying him that he was to present himself together with
the rest of the local Jewish community.
Tereupon, the community from Damanhur wrote to Baron Jacques
Menache in Cairo and to Ibrahim Piha in Alexandria, informing them
of this development:
Tese two notables immediately dispatched through the Provincial
Governor a guideline to the magistrate to refrain from any further
measure against the Rabbi nor to threaten him. Tus, the Rabbi
was not prosecuted, but he was asked to make a written deposition
which would be veried. But Bassiouni kept accusing the Jews, and
he succeeded on April 4, 1877 to have the Jews accused of killing a
little girl and having cast her body into the latrine of the school. Local
Muslims thereupon gathered around the school and beat the Jews they
could nd there, breaking the ark of the holy law while searching for
the body of the girl. Te local magistrate was present, but fearing an
insurrection dared say nothing. In the afternoon the girl was found
in the elds. Once again Baron Menache and Mr. Piha undertook the
case, but due to their dierences nothing came of it ...
In consequence, we are resolved to address this letter to you in-
voking your assistance, certain that you would wish to grant us that
since the authorities summon us to these aairs from time to time,
we can no longer bear these barbarities in Egypt which is now, one
might say, a part of Europe ... Please, help us and cause this folly to
exist no more. God will know how to reward your benecience.
46

Tose accusations recurred in Damanhur in 1879 and in 1881. By
then, they had become as current as in the lands of Christianity if only
due to the fact that in many by now Islamized countries, like Egypt,
Syria, and Lebanon, strong Christian minorities had remained in place.
Te introduction of the blood libel into the Islamic world has had such
a tremendous impact in all the political, social, and cultural levels, and
has been so deeply imbued into popular culture, that the many ramica-
tions that stemmed out of it make up part of what the Arab public, from
the leaders and the clerics down to the lowest strata of society, refers
to as a matter of course datum that is venomously transmitted from
generation to the next, hardly with anyone protesting or shaking the
belief in it. It is all the result of the education of hatred to Jews, Zionists,
and Israelis, which is absorbed by the Arab public in schools, in the
177
media, in religious sermons, and in political statements by the leaders.
If in our days the blood libel has become a cause clbre once again,
this is to no small measure due to Mustafa Tlass, the Syrian defense
minister for twenty years, who published a book on this matter in 1983,
and then a purportedly scientic version in 1986, which he presented
as a doctoral dissertation in Paris. Both versions were based on the
1840 story, when the Jewish community of Damascus was accused of
having murdered a Christian priest, Tomas al-Kabushi, and his aide
for the purpose of preparing Yom Kippur pastries. Apart from the
pathetic ignorance of the writer, who does not know that Jews fast on
Yom Kippur and therefore do not consume pastries, or that the original
blood libel in Europe was connected with the unleavened Matza bread
in Passover, or that Jews go to great lengths to avoid eating blood of
any sort as part of their meticulous dietary laws, none of those traders
of hatred who wrote the stories could explain how the murder of one
Gentile could provide enough blood for the entire Jewish community.
Tis would not have been the rst time that Arabic papers invoke
the blood libel, or other blind-hatred-inspired Egyptian mainstream
dailies
47
had done so beforebut Tlasss vitriol, on the part of such high
o cial who would not publish without the approval of his president,
not only serves as a back-up to European anti-Semites who avidly use
his garbage for their own propaganda, but establishes a model for other
Arab Jew-haters to follow. Te best proof of the Syrian establishments
backing to Tlasss cheap and spurious propaganda was the summon
of the Syrian delegate to the Human Rights Commission of the UN in
Geneva to read that book in order to learn the true nature of the Jews.
In the new 1986 version of that book, the photograph of the murdered
priest is reproduced, with the inscription: murdered by the Jews. On
the jackets of both versions, the mind-boggling picture of a person is
represented with his throat cut and the running blood being collected
in a large bowl. In the rst edition, it is a gang of Jews who commit
the murder while in the later version, a Jewish Menorah performs the
throat cutting itself. Tis scientic study links the horrible crime by
the Jews to the directives of the Jewish religion without specifying
any reference, save for stating that they are laid out in the Talmud,
without saying where, but concludes that these directives encompass
destructive distortions emanating from the fervent hatred of the Jews
toward humanity and all religions without exception.
Tis appalling concept of science, which does not require any crit-
icism, or precise reference when one mentions a source, and in which
178
the boundaries between fantasy and reality are blurred, is probably
one of the main hindrances to the development of science in the Arab
world. Be it as it may, the book continues to describe in harrowing
detail all the networks of worldwide pressures and briberies eected by
inuential Jews at the time of the Damascus blood libel, such as Moses
Monteore, in order to secure the release of the culprits. Tlasss in-
troduction to the latest version of his book, written by the perpetrator
of the Hama massacre (1982), when over 20,000 Muslim Brothers were
slaughtered by the armed forces under his command, ended on the
gloomy note of that inhuman butcher, as he was attempting to project
his own indelible stains on the Jews:
Te event of 1840 was repeated time and again in the 20th Century,
when the Zionists committed horrendous crimes in Palestine and
Lebanon, which have shaken decent people everywhere. But every
time the media, political and nancial inuence of the Zionists suc-
ceeded in mitigating that anger and distracting public opinion away
from those crimes. And instead of punishment they got rewarded by
huge amounts of nancial aid and vast arsenals of frightening arma-
ments ... Te murder [of Father Tomas] had happened in Damascus,
the city of tolerance and peace, exactly as other crimes had occurred
in other places around the world. How could that happen at a time
when the Jews constitute a minuscule minority in the midst of the
societies where they dwell? How could those societies ignore that
hatred-laden minority? It is possible that the atmosphere of tolerance
that was ushered in by the Muslim Arabs was what had allowed the
Jews to live in total freedom in Muslim Arab countries. Te Jews
know those countries very well, but they surrounded themselves with
mystery so that the Muslims knew nothing about them. No won-
der, then that Damascus was thoroughly shaken by that harrowing
crime, but it soon learned the truth about them. Every mother would
thenceforth warn her children: Beware not to wander far away from
the house, lest the Jew would seize you, put you in his bag, slaughter
you and collect your blood for the Matza of Zion [the title of Tlas
book]. Generation after generation they bequeathed that warning
regarding the treacherous Jews.
In the meantime, a state was created for the Jews in al-Sham
48
but
Jewish hatred did not disappear, and the rules of the Talmud, with
their sanctioning of all manner of distortions and crimes, continue
to govern their hatred-laden attitude towards humanity ... Anyone
who follows daily events in the Occupied Territories understands
beyond any doubt that what is termed as Zionist racism is nothing
but the continuous and improved implementation of the Talmu-
dic tenets ... In publishing this book it was my intention to throw
some light on some secrets of the Jewish religion, by describing their
179
deeds, their blind and repulsive fanaticism towards their faith and the
implementation of the Talmudic teachings, which had been written
by their diaspora rabbis and in so doing they distorted the meaning
of their own religion, namely Mosaic Law, as certied in the Baqra
Sura of the Quran, verse 79.
49

Tlass is not alone in seeing continuity between the ancient hatred
toward and their daily behavior toward the Arabs and indeed all human-
ity today. Te old accusations of poisoning wells, spreading disease, are
spread in more recent time under dierent forms, like using depleted
uranium ammunition against Palestinians, or distributing poisoned
sweets to, or injecting HIV positive virus into, Palestinian children, or
diusing an aphrodisiac chewing gum to arouse the sexual appetite
of Muslim women in order to corrupt them, or poisoning the soil of
Egypt through farming aid programs. Tis is what the consumers of
Arabic media are fed, day in day out, in the service of perpetuating
the hatred toward the Jews, discrediting and indeed de-legitimizing
them so as to bring up new generations in that spirit. Moreover, the
trumped up citations from the Talmud that no one took the trouble
to verify are often repeated and perpetuated as genuine, resulting in
educating the young Arab generation to intellectual dishonesty and
irrational hatred; worse, it blunts scientic curiosity, rigorous meth-
odology, and research pursuits that are diluted by fantasy and wishful
thinking. Apparently, for them Israel-bashing is overriding and truth,
and vindictiveness and humiliation of the enemy are more expedient
than fact, history, reality, and soul-searching. So, while blood libel has
virtually disappeared in the Christian establishment of the Western
world, it is still being cultivated in Arab and Islamic circles and is often
sponsored by the governments in place, who in any case do nothing
to eradicate it.
Te civilized world was shocked when a Saudi scholar, Dr. Umayma
al-Jalahma, of King Faisal University in Dammam, purported to write
about the Jewish holiday of Purim, which is based on the book of
Esther in the Bible, with delirious detail that only a mentally sick and
unbelievably cruel mind could produce, and which is probably un-
surpassed in the millennial annals of the blood libel against Jews. Te
great innovation of her study was that while the classic blood libel
is usually connected with Passover, it was now shifted to Purim, thus
deserving a sensational publication in the Saudi governments daily
Al-Riyadh .
50
In this pathetically ignorant authors words:
180
I chose to speak about the Jewish holiday of Purim, because is con-
nected to the month of March. Tis holiday has some dangerous
customs that will, no doubt, horrify you, and I apologize if any reader
is harmed because of this ... During this holiday the Jew must prepare
very special pastries, the lling of which is not only costly and rareit
cannot be found at all in international markets. Unfortunately, this
lling cannot be discarded or substituted for by any alternative serving
the same purpose. For this holyday the Jewish people must obtain
human blood so that their clerics can prepare the holiday pastries. In
other words, the practice cannot be carried out as required if human
blood is not spilled....
Before I go into details, I would like to clarify that the Jews spilling
human blood to prepare pastries for their holidays is a well established
fact, historically and legally, all throughout history. Tis was one of
the main reasons for the persecution and exile that were their lot in
Europe and Asia at various times. Tis holiday of Purim begins with
a fast, on 13 March, to follow the Jewess Esther who vowed to fast.
Te holiday continues on the 24th of March, during which the Jews
wear carnival-style masks and costumes and indulge in drinking
alcohol, prostitution and adultery. Tis holiday has become known
among Muslim historians as the Holiday of Masks ...
Who was Esther and why the Jews sanctify her and act as she did,
I will clarify in my next article ... Today I would like to tell you how
human blood is spilled so that it can be used for their pastries ... For
this holiday, the victim must be a mature adolescent who is, of course,
a non-Jew, namely a Muslim or a Christian. His blood is taken and
dried into granules. Te cleric blends those granules into the pastry
dough, they can also be saved for the next holiday. In contrast, for
the Passover slaughtering, about which I intend to write later ..., the
blood of Christian or Muslim chilfren under the age of 10 must be
used, and the cleric can mix the blood into the dough before or after
dehydration [of the victim] ...
Let us now examine how the victims blood is spilled. For this, a
needle-studded barrel is used. Tis is a kind of barrel about the size
of the human body, with extremely sharp needles set in on all sides,
which pierce the human body from the moment he is placed in the
barrel ... Tese needles do the job, and the victims blood drips from
him very slowly. Tus, the victim suers dreadful torment, a torment
that aords the Jewish vampires great delight as they carefully mon-
itor every detail of the blood-shedding with a pleasure and love that
are di cult to comprehend ...
After this barbaric display, the Jews take the spilled blood in the
bottle set in the bottom, and the Jewish cleric makes his coreligionists
completely happy on their holiday when he serves them the pastries
in which human blood is mixed . . . Tere is another way to spill
the blood: the victim can be slaughtered like a sheep, and his blood
collected in a container. Or, the victims veins can be slit in dierent
181
places, letting his blood drain from his body. Te blood is very care-
fully collected by the rabbi, the chef who specializes in preparing this
kind of pastry. Te human race refuses even to look at the Jewish
pastries, let alone bake and consume them ...
51

Tis was written in an o cial daily of moderate Saudi Arabia, by
an academic with a PhD probably from a Western country, in the
year 2002. Te article was retracted by the editor following a worldwide
outcry and the US protests that resulted, but the fact remains that it
was published, just like Tlasss book, with precise and sickening detail
that add to their credibility in the eyes of the uninformed and the bigot,
and it would certainly not have been retracted had it not been for the
Western protest. Moreover, the dangerous vein of hatred that the author
exhibited when addressing her avid readers points to the popularity of
her messages in the Arabic and Islamic press and to the quality of the
academic garbage that she imparts to her students. Te anger that
she caused has generated the breaking of the thermometer, but the
fever was not removed, if one were to judge by the vast quantity and
variety of this kind of materials that see the light in Arab and Muslim
media. Aside from the blood libel, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion
and variations on the world Jewish conspiracy, have been enriching
the writings of Arab authors, including intellectuals and academics in
their primitive attempts to justify their hatred of Israel and the Jews,
using anything that comes their way without criticism, examination,
or test of logic.
Hatred-related lies generated by blind and fanatic bigotry have
become such a common place aair in the Arab and Islamic world
that without a blink of the eye, it has been repeated throughout those
lands, or in lands, like the United States and Israel, which prize free
speech over the elimination of incitement. Tus, while this sort of
expressed bigotry has been criminalized and can could be prosecuted
in many countries in Europe, in the United States and Israel it is not.
Sheikh Raid Salah, the head of the Islamic Movement in Israel, who
has been repeatedly convicted for his anti-Israeli deeds against the state
authority, and served periods in jail,
52
has also dared in the face of the
little risk he runs for his outrageous hateful statements, to accuse the
Jews, during his public speech in the East Jerusalem neighborhood
of Wadi Joz, of using childrens blood to bake bread. He was charged
in the Jerusalem Magistrates Court with incitement to violence and
racism.
53
He complacently explained:
182
We have never allowed ourselves to knead [the dough for] the bread
that breaks the fast in the holy month of Ramadan with childrens
blood . Whoever wants a more thorough explanation, let him ask
what used to happen to some children in Europe, whose blood was
mixed in with the dough of the [Jewish] holy bread ... Great God, is
this a religion? Is this what God would want? God will deal with you
yet for what you are doing.
54

Tat rally was called to protest the planned Mughrabi bridge con-
struction in Jerusalems Old City. Addressing the one-thousand-strong
crowd and assembled press, Salah accused Israel of attempting to
rebuild the Jewish Temple on the Temple Mount while drenched in
Arab blood:
Whoever wants to build a house of God should not do so while our
blood is still on his clothes, on his doorposts, in his food, in his drink,
being passed along from one terrorist general to the next terrorist
general ... You are inciting against us, do not let the ranks on your
shoulders tempt you, these ranks and stars on your shoulders were
made from the skulls of our martyrs. Tey are ranks of shame, not
ranks of splendor. Tese are ranks of disgrace, not ranks of honor.
55

Following the speech and Friday prayers, the crowd began rioting and
throwing stones at police. According to the prosecution, Salahs ery
words constituted a call to commit acts of violence and encouragement
of acts of violence, which given the content and context, there was a
real possibility that it could lead to acts of violence. Te prosecution
also said that Salah made the remarks with the objective of inciting
racism. In an interview with Ashams radio, Salah said in response
that, I am willing to repeat before the court all the things I said at the
Friday sermon in Wadi Joz or any other meeting with journalists. Our
statements are the products of conviction, and I will not recant, he
continued. Salah said the decision to indict him, along with the decision
to close the case against o cers involved in the deaths of thirteen Israeli
Arabs in the October 2000 riots,
56
was part of an attempt to pressure
and threaten Israeli Arab society. Tey want us to be good little boys,
he said. Salah was released from prison in 2005 after serving some two
years for having contacted and aided the outlawed Hamas, as well as
for the nancial crimes related to the Islamic Movement that he and
his underlings had perpetrated. His ideological partner, Hamas Leader
Mahmoud al-Zahar, followed suit with the blood libel, but also went a
bit further. He claimed that:
183
Ibn Al-Kathir said
57
that Allah sent 124,000 prophets and messengers.
Te Israelitesor the Jewskilled half of them. In other words, they
slayed 62,000 prophets and messengers. [...] Our enterprise extends
far beyond Palestine: Palestine in its entirety, the Arab nation in its
entirety, the Islamic nation in its entirety, and the entire world.
58

Most extraordinary in this regard was Turkish prime minister, Nec-
mettin Erbakan, in the 1990s, who oated around such an abundance
of anti-Semitic lies as to make himself ridiculous in the civilized world,
though not among his constituents in Turkey.
59
One wonders how
this anti-Semite, full of hatred and steeped in fantasy, could serve as
Turkeys prime minister when his party won the plurality in the 1996
elections and served for nearly two years as the head of a coalition
government before his party was ousted by the military (and they call
that democracy) due to his rapprochement to Iran and outlawed. His
disciple, Erdoan, who was jailed for incitement while serving as the
mayor of Istanbul, ended up as the head of the AKP, an Islamist party
that won the majority for the rst time in 2002, and pushed aside the
civilian parties. Erdoan, especially during the otilla aair (summer
2010), was not far from the statements of his master, mentor, and pre-
decessor, hence his accusations against Israel that pushed the relations
between the parties to the brink. His allies in Syria and Iran toe the
same line, and that entire anti-Semitic alliance nds itself reinforced.
In fact, a Syrian author, Muhammad Nimr al-Madani stated to his in-
terviewers on Iranian state TV that In Many Countries, the Jews Kill
People and Mix Teir Blood with the Matza of Zion, a clear parroting
of Tlasss infamous book, and he added insult to injury by reversing the
condemnation of the Nazis for their anti-Jewish crimes by imputing to
the Old Testament the recipe how to build a crematorium.
60

Tese horrifying statements are not only injected into the public
of Iran and Syria, and of their recent additionTurkey, but also by
children, to children in moderate Egypt, who were born less than three
decades ago when their country signed a peace treaty with Israel, who
had withdrawn from all claimed Egyptian territory to the last inch. We
must listen to what this preacher-child said, or was told to say in public,
in expression of the blind hatred he was brought up on, and directed to
propagate and under the fascination with blood that he is imbued with:
Te state of our nation is peculiar. By Allah, our nation lives in misery
and agony. It is ooded with a deluge of terrifying conspiracies. Te
schemers are plotting to drown it in tragedy, but they will dig their
184
own graves in the process of their terrible scheme. Tey keep talking
about peace, but I say that the plundered land should be restored to
its people. Tomorrow the Al-Aqsa Mosque will don its best clothes.
If their peace means that we relinquish our beloved Al-Aqsa, this
peace of theirs is a catastrophe, and so is their terrifying scheme. Te
levy of blood will be paid for the Al-Aqsa Mosque. My brothers in
Islam, the tidal waves of the indel West approach us from all direc-
tions, revealing the truth about what the (West) has been saying for
years in order to deceive us: that they are men of peace. Te Jews are
men of peace vis--vis all the other religionsall the religions that
were not sent down by Allahbut not vis--vis the religion of the
Lord of heaven and earth.
My brothers, this conict is not a few days old, or even a few years
old. Tis conict is 1,431 years old. It started when the Prophet Mu-
hammad began to preach the word of Allah. Oh Muslims, Jerusalem
is Arab and Islamic, regardless of what the stupid liars, like Ben-
Gurion and his helpers, say. Ben-Gurion said: We may not have a
right to Palestine from a political perspective, but we have a right to
Palestine from a religious perspective. It is the Promised Land, which
God promised us, from the Nile to the Euphrates. Later, Sharon and
Barakmay Allah punish them as they deserverepeated this.
Te West has industry, tourism, and sights that tempt us, but it is
devoid of faith. Te West is still a graveyard for principles. It targets
our religion with arrows of temptation. Te West is a graveyard for
justice. Whenever a hand is raised (in resistance), the West wields a
knife. Te West renounces peace, yet it tries to seduce us with its illu-
sion of peace. Can heresy and Islam ever coexist? I do not blame the
West for its scheming, but I do blame the Muslims who are seduced
by this.
61

Te attack is upon the Jews as such, not, as often claimed, targeting
specically Zionists or Israelis, for their alleged crimes against Ar-
abs and Islam. Arab commentators interviewed on Iranian TV have
accused Washington Institute Researcher David Pollock, a Jew in
name, of Enjoying Drinking the Blood of Children on
62
. Te fascina-
tion with blood goes on, despite the hopeful harbingers of change,
which researcher and Memri president, Yigal Carmon, has detected
since 2003.
63
Tough some of those positive remarks have emanated
from intellectuals of consequence in the Islamic world, they are still in
the minority and being constantly refuted by the majority, for whom
hatred and stereotype are more prevalent than serious research and
the truth. Te most prominent among Arab self-critics in this matter
has been Osama al-Baz, President Mubaraks adviser for many years,
who almost single handedly carried this burden from his position of
185
power. Most others, though they criticized one aspect or another of
anti-Semitism, like Holocaust denial, the dismissal of the Protocols of
the Elders of Zion as a hoax, and the refutal of anti-Jewish stereotypes,
including the blood libel, most critics never invoked moral, historical,
or factual justication for their criticism, but rather practical, politi-
cal, or diplomatic rationalizations. So, together with fuming over the
convictions of Holocaust deniers in Europe, they recognized that it did
not serve the Arabs interests to deny what was universally recognized
in the Western world.
Te most recent signicant test of this matter unfolded when the
editor of the Egyptian government daily Al-Ahram , Ibrahim Na,
published a blood libel in his newspaper.
64
When that issue of the
paper was distributed in France, the French Jewish organization
LICRA
65
read a translation of the article and subsequently filed
a complaint, which led to a criminal investigation of Na for in-
citement to anti-Semitism. When Nafi launched a campaign
in support of his right to publish such material, Arab and European
intellectuals rushed to his aid. Since the August 2002 announcement
that Na was to be subpoenaed in Paris, his newspaper, Al-Ahram ,
was inundated with declarations of support from Egyptian and Arab
public gures and organizations. Various organizations such as the
Arab Lawyers Association in Britain have expressed willingness to
help with his legal defense, while clerics, politicians, diplomats,
newspaper editors, journalists, jurists, intellectuals, businessmen,
nanciers, and many Arab organizations published statements of
solidarity. Among these were top clerics such as the Sheikh of Al-
Azhar, Muhammed Sayyed Tantawi, and Egyptian Coptic Patriarchal
Aide Father Yohanna Qalta; politicians and representatives such
as Egyptian State Council Chairman Abd al-Rahman Azouz,
Chairman of the Egyptian Peoples Assembly Ahmad Fathi Sroor,
Chairman of the Egyptian Shura Council Mustafa Kamal Hilmi, Arab
League Secretary-General Amr Moussa, and Jordanian Ambassador
to Cairo Hani al-Mullqi; jurists such as the attorney for French Ho-
locaust denier Roger Garaudy, Dr. Ali el-Ghatit, and Arab Lawyers
Association Chairman Sameh Ashur; journalists such as editors
of the Egyptian opposition papers Al-Wafd , Al-Ahali , Al-Midan ,
Al-Usbu , Al-Arabi , and Al-Zaman and the Palestinian Journalists
Association; businessmen and nanciers such as the chairman of
the Union of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, and Agriculture
in the Arab Countries, Khaled Abu Ismail, Egyptian Businessmens
186
Association Chairman Jamal al-Nader, and Egyptian Bankers Union
chairman Bahaa al-Din Hilmi; Arab organizations and associations and
their members such as Arab Pharmaceutical Industries Association,
Egyptian Physicians Association Chairman Dr. Hamdi al-Sayyid, the
Egyptian Organization for Human Rights, and Arab Artists Association
Chairman Dr. Fawzi Fahmi.
66

We would go amiss nonetheless if we do not mention the rare, occa-
sional but extremely courageous and honorable people of conscience,
who dare to defy this muddled stream of hatred and bigotry and put be-
fore their media readers the truth as they perceive it. Khaled Muntaser,
a columnist of the independent Al-Watan in Cairo, who obviously hails
from that rare brand of liberal, fair, educated, and intrepid publicists,
is one of them. He wrote:
When the Jewish giants of Internet and the social networks convene
together, they forget about their competition and unite around the
theme of donating a $33 million prize for medical research, likely to
assure longevity and cure hitherto incurable diseases.
67
I cannot help
applauding them and clamoring: Long Live the Descendents of Mon-
keys and Pigs !, as they were described by Dr Mursi and his [Muslim
Brothers] movement. Conversely, those who blow themselves up in
order to kill innocent people, attack tourists and slit their bellies,
mount attempts on the lives of politicians, thinkers and intellectuals,
and accuse others of heresy, let them go to hell, where they be able
to pursue their sick enjoyment of blood and violence.
Te founders of Facebook and Google and their Russian partner
are the true lovers of life. Tey improve the conditions of living and
love freedom and creativity. Te respect the true scholars, not those
that we dub scholars because they have memorized 100 outdated
books and repeat them endlessly without either understanding
them or commenting over them. We can do without them all and
substitute for them one DVD disk containing all the useful books
that we can read with a click on a screen that is widely available to
everybody ... Unlike them, the giants of Internet have a llocated a
prize of $3 million to any individual, from any nationality, religion or
gender, who would make a breakthrough in brain research, genetics
and other medical research.
I have read this piece of news and got acquainted with this gen-
erous organization when watching a video sent to me by a friend ...
At the same time, I heard the voice of the Imam in the adjoining
mosque who was cursing the Jews, the descendents of monkeys and
pigs, wishing them to disperse to all corners of the globe, their wives
to be widowed and their children orphaned, causing his audience to
rejoice its tremendous victory...
187
For Gods sake! Who is more conscientious, moral and humanist?
Tose three Jews who promote science, health and happiness, and act
for the betterment of life, or [al-Qaida leaders] Bin-Laden Zawahiri,
and Zarqawi, [Taliban leader] Mullah Umar, and those who wave
their pictures, kiss them and embrace their ideas? Who has been
more useful to the world, including the Muslims? Tose who hoist
the banner of science or [fanatic Egyptian sheikh] Abu Islam and
those who wave shoes in the TV satirical series?
68

Notes
1. Posted on Barry Rubins Blog, August, 2009, http://rubinreports.blogspot.
com/2009/08/why-is-israel-demonized-while real.html.
2. Haaretz, August 2023, 2009.
3. Haviv Rettig Gur, Jews harvesting Algerian kids organs, Jerusalem
Post , September 14, 2009, http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=
1251804571092&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FPrinter.
See also MEMRI Special DispatchNo. 2541, September 16, 2009 http://
www.memri.org/bin/latestnews.cgi?ID=SD254109.
4. www1.wafa.ps , September 4, 2009.
5. Al-Watan , Syria, September 28, 2009.
6. Al-Hayat Al-Jadida (PA), September 6, 2009.
7. www1.wafa.ps, September 7, 2009.
8. Al-Watan , Syria, August 25, 2009.
9. www.palestine-info.info, August 31, 2009.
10. [9] www1.wafa.ps, September 7, 2009.
11. Al-Arabiya TV, www.aljazeera.net, September 17, 2009. It should be noted
that there were no reports on the rest of Bostons tour. However, during a
visit to Syria he expressed his disappointment that the Arab governments,
and especially the PA, had done nothing to help the families of the Palestinian
victims, even though they had known about the phenomena described in
his article. Al-Watan , Syria, October 12, 2009.
12. Al-Tawra , Syria, September 18, 2009.
13. L. Barkan Arab Reactions to Aftonbladet Report Accusing Israel of Traf-
cking in Palestinians Organs, Memri, Inquiry & Analysis Series Report
No.2736, November 23, 2009.
14. Syrian TV on January 27, 2010.
15. Ibid.
16. Ibid.
17. Tovah Lazaro, UN Site Posts Organ Harvesting Claim, Jerusalem Post ,
March 25, 2010. http://www.jpost.com/International/Article.aspx?id=
171732.
18. Ibid.
19. Ibid.
20. Statement by the Permanent Observer of Palestine to the UN, on the 53rd
Session of the Commission on Human Rights in Geneva, 10 March, 1997,
at 17:00. Te written text of the address by the Palestinian Ambassador was
diused to the members of the Commission.
188
21. Jerusalem Post, March 17, 1997.
22. Yearbook of the United Nations, New York, 1987, 33233.
23. Document E/CN/4/1997/122, letter addressed by the Chairman of the
53rd Session of the Commission on Human Rights to the Ambassador of
Israel.
24. Letter by Ambassador Miroslav Somol to Ambassador Nabil Ramlawi, the
Observer of Palestine at the Human Rights Commission, April 3, 1997. Te
letter was circulated by Ramlawi upon its receipt.
25. Cited in Bat Yeor, Islam and Dhimmitude.
26. Ibid.
27. Cited in Andrew Bostom, Te Legacy of Jihad.
28. Ibid.
29. At the opening of the annual international conference of the Global Forum
for Combating Antisemitism held in Jerusalem on Sunday, February 24,
2008. Much of the following discussion is based on this lecture.
30. Quran, 2:65, 5:60, 7:166. Two of these texts (2:65 and 7:166) specify that
violation of the Sabbath was the cause of the transmogrication. In one
instance (5:60), it is mentioned as a punishment brought upon ahl al-kitab
(the people of the book,) a term signifying both Jews and Christians who
refused to accept the true faith.
31. See MEMRI Special Report No. 11 (November 1, 2002), by Aluma Solnick.
http://www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/975.htm.
32. Iqraa Television, May 7, 2002.
33. See R. Israeli, Muslim Anti-Semitism in Christian Europe (New Brunswick:
Transaction, 2009), 45.
34. See Andrew Bostom, ed., Te Legacy of Islamic Anti-Semitism (Prometheus
Books, 2008), 45961.
35. MEMRI TV Clip No. 1184, Egyptian Cleric Sheik Muhammad Sharaf al-
Din on a Children Show: Te Jews Are the People of Treachery, Betrayal,
and Vileness, http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/1184.htm.
36. MEMRI TV Clip No. 669, Palestinian Friday Sermon by Sheik Ibrahim
Mudeiris: Muslims Will Rule America and Britain, Jews Are a Virus Resem-
bling AIDS, http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/669.htm, May 13, 2005. See
also the reference to Turkish Necmettin Erbakan who used similar abusive
vocabulary.
37. Al-Ahram , October 28, 2000.
38. MEMRI TV Clip No. 972, Political Analysts on Iranian TV: Te Jews Killed
Children and Used Teir Blood for Passover, http://www.memritv.org/clip/
en/972.htm, December 20, 2005.
39. It is interesting to note that the producers of Al-Shatat , conscious of the
previous years outcry against Knight Without A Horse , which was screened
on Moderate Egypt state TV, preceded each episode with a disclaimer
stating that the series was not based on the notorious Protocols of the Elders
of Zion but on historical facts and research, including writings by Jews and
Israelis. And they continued to believe that they were producing a work of
art in the notorious land of freedom of the press, Syria, not a reprehensible
hoax.
40. Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, March 20, 2002. See Milson, op. cit.
41. Quran 4: 15657.
189
42. MEMRI TV Clip No. 1249, Sheik Yousef Al-Qaradhawi: Te Jews of Today
Bear Responsibility for Teir Forefathers Crime against Jesus, http://
www.memritv.org/clip/en/1249.htm, August 26, 2006.
43. Such claims are the focus of a 1982 doctoral dissertation by top Palestin-
ian Authority o cial and PLO Executive Committee Secretary-General
Mahmoud Abbas, also known as Abu Mazen, at Moscows Institute of
Oriental Studies. Te Arabic version of the dissertation was published in
1984. See Yael Yehoshua, Abu Mazen: A Political Prole, (MEMRI, Special
Report No. 15, April 29, 2003) Chapter V (Zionism and Holocaust Denial),
and R. Israeli, Islamikaze: Manifestations of Islamic Martyrology (London:
Frank Cass, 2003), especially Chapter 8 (Jews, Zionism, and Israel,) http://
www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/1603.htm. See Milson, op. cit.
44. Norman Stillman, Te Jews of Arab Lands (Jewish Publication Society of
America, 1979), pp...
45. Ibid.
46. Te letter in its original French was published by Jacob Landau, Jews in 19th
Century Egypt , 200, 203204. Cited by Stillman, 42627.
47. See, for example, Al-Ahram , October 28, 2000; or Al-Akhbar , October 20,
2000. See also MEMRI, Special Dispatches 150, 201 and 354, 20002002.
48. Al Sham is the Arabic for Damascus and also for the province of Damascus
of which Palestine was part. Tis emphasis by Tlass that Israel was founded
in Al-Sham underscores Syrias standing claim to Palestine, where neither
Israel nor Palestine (or Lebanon for that matter) are recognized as separate
units independent of Syrian rule.
49. Tis is a verse that warns the children of Israel of harsh divine punishment
for their sinful deeds. Incidentally, at the close of his introduction Tlass
warned of repeating the disastrous mistake made by President Sadat, when
he made peace with Satanic Israel, thus compromising the integrity of his
country, something that had led to his assassination.
50. Te rst installment was published in Al-Riyadh , March 10, 2002, the second
part on 12 March of the same year, purporting to explain the story of the
Book of Esther. See MEMRI, No 354, March 13, 2002.
51. Ibid.
52. See R. Israeli, Islamic Radicalism and Political Violence (London: Vallentine
Mitchell, 2008).
53. In a speech at the February 16, 2007 protest in the East Jerusalem neigh-
borhood of Wadi Joz. Related live by the media.
54. Ibid.
55. Ibid.
56. Te Orr Commission, which came to that conclusion, also decided to drop
charges against Arab leaders, including Salah himself, for their incitement,
which triggered those severe riots in Israel Proper during those days of
early October 2000, after the failure of the Second Camp David Conference
convened by President Clinton, which Arafat has used to launch his al-Aqsa
Intifada.
57. A celebrated and popular Quran commentator.
58. MEMRI, 5 September 2010. http://www.memritv.org/clip_transcript/
en/2606.htm
59. See details in Chapter 7 on Turkey.
190
60. Al-Alam TV , Iran, August 8, 2010, 05:33
61. Al-Nas TV , February 16, 2010.
62. Press TV , Iran, May 27, 2008, 04:13
63. Y. Carmon, Harbingers of Change in the Ant-Semitic Discourse in the Arab
World, Memri. Inquiry & Analysis Series Report No.135, April 23, 2003
64. Te blood libel appeared in the article Jewish Matza is Made from Arab
Blood. Te article connected the 1840 Damascus blood libel with Israels
actions. See MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 150, http://www.memri.org/
report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/388.htm.
65. Ligue Internationale Contre le Racisme et Lantismitisme.
66. Carmon, op. cit. See also French Legal Authorities Investigating Editor
of Major Egyptian Daily for Antisemitism Inquiry & Analysis Series
Report Memri No. 107, September 6, 2002, http://www.memri.org/report/
en/0/0/0/0/0/177/726.htm
67. Reference was probably made to Jewish Russian Tycoon Yuri Millner; Mark
Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook and the co-founder of Google, Sergey
Brin, who established a fund to nance the Prize for Breakthroughs in Life
Science.
68. Al-Watan , March 8, 2013.
Te Distribution of Lies and
Hatred: Mosques, Education,
the Media, Internet, Poetry,
and Folk Songs
191
4
In the Arab and much of the Muslim worlds, the public square is
permanently inundated by biased information and one-sided propa-
ganda emanating from its authoritarian governments, who have not
educated their public to think freely, to gather information from many
sources, and to make judgments for themselves. And the o cial version
of news in those countries, where propaganda takes precedence over
knowledge, and universally, exclusively, and constantly transmits and
diuses the versions crafted by the governments in place, which in-
variably demonize the Jews-Israelis-Zionists, impute to them the most
horrible monstrosities, heap on them the most horrible accusations,
and attribute to them the most evil intentions. History is also rewritten
and tailored to suit the evil nature of the Jews, in daily columns, in
scientic books, encyclopedias, not to mention Friday mosque ser-
mons and political speeches made by unscrupulous politicians, clerics,
scholars, and writers. Citations are invented that have no source to
draw from, without concern for the false reporting to the readers or the
distortion of the minds of children and youth who will grow in error,
be bereft of intellectual curiosity and fortitude, and get accustomed to
their narrative instead of to the truth. Arab media generally have no
compunction about distorting reports, inating negatives, and attenu-
ating positives when Israel or Jews are concerned, lest the stereotypes
they are harnessed by their governments to propagate be corrected.
Rumors and accusations that Israelis are killers of children, spread
diseases around (this is particularly ironical due to Israels world-famous
192
medical aid brought to developing countries, especially in Africa, while
the blaming countries are themselves sunken in disease), undermine
governments, and diuse corruption, are quick to travel in the Islamic
world and adopted, lock stock and barrel, without critique or veri-
cation. Conrmed reports about a scientic invention by Israelis or
Jews, an Israeli sports team that won a medal or a championship, or
any international distinction awarded to Israel, like a Nobel Prize, or
aid brought by Israel to Arab patients and children, is sure to disappear
from the Arab news reports lest, Allah Forbid, Jews might appear in a
positive light and contribute toward the attenuation of the Arab and
Muslim hatred toward them.
No wonder then that children in kindergartens in Gaza are prone
to vow for Islamikaze careers when they grow up, and for their mates
to watch television programs of the o cial Palestinian Authority, or
of Hamas Television, in which even popular international cartoon
gures render Palestinian kids heroes who devote their lives to ght
the Zionist enemy, and the latter are dubbed the scum of the earth
whose sacred duty of all Palestinians it is to blow up. Te infamous
Muhammed al-Dura case, which became cause celebre in France during
the Second Intifada (20002003), after it was proved in court that it had
been jointly staged by a French television channel and the Palestinian
Authority with a view of demonizing Israel, provides ample evidence
of this manifestation of hatred. In Arab lore, Jews and in consequence
Israelis and Zionists are accused of racism, bigotry, and corruption;
undermining the world order; wielding international power on the
media and nances; desecrating Muslim holy places; occupying Arab
lands; discriminating against their own new immigrants, their leaders
as devious monsters, their foreign policy as aggressive and expansionist,
threatening the peaceful Arab nation and Muslim world; accumulating
a dangerous nuclear arsenal; and striving for the demise of the Arabs
and Islam. As regards the Palestinians specically, not only usurpation
of their rights is invoked, together with the claim of their occupation,
their exploitation, and their persecution, but also false genocidal ac-
cusations are occasionally raised against Israel. In the meantime, Israel
and Zionism are routinely charged of eliminating Palestinian culture
in order to replace it by the Jewish-Zionist one, and of diminishing the
Islamic prevalence in Palestine and other occupied territories.
1

Tis image of the Jews, Zionism, and Israel, which is cultivated in
the Arab, and many Muslim media worldwide, at the exclusion of any-
thing positive that may be said about them, naturally channels public
Te Distribution of Lies and Hatred
193
opinion toward a very deeply seated hatred toward those entities,
which is becoming gradually irreversible, even in the countries that
have signed peace with Israel, like Egypt and Jordan, or used to be
Muslim moderates, like Turkey, Qatar, Morocco, and the Emirates,
which sharply shifted their relative openness toward Israel the moment
the rst reports of Israels atrocities in the Gaza War (2009) started
to lter out. It seemed that the infrastructure of hatred entrenched in
the Islamic world toward Israel was there all the time, and all it needed
was a trigger to relaunch it with ever greater vigor. Admittedly, even in
many European countries where that same sort of anti-Israeli hostility
was aired on the same occasion of the Gaza War, it was connected,
at least in part, with the wrath of the Muslim minorities in the West,
which are fed by the same disinformation, hallucinations, and hatred
that they brought with them from the Islamic world, and continue to
update their background education from the Arab and Muslim
media or from the anti-Semitic European media. In sum, the Jews, who
were traditionally depicted in despicable terms in Islam, continue to be
portrayed stereotypically in Arab and Muslim writings, in cartoons, and
in the electronic media, with the related extreme expression of disgust
and hatred. Two brief illustrations will make the point:
1. I am in no way preaching hatred or praising it as a way of hu-
man behavior. But the hatred individual or society must examine
themselves so as to understand why it is this way, since no society
or individual can be hatred in such a way [as the Zionists] for no
reason ... I will give you an example of how hatred for the Zion-
ist entity takes root in the soul of the Arabs ... I once attended an
international conference on road accidents in the military, held in
Paris ... With me was my colleague ... whose mood changed when
he was informed that a man who stood next to us ... was a trans-
portation o cer of the detested Zionist entity ... My colleague
raged, swearing that he would not stand next to this criminal, talk
to him, or enter the hall in which he was sitting ... He did not calm
down until I swore to him that I did not know the nationality of
that man, because he was in the company of o cers from all over
the world, and I myself was incapable of standing next to someone
whose hands were dripping with the blood of innocent Arabs ...
Tese are our enemies and our hatred toward them is rooted in
our souls, and the only thing that can remove it is their departure
from our lands and the purication of their delement of our Holy
Places ...
2

194
2. An editor of the Egyptian weekly, al-Usbu , described a dream he
had had, in which he was delegated by the Egyptian government to
serve as the bodyguard of Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, on
his o cial visit [also in the dream] to Cairo. Te scene of the dream,
starting with a pig [pointedly abhorred by Jews and Muslims alike]
took place at the airport: After a short while the pig landed; his
face was diabolical; his hands soiled with the blood of women and
children; a criminal who should be executed in the public square.
Should I remain silent as many others did? Should I guard this
butcher on my homelands soil? All of a sudden, I forgot everything:
the past and the future, my wife and children, and I decided to do
it. I pulled my gun and aimed at the cowardly pigs head. I emptied
all the bullets and screamed: Blood vengeance for the [Egyptian]
POWs! Blood vengeance for the martyrs! Te murderer collapsed
under my feet. Ten I realized the meaning of masculinity and
self-sacrice. Te criminal died. I stepped over the pigs head with
my shoes and screamed from the bottom of my heart: Long Live
Egypt! Long Live Palestine! Jerusalem will never die, and never will
the honor of the nation be lost! I kept screaming at the top of my
lungs until my wife put her hand on me. I woke up from this most
beautiful dream and decided not to surrender to humiliation ...
3

Tis kind of hatred is instilled o cially and informally through all
channels of knowledge acquisition in the Arab and Muslim countries:
educational systems, sermons in mosques, o cial statements by po-
litical leaders, the state-controlled media, mobilized scholars that
rewrite history tailored to their political guidelines, and even popular
poems and songs that are either spontaneously produced by their
writers who understand the political mood of their environments, or
are specically urged to create in response to the needs of their na-
tion. We have already exemplied the sort of hatred that is diused in
the Friday sermons, like that recurrent citation from the book about
the Jews as descendents of pigs and monkeys, attributes that are not
likely to encourage sympathy to them, not even to allow them to be
counted among the human kind. Another universal prayer in mosques
throughout the Islamic world, invokes Allah to destroy the enemy,
meaning either the Jews and Israel, or America and the West, or both.
Te call upon Allah to destroy them implies that they are considered
somehow mighty beyond Muslim power, to such an extent that only
Allah can overwhelm them, and when He intervenes, He will certainly
do so in the Muslim favor.
195
We have also reviewed a sample of Arab and Muslim media state-
ments and reports, which reect their deep sense of hatred, contempt,
and hostility toward Jews, Zionism, and Israel, and encourage violence
toward them. Very often, however, as is the wont in authoritarian re-
gimes, the state media, which shape public opinion, rather than express
it, are mobilized to educate the masses by injecting into their minds
the party line of the authorities, by means of commissioned studies,
research, lectures, and treatises that known scholars are urged to
diuse, not as their own ndings but as the necessary conclusions
that the regime needs to reinforce its political views or to battle its
enemies, or to enforce on its constituency. Tere are also anthologies
of poetry that specialize on anti-Semitic propaganda, together with
occasional declarations of hatred that the state media help to distribute.
Since Yasser Arafat had himself coined the war cry: We are coming to
Jerusalem as martyrs in the millions!, the Jihad war against Jews-Israelis
has been celebrated among Arab folks and its lyrics memorized and
repeated on every occasion:
Because I am a Palestinian
Because I am enamored with fate
And my fate is to have my blood
Turned into songs
Tat sketch out the road to freedom,
MY fate is to become a human bomb,
Because I am a Palestinian.
Oh, lovers of cruelty, we
Inform you in the name of our hopes,
Either I shall meet Allah by means
Of perfume and musk
4

Or I will live on My land
In freedom and honor.
[Addressing the Israelis] Much to your distress,
We shall not forget Haifa and Acre
To your distress
All of Palestine is ours
We have nothing for you but death
Plant as many gharqad trees
5
as you like
Build as many shelters and hiding places as you desire,
And, if you wish, create your own articial peace.
196
Your history is black and covered
Your ancestry is a tree whose
Branches are corrupt,
And the Arab rulers in this homeland
Lie in a perpetual slumber
Eating from the fruit of your tree
And drinking of your humiliation
As if they were not Muslims.
Because I am a Palestinian,
Because I bear the ag
And I long for the memory of Hittin
6

I shall place the parts of my body as bombs
In hating you, your origin and your accursed fruit,
And in spite of you, they will germinate
Te most beautiful owers
Tey will give rise to the most beautiful Palestine
7

Egyptian researcher, Muhammad al-Buheiri, who preceded his Pal-
estinian colleague, had a longer and more solid tradition of Egyptian
anti-Semitism to draw from and to lean upon. Well known is Muslim
Brotherhood luminary Sayyid Qutbs notorious invective against the
Jews, Our War against the Jews , as are the various anti-Semitic writ-
ings of Anis Mansur, the Christian associate of President Anwar Sadat
and editor of October , who inspired an entire generation of journalists
and writers, many of them regarding themselves as researchers. Two
important anti-Semitic books were published in Cairo in 1980/1981,
whose titles tell the whole story: Te War of Survival between the Quran
and the Talmud and Te Jews: the Objects of Wrath of God , which were
reportedly much in demand by the Egyptian public during the Cairo
book fair of February 1981. Anis Mansur has unabashedly rea rmed
his anti-Semitic convictions in his book Te Wailing Wall and the
Tears , which ridicules, slanders, condemns, and calumniates the Jews
as no other anti-Semite in recent memory has dared to do, for example,
Jews are enjoined by their faith to ravish all women of other religions;
the secret constitution of the Jews, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion ,
encourages Jews to pursue the profession of obstetrician in order to
specialize in abortion and so reduce the numbers of non-Jews; or that
children in Israeli kibbutzim are raised to hate anybody who is not
Jewish; or that the Talmud advises the Jews to kill any non-Jew; and
that their souls are full of hostility to all people without exception.
8

197
Tis sort of silly, childish, ignorant, and hateful stereotyping of the
Jews by intelligent and supposedly scholarly and prominent people in
Egyptian and Arab society, which include writers, artists, journalists,
academics, editors, publishers, and other educated members of the elite,
has become routine in Egypt, decades after that country signed a peace
treaty with Israel. Te scourge of anti-Semitism, the blood libel, also re-
appeared in Cairo in 1981 under the respectable guise of a scholarly
book by Dr. Kamil Safan, entitled Jews, History and Doctrine , which
recounts as historical fact and in harrowing detail, the February 1840
Damascus blood libel, and a rms that similar cases went unnoticed
by the Chronicles or were manipulated by the Jews. Another scholar,
Dr. Lut abd-al-Adhim, wrote in the prestigious Al-Ahram al-Iqtisadi
( Te Wall Street Journal of the Arab World ), a substantial article entitled:
Arabs and Jews: Who Will Annihilate Whom?, which became more
salient in its oddity after peace was signed between the two countries:
One of the assumptions which needs to be straightened out is the
distinction made between Jews and Israelis ... for Jews are Jews; they
have not changed over thousands of years; [they embody] treachery,
meanness, deceit, and contempt for human values; they would devour
the esh of a living person and drink his blood for the sake of making
a few pennies ... Another faulty assumption is that the Jews want
to live in peace with the Arabs. We lived under that illusion when
some of our leaders declared the October 73 War to be the last war,
and when Israel returned the Sinai to us under the Camp David
Accords ...; but I am absolutely certain that when Menachem Begin
was signing those accords he was laughing at our naivete ...
If we looked realistically into the problem we would nd out that
it is one of a total war of annihilation waged by the Jews against the
Arab nation. Tis war of extermination probably lay at the base of
Israels motivation in signing the peace treaty with Egypt . . . For
they discovered that the best way to erase the Arab homeland was
through its humiliation, slander, character assassination, and the
destruction of its past and present noble history. Tere was no better
way to achieve that than dismembering the Arab nation, beginning
with Lebanon, while the Israeli ag is hoisted in Cairo ... We do not
mean necessarily that the Jews aim at the physical extermination of
all Arabs; this is simply impractical, although they would have been
delighted to do it. Rather, they intend to terrorize the Arabs and make
them afraid of Jewish ferocity, and intimidate them by such atrocities
as Sabra and Shatila and Deir Yassin ... Tere is no doubt that the
Israeli master plan strives to commit the same in Iraq, Libya, Syria
and other places in the Arab world ...; even Egypt would not escape
this bloody and base Jewish scheme ... And there is no dierence
198
in this regard between the gangs of terrorists ruling Israel and the
Jewish lobbies around the globe ...
Since I would rather be the killer than the killed (and I hope I am
no exception in the Arab world, I cannot be expected to sit by and
wait for the blood thirsty and enraged Israeli dogs to dismember my
body and bury the remains of the bodies of my wife and children ...
Let me declare unequivocally that, yes, this is anti-Semitism, but since
Arabs are also Semites, our anti-Semitism is no dierent from that
of the Jews: they hate Arab Semites and we hate Jewish Semites ...
Te Jews do not hesitate to resort to any means in their battle: they
shot their Ambassador in London and killed Bashir Jumayyel, who had
given them on a platter all they wanted ... I advise the Arabs not to
be taken in by the appearance of protests in Israel and by Jews around
the world. All this is a well orchestrated game where role-playing is
eectively assigned ... Te only dierence between various Jewish
circles is whether to kill their Arab victim under anesthesia or attack
him ferociously and drink its blood outright ... On this goal all Jews
are agreed ...
9

Tis monstrous article, which reects a deep mental derangement
of its author, was headed by a cartoon featuring a Zionist monster
ripping children, presumably Arab, to pieces. Although the scholarly
assumptions advanced by its learned author are echoed in the Egyp-
tian press in general, it remains particularly alarming in that it not only
presents deep-seated hatred of the Jews, but also summons Arabs to act
upon the perceived threat that the Jews constitute before it is too late.
Only two generations previously had similar contentions and appeals
in other anti-Semitic lands ended in the mass extermination of Jews.
And the fact that the Egyptian regime is either unable or unwilling to
control this kind of rhetoric, which in civilized countries would have
warranted state persecution for ethnic hatred and religious incitement,
is indicative of Egypts masses predisposition to absorb it. Not much
has changed when what is termed as a scholar, Al-Buheiri, spells out
his invective against Israel and the Jews in the context of the Toaf book,
in an interview that was aired on Egyptian TV. His ignorance of Jewish
history is appalling, but his determination to knock Israel out prevails:

Interviewer : What is this story of the blood matza , which some
authorseven Arab onessay is anti-Semitic lies and nonsense, while
others say it is true?
Muhammad Al-Buheiri : Unfortunately, some Arabs want to be holier
than the Pope.
199
Interviewer : A journalist like Salah Issa, for example, wrote in
Nahdhat Masr that we dont need to decide whether the blood matza
story was true or not, but that we should examine how we deal strate-
gically with the Jews and the Israelis in the twenty-rst century.
Al-Buheiri : Tats true, but it doesnt mean that we shouldnt deal with
such issues. Lets not forget that the West in its entirety globally cele-
brated Salman Rushdies Te Satanic Verses . So why shouldnt we do
the same? I called for a Nobel Prize to be awarded to the Israeli Jewish
historian [Toaf ], the son of the chief rabbi of Rome ...
Interviewer : He wrote Bloody Passover , the book we are discussing.
Al-Buheiri : Tis man proved scientically and objectively ... Hes an
academic, who heads the department of Jewish history at the Israeli
Bar-Ilan University. We are not talking about an amateur, a fraud, or
someone looking to get famous. We are talking about an academic,
who follows scientic and objective principles. He reached the con-
clusion that there was indeed a group of extremist Jews, who used to
slaughter Christian children, and to collect their blood in order to
make the Passover matza . It had to be a child who had not reached
puberty. Tey would abduct him and put him into a barrel designed
for this purpose, which had holes in the sides at the place of the ar-
teries. Tey would insert iron skewers through the barrel, and make
the boys blood ow that way. Ten they would collect the blood, and
use it for Passover. Some sources in Jewish halacha say that prepar-
ing a single matza on Passover this way is su cient for all the Jews.
Others believe that such matzos should be prepared in each country
separately.
Interviewer : Tey sacrice Christian children . . . When was it? In
what century?
Al-Buheiri : It has been substantiated since the Middle Ages.
Interviewer : My question is: Until when did it happen?
Al-Buheiri : Tat is the question we must ask. Have the Jews, with all
their extremists, especially in Israel, given up ... Have they given up
these customs and religious rituals, which are important to them? Tere
were very many cases. Tere were similar cases in Syria. Tere were
similar cases in 1700 and 1800. Such children were abducted.
Interviewer : I have another question. Who are the people who prepare
these matzos? Are they Jewish extremists or moderates? As a researcher
200
specializing in inter-faith dialog, do you believe this still occurs in Israel?
Im rephrasing the question.
Al-Buheiri : I believe it does, because these are religious rituals.
Interviewer : In some Israeli newspapers and media, we have seen
that they take an Israeli hen or rooster, and shed its blood, and they
say that this is a form of Israeli sacrice that brings blessing. We have
witnessed this on several occasions. Te question is why this important
book, Bloody Passover , provoked the Jews throughout the world, who
said that this renowned Israeli historian is anti-Semitic.
Al-Buheiri : First of all, we should be aware that the Jews always im-
plement a rule they consider basic: a loud voice is capable of erasing
the truth. Tey are quite loud, arent they?
Al-Buheiri : Precisely. If they attack somebody, they announce in the
media and propaganda tools, which they control so skillfully, through-
out the world ... Tey turn the facts upside down. Tey turn the attacker
into the attacked.
Interviewer : Te media are controlled by the Jews.
Al-Buheiri : Te Jews have made great eorts to conceal the issue of
the Passover blood. Tey even called it blood libel. In Jewish culture,
this is called blood libelthe lie about the use of Christian blood to
prepare matzos .
10

Te recrudescence of these libelous lies among Muslim Arabs does
not mean that Christian Arabs have relinquished that course of ac-
tion, unlike most of their brethren in the West. Celebrated Christian
Lebanese Poet, Marwan Chamoun, is still clinging to the 1840 hoax
about the Damascus blood libel and a rms with conviction the Jews
had slaughtered the Christian Priest in Damascus in 1840, and used his
blood for Matzos. His harrowing description is so vivid as if he were
present in the process:
How many of us Lebanese, or even Arabs, know anything about the
Talmud? Or about the book, Exposing the Talmud ? Or about the
book, Pawns on the Chessboard ? Or about another book, Te Secret
World Government ? Or about Exposing the Talmud ? Or about Blood
for the Matzah of Zion , [which deals with] the slaughter of the priest
Tomaso de Camangiano, who was a Sicilian with French citizenship,
in the days of Muhammad Ali Pasha, in 1840 ...
[Former Syrian] Minister of Defense, Mustafa Tlass wrote a
voluminous book about this, in which he included all the documents
201
written by the French diplomats and consul in Lebanon. Te world
loves the Jews. Te ruler is Christianitythe Christian West.
Arabs, Muslimswhy dont you take advantage of something like
this? A priest was slaughtered in the presence of two rabbis in the
heart of Damascus, in the home of a close friend of this priest, Daud
Al-Harari, the head of the Jewish community of Damascus. After he
was slaughtered, his blood was collected, and the two rabbis took it.
Why? So they could worship their god, because by drinking human
blood, they can get closer to God. Where are our diplomats and
politicians? Why dont we prot from these historical matters, which
are presented to us on a simple, eternal, golden platter?
As Ive said, these books can be found on the streets of Beirut.
Tere are approximately 20 to 30 such books. I must have bought
about 2,000 copies since they were published, maybe more. Id like to
say 20,000 copies, but I dont know. When somebody gets married,
instead of chocolates, I give him one of these books. Whoever reads
this for the rst time feels a chill of horror and disbelief. He cannot
believe it.
11

While it is understood why Arab wish to demonize Israel as part of
their struggle to delegitimize it, it is less well understood why Chris-
tian Arabs, who are themselves facing extinction under Muslim rule,
should toe the same line. But it is absolutely fascinating to watch how
Muslims who settled in the Western democracies in the past two or
three decades, are reviving the scourge of blood libel in their host
countries where that horror has hardly any appeal anymore, as part
of their anti-Semitic and anti-Israel demonization. None other than
the Hamas Television was delighted to interview Dr. Salah Sultan, the
President of the American Center for Islamic research, who declared
with deep conviction:
I want our brothers, and the whole world, to know whats going on
these days, during Passover. Read Dr. Naghuib Al-Kilanis book, Blood
for the Matzos of Zion . Every year, at this time, the Zionists kidnap
several non-Muslims [ sic ]Christians and others . . . By the way,
this happened in a Jewish neighborhood in Damascus. Tey killed
the French doctor, Tomas, who used to treat the Jews and others for
free, in order to spread Christianity. Even though he was their friend
and they beneted from him the most, they took him on one of
these holidays and slaughtered him, along with the nurse. Ten they
kneaded the matzos with the blood of Dr. Tomas and his nurse. Tey
do this every year . . . Te world must know these facts about the
Zionist entity and its terribly corrupt creed. Te world should know
this.
12

202
Notes
1. For details of such accusations, see R. Israeli, Peace is in the Eye of the
Beholder (Berlin and New York: Mouton, 1985).
2. Al-Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, November 22, 2001.
3. Al-Usbu, Cairo, February 12, 2001. Cited by al-Quds al-Arabi London,
February 13, 2001. Translated by MEMRI, No 188, February 22, 2001.
4. According to Muslim belief, the bodies of martyrs do not putrefy, but give
o the scent of musk.
5. According to Islamic tradition, which is incidentally also cited at the end
or Article 7 of the Hamas Charter (see R Israeli, Te Charter of Allah , 137),
on the Day of Judgment, the Muslims will ght the Jews [and kill them],
and the Jews will seek to hide behind trees and rocks, which will cry out:
Oh Muslims! A Jew is hiding behind me ! Come and kill him! Tis will not
apply to the Gharqad tree, a sort of raspberry bush which is considered a
Jewish tree. One of the Arab-Muslim manufactured lies is that Israel has
been planting many of those trees in order to avoid the massacre awaiting
her.
6. Tat is the decisive battle in which Saladin routed the Crusader armies in
1187 and evicted them from much of Palestine. In Arab and Muslim imagery,
Israel is often likened to the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem whose days
are numbered.
7. Lyrics written by Ayman al-Saka, an unknown poet, published in al-Istiqlal
(the weekly of the Islamic Jihad in Gaza), December 13, 2001.
8. Al-Idhaa wa-l Telesion , December 16, 1976.
9. Al-Ahram al-Iqtisadi , September 27, 1982, 47.
10. Muhammad Al-Buheiri, which aired on Nile Culture TV on February 25,
2007, 7:20, is a past recipient of an Egyptian Ministry of Culture scholarship
http://memritv.org/clip/en/1393.htm
March 2, 2007 Memri Special Dispatch No.1485
11. Excerpts from an interview with Lebanese poet Marwan Chamoun, which
aired on TeleLiban TV on January 30, 2007. http://memritv.org/clip/en/1374.
htm
12 Dr. Sallah Sultan, president of the American Center for Islamic Research,
which aired on Al-Aqsa TV on March 31, 2010, Memri, Clip No 2443, March
31, 2010.

Distribution of Libel, in
Defense of Lies
203
5
Another and dierent kind of lie is propagated throughout the
Islamic world against Jews and Israel in self-defense from other lies
that come under attack worldwide, or in order to leave the impression
that Arabs are sometimes self-critical too, not only bashing Amer-
ica, Israel, and the Jews. For example, a Kuwaiti columnist, Ahmed
al-Baghdadi, while lashing out at Arab regimes who persecute their
own intelligentsia , and positing the Arabs and Muslims as masters
of terrorism, justied the aggressive reactions of the West to terror,
which have turned to humiliating Arabs and Muslims and rejecting
them from its midst ... He argued that Islam does not tolerate others
opinions and even undercuts its own intellectuals at a time when the
heretic West and Israel do not practice that kind of terror against
their own people.
1
In a letter to America, published in the Hamass
Al-Risalah in Gaza after September 11, 2001, the message was made
clear:
Oh America, the sword of oppression, arrogance and crime!!! Do you
remember how you smashed mans humanity? Do you remember
how you mistreated the Blacks under your aegis? Can you describe
for us the humiliation, disgust and contempt you meted out to those
unfortunate people, whose only sin was that they were born to black
parents? ... Tey were born free, but were enslaved in your virgin
land ...
America, re-examine your decisions to cast hundreds of veto
votes [at the Security Council of the UN, in Israels favor], with a
view of denying humanity its rights. Look at your humiliated face,
and check whether it is not due to those votes. Tis will teach you
to stand by justice and by the righteous, even if they are weak, and
then perhaps the dust of humiliation will be removed from your sad
face ...
2

204
Tus, in a fascinating reversal of projecting their own feelings that
justify their Jihad against the West even at the price of their own
misery and humiliation,
3
their yearning is revealed for humiliating
the West and Israel in return, violently if possible, insultingly for lack
of better, because only counter-humiliation, born out of hatred, can
remove the traces of humiliation. Tese manifestations of humiliation
and the constant need to remove them by retaliation in kind have been
part of the Arab psyche since their defeat of 1948, and the resulting
hatred toward their enemies. Moreover, as Arab and Muslim writers of
all walks can show the danger that Jews and Israel pose to the world
in general and to the Arabs and Islam in particular, they are able, just
like the Nazis before them, to justify their persecution and eventual
annihilation. Te Jewish conspiracy is not the only irrational narra-
tive that those Muslim writers were deluded enough to believe. Tey
nd that the very roots of Zionism, which they oppose fervently, go
back to that plot. Chaim Weizmann, the Zionist leader, who obtained
the Balfour Declaration from the British in 1917, was credited for his
contribution to the war eort when he invented the articial process of
producing acetone, was accused by Arab writers of having stolen war
secrets from Russian scientists. Te Europeans let the Jews go to Pales-
tine, not because of sympathy to them, but in order to rid themselves
of the Jewish cancer that threatened to choke them on all sides, for
they could not nd any other country to absorb the poisoned human
garbage called the Jews. Tus, the author claimed, Britain permitted
the Jews to take over Palestinian lands by facilitating their attacks on
Palestinians and by letting Jewish gangs receive weapons from Europe. It
was the Jews who spread false rumors about Germanys defeat in World
War I and ruined the German economy, spread anarchy in Germany by
introducing Communism, and even tried to murder Bismarck. Hitler
wanted to collaborate with the British to thwart the Jewish threat in
Europe, but they outsmarted him when they appointed their agent,
Winston Churchill, as the British Prime Minister. He even tells us that
Hitler set up a special research Institute to study the roots of Jewish
corruption and rot, and how they could be cured of that disease so as
to arrest their threat to humanity. But when he gave up on remedying
their incurable diseases, he began to restrict and neutralize them.
4

Tese good reasons for hating the Jews are then indoctrinated
into children throughout the Muslim world and consumed with and
in their mothers milk, so as to internalize them so deeply, as in Aayan
Hirsis case above, that not only is hatred toward the Jews and Israeli
Distribution of Libel, in Defense of Lies
205
continued in the present but also perpetuated in the generations to
come. How else can one interpret the appeal of an Egyptian infant on
television: Oh Allah, destroy Israel! Amen, expressing the despair
from the inability of his nation to achieve that goal and appealing
to the All Mighty to do it for them. Te child preacher, identied as
Ibrahim Adham, who certainly did not understand the signicance
of his appeal, but assuredly lent credibility to it and caused sympathy
and identication with it due to the purity of its innocence originating
from a young boy, said that martyrdom is a religious duty for Muslim
believers and refers to the accursed [PM of Israel, Ariel] Sharon, and
to [Presidents] Bush and Obama. A robed man was also seen in the
clip, telling the boy: You are such a beautiful boy, by Allah! Tis eerie
scene was recorded briey after President Mursi of Egypt attended a
prayer in a mosque in Marsa Matruh on the Mediterranean, where
the preacher called in the Ahmadinejad style for the destruction and
dispersal of the Jews, and the congregation, including Mursi, answered:
Amen. Te prayer was aired on state TV and recorded on video by
MEMRI.
5
Why would that innocent child behave any more leniently
toward Jews than his Resident, in view of the picture that is presented
of them as an imminent danger to all Muslims?
In the context of the invitation of eminent Saudi Sheikh al-Sudais to
Melbourne, Australia, in March 2013 to attend the oddly named Aus-
tralian Islamic Peace Conference, those who opposed that invitation,
like Rev. Mark Durie, a noted scholar in Arab and Islamic studies,
argued:
Te Sheikh had referred to Jews as the scum of the human race, rats
of the world, violators of pacts and agreements, murderers of the
prophets and grandsons of apes and pigs . . . When this eminent
personage comes to Melbourne to be part of the best ever Islamic
event held in Australia, will only be speaking in Arabic and reading
the Quran, possibly the chapters referring to Jews as pact breakers
(sura 5:13 and 2:27); to Allah who has turned some of them to apes
and pigs (sura 2:65, 5:60 and 7:166); or Jews as murderers of the proph-
ets (sura 3:181 and 2: 65). What sense are the people of Melbourne
meant to make of the proposition that they need not worry that the
preacher has called for the annihilation of Jews, because he will only
be speaking in Arabic?
6

Rev. Durie understood from his long experience with Muslim com-
munities, which was summarized in his Te Tird Choice ,
7
that the visit
of the Sheikh was meant to not only justify and promote the Muslim
206
hatred toward the Jews but also mainly spread that bigoted message
and encourage international violence against them, the way the Nazis
had acted when they decried before the entire world the imminent
danger they posed to humanity and civilization in order to facilitate
the acceptance of the nal solution. In view of the now known col-
laboration of the Muslim Brothers, including the Mufti of Jerusalem,
with the Nazis in this endeavor, there is little doubt about the nature
and goals of the renewed Muslim onslaught on the Jews. For example,
when a Turkish legal delegation tied to the Turkish Muslim Brothers
headed for Gaza in January 2013, after the brief exchange of re between
the Hamas there and Israel, it arrived with the purpose of collecting
evidence on Israeli crimes, neglecting to even mention the shower of
missiles that fell on Israeli towns and caused death, destruction, and
terror to the entire Israeli south. For the delegation, its mind was made
up beforehand, and only the measured and surgical retaliation mounted
by Israel to put an end to the bombardment of its southern towns and
villages mattered and were taken as aggression. Tat was the exact
replica of Recep Tayyip Erdoans shameful attack against Shimon
Peres in Davos, and of his outrageous reaction to the Israeli boarding
of the Turkish otilla, which came to break the blockade against Gaza.
8

For every act of violence perpetrated against Israel or the Jews, justi-
cations and rationalizations are manufactured. On the eve of Passover
of 2002, almost ten years into the Oslo Accords between Israel and the
Palestinians, the latter had undertaken to put an end to terrorist at-
tacks against their peace partner, and their leader was rewarded for his
change of mind and heart by a Nobel Prize. But to cleanse themselves
of any such accusations, and instead of attending to the education for
Islamikaze of their children, they project out of a sense of guilt their
embarrassment on Israel. For example,
Demonization of Israel and the Jews can be done not only by heaping
devilish evil on them and derogating their faith, but also by attributing
the worse anti-human deeds to them. So, while Muslim clerics and
scientists have specialized in libeling the Jewish religion of which they
know not a trie, their defense experts take the liberty to comment
on Israels military prowess that is geared, by denition, to undermine
humanity. Most stunning is the fact that September 11, which is second
to none in terms of media coverage and about which there is no ques-
tion left in doubts as to perpetrators, victims, political, and military
signicance, and the worldwide repercussions thereof, was precisely
the event chosen by Muslims around the world to divert the attention
207
to Israel and to shake o the ngers pointed to them. Again, a childish,
nave, and silly ploy that any rational person or culture would nd hard
to accept, but here, we are confronted with a former Lebanese minister
of defense, Abdul Rahim Mourad, who says the following live on TV:
Te so-called 9/11 incidents are a big lie, which was used by the
Americans as a pretext to stage a global oensive, beginning in
Afghanistan, continuing in Iraq, and Allah knows where it will go from
there. Te US used Al-Qaida as a pretext. In the rst moments after
the explosion that targeted the Twin Towers, they found a caror
rather, they planted a carand when they searched it, they found
a copy of the Quran. Tus, they concluded that Islam, or rather,
Al-Qaeda, was responsible. No investigation was conducted. It was
obvious that it was premeditated, in order to place the blame on an
Islamic group. So they selected Al-Qaeda to justify their onslaught
on Islam and the Muslims ...
It is well known that 5,000 Jews did not go to their o ces in the
Twin Towers that day. In addition, it is clear that the lming was not
done by amateurs. Te lming was planned to incite the world. Tey
claimed that they had not planned the lming in advance, but they
imposed a media blackout and refrained from investigating, yet they
continue to talk about free media and democracy. At that time, anyone
who tried to say a word was arrested. Te Arabs were not allowed to
even walk down the street. Four planes hijacked at the same time from
Boston Airportthats impossible. We know what security measures
they have in US airports. It is all one big American lie. I am convinced
that the Israeli Mossad, along with the US intelligence, carried out
the entire thing. I believe this is what President Ahmadinejad means,
but he does not want to put the cart before the horse.
If the world is courageous enough to hold a real investigation,
it will nd that this is the outcome: US intelligence and the Israeli
Mossad . If they get to the bottom of it, international tribunals must be
formed in order to place on trial the American bully, who fabricated
that great lie, using some young men from Al-Qaeda. Tese young
men may not even have been on board the planes. Tey might have
been murdered on the ground. Tey killed them on the ground to be
able to say that they participated in the hijacking.
9

With this kind of mind, one wonders how could this be a Minister,
or in any position of responsibility, if reality and fantasy are blurred,
wishful thinking takes the place of facts and conspiracy theories the
place of unfolding events, though one has to admit that for the sake of
blaming others and demonize enemies, those qualications have no
equal. But then, when one learns that Mr. Mourad was simply parroting
his master in Tehran, one wonders even more how such a mind can
208
lead a country of 80 million, manage such a huge wealth of petrodollars
and dangerously concentrate in his hands the fate of the Middle East.
Let us go to the horses mouth:
Today, the world is on the brink of a great change, which has begun
in our region. As you know, the bullies [the West], relying on material
strength, hypocrisy, and weapons, and striving for decades and cen-
turies to expand their inuence and supremacy, consider our region
to be the key to gain worldwide rule. Tey will not be satised until
they gain full domination over the region and the entire world. Tey
show no respect for the lives, property, lands, dignity, and culture
of [other] nations, and especially of our nation. In a premeditated
manner, exploiting the neglect of the people of the region, and us-
ing the pretext of reparations for the damage caused by the world
war, they occupied Palestine, using violence, massacring thousands,
and displacing millions, and they established a foreign, illegitimate
regime there, creating a perpetual threat against all the states and
peoples worldwide. Wherever the [West] wanted to use violence,
they displayed the unrestrained and unreasonable strength of the
[Israeli] regime, letting it perpetrate any crime it wanted anywhere in
the world. In Lebanon, they cowardly assassinated a patriotic friend
[Raq Al-Hariri]. Trough the fabrication of facts and exploitation
of the legal systems of the hegemonic regimes, and through the prov-
ocation of conicts and instigation of civil strife, they are accusing
other friends. Under the pretext of the painful events of 9/11 in New
York, they attacked Afghanistan, and later, under a dierent pretext,
they attacked Iraq ...
From the scope of the measures taken by the occupiers in Afghan-
istan, in Iraq, and most recently, in Pakistan, it is becoming very clear
that their goal was not to identify and punish the alleged perpetrators
of 9/11. Tis event was merely a pretext to justify [their] presence in
the region, and to pursue their colonialist goals. Revealing the truth
behind 9/11 and reexamining the black box of these events will re-
solve most of the problems. I declare: Establishing an independent
and impartial committee of investigation, which would determine
the roots and causes of the regrettable event of 9/11, is the demand
of all the peoples of the region and the world. Any opposition to
this legal and human demand means that 9/11 was premeditated in
order to achieve the goals of occupation and of confrontation with
the nations. My advice to the occupiers of Afghanistan and Iraq is to
leave the region, to apologize to the people, and to pay compensation
for the damages.
If they ignore this kind advice, the powerful hand of the peoples of
the regionwhich are the manifestation of the power of Godwill
drive them out of the region in shame, and will hand the criminals
over to the court of justice. Te uncouth Zionists, who see that they
209
have reached a dead end, are liable to carry out further wicked acts in
order to save their own skin. I declare that any new act of wickedness
will only shorten even further the shameful life of this fake regime.
Te only way to resolve the Palestinian issue and to establish a stable
peace in the region is to recognize the Palestinian peoples right to
sovereignty, as well as their right to return to their lands, and for the
occupiers to return to their own homes. It would be better for the
Zionist leaders to return to their homes, and to restore Palestine to
its original owners. Otherwise, they will be overthrown by the storm
of wrath of the Palestinian people and free nations. I declare, loud
and clear, that the regime with the mission to conquer the lands
from the Nile to the Euphrates for the sake of the capitalist regime
is imprisoned within the walls it built itself. Te resistance front of
the peoples in Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Turkey, Iraq, and Iran was
established throughout the region.
10

Tis means that the eagerness to demonize Jews (and the West for
that matter) is not the domain of a few sick-minded individuals or
extremist religious radicals but, as we have seen, it cuts across large
sections of Arabs and Muslim societies, including intellectuals, the
educated, professionals, and young people. Israel, as a symbol of the
democratic West in their midst, is easy prey for their displaced ag-
gression toward the United States and the West on which they depend
and which they cannot attack directly. Te concept of Islamikaze
11
was
deemed by Israels Muslim enemies the ultimate weapon to tear it apart,
and they use it wholeheartedly not only through lack of choice due to
their military inferiority, but also as a strategic choice, as a mobilizing
force, as an ideal that youth are called upon to emulate, and as a fo-
cus where they can channel all their hatred and lies: the more Jews
are depicted in derogatory terms and demonized as subhumans, the
more their murder becomes easier for them and for others to accept.
When the leader of the Palestinians, Yasser Arafat, made the vow to
see one million martyrs march on Jerusalem, he not only evinced a
callous disregard for the lives of his people, not to speak of his enemies,
but he elevated martyrdom to the level of a legitimate political tool
to achieve his goal. Worse, when his Chief Mufti and other clerics
brandish martyrdom as a desirable goal, because of the Muslims love
of death, unlike the westerners love of life, and thereby justify the
indiscriminate annihilation of innocent civilians, then they take one
more step toward their own exclusion from the human kind.
12

When the peace process began between Israel and several Arab
entities, rst with Egypt (1977) then with the Palestinians (1993)
210
and nally (for now) with the Jordanians (1994), the Arab parties
undertook, as part of the negotiated agreements, to tone down their
anti-Semitic rhetoric, which had amounted to incitement against the
Jews and Israelis who were now the candidates for peace partners. As
part of the Oslo Agreements, for example, the Palestinians and Israel
undertook to eradicate the statements of hatred and incitement from
Palestinian textbooks, and to foster mutual understanding and toler-
ance and shall accordingly abstain from incitement, including hostile
propaganda against each other ..., shall take necessary measures to
prevent such incitement by any organizations, groups or individuals
within their jurisdiction . . .
13
However, no sooner had the Accords
been signed, than the Arab signatories either reverted to their previ-
ous level of incitement and expression of hatred, or even surpassed it,
arguing either that their democracy did not allow any restriction on
free speech and free expression, which was obviously disingenuous
when criticism of the rulers in place was banned, or that they could
not restrain popular sentiment. However, even in schools, where the
curricula were under the entire supervision of the authorities, not
much has been done to correct the prevailing mood of distortion,
derogation, and history rewriting that were dictated by the authori-
ties, nor to alter the contents of the state media, which continued to
blame the Jews for nearly every ill, citing holy Islamic sources that
cannot be altered, or reecting popular sentiment that was the fruit of
decades of negative indoctrination by the state systems, which could
not be reversed even when the authorities wished to do so. In most
cases, however, the authorities followed the easy course of going along
with the current propaganda that they had manufactured. In a way,
they became the victims of their own decade-long indoctrination.
In this fashion, education in Arab schools continued to contradict
their authorities obligations under the peace accords with Israel, for
example:
1. Under the wording: Palestine, a map that includes all of Israel con-
tinues to be presented in the Arab media and schools as the state of
Palestine, even though, strictly speaking, such a state does not exist,
while Israel, with which they have supposedly signed peace, disap-
pears from sight.
2. Often, the map of Israel is presented as the Arab lands conquered
before 1967, while the West Bank and Gaza are presented as the
lands occupied in 1967.
211
3. Often, not only the entire map of Israel is shown as part of Palestine,
but also numerous Israeli cities, some of which dating from biblical
times, such as Safed, Tiberias, Acre, Nazareth, Jaa, Jerusalem, and
Beersheba, are mentioned as Palestinian cities.
4. In a geography book, there are nineteen references to Israel as
Palestine, while Israel is not mentioned even once.
5. In classes on religion, Islam is mentioned as the wave of the future,
while Christianity is doomed to decline and Judaism to total
disappearance.
6. A new history and an articial tradition are manufactured, which
relate between Arabs, Islam, and the land of Palestine, while Jewish
heritage, which has been rooted in the land for more than three
millennia, is denied, refuted, and totally rejected.
7. In terms of demography, the Arabs/Muslims claim that the ancient
inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, were Arabs, some even
advance the claim that they were Muslim, since Abraham the Patri-
arch was himself the rst Muslim. Never mind that all that history
had unfolded some two millennia before Muhammad the Prophet
launched Islam in Arabia in the seventh century AD.
8. All those trends in learning, which betray Arab determination not to
concede oneinch, have been unwittingly hardening the positions of
the next generations, which are supposed to live in peace and good
neighborliness with the Jewish state with which their authorities
have negotiated and made peace. For example, the Muslim parties
that have taken over many countries following the Islamic Spring
(20112013) have been demanding the revision of those peace
accords, which they nd contradictory to the mood of their crowds,
who had been educated to denigrate the peace and their peace
partner.
9. Infamous murderers among the Palestinians, who have mass-
murdered entire Israeli families in buses, restaurants, market places,
and city streets, are being lauded by the Palestinian leadership, as
national heroes, deserving of emulation and iconization. Some
Arab authorities award pensions to the families of the murder-
ers, who either died or are serving jail terms for their crimes, and
incessantly press for their release from prison, regardless of the
crimes that they perpetrated against innocent victims. Public
squares, streets, sports installations, and events are often named
after those heroes, whom young Palestinians are called upon to
emulate. Among those are included the murderers of Israeli athletes
during the 1972 Munich Olympics, and young women and children,
who were lured to commit Islamikaze acts where they killed Jewish
passers-by together with blowing up their young selves.
212
One sample of a textbook for Middle school Palestinian children
places Israel as their immediate and most implacable enemy, the source
of Arab misery and of universal evil. Tey accuse the Jews of corruption
by nature, which cannot improve, since Zionist ideology that nurtures
the state is the paradigm of racism and doomed to failure. It reads:
One must beware of the Jews, for they are treacherous and disloyal
14

Racism: mankind has suered from this evil both in ancient as
well as in modern times. For indeed, Satan has, in the eyes of many
people, made their evil actions appear beautiful ... Such people are
the Jews ...
15

Te clearest examples of racist belief and racial discrimination in
the world are Nazism and Zionism.
16

Israels mean, brutal, inhuman, fascist, racist, genocidal, [ethnic]
cleansing wars ... Te Jewish gangs waged racial cleansing against
innocent Palestinians ... large scale and appalling massacres, saving
no women and children ...
17

It is mentioned in the Talmud: We [the Jews] are Gods people on
earth ... He forced upon the human animal and upon all the nations
and races of the world that they serve us, and He spread us through
the world to ride upon them and to hold their reins. We must marry
our beautiful daughters with kings, ministers, and lords and enter our
sons into the various religions, thus we shall have the nal word in
managing those countries. We should cheat them and arouse quarrels
among them, then they will ght each other ... Non-Jews are pigs
that God created in the shape of men in order to t them into serving
the Jews, for whom God has created the world.
18

Te above passages are cited from either ancient Islamic sources,
considered irrefutable, or from speculation mixing wishful thinking
with emotional distress in the face of formidable and successful rivals
who refuse to disappear from sight, in spite of the unrelenting dero-
gation meted out to them by Arab and Muslim minds. However, while
Palestinian defamation of Jews and Zionists can be understood in terms
of the subjective sense of humiliation caused by a century of conict
and loss, it is much harder to comprehend fabrication of evidence
from the Talmud, of which they are ignorant. Unless the writers of these
texts have themselves fallen into the trap of their own propaganda, it
remains incomprehensible how educated people of obvious scholarly
merit could posit a fake text when the authentic textual source exists and
could be easily referred to if the cited passage were genuine. Worse, how
could they hope to train a new generation of scholars on imagined and
invented texts? Understandably, the writers of the text refrained from
213
citing a precise reference beyond a vague attribution to the Talmud.
Tus, instead of erecting a logical case based on evidence, the authors
seem to be content with mud-slinging, vilication, and deprecation,
assuming that by force of repetition, some of the mud will stick and
serve the purpose of political indoctrination of their kin and demon-
ization of their rivals that they do not dare to face in an open debate.
One way of educating their youth for hatred of the Jews/Israelis is
by polluting the spiritual and intellectual environment that they share
with Israel. For example, the moment the Palestinian Authority (PA)
undertook the job of shaping a new curriculum that embodies the
ideals of Palestinian nationalism, it has also undertaken, with Arab and
Islamic endorsement, to incite its youth into hatred, demonization,
and violence against the Jews by portraying them as the aggressors
who undermined Arab and Islamic freedoms and by iconizing its he-
roes who indiscriminately murdered innocent Israeli civilians. Tus,
instead of directly calling for violence and exposing itself to criticism
by its Western donors, the PA has been glorifying those terrorists who
it considers as martyrs and calling upon young people to follow their
example. For example, Dalal Mughrabi, who blew up an American
photographer and thirty-six Israeli civilians in the 1978 Coastal Road
massacre and had left Israel horried, has been now revived as part of
the peace process so as to impress upon the Israelis that given those
values of intentional and sponsored murder of innocent Jews, it is
doubtful that one can make concessions to them for the sake of peace.
Additionally, the Palestinian government has taken to rewarding the
families of those declared heroes, has called public places and events
in their names, and has urged others to follow in their footsteps.
Te rationale for rewarding those martyrs, which had been also
embraced by the renowned philanthropist Saddam Hussein during his
reign, was that they had martyred themselves in the path of Allah, thus
merging Arab and Islamic motivations in one. On another celebrated
case, the female Palestinian Islamikaze, Hanadi Jaradat, who killed an-
other twenty-one Israelis and injured more than fty, has been chosen
worthy of the highest honor by the Palestinian Committee of the Arab
Lawyers Union, who should know better about the punishment due to
terrorists of this sort. Te Palestinian daily Al-Ayyam , reported that the
Arab Lawyers Union had created the Martyr Hanadi Jaradat Plaque
of Honor, which a delegation presented to the Jaradat family. Jaradat
was working as a lawyer when she carried out the Islamikaze attack in
a restaurant in Haifa in 2003, cold-bloodedly wiping out in the process
214
several entire families who had the misfortune to be there for a family
outing. Te Plaque referred to the day of her suicide as the sweet
anniversary of her martyrdom.
19
Only an organization made of deeply
disturbed minds could invent such laudatory words of dedication to
one of their kin who displayed such an atrocious disdain for human life.
More harrowing details were given in that report, which indicate that
the mental malaise that permits such expression of blind hatred and
fanatic sense of vengeance, is much more widespread than one would
think. For the Union of Arab Lawyers emphasized its pride for what
their daughter had done in defense of Palestine and the Nation. How
that act of massacre of innocent people helped the cause of the Arabs,
those respectable lawyers did not explain. So, the pure motive of hatred,
vengeance, and blind rage remains the preponderant sentiment that
united the members of this Union (ALU), praised itself in its statement
for its humanistic mission:
a. To promote and protect human rights, basic freedoms, and the
primacy of law;
b. To struggle with the Arab Palestinian people to liberate Palestine
from Zionist settlers colonialism;
c. To struggle against Zionism and its greed, which amounts to a form
of racism;
d. To resist all forms of normalization with the Zionist enemy and all
projects which aim at dominating the Arab region and eradicating
its identity.
20

Jaradats praise did not end there. Te PA Ministry of Culture
published a poetry anthology entitled What Did Hanadi Say , which
was distributed to the public with the Al-Ayyam daily. Te book was
dedicated to the Rose of Palestine, the Iris of the Carmel, the Martyr
Hanadi Jaradat, and the poem in her honor reads:
Oh, Hanadi! Shake the earth under the feet of the enemies!
Blow them up!
Hanadi said: Tis is my wedding!
Its Hanadis wedding, the day when death as a martyr for Allah
becomes the most sublime goal, that redeems my land.
21

Other Arabs and Muslims, like Egyptian popular singer, Amr
al-Masri, also expressed their vehement hatred of the Jews and Israel,
thirty years after his nation signed peace with them, even as he dwelt
215
in the safety of his home in Cairo and his voice and hateful messages
were recorded for distribution all over the Arab world. One of his most
widely circulated songs spoke in sarcastic terms:
My name is al-Masry
I love Israel
May it be destroyed
May it be colonized
May it be wiped o the map. May a wall fall on it.
I love Israel
May it disappear from the universe. Allah, please have it banished.
I love Israel
May it dangle from the noose
May I get to see it burning, Amen. I shall pour petrol on it ...
I love Israel.
I am an Egyptian man. I am not a coward.
Everywhere I go, my name is Amr al-Masry.
I love Israel, May it be targeted.
May it go up in ames that will never subside.
From the bottom of my heartmay a wall fall on it
I love Israel.
May it destroy itself. May we never hear of it again.
I love Israel.
May it cease to exist, not even on the border.
May they say on the news that there is no more destruction
I love Israel.
My heart is broken under my smoking jacket
I see that you are occupied, so I am o. Goodbye
I love Israel.
22

Te projection on Israel and the Jews of their own wishes and de-
ciencies, in their belief that words can substitute for deeds, so as to
exonerate themselves from the need to act and thus justify their inac-
tion, has reached pathological dimensions even in the mainstream of
Arab thinking. In the process, ignorance and the manufacturing of lies
have attained diabolical proportions. A Jordanian columnist, himself
of Palestinian origin, an inveterate anti-Semite, found an appropriate
occasion to calumniate Israel and the Jews in the Boston Marathon
context of the Muslim act of terror there. Te author, Asad al-Azuni,
claimed in his article that:
It is well known that the US has been for a long time in the sight of
the Jewish conspiracy to dismiss it from its preponderant role in the
world ... So, ultimately, its fate will not be any better than that of
216
Great Britain, the womb that gave birth to Israel ... Tis will also be
the fate of the Arab countries which have helped the establishment
of Israel, they will not escape the Jewish plan to eliminate them ...
It was Britain who had violated all natural and human laws when
establishing Israel so as to rid itself from its own Jews and remain a
purely Christian country ... However, after the Jews strengthened
themselves in Palestine, they expelled England from it, since they
had come to consider it as a conquering power. Today, the Jews are
destroying the Arab regimes which had supported them ... Tey had
concluded a pact with Nazi Hitler, who was the rst western leader
to promise them Palestine. Tey agreed to hand over to them the
old and sick Jews, of whom he could dispose as he please, in return
for his allowing the immigration of young Jews to Palestine. I do not
know whether he did that willingly or was cheated by the Jews, for
they ultimately plundered Germany under the pretext that Hitler had
burned them ... At rst, they claimed that Hitler exterminated 40
million Jews, but since the international community was outraged
from the scope of this lie, they corrected the gure to 24 million, and
then to 6 million ...
We cannot forget the September 11 acts of terror which have shaken
America. It turns out that it was Jews and their allies from the Amer-
ican Right who perpetrated this shameful crime, in order to get the
US involved in wars of attrition in Iraq and Afghanistan, so as to
weaken it and force it to desist from its pressures on Israel to establish
a Palestinian state ... Tey have also tried to press President Obama
to let them attack Iran, but he refused ... It seems then that the Twin
Towers bombing was calculated to complicate Americas position in
the Middle East, exactly as the Boston operation was geared to avoid
American pressure to embrace the peace process ...
President Bush had announced that 11 September was perpetrated
by al-Qaida members, whose passports he held in his hands ... But
his successor was smarter than him, he did not announce any culprits,
leaving room for rumors that they may have been homegrown ...
In the Boston Marathon horror, clear Jewish ngerprints were left,
signaling to Obama to desist from his contempt towards Israel.
One may assume that this will not be the last warning to Obama,
and that he will have a hard time enjoying his second term ... Jews
and the allies from the Right, who hate intensely all non-whites,
and cannot accept a black president in the White House, will make
his second term in o ce unbearable. Jews are not reliable allies, for
they feel no fealty to those who serve them, and treason is innate in
them ...
23

Tese good reasons for hating the Jews are then indoctrinated
into children throughout the Muslim world and consumed with and
in their mothers milk, so as to internalize them so deeply, as in Aayan
Hirsis case above, that not only is hatred towards the Jews and Israeli
continued in the present but also perpetuated in the generations to
217
come. How else can one interpret the appeal of an Egyptian infant on
Television,: Oh Allah, destroy Israel! Amen, expressing the despair
from the inability of his nation to achieve that goal and appealing
to the All Mighty to do it for them. Te child preacher, identied as
Ibrahim Adham, who certainly did not understand the signicance
of his appeal, but assuredly lent credibility to it and caused sympathy
and identication with it due to the purity of its innocence originating
from a young boy, said that martyrdom is a religious duty for Muslim
believers and refers to the accursed [PM of Israel, Ariel] Sharon, and
to [Presidents] Bush and Obama. A robed man was also seen in the
clip, telling the boy: You are such a beautiful boy, by Allah !. Tis eerie
scene was recorded briey after President Mursi of Egypt attended a
prayer in a mosque in Marsa Matruh on the Mediterannean, where
the preacher called in the Ahmadinejad style for the destruction
and dispersal of the Jews, and the congregation, including Mursi,
answered: Amen. Te prayer was aired on state TV and recorded on
video by MEMRI
24
. Why would that innocent child behave any more
leniently towards Jews than his Resident, in view of the picture that
is presented of them as an imminent danger to all Muslims?
In the context of the invitation of eminent Saudi Sheikh al-Sudais to
Melbourne, Australia in March 2013 to attend the oddly named Austra-
lian Islamic Peace Conference, those who opposed that invitation, like
Rev. Mark Durie, a noted scholar in Arab and Islamic studies, argued:
Te Sheikh had referred to Jews as the scum of the human race, rats
of the world, violators of pacts and agreements, murderers of the
prophets and grandsons of apes and pigs . . . When this eminent
personage comes to Melbourne to be part of the best ever Islamic
event held in Australia, will only be speaking in Arabic and reading
the Quran, possibly the chapters referring to Jews as pact breakers
(sura 5:13 and 2:27); to Allah who has turned some of them to apes
and pigs (sura 2:65, 5:60 and 7:166); or Jews as murderers of the
prophets (sura 3:181 and 2: 65). What sense are the people of Mel-
bourne meant to make of the proposition that they need not worry
that the preacher has called for the annihilation of Jews, because he
will only be speaking in Arabic?
25

Rev. Durie understood from his long experience with Muslim
communities, which was summarized in his Te Tird Choice
26
,
that the visit of the Sheikh was meant to justify and promote not only
the Muslim hatred toward the Jews but mainly to spread that bigoted
message and encourage international violence against them, the way
the Nazis had acted when they decried before the entire world the
imminent danger they posed to humanity and civilization in order
218
to facilitate the acceptance of the nal solution. In view of the now
known collaboration of the Muslim Brothers, including the Mufti of
Jerusalem, with the Nazis in this endeavor, there is little doubt about
the nature and goals of the renewed Muslim onslaught on the Jews. For
example, when a Turkish legal delegation tied to the Turkish Muslim
Brothers headed for Gaza in January 2013, after the brief exchange of
re between the Hamas there and Israel, it arrived with the purpose
of collecting evidence on Israeli crimes, neglecting to even mention
the shower of missiles which fell on Israeli towns and caused death,
destruction and terror to the entire Israeli south. For the delegation,
its mind was made up beforehand, and only the measured and surgical
retaliation mounted by Israel to put an end to the bombardment of its
southern towns and villages, mattered. Tat was the exact replica of
PM Erdogans shameful attack against President Peres in Davos, and
of his outrageous reaction to the Israeli boarding of the Turkish otilla
which came to break the blockade against Gaza.
27
What happened in
all those cases was not that Israels conduct, the friend and ally of yes-
teryear, had changed. It was the Turkish government of Erdoan, now
dominated by the Islamic Party, which took control of the countrys
policies and decided to embrace the open hatred of the Arabs and
Muslims toward Israel.
To universalize demonization of Jews and avoid projecting it as the
exclusive bigotry of Muslims, the latter have harnessed to their propa-
ganda goals the Christian minorities under Islam, trying to make them
their allies in their common struggle against Zionists. While the plight
of Christians (and Jews) under Islam has been widely documented,
28

and nowadays, the programs against Christians in Iraq, Egypt, Nigeria,
and elsewhere have become a daily matter, the Muslim world has scaled
up its demonization of Israel and the Jews, seeking to put the burden of
Christian persecution on the Jews, in an ironic reversal of history, and
exonerate themselves from the same. Te cynicism, with which Muslim
societies undertake their campaign of lies while knowing that never
before in history have Christian minorities been so free as under Israel,
and at the same time continue to ee their lands that are now occupied
by Muslims due to their oppression, cannot sustain what obviously
jumps to the eye as a wanton demonization of Jews and Israel. Evident-
ly, some Christian minorities in the Middle East, especially in mixed
Arab villages, continue to sing out loud the praise of the harmony
they enjoy under Islam, while in secret, they prepare their emigration
to Christian lands. Tus, when Bethlehem and Nazareth turned from
219
Christian to Muslim cities in the last half century, that was primarily
due to the Christian persecution by the Muslim majority. Muslims,
including some fanatics moved in and intimidated the Christians who
gradually shrunk and lost their majority, until they were forced to move
elsewhere in Israel or emigrated altogether.
But that image has been reversed at the hands of Arabs and Mus-
lims, claiming that Christians represent an obstacle to Zionists plan
to create a Jewish state in Palestine. Never mind that the numbers of
Christians in Israel keep growing, and the gures of Muslims even more
so (from 150,000 on the birth of the state in 19482012 when they con-
stitute the ten-fold gure of one million and a half ). Israel must then
be totally inadequate at the task of accomplishing an ethno-religious
cleansing, if, after sixty-ve years, these are the results. Conversely,
they have succeeded during that period to expel from their boundaries
about one million Jews, most of whom have found refuge in Israel. To
cover up for their destruction of Jewish sites in the Muslims world,
most recently during the Intifada of 2000, when they burned the Joseph
Tomb in Nablus and the Jewish Synagogue in Jericho, which they had
committed to guard before they were handed to them under the Oslo
Accords, and for the hundreds of churches burned daily throughout
the Islamic world, they manufacture lies against Israel, Zionism, or the
Jews. Instead of acknowledging the brewing hatred they entertained
toward Judaism and Christianity, which found its expression in history
by converting churches and synagogues to mosques, the most famous
example of which was the largest cathedral in Constantinople (the Hagia
Sophia) when they occupied it and renamed it Istanbul as if had been
their patrimony from time immemorial, before they began sermonizing
others about occupying territories and destroying existing cultures.
29

Te Palestinian Maan News Agency is one of the foremost cham-
pions of spreading hatred against Jews, Zionists, and Israelis, wrapped
in fantastic lies that seek to justify it but end up perpetuating it and
being caught themselves in pushing their imagination to the farthest
limits of self-delusion. As against Israels world reputation as a Start-up
Nation, a trove of innovation and of invention, they manufacture in
their minds, to suit their wishful thinking, a miserable and backward
country, full of evil and overowing with hatred and hostility itself.
Tey avoid accounting to themselves for the hundreds of thousands of
Palestinians who ock to Israel daily to seek work, medical assistance,
technological guidance and shopping, and entertainment. Why would
they wish to join such an evil entity, and even more so to demand the
220
right of return permanently to it, one wonders, unless we have here
a clear case of cognitive dissonance? A few citations from a recent
venomous report of this agency, which is aided, incidentally, by Eu-
ropean governments such as Britain, the Netherlands, and Denmark,
would su ce to make the point. Once again, noticeable is the eort
to universalize their hatred and to claim that it has been part of the
lot of many other nations too, so as to explain and to rationalize their
own unbridled anti-Semitism, and to warn the world that the Jewish
threat is global:
Te Jews feel inferior to the nations and societies in which they live,
because of the hostility and evil rising in their hearts towards oth-
ers, and for their plots and schemes against the nations, who know
with certainty that the Jews are the root of the conict in the world,
wherever they reside . . . Tey are outcasts in every corner of the
earth, and not one nation in the world respects them.... but Allahs
curse against them and his fury at them cause them to continue with
their transgression . . . Allah has stricken fear in their hearts and
decreed humiliation and degradation against them until the Day of
Judgment ...
Jews are sons of death, too cowardly to confront an enemy face to
face, and seized by fear and trembling if their fortresses are breached,
their hearts lling with horror if a missile falls [upon them], or a
bullet passes over them ... Terefore the only way we can deal with
them ... is to stick to the threat to annihilate Israel, not to submit to
its desire for a cease-re, and keep the ame of resistance burning.
30

Te mounting mood of Islam in the Middle East has tinged the
hatred toward Jews and Israel in strongly green Islamic colors. For
example, anti-Semitism has been rife in Egypt throughout the years
of Mubarak, and he tolerated it, under the pretext of freedom of the
press, knowing that he had to permit that sort of safety valve for the
violent anti-Semitic sentiments of the Egyptians, as a way of deecting
the public wrath from him. Te change of guard in Egypt, and else-
where in the Arab world, after the outburst of the Spring since 2011
where Muslim movements have emerged at the helm, has also oc-
casioned the outburst of the sort of anti-Jewish vitriol that had been
taught by Sayyid Qutb two generations earlier in the 1950s, rational-
ized, defended, and justied in Islamic terms. At the end of November
2011, on the anniversary of the United Nations (UN) Partition Plan of
November 1947, an anti-Israeli rally at Tahrir Square gathered 5,000
protesters who demonstrated against the Judaization of Jerusalem.
221
Speakers at the event delivered impassioned and hateful speeches
against Israel, slamming the Zionist occupiers and the treacherous
Jews. Ahmed al-Tayyib, a spiritual leader of the Brothers, proclaimed
that in order to build Egypt, politics is insu cient and faith in Allah
is everything ... Al-Aqsa Mosque is under an oensive by the Jews ...
We shall not allow the Zionists to Judaize al-Quds ... We are telling
Israel and Europe that we shall not allow even one stone to be moved
there.
31
Had he bothered to ask the Egyptian Ambassador in Tel Aviv
to render a visit to the mosque in person, he would have reported back
that no one was attacking it or undermining it, but then that lie would
have had to be denied and refuted, which is unacceptable.
Anti-Semitic incitement against Jews and Israel, emanating from
intense anti-Jewish hatred finds its rationale in the deep-seated
stereotypes borrowed from classical European anti-Semitism, and
so thoroughly integrated into the Islamic world that they became
undistinguishable from the Islamic-grown ones. For example, while
the hoax of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion has lost its credibility
and impact in the Western world, it has been alive and kicking in the
Islamic world, which has lent to it a new impetus. In none other than
pro-western and moderate Saudi Arabia, columnist Anisa al-Sharif
Makki only recently poured her lava of nonsense, hatred, and lies on
Jews concurrently with the inter-Arab coordinated eort to push the
Saudi peace plan through, arguing that Israel and the West cannot
miss this window of opportunity to make peace with the Arab world.
One can at least understand the skeptics among Jews and Israelis, who
simultaneously read and hear the vitriol of this mentally deranged wom-
an who represents the mainstream of Saudi politics and has never been
contradicted or rejected by anyone in the moderate Saudi hierarchy,
which is busy with its own corruption in its palaces and could care less
about libeling a country with which they propose to make peace. Some
excerpts of her article will make the point:
Since 1897 they [the Jews] plan to establish their world kingdom
Zion. Te Protocols are a bad conspiracy mounted by the Jews in
response to the persecution they suered in 19th Century Europe ...
In Protocol No 24, they declare their decision not only to conquer
the land of Palestine via dark avenues and dirty tricks, but the entire
world ... Te Protocols are the source for modern Zionist ideology
and for the satanic plans deriving from it ... Individuals and groups
among them have met and devised the most criminal ways to destroy
the world and drawing benets from it. Tey boast in this Protocol
222
that they can achieve the best results of ruling the world when taking
over by violence and terror, not through academic discussions; and
that political freedom does not exist except as a means to lure the
populace ... Tis criminal plan threatens to reverse the world order
by spreading anarchy and conicts and undermining all religions and
the very fundaments of Creation, in addition to creating economic
crises and world wars ... After they have assured for themselves full
control on the ground, the sons of Zion will take over the reins of
nances, banking and communications, and will proclaim: We the
Jews are the rulers of the world, its corrupters, who trigger its conicts
and end up as its executioners ...
Tey believe in their status as the elected people by God, while
all others are just objects they can use and dispose of as they please.
Tey believe that when they win battles, they must annihilate their
enemies to the last, something that we have been witnessing lately in
the Gaza war ... In their eyes anything good done by Jews to others
is a mistake, and everything bad done to non-Jews is considered a
sacrice to God ... When Jews meet, they seem united, but in fact
deep controversies divide them, for their hearts are divided as Allah
says of them in the Quran ... Tey are enemies to each other, but
united against others ... Tey are cowards, scared of a stone in the
hand of a child, even though they wield lethal weapons ... Tey ght
defenseless citizens and tremble of fear from the primitive missiles of
the Hamas ... Even the alarms in Tel-Aviv are panicky ... What would
have happened if the Hamas had only one tenth of their weaponry?
Jihad in Palestine will continue, and resistance in Palestine will
persist until Palestine is liberated ... Whatever happens, victory is
close at hand ...
32

Another moderate Islamic country, which has made peace with
Israel and is considered part of the American sphere of inuence in
the Middle East, has also joined the cacophony of anti-Semitic hatred,
based on the same lie of the Protocols. A Jordanian columnist, Rashid
Hasan, claimed shamelessly in the mainstream press that the Protocols
were still the base for Jewish activities against the Palestinians and
for their takeover of the centers of decisions in the world. For him,
Jews stand behind Islamophobia and the campaigns of libel against
the Prophet, conspiracies that cannot be comprehended unless one
reads the Protocols. He himself has discovered while rereading those
documents the evil of the Zionists, who take control of the nancial
and communications centers of the world, and seem also to have taken
control of many of the centers of decision in the US, Europe and other
places. In an exhibition of abysmal ignorance, he claimed that the
Zionist thinker Ahad Haam, who was the personication of pacism,
223
spirituality, and humanism, wrote those protocols to promote a spirit
of vengeance which means blood, sword, destruction, secret societies
etc ... He contrasted this view (without showing any contrast) with the
Strategy of Teodor Herzl, the founder of Zionism, who initiated the
idea of return to Palestine, and after the Jews would have assembled
there, to launch an invasion, accompanied by a war of annihilation and
massacres against the Palestinians for more than a century. He claimed
that the Zionist thinking is still dominated by this doctrine and nds its
expression in the policies of terror adopted by the Israeli leadership. He
nds that Jewish control of the world cannot be implemented unless
by sex, money, corruption of moral values, and distortion of the image
of Islam and Christianity. To stun the readers with his unfathomable
ignorance and bigotry, he assures us that the source of all this evil is the
Jewish Talmud, of which he has no clue, and seems to celebrate the fact
that it was the Russian secret police that broke into the rst Zionist
Congress session held in Basel, Switzerland in 1897 and boycotted all
these incriminating materials.
33
He never explained how the Czarist
police was given license to breakup a Zionist conspiracy.
Te Iranian Jew haters address themselves to dierent aspects of
the Protocols to cull from them other lies and libels to quench their
thirst for their own lies and hatred. For Vice President Riza Rahimi.
Te Talmud provides the guidelines for sucking human blood, while
his Spiritual Guide, Ali Khamenei professed that the western media
are clearly guided by the Protocols. President Ahmadinejad on his part
claimed that Jews are responsible for the two world wars, while the
daily Risala described those forged protocols as the most dangerous
corpus of rules and directives in history. Te website of the Tehran
regime routinely attributed the economic crisis in Europe to the con-
spiracy of the Jewish banking cartel.
34
Tis variety of utterances from
various parts of the hierarchy shows that contrary to their protestations,
Iranians, like other Muslims and Arabs, use Jews, Israelis, and Zion-
ists interchangeably. More specically, the Fars News Agency, which
is close to the Revolutionary Guards circles, published the following
revelations about Jewish criminality, which should delegitimize them
in the eyes of the world and turn them into an easy prey:
Te central ritual that the Jews perform during their pilgrimage is
the sacrice, as they are directed by their religion. Tere is a great
dierence between what the Jews do in practice and what they are
directed to do in their Tora . Te latter prescribes the sacrice of a cow,
224
but their religious precepts oblige them to perform human sacrice.
Tus, on Passover, they choose a child under 10 or thereabout, whose
blood they mix with doe ... Tey extract the blood in various ways,
at times they place the live victim in a barrel, whose circumference
is covered with needles which suck the blood until the victim dies in
torture and pain, causing his Jewish tormentors delirium in delight ...
At times they tear the arteries of the victim in several places, so as
to increase the ow of the blood, and at other times they murder the
child victim as if he were a sheep ... Tey collect the blood and hand
it to the Rabbi or the Cleric or the magician, to use for the baking
of mazza or for magic ... One must say, though, that at the present
time the Jews sacrice a sheep during their pilgrimage to Jerusalem,
and their murder of humans is done in a dierent fashion.
35

Of course, cannibals of this sort deserve only one treatment:
extermination in order to rid humanity for their punishment. Tis
harrowing description lacks originality because it was already widely
publicized in Saudi Arabia as a scholarly investigation anchored in
truth, in spite of the abysmal ignorance of its author, Dr. Umaima.
36

In fact, while this Iranian author stuck more closely to the European
sources, where the blood libel had originated, by attributing this eerie,
imaginary, and inhuman ritual to the eve of Passover, another Iranian
hatred-lled ignoramus, followed the Saudi original author, who had
located this whole chilling description in the festival of Purim one
month earlier, which is connected according to the biblical narrative
to the ancient kingdom of Persia, of which modern Iran considers itself
the heir. Little did all those amazingly obtuse authors know that one
of the most strictly observed prohibitions in Judaism is the eating of
blood, of animals, and more so of humans; therefore, to voice this sort
of libel, especially under the cloak of learned scholarship, only shows
why honest investigation and rational analysis have not become the
most salient traits of scientic research in the Islamic world. In the
Mashreq internet site that is close to the Revolutionary Guards, an
article was published under the title: A Jewish Festival to Celebrate
the Iranian Holocaust. It recounts, based on biblical narrative, that
in that event mentioned in the Book of Esther, 77,000 Iranians had
been massacred by Jews, though independent sources claim that the
number of victims amounted to half a million. Of course, the article
does not deal with the conspiracy that had been mounted against
the Jews by Haman and his followers, in reaction to which the Jews
had rebelled and then celebrated their salvation in the festival of
Purim.
37

225
Very skillfully, the authors of this libel manipulate the biblical story
to justify the current Iranian annihilationist designs against Israel,
by depicting Zionists, namely the Jews, as dirty plotters who seek to
dominate the world, and tie between the robbery and despoiling of
the Palestinians by the Zionists nowadays with the current threats
of Israel against Iran, all emanating from Esthers doctrine and are
reminiscent of Mordechais conspiracy and Esthers whisperings
in the ears of Assuerus, which resulted in the Iranian Holocaust
where tens of thousands perished. Te article was accompanied by
pictures from the Purim Carnival in Tel Aviv, where larger than life
e gies were shown in a procession, as proof of the Jewish custom
to wear masks as a religious ritual, and to drink human blood. In the
articles language:
Another Jewish ceremony takes place in Purim, in a procession of
large e gies, where the Zionists wear masks and disguise themselves
as cannibals. Tey put in their mouth human organs to symbolize
their murder of ancient Iranians and their blood thirst. In a separate
ceremony, they drink blood or a red uid, as a symbol of their avidity
for blood and their drive to spill Iranian blood.
38

Notes
1. Akhbar al-Yaum Kuwait, November 3, 2001.
2. Al-Risalah , Gaza, September 13, 2001, cited (in Hebrew) by MEMRI, Terror
in America , No 1.
3. Al-Gumhuriyya , Cairo, October 7, 2001. See MEMRI 289, October 19, 2001.
4. October , Cairo, June 17, 2001.
5. See http:// www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=6255
See also MEMRI special dispatch 5023 of October 23, 2012.
6. Mark Durie, Hatred Sounds Sweeter in Arabic? in Markdurie.com.blog,
December 15, 2012.
7. Mark Durie, Te Tird Choice , Melbourne, 2011.
8. http://globalmbreport.org/?p=7882, of January 16, 2013.
9. On October 15, 2010, Al-Alam TV aired an interview with former Lebanese
defense minister and former minister of education and higher studies Ab-
dul Rahim Mourad, who serves as chairman of the Lebanese Union Party.
October 15, 2010, Memri Clip No. 2645
10. Public address delivered by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
in Beirut, Lebanon, which aired on IRINN (the Iranian news channel) on
October 13, 2010: October 13, 2010, Memri Clip No. 2641.
11. Te term was coined by this author to describe what is usually termed Sui-
cide bombers. IT is the combination of Islam and Kamikaze, considered
by the author as more appropriate for this kind of mass murder than the
wording of suicide because the focus of the killers is their victims, not their
226
own selves. See R. Israeli, I slamikaze: Manifesttations of Islamic Martyrology
(London: Frank Cass, 2003).
12. See Aluma Solnick, Te Joy of the Mothers of the Palestinian martyrs,
MEMRI No 61, June 25, 2001; Michael Grove, Spare Us More Middle East
Peace Plans, Te Times (London) , April 2, 2002; and Tomas Friedman,
Suicidal Lies, New York Times , March 31, 2002.
13. See Oslo II (1995), Article XXII.
14. Islamic Education for 9th grade (Ramallah/Gaza, Palestinian Authority) ,
79.
15. Islamic Education for 8th Grade , 95.
16. Te New History of the Arabs and the World (the Palestinian Authority) , 123
17. PA Television, May 14, 1998.
18. Te New History of the Arabs and the World, (PA Ramallah and Gaza) , 120
19. Al-Ayyam , August 22, 2005.
20. Ibid.
21. Ibid.
22. http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/3451.htm.
23. www.ammonnews. Net, a Jordanian site.
24. See http:// www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=6255
See also MEMRI special dispatch 5023 of October 23, 2012.
25. Mark Durie, Hatred Sounds Sweeter in Arabic? in Markdurie.com.blog,
December 15, 2012.
26. Mark Durie, Te Tird Choice , Melbourne, 2011.
27. http://globalmbreport.org/?p=7882, of January 16, 2013.
28. See Bat Yeor, Eastern Christianity under Islam etc , op. cit.
29. See http://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/2011/04/24/crimes-against-
Christianity.
30. Sawsan Najib abd-al-Halim, Maan website, posted November 8, 2012, http://
palwatch.org.main.aspx?=157&doc. Id=8493
Reported by Itamar Marcus and Jacques Ziberdick, in their Bulletin of 30
January, 2013, PMW (Palestinian Media Watch).
31. Ynetnews.com November 25, 2011.
32. Al-Yaum , Saudi Arabia, November 2, 2012.
33. Al-Dustur , Jordan, February 7, 2013.
34. http:// memri.org.il/cgi-webaxi/sal/sal.pl?lang=he&ID=107345_mem-
ri&act=show&dbid=articles&dataid=3337
35. Fars News Agency, September 30, 2012.
36. Originally published in two installments in al-Riyadh (Saudi Arabia) on 10
March and March 12, 2002, in a distorted story full of lies, purporting to
explain the biblical Book of Esther. See MEMRI, No 354, March 12, 2002.
Cited and analyzed in R. Israeli, Te Blood Libel and its Derivatives (Trans-
action, 2012), 15052.
37. Mashreq Internet site, September 3, 2012.
38. Ibid.

Te Palestinians as the
ArabPrototype of Lie
Manufacturing
227
6
It is said that while the victors write history books that celebrate their
warlike qualities and the myths of their heroes, the losers write books
of poetry, nostalgia, and vindictiveness that mark their victim hood and
reect their self-righteousness. Te process of demonization of Zionism
in the Arab/Muslim world had been embraced from the very beginnings
of its inception, since it was regarded as a rival to Arab nationalism
for the takeover of Palestine as the land of the Jews, at the same time
that Arabs and Muslims also regarded it as an Arab homeland and part
and parcel of the Islamic patrimony. Unable to eliminate Israel that
Zionism has brought about, and fearing lest direct assaults against the
Jews might seem or sound anti-Semitic in Western eyes and ears, some
Arabs and Muslims, like some anti-Semitic westerners, found it expe-
dient to focus their attacks on the political movement that generated
the rebirth of the Jewish state, and to attach to it all the attributes that
may make it abhorrent in the eyes of Tird World countries, which had
just emerged from colonial rule: imperialism, colonialism, occupation,
aggression, exploitation, oppression, discrimination, racism, elitism,
and such. Pioneered by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO),
this propaganda eort soon spread across the non-Western world and
became the mainstay of Arab, Muslim, and Tird World rhetoric. So,
while Israel had one-sidedly, though foolishly, recognized the PLO, it
did not insist on a parallel and reciprocal recognition of Zionism. Tat
made the PLO universally legitimate, accepted, and recognized, while
Zionism became a repulsive nemesis.
In fact, the very Charter of the PLO, adopted in 1964 and amended
in 1968 by the Palestinian National Council, far from constituting a
political and social blueprint for the building of Palestinian nation-
228
alism and a base for stating the Palestinian national dream, has, on
the contrary, focused, in fteen out of its thirty-three articles, on the
nightmare of the destruction of Zionism, a euphemism for the polit-
ical annihilation of the state of Israel. Te abusive vocabulary used
by the Palestinians against Israel and its national movement became
so recurrent in Arab and Muslim discourse that it was soon adopted
by the twenty-two-member Arab League and then the fty-ve odd
members of the Islamic Conference, followed by some arm-twisting,
which resulted in the adoption of that harsh language by the majority
of the Tird World countries that constitute the majority in the United
Nations (UN). In this situation of automatic majority for any resolution
tabled by the Arabs (even if it should suggest that the earth is at), it
was not di cult to pass that infamous UN resolution in 1975, which
equaled Zionism with racism. Te fact that all democratic, developed,
and liberal states were voted against, and most dictatorial, fascist,
communist, and backward nations were voted for, said volumes about
the nature of that automatic majority in the UN.
Tat vote was to be reversed in 1991 as a result of the Madrid Con-
ference and the tremendous eorts exerted by the United States, but
the Arab and Muslim countries remained recalcitrant in their negative
vote. Te Palestinian public, with the mounting popularity of the Hamas
Charter , which was published at the onset of the First Intifada (1988),
and where Zionism was equaled to Nazism and worse might have been
the most blatant indication of the moods among Arabs and Muslims
in general. Since then, as if the UN had no slavery and oppression of
Christians in Sudan to deal with, or the abuses of Saddam Hussein and
Hafez al-Assad to rein in, or the killings in Algeria, the Congo, and
Darfur to put an end to, or the nuclear programs of Libya and Iran to
contain, or the persecution of Christians in Egypt, Iraq, and Nigeria to
contend with, it concentrated its attention on annual condemnations of
Israel, led by the automatic majority. All that climaxed in the shameful
UN 2001 Durban Conference against racism, where anti-Semitism
under the guise of anti-Zionism was so blatant and outrageous that the
United States quit and the conference disbanded in disgrace. But the
Arabs/Muslims had made their point: Zionism was to remain outlawed
and excommunicated in spite of the vote reversal of 1991.
An Historical Background
Te Palestinians as such have achieved world recognition and have
been regular guests on the TV screens of all Western households and
Te Palestinians as the Arab Prototype of Lie Manufacturing
229
their leaders have also become household names and every incident
involving Palestinians receives such a resonance in the Western press,
that very often Europeans know about Palestinians more than they
know about their own country and its political aairs. Tis trend of Pal-
estinism, which in France even generated a political party which ran for
elections on a Palestinian platform, did not dierentiate between those
Palestinians who were allegedly prepared to negotiate and make peace
with Israel, signed the Oslo Accords (1993), and set up the Palestinian
Authority (PA) in conjunction with Israel, and the Hamas members
who remain committed to terror and to the destruction of Israel. Both
were the wronged underdogs in the eyes of Europeans, regardless of
what they did, and by denition Israel then came up as the culprit, no
matter what it did not do. Tis European attitude of forgiveness toward
the Palestinians naturally encouraged the Hamas to celebrate its out-
rageous statements, immune of any reproach or criticism, and to push
forward with its one-sided subversion of both the PA and Israel, as to
precipitate violent Israeli reactions that culminated in the Gaza War
of 20082009, which focused the blame on Israel and stepped up the
Hamas expressions of hatred, which ultimately came to full fruition
when the Spring broke out in next-door Egypt in January 2011, and
the two sister organizations of the Muslim Brothers and the Hamas
became united in action, not only in their theory or hatred toward the
Jews and Israel.
During the forty years of Yasser Arafats leadership of the Palestinian
movement, since his rise in the 1960s until his death in 2004, with
few rm achievements on the ground and after having missed many
opportunities to settle with Israel and to obtain a state for his misfor-
tuned people, the Palestinians occupied the frontline of the ghting
Revolutionaries. It appears today, after the failure of the Oslo exper-
iment, that all he was interested in was not to set up a peaceful state
and deal with the routine and boring aairs of management and daily
life, but more in creating chaos and conict, undermining others
rule, and attracting international attention. Indeed, under Arafats
leadership, the Palestinians concocted their National Charter in 1964
and amended it in 1968, making it the expression not of the legitimate
rights of the Palestinian people for nationhood, or of the dream for na-
tional reconstruction in peace, but the nightmare of his neighborsthe
Israelis, whom he pledged to destroy and replace. He was given shelter
by Jordan, and instead of gratitude, he demonstrated his ambition to
reverse the rule of the King in Black September (1970) until he was
230
defeated and expelled from there. He was exiled into Lebanon, which
he robbed from its sovereignty and turned it into a base ( Fatahland )
to attack and harass Israel, until Israel felt constrained to mop up that
territory and cleanse him out of there, upon which he was evacuated
to Tunisia. Israeli mindless o cials tried to coax Arafat by oering him
negotiations and a Palestinian state, which he accepted only in order
to nd a new base to undermine the nave Zionism state from within.
Only his death brought his machinations to an end and left his people
bereft of any major achievement, except for the division of the Pales-
tinians between those who still sought a settlement with Israel but did
not command the majority of public opinion to execute it (the PA), and
those who followed dreams of revolution that might rid them of Israel
totally, and therefore refused to negotiate, much less to compromise,
and elected to indulge in hatred and lies.
Immediately after the Arab asco in the 1967 War, Arafats proximity
in Jordan to the newly Israeli-occupied West Bank put him in a novel
revolutionary situation of his own, where he had the distinction, he
believed, to remain the only Arab leader ghting Israel while all the
others had been routed, something that would enhance his prestige as
the chief of all Palestinians, half of whom were in Jordan, one-third in
the West Bank (and Gaza), and the rest within Israel and the refugee
camps in Lebanon and Syria. Te Palestinians could not contain their
pride at standing rm as the avant-garde of Arab nationalism, even
though defeated and humiliated Gamal Abdel Nasser still retained his
crown of leadership. For want of social networks (Facebook, Twitter,
and Internet) and of Al-Jazeera at the time, which two generations later
were to bring the world into the awareness of the common people,
thereby reinforcing its power, it was revolutionary leaders like Ara-
fat, and diminished Nasser, who aroused the masses and raised hope
among them, hence the tremendous attraction that the Chairman had
among his people and the Arab masses in the world. His charisma
was also reinforced by the near-uniqueness of his position as a leader-
ghter which made him known and famous, popular, and attractive,
able to trigger a spring of hope and promise, unlike the other Arab
leaders of the current Spring who were dismissed and humiliated as
stale, condemned, blamed, and rejected by their peoples, if not worse.
Hence the extraordinary diusion on Arafats anti-Semitic mantras
among the Palestinians and thence through the Arab and Islamic world.
From this perspective, the Palestinian awakening in the aftermath of
1967, not only preceded the current Spring by half a century, but it
231
was also genuine, because it instilled optimism, high spirits, and a
sense of revival among the Palestinian masses, unlike the melancholy,
depression, pessimism and despair, incertitude, and fear from the future
which have swept the Arab world during the Spring of 20112012, as
a result of the unrest, instability, death, destruction, and nebulousness
of the future.
Arafat went out of his way to obtain rapid results to his revolution
and to take the rule in Jordan in his own hands, by removing King
Hussein and replacing him. In her mindlessness, Israel, instead of sup-
porting him with a view of eliminating the anomalous and illegitimate
Hijazi Hashemite monarchy that established itself in Amman upon a
majority of Palestinians, and thus generating a Palestinian state such
that only border conicts would continue to separate it from Israel,
stuck to the non-starter impractical solution of preserving the Hash-
emite monarchy. Te fallacy was then implanted in the minds of the
West and in Israel that Hussein being moderate and pro-Western, was
preferable to revolutionary Arafat, a concept that reversed as Arafat
signed the Oslo Accords in 1993, as his demands were suddenly rec-
ognized and backed by the West, which prevailed on Israel to pay the
price and disburse the cost. Never mind his violent, anti-Israel and
anti-Jewish broadsides which did not recede and continued to sweep
behind them the entire Arab and Islamic world. For when Israel agreed,
again foolishly, to accept Arafat at the expense of her security positions
in the West Bank, it gave up the alternative of basing him in East Jordan
whence he would have endangered Israel much less. Te false promises
of Oslo that the annihilationist clauses of the PLO Charter vis--vis
Israel would be amended were never fullled and the Palestinian prin-
ciples of harassing Israel until its total elimination, remained valid, this
time embraced equally across the two isles of the Palestinian people
the moment Oslo started to crumble.
When Arafat abused of the permission he was given by the King
after 1967 to act against Israel from his territory, lest he be viewed as
a coward while Arafat was regarded as the hero, the intensication of
Arafats activities against Israel, in what was dubbed as the War of
Attrition (19681970) along the Jordan Valley, resulted in Arafats
taking the glory and Hussein the beating from the Israeli air strikes,
which devastated the entire Valley that he had developed at great pain
and cost. Tereupon, he decided to move: he demanded from Arafat
that he desist from his transborder attacks against Israel, and when
he encountered a refusal, based on the PLOs calculation that Hussein
232
would not dare to put an end to the very popular acts of resistance,
the Jordanian army moved in, once the king realized that only with one
gun, wielded by one authority, can order be maintained in one country,
and within a few days of bloody combat known as Black September
in 1970, massacred enough of the Palestinian forces as to compel their
survivors to ee to Syria and to Israel (!!) and then to Lebanon. Tere,
they constructed new bases, taking advantage of the weakness of the
country and its inability to stop the inux of the Palestinian armed
forces. Due to the inner divisions within Lebanon, it would have been
unpopular for any government to seem to obstruct the heroes of the
Arab world from pursuing their battle against the Zionist enemy
and to revenge the humiliation of all Arabs in 1967.
After the West Bank and Jordan, which were utilized by Arafat
to ght Israel, Lebanon was the next closest to Israel, since Hafez
al- Assad the father would not allow anyone to act from his territory
on the Golan and expose Damascus that was within artillery range of
Israels retaliation. Even when evicted by Israel from Lebanon in 1982,
the PLO inuence subsisted ideologically in the West Bank and Gaza,
and operationally as a base of escalating terrorist action against Israel.
One year after their exile to Tunisia, on the eve of Passover, 1983, a
hoax was spread by pro-PLO Palestinians in the West Bank that Israel
had unleashed a massive poisoning attack against Palestinian school-
girls with a view to hurt their reproductive organs just as they were
ready to wed and raise Palestinian ghters. Despite the international
investigation that revealed the nature of the hoax, the belief persisted
among the Palestinians, supported by other Arabs, Muslims, and many
international institutions, that Israel was out to commit genocide
against them. Tis pattern of repeatedly lying in public and to the public
in order to rationalize their deepening hatred of Israel, would become
a routine means of battling Israel among the Arabs and Muslims in
general, with a view to discredit it. More on that campaign of libel and
hatred, which raises questions about Palestinian readiness to accept
Israel, any Israel, as a permanent neighbor, was tackled by the author
in some of his previous works
1
and will be updated below. In any case,
all those manifestations of Palestinian activity clearly point out that
their main concern is not to establish a state and enter into a peaceful
state of mind, but to spread hatred against Jews and Israel, even at the
expense of realizing their dreams.
Loyal to the Maoist principle of permanent revolution lest it
settles and becomes routinzed, and committed to the passion of the
233
revolutionary Spring and keep it alive, a rst Intifadah (shake up)
erupted in Gaza in December 1987, and soon spread to the West Bank
and lasted, with interruptions, until the Oslo Accords in 1993, causing
considerable casualties and damage and disrupting the normal course
of life in Israel. But in spite that the chief item in those Accords de-
manded the cessation of all violence pending the negotiations between
the parties,
2
and despite the foolish invitation of Arafat and his arms by
Israel, from Tunisia to the West Bank and Gaza, naively believing that
he would honor what he had pledged in the Accords, terrorism never
stopped. Arafat simply had become accustomed to rebel and disturb
the order, not to manage civil aairs; to mount military operations and
subvert the state machinery of his hosts, not to enforce law in his own
territory that he never had before. In short, it was like conding the
management of public order to the maa that has vested interest in
disturbing it, and prot from the chaos. In fact, if that most important
of clauses had been honored, Arafat would have thereby eliminated his
own revolutionary Spring, something that he patently could not do. It
would be only his successor, Abu Mazen, who understood that in the
exercise of violence the Palestinians could not win, since they were
not the stronger party, and that they could, on the contrary, bring to
its end the Palestinian dream, without eliminating Israel, if they did
not control violence. He also understood that without cessation of
terrorism, the Palestinians would lose Western support, economic and
political, which they needed desperately to survive. Especially in view of
the challenge that the Hamas posed to him internally, he realized that
only one gun in one entity would ensure peace and order in the PA,
unlike Arafat who manipulated eleven separate security apparatuses
in an attempt to maintain his personal control; therefore he opted for
security coordination with Israel, and put an end to terrorism, without
ideologically abandoning any major Palestinian goal.
Arafat had refused to extradite to Israel the Palestinian terrorists
who acted against Israel and then found refuge in the cities that Israel
had stupidly submitted to Palestinian rule. For him, it was unthink-
able that he would surrender his heroes to Israel. Abu Mazen after
him, who was to prove as deep a commitment to the heroes of the
Revolution, simply avoided that dilemma by eliminating the need to
stand on its horns via preventing terrorism. Te Rabin government
in Israel was prepared to absorb those acts of terror as sacrices for
peace, in order not to allow the enemies of peace to put an end to it,
although the numbers of Israeli casualties after Oslo clearly surpassed
234
the numbers of the pre-Oslo era, which brought many Israelis to doubt
the benets of Oslo if it cost more than without accords. Te failure of
Camp David II and the quelling of the second Intifada in its aftermath
(2000), together with the rebellion of Israeli Arabs that same year, when
they thought that it was the opportune moment to launch their own
Spring, triggered the change of government in Israel and the advent
of the Sharon era, which prompted a widespread mop-up operation
in 2001 that eradicated terror in the territories, conned Arafat to his
Muqataa o ces in Ramallah, and ultimately allowed him to leave for
medical treatment in France, where he died in 2004, with Israel pre-
dictably accused of his death. Te Palestinians, headed by Abu Mazen,
then understood that the bells of their peaceful Spring had not tolled
yet. Abu Mazen, not a partisan of the revolutionary Spring, due to the
suering it caused his people, which was graver than the strikes that
they delivered to Israel, desisted from terrorism in order to collect the
benets of the Palestinian revolution. Te Hamas organization, in es-
sence the Palestinians who were members or followers of the Muslim
Associations in the territories, was crystallized during the rst Intifada
by charismatic cleric Ahmed Yassin in Gaza, into the Hamas (acronym
for the Islamic Resistance Movement), as a militant group to supple-
ment the young Palestinian rebels in the territories. But when Arafat
died and his successor seemed to embrace the more quietist way of
negotiations and security coordination, they rose to ll the gap that
was left, and they stepped up their acts of terror. Tey signaled thereby
to the Palestinian people and to the world that they had taken up the
arms that the PA had abandoned, and that henceforth the Palestinian
Spring would be Islamic.
Unlike the PLO, which was ready to negotiate with Israel and was
naively brought bona de into the territories to take control of them,
was armed to enforce security, and was given control on part of the ter-
ritories, with a view of arriving to a territorial compromise with Israel,
the Hamas radicals published their own platform at the outset of 1988,
where they committed to a generational conict with Israel over the
entire territory of Palestine/the Land of Israel, which they considered
a waqf land, therefore they were unable and unwilling to negotiate
over it, let alone compromise on it. Te maximum they were ready to
concede was a temporary hudna (truce) that could be reached indi-
rectly, echoing the truce the Prophet had reached in Hudaibiya with
his Meccan compatriots, pending the capacity of the Muslims to over-
whelm their enemies and take them over. Tus, the rules of the game
235
had changed, and since Israel had mindlessly fallen into the Oslo trap,
it realized that its security situation not only had not improved, but also
had much worsened. Te general elections of the Palestinians under
Abu Mazen constituted a great victory to the Hamas, the new revo-
lutionary alternative for the Palestinians once the PA had abandoned
the eld of combat. Hamas also formed a new combative government
headed by the Hamas, which stood in opposition to President Abu
Mazen, a situation known in France as co-habitation , where the two
opposing executive branches of government (the President and the
Prime Minister) share the impossible task of making policy and exe-
cuting it. In the United States, this happens when one or both houses
of Congress are from the opposite party to that of the President. Te
impossibility of such a rule was reinforced by Israels hurried unilateral
withdrawal from Gaza in 2005 without any agreement or understanding
regarding security arrangements. Te Hamas government, which found
itself paralyzed by a PLO president who was prepared to negotiate with
Israel, decided to take things in its own hands, as do revolutionaries, and
declared its own government in Gaza, in clear and open deance of the
Presidents authority, but nevertheless drawing its legitimacy from the
majority it had obtained in the elections. Te Gaza Strip became then
the Islamic territory from which Israel could be harassed, and where
the ame of revolution could be rekindled, which preceded the Islamic
Spring by six years and then merged into it. Naturally, the deepening of
the gap between the rival parties within the Palestinians also produced
the escalation of the anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish rhetoric among them.
Te Hamas takeover of Gaza, which can be post-factum understood
as an early and pioneering outburst of the Islamic Spring, not only will
be able to create a new continuity and harmony with Mursis Egypt,
instead of the Mubarak eras hostility, suspicion, and tension, but it
also signals to the Palestinians in general the position of Palestinian
Islam as part of the wave of the future. For Hamas will be one of the
most Islam-experienced working governments in the Arab world (ex-
cept for Sudan), a sort of pioneer and early- reconnoissance patrol to
examine the terrain and ascertain the hazards of such a venture. Te
Hamas government in Gaza will also serve as a warning to Israel not
to commit once again the imprudent step of evacuating vital positions
without guarantees for the improvement of security, especially that
now Hamas has become an agent of Tehran, causing Israels security
situation to worsen immeasurably. Maybe the West will also awaken
to the reality that when radical Islam takes over the rule, security and
236
peace, stability and good neighborliness are not necessarily improved.
Te Islamic victory in Gaza, which was disputed and doubted by all
supporters of the PA hitherto, will see itself recognized and approved
by the Islamic world, and gradually also by the West, and it will be
the status of the PA which will be in question. In Israel, the growing
strength of the Islamic movement that supports the Gaza regime will
encompass larger sectors of the Arabs in Israel, turning them into a
dangerous and subversive fth column that future governments will
have to deal with. It also stands to reason that the Hamas people will
dare more to provoke the Israeli towns and settlements around Gaza,
knowing that the Muslim world stands united with them in case of
Israeli retaliation. Tey will probably initiate more border clashes with
Israel, in an attempt to create enough tensions and casualties so as to
drag more Islamic countries to tighten the noose around Israel. It has
always been the Palestinian strategy to exhaust Israel by a continuous
friction on its borders, except that now more Islamic countries, in
addition to Iran, may be drawn into the circle of conict.
Te Favorite Palestinian Temes of Hatred and Lies
Either as a result of reading the regional map in this vein, or due
to its competition with the Hamas on the souls of the Palestinians
who are still hesitating, the leadership of the PA has also embraced
a rather negative attitude toward Israel and insists on boycotting the
talks with it unless its unconditional conditions for a jump-start
are met. Te PA has also intensied its propaganda campaign against
Israel in central issues such as: the iconization of past terrorists who
murdered Israeli innocent civilians indiscriminately; the negation of
any historical link between Israel and its land in order to delegitimize
it by rewriting history, erasing archeological evidence of Israels roots
in the land, educating its children to reject the existence of Israel; ad-
amantly refusing to recognize Israel as a Jewish state; and much more.
In the o cial PA broadcasts of JuneJuly 2012, for example, a hatred
poem was repeatedly read, by a young and innocent girl to increase the
eect, which described Jews (and Christians) as inferior and shrunken,
cowards and disgusting. In the preceding month of April, another girl
read out passionately a poem on: Zion, our enemy, the like of Satan
with a tail, amidst the mention that the same girl had read the very
same educational poem at the opening of a Palestinian exhibition of
educational tools previously. Putting this libelous poem in the mouth
of an innocent and innocuous girl certainly adds to its credibility,
237
and goes to show the depravity of those who made her play their ugly
propaganda game. Teir hatred to Israel goes so deep that they do not
hesitate to use educational themes for their propaganda purposes
and do not seem to mind the devastation they eect on the minds and
souls of children who are constantly sprayed with these jets of poison,
which we are asked to believe are the fruit of their own spontaneous
and virgin instincts under the impact of occupation. Te complete
wording of the poem is repulsive and revolting, and as the moderator
was instructing the girl to read it in order to build up a sense of re-
sponsibility and belonging among her schoolmates, she read, without,
one should hope, understanding the eect of what she read:
Te usurper robbed my land and the land of my ancestors
Where is your sword, oh Khaled [the name of a warrior]
Where is your audacity, oh Salah-a Din [Saladin, the famous Jihad
warrior]
But no one responded to me,
Where is my weapon?
Oh, I have just found it! It is the stone,
I have found it and pelted it towards the enemy of Fate,
I have taught the world that the Muslim set on the path of Allah is
invincible
Tey use the White House to challenge us
But we challenge them with the Islamic awakening,
And with the Holy Rock of Mecca.
Tey are not stronger than the Emperors of Persia and Byzantium,
For they are diminished and cowards, inferior and disgusting
Tey are the descendants of Crusaders [Christians] and of Khaybar
[Jews],
Oh, Muslims of the world! Wake up! You have slumbered long enough!
Your parents and sons are being slaughtered, and
Your al-Aqsa Mosque is being desecrated!
3

Te PA TV moderator, who was encouraging the girl with applause
and urgings: Bravo!, knew that slaughters were happening daily in
the countries of the Spring, not in Israel, and that mosques were be-
ing destroyed in Homs and Aleppo, not in Jerusalem. Never mind the
destruction of the minds of young children with lies and injections of
poison and hatred, and never mind the distortion of the intellect of
young people with the confusion between reality and myth, so that
they can never grow up thinking freely and recognizing the fact from
ction. However, the o cial Palestinian Television could not aord
to lag behind the surrounding violence of Islamic and anti-Islamic
238
rhetoric that is setting aame peoples and countries, destroying cities,
and killing thousands of innocent people all over the Islamic world.
And whom can the Palestinians accuse of all that, without losing the
support of their own people, if not neighboring Israel, and its inevitable
companion for blamethe USA, both of which have remained the lone
islands of security, tranquility, freedom, and sanity in the middle of
all that madness? Is one to conclude that in its moderate and round
about way, which avoids conict with other Palestinians and other
Arabs and Muslims, the PA has been also partaking of the unfolding
Islamic Spring, including the distortions and lies that this involves,
without incurring too many risks?
One of the most extroverted ways for some Palestinians to express
their reluctant identication with the Spring, of which their Hamas
rivals have become the champions, is their novel audacity to rewrite
history in a fashion that, on the one hand, lays solid foundations
for their claim on the territory of Palestine, while on the other hand
completely rejecting and refuting all Israeli claims to the same. Tis
brings them into a common denominator with the Hamas and general
Islamic arguments to the eect that the Jews are not a nation, therefore
they do not deserve a state, and in any case there has never been any
factual or historical attachment between the Jewish people and the land,
hence the Islamic rejection of any notion of a Jewish state. Never mind
history, archeology, the ndings on Temple Mount of ancient Jewish
vestiges and Israeli generous acceptance of the claims of the Muslims
on the Mount and its readiness to share with them the holy premises
like in Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron. What counts for the Muslim
is only Muslim tradition and legend, which for them amount to history
and fact, while all the rest have to be dismissed, destroyed, denied, and
refuted. Te Palestinians, who sometimes look moderate and reason-
able on occasion, have denitely and inexorably joined the chorus of
deniers, which convenes in Tehran all the Jewish haters of the world.
On August 26, 2010, a violent clash developed between the inhab-
itants of the Silwan village in southeast Jerusalem and Jewish settlers
who have been living there since right after the 1967 War. Prima facie ,
the conict erupted because of a gate erected illegally by a local Arab,
but since in Jerusalem nothing happens just by chance, every simple
real estate issue can be linked to an endless string of conspiracies and
intentions to impact the future of the city, which can reect contra-
dictory policies of either Arabizing and Islamizing the city or, on the
contrary, Judaizing it. Te approach of rewriting history in order to
239
reinforce what is Islamic and reject everything that is not, has been
part of the Islamic Spring tendency to inuence events by ignoring the
environment and the world, and striving for victory and acclamation,
not for compromise and accommodation, for kindling res, not for
extinguishing them. We saw the followers of Mursi waiting at Tahrir
for the announcement of the results of the elections and ready to erupt
in violence if their candidate was not proclaimed the victor. No other
result was possible for them. For this purpose, only narratives that
encourage the Islamic Spring are championed, not the research of facts
and the analysis of ndings. Typical to this approach is the recurrent
Palestinian claim that the Talmud says, with a totally trumped out
citation, without, understandably, any precise reference to back it up.
How can they hope to bring up a new generation of scientists that way,
if intellectual honesty is thus dismissed for the sake of propaganda?
And if they mean peace, how can that be made possible, if the next
generation is already trained to perpetuate war and hatred?
Te manufacturing of lies, which has intensied as the Islamic Spring
unfolded, has been aimed at nding all the requisite explanations, justi-
cations, and rationalizations for the newfound rejectionism among the
PA leadership, to match the Hamas one, which has been aligned with
the Muslim Brothers and their opponents alike, who nd it convenient
to dump on Israel all their shortcomings, frustrations, and problems.
Tese heaps of lies rely on the ancient tribal Jahili tradition of aggran-
dizing the self s tribe and diminishing the rival or enemy tribes, with
the governments of Egypt, Jordan, and the PA, who have supposedly
signed peace accords with Israel, reverting to dub Israel the enemy.
Tese trends have to be watched and studied closely because they are
likely to persist as long as the Spring unfolds in uncertain directions.
Indoctrination by lies, as an educational system to replace human
values and historical truth, is not an innovation of recent times, but
after the launching of the Spring, more Palestinian and Arab intellec-
tuals than before have harnessed their training to mobilize politically
in the service of their nation, with a view of fabricating knowledge
and implanting it in the minds of young Palestinians, so as to ascertain
the continuation of the conict in the next generation and to guar-
antee its longevity in general. We may take, for example, once again,
the holy places on Temple Mount, where the two Jewish Temples had
existed for some eight hundred years, on which the Aqsa Mosque and
the Dome of the Rock were built knowing that they were Jewish holy
sites. In 1925, and again in 1950, the Palestinian High Islamic Council
240
had recognized the link of the Jews to the place, as if they were attesting
that the sun rises at dawn. Even the publicity booklet put out by the
Council for tourists, mentioned that the place was the site where King
Solomon had erected his temple and also the site of the altar built by
King David to the Almighty before there was a temple.
One of the new means to augment the validity of their exclusive
claim on Palestine and also ensure Western support for that claim has
been to baptize Jesus Christ as a Palestinian, in total disregard to the
fact that he was born Jewish and lived as a Jew and to gain sympathy
by comparing their suering to his passion. Never mind that they
base their nationalism on Islam, that half of their people hail from the
fanatic Hamas conviction which is part of the Muslim Brothers, and
that Christians are currently harshly persecuted throughout the Islamic
world. Tey nevertheless hope to increase delegitimation of Israel and
Jews in Christian eyes by making them, not the Islamic world, as the
persecutor of Christians and themselves as the natural allies and part-
ners of Christians and successors of the Christ. If history is not kept
to the letter, it does not matter, as long as the Palestinian struggle is
heeded. Ten, propaganda phrases like this become possible, and by
repeating them every so often, they themselves begin believing in them:
Jesus ... the virtuous patriotic Palestinian forefather ... brought forth
his New Testament and spread it among mankindwhich led the Jews
to persecute him until they caught him, crucied him, and murdered
him ... Te Zionist movement wanted to falsify historical facts, to exile
and crucify the Palestinian Arab nation and then murder it
4
. Having
no ancient Palestinian history, the newly manufactured Palestinian lie
wishes to create it against all odds. In an op-ed of the o cial organ of
the PA, the hoax is shamelessly deployed, with its coarse seams obvious
to any watcher:
Easter ... is not a holiday for Christian Palestinians only but a holi-
day for Palestinian nationalism, because Jesus, may he rest in peace,
is a Canaanite Palestinian. His resurrection, three days after being
crucied and killed by the Jewsas reported in the New Testament
reects the Palestinian narrative, which struggles against the de-
scendants of modern Zionist Judaism, in its new colonialist form,
that conspires with the Western capitalists who claim to belong to
Christianity.
Jesus, may he rest in peace, the virtuous patriotic Palestinian fore-
father, who renewed the Old Testament, split away from its followers,
brought forth his New Testament and spread it among mankind
241
which led the Jews to persecute him until they caught him, crucied
him and murdered him. Afterwards, he rose from the dead like the
phoenix and set out to spread his teachings that still exist and will
exist as long as mankind exists.
Jesus story is his [Palestinian] peoples story; the Zionist
movementtool of the capitalist Westwanted to falsify historical
facts, to exile and crucify the Palestinian Arab nation and then mur-
der it by means of ethnic cleansing ... But the Palestinians, Jesus
descendants, rose from the ashes, like the phoenix, from the ruins
of the Nakba (i.e., the catastrophe, the Palestinian term for the es-
tablishment of the State of Israel) and the Naksa (i.e., the setback,
Palestinian term for Israels victory in the Six Day War.) Tey dressed
their wounds and raised the ag of nationality again by founding
parties and factions ...
Easter is a distinct [Palestinian] national holiday which doesnt
concern only Christians but rather all Palestinians believing in the
dierent religionsIslam, Christianity and Judaism.
5

Te fact that in Christian tradition Jesus is a Jew from the nation
of Judea and that the historical record has no narrative of a Pales-
tinian Arab people is not taught by the PA. Te PA also ignores the
fact that Rome only changed the name of Judea to Palestine after
the Judean Bar Kochba Rebellion in the year AD 136, long after the
death of Jesus. Furthermore, according to Christian tradition, Jesus
did not marry, had no children, and therefore Palestinians could not
be Jesus descendants. Te Palestinian Authority has tried for many
years to convince its people that they have a history going back many
thousands of years, that there was an ancient Palestinian nation, and
that one of the great gures of history, Jesus, was their forefather
and they are Jesus descendants. As the struggle of the Arabs against
Israel escalated, the earlier recognition of Jewish history in Jerusalem
was gradually eroded and with the mounting of radical Hamas-style
Islam, it was completely eradicated to the point that the total rejection
of the idea of the Jewish state, even in the most moderate circles of
the PA, has been nourished by this denial of the previous recognition,
for otherwise the Jewish state would be a logical consequence of it. Te
champion of this denial had been Ikrama Sabri, the Mufti of Jerusalem
appointed by Arafat, who rmly and uncompromisingly rejected any
link between Jews and Temple Mount and even refuted any spiritual
and historical relationship between the Jewish people and the land of
their two ancient commonwealths. He also declared that the Temple
Mount was seven oors over ground and seven underground a holy
242
Islamic ground, including the Jewish Wailing Wall, which was nothing
more or less than the outer wall of al-Aqsa and the place where the
Prophet Muhammad had tied his mythical horse al Burak (hence the
name of the wall by Muslims). He insistently emphasized that the site
belonged for 1500 years to the Muslims, and to them alone, and he
was reinforced in his verdict by generous Israelis who were prepared
to compromise with the Muslims or to even renounce their rights for
the sake of settling with the Palestinians at any price. Little did they
know that their concession was not greeted by the Palestinians as a
sacrice for the sake of peace, but was viewed with contempt as proof
of relenting from their false claim in the rst place.
Rachels Tomb, which had been recognized as a Jewish site on the
Bethlehem road for centuries, including by Arab sources, and was
conrmed by the Muslim Ottoman Sultan, was turned amidst the PAs
struggle to delegitimize Israel, since the Spring erupted and even slightly
before, into the Tomb of Bilal bin Rabah, one of the Prophets servants
who was purportedly buried there, and this historical distortion, both
of denying Rachels heritage (one of the Matriarchs) and imposing a
new freshly invented identity that was never proved, and relating to
a person whose standing never inspired any imperative to preserve
his remains, was approved by UNESCOs automatic vote, which can
rally enough votes for anything anti-Israel that is tabled by the Mus-
lim bloc. Tis travesty of justice that is repeated daily under the eyes
of the Secretary General and his inated sta, of course encourages
the Arabs to invent at will any topic that comes to their mind to harm
Israel and the Jews, a trend that has been escalating since the Islamic
Spring broke out. For it has transpired that their concern is no longer
accusing Israel in the international bodies of occupation and killing,
domains where the Muslim Spring excels more than by any other
UN member, but focuses now on the injustice of its very existence.
Terefore, the idea is no longer only to weaken it and to punish it, but
to eliminate and replace it by Palestine. Te idea of totally refuting
the existence of a Jewish state, which had been most dramatically
and venomously advocated by Sayyid Qutb in the 1950s on behalf of
the Muslim Brothers, upheld by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in the
1970s and 1980s, who dubbed them the enemies of Allah, has been
taken up by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and by Hamas and Hizbullah.
All those sworn enemies of Israel refuse to accept or negotiate with it,
and that position was adopted by the PA, which refuses to recognize
a Jewish state and is working for its delegitimation. Teir rationaliza-
243
tion is that Palestine is Arab and Muslim, and the Jews have no part
in it.
Terefore, if no written history depicting Palestinian rights in the
land exists, it has to be written, taught, and propagated, and if there
are extant sources proving ancient Jewish existence in the land, they
must be erased, distorted, altered, denied, and refuted, for history in
their minds is not the science of investigating the past and writing it,
but the task of constructing and reconstituting a past based on myth,
national narratives, ambitions, wishes, and wishful thinking. And if
rm volumes of history or of ancestral tradition stand in the way, they
must be eliminated. Once the Islamic movements have embraced this
trend, and the Arab Spring has become Islamic and is being led by
the Islamic movement, delegitimation of Israel has become one of
their main themes. But in order to lend academic respectability to this
long-term eort, committed Palestinian academics were recruited,
for whom defending national theses dipped in fallacy is much more
important than investigating historical truth, something that does
not attest to their outstanding academic standards. Abu Mazen had
repealed the use of violence against Israel due to the great damages
Israeli retaliation caused him and his people, but the campaign of
delegitimation that he is encouraging against Israel, inter alia in the
UN and via his academics, being an academic himself, who wrote
his dissertation in Moscow on the collaboration between Zionism and
Nazism and denying the full extent of the Shoah, bring him very close
to Ahmadinejads positions. His own convictions and the venue of his
doctorate where indoctrination was more important than history, are
at play once again, but the circle of actors is growing at Abu Mazens
own instigation. Tus, his strategy of delegitimation is becoming part
of the Islamic Spring, and the Palestinian president one of its actors
and agents.
Tis Palestinian strategy is carried out through school textbooks and
the state mass media, as we have seen in the poems above, through
speeches of leaders and state-guided sermons of clerics; literature and
poetry readings to the public, processions, and public exhibitions; pub-
lic ceremonies; memorial services to the departed terrorist heroes;
and welcoming ceremonies to freed prisoners. Te recurrent themes on
these occasions are the denial of the right of a Jewish state to exist, the
false accusation of Jews and Israel of systematic massacres of Palestinian
children, and even their cremation in crematoria, Nazi-style. Tese
theses are so recurrent, omnipresent, and blunt and unfounded that it
244
becomes pointless to start to deny them on a one-to-one basis, lest they
acquire credibility, as there was never a point in Jews trying to deny
every accusation the Sturmer concocted against them. But they have
become so deeply entrenched in the Palestinian psyche and narrative,
and they are so convenient to hang on to them in order to accuse Israel
and Jews of all their problems and misfortunes, which they have been
taking over the thinking of the Palestinians so overwhelmingly that
even if the leadership should decide to change course, it would nd
itself trapped in and by the stereotypes, distortions, and deprecations
that it had itself invented regarding Israel. In fact, the Palestinians
are the rst victims of their own propaganda, when they realize that
the medical help they receive in Israel that saves many of their lives,
does not concord with the image of the killers of children instilled
by their leadership; the peaceful and massive participation of Muslim
worshippers in Ramadan in the great mosques in Jerusalem does not
accord with the accusations of Hamas that Israel is destroying al-Aqsa,
oppressing Muslim worship; or that the Palestinians ocking to West
Jerusalem and shopping and relaxing in its hotels and entertainment
centers does not reect Palestinian propaganda about curfew, oppres-
sion, siege, and roadblocks in the territories; or when hundreds of heavy
trucks loaded with food provisions, fuel, and building materials, which
cross daily into Gaza, simply belie the propaganda about the Israeli
siege and starvation of the poor besieged Gazans.
Te Palestinian propaganda also denigrates the Jews as such, not
only Zionists or Israelis, dubbing them satanic, whose conduct is
treacherous, based on forgery, deceit, and fake inventions, and it gets
its mobilized scholars to prove that those qualities cannot be changed
or mended, and to distribute their learned conclusions through their
media to the masses, so as to turn them into the preponderant public
discourse, summed up in a few easily memorized mantras that later
can be heard everywhere or cited in all media. Already in 1998, the
Palestinian historians have convened a conference where they voiced
a few revisionist views, not as the fruit of their original thinking and
research, or the reection of their opinions or of their professional
conscience or new sources that they discovered, or new ideas that their
scholarship created in them, but under the PA guidance, as was the
practice in the communist countries where the Palestinian leadership
had been educated, or the Arab authoritarian regimes under which
they were groomed, and now the Islamic Spring is toppling one after
the other.
245
Dr. Yussuf al-Zamili, the Head of the History Department at the
Beit Hanoun College of Education, had presented at that gathering
the new approach that was being shaped in the Palestinian educational
system, which advocated not the teaching of history to students, but
training them to adopt a political narrative that totally negated the
right of Israel for existence in the Land of Israel/Palestine. He urged
at the conference all universities and colleges to express their creative
activity by writing Palestinian history, and not allow the enemies and
the impure to distort it. He knew very well that some of the most
scientically tested, credible, and comprehensive histories of Pales-
tine, from antiquity, through the Ottoman era to modern times, were
written by Israeli historians who made their reputation in the West,
well before the warnings from distortion were issued by the PA. But
those political guidelines will make sure that they too will be distorted
by these new Palestinian standards. Some of their scholars, being
unable to deny outright the evidence of Jewish presence in the land
from antiquity, simply appropriated that history to themselves and
wrote it anew. Without any regard for chronology, like the Quran itself,
or for the absurdity of their arguments, they claim, for example, that
the Hebrew tribes who had inherited the land in biblical times were
in fact Arab and Muslim, some two millennia before there was any
Islam, and at least one millennium before any Arabness was identied
in history.
One of those academics, Jirar al-Qidwa, who was appointed by
Arafat as his chief librarian, has been the main thinker of this new
replacement theology, which is frequently broadcast as scientic
on Palestinian Television. He converted Biblical Jews into Arabs, two
thousands years before the Arabs invaded the land from Arabia and
conquered it, and wrote with his scholarly authority: As regards the
Israelites, they were the sons of the purest Arab tribes ... and believe
me that, by Allah, more Israelite and ancient Hebrew blood ows in
my veins than in Sharons and Netanyahus blood. After all the defaults
and deciencies heaped upon Jews and Israelis in the o cial Palestinian
media, one wonders why would a Palestinian scholar wish to attribute
those qualities to himself? To make those points, the Palestinian daily
al-Quds published a series of articles in the months of July and August
1996, chronicling the history of the Canaanite-Palestinian people.
In these articles, various academics from Palestinian universities
explained how the Israeli archeological ndings conrmed the
Palestinian claims of their deep-rooted Canaanite roots in Palestine.
246
All those revisionist publications led at the end of that Summer to
the Sebastya Festival of the Palestinian Ministry of Education, where
young Palestinians wearing Canaanite robes and waving torches in
their hands danced in the villages central square, under the chanting
and merrying of the personnel of the PA.
Since then, much water has trickled through the semi-dry riverbed
of the Jordan, but the passion to demonize and disinherit Israel only
increased. Dr. Mustafa Najem, a lecturer on Quran exegesis at Gazas
al-Azhar University, wrote that Jews are characterized by arrogance,
pride, deception, wildness, crookery, treachery and cunning. Sometime
thereafter, this academic conrmed in a TV broadcast that Jews re-
mained Jews, and we are called upon not to forget those characteristics
even for one moment. Tose sensational revelations on the Jews,
which were emphasized by that cleric, who also pretended to don the
academic clout and presented on the o cial channel of the PA to boot,
at the same time when it was negotiating peace with Israel, showed
that more than there was an expression of negative hyperbole by an
individual lunatic anti-Semite, there was a consistent line of guided
propaganda; and rather than an attempt to teach the eager audiences
history and anthropology of their enemy, the lecturers were politically
manipulating false data to indoctrinate hatred to their youth, again in
deance of the cumulative damage that it would do to the minds and
souls of ignorant people, who had no way to criticize the sayings of an
authoritative source on their national TV. Tose auditors, listeners,
and watchers would be doomed to grow up on lies, hatred, hostility,
demonization, and conict, instead of being conditioned to peace,
knowledge, good neighborliness, and truth. Te fact that successive
Israeli governments allowed this destructive process to play out, instead
of arresting the Oslo process until this is rectied, and the incitement
and indoctrination of hatred are completely halted, has allowed it to
grow out of proportion, to become larger than what the leaders had
wished it to become, so as to become irreversible. Tis had also sent
signals to the Palestinian leadership that it could pursue its incitement
and indoctrination, so as to deect their public opinion from their own
shortcomings, as long as they were not made to pay a high price for
their violation of this vital aspect of the Oslo Accords. Tere was no
courageous enough Israeli government to stop the negotiations and
the process of concessions to the Palestinians, lest the sanctied peace
process be hurt, with the result, as Winston Churchill had described
it with regard to the Munich Agreement of 1938, where France and
247
Britain sacriced their honor in order to rescue peace, but they ended
up losing both.
Dr. Riyad al-Astal, another historian from al-Azhar University
in Gaza, like others of his colleagues who became pen-mercenaries
of the PA, quotes liberally from the Protocols of the Elders of Zion , as
a historical document, as has done the Hamas Charter, and injects
that fallacious and poisonous document of hatred, lies, and bigotry to
his students, the future generation of Palestinian leaders, through the
textbooks that he and his peers are employed to write. In one case,
due to international protests, mainly by those Europeans who nance
the new textbooks for Palestinian schools, the PAs were compelled to
excise certain fallacious and inciting data, but when the lever of outside
nancing will not be present, who can guarantee that the next editions
will undertake the same corrections? Yes, this thermometer was broken
and removed, but the fever did not elapse, and other false citations and
information are still current in other textbooks.
Dr. Nizami Amin al-Juba, the Head of Archeology at Bir Zeit Uni-
versity, is specializing in turning Israeli archeological ndings into
Cananite and Muslim exhibits. He is apparently of the opinion that
if he merely states that he opposes the Biblical version of the events
of Jewish history (something that he is perfectly entitled to do if ac-
companied by evidence and analysis), which recounts the momentous
happenings of the First and Second Temples, and that the Jews had
arrived only for a short period to Jerusalem in the rst century BC, he
is thereby establishing a credible alternative version of history. While
this interpretation is a great concession to Jews, for it recognizes some
connection, eeting as it may be, between the Jews and Jerusalem, it
nevertheless denies any Jewish presence during the one-millennium
history of the two Jewish Commonwealths on the land, which were
amply documented by serious Western scholarship of many centuries.
Yunus Amr, the President of the Jerusalem Open University, has been
one of the propagators of the hoax that the Canaanites are the ances-
tors of the Palestinians, hence their rights in Palestine. By resorting
to that thesis that connects them to the remote past, which cannot
be proven either way, it indicates that they are not aiming at a serious
and pragmatic settlement with Israel, based on present realities and a
permanent partition of the land, but they prefer to create legends of
their ancient links to the land in order to circumvent Jewish relations
to the Kingdoms of David and the Hasmoneans, by showing their even
more ancient link to the Canaanites. It is interesting that the Biblical
248
narration of events, which is not credible in their eyes as evidence to
the existence of the Jewish Temples, becomes suddenly a rm and
reliable base for the story of the Canaanites in the land.
Just to show that these absurd claims are merely the ber of Pales-
tinian imagination, it is noteworthy that during Camp David II (2000),
Arafat attempted to argue, with President Clinton smiling forgivingly,
that the Jewish Temple had never been located on Temple Mount,
and the determining proof was the Quran which for Muslims is the
word of Allah and therefore the ultimate and undebatable truth.
Tey do not realize that non-Muslims do not accept the Quran as
the truth, and therefore that argument cannot be valid. Tis sort of
argument that was tactfully dismissed by Clinton, becomes all the
more valid for Muslims today under the Islamic Spring, in light of the
prevalent tendency to abandon the frustrating Arab nationalism that
has brought only failures and to rally back to the more promising Islam
as the source of rule and legitimacy, where the Quran would again be
an incontrovertible and immutable truth. Going back to the Silwan
event with which we opened this section, it is true that since the Arab/
Muslim conquest in the seventh century, that village lay outside the
city wall and was expanded, though it kept its ancient name derived
from the original Hebrew Kfar Ha-Shiloah . But at the end of the nine-
teenth century, Jewish new immigrants came from Yemen and settled
down in the village. But in the disturbances of 1921 and 1929, Jews
were attacked by the surrounding Muslim population, and during the
19361939 Arab Revolt that was led by the Jerusalem Mufti, Haj Amin
al-Husseini, the precursor of Palestinian nationalism, the remnants of
those Jews were evacuated by the British mandatory power in order to
avoid their extermination. Teir houses were taken over by local Arabs,
until their owners showed up after the 1967 War and claimed them
back. So, to claim, as the Arabs do with regard to all Jews in all Palestine,
that Jews had no roots in the village and in the land, is a hoax without a
leg to stand on, but it is being reiterated and reinforced by the Islamic
Spring.
But the most absurd claim against Israel, raised by the Palestinians
and vehemently supported by the Islamic Spring and enjoys some po-
litical support in Europe, has been the complaint that Israel has been
Judaizing Jerusalem, as if someone accused the French of Francizing
or Christianizing Paris, or the Egyptians for Arabizing or Islamizing
Cairo. In December 1995, the General Assembly of the UN adopted
a resolution with an overwhelming majority, abrogating all the Israeli
249
laws regarding Jerusalem. Te resolution also condemned Israels
Judaization of Jerusalem, as if anyone would dare to condemn Saudi
Arabia for Islamizing Mecca. When the Arabs occupied and ruled
East Jerusalem, which was never their capital, they not only Arabized
and Islamized it, but they also did that at the expense of the Jewish
sites that had existed there generations before, like Temple Mount,
the Mount of Olives, and the Jewish Quarter, and no one complained,
save the Israelis, whose voice was not given audience anywhere. But
the moment Jews dared to recuperate their own ancient sites, without
even touching al-Aqsa and the Muslim sites that had been purposely
built on the ruins of the Jewish holy places, and while honoring all the
existing Islamic and Christian sites in place, cries of Judaization began,
warning of the danger to world peace, as if this was not the rst time
that free access to all holy places had been instituted for members of
all religions.
Te world hypocrisy also disregarded the fact that united Jerusa-
lem has grown, developed, and beautied more than any period in its
history, to the welfare of all its inhabitants, with unprecedented social
and administrative services that no Arab or Muslim (and Jewish) pop-
ulation has ever had. Te absurdity lies in the fact that in view of the
resolution calling on Israel to abrogate all its measures in Jerusalem; is
she expected to destroy all the buildings, roads, clinics, social services,
houses of prayer it built, or undo the rehabilitation of ancient places,
destroy the schools and hospitals that were developed for the growing
populations and the housing projects for the expanded families? For
example, the Jewish Quarter in the Old City had been totally destroyed
by the occupying Jordanians, its population exiled, and it was turned
into latrines and heaps of ruins. Does the UN want it to revert to that
miserable state and its inhabitants expelled again? Or perhaps, the
Jewish tombstones that were torn from their places on the Mount of
Olives and used by the Jordanians to pave roads and are now restored
to their place, should be returned to the state of desecration from which
they were rescued by Judaization? Or the archeological digs that were
done by Israel with professionalism and sensitivity to reveal the ancient
Jewish past of the city, ought to be lled in and that chapter of Jewish
history erased? Even the UN cannot countenance such absurdities.
And yet, on the agenda of the Islamic Spring countries, this issue is
more salient than the killing, the destruction, the bigotry, the chaos,
and the oppression that their societies are suering, and from which
it is precisely Judaized Jerusalem that is excepted.
250
In October 1996, the European Union adopted a resolution to call
upon Israel to repeal all its rehabilitation and restoration projects in
Jerusalem and return them to their previous state. Does that mean
that the enormous Hadassah hospital on Mount Scopus which serves
the entire Arab population of Jerusalem should be closed down or taken
apart? Will those European countries take responsibility for the health
of a quarter million Arabs? Of course not, they will rather adopt another
resolution blaming Israel for the state of health of the poor occupied
population and watch it die. Do they want the restored Hebrew Uni-
versity on Mount Scopus, which had been evicted from there by Arab
siege in 1948, to close its doors and ruin one of the most prominent
universities in the world, the like of which there are not many either in
Europe and certainly not in the Arab world? Or perhaps they mean that
the latrines that were put in place by the occupying Arabs in 19481949
on the emplacement of the destroyed Jewish synagogues should be
restored after the rebuilt synagogues are ruined again? Of course, the
Arabs and Muslims are elated by the European endorsement to their
policy of total destruction that has been practiced under the Spring. As
part of their struggle to disinherit Jews completely from Jerusalem and
the Land of Israel, they have declared Silwan, the village in southern
Jerusalem which is under dispute, into a waqf land, so as to claim that
any measure of development adopted there by the municipality is an-
other phase of Judaization of the city. Tey are afraid that the ancient
garden in the valley which had been devastated by seven hundred Arab
families in order to settle on its land will be restored to its past splendor,
and bring the Jews closer to undermining the foundations of nearby
al-Aqsa. Since they are sure of European support for their program
of preventing any development of Jerusalem, they also conclude that
Europe is supportive of the Spring in general.
Tese have been the problems that lay at the background of Pal-
estinian discontent and internal divisions. Talks of a coming third
Intida have been rife for a few months, in which Palestinian rage
was to explode, to express the worsening economic situation of the
Palestinians in the West Bank, and to join the permanent explosions
of their brethren in the Gaza Strip, where occasional shelling of Israeli
towns and villages has been sporadically breaking the peace, with Israel
responding with precise surgical bombings which either destroy fun-
damentalist Muslim targets or preempt missile attacks when they are
detected on time. Usually, these missile attacks are supposedly initiated
by more extremist groups than the ruling Hamas, which despite its
251
bombast is not interested to see itself devastated by another Israeli Cast
Lead operation, if Israel should feel too threatened by a continuity of
attacks that does not give respite to the Israeli population around the
Strip. However, the Hamas is not always able to control those groups
of Islamic Jihad or Popular Organizations who care less about the
hudna uno cially installed by Hamas. Te latter has been trying to
draw support from the rule of the Muslim Brothers in Egypt, and are
wary of aggravating their situation on their border with Egypt in the
Sinai, especially after their long-hailed reconciliation eorts with the
PA have ended in failure. In despair, Abu Mazen has once again turned
to the diplomatic front by placing a renewed request at the UN to be
recognized as a non-state member so as to gain access into UN orga-
nizations, to deviate internal attention to some outside success and
placate the mood of frustration internally.
However, in September 2012, the crowds in the West Bank, who
could no longer bear the cost of living and were looking for someone
to blame, as they learned from the ongoing upheaval of the Spring
elsewhere, turned rst against Salam Fayyad, the economist Prime Min-
ister, who was supposed to turn the Palestinian economy around and
make it more independent of Israel. However, in view of the mounting
prices and the inability of most Palestinians to make a living and get the
donors, Arab and Europeans, to continue to cover the huge decits of
the PA, Fayyad was disappointing as a savior and became naturally the
spoiler that must be ousted. Serious demonstrations and disturbances
in practically all the cities of the West Bank, very much reminiscent
of what happened in the rest of the Arab world, except for the use of
violence that has remained for now at low level, have channeled their
rage through their slogans and street gatherings, against Fayyad. Tey
demanded his immediate departure and the revision of the economic
agreement with Israel that governs much of the PA economy, as if he
were the sole culprit. Abu Mazen, the President, who tried at rst to
defend his Prime Minister, saw the rage turn against him, as the crowds
also started demanding his resignation, as if he were one of the mon-
archs or tyrants who were made to quit in the course of the Spring. He,
like others, will have learned that those who incite their people in their
own service against others, will ultimately see their people turning to
incite against them.
Palestinians have been living within the great paradox consisting
of their spelling out their national ambition as the replacement of Is-
rael on its land, but at the same time are the least able of all the Arab
252
and Islamic countries to make that aspiration come true. Terefore,
having tried through revolution, violence, murder, and war, as they had
pledged in their national Charter, to gnaw at Israels strength and bring
it down, without much success, they launched the path of diplomacy
of Oslo, counting on the nave policies of some Israeli governments
who were willing to compromise, in order to attain that goal without
compromising much on their part, and that also failed. Now, during
this last stage, which coincides and accords ideologically with the
Islamic Spring, though it preceded it by several years, they have been
attempting to reach their goals via the Hamas, which has been prac-
ticing Spring policies of ridding themselves of tyrants and instituting
a Muslim state. Teir problem is that as a revolutionary movement,
they have never settled on one unitary and consensual aim, half their
people being Jordanians, 10 percent Israelis, 30 percent in the West
Bank and Gaza, and the rest in refugee camps in Syria and Lebanon.
Even those in the Palestinian territories are divided between the West
Bank under the PA and the rest in Gaza under the Hamas.
On the table today, after twenty years of protracted negotiations
between Palestinians and Israel, there is still no united Palestinian
leadership that would wish to negotiate a settlement with Israel, each
one of their components pulling in another direction. To be sure, the
PLO has been claiming for years that it represented all Palestinians
and successive Israeli governments as well as most world governments,
have foolishly recognized that claim, while in fact every one of those
sections has lived a separate existence. Tus, the Spring dreamt about
among the Palestinians, is far from realizing itself, the main struggle
being directed against outside powers, in order to gain rst statehood
before they can embark on a domestic Spring, unlike the rest of the
Islamic world where the struggle is mainly domestic, against tyrants
and for the restoration of some sort of Islamic state. So, even if that
illusory solution of two states could materialize, that would only mark
the beginning of the Spring, not its end. For a solution to 30 percent
of the Palestinian people in the territories, even if it were possible,
would resolve nothing, and the rest of the 70 percent would continue
to knock on Israels doors, crying for a spring of their own to gain full
satisfaction of their national and Islamic goals.
For some fty years now, the Palestinians have occupied the front
arena of revolution in the Arab world, including the forty years of
Arafats turbulent but sterile years of leadership. All those years,
Arafats leadership has produced upheavals in all countries where he
253
sought refuge (Te West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon, Tunisia, and back to
the West Bank and Gaza), and drew the international limelight to his
revolution and its victims. Under his leadership, the Palestinians drew
their National Charter which they adopted in 1964 and amended in
1968, both spelling out not the dream of their own state building, but
the nightmare of eliminating all the military, political, economic, so-
cial, and cultural manifestations of Zionism in Palestine, meaning the
elimination of Israel and triggering the impasse that would make any
settlement with Israel impossible. Compromise had never been Ara-
fats goal, but since Israel foolishly agreed to negotiate with him, it ipso
facto referred to the terms of its own elimination when it agreed to that
destructive process which was encouraged by the West. To the Israeli
hopes that Israel could be accepted as a Jewish state at least on part
of the land, Arafat and his ilk have responded in the negative. Justice,
in his eye, as in the eye of the rest of the Arabs and Muslims, meant
absolute justice to them, on their terms, where the idea of compromise
could never be incorporated.
Rational anti-Zionism, as it is now customary to dub irrational
anti-Jewish sentiment, came to one of its highest peaks during the brief
Gaza war (December 2008 to January 2009). When a country decides to
go to war, it is usually in order to resolve, once and for all, issues that it
was unable to settle by diplomacy, reecting on the old adage that war is
the continuation of diplomacy. So, only after years of regular shelling of
Israeli villages from Gaza, and thousands of Palestinian bombs, shells,
and missiles which landed on its citizens and caused substantial human,
emotional, and material damages, did the Israeli government, propelled
by the upcoming elections in Israel, nally decide to venture into this
long-awaited operation that the Israeli electorate widely supported. Te
operation, in addition to the immense human sacrice its occasioned,
mainly caused by the Hamas strategy of using its own population as
human shields, without any regard for protecting schools, hospitals, and
mosques, thus assured that Israel either would not dare to assault those
places or would bear the blame for attacking civilians, humanitarian
targets and holy places. Tat calculation showed the ultimate primacy
of strategic considerations, over the human cost they entail. Backed
by Hizbullah in Lebanon, which embraced the same tactics in 2006,
during the second Lebanese War and supported by Iran, which had
triggered both confrontations, these Islamic movements have in fact
set themselves apart from civilized conduct. Te Gaza battle, far from
deciding the war and the further management of the Islamo-Jewish,
254
the Arab-Zionist, and the Palestinian-Israeli rift, has on the contrary
complicated it by altering fundamentally those basic equations which
had hitherto been taken as permanent truisms: the fty-seven-member
Muslim world, which had always regarded the existence of Israel as an
aront to it, has split into two rival parties in Gazathe supposedly
moderate who opposed the Hamas, due to the dangers it poses to
their own regimes, and the vitriolically extremist, who would battle
to the nish against Israel and much of the world. Te Arab world, as
it is encompassed by the Arab League, has never been so divided and
so chaotic, as reected in the two parallel, and rivaling Arab Summits
that took place in Kuwait and Doha; the Palestinian front, has in fact
two separate territories (the West Bank and Gaza), and two separate
and rival governments (PLO and Hamas), rendering any negotiation of
any other party with the Palestinians to seek any settlement, unfeasible.
War does not decide who is right, it decides who is left, and those are
the lingering factors with which Israel and the world have to deal with.
Te battle of Gaza did not grow in a vacuum; it was the fruit of the
mindlessness of several successive Israeli governments, beginning in
1993, who foolishly, though innocently, believed that the Palestin-
ians were ready for self-government, and that if they were accorded
territory and economic development, peace would descent on earth.
Both assumptions were proven erroneous, but the Israeli leaders who
harnessed all their and their countrys future to that nave assump-
tion, were never decent enough to acknowledge in public their fatal
mistakes and to move away from the purview of the people who had
elected them, but have meanwhile awakened and changed course well
before them, while they continue to lead into the impasse, or to drift
uncontrollably into the abyss. Te failure of the Oslo Accords (1993)
has not only demonstrated that the Palestinians were as yet unprepared
for agreement with Israel, as evidenced by the Camp David Conference
of 2000, in which they refused to sign the nality of the conict even
when Israel oered to withdraw from 97 percent of the territory; but
that they are also unprepared for self-rule. Tey declared free elections
in 2005, but when the Hamas was elected, they never accepted it in
reality. When Hamas took over by force Gaza, it actually established
its own hegemony there, against the wish of the President, Abu Mazen,
whose rule, just like the rule of all other Arab dictators, lacks legitimacy,
especially after his term of o ce expired o cially (January 2009) and
no new elections were set or agreed upon. In the meantime, his rule in
the West Bank, which in fact does not extend beyond Ramallah, can be
255
maintained only due to Israeli security preponderance in the area that
prevents the Hamas from taking over. In confrontations between PLO
and Hamas in Gaza, PLO people were murdered, jailed, humiliated,
and even thrown to their death from the high rise buildings in Gaza,
recently built for slightly dierent purposes.
After the failure of the 2000 Camp David Conference, but still en-
trenched in the illusions of Oslo, that by making further concessions
to the Arabs, they might mellow and come to settlements with Israel,
the latter adopted a series of unilateral withdrawals, rst from Lebanon
(2000), which allowed the Hizbullah to build up in preparation for
2006, and then from Gaza (2005), which allowed the Hamas takeover
and the creation or a forward Iranian base, sponsored by the victorious
Hizbullah and under its guidance and tutorship. Oslo was a dead corpse
by then, but those defeatist governments of Israel continued to claim
that they were negotiating a settlement with the Palestinians. Which
ones? Not those who held the eective rule in Gaza and showered on
Israel seven thousand missiles since the latter erroneously and naively
ceded territory to them and continued to deny to Israel the right to
exist and to terrorize its citizens; but those who had no actual power,
but continued nonetheless to demand that Jerusalem be divided, and
that the Palestinians be accorded the right of return, namely to inundate
Israel with enough Palestinians to drown it.
Te Israeli elections of February 10, 2009 broke that deadlock, as
the attraction of the right kept mounting among the electorate, and as
the Egyptians, the Saudis, and the Jordanians, who had much to fear
for their imsy governments that lack legitimacy, were pushed into a
coalition of convenience with the Israelis, in the face of the immense,
and growing, popularity of Ahmadinejad and Nasrallah in the Arab and
Muslim street in general. But once the date was set for those elections,
the main parties in power, who feared the loss of the reins thereof, sud-
denly remembered that Hamas, which had been smuggling through
tunnels and accumulating illegal weapons, prohibited under the Oslo
Accords, in whose name they were operating, and shelling Israel
without reprieve in the past few years, was now threatening the Israeli
public, who could no more accept the repeated, but vain, promises of
the Israeli government that it would move soon, and that the move
had become inevitable. Never had the terms of soon and inevitable
been so hollow. Until election day was announced, Hamas, learning
from the Hizbullah experience, turned Gaza into a civilian trap; its
children, journalists, foreign workers, and innocent citizens into its
256
shield; the foreign institutions, mosques, schools, and hospitals into
arms depots; Gazas underground into a complex web of tunnels that
began or ended inside houses; and innocent looking apartment build-
ings into deadly booby-traps. Te tragic death of so many non-involved
civilians and the destruction of so many non-military targets did not
emanate from the will of the Israeli army to devastate them, but from
the necessity to put an end to that rain of missiles that were launched
from those houses. Israel set out to destroy depots of illegally smuggled
in weapons, of ammunition and missiles, and the launching pads of
the missiles, and if they happened to have been placed, purposely, by
the Hamas, in mosques, schools, or apartment buildings, then those
were hit and destroyed. Te main goal of the Hamas and its supporters
was attained to demonize the Zionists and delegitimize Israel so as to
make justiable its destruction.
Many media reports inimical to Israel tried to evaluate the relative
guilt on both sides of the divide by measuring the tragic amount of
killing and devastation, coming to the conclusion that since many more
Palestinian casualties lost their lives and much more Palestinian real
estate was demolished that meant that Israel was more guilty, acted out
of proportion, and was even accused of genocide, yet another way to
delegitimize it and justify its demise. It was as if after the German blitz
on London and Coventry, the British would be blamed for attening the
city of Dresden on Valentine Day, 1945, killing more innocent citizens
and destroying more real estate than did the Germans in Britain. To kill
more does not make one a culprit, and to be killed more does not make
one innocent. Te judgment has to be made by the volume of re and
by the intention of its shooters. When the Hamas pointed those seven
thousand missiles to Israel, they were intended to fall in the center of
cities and towns and to kill whomever was hit. Most fell in the open,
by chance or failure, not by design, and when their targets were hit,
they found the citizens, who had been trained by frequent alerts, in the
shelters that were built and prepared to protect them. Tat resulted in a
minimum of casualties and of damages. In sum, the Palestinian attempt,
sustained by the rest of the Arabs and Muslims, that anti-Israeli fervor
emanated from Israels cruelty and uncivilized conduct during that
war, had no leg to stand on. It existed before and will persist after that
war. Pretexts for hating and lying will never be exhausted.
In Gaza, all the millions of nancial aid coming from the outside
were invested in weapons, not one penny for shelters or civil defense;
no provision was made to alert people or to warn them. Hence the
257
inordinate disproportion in casualties between the parties, not the evil
of the one and the innocent victimhood of the other. Quite the contrary,
those who claim innocence were guilty of a priori sacricing their ci-
vilian population, and those who are accused of wanton destruction,
took all the necessary precautions and risks of battling from house to
house, instead of simply razing entire areas by artillery and air force
without taking any risk. A reporter of Al-Arabiya was caught on tape
as telling her editors on the telephone, from the rooftop of the foreign
correspondents building in Gaza that she saw a missile red from the
lower levels of the building. But her station only reported the denial of
the foreign correspondents association, to the eect that their building
was hit by design of the Israelis. Te same scenario worked for the
UNRWA building. In this regard, the Hamas strategy was a stunning
success, inasmuch as they succeeded in triggering a painful war and
then blaming its unfortunate results on the victors. Many more Japa-
nese defenders were killed in Iwo Jima, Guadelcanal, the Philippines,
and Okinawa than American attackers. But after Pearl Harbor, which
triggered the Pacic War, no one can accuse the Americans of aggres-
sion or warmongering. To round up this comparison, one should add
that never did the Japanese threaten the very existence of the United
States, they just challenged it hegemony in Pacic waters, while the
stated goal of the Hamas is to annihilate Israel in order to replace it.
On the inter Arab front, all Arab countries duly fullled their duty
of siding with Gaza and harshly criticizing and demonizing Israel,
though many of them in fact supported the defeat of the Hamas. Even
Egypt, who did the most to show understanding to the Israeli opera-
tion, because of the direct threat Hamas posed to the Cairo regime if it
emerged successful in the showdown with Israel, due to its links with
the Muslim Brothers opposition to Mubarak, in public reproached
to Israel its arrogance and aggression against the Palestinians.
European media, as usual, were impressed by the body count and the
intensity of the devastation, and made no attempt to reason about the
meaning of disproportion. Should have Israel launched seven thou-
sand missiles blindly into Gaza, for the proportion to be redressed?
Ten there would have been no Gaza to lament about, or a pretext to
lash out at Israel anymore. On the Islamic front, which also, predict-
ably, blamed Israel without investigating the root of the crisis, Turkey,
which had been in the previous decade a close ally of Israel, joined the
noisy cacophony of blind condemnation of the Jewish state, without
even attempting to inject any sense of balance into the picture. Israelis
258
were shocked to see the cracks of crisis deepening in the previously
friendly relations. It was convenient for them to forget, that since
the elections of 2002, Turkey had fallen into the hands of Islamists,
and that even its more important alliance with the United States has
known strain since. Te Erdoan-Gl government did not move im-
mediately upon its ascendance to downgrade the relations with Israel,
only because of the secularist military who would not permit it. But
as this government gathers popularity and years, it has been gradually
putting its own men at the helm of the supreme command of the army,
to make sure that what happened in 1998 to their predecessor and
mentor, Necmettin Erbakan, who was removed from power and his
party delegitimized, should not recur to them. In the meantime, they
get more and more intimate with Iran, Syria, the Palestinians, especially
Hamas, an alliance not likely to improve Israels standing in their eyes
and likely to pursue its campaign of delegitimation against it.
No other Arab nation has captured the essence of its hatred toward
Israel and the Jews as the Palestinians did in their very prolic poetry,
which found refuge in its verse, as no other achievements, in terms of
territory and nationhood have as yet been obtained. Poetic lies must
be as great, hallucinatory, and phantasmagorial as poetry itself, hence
their celebration in the Palestinian o cial media and gatherings of
poetry recitation, their ritual memorizing by children and adults alike,
and the frequent invocation of the verses by public speakers, be they
clerics, politicians, or intellectuals. Tey seem to nd in the power of
the word, which is said and emphasized in the intimacy of like-mind-
ed listeners, a substitute that makes up for the misery of the day and
a fulllment of desires even when not met by the harsh reality. Te
expressions of hatred and the fabrication of lies are given free hand
under these circumstances, not only as the usual free license of poets,
but also as a reection of the deep sentiment of frustration, as if they
were a social safety valve to avoid explosions. Tis sort of poetry is
reminiscent of the great Soviet poets, like Yevgeniy Yevtushenko, who
in the dark years of Stalin and his successors could voice in poetry what
they could not say in common speech, and their artistic and theatrical
recitations, which not only attracted large audiences and lasted hours
on the one hand, but also elicited acceptance and leniency on the part
of the authorities on the other.
Te gamut of themes tackled by this mobilized poetry, which also
provides the lyrics for many morale-propping nationalistic songs, per-
formed by the most popular singers, is great, from Holocaust denial to
259
self-strengthening, from incitement to violence to rewriting history.
Here we shall focus on the most salient manifestations of anti-Jewish
and anti-Israeli hatred and the fabrication of lies they occasion, like
invariably treating the Israelis as the treacherous aggressors even
when a violent clash is triggered by the Palestinians.
6
Apparently based
on an Egyptian song, which was repeatedly broadcast on Palestinian
TV, blaming the Zionists for killing your doves in your sacred areas
and urging the Palestinians to attack the snakes head,
7
a Palestinian
song, addressing the same theme and performed in front of the Fatah
leadership under the heading: Te Enemy and a Snake, picked up
almost the same words: Te Zionists are killing your doves in your
scared area ... I want to go and be with you, and with you attack the
snakes head.
8
Incidentally, the same PA TV reported and showed
a Palestinian art piece that depicted Israel as a monster impaling
Palestinian babies and devouring them,
9
while the TV host was explain-
ing that the artist is dealing with the Palestinian nations problems.
On another occasion, the same words of hatred reverberated: Oh
enemy, oh my enemy. Stop your crimes. My enemy, Oh snake! You
are coiled around the land. We, noble and courageous, on the Day of
battle we shall stand ... You have no choice, Oh enemy, but to leave
my country ...
10

Frustration at the inability to achieve possession of all Palestine
nourishes the hope that the national goals will be somehow achieved
in the future. Tese hopes are best expressed in poetry, which when
widespread enough among the populace also feeds the hatred toward
Israel and the Jews who are perceived as the obstacle toward the real-
ization of these aspirations. One of those poems tells the story:
... How can I tolerate the harm of my enemys malice?
How can I endure his aggression?
Would fear stop me if it is easy to sacrice my life?
Am I humble? I simply can endure no scorn!
With my own heart Ill ght the enemy;
My heart of steel, my ravenous ames
Ill stalk my land with the blade of this sword
So my people know I am their defender ...
11

While the PA leadership approves of the hate-lled messages de-
livered on the Palestinian o cial media and participates in events
dedicated to the memory of murderous terrorists who killed innocent
Israeli citizens, Hamas messages, including poetry and songs, reecting
260
the views of the other half of the Palestinian people, are often authored
by the Hamas leadership itself. It is not only that Hamas leaders are
more lyrically inclined than their PA colleagues-rivals, but they also
feel perhaps more personally committed to their cause, and since they
have no double game to play in the absence of any interaction with
Israelis, they can also be more straightforward and one-track minded
when they express their sentiments toward their enemies. In fact, two
of the most inuential leaders, Abd-al Aziz Rantisi and Ibrahim Ma-
qadmeh, were also mobilized poets, who brandished their venomous
words as well as their swords until they were liquidated by Israel, not
for their remarkable poetic prociency and rhetorical skills, but for
their terrorist activities. Rantisi published a collection, A Conversation
with the Self , while Maqadmeh published his Do not Steal the Sun. Atef
al-Shaer contends
12
since the Hamas emerged from the womb of the
Muslim Brotherhood, it became the predominant force among the
Palestinians in view of the unpopular peace process with Israel. In this
context, the leaders of the Hamas shaped its vision and encouraged a
poetry linked to Islamic ideology, thus distancing itself from the secular
Palestinian poetry cited above. One has to say, nonetheless, that even
in that secular poetry numerous were the Islamic themes that crept
in, like martyrology. However, Hamas regularly publishes poetry on
its website and since it seized power in Gaza in 2006, there has been
an increase of poetry by Hamas members.
13

Martyrdom operations, which have been erroneously dubbed in
the West as suicide bombings, are rather based on the Hamas fear-
lessness from death, as encapsulated in its Charter, which a rms that
the Hamas joins arms with all those who wage Jihad for the liberation
of Palestine. Te souls of its Jihad ghters meet the souls of all those
Jihad ghters who sacriced their lives for the land of Palestine, from
the time when the Prophets Companions conquered it until the pres-
ent. Tis is backed unequivocally by the Quran itself, where Allah
was supposed to have said: Allah has bought from the Believers their
lives and their wealth, because the Garden [of Eden] will be theirs;
they shall ght in the Way of Allah and shall slay and be slain.
14
Tis
conrmation of the desirability of martyrdom was also backed by the
Prophet as recounted in the Hadith where he was reported to have said:
Nobody who dies and nds good from Allah would wish to come back
to this world, even if he were given the whole world and whatever is
in it, except the martyr, who on seeing the superiority of martyrdom,
would like to come back to the world and get killed again [in the Path
261
of Allah].
15
Hence statements by the Hamas of eternal hatred toward
Jews and Israel and stern assurances by its leaders that recognition of
Israel contradicted the Quran,
16
and that the Hamas is dedicated to
eliminate the state of Israel.
17
In November 2012, during the eight-day
confrontation between Israel and Hamas, known as Pillar of Defense,
the latter aired its ideological messages on its o cial al-Aqsa TV station,
with its recurring message calling for killing Jews, which was dened
as a religious act in worship of Allah. Te rest of these aggressive and
annihilationist lyrics were:
Oh lovers of the trigger
Killing the occupiers
18
is worship that Allah made into law
Arise, oh determined men
Te color of [the martyrs] blood protects the land
Oh masked one wearing wearing a keyyeh (an Arab head cover)
Terrifying the Jews ... call out in the Zionists face:
Muhammeds army has begun to return ...
[Addressing Israelis] your body parts are scattered everywhere
Te cemeteries await you ...
Destroy the usurpers dens and set re to the oppressors
Trough training and preparations, you roar, Oh lion of the Qassam
brigades
It is in your hands to get our country back
And then we will raise the banner of Islam ...
Repeat in the name of your Jihad: Death to Israel ...
Destroy Israel, the house of absolute evil
And the enemies of humanity ...
19

As if stating its blunt anti-Israeli messages was not enough, the
Hamas also resorted to its disinformation, as we have seen above, for
example, complaining about Israeli occupation of the Gaza Strip while
its leaders had repeatedly conrmed that occupation had ended in 2005,
as it indeed did. Tat was not the only manufactured lie. Al-Aqsa TV
also falsely claimed that due to its successful missile attack on Israel,
it forced it to close down its Ben Gurion international airport and to
redirect incoming planes to a secret base in northern Israel. No such
event was recorded or noticed in Israel, and no one could detect the
identity of that secret base. Te Hamas also boasted that its attacks
on Tel Aviv had cut o electricity supply to Tel Aviv, but no one there
has noticed any electricity shortage. On the same occasion, the Hamas
boasted that the Iron Dome system, which they had forced Israel to de-
velop due to lethal eectiveness of their bombing and shelling of Israeli
262
cities, was in fact a paper dome despite the fortune it cost, but they
did not explain why after eight days of confrontation with Israel, they
yielded to Egyptian mediation which imposed on them the renewal of
their commitment to a cease-re.
20

Religiously inspired hatred is not the exclusive domain of the Hamas,
as already hinted above with the example of the encouragement of mar-
tyrdom. Understanding the powerful mobilizing force of Islam, the PA
has been reluctant to leave that entire domain to its lethal rival and has
chosen to compete with Hamas on its own grounds. Nothing is easier
and more eective than dripping that poison by means of innocent
children, who probably have no grasp of what they say on their national
TV on the one hand, but have a tremendous eect on their audiences on
the other. One harrowing sample will su ce to make the point, culled
from the popular PA TV show Te Best Home, where a young girl
was made to recite the poem that treated the Jews as Allahs enemies
and the sons of pigs, who deled the Quran, murdered children, cut
o their limbs and raped the women in the city squares. Some time
ago, some Palestinians had a hard time to explain that unlike in other
conict situations, not a single case of rape of Palestinian women was
registered in this instance, and some of them concluded that it was
not due to Israeli self-restrain, discipline or good morals, but to the
innate Israeli racist contempt of and disgust from Arab women. And
now, suddenly, their unbridled wild instincts lead them to public rapes
in the city squares. Not only the lies are crying to the sky, but more
so the insensitivity and the obtuseness of the TV programmers who
lend more importance to doubtful propaganda gains over the hurt this
might cause to infants who are prompted to recite, memorize, and
internalize this horror. Tis text deserves to be aired more extensively.
Recited the girl, Hadeel:
Allah created me and shaped me
He made me prouder and made me a Palestinian
He made deance ow like blood in my veins
And I made the revolution burst forth like clay stones
I raised the ags of certain victory
Allahs Book and the tradition of the most esteemed of Prophets ...
I called in the voice of hidden justice
I lit a re like volcanoes under their feet
I refused to be submissive and degraded
I rejected everything but dying with the life-giving honor
From a nation that has forgotten Muslims heroism.
Umar Ibn al-Khattab and Saladin ...
263
I sing Long Live the nation of Fatah and Yasser Arafat
Allahs enemies, the sons of pigs
Have destroyed and uprooted the olive and g trees
Tey murdered children with guns, like snakes
Tey cut o their limbs with stones and knives
Tey raped the women in the city squares
Tey deled Allahs Book in front of millions
Where is the nation of Islam?
Where are the nation of Islam and the Jihad ghters?
Where is the fear of Allah in Jerusalem, which has been deled by
the Zionists?
21

Te moderator, an adult supposedly in his right mind, could not
contain his enthusiasm at this chilling, if innocent, performance, and
burst into the screen with calls of: Bravo, applause, applause to Ha-
deel, probably unaware of the implications of his and her accomplished
feat, or constrained by his authorities to conform. In eect, Palestinian
Authority Chairman, Mahmoud Abbas, himself, watching his author-
ity waning and Hamas popularity soar, has embraced the lies of his
Palestinian rivals as his own and has pushed forward the promotion
of the hoax that Israel is scheming and acting to destroy the Al-Aqsa
Mosque in Jerusalem. In an interview, Abbas also added that the Arab
and Islamic world should be doing more to respond to Israels plans. He
said: All these [Israeli] actions indicate an evil and dangerous plot to
destroy Al-Aqsa [Mosque] and build the alleged Temple. Unfortunately,
these dangers, which are clear for everyone to see, have yet to receive
proper Arab, Islamic and international responses. Abbas reference to
the alleged Temple is part of the language the PA routinely uses to
deny Israels history in Jerusalem and refers to the false PA claim that
there never was a Jewish Temple on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.
Abbas presents taking Jerusalem from Israel as an Islamic mandate.
In a speech at the Arab Summit in 2010, Abbas told Arab leaders that
taking Jerusalem away from Israel is a religious Islamic obligation of
the highest level, a fard ayn a personal Islamic commandment
incumbent on every Muslim.
22
Abbas has also cited his Islamic beliefs
as an indicator that Israel will not endure in Jerusalem. According to
him, Jerusalem is only Islamic and therefore Israels capital is destined
to be under Islam: An oppressor will not last in Jerusalem; oppression
will not endure. Victory will come, Allah willing. Tis land is Allahs
best land, for which He chooses the nest of His believers, as was said
by the Prophet.
23

264
Te PAs policy to deny Israels history is exemplied by an o cial
PA TV News story about excavations near the Western Wall, which
reported that Israeli archeologists falsify historical facts because
the Temple existed only in the minds of radical organizations. Tey
propagate the delusory story that deep underground beneath the
Al-Aqsa Mosque, theres an Israeli race against the clock to com-
plete the excavations in search of Jerusalems Temple that exists only
in the minds of radical organizations ... Tey falsify historical facts
by linking them to Jewish history, the traces of which dont exist in
our land. Tese stories are supported and diused by the religious
authority of the Mufti of Jeruslam, who is himself appointed by the
head of the PA. Te Mufti, Muhammad Hussein, on PA TV News
likewise denied Jewish history in Jerusalem by announcing that Jews
want to say or suggest that this place (the Temple Mount) was once,
according to their claim, a Temple. However, in truth, there never
was a Temple in any period, nor was there, at any time, any place of
worship for the Jews or others at the Al-Aqsa Mosque site (i.e., built
on the Temple Mount, 705 CE).
24
Te Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and
the Palestinian territories, Sheikh Muhammad Hussein, summoned
citizens to the Al-Aqsa Mosque in order to ll it and defend it, es-
pecially in light of recent threats from extremist settlers and senior
Israeli o cials who called for an invasion of the mosque and to impose
Israeli sovereignty over it in order to build their alleged Temple.
25
Had
Israel wished to do all that, it could have been easily achieved during
the heat of the war in June 1967, when during the artillery and air at-
tacks the Mosque could have been raised. In fact, out of consideration
for the holy places, the Israeli military took the harsher and costlier
way of assaulting the Old City of Jerusalem by infantry, thus sparing
destruction.
It is worthwhile examining in more detail Abu Mazens interview
with a consummately Islamic Saudi paper, to realize the Islamic appeal
that he wished to acquire in the eyes of the Islamic world, in view of
the competition the Hamas oered on that score:
Q: Jewish organizations are making frantic eorts, both visible and
hidden, to complete the Judaizing of the Al-Aqsa [Mosque] and to
take control of it, especially following the recurring invasions of
Al-Aqsa and the attacks on worshipers. What aect do you think this
has [both] on the Palestinian level and on the regional level? And do
you think that the Arab and Islamic responses are at the adequate
level?
265
A: Weve said on several occasions that Al-Aqsa is in danger because
the excavations Israel is conducting in the Haram (i.e., the Temple
Mount) and beneath its foundations put it in danger of collapse.
Likewise, preventing West Bank Palestinian worshipers from entering
the Mosque and giving free rein to radical Jews to enter its courtyards
and conduct their religious ceremoniesall these actions indicate
an evil and dangerous plot to destroy Al-Aqsa and build the alleged
Temple. Unfortunately, these dangers, which are clear for everyone
to see, have yet to receive proper Arab, Islamic and international re-
sponses. Most countries have not implemented the Arab and Islamic
Summits resolutions for providing assistance to Jerusalems residents
and institutions.
26

One of the most regrettable and pathetic eorts made by the PAs
to promote fear from the Israeli and a passionate hatred toward them
has been the intensive attempt to indoctrinate children. We have seen
above a sample of using children in the national media to make the
indoctrination more credible by its naivete and more indelible by the
deep mark it leaves on their soft and impressionable souls. Te end
result will be that it will become irreversible, even if at some point the
older generation of the present leadership should accept to make partial
and/or provisional peaceful arrangements with Israel. For children who
are cultivated and groomed in that atmosphere of hostility, assure for
ever that no change can come about and no ambience of forgiving and
reconciliation can be introduced into this di cult and prolonged con-
ict. Te Palestinian leadership on its part, in a spirit of vengeance and
hostility, wishes to make sure that the refugees remain in their camps
for the fth and sixth generation, their hearts brewing with hatred and
their minds sizzling with aggression. Te ways to achieve that bigoted
goal are many, from demeaning Jews and comparing them to animals,
a level of existence understood by children, to frightening children of
their evil. No other aspect of Palestinian propaganda has attracted so
much attention and destructive creativity as this one. A few examples
will clarify the point:
1. Te daily Filastin , which reects the views of Hamas circles and
routinely publishes anti-Semitic materials, surpassed itself when
it published an article in April 2013 accusing the Jews, as usu-
al, of all problems of the world, geared to justify the hatred they
attracted from all quarters throughout the generations. Major sins
were credited to them like killing prophets, behaving with con-
ceit and fraud, and causing the major upheavals and unrest ( tna )
266
everywhere they were given shelter, especially in the Islamic world
where they have triggered troubles throughout history. Te medie-
val expulsion of Jews from Britain and France were the result of their
evil attempts to take over the countries they resided in; therefore,
they are to be blamed for all the persecutions they suered. In a
wording that pretends scholarship and knowledge, but full of hatred
and bigotry stemming from abysmal ignorance. He recognizes
that since the Napoleonic conquest of the Holy Land, the Jews
were encouraged to return there, to buy lands and learn agricul-
ture. Tus, the author doubts whether after this history of Jewish
rancor and hostility toward Arabs and Muslims, there can be any
peaceful settlement withthem, which he terms as a delusory grand
scheme of deceit embraced by some materially interested Arabs and
Palestinians.
27

2. Te Balfour declaration was an ideal solution to get rid of the Jews,
claim Palestinian media, in line with their perennial explanation
that Zionism was a plot born in Europe to rid it from Jews. Of
course, Europe could not bear Jewish innate corruption. Here we
have an example of Arabs and Muslims projecting their own prob-
lems on Jews, instead of acknowledging the many deciencies which
put their societies in permanent chaos and their authoritarian rulers
in deep and irremediable corruption. Tey seem to believe that if
the blame is transferred to Jews and their own traits of character
are attributed to Jews, they themselves would thereby not only be
exonerated from any fault, but also their own culture of hatred, lies,
and bigotry would become ipso facto acceptable and understood by
the world.
28

3. Ten, Jewish innate evil traits are attributed to Cain, Adams rst
son who murdered his son Abel. Openly anti-Semitic articles in the
PA major organs in fact unabashedly repeat the same racist non-
sense, without anyone having the decency to refute them or calling
attention to the bigotry inherent in them. One of those articles, by
Sheikh Fleifel, writing in the o cial PA daily section on religion in
the PA paper, tells us that the struggle between truth and falsehood
is as ancient on earth as earth itself.... Yet Islam has been targeted
from its beginnings by its enemies ... Prime Minister Ben Gurion
had stood before the UN, after it granted recognition to malignant
cancerous growth known as the state of Israel ... But the Jews only
talk through their distorted, corrupted, falsied religion which they
have adopted, which they glorify and honor ... Te conict Between
us and the Jews is not about land and borders, but rather a conict
about faith and existence.
29
Te same hatred-lled ignoramus,
who teaches hatred instead of religion to the Palestinians, found
267
relevance to recount the story of Cain and Abel, due to its similarity
to Jewish crimes. He specied: the Jews, by throwing o their yoke
followed in the footsteps of the rst person who threw the yoke of
Allah, namely Cain, by killing the pure soul of Abel as the Zionist
Jews kill every day the Palestinian people.
30
Another genius of that
category wrote in the same daily: Tere was no period of history
where any other nation has acted with such recklessness, expelling
and spilling blood, as the Zionist movement did in Palestine. He
apparently never heard of the Armenian massacre by the Ottoman
Muslims or the Jewish Holocaust by the Nazis, or even what is
happening in Syria daily, when this heap of lies was being diused
among the Palestinian readership. He concluded, again in a blunt
exhibition of his total misunderstanding of world events, that:
Zionism is an extreme religious ideology whose aim is political
hegemony and the transformation of a Jewish monarchy in Palestine
into a basis for their eternal rule over the world, and that the Gen-
tiles should submit their will which draws from the will of Allah.
31

4. Tat is not exactly the mood of people who wish to live peaceful-
ly with their neighbors, to recognize them and to accept them.
Quite the contrary, it instills in its readers, coming from a religious
authority, the absolute resolution to ght their evil enemy to the
nish, since there is not a chance of settling with that monster.
Even if and when the Palestinian leadership decides to reverse that
position, it will nd itself trapped in its own sewer propaganda,
from which it will not be able to disengage. Te same organ of the
PA pursue routinely, as a matter of course, abuses of the Jews and
Judaism, which seem to have no other purpose than humiliation,
degradation, and demeaning of its enemies, like while the Palestin-
ian cities were celebrating their Spring with dance and song and the
fake Muslim-Christian unity in the city of Bethlehem where most
Christians have ed for their lives, the contemporaneous Jewish
holiday of Passover is considered as the festival of the monkeys.
32

Te Hamas TV Channel even bettered that statement by hurling
against the Jews the descendents of monkeys and pigs, that they
were desecrating the holiness of Jerusalem and praying to Allah
that He may take care of the throats of the Jews, to be slushed one
by one, not leaving one of them on Palestinian land.
33
Despicable
cartoons, portraying Jews like the Jews as blood thirsty criminals, or
as decaying entities, sporting hideous gures taken from the worst
anti-Semitic propaganda, at times citing Israeli critiques like author
Sami Michael, to exemplify its racism and short life expectancy,
and urging Arabs and Muslims to rise in order to Smash the head
of the snake.
34

268
5. Children are particularly targeted to cultivate the idea that the Jews
are monsters, Satan personied, who have to be feared, alienated,
demeaned, and despised. A Palestinian Mayor, Mustafa Fuqaha of
Ein al-Bayda in the Jordan Valley, accused the Israelis of leaving
behind explosives shaped like pens and toys after their exercises, in
order to tempt children to touch them or pick them up.
35
Tis libel
is not new, it was already voiced during the Second Intifada (2000
2003), together with other libels which falsely accused the Israelis of
using depleted uranium ammunition, geared to maim Palestinians
and of distributing a sexual desire-raising chewing gum in the Arab
world in order to corrupt the morality of decent Muslim wom-
en. Another fabricated lie claimed that in a new step to kill more
children, the occupation forces threw large quantities of poisoned
candies in front of schools. Salem Ahmed, a medic, said that when
he collected ten pieces of these unwrapped candies, he felt the rub-
ber glove on his hand melting, in addition to experiencing breathing
di culties, stron headaches and dizziness.
36

6. A popular song, repeatedly presented on PA TV and entitled
Strike a Blow at Tel-Aviv does not only threaten destruction on
that city and pledge that the more you build it we shall destroy it,
at a time when the Oslo Accords, which supposedly put an end to
violence are still valid, and peace negotiations are taking place,
but it boasts that we have downed their airplanes and lled their
air raid shelters. Tere are also racist connotations in the phrase:
Tose low lives are not the same blood as me, which means that we
shall strike with Qassam missiles, and not let the Zionists sleep ...
Even if they beg for mercy be sure not to show Tel-Aviv any mercy
...
37
All these incitements to bombard the enemy and not let it rest
are based on the assumption that Israelis spread drugs to destroy
Palestinian society, trying to escape the fact that most drugs smug-
gled into Israel come from Arab sources. Arabs liberally cite Iranian
Vice President Rahimi who said that the Talmud was responsible
for international drug tra cking, and no less than ve articles in
July, 2012 have expressed the rage of PA o cials who accused Israel
of adopting a policy of hooking Arab youth on the use of drugs.
38

Tese accusations, based on delusionary fallacies, also include: that
Israel murdered Arafat, seeks to destroy al-Aqsa, steals organs from
Palestinians for transplant, carried out Nazi-style experiments on
prisoners, planned to expel Arabs from Jerusalem, murdered and
poisoned its enemies and replicates Nazi crimes, and injected Aids
to Palestinian children.
39
Who then wishes to spare any Israeli or
Jew? Tey all deserve annihilation.
269
7. Paradoxically, it seems that Palestinians and Israelis were closer to
peace before Oslo than thereafter. Te reason is that with the insti-
tution of the PA under Oslo, the systematic campaigns of incitement
against Israel, as detailed above, especially for children under the
guise of education, have considerably precipitated the initial dislike
of Jews and Israelis among the Palestinians into an abysmally deep
and seemingly unbridgeable hatred, thus occasioning the fabrication
of lies that have grown to become part and parcel of Palestinian, and
generally Arab and Muslim, creed. Tis planned delegitimization of
Israel, often unwittingly nanced and supported by the West, has
poisoned the atmosphere to such an extent that it appears almost
irreversible.
40
For example, teaching innocent children that the
Jews killed Arafat while the PAs conduct an investigation to nd
out the truth, is a lesson in prejudice to their kids, that whatever the
truth the Jews are to blame. In the meantime, the mantra: Te Jews
poisoned him, and I hate them very much. Allah will repay them
what they deserve is repeated every year by a young Palestinian girl
during the PA TV annual rebroadcast of a program commemorating
Arafats death.
41

8. Other means of promoting hatred and lies include the hoax of
Israel using chemicals to ruin al-Aqsas foundations, as a halluci-
nating Palestinian cleric, Tayseer Tamimi declared that al-Aqsa was
hanging in the air due to Israels injecting chemical acids to dissolve
the Mosques foundations.
42
Te rst to fall to that fantasy are
children, who absorb what they are told, incredible as it may sound.
Tey (and others) are told that the ancient Wailing Wall, tradition-
ally the remain of the Western Wall of the destroyed Jewish Second
Temple, was a Muslim site and the Jews have nothing to do with it;
that Israeli cities like Haifa and Acre are Palestinian and Arab, a fact
transmitted to the youth in a song: My Beautiful Country Palestine,
taught by a music teacher
43
; that Jesus Christ was part of the trinity
Jesus-Arafat-Abbas
44
, calculated to bring in Christian support; are
all means to tempt Palestinian youngsters (and the general public for
that matter), to absorb these lies uncritically and to promote their
hatred to the Jews and Israelis who allegedly cause them deprivation
and alienation from their national treasures, to the point that a ten-
year old Palestinian girl was shown goading Israeli soldiers in order
to provoke a violent response and prove the inhumanity of Israeli
occupiers.
45
In short, since everything is mobilized in the service of
the Palestinian cause, any means is adequate, even using children
and destroying their future by lying to them and getting them accus-
tomed to lie and to hate.
270
Notes
1. R Israeli, Poison: Modern Manifestations of a Blood Libel (US: Lexington
Books, 2002); and R. Israeli, Te Blood Libel and its Derivatives (Transaction,
2012).
2. See Raphael Israeli, Te Oslo Idea: the Euphoria of Failure (New Jersey:
Transaction, 2012) .
3. PA Television, 11 May, and again June 2, 2012.
4. Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, May 6, 2013.
5. Te resurrection of Jesus, the resurrection of the state, Op-ed by Adel Abd
Al-Rahman, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, May 6, 2013.
6. See, for example, the video aired on January 20, 2012, and rebroadcast on
Palestinian TV on 1 February and March 27, 2012.
7. Tis song was originally aired on August 14, 2011, and rebroadcast on
Palestinian TV on 20 January, 26 and 27 March and May 3, 2012.
8. It was initially aired on September 4, 2011, barely a fortnight after the
Egyptian song was rst broadcast on Palestinian TV. Announced as present
during the performance were: Abbas Zaki, Member of the Fatah Central
Committee; Hanan AShrawi, PLO Executive Committee Member; Abd
al-Rahim Malluh, member of the PLO Executive Committee; and Sultan
abu-al Einein, member of the Fatah Central Committee.
9. PA TV, July 13, 2012.
10. Tis video was rst broadcast on PA TV in 2004, but was run again frequently
between October 2007 and the end of 2007.
11. Tis poem is entitled Te Martyr, authored by Abd al Raheem Mahmud,
in Te Anthology of Modern Palestinian Literature , ed. Salma Khadra Jayyusi
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1992), 21011. Translated from
Arabic by SHarif Elmusa and Naomi Shihab Nye.
12. Te Poetry of Hamas, Middle East Journal of Culture and Communication
2 (2009): 21430.
13. Ibid.
14. Quran, 9: 111.
15. Sahih al-Bukhari, Vol 4, Book 52, No 53 (see also No 54).
16. Statement by Mahmud al-Zahar, Jerusalem Post , April 20, 2007.
17. Statement by Kanaan Ubeid, Al-Risala , Gaza, October 8, 2012. Reported
by MEMRI, October 11, 2012.
18. Earlier, Hamas leaders had conrmed that since Israel had evacuated the
Gaza Strip in 2005, it was no longer occupied. See Maan News Agency,
January 3, 2012; and Jerusalem Post , January 4, 2012.
19. Excerpts from the Hamas al-Aqsa TV Station. See Itamar Marcus, and
Jacques Ziberdick, Hamas: Killing Jews is Worship of Allah, PMW Bulletin,
November 27, 2012.
20. Ibid.
21. PMW Bulletin, April 8, 2013.
22. Al-Jazeera TV, March 27, 2010.
23. Al-Hayat Al-Jadida , 11 July, 2010.
24. PA TV (Fatah), January 5, 2012.
25. Al-Hayat Al-Jadida , May 7, 2013.
26. Al-Watan , Saudi Arabia, June 3, 2013.
271
27. http://www.memri.org/cgi-webaxy/sal/sal/pl?lang=he&act=show&dbid=
articles&dataid=3362.
28. Itamar Marcus, and Jacques Ziberlick, PA TV on Jews, PMW Bulletin,
January 27, 2012.
29. Al-Hayat al-Jadida, June 3, 2011.
30. Ibid. May 13, 2011.
31. Ibid, May 15, 2011. Tat was the anniversary of the declaration of the State
of Israel 63 years earlier in 1948.
32. Ibid, April 19, 2011.
33. Al-Aqsa Channel, Hamas TV, March 5, 2010.
34. See AL Hayat al-Jadida, September 11, 2012; August 29, 2012; August 23,
2012 and July 16, 2012; PA TV, July 13, 2012; and July 2, 2012; and al-Ittihad
(the Emirates) of September 11, 2012.
35. PMW Bulletin, January 8, 2013.
36. Nothing was said, of course, of the hundreds of Palestinian children who
undergo life-saving treatment in Israeli hospitals every year. During the
Syrian civil-war, many children ee from other Arabs and Muslims who
murder them to Israel to be cared for.
37. MEMRI Special Dispatch No 5056, November 18, 2012.
38. Al Hayat al_jadida, June 24, 2010; December 9, 2011; PA TV, June 23, 2010.
39. Al-Hayat al-Jadida, June 27, 2012.
40. See Maxine Dovere, Teaching Children to Hate, Jerusalem Post , May 19,
2012.
41. Itamar Marcus and Jacques ZIberdik, Te Jews Killed Arafat: Palestinian
Kids Hate Speech in PA Annual Broadcast, PMW Bulletin, November 11,
2012.
42. Itamar Marcus, PA Libel: Israel Using Chemicals to Ruin al-Aqsas Foun-
dations, PMW Bulletin, August 7, 2012. See also PATV, June 9, 2012 and
August 3, 2012.
43. Rebroadcast repeatedly on PA TV in JanuaryApril, 2013.
44. Al-Hayat al Jadida November 30, 2012; and PA TV November 29, 2011.
45. Israel News , May 11, 2012.

Iran: Te Extremist Shiite
Example
273
7
Te Shia, being the most persecuted and loathed minority by Sunni
Islam, has also embraced an independent and extremist model of anti-
Jewish hatred, and in consequence also of lie manufacturing, which
stems both from its competition with the majority-Sunnite world for
the high ground in anti-Zionism, and from its messianic and ever-
expecting salvation and change, upon the impending return to earth
of the Hidden Imam, who will transform the entire world under its
regime of justice and plenty. Namley, in contrast with the four prevail-
ing schools of law in the Sunna, which are xed and immutable, since
their Salvador was the Prophet Mohammed, the Seal of the Prophets,
meaning that the ideal utopia had happened in the past, from which
we can only keep distancing ourselves, the Shiite hope for the return
of the Hidden Imam will happen in some indenite future, in order to
produce prosperity, justice, and happiness to all humanity. Te great
luminaries of the Sunna, which constitutes about 90 percent of all the
1.5 billion Muslims in the world, usually counsel their followers to
submit to the rule under which they live, even if it is not satisfactory
to their religious taste, for a bad ruler is always superior to chaos, since
in disorder no Islam at all can function. Te Shiite scholars, on the
contrary, have always been rebellious, especially when they were not in
power. Tis restlessness, which has always been tinged with messianic
and utopian elements, has lent to the Shia the fanatic characters that
we today identify in the Islamic Revolution, which Ruhollah Khomeini
has brought about in 1978.
Te Twelver Shia, which rules Iran today, had always promoted a
particularly fanatic attitude toward Jews and dhimmis in general, due
to matters of Impurity of Unbelievers professed among its follow-
ers. It is well known, for example, that in medieval and early modern
Iran under the Shia, Christianity was almost totally extirpated from
274
the land, while the large Jewish community suered limitations such
as prohibition of walking outdoor when it rained or snowed, for fear
of infecting the environment with their impurity.
1
Justice and purity
will precipitate the coming of the Imam Mahdi, so those who block
the way to redemption, such as the impure Jews, are to be discarded.
Te fact that this dream did not come to pass in Tehran yet does not
judge negatively the missed and unfullled utopia; this is what by the
nature of what Max Weber had called the routinization of the cha-
risma, or what others usually name the deed that distorts and cor-
rupts the ideal, or what revolutionaries have elected to express in the
dichotomies of theory and practice, doctrine and praxis, ideology
and organization, or the wings of vision vs. the feet of reality. Te
battle goes on until the goal is attained. While in theory the Jews
have a place as dhimmis in the Muslim order, in Shiite Islam they are
much less tolerated and the hatred and contempt toward them much
more accentuated than in Sunni Islam. Hence, the much more aggres-
sion and many more aggravated statements of outright annihilation
toward Jews in Iran, under the guise of anti-Zionism, than one can
nd in Sunnite Islam, save among the radical kind of it, like al-Qaida
and the Muslim Brothers, where masters like Sayyid Qutb have left
their imprint.
Te Shia has always been embroiled in rifts and dierences, not only
with its enemies but also within itself. Classical Shia, which was usually
persecuted by its Sunnite environment, learned to bear its suering
quietly and passively, and carried out its rituals within its mosques or
in public without provoking the rulers or the general Muslim popu-
lation, especially before there was a Shiite state after the dissolution
of the Fatimid Empire in Egypt in the twelfth century. In Safavid Iran
(sixteenth to eighteenth centuries), Twelver Shia was nally established
as the o cial faith of the Empire, and in new Iran, where the Empire was
revived under the Shah, the Shiite clergy, in contrast with the Sunnite,
which has no clerical hierarchy, was hierarchical all right, but as an
institutional religion,
2
namely it did not depend on the state for exis-
tence and did not ll any o cial role in the government. Te rationale
was overwhelming in its simplicity: In view of the belief that it was the
Hidden Imam who managed the aairs of the world from his hiding,
the proper functioning of society would be impossible without some
sort of spiritual contact with him in order to receive guidance from
him. Not every Mulla (cleric) is capable of maintaining such a supreme
contact with the Hidden Imam; therefore only the most senior among
Iran
275
them, who do not exceed two dozens in each generation, and who
earned the title of Ayatullah (the Sign of Allah), and were so designated
thanks to their scholarship, knowledge, and spiritual state, do deserve
this status. A handful of them, the most pathbreaking and imposing
by their leadership, like Khomeini himself, were titled Ayatullah Uzma
(Super-Ayatullah), who lead this select group and dominate it without
challenge. Other senior clerics, with the titles of Hujat al-Islam (mil-
itant for Islam, like for instance the second President Akbar Hashemi
Rafsanjani), and lower Mullas, aspire all their lives to advance in the
ladder of the hierarchy as in the Catholic Church, and the higher the
clerical rank, the more imposing his spiritual impact on society. Even
after the Islamic Revolution, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is more
inuential that his predecessor President Mohammad Hatami in spite
of the latter being one of the few Ayatollahs while the former has no
rank in the clergy. Conversely, Supreme Leader Imam al-Khamenei,
who is not among the top clerics, is the man whose decisions count
the most. In both Iran and Iraq, where the status of the Ayatollahs
was not dominant until recently, the Mullas were inuential spiritual
leaders but without any eect on state aairs, because they were often
executed by Saddam Hussein or incarcerated, or exiled by the Shah.
Ayatollah Khomeini changed this, at least at the doctrinal level. He
had begun to develop his revolutionary ideas under the Shah, which
had they not preceded the Spring by one generation or more, could
have served as its precursor, if one considers their audacious lan,
their out-of-the-box thinking, and their far-reaching political con-
sequences. Te rst thoughts that Khomeini started to develop cost
him, inter alia, fteen years (19631978) of exile in Najaf, Iraq, one of
the holy places of the Shia, being the site where Ali, the First Imam,
is buried, where he brought to completion and published his Islamic
Revolution where he outlined his positions and plan of action. He was
then compelled to leave by Saddam, who had sealed with the Shah an
agreement on the border between the two countries in the middle of
the mighty Shatt al-Arab, where the Tigris and the Euphrates converge
before they pour into the Arab/Persian Gulf. Te main thought that
would have appealed to the Muslim crowds today would have been the
need to eradicate the tyrant rulers and to install in their stead Islamic
regimes under Sharia law. Khomeinis Iran was the rst to do that by
an Islamic revolution where the clergy played a part, followed by Iraq,
which, under American tutelage, applied that same principle through
a Western style democracy, at least for now.
276
Khomeinis doctrine was revolutionary from yet other aspects
because it provided the ideological infrastructure and underpinnings
for a new model of rule where the clergy are actively involved. For him,
in view that the Ayatollahs are the supreme sources of knowledge,
wisdom, and inspiration, it is only pertinent that they should also be
the rulers, something similar to the Prince who is also a philosopher
in Western tradition. He developed two concepts, which anchored
the suggested revolutionary change: marja taqlid (the reference for
emulation), that is, that the supreme head of the clergy ( Ayatullah
Uzma ) also being the supreme spiritual power, ought to be the refer-
ence that everybody should aspire to emulate, a modern manifestation
of the supreme model of the Prophet that we saw in the Sunna; and
second Wilayat al-Faqih (the rule of the jurist). Tese two princi-
ples turned the passive state of expectation of the return of the Imam
Mahdi in order to bring salvation, into an aggressive initiative to
precipitate such a momentous event. To those familiar with modern
Jewish history, this could be comparable to the revolutionary doc-
trine developed in the 1920s and 1930s by Rabbi Kook in Palestine,
whereby it was not enough for Jewry to sit and wait in the diaspora
for the coming of the Messiah to provide salvation, but it had become
necessary to rise and practice Zionism by settlement, development,
and social and political action as an avenue for redemption. Khomeini
probably viewed those two concepts as personied in him, as a result
of his scholarship, life-long struggle against the tyranny of the Shah,
and spiritual qualities, which made him into a mujtahid who is thus
qualied to continue his innovative ijtihad and express the will of the
Hidden Imam pending his return. Unlike the Sunna, where the gates
of ijtihad had been closed since the passing of the great luminaries,
the founders of the four schools of law, by the tenth century, the Shiite
mujtahid undertakes the task of innovative legislation, and his verdicts
ought to be the law. Hence, it is only natural that membership of Par-
liament was to be assigned to Mullas, who understand the matter of
religious legislation and the will of the Imam. He wrote that only the
Mullas are able to get people out into the streets and motivate them
to die for Islam, and even to beg that they should be let to sacrice
themselves for Islam.
Khomeini, like Muslim Brother Sayyid Qutb, was full of hatred to-
ward the Jews and turned his bigotry into doctrine by dubbing them
enemies of Allah, hence the extremely large and profuse, libelous, and
imaginary pool of lies, blind contempt, and outright primitive ability to
Iran
277
fabricate anti-Semitic hoaxes that is extraordinary for such two great
luminaries of modern Islam, from whom one could expect a higher
measure of humanity, civility, and good judgment than the ludicrous
statements made in the classic books of those two very respected and
adulated Muslim thinkers.
3
No wonder, then, that Ahmadinejad, who
considers himself their disciple and the devoted executor of their
anti-Semitic doctrine, should feel as compelled as Hitler to repeat on
every occasion his nonsense about the extermination of the Jews and
their state. Khomeini also included in his political activism a novel
interpretation of the murder of Hussein bin Ali and his entourage in
Karbala, which is celebrated as the central rite in Shiite liturgy (the
tazia on Ashura Day). It was no longer only a memorial day for the
most despicable murder of the greatest martyr of all generations, with
whom every Shiite ought to identify by reliving his suering, through
self-inicted pain, and torture, but a war hero whom it became in-
cumbent on all Shiites to emulate as the supreme martyr in the path of
Allah, on his way to Paradise, who will also recommend his followers for
admission into the high heavens. When Iraq invaded Iran in October
1980, Khomeini, who was adored as if he were the Imam himself, called
his people to the defense of the land, and produced more recruits than
needed, thanks to his reference to Husseins model.
Whether the main focus of the Middle East unrest has remained
between Israel and the Muslim world, as the Hizbullah, the Hamas,
and some other fundamentalists wish it, or has shifted to the Sun-
ni-Shiite dichotomy, it is evident that since the accession to the power
of Ahmadinejad in the 2000s, it has become centered on the issue
of nuclearization of Iran, a matter equally feared by Israel and the
Gulf states, who loathe that idea. Te dierence is that Israel, having
learned to count on no one for its fundamental security, has been doing
something about it and preparing at least to damage the Iranian eort
if not to destroy it, while the Gulf states regimes, precisely those who
are opposing the Muslim Spring lest it sweeps them away in its wake,
are helplessly watching and waiting. In the meantime, they are arming
themselves to the teeth, to the full extent of what their wealth aords
them, hoping that either the United States will interfere to destroy that
nuclear capability, she being the only one able militarily to do so, or at
least Israel will attempt to damage that ability by a limited strike within
her means. Iran, on her part, being undeterred by the economic sanc-
tions and the military threats against her, has been pursuing her course
frantically, aiming at getting to the point of no return of possessing the
278
bomb so as to make herself immune to any attack to which she could
threaten to retaliate with her nuclear devices.
During the Cold War, mutually assured destruction (MAD) was the
key to deterrence between the nuclear powers; they understand that
since each had the capacity to destroy the others many times over,
none of them would dare to initiate an attack. Te assumption was
that the actors in both parts of the equation were rational and for fear
of bringing disaster upon their peoples and countries would certainly
refrain from precipitating a nuclear conict. For that reason, paradox-
ically, it was the presence of the ultimate weapons that assured their
denite unuse. But in Iran, the situation may be totally dierent. We
know from Ahmadinejads past in the Basij militia that he is a fanatic
in the belief of the imminent return of the Imam to earth, something
that he had prepared for as a Mayor of Tehran, when he ordered the
widening of the main avenues of the city to absorb all the millions who
would ock to the streets to watch the return of the Hidden One. He
also said that when speaking to the United Nations General Assembly
as President of Iran, he could feel the aura of the Imam hovering over
him and inspiring his speech. Since in Shiite eschatology, the Imam
would choose to return, after a millennium of hiding, at precisely the
worst moment of misery, injustice, and oppression, what in other escha-
tologies is called the pangs of the Messiah, precipitating his return by
an extreme and desperate tour de force , like using nuclear arms, could
be thought by mad rulers who do not ply to the MAD theory, the best
and most feasible avenue. In other words, in the minds of irrational
leaders, whose considerations and reasoning are obscured by religious
fanaticism, mutual deterrence would not simply work.
Why would the Iranians wish to attack, and whom? Usually, when
leaders concoct a plan of attack, they keep mute on it for the eect of
surprise, and they even try to create a reverse impression that they
anchor no aggressive intent toward their victim. Ahmadinejad, since his
advent to power, did not stop, on the contrary, proclaiming his ambition
to destroy Israel, to put an end to Zionism, which is another wording
for the same, to deny the Holocaust, to instigate and dispatch terrorists
against Israel and Jewish targets, to convene international conferences
about Holocaust denial, to address the United Nations (UN) about his
mad plan, to nance and instigate the Hamas and Hizbullah against
Israel, and to gather annual meetings of Islamic Terrorism Interna-
tional in his capital. Is anything else needed to prove his intentions
and to see to it that the lunatic man who was put at the helm of Iran
Iran
279
must not possess nuclear arms? His intent is clearly aggressive espe-
cially against another member state of the UN, (Israel). Instead of its
Secretary General responding with harsh reprisals, like ejecting Iran
from the UN until it repents, he attends the conferences convened by
it and his convoluted speeches of nonsense echo at the UN Headquar-
ters. An attack of this sort on Israel would be one of indiscriminate
extermination and genocide, motivated by hate and fanaticism, while
an Israeli preventive attack geared to preempt such a disaster, would
be directed only against the threatening nuclear installations of Iran,
though collateral damage will unfortunately remain inevitable.
Israel Defense Force (IDF) Chief of Sta, Lieutenant General Benny
Gantz, declared in an interview broadcast on Israels sixty-fourth Inde-
pendence Day (May 2012) that Te IDF is ready to move against Iran
the minute it receives the green light. Te Iranians are determined to
build a nuclear weapon while they continue to dupe the international
community, Minister of Defense Ehud Barak added the following
day. Tese very fateful declarations were not gratuitous, for Israels
leaders have been facing a series of existential questions: should Israel
attack Iran or pursue the diplomatic track? When, if ever, is the right
time to launch an attack? How should it be executed? How will Irans
leaders react to an onslaught on their nuclear facilities? Te most likely
day-after scenario, as the international media sees it, is a devastating
Iranian response based mainly, though not entirely, on its long-range
missile arsenal. Tis attack would be coupled with terrorist strikes
against Jewish and Israeli targets abroad, and backed by Hizbullah
Irans proxy in Lebanon and perhaps Hamas, its agent in Gaza. On the
international front, Iran could wreak havoc on the global economy
through uctuations in oil prices, even though this could also ulti-
mately harm Iran itself, which could respond via a four-way campaign
with long-range counter-re against Israel, terror activity on Israels
borders, attacks on Israelis and Jews overseas, and a limited conict on
the Lebanese border of Israel. Israel is fully aware of the implications
of the day after, but senior political-security gures have increasingly
alleged that Irans response capabilities are limited due to international
constraints and its distance from Israel. From Israels perspective, it
could withstand an Iranian retaliation, just as it has withstood missile
attacks in the past.
An unlikely voice is sounding the alarm on a nuclear Iranthe liberal
Israeli newspaper Haaretz ,
4
which is well-known for its opposition to
o cial Israeli government policy. Columnist Ari Shavit, taking as his
280
source an article in Te Economist that declares it will be impossible
to stop Iran from going nuclear, warns Were out of time. Were really
out of time. Via the Economist , the mainstream of the international
community has then admitted that its campaign against Irans nucle-
arization has ended in failure. And via this journal, the school that
favors containing a nuclear Iran came out of the closet, Shavit writes.
He continues: What the world promised would never happen is hap-
pening at this very moment. What the top ranks of Israels defense
establishment promised would never happen is in fact happening.
Iran is becoming a nuclear power, while Israel stands alone. Tis was
the strategy of Ahmadinejad, which put the elimination of Israel o
the map at the tope of his agenda, and he was clear, open, and honest
about it as a result of his visceral hatred of Jews, Zionism, and Israel.
Dividing into two camps, those who advocate containment or reject
the severity Irans nuclear ambitions (the optimists) and those who
warn of Irans impending nuclear breakout (the pessimists), Shavit
landed then on the side of the latter. Te international optimists and
the Israeli optimists were wrong, big time. And: Benjamin Netanyahu
was right in his repeated warnings which were often derided by the
international media and Haaretz itself, he wrote.
5

While the optimists were misled by their illusions, the pessimists
read reality correctly. While the defense establishment and the media
establishment were smitten with weakness and apathy, the pessimists
kept sounding alarms, Shavit writes, adding, Wolf? Wolf? Wolf! A
strategic wolf with nuclear teeth is now at the gate. Meanwhile, a
former research fellow at the London School of Economics wrote in
Israeli daily Maariv
6
that Western sanctions against the Islamic Re-
public were having little aect. Moshe Efrat wrote that Irans foreign
exchange reserves of roughly $96 billion, as well as other newly imple-
mented economic policies such as raising minimum wage, will keep
the country aoat and the middle classes happy for the foreseeable
future while Irans Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on
the June 26 that the dispute over his countrys nuclear program could
easily be resolved if the West were to stop being so stubborn. Some
countries have organized a united front against Iran and are misguid-
ing the international community and with stubbornness do not want
to see the nuclear issue resolved, Khameneis o cial website quoted
him as saying. But if they put aside their stubbornness, resolving the
nuclear issue would be simple, he said, without clarifying his demands
of the Western nations.
7
Tus, after the victory of Hassan Rouhani
Iran
281
at the presidential elections in Iran in June 2013, even if Irans vitriol
against Jews and Zionism will recede, due to a tactical distancing from
Ahmadinejads aggressive and unbridled outpour of anti-Semitic rhet-
oric that there was no one around to counter or lessen, the very success
of the nuclearization strategy due to the capitulation of the Western
policies of appeasement, will do nothing to reduce the anti-Semitic
feelings and hatred toward the Jews, though there will prevail less need
to manufacture new lies.
If Israel initiates a military strike and Iran responds, Israel will face a
security challenge of a magnitude that it has never experienced. It will
be the rst time in history that Israel faces a non-Arab state with an
entirely dierent culture, mentality, and historical legacy. Te same is
true for the Iraniansfor the rst time, they will be confronting Israel
and the West. Furthermore, Israel has never carried out a military at-
tack against a state on the brink of nuclear capability. An attack against
Iran would be far dierent from the bombing of the nuclear reactor in
Iraq or the air strike against the reactor in Syria (attributed to Israel).
For Israel, the element of surprise is already gone, which in eect, has
already enabled the enemy to carry out a series of cautionary steps.
Tese steps range from instilling a state of awareness into their nation,
political-strategic maneuvering, and preparations for both an oensive
and defensive military response. When we examine the rationale behind
an Iranian response, we should assume that the regime in Tehran will
make every eort to cause the Zionist entity such severe damage that
it would restore the Islamic Republic to the lofty position of a regional
superpower. Irans choice of targets and its method of attack will be
a regional and international display of Iranian strategy and military
might. Iran cannot allow the campaign to end with it appearing ruined
and humiliated. Another Iranian goal will be to safeguard its nuclear
project so that it can quickly resume operations if damaged. An Iranian
strike would probably be directed against Israels population centers,
since the Iranians believe that Israel would be hard-pressed to cope
with a protracted campaign of attrition that weakens the home front.
Upon examining these goals against the scenario established by
the media, we can see that the scenario the media portrays would not
attain Irans objectives. What then is the modus operandi that Iran will
choose to meet its goals? To understand how the Iranian leadership
operates, we must go back to the 19801988 Iran-Iraq War. Despite
the extreme dierences between that war and a possible Israeli-Iranian
confrontation, it would be worthwhile to look at the way the Ayatollah
282
regime, then still in its infancy, waged its rst war. At the time, following
a break in relations with the United States, the Iranian regime was iso-
lated and bereft of superpower backing. Iraq received lavish military
assistance from the Soviet Union, while Europe exerted pressure on
Iran for disrupting the ow of oil caused by the war. During the long
and bitter conict, Irans Republican Guards displayed a high degree of
patience, endurance, and determination. Te nation proved that it could
weather massive attacks from unconventional weapons (poisonous gas)
and retain its trust in its leadership. Tis is the heritage that Khomeini
bequeathed to the Iranian people: ghting and winning against all odds.
Tose that believe Irans geographical distance from Israel will limit the
Iranian response (the Iranians will mainly engage in long-range counter
re) fail to take into account the Iran-Syria-Hizbullah axis that enables
Iran to bridge great distances, despite the current Syrian turmoil that
has curtailed that capacity. Republican Guard ground forces could be
deployed along Israels northern border and even engaged the IDF in
a protracted guerilla campaign on the frontlines.
Israel must also take into account Hizbullahs role in such a scenario,
since Israel could be tested in an unprecedented event. For the rst time,
Hizbullah would be completely subordinate to Tehrans leadership and
the Iranian military command even though it is a Lebanese organization
supported by the countrys Shiite population. In an Israeli-Iranian war,
Hizbullah would take orders from Iran in its rst and perhaps only real
opportunity to repay the enormous debt that it owes to Iran for building
up its military strength. Another possibility is that Iran could launch a
preemptive strike and place responsibility on Hizbullah, since Tehran
has no interest in becoming entangled in hostilities prior to an Israeli
attack. After an Israeli strike, the scope of Hizbullahs rocket re into
Israels depth could parallel the developments in the ghting between
Israel and Iran. Israel should not be surprised if this time the rocket
and missile re is entirely dierent from the past. Instead of gradual
escalation at the outset, Hizbullah could unleash a massive missile
barrage into the heart of Tel Aviv. Israel has to proceed with great
caution in light of Irans policy and culture. A long and bitter guerilla
struggle may ensue, one that could last for a year or a number of years
against Iranian combat units on Israels northern border.
8
Te missile
exchange between Israel and Gaza in October 2012, which was initiated
by Hamas, may in fact have been a rehearsal planned by Iran to test the
soft belly of Israel in terms of missile defense, and the reaction of the
Israeli public when exposed to massive missile attacks.
Iran
283
Tese scenarios are not the product of an imagination run wild,
but logical directions (where no logic applies) that Iran could take as
it aspires to realize its goal to become a regional superpower. Tese
alternative plans have been mocked by many, who contrasted Iranian
military bombast, aggrandizing themselves and diminishing the ene-
my, in an attempt to boost their peoples morale and intimidate their
rivals in ridicule, to Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf, the Iraqi Information
Minister under Saddam Hussein during the America-led invasion of
2003, who was dubbed Baghdad Bob by the Americans and Comical
Ali by the British. He spouted wildly inaccurate propaganda during his
daily press briengs, praising the Iraqi troops and telling fabulous tales
how they crushed the foreign invaders, even as those invaders could
be seen on the screen moving in on him. For example, Brigadier Gen-
eral Hossein Salami, lieutenant commander of the Islamic Revolution
Guards Corps, said: Te IRGC is never intimidated by the hugeness
of the aircraft carriers and the roaring of missiles of U.S. and trans-re-
gional enemies, and their equipment is nothing more than rusty iron
in its eyes. Another brigadier general, Ahmad Vahidi, the minister of
defense, in a telephone conversation with his Syrian counterpart just
as he took over from his assassinated predecessor, announced that:
Iran is condent that Syrias powerful defense system will make the
United States, its regional allies, and Israel back down from their plan
of achieving their goals in the region. He said that the Zionist regime
and terrorists cannot aect the Syrian armys strong will and cannot
build a stronghold for Israel through.
9

Nevertheless and despite Israels warnings, the West was relishing
in being duped, since after ten years of negotiations, warnings, sweet
talk by Iran, promises that the nuclear plan was only for peaceful
ends, and the counter-threats of the West, accompanied by sanctions
that have had no much eect so far, the program, if anything, has been
accelerated in an eort by Tehran to get the bomb and thus constrain
its rivals of all sorts to deal with containing the bomb instead of pre-
venting it. Some US think tanks strongly argued against meeting Irans
demand in the negotiations that its right to enrich uranium should
be acknowledged. Looking at the text of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation
Treaty, they document that the treaty grants no such right, and more-
over, Iran has violated the conditions the treaty sets out in order to
receive the right to peaceful use of nuclear energy. Tey go on to argue
that Iran was using the demand for acknowledgment of the supposed
right to enrich uranium because it places its P5+1 (the ve Security
284
Council permanent members and Germany) interlocutors in a lose-lose
situation, and they should challenge this false claim more directly.
10

Others exposed alleged Iranian nuclear intentions based on what
appeared to be the Iranian position papers for its negotiators from the
talks in Istanbul in July 2012. Te documentwhose authenticity is not
independently veriedindicates that rather than being prepared to
curtail its uranium enrichment activities, Iran was actually planning
to expand them, calling for four additional research reactors and new
programs to sell nuclear fuel to other countries. Te document also
indicated that Iran was unwilling to consider closing the heavily for-
tied Fordow nuclear plant, as the international community has been
demanding, and insistent on an unlimited right to enrich uranium to
3.5 percentthough perhaps showing some room for exibility on the
20 percent enrichment (technically very close level to weapons grade)
taking place at Fordow. Still others argued that increasingly tight sanc-
tions would soon bring greater Iranian exibility at the negotiating table
was probably a bad bet. Current and historical evidence was adduced
to suggest that while the sanctions are aecting Tehrans oil exports
and consequently very important regime revenue streams, this eect
is more likely to decrease rather than increase over time; therefore, the
way forward is to nd other means to target the regimes vulnerabil-
ities, including stepping up pressure on Tehrans allies in Damascus,
as if they were not pressured enough by their own turmoil, increasing
the regimes isolation and bolstering the credibility of military threats
against it, bearing in mind that as the threat remains a mere threat,
Iran is more and more tempted to call the blu.
11

Meanwhile, the Judeophobic legacy of Ahmadinejad will linger af-
ter his departure because it has established during his eight-year rule
patterns of hatred and lies that cannot be easily erased: from Shoah
denial to blunt delegitimation of Zionism and Israel; from direct
threats to eliminate Israel o the map, exactly as Hitler had pledged
for Czechoslovakia and Poland, which the world, including the UN,
has elected to ignore rather than confront, to building nuclear power
so as to implement those designs; from vocal public rallies in support
of Palestinians and in condemnation of Israel, to providing arms and
nances to proxies to ght Israel, like Hizbullah and Hamas; from direct
support of terrorist acts against Israel all over the world, to direct supply
of weapons and missiles to enemies of Israel. Since except for Professor
Bollinger, the President of Columbia University, who dared to tell Ah-
madinejad to his face that he showed all the signs that he was a petty and
Iran
285
cruel dictator and that his denial of the Holocaust was either brazenly
provocative or astonishingly uneducated,
12
no governments or coun-
tries have come out openly to contradict that heap of hatred and lies.
Ahmadinejad himself had repeatedly declared his hatred and violence
to express it to be holy,
13
making his international conduct unique.
For, can anyone imagine any leader stating on international arenas his
hatred toward a Muslim country or people, and his determination to
wage a (Jewish or Christian) holy war against it, the outrage that would
have kindled the entire Muslim world, which would have clamored:
Islamophobia!, demonstrations would have erupted the world over,
taking the lives of innocent civilians, and embassies would have been
set aame in vengeance, as had happened during the Cartoon Crisis
of 20052006? But when only Jews and Israel are at stake, who cares?
In the Shia, as exemplied in Iran, holy hatred that is sustained by
religion and encouraged by clerics, can not only attain peaks unknown
in other cultures, and cultivate the attending lies to support it, but also
drive the conict that results from it into a hopeless deadlock. For,
while resentments and angers that stem from quantitative disputes over
territories or assets can be negotiated and in a process of give and take
the contenders can come to a compromise and reconciliation, hatred
that is inspired by religion is usually absolute and nal cannot be ne-
gotiated and resolved, and no compromise can lead out of it because it
is God-ordained. For example, while the Palestinian Authorities nego-
tiate with Israel with the aim of coming to a compromise, the divinely
driven Hamas refuses any deal, recognition or compromise with Israel.
Similarly, while Sunni Islam in general, represented by Saudi Arabia,
has oered the Arab Plan to settle with Israel, even if there are many
problems and question marks to be resolved before, and extremists like
the Muslim Brothers still negate any compromise or negotiation with
Israel, Shiites brandish the banner of total and unabated negationism
stemming from their deep and unmitigated hatred toward Jews, Zion-
ism, and Israel, which is reected in the oft-repeated mantra: you love
life, we love death. For, we believe in a life of construction, creativity,
progress, and change; Shiites believe in hastening the return of the
Hidden Imam by installing a just regime, and they detect the pangs
of the Messiah in the di culties and threats that surround them, to
wit, the more di cult the circumstances and lethal the menaces, the
surer and speedier is the coming of the redeemer.
Apart from nuclearization, the Iranian regime under Ahmadinejad,
in the years of his tenure (20052013) seemed to concentrate on
286
promoting anti-Jewish sentiments by resorting to the old Islamic and
out-of-fashion European anti-Semitic stereotypes, and particularly
stressing Holocaust denial, it being erroneously considered by the
regime as the legitimacy-granting event to Israel. Te rationale was
that Zionism, which had illicitly implanted itself in Palestine during
the Ottoman and then the British Mandate, obtained from the Pow-
ers the stamp of approval to establish the Jewish state only in view of
their sense of guilt for having failed to protect their Jewish population
during World War II. If it could be shown that the alleged Holocaust
was a hoax, or at the very least grossly exaggerated, as other Muslims
customarily do, then the West would lessen from its support to Israel
and shift instead toward the Palestinians who had been disinherited
from their lands by Zionism. In June 2013, Hassan Rouhani was elected
as the new President. While on the nuclear issue, which is under the
direct supervision of Supreme Leader Khamenei, there seems to be no
noticeable change, it is hoped that at least on the Judeophobia front the
new President will evince more moderation as part of the smiling face
that he wishes to present to the West, inter alia, as a way to pursue his
nuclear program with great power acceptance, until such a time that
he chooses to announce to the world that he had crossed the nuclear
threshold, and impose the fait accompli that no one can interfere with
any longer.
Iranians are bent on preaching their anti-Jewish hatred not only
to their own people and to other Muslims, who are already sold to
that conviction, but also mainly to the world at large so as to hasten
Israels delegitimation worldwide. Hence their Presidents insistence
to repeat every year his lies to the UN Assembly and to spread their
bigotry through interviews in the international press. Another device
has been to harness non-Iranian and non-Muslim anti-Semitic bigots,
who specialize in Holocaust denial, in order to advance their cause.
Besides the research projects, the cartoon competitions, and the
scholarly prizes that they confer on adherents of those beliefs, they
also convene in Tehran conferences where the most infamous holo-
caust deniers participate and spread their research ndings, including
ultra orthodox and anti-Zionist Jewish sects, who abhor Zionism for
attempt to force redemption of the Jews before the divinely inspired
dispatch of the Messiah to redeem them in due course. So, in fact, these
assemblies were gatherings of all the anti-Jewish, anti-Zionist, and an-
ti-Israelis bigots, all usually under the guise of anti-Zionism, with the
aim of delegitimizing Israel and bring to its demise, if the movement
Iran
287
of national liberation of Jews is shown to be unworthy of existing due
to its racism, demonic character, and its anti-Islamic, anti-Arab,
and specically anti-Palestinian bias. Tose bigots, orchestrated by
Iran, are perennially obtuse to the fact that saying that all people of the
world possess the right of determination, except the Jews, is in itself
an anti-Semitic concept.
Joachim Martillo, an economic analyst, who participates in those
conferences and often airs his anti-Semitic views in Irans English lan-
guage press, where he blames the Jews for the American and global
economic crisis. He claimed that there was a conspiracy on Wall Street,
and that the nancial apparatuses for securitizing mortgages, which
ultimately led to the sub-prime crisis, were the handiwork of a rising
class of East-European Jewish bankers that had supplanted the older
German-American Jewish bankers on Wall street and was looting
Arab oil money. He said that there was an intimate connection between
the collapse of the nancial system in the US and worldwide and US
international policy and its manipulation by a class of hyper-wealthy
Jewish Zionists. Martillo had also written against the Jews on previous
occasions, and claimed that much of the mass murder of Jews during
WWII was unjustied, but a very understandable reaction to, or col-
lective revenge on, Jews for the part that that East European Jewry
played in the commission of Soviet mass murder and atrocities.
14
Even
though Martillo nds the Holocaust understandable, he at least attests
to its veracity, while Ahmadinejad and his gang have opted to deny it
altogether or at least to diminish it in its scope and signicance. What
is striking about Iran, regarding the Holocaust and other anti-Jewish
utterances, is that the state and its higher institutions have embraced
the cause of hatred and lie manufacturing and propagation, while in
other Muslim countries the authorities let their press take care of the
issue, so that they can justify the publications by the imperatives of
their free press whenever they are accused by the West of bigotry or
incitement or hate speech.
Irans vice president, Riza Rahimi, has been one of the channels for
airing the countrys unbridled anti-Semitism and incitement against
Jews and Zionism. Any context is convenient, as long as Jews can be
blamed and condemned. In June 2012, the Anti-Drug Day was com-
memorated in Tehran and that too was a good occasion, as the vice
president attributed the production and distribution of drugs to the
Talmud , without of course citing any particular passage. He said that
the Zionists have learned from that book how to suck the blood and
288
destroy non-Jews. Te full citation of his words of wisdom deserves
to be mentioned:
... Te Zionists teach their Talmud where the production and dis-
tribution of drugs are advocated as a means to such the blood of
non-Jews and exterminate them. Te economic part of the Talmud
promotes illegal and legal fund-raising, like levying interest, robbery
and pillaging other nations wealth. Tis was the launching point of
Zionism against humanity ...
Zionists are responsible globally for all conicts, for example the
October Revolution in the Soviet Union, which was launched by
Zionists. Tough not one Jews was killed in it ... Te Talmud was
calculated to guide a handful of Zionists to destroy the entire world,
for one of the goals of Zionism is to trigger conicts between nations
and between Sunna and Shia ... Imagine that the money that they
have spent in Afghanistan and Iraq would have su ced to bring
prosperity upon the entire world ...
Zionists consider themselves a superior race, and according to
books published in Europe and other foreign countries, they use
all other races as slave in fulllment of their own designs. 70% of
the world capital is located in America, and 80% of it is controlled
by Jews, who constitute only 6% of the population [they are in fact,
hardly 2%] Since their ultimate goal is to destroy the world [and how
would they themselves survive?], they use their money to attain this
aim. Zionists never use drugs themselves [they only invented the use
of them], and they use opium just to undermine other societies. Iran
is ready to spend the requisite budgets for research in order to prove
that Zionists are the culprits in producing and spreading drugs ...
A Zionist doctor in America has sterilized 80,000 Indian women in or-
der to help exterminate them ... Zionists are set against humanity ...
Any conict that unfolds in the world has necessarily Zionists roots
..., for they control the world media, which facilitates the fulllment
of their goals ... Although Iranian religious education forbids nuclear
weapons, the Zionists have used their control of the media to incite
the world public opinion against Iran, thus bringing about a 32 year
world boycott against it. Iran only enriches uranium for scientic
and research purposes, and these are objectives that run counter
to Zionist policy which strives to prevent from Iran information,
knowledge and human science ...
15

Tis was the Iranian vice president, who certainly surpasses even
his President in ignorance if not in bigotry, hatred, and lies. In the
extreme ambience of hatred created in post-Khomeini Iran, anything
said, invented or claimed by the leadership is likely to be accepted
and digested by the ignorant crowds, while the intelligentsia , which
Iran
289
are better informed and do not lose their sense of criticism, either do
not dare to speak up or elect to follow the general stream rather than
risk their lives countering it. During the latest confrontation between
Israelis and Palestinians in Gaza, in November 2012, the o cial FARS
News Agency disseminated a cartoon of the Israeli Prime Minister
sucking the blood of a Palestinian child.
16
Te common people of Iran
feed on those lies, which are daily reinforced by cataract of vicious hate-
lled propaganda voiced by their leaders. One day earlier, President
Ahmadinejad cited the founder of the Revolution, Khomeini, who said
that Israel was a cancerous growth, urging the people of the Middle
East to excise it so that the area could exist without Zionism. He charged
Zionists with the damage they have been causing the Middle East for
the past 400 years [Never mind that Zionism was founded on at the
end of the 19th Century], taking advantage of the centers of power
that they control. He said:
Today it is clear to all that Zionism opposes human society and con-
stitutes the main reason for its decline ... Tey are a small minority,
well organized, corrupt and inhuman which opposes divine values ...
Tey are only interested in power, wealth and control . . . A small
number of them have been causing the worst damage ever inicted
on humanity, part of which is irreversible.... Tey had initiated WW
I and II in order to control others, and since they have taken over
America, all world matters are under their control ..., for all the strong
governments, the banks and media are under their rule, and they
use that power to destroy cultures, values, nations and states. Tey
stand behind all large moral failures, and behind wars, conicts and
massacres ...
Te existence of Zionism is an insult to the entire world . . .
According to their racist education, only they are considered as hu-
mans while all other cultures and people are animals ... Tey allow
the murder of people, thus any opposition to Zionism and to the
distorted Zionist regime is tantamount to safeguarding human rights,
and to paving the way to rescue all humanity from colonialism, impe-
rialism, poverty and misery ... Tat is the reason why safeguarding
Zionism is a commitment of most colonialist and imperialist coun-
tries ... In America, candidates for the presidency must prostrate
themselves before Zionists to have any chance to be elected ...
17

Tese themes, in addition to allusions to the Protocols of the Elders
of Zion , and numerous references to the world Jewish conspiracy, are
so widely and frequently repeated to the Iranian public, and from
there distributed to other Islamic and anti-Semitic channels that they
290
become a matter of course anything contradicting them seems out of
line with conventional wisdom.
18
Writers of these dispatches and news
items are more bigoted than knowledgeable and they hang on to any
rumor, or libel picked up abroad to conrm and duplicate it for further
distribution. For example, one of them listed the 100 most important
people in Hollywood and found that the rst twelve among them
were all Jewish, who lend leverage to the international Jewish power.
He of course found that as Steven Spielberg devotes a percentage of his
revenues to commemorate the Shoa (something that never happened
to his mind), he contributes to the propaganda machine of Zionism,
which gives it pre-eminence despite the fact that Jews constitute only 4
percent of the American population [in fact they are hardly 2 percent].
Hence, the immoral import of Hollywoods movies, which contradict
human and family values. Te lm industry has invested lots of mon-
ey lately for that purpose, and when one watches those movies, one
realizes that the main goal of Western, especially American, cinema is
to spread around those perverse ideas.
19

Naturally, demonization of Israel and Jews, which leads to aggran-
dizing those entities far beyond their size and capacity, tends to impute
to them many of the troubles of the world. Examples abound:
a. Under the title: Greece is Raped by Jewish Bankers, which was
published in Press TV in July 2012, and where the Jewish banking
cartel, that is part of the Jewish maa, was accused of responsibility
for the economic crisis in Europe, especially in Greece. Accord-
ing to this article, this economic collapse was concocted by Jews,
who inuenced the decisions of the IMF in order to take control
of the countries public assets ... Tis argument also claims that
the Jewish banking cartel was the true architect of the European
monetary union, which knew that the union would damage the
economies of southeastern Europe, but they hid this information
from the French and the Germans ... Te article predicted that the
Jewish cartel would end up expropriating airports and seaports at
the lowest prices, so that the Greeks would become subjugated by
them, thus allowing the Jewish maa to enter the criminal arena,
and eliminatethe Greek religion, culture, solidarity, and heritage of
the Greeks.
20

b. As part of Israels conspiracies in the world, the Jews were also
accused of the Muslim massacres in Myanmar. None other than
Ayatollah Karahi, the director of the Imama Mahdi Seminar in
Tehran, said without blinking:
Iran
291
Te Muslim massacre in Mianmar has been allegedly committed
by Buddhists, but we are sure that the murder and genocide are
perpetrated by world Jewry and Zionism ... For Buddhism de-
rives from Judaism, and Buddhists have been tools in the hands of
Zionists ... Jews are also controlling America. Did it ever happen
that any American President has failed to put on the kippa (head
cover of Orthodox Jews) when he wished to be elected? ... But
since they know that Jews carry a stigma in the world, they prefer
to hide behind other epithets, like Buddhists ... So all lecturers in
the universities and the media, must explain in various languages
and in a way acceptable to the young people, that behind Buddhism
hides a Jew ...
21

c. When one understands that this nonsense is not merely the inven-
tion of one deviating cleric, but the same blind mantra repeated by
the top hierarchy of that dark regime, both political and clerical,
one begins to wonder about the sanity of those people and of that
country. In fact, another Ayatullah, one of those super- intellectuals
who are supposed to be in touch with the Hidden Imam, Hadawi
Tahrani, repeated the same garbage, accusing the Jews of involve-
ment in the massacre of Arakan (Mianmar) Muslims. Tat top
cleric, who is a member of the Supreme Council of the World
Assembly of Ahl al-bayt, and the President of the Rawak Hikmat
Institute (ironically connoting wisdom), published an epistle
where he said:
In Mianmar, cruel massacres against Muslims are unfolding.
19 years ago, I was there, and watched the people who had been
taken over by Marxists and Maoists during the past 80 years ...
But when the population extricated itself from the claws of its
executioners, and the people were enthusiastic about the new-
ly-found freedom, the Zionists came in, to purchase lands and
take root in the cheap land of MIanmar ... I watched the Muslims
of MIanmar, who have preserved their tradition under di cult
circumstances and were proud of their Iranian roots ... Nobody
could have imagined that the Zionists would once again launch
the country on a course of massacres of Muslims by Buddhists ...
Te Jews have linked their small population to the large pop-
ulation of Buddhists and Hindis in the world, and they took root
among them by taking advantage of their own wealth and the
poverty of their hosts. Tey even put several Jewish gures as
spiritual heads among some Buddhist and Hindi sects and set up
temples for them in India and other countries in the area. Today,
it is a Jewish arm that wears a Buddhist sleeve, to take vengeance
on the freedom-ghting Muslims, by harming the Muslims of
Mianmar and punishing them for the anti-Zionist activities in
Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco, Lebanon, Syria, Bahrein and Hijaz.
22

292
Tis obsessive and repetitive anti-Jewish attitude of the Iranian
state and clergy cannot be just a collection of whimsical expressions
by individual leaders who had a grudge following some unfortunate
encounter with Jews, as President Sadat of Egypt had claimed in his
experience. Its frequency, its mantra-like style, its virulence, and the
uninhibited form in which it is couched, which is characteristic of Shiite
Islam, suggest some underlying deep-rooted creed that encompasses
that entire culture and obscures any reasoning, logic, or good sense that
might refute it. Often, this obtuse attitude toward Jews is anchored in a
novel interpretation of Quranic verses and Hadith stories, as if the tra-
ditional (Sunni) interpretations were not loathsome enough. Nominally,
the Iranian regime dierentiates between Judaism as a faith, which is
supposedly legitimate and acceptable, though it is often debased and
humiliated, and Zionism, which as the expression of Jewish nationalism
is objectionable and doomed to elimination. Nonetheless, since Iran
became o cially Shiite in the sixteenth century, the Jews there were
a icted by harsh persecutions, before anyone had heard of Zionism.
Not only were Jews considered inferior and impure, but they were also
imputed mysterious and devilish powers, which evolved under Kho-
meini into the personication of evil, which sought to control the
Muslims and saw the elimination of Islam a prerequisite to attaining
their goals. Te verses in the Quran, the stories in the Prophets biog-
raphy (the Sira ), and the Hadith stories, which hint to Muhammads
disaccord with the Jews of Medina, are amplied and made central
to early Islamic narrative, as they are in other Islamic fundamentalist
writings by Jew haters such as Sayyid Qutb, Sheikh Raid, and their
likes. Tis reinterpreted history connects between those events and the
Jews innate evil character, which drives them inexorably to constantly
undermine Islam. To the point that Muhammads policy of eliminating
the Jews in Arabia, and expelling the remainder of them from it, which
is still valid today, has been hailed as a model to follow today vis--vis
the State of Israel.
23

Interestingly enough, we are now able to explore deeper into the
roots of the Cartoon Crisis of 20052006 and realize that the contem-
porary hatred toward Jews and other Unbelievers stems to a great extent
from the complex of inferiority, which has been a icting Islam since
its inception. In no other faith would followers go on rampage and kill,
maim, and burn just because someone had insulted their creed or
their Prophet. Te issue here is their lack of self-condence in the power
of their conviction, to open it up for competition in the free market,
Iran
293
as other faiths do. Tat is the reason why any apostate is deserving of
death, no Christianity or Judaism is permitted in Arabia, and members
of other faiths in Muslim lands are exposed to persecution and death
everywhere there is a Muslim revival. Any insult to their holy book
or their Prophet is also punishable by death, and they constantly seek
and proclaim the superiority of Islam, something they would have
certainly avoided if they were more condent of the self-evident dom-
inance of their faith. In the Los Angeles Muslim rally of February 18,
2006, at the height of the Cartoon Crisis,
24
one of the slogans waved
by the furious demonstrators was: Islam shall Dominate! In other
words, they were not seeking accommodation among the host culture
that they came to live with, but victory over it; not calming down their
own tempers, which had reached the boiling point, but vindication of
their fanatic position; not a free competition for their ideas on fair and
equal grounds (something they do not permit in their own lands), but
a statement of domination over all others. Tere is a paradox here: on
the one hand, Islamic countries at large have been in the bottom of the
heap of the UN Annual Development Report, something that does not
inspire much pride, while the developed West is Christian for the most
part; on the other hand, it is Christian culture that produced progress
and development, which is totally rejected by Muslims. Tey feel more
threatened by it than taking it as a model.
In a shame culture where honor and prestige hinge on appearances
and make-believe, and where sycophancy and falsehood take prece-
dence over reality and hard facts, one is more expected to confront
humiliation and reject it than to reconcile to painful realities, even
if that should bring damage and more pain. Dr. Duani, a lecturer at
Imam Hossein University, stressed during a lecture on Islamic History
the aront that Jews had caused to early Islam, and the consequences
that derive there from. He said that the rst action taken by Jews to
undermine Islam was to mock it, especially its lack of a holy scripture,
at a time when the Quran was only a series of unrelated oral revela-
tions, not yet canonized and open to various versions. He emphasized
that exactly then, Jews appeared at the mosque and mocked Muslim
customs, to the point that the Prophet ordered to oust them. Te Jews
boasted that they possessed a Holy Book, contrary to Muslims who had
none, and regarded that as their election by God over other faiths. Tey
also bragged that they had a day of rest a week, while others had none,
until Muslims instituted their own Friday in response. Tis, of course,
unwittingly posits Islam not as an original revelation as its followers
294
would wish, but as a copycat who imitates others in order not to lag
behind: rst to put together a Quran to counter the Bible and then to
institute a Friday to best the Jewish Saturday. In those early days, said the
lecturer, the Jews of Arabia, notably the famous poet Kab bin Ashraf, a
son of Banu Nadir tribe, wrote poems that insulted Muslims and Islam,
and when they reached Muhammad, he furiously sought to combat
that evil, and he entrusted Kabs half-brother with that task. With a
team of supporters, the latter proceeded to Kabs place, lured him out
under some false pretext and killed him. Tat was how the Muslims
got rid of their critique and how the precedent was established that a
critique of Islam deserves death. After all, the Prophet, the most perfect
of men, created that inviolable precedent, and no one can contradict it.
After that a long series of ramblings accusing the Jews of wrongdoings,
without any documentary source, all ended up of justifying the murder
of more Jews until they were all massacred or expelled from Arabia.
25

From all this manipulated Islamic history, for which there is no doc-
umentation, except for oral traditions that were written, with a Muslim
bias a century or more after the death of the Prophet, maybe the most
prominent parable is the one related to the story of Khaybar, which
turns their desperate attempt to defend themselves and their property
from an aggressive and murderous Muhammad, into a Jewish plot to
destroy Islam. Of course, the Jews were accused of having organized
and incited the Arab tribes of Arabia against Muhammad and Islam, as
if they were marionettes easily manipulated according to Jewish wishes.
Like today, anyone who dees the Prophet or his faith deserves death;
thus, all the Jewish population of Khaybar, which had been rooted there
for centuries before the coming of Islam and engaged in peaceful farm-
ing, was slaughtered. Already in the 1990s, Hamass posters distributed
in the West Bank and Gaza, hailed the Khaybar events as a model for
things to come, as they warned/threatened that the time of Khaybar has
dawned, meaning that it was time for the Jews of Israel to think about
the choice between deportation or slaughter. Irans usage of the same
parable came lately from the mouth of none other than the Supreme
Leader Khamenei, as he claimed that his country was combating the
economic sanctions imposed by Heathen America and its Zionist allies
under the same circumstances as the days of the Badr (AD 623) and
Khaybar (AD 628) battles led by the Prophet. In his words: the front
we face is of America and the Zionists, who have tried any avenue to
combat Iran ... We live today like in the days of Badr and Khaybar, we
see only the upcoming victories.
26
In an interview, a senior o cial also
Iran
295
resorted to that parable, this time based on the great philanthropist,
Hassan Nasrallah of the Hizbullah:
Te Israeli vision of from the Nile to the Euphrates is over ... Tis is
the rst time the Zionists feel they have no incentive to defend their
articial state ... Tey are so afraid that they built a wall of separation
between themselves and the Palestinians, and they will do the same
due to their fear from the impact of the Egyptian Revolution ... Tis
is exactly the application of the Quranic verse: Tey shall not burst
forth to ght against you, but will hide behind fortied walls (59:14)
... Te Supreme leader believes we are under the circumstances of
Badr and Khaybar because we won the 33-day war in Lebanon [the
Second Lebanon War in July 2006] and the 22-day War in Gaza [Cast
Lead in Gaza 20089] under the same circumstances. As in Khaybar,
the Jews hid behind walls in these battles, which means that the Jews
are at the edge and cannot get out of their homes any more. As a very
small and narrow state, Israel is unable to defend itself strategically
and geopolitically, and it is likely to disappear at any moment. Ten,
they will all run away collectively. In case of war, one million of them
will ee from the occupied territories ...
27

Te inexcusable behavior of the Jews and the Zionists is found even
in such international art ceremonies as the Oscar, due to their con-
trol of Hollywood and America. Te 2013 recipient of the award, the
movie Argo, which recounted the story of the rescue of six American
diplomats from Tehran after the outburst of the Islamic Revolution,
was condemned by Iran as lacking any artistic or cultural value, dis-
torts facts of history, is part of the Iranophobia led by Americans and
ZIonists. On the footsteps of the award and to counter it, a confer-
ence was held in Tehran by the Ministry of Culture, where a suit was
announced against the producers, the director, and the actors in the
lm, and a new twenty-installment television series was launched on
them of the conquest of the American spy nest in Tehran.
28
In the
same vein, some of the press, the Iranian Ambassador in the UN, and
some cartoons in the press, all condemned the political bias of the
movie, though some reformist and fairer minds, admitted its artistic
worth. But when all rational devices of propaganda and all avenues
of hatred and lies are exhausted, there always remain the mystic and
magic channel of extranatural means that the demonized Zionists can
use. Tis means that as the Iranian regime proclaims to the world that
it can measure up to plots, conspiracies, and military and diplomatic
threats, there is little it can do about supranatural charms. A selec-
296
tion of these bizarre statements, which parallel some of the mystical
Palestinian and Egyptian accusations of Israel of poisoning the land of
Egypt, or of luring sharks into the Sinai coast to frighten o tourists,
or of poisoning young Palestinian girls to aect their reproductive
organs, will throw some light on Iranian bigoted thinking rather than
on Jewish conspiracies:
a. Mehdi Taeb, the head of Khameneis think tank, said in April 2013
that the Jews possess the strongest magic powers in the world,
which they use against Iran, either by way of imposing sanctions,
where America serves as their tool, or by their abortive intervention
with the Iranian elections in 2009. He warned that the Jews have
not yet used all their potential for magic.
b. In March 2013, the site Rassa News, which is linked with the reli-
gious seminaries in Qum, published an article on numerology and
magic in Jewish mysticism, claiming that their power of charm, is
transmitted genetically, with a view of taking over control of the
world, of nature and even of Gods decisions ...
29

c. On the websites of the Iranian regime, there are cartoons compar-
ing Jews to wild beast known for their cruelty, for the fears they
engender in humans and for the dangers they pose to them, such as
wolves and snakes. Hence, the only way to counter them is to stand
up to them, and to kill them in order to save human life from their
grasp.
d. Israel is a cancerous tumor that will soon be nished o, that is
how President Ahmadinejad addressed demonstrators protesting
annually against the existence of the Jewish state.... Even if one cell
of them is left in one inch of Palestinian land, the story will repeat
itself ... Te nations of the region will soon nish o the usurper
Zionists in the Palestinian land ...
30

Te election of Hassan Rouhani in June 2013 to succeed Ah-
madinejad has inspired some optimism in the West that he might
lead his country in a more pragmatic and less ideological fashion
than his predecessor. However, in view of precedent pragmatic
and moderate presidents, such as Rafsanjani (19891997) and
Khatami (19972005), who pushed forward with the nuclear
program, but unlike the confrontational style of Ahmadinejad,
they used sweet talk, the newly elected president may also tread
the same path. Te question will remain contended whether that
is good or bad in terms of Irans relations with the world. On the
positive side, one can appreciate a softer and more civilized dia-
log with the world, and a less openly hostile attitude to Jews and
Israel; but on the negative side, one may fear that it could be that
the soft conduct by the leadership in Tehran may be precisely the
Iran
297
one to lure the Western powers, who will do anything to prevent a
conict, to continue to negotiate endlessly while Iran is pursuing its
nuclear program without conceding an inch. Paradoxically, then,
it will be a cleric like Rouhani, the only religious gure among
the candidates to the presidency, who will follow the Moderate
course of his two moderate predecessors who were also clerics,
while the doctrinaires among them, most of all Ahmadinejad, will
continue to represent the civilian branch of the rule. At any event,
one should not forget that the reins of power and of supreme con-
trol of the regime, including the nuclearization program, remain
indisputably in the hands of the Supreme Leader, who by denition
will always be a cleric, and not of the moderate kind.
Notes
1. See Bernard Lewis, Jews in Islam (Princeton, 1984), especially Chapter 3.
2. Tis distinction between Institutional and Diused religion, see C. K. Yang,
Religion in Chinese Society (Berkeley: University of California, 1967), Chapter
XII, 294340.
3. Khomeini, Ayatollah, Te Islamic Republic, op. cit.; Sayyid Qutb, Our War
against the Jews, op. cit.
4. Haaretz Columnist: Benjamin Netanyahu Was Right on Iran June 27, 2013.
http://www.algemeiner.com/2013/06/27/haaretz-columnist- benjamin-
netanyahu-was-right-on-iran/.
5. Ibid.
6. Maariv , June 27, 2013.
7. Ibid.
8. Tis passage is based on an article published in Israel Defense , Issue #8 of
2012.
9. IRNA (Islamic Republic News Agency) July 19, 2012.
10. Michael Makovsky, and Blaise Misztal, Wall Street Journal , July 8, 2012.
11. David Horovitz, Times of Israel , July 9, 2012.
12. In September 2007, during Ahmadinejads show at the UN GA in New York.
13. Mathias Kuntzel, Te Iranian Holy War, an address at Columbia University
on 6 March, 2008, Under the auspices of Scholars for Peace in the Middle
East.
14. MEMRI Special Dispatch 4824, July 10, 2012.
15. JAM News, Iran, April 4, 2012.
16. FARS News Agency, November 18, 2012.
17. In a speech delivered on Jerusalem Day, August 17, 2012, and reported by
the major media of Iran on the same day, and by the written press the next
day.
18. See e.g., Risalat , Iran, June 26, 2012.
19. Ibid.
20. Presstv.com, July 10, 2012.
21. Interview with the Rasa News Agency, August 8, 2012.
22. Mahr News Agengy, July 24, 2012. Te same nonsense was parraoted by
the Basij Commander, Muhammed Riza Naqdi, and reported on August 6,
2012 on the site yjr.ir.
298
23. See A. Zigron, and A. Savion, Te Jewish Image in the Eyes of the Iranian
Regime: Teological Roots, http://www. Memri.org.il/cgi-webaxy/sal/sal.
pl?lang=he&ID=107345_memri&act=show&dbid=articles&dataid=3306
24. For the complete story see R. Israeli, Te Spread of Islamikaze Terrorism in
Europe (London: Vallentine Mitchell, 2008), especially Chapter 5.
25. IRNA News Agency, June 15, 2012.
26. http:// farsi.khamenei.ir, January 9, 2012.
27. www.farsnews.com, June 6, 2012.
28. www.memri.org.il, March 27, 2013.
29. www.memri.org.il/cgi-webaxy/sal/sal.pl?lang=he&ID=107345 memri
&act=show&dbid=articles&dataid=3373, April 29, 2013.
30. Arab News, August 18, 2012.

Turkey: Te Non-Arab
Muslims Entering the Fray
299
8
Turkey consequent to the Ataturk Revolution, which had forcibly
converted the reduced remnants of the Ottoman Empire into a modern
secular state, imposing on the population a Western demeanor, divorc-
ing modern Turkish from the Arabic script, separating the state from
the Mosque, and resolutely turning its orientation westward, was able
to enforce its policy domestically and to project a uniform image of
modernization, secularism, and progress outwardly. To the extent that
when the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was constituted,
and later when the Common Market and the European Union were
implemented, Turkey regarded and viewed itself as a natural candidate
to join. Te great leaders of modern and secular Turkey after Ataturk,
like Inonu, Bayar, Menderes, Demirel, Ozal, Ecevit, and Ciller, who were
thoroughly westernized, gave the outside and irrevocable impression
that Turkey had been indeed so thoroughly revolutionized that it had
denitely placed itself in the West European camp. Except that they
refused to see that the picture was much more complex from many
angles:
a. Tat the ideas of democracy did not penetrate deeply enough into
the Turkish society. Elections were held all right, for the most part
honest and fair, but the questions of civil rights, freedom of ex-
pression and of organization, independence of the press and the
judiciary, the total subjection of the military to civilian rule, a fair
treatment of the minorities, safety nets for the poor, the elderly
and the like, remained problematic since. Enough to mention that
journalists are still arrested for their views and writings in the year
2013, civil demonstrations are still broken up violently, and until the
Erdoan reform, in the 2000s, which broke the independent power
of the military to remain the curator of the Attaturk legacy and to
300
interfere when it thought it was threatened, the generals did play a
great role in politics.
b. Two parallel societies had been produced by the Revolution: the
bourgeois urban society, made up of politicians, intellectuals, and
businessmen, which dwelt in the large cities of Istanbul, Ankara,
Izmir, and the like, or those in the tourist industry who hosted the
multitudes of tourists from Europe and Israel, which was modern
and secular Turkey known to the West. But the other half (or more)
of society, namely the rural population, who stuck to Islam, was
remote from the urban centers and remained alien to the West, was
the less educated, poorer, and did not see eye to eye with the rest of
the Turks who dwelt in the cities. Tere, the Revolution could not be
strictly enforced, and it was there that Islamic parties were cultivat-
ed and nourished, by Prime Ministers Necmettin Erbakan, Abdullah
Gl, and Recep Tayyip Erdoan. It is also there that Erdoan recruits
his big numbers of followers when he is faced by the urban demon-
strators, who do not accept his policies.
c. Te image of Moderate Islam of Turkey, which the Americans
erroneously diused around the world, especially after the collapse
of the Soviet Union since the end of the 1980s, was geared to form
an allied continuum of manageable Islam from Central Asia where
the Islamic countries of the Caucasus and the Former Soviet Union
(Azarbaijan, Turkemenistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan,
and Kyrgyzstan), led by secular Turkey, had attained independence,
to the Balkans, once the domain of the Ottomans, and now the ter-
ritory where local Muslim minorities (in Bosnia, Albania, Kosovo,
and Macedonia) have been asserting their independence. Hence
the foolish American support of the Muslims in the 1990s and
2000s, which backred on them, when they forfeited the millennial
Christian continuity from Russia, Central Europe, Greece, and the
Mediterranean when they allowed so many Muslim wedges to be
driven inside the heart of Europe.
d. A foreboding of things to come unfolded in the 1996 elections when
the Erbakan Islamic Party won the plurality and its head formed the
government. When he started approaching Iran, the army moved
in, removed him from power, banned his Islamic party (that was
democratic in their eye), and forced the formation of another civil
government. However, the writing was on the wall: Islam had not
disappeared, it simply hid in the countryside, and that sooner or
later it would reappear. In the elections of 2002, it did under Gl as
long as Erdoan was incarcerated for his incitement, and then under
Erdoan three times in a row, proving that the public opinion in
Turkey had been impressively turned around by the Islamic Party,
Turkey
301
which mobilized the passive and timid rural population into active
masses that this time won the majority and crushed the bourgeois
who had supported the civil governments. Tese are the masses that
Erdoan threatens to assemble as his show of force every time he is
threatened by his urban opposition.
e. As a rule, modern Turkish policy toward Israel, was one of a cold
shoulder, even under the civil and secular governments, mainly
due to its reluctance to create disagreements with its former Arab
colonies which were part of its Ottoman Empire, and to its Islam-
ic sympathies with the Palestinians, which alone remained as the
one people among its former subjects that did not settle into an
independent state. In the 1990s, however, an extraordinary shift
1

occurred in that policy, due to, among others, the pressures of the
army, which was interested in a security pact with modern and
pro-American Israel; the belief in Turkey that Israel was an e cient
channel to improve Ankaras relations with the United States; the
shift in Turkey toward Pan-Turkism and Pan-Turanism, as the pros-
pects of integrating into Europe diminished, on the one hand, and
the expansion toward Central Asia increased; the internal upheaval
of the Kurds that required close external allies; the tremendous
intelligence collaboration between the security apparatuses of the
parties; and the opening up of Israel as a new source for advanced
technology, which did not demand in return any compliance with
human rights requirements. In that decade, until the rise of the
Islamic Party in 2002, the relationship between the two countries
grew to a close alliance and true intimacy between the leaders,
which even the rise of Erbakan in 19961998 could not obscure.
It was he who was pushed aside by the military when he tried to
interfere.
Ever since the Ottoman Empire crumbled at the end of World War I,
the likelihood of an Islamic return there was constantly at the gate,
much as the civil leadership of the Ataturk legacy and the West gave it
little credence and tended to dismiss it as inescapably gone with wind.
However, the collapse of a 400-year-old empire cannot be summed up
by a sudden and cruel transition from an imperial religious regime into
an utterly secular and anticlerical one. Certainly, the vast empire had
shrunk, the multiethnic, multicultural, and multilinguistic entity had
melted into a modern nation state where one predominant groupthe
Turksspoke Turkish, identied itself as Turkish and its country as
Turkey. But the imperial culture and the imperial religion that made
the empire glorious and world reputed, could not be wiped out at once
302
as if it had never existed. Indeed, in the countryside, which remained
backward, illiterate, and traditional after the Ataturk revolution was
imposed on the country, enclaves of puritanical Islam had survived,
hidden from Western tourists and from the spoiled bourgeois urbanites
who boosted the growth of the civil culture, which was to transform
modern Turkey and push it to the arms of NATO and the European
Union. In all those eight decades between the Republic in 1922 and
2002 when the Islamic government took over the country, the politics,
the economy, the culture, modern education, intellectual life, and the
opening to the world unfolded in the great cities, which continued to
attract a constant ow of countryside migrants, while the rural area
remained backwater and unconcerned with world trends. Te elections,
which ran regularly unless interrupted by military takeovers, were
mainly a business of the urban populations, and the successive civil
governments, which were essentially made up of urban intellectuals,
businessmen, and politicians and oriented toward the West.
In the atmosphere of aggressive secularism, where the military old
guard permanently threatened to intervene if the secular heritage
of Ataturk were endangered, the survival of religious tradition was
ignored, considered as non-existent and non-relevant, though it was
still alive and kicking, albeit pushed to the sidelines. Even when such a
great leader as Turgut zal was in charge in the 1990s, his total com-
mitment to civil government and to his American allies obscured the
fact that he was himself a religious Muslim. An Islamic party was there
most of the time, though it did not pass the threshold of representa-
tion in parliament, and when it did under Erbakan, Erdoans mentor,
in 1996, it won the plurality for the rst time and was entrusted with
forming a government. Tat was a dramatic proof that all the Western
experts who had killed and buried Turkish Islam for eternity, and did
not believe that Islam was ever likely to regain power in Turkey, had
to swallow their hats and to adapt to a new reality of an Islamic-led
government of a member state of NATO, a candidate for membership
in the European Union, and a close ally of the United States and Israel.
Te United States, as has been their wont, might continue to deny that
Turkey has any Islamic inclinations, just as they continued to deny that
the Muslim Brothers were undermining the Mubarak government or
that they are inltrating the US government, but the truth will reveal
itself ultimately, perhaps after the Americans and their allies will have
paid the price of negligence and underestimation of the new contours
of the Middle East and of Islamic penetration into their own ranks.
Turkey
303
At the time of successive civilian governments since the 1980s, the
Turkish army had attained the conclusion that in matters of armament,
security, and strategy, Israel was a close ally, and it imposed on the gov-
ernment in place to hold those relations in high priority. Relations were
brought to the highest diplomatic level of embassies, business and trade
ourished, arms deals peaked, and training areas were made available to
Israel in the vast Anatolian plateau, as well as water supply from Turkey
in case Israel ran into drought years. Two di cult problems continued
to mar the relationship nonetheless: Turkeys special sensitivity with
regard to the Palestinian issue, which the Turks felt somehow respon-
sible for due to their inheritance of the Ottoman heritage. For, while
all other Arab countries established their own states, the Palestinian
problem remained unresolved. Te second problem was the slow revival
of Islam in the heartland of Turkey, which those in power in the urban
areas, and especially foreign observers who were persuaded that the era
of Islam had revolved, never suspected would rise in such a dramatic
fashion. But already in the 1990s and even before, the anti-Semitic
poison was being spread in the countryside, under the chief mentor
and ideologue Erbakan, and with the help of his dedicated disciples
such as Erdoan and Gl. Side by side with that quiet and long-term
revival, there were other Islamic movements of Turkish inspiration
among the Turkish population in Europe and Muslims in the West
in general, such as the Fethullah Glen and the Mill Gr , which
won a large audience at home and developed a growing one abroad,
especially through education. Tese movements would be the pre-
cursors of the Islamic Spring in Turkey one full decade before Tunisia
and Egypt, and will have pursued three or four decades of patient and
dormant activities, just like the Muslim Brothers in Tunisia, Egypt,
and the rest.
Erbakan, who was removed from power by the Army in 1998, and his
Islamic party declared as illegal and banned, had also been the founder
of the Mill Gr, which was the hotbed for the rise of Erdoan and
Co., who would attain the highest positions of power after the elections
of 2002. Before that, some of them had reached prominence in local
government, like Erdoan who served as Mayor of Istanbul until he
was tried and incarcerated for incitement. Erbakans removal by the
military was accepted as a matter of course, inter alia because during
his rule the daughter of Iranian President Rafsanjani visited Turkey
and declared to the press that the ambience in the country reminded
her of the prerevolutionary atmosphere in Tehran in the nal days of
304
the Shah, something that sounded as a threat on civil government in
Turkey, though its diagnostics could not be more precise. Erbakan
did not hide his bigotry, exclusion of non-Muslims and anti-Semitic
hatred, which he bequeathed to his disciples, and after Erdoan won
the elections at the head of a new-old Islamic party in 2002, his mentor
increased the pace of his anti-Christian and anti-Semitic propaganda
and brought it to levels unknown since the Nazi regime. In the elec-
tions of 2007, he was interviewed by various television channels and
spoke to them in terms reminiscent of the maddened remarks made by
Erdoan himself against Israel when he decided to veer toward Islam
and to embrace Iran and Syria as allies instead of Israel, and to send
Muslim terrorists aboard the Mavi Marmara to Gaza in order to defy
Israel and discredit it. Tose interviews to the Turkish media
2
reveal
the sources of his hatred toward Christians, Jews, and Israel, whom
he dubbed as bacteria and disease, and he repeated that infamy in
every city and town where he stopped. A selection from his outrageous
remarks will make the point:
1. All Indel nations are one Zionist entity; Jews want to rule from
Morocco to Indonesia ... Tese elections are about whether we will
be, or we will cease to be. Ill tell you where this is coming from, and
for this we have to rst expose the infrastructure. [...] Te right
path to the happiness of all humanity is our path, the Milli Gorus
way. Our Prophet was sent with love and compassion, and our
goal is the happiness of all six billion people in the world. We are
Muslims, and our civilization has brought happiness to the entire
world. Tis is the good, but there also is evil. Our religion says that
the indels are one nation [ Millah ]. Tat means evil is run by one
control center. When we look at the map of the world, we see about
200 countries painted in colors, and we think that there are many
races, religions, and nations. Te fact is that for 300 years, all these
[200 nations] have been controlled from one center only. Tis center
is racist, imperialist Zionism. Unless you make this correct diagno-
sis for the illness, you cannot nd the cure to it. You will ask, What
is this belief, this racist imperialism that destroys happiness in this
world?
2. Tis belief began 5,765 years ago, when the children of Israel were
living in Egypt, with a book of magic that was written by someone
called Kabbala. Te author or authors of this book later claimed
that they belonged to the tribe of Moses, but this is not true. Tey
distorted the Tevrat [= Torah, Bible] of Moses and put in it the
Turkey
305
Kabbala . If you want to see proof of this, you can look at their
Tevrat and then look at the Kabbala . What do these people believe
in? Teir belief has four principles that say: [...](1) You [the Jews]
are the real people of God; all others are created to be your slaves;
you were created as men and others [were created] as monkeys that
later turned into men. Tis is what they believe and what they teach.
Tey believe that they are the superior class. (2) Tis superiority will
be not only in thought, but will be materialized, actually realized.
Tey will be the masters and the others will be their slaves. (3) For
all this to come true, they must perform three duties: Te rst duty
will be to gather all the exiled sons of Israel into Quds [Jerusalem];
the second duty is to build Greater Israel between the Nile and the
Euphrates, within these determined borders, and to provide for the
safety of this Greater Israel.
3. Do you know what the safety of Israel means? It means that they
will rule the 28 countries from Morocco to Indonesia. Since all
the Crusades were organized by the Zionists, and since it was our
forefathers the Seljuks who stopped them, according to the Kabbala
there should be no sovereign state in Anatolia. Tis is these peoples
[i.e. the Jews] religion, their faith. You cant argue or negotiate with
them. Tis is their religion, and it comes from the Kabbala . Why did
this man, Kabbala, write this book? Because he wanted to encourage
those who were oppressed by the pharaohs, by saying that they were
superior and were Gods true people. Kabbala says that this people
defeated even Godmay Allah forgive. Te same line is found in the
Tevrat as well.
4. Tey will destroyAllah forbidAl-Aqsa mosque and in its place
build Solomons temple. Only then will their messiah come and
establish them as the rulers of the world. Tis is what they believe in.
To realize these goals and meet their obligations, they [i.e. the Jews]
have been working for 5,767 years! Teir history begins with this
Kabbala . Tey say that they want to be the rulers of the world. Tis
is a racist religion. If your mother is not a Jew, you cannot be a Jew.
Tats why they cannot multiply and grow. Among six billion people
they are only 30 million. [...] So how will they rule the world? Tey
say, Wait a minute, we have conquered the power of money within
the capitalist order. As one can see in the symbol of the 13 levels of
a pyramid that is depicted on the American dollar, all peoples will
serve us at the top. With the power of the dollar, we have established
a world order where money and manpower are dependent on us.
Tis is how we rule the world.
5. Now, lets come to us [the Muslims]. Tanks to our beloved Prophet,
light and happiness came to the six billion people of the world. We
306
became the masters. We [the Muslims] ruled for 11 centuries. But
unfortunately, in the last three centuries, the children of Israel have
grabbed this material power. Now they control the world that we
live in. What kind of a world did they build? Without understanding
this, nothing can be comprehended. Ballots, elections are all details.
Te essence is this: Lets assume you, as a Muslim, want to go to
[Mecca for] the haj (=pilgrimage) , and you want to y on a Turkish
plane. For an airline to get a permit to y and land in other airports,
it must be a member of the IATA. IATA is an organization of the
children of Israel, of Rockefeller. To become a member, airlines must
give them [the Jews] 9 percent of the ticket proceeds. You know
what this means. It means saying to Israel, Take this money, buy
guns, and kill me tomorrow, [so that you can] occupy Turkey. Tis
is the order that they have built and have implemented for three
centuries.
6. Lets say that you, as a Muslim, want to send money to another
Muslim country. Say you want to send money to Pakistan. You
cannot send it because you dont have the infrastructure to do that.
You are living in their [i.e. the Zionists] world. To send the money,
you need to take it to a Turkish bank. Ten the Turkish bank will
give it to the American bank. Te American bank will give an order
to its branch [in Pakistan], and that branch will give the money to
the Pakistani bank that will pay out the money that you sent. But in
all this, you will pay 1 percent. From wherever [and] to wherever the
money goes, 1 percent is paid to the Jew. Tey have taken the world
into their hands. Tat green dollar that you recognize is Zionist
money. Te owner is not the American central bank. Te American
central bank only rents this money, paying $500 billion a year for
rent. Tey [the Zionists] print this green money, the paper, and they
bring it to our sheikhs in Saudi Arabia and they say, Here, take this
green paper and give us your oil. And they take the oil with these
pieces of paper. Tere are ve trillion [of these] dollars outside of
America.
7. And look at what else they do. I am telling you all this so we can all
recognize this bacteria. What do they [i.e. the Zionists] do? Tey
go back to the oil sheikh and tell him to return the green papers,
and give him a yellow paper instead. What is this yellow paper? It
is an American bond. Tere are bonds outside the United States
valued at $5 trillion as well. Tat means they took back their green
papers to use them again. Tose bonds go to the central banks. And
what does the American central bank do? It gathers all the central
banks, to give them a white paper. So where are all the reserves of
the countries? Our reserves are not in the safes of our central bank.
Turkey
307
Tey are in the safes of Rockefeller. He is using all this money. What
do we have? Te head of our central bank has a white paper in front
of him. On this paper, it is written that such and such a number of
billions of dollars are in the banks [in the U.S.] What we have is only
a piece of white paper.
8. Tey are crooks three times over. Tey suck [money] from every-
bodyve trillion with green papers, another ve trillion with
yellow papers, and they keep trillions with the white paper they
give you. Every child born should be told, Welcome to this house,
my dear, but this house has an owner, and there is rent to be paid.
Te owner of this housethat is, this worldis the Zionist, and
you must pay him $1,200 every month. Every one of us has to pay
this $1,200, because of those trillions of exploitation dollars. Teres
more: Say you go to a supermarket, wherever you are in the world.
You [select] some products, and you pay for them. Say the cashier
tells you the total is 300 lira. You pay 300, and you walk out with
your sack. No matter where you are and where you buy, 100 lira of
the 300 is interest. You buy bread. Te tractor was purchased with
interest. Te our mills, the factories were built with interest. We
are made to pay for these interest [charges]. If you read the book we
wrote on this, you would see clearly that one-third of the money we
pay for a loaf of bread is paid out in interest.
9. My students and disciples [the current rulers of Turkey] must have
thought, Since there is so much money going around, why shouldnt
we have a share of it too? But that money is exploitation money. It is
not good money. Our students apparently have not understood what
we have been teaching them for 30 years [in Milli Gorus ]. Lets go
back to the [Zionist] bacteria. About $22 trillion out of all the mon-
ey we spend every year is paid to these racist imperialist Zionists.
We, as a country, are paying $200 billion every year to the Zionists
so that they can prepare their bombs, so that they can one day come
and take our country. Tis is the world that the Zionists have built.
[...] Tis racist imperialist Zionism organized 19 Crusades just to
reach its goals. To organize the Crusades, it used the Christians.
Why is it that the Christians are helping the Jews? A rabbi goes out
on the balcony and tells them, Oh Christians, isnt it the Messiah
that you are waiting for? We too are waiting for the same Messiah.
What the rabbi is doing is taqiya ,
3
of course. Ten he goes into his
synagogue and tells a ve-year-old, What you heard me say outside
is not true. Our Messiah is dierent. Jesus is someone whom we
killed. He will not come or go anywhere. I told them that to deceive
them. Tese people tell the Christians: You are waiting but you
have no guidelines as to how to make him come. Our Tevrat tells
308
us what to do. Lets do it together and lets bring the Messiah. And
what were those guidelines? To bring the Jews to Jerusalem, to build
and secure Greater Israel, and so on.
10. It was Zionism that established the sect of Protestantism. Te
capitalist order of today is the religious order of Protestantism. Its
because the pope rejects the concept of interest, so as not to allow
the exploitation of his children. Tats why the Jews decided to
change the [Christian] religion, and founded Protestantism. Tis
way they can charge interest and make everybody work for them.
Tats also why they built the Evangelical sect in America, which
now numbers 90 million members. Most people you see there [in
the U.S.] belong to this sect. Take [President] Clinton: He said that
he did not serve in the military for America, but for Israel he said,
I would take up arms, go into a bunker, and ght. You ask him,
Hey, Clinton, are you a Jew? Why is Israel your business? He says,
Nooo. It is not because I am a Jew that I say this. It is because I am
a good Christian that I think that way. Its because I want Jesus to
come that I am saying this. All this is because the Evangelical sect
was built by the Jews for them to think that way. Bush belongs to
that sect. Clinton belongs to that sect. Anyone you know ... Now
look, when we look at someone we see his skin only; but behind it
are all the muscles, bones, nerves. I am now giving you the anatomy
of the world to show you what is behind the skin, behind the surface.
11. Without knowing all this, you cannot comprehend what is going
on in the world. When we learn all this, we will know that there are
no 200 countries in the world. Tere are only two. One is the world
of Islam, and the other is all the others. Who uses these others?
Racist imperialism [meaning Zionism]. Te Zionists are holding
the Christians in the palms of their hands, and using them. Chinas
and Indias industrial development is being carried out with Jewish
capital. Japans too. Tey control them too. Now, only Islam remains
against them. Te Jews say you will be our slaves. Islam says la ilaha
illaAlla (=there is no God but Allah). We wont bow to anyone but
Allah. Nobody will be slaves to anybody. So this is the clash between
the twothe clash between good and evil.
12. Tese Jews started 19 Crusades. Te 19th was World War [I]. Why?
Only to build Israel. Tey used the Christians to build Israel. Te
Canakkale [Gallipoli] victory was only one of our battles. We fought
on 30 fronts during the war. Ten they had us sign the Treaty of
Svres. Tey told us they would eliminate us and build Greater
Israel and make us their slaves. No other nation could ght against
them on 30 battlefronts like our nation did. After they made us sign
the Treaty of Svres, the French came to Kahramanmaras [on the
Turkey
309
Syrian border], not to keep it but to give it out so as to make it part
of Greater Israel. Te English went to Palestine, not to keep it for
themselves, but to build Israel. Tey are doing all this just so that
Jesus will return. If we do not see these realities, we cannot under-
stand world aairs. What does Bush say? He says that Jesus ordered
him to invade Iraq. He says that the most important factor in mak-
ing his decision on Iraq was his being Christian. [He thought,] I will
take Iraq. I will build Greater Israel, so that Jesus can return. Tese
people work with that kind of belief. If you dont know about these
peoples beliefs, you cannot understand why they do what they do.
Our youth must learn all this. [...]
One wonders how this ignoramus, inhuman, anti-Christian, and
anti-Semite, full of hatred and steeped in fantasy, could serve as Turkeys
Prime Minister when his party won the plurality in the 1996 elections
and served for nearly two years as the head of a coalition government
before his party was ousted by the military (and they call that democ-
racy), mainly due to his rapprochement to Iran and the cold shoulder
he showed toward the alliance with Israel. He and his party were then
outlawed and excluded from politics. His disciple, Erdoan, who was
jailed for incitement while serving as the mayor of Istanbul, ended up
as the head of the AKP, an Islamist party that won the majority for the
rst time in 2002, and dwarfed the civilian parties. Erdoan, who did
not hesitate to attack in a very uncivilized fashion, Israels President
during a debate in Davos, and especially during the otilla aair (sum-
mer 2010) when he sent Muslim terrorists to defy Israel in Gaza, was
not far from the statements of his master, mentor, and predecessor,
hence his false accusations against Israel, which pushed the relations
between the parties to the brink. With his allies in Syria and Iran toeing
the same line, that entire anti-Semitic alliance found itself reinforced,
until Ankara realized that Assad and Ahmadinejad were not exactly
the sort of allies it needed to increase its reputation in the world. Af-
ter he purged his army from the personnel who wished to maintain a
good relationship with Israel, and placed his own men in their stead,
he embarked on a campaign of hatred and lies, in order to occupy his
place of leadership in the Islamic world, in replacement of the position
in Europe that his allies in NATO denied him. It stands to reason that
as long as Erdoan heads that party and as religious fanaticism takes
the place of rational calculations, that man who knows no erontery
will continue to manufacture accusations and encourage anti-Israeli
hatred to justify his irrational policies.
310
On December 28, 2002, columnist Y. Bayer of the high-circulation
Turkish daily Hurriyet (Freedom) wrote:
Did you know that in 1974, when Erdogan was President of the
Beyoglu Islamic youth Group in Istanbul, which belonged to the
Erbakan National Salvation Party, he wrote and directed a theatrical
play called Maskoyama , and also played the lead role of the bad son.
Maskoyama stood for Mas-ko-ya, the acronym for Masons, Kom-
munists and Yahudi (Jews), which was built on the combination of
the evil concepts of these three terms and the hatred towards them,
and was staged all over Turkey.
4

Tat was published after Erdoan won his landslide in 2002. But
when one digs up the sources of his upbringing and political activity,
one is reminded of his utterances as Mayor of Istanbul, for part of which
he was incarcerated and ousted from politics until his release, when his
illegal and inciting deviations became the law of the land. As the mayor
of Istanbul in the late 1990s, Erdoan publicly read a poem that includ-
ed the lines: Te mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets,
the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers. Te Islamist
message earned him a few months in jail from Turkeys military-backed
secular government. A few years later, Erdoan re-emerged in politics
as a champion of liberal democracy calling for sweeping institutional
reforms and closer ties with Europe, became prime minister, and led
Turkey through a decade of prosperity and inuence. Now, Mr. Erdoan
has tacked back in the other direction, igniting weeks of protests from
Turks concerned by what they see as Mr. Erdoans eorts to consolidate
his power and Islamize public life. Te shift has raised new questions
among many Turkish voters about whether the prime minister is dem-
ocrat or autocrat. How far Mr. Erdoan pushes his new agenda may
determine the durability of Turkeys revival and undeniable economic
prosperity. Te protests were ignited by Mr. Erdoans development
plans for an Istanbul park but quickly spread into a national crisis.
Mr. Erdoan on June 15, 2013, restored order by sending riot police
to storm the park, sending protesters eeing in a hail of tear gas and
water cannons. Consequences are starting to emerge. Germany, Tur-
keys largest trading partner, already sought to block the start of new
talks about Turkey entering the European Union. Te United States,
which has called on Turkey to show restraint, is watching to see if the
protests constrain Mr. Erdoans ability to pressure the Syrian regime
that President Barack Obama wanted to oust.
5

Turkey
311
When the United States was presenting Turkey as the moderate
Muslim country that might lead the Turkic bloc and the former Otto-
man patrimony from the Balkans to Central Asia, its idea was to bring
under control a moderate brand of Islam led by its ally in NATO and
Europe; but when it failed, and realized the return of Turkey to Islam
under Erdoans rule, and his abandonment of the alliance with Israel
in favor of a rapprochement with Arabs and Muslims, especially when
he chose to align himself to Iran and Syria until they failed him, Wash-
ington began to present him as a model of Islamic democracy, who
could combine Islam with all the trappings of liberal rule, to serve as
an example to emulate in the rest of the awakening Islamic world. But
the Americans were wrong again: it took them too long to wake up to
the fact that although elections in Turkey were fair and democratic, and
Erdoan won his sweeping majority without the riggings of Mubarak or
Assad, other aspects of democracy were sorely absent: harsh oppres-
sion of civilian demonstration, an enforcement of Islam in the public
square, which gave it much more visibility than previously under the
civil governments, more journalists imprisoned than in any country in
the world, the failure to reconcile with its past as Germany has done,
by recognizing the massacre of the Armenians and paying them some
damages; and especially the campaigns of incitement and lies against
former ally Israel, which have practically frozen the alliance between
the two countries and sent it back to what it was prior to the 1990s.
How Erdoan navigates the next stage could aect other Muslim
countries that have viewed his brand of Islam-infused democracy as a
model. Turkey was quick to champion the pro-democracy uprisings
that unseated dictatorships in Tunisia, Libya, and Egypt in 2011, and
to oer advice how to return the military to their barracks and put an
end to their interference in civil politics. In Egypt, Turkey oered more
than $2 billion to bolster the economy and dispatched leading o cials
and businesspeople to help President Mohammed Mursi reform,
Turkish-style, the countrys secular-dominated institutions. For Mr.
Erdoan himself, the protests could hinder his eort to overhaul the
constitution to his benet so as to allow him to switch to presidential
rule and so augment his authoritarian power. But so far, his policy has
been reinforcing the divisions between the liberal, urban prodemo-
cratic civil demonstrators, and his rural, religious, and conservative
rural supporters of the hinterland. His supporters openly deny that
he is sliding toward a more religious authoritarianism, arguing that
his democratic records are impeccable, something that can be easily
312
dismissed by his wild and uncivilized onslaught on Israel and incitement
against its people; by his further restrictions on alcohol consumption
and abortion; and by his repeated calls for all women to have at least
three children to grow Turkeys population. He has held forth on what
citizens should eat at the family dinner table, and intervened to censor
sex scenes in prime-time television series. His government has sought
to muzzle the press; Turkey now jails more journalists than Iran or
China, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
6

Following an adolescence steeped in religion and soccer, we are told,
Mr. Erdoan entered politics in the 1970s as a follower of Erbakans
Islamic National Salvation Party. It was a violent period. More than
5,000 people died in the daily street violence, mainly at the hands of
armed left- and right-wing militants. Two of Mr. Erdoans close friends
were killedone in a bombing, the other shot. Religion was the only
source for the ideas that Mr. Erdoan and his friends shared at the
time, says Mehmet Metiner, a fellow member of the youth wing of the
National Salvation Party at the time. We opposed radical secularism
in a country where most of the population were Muslim. Mr. Erdoan
gained nationwide attention when, campaigning for an Istanbul Munic-
ipal Council seat, he canvassed for votes in a licensed brothel. But he
remained very conservative. In a 1992 speech, he said Turkeys armed
forces should not be a slave to NATO, and that Te EUs real name
is Union of Catholic Christian States. Amid broad discontent with
political corruption, Mr. Erdoan won election for mayor of Istanbul
in 1994 on a populist platform to x the citys ailing infrastructure. His
views were said to have changed when he was jailed for four months
in 1999 following his recitation of the poem deemed an incitement to
religious hatred. He used his time in prison to read up on history and
international aairs, honing a vision for a more moderate religious
party that could reach beyond the pious voting bloc to merchants and
nationalists, according to Hseyin Besli, a former aide who was a leg-
islator in parliament until 2011. Maybe this was his change of tactics
that, while not altering his fundamentally religious views, enabled him
to address non-religious groups from the urban elites, which nally
helped him to achieve power in the 2000s.
7

Te symbolism of Mr. Erdoans jail term boosted Mr. Erdoans
popularity with conservatives and liberals uneasy with the governments
heavy-handed approach to religious politicians. He was inundated
with fan mail13,000 letters, according to Mr. Besliand a stream
of visitors bearing gifts of baklava, the sugary pastries. Once released,
Turkey
313
Mr. Erdoan and his partners Abdullah Gl, now Turkish president,
and Blent Arinc, now deputy prime minister, founded the Justice and
Development Party to encompass a broader spectrum of Turkeys center
and right. Tey toured European capitals to convince policy makers that
their more moderate vision supported rather than shunned Turkeys EU
membership bid. Previously, Turkish Islamism was based on dividing
the country between believers and nonbelievers, and there was a limit
of how many votes they could win says Ihsan Yilmaz, a columnist
for Turkish progovernment daily, Zaman . Erdogan and other young
leaders wanted to broaden the appeal. Te move capped a turn to the
center for Mr. Erdogan, who had said in speeches and interviews in
the early 1990s that it wasnt possible to be both secular and Muslim.
Te pivot was sustained after Mr. Erdoan became prime minister in
2003. During his rst term, he enacted sweeping reforms to democra-
tize Turkeys secularist-dominated institutions and bolstered ties with
Brussels and Washington. He championed human-rights reforms and
the opening of European Union entry talks, and he brought powerful
generals to heel and put the military-dominated National Security
Council, which had broad control of state aairs, under civilian control.
Te breaking of the power of Turkeys military, which had toppled four
governments in the second half of the twentieth century, was perhaps
Erdoans most striking achievement. Hundreds of o cers were jailed
after coup trials. Te prime ministers popularity was boosted by a
remarkable decade of economic growth that has seen a near tripling
of nominal incomes. Te average Turk today earns $10,500 a year, up
from $3,500 when Mr. Erdoan took power.
8

Many people were unhappy with the direction of the government,
but the trade-o was clear: economic growth and a government that was
socially conservative but didnt encroach too much on lifestyles, said
Sinan lgen, a former Turkish diplomat with the Carnegie Endowment
in Brussels. But while seeking election for a third time in 2011which
he ultimately won with his biggest margin yetMr. Erdoan gave a
speech that many analysts say foreshadowed a more autocratic and
Islamist style of governance. Erdoan felt strong and established enough
to revert to his roots, and he did it in his blunt and coarse style, which
in some regards, including his anti-Israeli attitude, is reminiscent of
his patron and mentor, Necmettin Erbakans, uncivilized demeanor.
Before tens of thousands of party loyalists in Ankara, Mr. Erdoan said
that following a June 2012 election victory, he would transition into an
Ustalik , or masterful, phase, which was very revelatory of his roots.
314
God willing, we will reconstruct Turkey. Te apprenticeship started in
2002. In 2007, the foremanship began. Until when? Until 12th of June.
After that date, the mastership will begin, Mr. Erdoan said, as the big
crowd chanted buyuk usta or grand master. Te masterful period has
seen political power increasingly centralized around Mr. Erdoan, who
has nal word on every issue. He has stied dissent, using a broad coup
investigation designed to subdue the military to purge other enemies,
including opposition journalists and Kurdish activists. Tat master-
ful speech showed us that Erdogan was no longer ghting reactive
battles, but would from now on do big things to redraw Turkey as its
paramount ruler, says Ziya Meral, from the Foreign Policy Center, a
London-based think tank. Te switch had been completed and a new
system had superseded the old guard: Te same Turkey but under new
management.
9

In a series of combative speeches, Mr. Erdoan has blamed unrest on
terrorist groups backed by foreign powers and labeled demonstrators
as looters and bums. He told a large crowd of supporters: Tey beat
my girls wearing headscarves ... they entered our mosques with their
beer and their shoes. In a speech in Ankara aimed at those who have
urged him to adopt a more conciliatory tone, the prime minister said:
Sorry, Tayyip Erdogan is not going to change. An opinion poll showed
that 50 percent of respondents felt the government was becoming
more authoritarian, with 54 percent saying that it was interfering with
their lifestyles. According to the survey of 2,800 people, support for
Mr. Erdoans party has declined in the wake of the protests of Summer
2013, though it remains by far the most popular party. Some observers
of Mr. Erdoan say that his charisma has been the key to his success,
but could also be a roadblock that could frustrate reaching a resolution.
Erdogan is at his root a pragmatist and not unlike Bill Clintonhe
would make you feel like you were the only person in the room, said
Jenny White, a professor at Boston University who once shadowed
Mr. Erdoan when he was Istanbul mayor. Erdogan is a product of
Turkish culture that is characterized by militant masculinity that can
easily turn to violence. Its a loaded gun that can be manipulated and
pointed, which makes it dangerous.
10

Part of Erdoans metamorphosis, both waystoward pragmatism
and back from it, including his anti-Israeli virulence and lies, matched
his mentors, but it turned out that the terrorist organization IHH,
which staged the anti-Israeli otilla in 2010, had acquired the Mavi
Marmara from the AKP-run municipality of Istanbul. IHH was an
Turkey
315
example of how NGOs are used by the Turkish foreign ministry to
execute dirty missions without ostensibly sullying its hands openly.
Indeed the IHH, which originated in the Mill Gr , was also used by
the Turkish government to distribute aid to populations in Northern
Iraq without seeming to have invaded that foreign land in order to
thwart any Kurdish inroads into Anatolian territory.
11
If one adds to
that Erdoans attacks against the secular Turkish constitution while
serving as Mayor of Istanbul (19941998), describing it as a huge lie
and declaring unequivocally that Sovereignty belongs unconditionally
and always to Allah, and that one cannot be a Muslim and a secular,
12

one understands the avenues to which he proposes to lead the Turkish
people if his plot to alter the constitution so as to permit himself to
reign supreme as an executive president free from the supervision of
Parliament.
Te more serious problem with Turkey is that it has been peddling
the Turkish model to be emulated by other Islamic countries emerg-
ing from the Spring. Egypt seemed to be the rst to follow it, when
the rule of the Brothers seemed assured, and Erdoan visited them in
Cairo, after they won the elections, and prevailed on them to emulate
the same tactic that enabled the Islamic Party of Turkey to emerge
from long years of civil government and conquer the necessary votes
to win a landslide. Te tactic consisted of building silently and patiently
a pool of support in the countryside, and use those bases to assault
the cities that were the strongholds of the intelligentsia and the bour-
geoisie, and take them over. Later, Erdoan moved to dismiss the top
military brass in order to avoid a repetition of the Erbakan ouster. Te
assumption that prevails today in the Spring circles and in the West is
that the Turkish model marries moderate Islam and democracy, both
accompanied by the impressive economic success which moved Turkey
forward. Egypt had begun to copy that model, prior to the crisis of the
military coup of July 2013, for example, as President Mursi removed
the Heads of the military and Intelligence establishment and several
senior military o cers, to replace them with his appointees, in order
to avert any possibility of the military command rising against him
when he decided to neutralize military inuence over government, as
Erdoan had done. But the events of the Summer of 2013 show that
Egypt was not stable enough and Mursi not established enough to take
that daring step because one year after their appointment, the new
military chiefs rose against him and sided with the opposition, despite
the legality of his elected o ce.
316
In Morocco, where the elections of April 2012 have delivered a great
victory to the Muslim parties, there is also talk of following that model.
Te founding of the Party of Justice and Development there, also a close
imitation of successive Islamic Parties in Turkey, has been the rst step
in that course. But the name of those Islamic parties is the easy part, it
remains to be seen whether the matters of religion and state, secular-
ism and Islam, and personal piety and public service can be addressed
in the new mood of revolution that has swept the Islamic world. Te
AKP example has been considered to be the epitome of moderation,
pragmatism, good governance, and the convergence between Islam,
democracy, and modernity. But the question is whether that image is
justied. For example, the Turkish model has been famously known
for its peaceful and gradualist strategy, which respected the red lines of
the established order, and by its reduction of the number of the Islamic
candidates it elded in elections, while avoiding revolutionary rheto-
ric, as long as it was struggling for hegemony. Along these lines, when
debate raged about the compatibility between Islam and democracy,
the Islamic party sounded more democratic than all the rest, in order
to avoid raising suspicions as to its designs.
Tings changed radically, however, when the Islamic Party gained
power, won a majority, which allowed it to take over the government
machinery and to remove into retirement the old military brass that
alone could threaten its rule. For example, Erdoans and Gls wives
appear completely veiled in public, on campuses students are again
permitted to sit in classes covered, journalists who bluntly criticize the
rulers are arrested, the state media go into blunt and bigoted incitement
against rivals and enemies, and in general, their style of Islam does
not appear to be moderate, but following the outrageous wordings of
Erbakan and Erdoan cited above. At the same time, democratic pro-
cedures are enforced as a choice tactic to win the trust of their constit-
uencies, something that was taken in the Arab countries of the Spring
as an example of reinforcing democracy, and they might be assuring
their followers of adopting the same means of instituting democracy
in their countries. In this regard, Mohamed Ghannouchi, the head of
Al-Nahda fundamentalists in Tunisia, praised the Turkish model for
promoting human rights and for extending political freedoms to meet
European standards, as an example to erect his own democratic state.
Similarly, the Egyptian Freedom and Justice Party, the political arm
of the Brotherhood, also consulted with the Turkish AKP before the
Egyptian elections, in order to make their platform and campaign more
Turkey
317
palatable to their general electorate. Tey wished, as they promised, to
assure the public that they did not intend to monopolize the political
process. But, judging from their repeatedly broken pledges to eld
less than half the candidates, and then not to present a candidate to
the presidency, it is evident that as they gained self-condence, their
expectations and ambitions increased.
Te Turkish model can also have international repercussions. At
rst, when the AKP came to power, and knowing that the army was in
favor of a good relationship with Israel, it maintained on the surface
the good relations between Ankara and Jerusalem. But after it removed
the old guard and replaced it with its own people, it came out openly
and totally against Israel and adopted a hostile attitude toward it.
Tunisian Ghannouchi referred to that aspect in the shift of the AKP
conduct and presented it as part of the Turkish model worth emulat-
ing, because it strengthened Ankaras Islamic identity. Tis all around
praise for Turkey by the Islamic parties that have come to power in the
Spring countries has indeed endeared it as the model to be followed,
making even the Sala Movement in Egypt, which came in second in
Parliament (30 percent) to the Brothers (45 percent), turn to Turkey
for guidance on the much damaged Egyptian tourist industry during
the upheaval. Tey suggest that since the Turks had successfully ad-
opted male beaches that are segregated from female beaches, and
still attracted Arab and other foreign tourists, Egypt should act simi-
larly. Morocco too, which has not suered yet from the ripples of the
Spring, but has experienced the rise of the Justice and Development
Party in the last elections, has been inspired by the successes of the
AKP in Turkey, which have been accompanied by all the amenities of
democracy for now. What remains to be veried over time is wheth-
er as the AKP rule is perpetuated, the government will not move to
Islamize the country even further, rst by soft measures of persuasion,
then through social pressure to conform, and nally through means
of coercion under Sharia law. One thing is sure, when the West had
recommended to other Arab countries to democratize following the
Turkish model, that was in the days of the civil governments of Adnan
Menderes, Sleyman Demirel, Turgut zal, Blent Ecevit, and Tansu
iller, when indeed Islam was moderate and arguably married well
with democracy. But since December 2002, when the AKP came to
power, the rule is no longer moderate Islam, neither domestically nor
externally, as the embrace of that model by Muslim Brothers a liates
elsewhere well testies.
318
Most outstanding in Erdoans turn around is the current Turkish
bashing of Jews and Israel since the AKP came to power in 2002, and
more emphatically since the Mavi Marmara incident, which was ini-
tiated and orchestrated by Erdoans government with a view to create
a crisis, thus turning the previous years virtual honeymoon alliance
between the two countries into a hostility, which threatens to degrade
into open enmity. Americas mediation to put an end to the rift between
two of its main allies in the Middle East, turned sour like any other
imposed settlements that are not accepted by the parties concerned.
It is clear that Turkey was interested in that rift, in order to abandon
its intimacy with Israel as a price for its new alliance with Iran and
Syria. Te Marmara was not the only ship in that convoy, but it was
the only one that violently resisted the boarding by the Israeli Navy,
which enforced the legal blockade on Gaza, and threatened the lives of
the Israeli soldiers, who had to defend themselves, and unfortunately
caused the unintended death of nine Turkish marauders who wanted
to break the blockade. In view of the violence used by the Turks, they
should have apologized to Israel, which they were in no mood of doing.
America prevailed on Israel via its many levers of inuence to wrongly
apologize to Ankara instead, but despite the humiliation of Israel, the
Turks keep raising their demands for a settlement. It is safe to assume
that the more Erdoan is battered at home, by the civil strife, the more
he will be likely to accuse the Jews of his troubles. A string of events
points in that direction:
a. Tere is a tendency in Turkey, encouraged by the Islamic govern-
ment, to demonize the Jews, thus triggering anti-Semitism. Erdoan,
for example, raised, hours before the cease-re between Israel and
Hamas on November 21, 2012, the question of Dual loyalty of
Turkish Jews. Te daily Yeni Safak , a supporter of Erdoan claimed
in a front page story, under the headline murders amongst Us
that there were Turkish-speaking Israeli soldiers who had board-
ed the Mavi Marmara on May 30, 2010 and killed nine Turks.
13

Tat newspaper, like Erdoan himself was eager to twist the truth
and paint the picture as if having a dual citizenship equals treason
in Turkey. When the readers comments on the article warned of
physical threats to Jewish citizens in Turkey, the spokesman of the
Association of Jewish Jews in Israel condemned the news report. He
announced that at the request of the Israeli Interior Ministry at the
night of the raid, he sent eight volunteers to Ashdod Port as those
detained Turks were going through passport control. (Tat had
Turkey
319
nothing to do with the boarding itself.) Ten, the Prosecutors o ce
in Istanbul that tried in absentia the Israeli soldiers who boarded the
Turkish ship, asked the Turkish National Intelligence O ce for a list
of Turkish Jews who traveled to Israel two weeks before and after
the incident. No democratic countries maintain surveillance on the
travels of its citizens is this suspicious manner.
b. A Turkish Jew attested to al-Monitor : Whenever there is ght-
ing between Israel and the Palestinians, the atmosphere in Turkey
turns against us and people start acting as if we committed a crime.
Another Jews sounded the same alarm bell: Te media are painting
such an image that many wont even consider us human.
14

c. Since Israels operation Cast Lead in Gaza (20082009), the
Israeli-Turkish relationship has suered dramatically. Tis can be
seen in the cancellation of joint military exercises, the rise of pro-
Palestinians television programming in Turkey and various diplo-
matic crises, including Prime Minister Erdoan walkout in Davos
and the otilla incident. Tat policy is shaped by Foreign Minister
Ahmet Davutolu, who published in April 2001 a book, well before
the rise to power of the AKP, where he outlined his anti-Israel sen-
timents, declaring that a Jewish Israel is not suitable to the Middle
East, and emphasizing dierences between anti-Semitism and
anti-Zionism. As the mastermind of neo-Ottomanism, he argued
that Israeli-Turkish relations undermined the implementation of
Turkish responsibilities derived from the Ottoman past. He accused
the Armed Forces of adopting an Israeli-oriented foreign policy after
the soft coup of 1997 when Erbakan was removed from politics and
his Islamic party banned.
15

d. In February 2009, after harsh and constant international criticism
surrounding the Davos Summit of January 2009, in which Erdoan
raised international outrage for walking out on Shimon Peres,
Istanbul hosted the Victory in Gaza Summit where two hundred
Arab and European Sunni Sheikhs and clerics, including members
of the Hamas that has been declared an International terrorist
group by the United States, and they declared Jihad on Israel and
support for the Hamas terrorists.
e. In October 2009, the Israeli foreign ministry protested against
Turkey over the state-run TRT-1 TV Channels program: Separa-
tion: Palestine in Love and in war, which falsely and deliberately
as intentionally murdering unarmed civilians in Gaza portrayed
Israeli soldiers, in complete denial of the massive rocket attack by
the Hamas on Israeli towns which had necessitated Israels incursion
in the rst place. Two years later, when during the Syrian civil war
a stray rocket hit Turkish territory, Ankara threatened a war if that
320
should be repeated. Not the shooting matters and justies response,
but who shoots: by Arabs, it is always right, except if on Turkish
territory, by Jews, it is always wrong, even if in self-defense.
16

f. According to a poll conducted in 2009 by Istanbuls Frekan
Research, 42 percent of the Turks declared that they would not
wanta Jewish neighbor. In 2012, that percentage rose to 54 percent.
g. Te relations between the two countries suered the most severe
blow over the September 2011 UN Palmer Report, which stated
that the blockade on Gaza, which was the excuse for the Turkish
otilla, was legal. As a thug mimicking his prime minister, Davu-
tolu rejected the United Nations (UN) Report, reiterating that the
blockade was illegal and that his countrys intervention was in order,
and issued sanctions against Israel, stating that Israel would be
forced to back down over his policies. He forgot that the times of the
Ottoman Middle Eastern bully are gone, and that Israel could stand
its position without submitting to threats.
17

h. A teachers union in Turkey initiated legal action over the distri-
bution of a series of books for primary school pupils, describing
Charles Darwin as a Jew, with a big nose who kept the company
of monkeys and other historical gures in anti-Semitic terms.
Te books were distributed to one thousand children in Istanbul,
though the authority that approved them denied any knowledge of
their content. Another book on Albert Einstein described him as
lthy and slovenly. Te book on Darwin said that the proponent of
natural selection Had two problems: rst he was a Jew; second, he
hated his prominent forehead, big nose and misshapen teeth ... He
threw nuts to monkeys at the zoo rather than go to school (a minor
detail: Darwin was not Jewish ..., but that is not the most terrible lie
concocted to humiliate Jews in Turkey).
18

It is reported that as a member of the banned Islamic Party in 1993,
Erdoan made a speech where he said:
Zionists, what are they afraid of America does not like my leader
[Erbakan at the time], the West does not like him either. Tere is
nothing more meaningful than the declaration of your enemy. Tus,
he [Erbakan] said, the ones they hate, I must love . . . [his stated
hatred for the Jews and their likening to bacteria, does not exactly
corroborate this statement, which is, on the contrary evidence of the
double talk of Islamic Party in Turkey and elsewhere].
19

In fact, already in October, 2009, some AKP insiders told the British
Guardian , what had been in evidence for years, that the Turkey-Israel
Turkey
321
strategic alliance was over. When Erdoan was asked about Ahmadine-
jad, he replied: Tere is no doubt he is our friend. Tat friendly
approach was reciprocated by Tehran, when the Iranian President
expressed his admiration for Erdoan, praising his decision to ban
Israel from a planned NATO maneuver in protest of Operation Cast
Lead.
20
Another way in which Erdoan encouraged anti-Semitism was
his backing to radical Islamic papers like Vakit (which was banned in
Germany due to its anti-Semitic content), and to anti-Israeli televi-
sion programs, such as the Valley of the Wolves that were approved
by the Turkish censor. Turkish journalists have conrmed that the
editorial policy of their papers was dictated by government bodies,
that journalists phones and o ces were wiretapped, that pressure
was applied on the owners of major media outlets to conform, and
that tight supervision was applied on Internet sites.
21
Leaked US cables
suggested that Erdoan was an Islamic fundamentalist who hated Israel.
In 2009, James Jerey, the US Ambassador in Ankara, reported that
his Israeli counterpart blamed Erdoan personally for the worsening
relations with Israel. Te Turks tried to convince the Israeli Envoy
that Erdoans public criticism of Israel was only for domestic con-
sumption to placate his Islamic radicals, but at any rate, it showed
his hatred toward Israel and it caused the irreparable damage that it
caused.
22

Erdoans one-track mind of only blaming Israel on the one hand, and
denying that any Muslim can do any wrong, on the other, was reected
in his scandalous denial of the Darfur massacre and his exoneration
of Umar Bashir, the president of Sudan, who has been a fugitive from
the Hague International Court. He said that he had visited Darfur and
saw no evidence of genocide where hundreds of thousands were
massacred by the Sudanese Janjaweed, while without visiting Gaza,
where most of the thousand victims were sustained as a result of
ghting, he saw massacres and extermination. He also outrageously
claimed that Bashir was innocent, the rationale being that a Muslim
can never commit genocide. Tat is not possible,
23
ignoring his own
countrys history with the genocide of Armenians during World War
I, his own onslaught on hundreds of Kurdish villages in Anatolia, and
the wide-ranging daily killings of civilians across the Islamic worlds:
Syria, Libya, Yemen, Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and Mali. Erdoan
knows what is happening there, but lying blindly in order to protect
the reputation of Muslims is considered in his culture more favorably
than the truth.
322
Another blatant lie from the mouth of Erdoan was reported in the
Saudi Al-Watan in March 2010 as he was criticizing Israels national
heritage and saying that the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron and
Rachels Tomb near Bethlehem were not and never will be Jewish
sites, but Islamic sites.
24
Tat gratuitous statement occurred several
months before the otilla incident of May 2010, so that could not have
been caused by any Israeli provocation. It was reported that while in
prison for his antireligious incitement, he read history. He apparently
did not read or internalize enough the history he would continue to
ignore all his life. Had he read it, he would have learned that Jews had
lived for a millennium in the Holy Land and sanctied its holy sites
some two millennia before his Turkic forefathers had come as nomadic
conquerors from Central Asia and taken over the Anatolian plateau
in the late Middle Ages, obliterating the Christian Byzantine Empire
that existed for a millennium before them and turning its churches
into mosques. He also lied blatantly when in an interview in June 2010,
this time after the Marmara incident, as he was furiously upset about
Israel, denying the 8,000 rockets that had been showered on Israel by
the Hamas and caused the Israeli incursion into their territory.
25
Little
did he know that two years later, during the Syrian civil war, he would
threaten a war with Syria just because one story bomb fell in his terri-
tory. In November 2012, Erdoan described Israel as a terrorist state
when it retaliated against Gaza again for its relentless and unprovoked
bombing of Israeli cities and villages, which spread terror among
Israeli civilians. His excuse was simple: Tose who associate Islam with
terrorism close their eyes in the face of mass killing of Muslims, turn
their head from the massacre of children in Gaza, he told a conference
of the Eurasian Islamic Council in Istanbul. For this reason, I say that
Israel is a terrorist state, and its acts are terrorist acts, he added, while
accusing Israel of ethnic cleansing in Gaza.
26

Tis anti-Israeli and anti-Semitic stand by Erdoan and his party
largely reverberates through the Mill Gr movement, created by
Erbakan in Turkey way back and disseminated throughout the Turkish
diaspora in Europe notably in Germany where three million of them
have taken root and established their Milli Gazette where they spread
an anti-Western and anti-Semitic message, and urging the Islamization
of society, and the overthrow of the secular trappings of the Turkish
regime. Tey attribute sovereignty to Allahs alone and predict the
establishment of a new Islamic world order where the hatred against
Jews, Erbakan-style is a central piece. Te combination of his Islamic
Turkey
323
hatred, together with the Nazi obsession with Jews, which they may
have picked up locally from Neo-Nazis and other extremists of their
kind, have turned them the hot spot of the Muslim Brothers in Eu-
rope. According to German scholar Johannes Kandel, the anti-Semitic
literature distributed by the Mill Gr in Europe includes Henry
Fords Te International Jew , and the infamous Protocols of the Elders
of Zion , which are sold in the mosques of the movement throughout
Germany and Europe. Tat is the kind of books that Erdoan must
have grown upon in his youth, and has had great di culties to part
with in his adulthood and his ascent to power. Te counter-revolution
in Egypt in early July 2013, which Erdoan supported and considered
as his protg, may portend bad omens for his own rule following the
rocky summer he had spent dealing with his crowds who shouted him
down and demanded his departure. For, a counter-Islamic revolution in
another Islamic country, which had also elected its Islamic leadership
democratically, may constitute a precedent and model for others to
follow.
Notes
1. R. Israeli , Te Odd Couple:Turkey and Israel, Orbis (January 2001): 16579.
2. TV interview given by previous PM Erbakan to Flash TV on July 1, 2007 as
part of a pre-election program (http://www.milligorusarsiv.com/videolar/
le.php?f=5). See Te Blood Libel and Its Derivatives, pp. 154-159, for more
information on Erbakans anti-Semitism, from which his disciple Erdogan
has learned.
3. Taqiya is an Islamic term that means concealing ones true beliefs to avoid
repression.
4. MEMRI, Special Dispatch No 916, June 6, 2005.
5. Joe Parkinson, Erdogan Tightens Grip on Turkey, Putting Nation at Cross-
roads, June 27, 2013. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323
300004578557693146971554.html?KEYWORDS=germany+turkey
6. Ibid.
7. Ibid.
8. Ibid.
9. Ibid.
10. Ibid.
11. Yaakov Lappin, http://web.archive.org/web/20100428140334/http://eng.
akpati.org.tr/english/lifestory.html
12. MEMRI, Special Dispatch no 1596, May 23, 2007.
13. Yeni Safak , December 13, 2012.
14. Tlin Daliglu, Turkish Intelligence Service Targets Jewish Population,
Al-Monitor , December 19, 2012.
15. Te Jerusalem Review , October 3, 2012.
16. Ibid.
17. Ibid.
324
18. Daniel Dombey, and Funja Guler, Turkish book on Darwin Sparks Outrage,
October 19, 2012. www.ft.com/cms/s/0/f27adba8-1a01-11e2-a179-00144
feabdc0.html#axzz2A3AovbTy.
19. Erdogans anti-American and Antisemitic rant in 1993, lifted from Israeli
Channel 10 broadcast on March 18, 2010.
20. Robert Tait, Iran is our Friend, says PM Erdogan, Te Guardian , October
26, 2009.
21. Barak Ravid, Israel accuses Erdogan of inciting anti-Semitism, Haaretz ,
January 26, 2010. Tat was before the Marmara incident of May, 2010, so
it could not be the reason, just a pretext.
22. James Bone, Turkey Denies Anti-Semitic Stance in Wake of Leaked Doc-
uments, Te Times , November 30, 2010.
23. Maayana Miskin, Erdogan: Israel Worse than Sudan, Muslims do not Cause
Genocide, November 8, 2009. www.israelnationalnews.com/news/news.
aspx/134297#.ULQrSGdryCk
24. Rachels Tomb was never Jewish, Jerusalem Post , March 7, 2010.
25. Charlie Rose, Turkish PM Erdogan: Hamas Rockets is a Hoax, June 28,
2010. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ptwir8pCnBU
26. Hurriet Daily News , November 20, 2012.
Conclusion: Are Hatred and
Lie Propagation Reversible?:
Summary Refections
325
It does not take much to rekindle hatred against the Jews and to
revive the popular lies concocted against them, by clerical and polit-
ical leaderships, who stand to gain from diusing them among their
ignorant masses. Te lies, which provoke hatred either in their original
and traditional forms or in their new and constantly evolving novel
expressions, continue to attract huge audiences in the Islamic world,
even if in the civilized countries of the West they might have waned to
a greater or smaller measure. While in the West, it is no longer fash-
ionable to fabricate false accusations against Jews, or to hurl against
them gross anti-Semitic lies that are punishable by law, under various
pieces of legislation geared to reduce ethnic and religious incitement,
it turns out that the predisposition remains in place there to hook on
to calumniations against Israel, under the pretext of anti-Zionism
in order to lash out openly at Jews, as things are unfolding these days
in Hungary and some Baltic countries. So much more so in the Arab
and Islamic worlds, where that predisposition is always on the verge
of exploding if just given the opportunity. Te poison aair of 1982
in the West Bank,
1
for example, which began as an innocent malaise
among Palestinian girls but grew into a staged malicious propaganda
campaign to tarnish Israel, was only avidly seized upon by the Euro-
pean media to castigate Israel without any justication. Especially the
German press was eager to show that it was not only the Nazis who
had been culprits of using gas against their Jewish victims, but they
also found their worthy followers in todays Israeli Jews, who allegedly
pursue the same methods against Palestinians. Even when the story was
proved to have been a hoax and Israel was totally exonerated from that
326
horrible accusation, none of the respectable papers who championed
the blood label had the decency to apologize.
Te Arabs and Muslims are so steeped in their own propaganda and
campaigns of hatred against Jews and Israel that they have grown to
believe in their own delusions, as the popular television series and books
on the blood libel and the Protocols of the Elders of Zion , which are
liberally cited in the writings of radical Muslims, such as the platform
of the Hamas and the public declarations that one hears from political
and religious leaders in the Islamic world attest. Tose beliefs come
to the fore when every time Israel exercises the right of self-defense, it
is accused of slaughters, mass murders, and intentional killing of
children among the Palestinians and other Arabs. Tose claims are
also voiced by moderate Palestinians and countries such as Jordan
and Egypt with whom Israel has maintained peaceful relationships
for decades. Tat shows that making peace through concessions to
those countries, and initiating gestures of goodwill toward them do not
necessarily generate changes in attitudes and behaviors among them.
Te hatred and lies it produces have gone so deep into the Islamic
experience and are so frequently repeated to the new generations of
Muslims that they have become part of the Muslim DNA that nothing
can erase. In a way, it is tragic that Muslim culture has unwittingly em-
braced Joseph Goebbelss infamous mantra that when repeated often
enough a lie becomes a reality. Te tragedy is that those who initiate
and propagate the lies begin to believe in them and are therefore vic-
tims of their own delusions. As they feed their lies into their youth,
they also foreclose any possibility of letting the young investigate the
changing situation and come to their own conclusions, as the prevailing
propaganda tends to perpetuate itself, and the very few independent
minds who challenge it are brutally silenced.
It was symbolic that on the eve of Passover 2002, when twenty-nine
Israelis who sat for the seder in Park Hotel in Netanya, they were
murdered by a Palestinian terrorist, in a horror that wiped out entire
families of innocent civilians, which included children. Tis time, it
was Jewish children who were sacriced on Pesach eve, contrary to the
blood libel millennial accusation against Jews that they used Christian
and then Muslim childrens blood to make their matza bread. Hardly
any reaction or expression of sympathy was triggered in the Arab and
Islamic world, which regarded that Passover murder with indierence,
sometimes even with elation. But when Israelis launched a few weeks
later a counterattack against terrorists who had dug themselves among
Conclusion
327
the civilian population of inner Jenin, and at the price of twenty-three
Israeli soldiers killed, carefully dislodged and eliminated that nest of
terror, Palestinian, Arab, Muslim, European, and United Nations out-
rage was heard from one end of the world to the other decrying the
massacre that the Israelis were again accused of having committed.
Moreover, in the course of time, Palestinian moderate Abu Mazen,
recognized the culprit as a national hero and posited him as a model
to be emulated by Palestinian youth. Tat is exactly the stu that per-
petuates hatred and lies to justify that hatred. Like in the Poison Aair,
the Jews were conveniently charged of a massive massacre of innocent
Palestinian civilians who never did any wrong to anyone. Moderate
Saib Arekat, the spokesman of the Palestinians at that time, cited a
fantastic number of 3000 innocent Palestinian civilians who were
wantonly attacked and annihilated by the murderous Israelis. Names
of nine-children families were eulogized for their falling victims to the
blood-thirsty Israelis. It was di cult to ght back this blood libel,
even against the background of the true slaughter that had happened
a few weeks earlier against Jews in Netanya. At the end, it turned out
that most of the fty Arab dead were armed combatants who were
killed during the ghting, which had levied such a heavy price on the
Israelis, who could otherwise had leveled that part of the city without
incurring one casualty of their own, had they chosen to use the Park
Hotel method of mass killing that Palestinian terrorists had resorted
to. Te lie was uncovered, but the popular belief among the Palestin-
ians that the massacre had been perpetrated by Israel persisted. And
Kamel Arekat, the master liar, was promoted to chief negotiator for
the Palestinian Authority.
Te false accusation against Israel has persisted nonetheless. Films
were made on the Jenin massacre, which do not relate to any reality,
and charges are still hurled by Muslim countries daily at Israel whenever
it dares to retaliate against the targeted Palestinian culprits every time
they launch missiles indiscriminately against Israeli civilian population.
Somehow, massive and indiscriminate murder of Israelis by Palestin-
ian terrorists is more tolerated, by Muslims and Europeans alike, than
the targeted surgical attacks against the perpetrators in their nests,
which admittedly sometimes cause unfortunate collateral damage.
Moderate Abu Mazen and Recep Tayyip Erdoan, Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad, and other Muslim leaders, let alone the murderers
themselves, immediately ritually decry the new Israeli crime, and
the massacre of innocent Palestinian children, while the Hamas- or
328
Islamic-Jihad-initiated murders are forgotten if not justied. Tis is
reminiscent of the traditional blood libel when the Jews were always
the accused victims, while the perpetrators were invariably exonerated
because, as Erdoan said, Muslims simply cannot perpetrate genocide.
Never mind that the greatest numbers of murders occur in and by the
Muslim world, if one considers the Darfur massacre (that Erdoan
could not see), the Syrian killings elds with 100,000 victims or more,
the daily terrorist attacks by Muslims against Muslims in Afghanistan,
Iraq, Pakistan, not to speak of the scattered death incidents that occur
constantly in Libya, Tunisia, Yemen, Somalia, Egypt, Iran, and all the
rest, where death is not reported as anything extraordinary. Only when
it refers to Jews and Israelis, the headlines advertize that new massacre
that they committed against the innocent Muslims.
In an interview by Egyptian Salast Muhammad al-Zawahiri, brother
of the Al-Qaida leader, he said that even though he was not a member of
any organization, he supported the vision of a Sharia state in Egypt and
declared that: ghting Israel and the Jews is a religious duty incumbent
upon all. Te Egyptian government [of Mursi] should have been ghting
the Jewish enemy. Perhaps due to circumstances, its weakness of its
interests, the Egyptian government ignored a religious duty incumbent
upon it. Not just the Egyptian governmentthe Jordanian one as well.
Tis is a religious duty incumbent upon all Muslims.
2

As other moderate Muslims, whose countries had made peace
with Israel continue to delegitimize it and deny the Holocaust, which
they regard as the basis of Jewish nationhood in the rst place in
spite of the paradox involved, hatred continues to spread toward the
Jews in general, for forging their Jewish identity while they hail from
the Khazars of the Caspian area, and owe their state to Hitler, at the
same time that they claim that the Shoa is a hoax.
3
Other Jordanian
writers also attacked Obama for celebrating the Jewish Passover in
the White House, ignoring the blood of gentile children that Jews
used for their Matza bread. Tis kind of garbage, which is backed by
many other articles of the same writers, which attribute September 11
to Jews, or to an Israeli-American conspiracy, or deny the Holocaust
altogether, is not likely to endear Jews to the Islamic world even in the
relatively moderate countries that have made peace with Israel, some
have visited it, and they should know better. Nevertheless, there is
demand in those countries and beyond to the most libelous nonsense
written about Jews because no sane voice is raised against them and
no government sanction is applied to them, they not being considered
Conclusion
329
illegitimate incitement as in Western Europe. Quite the contrary,
calumniators of this caliber are often considered a sort of popular
heroes, and they see no reason why to discontinue their work of libel,
hatred, and lies, and to lose thereby their fame and readership in the
Muslim world.
4

Worse than that is when advanced students in Arab Muslim univer-
sities undertake new pathbreaking research and win new academic
titles, based on hoaxes and lies, for this means that the hatred and
culture of lies that was transmitted to them will be faithfully passed on
to the next generation and perpetuated ad innitum . In January 2012,
a doctoral student at the Yarmouk University in Jordan published an
article analyzing the present malaise in the Arab world, heaping the
entire responsibility, once again, on a Jewish conspiracy. Tis unten-
able analysis, which it is worth to explore at length, not only draws a
desperately negative verdict of the primitive level of research at this
university, as in others of its kind, but also signals to the Muslims and
to the world that the next generation has been valiantly taking over
the banners of hatred, bigotry, and lies from their predecessors. Let
us read for ourselves:
Reading the Introduction to the Protocols of the Elders of Zion ...
I was surprised to discover the scope of the global Zionist conspir-
acy. But I was even more surprised that I could not nd any other
explanation for the current reality [in the Arab world], except that it
is the realization of this conspiracy ...
Out of respect for your intelligence, my readers, I will not belabor
the idea, I will only quote from the introduction to the book and leave
it to you to analyze the conspiracy in light of the reality, or to analyze
the reality in light of the conspiracy ...
Te Jews have had a secret plan to dominate the entire world to
promote their exclusive interests ... Te Protocols state: the Jews
aim to eliminate all the regimes in the world and replace them with
a tyrannical Jewish monarchy ... One of the steps they have taken is
to entice the monarchs to oppress their people, and entice people to
rebel against their monarchs by spreading the principles of liberty,
equality and the like interpreted in their special way so as to harm
both sides ... Tey corrupt the rulers and leaders, while quashing
any display of awareness among the non-Jewish peoples . . . Tey
use women, money, positions and trickery, among other means ...
Tey sow dissent and schism in all countries by means of secret
political and religious societies, labor unions, sports foundations,
Masonic temples and various clubs and societies, they want to
bring the countries from a state of tolerance to a state of political and
330
religious radicalism, socialism licentiousness, anarchy and inability
to implement the principle of equality ...
How long will our Arab nation continue to ignore these facts and
wander aimlessly? my brother, the reader, after citing these statements
there is no need for me to analyze or explain any further. Su ce it to
quote the word of Allah: Tose of the Children of Israel who went
astray were cursed by the tongue of David and of Jesus. Tat was
because they rebelled and used to transgress. (Quran 5:78)
5

For this trash to be considered academic research, his university
must be at the level of a primary school at most. He takes for granted
that the Protocols, which were conrmed by courts of law in civilized
countries, as a forgery by the Czar secret police at the turn of the twen-
tieth century, are a reliable source to cite. And then he pathetically tries
to tell his readers, without insulting their intelligence, that neither he
nor they have shown any evidence of having, and that Israels democrat-
ic, sane, and stable regime was conspirational, while the dictatorship,
unstable, and unrepresentative monarchies of the Arab world were the
victims of Jewish conspiracies. How primitive and insane is his thinking,
if he cares to think at all, and how destructive and uneducative are his
teachers who direct him to write these idiotic words, and lead their
student prodigy to believe that he deserves a superior academic title.
Tat is the true insult to intelligence, and a disastrous omen for any
improvement in the Arab Muslim mentality of hatred and lies in the
foreseeable future. Tis mentality and upbringing seem to be so deeply
steeped in religion that it is taken as the Word of Allah, namely it is true,
eternal, and immutable, and that there is no chance, even no attempt,
to alter it or ignore it. When school children learn Muhammad Ibn
Ishaqs authoritative Sira of the Prophet, for example, and they learn
from it how he hated the Jews and mistreated them, why would they
behave dierently? Sira said:
Te Apostle said: Kill any Jew that falls into your power. Tereupon,
Muhayyisa b. Masud lept upon Ibn Sunayma, a Jewish merchant
with whom he had social and commercial relations, and killed him.
Huwayyisa was not a Muslim at the time, though he was the elder
brother of Muhayyisa. When Muhayyisa killed the Jews, his brother
began to beat him, saying: You enemy of Allah, did you kill him when
much of the fat on your belly comes from his wealth? His brother
answered: Had the one who ordered me to kill him ordered me to
kill you, I would have cut your head o. He said that this was the
beginning of Huwayyisas acceptance of Islam. Te other replied: by
Allah, if Muhammed had ordered you to kill me, would you have killed
Conclusion
331
me? Yes, responded the other: if he had ordered me to cut o you
head, I would have done so. His brother exclaimed: a religion that
can bring you to do this is marvelous, and he became a Muslim.
6

Reverend Mark Durie then discusses the issue of whether this sto-
ry reects the strength of the weakness of Islam, as the words of the
Prophet have become absolute commands for his followers, and the
intolerance of Islam toward any apostate or insult of the faith is treated
with violent reactions. He thinks that this story reects the intimidating,
even traumatic eect of encountering a religion that inspires deadly
violence in someone you thought you knew as a reasonable person. Te
fact is that such trauma can jolt someone to the side of Islam, which
has the spiritual muscle to dictate violent acts in violation of the most
stringent civilized social norms. Apparently, Ibn Ishaq thought that
this was a splendid and exemplary story that reected well on Islam
and that later generations would be proud to follow. He was not far
from the cruel reality, which unfortunately is still being followed by a
massive killing in and by Islam both of Muslims and of others who are
hated front not submitting to Islam, and all manner of lies are heaped
on them to justify their elimination. Much of the web of lies woven by
the Nazis about the Jews and Western democracies, and by the Com-
munist world against capitalism (and also against the Jews), could not
be undone and refuted before those regimes crumbled, because their
very subsistence sustained those systems of lies and prevented their
refutation, and only their collapse could permit their end. Tus, maybe
only the end of Islamic regimes can begin to portend the end of hatred
and lies in the Islamic world.
Notes
1. For the full story, see R. Israeli, Poison: Manifestastions of a Blood Libel
(Lexington Books, 2002).
2 . MEMRI, clip No 3611, October 4, 2012.
3. MEMRI, Special Dispatch No 5022, October 23, 2012.
4. MEMRI, 7 April, 2013, www. Memri.org.il/cgi-webaxy/sal/sal.pl?lang=he&
ID=107345memri&act=show&dbid=articles&dataid=3359
5. al-Asawsana.com , Electronic journal, January 24, 2012.
6. Alfred Guillaume, Te Life of Muhammed , 369. Cited and interpreted by
Mark Durie, mark@markdurie.com, February 7, 2013.
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Al-Ittihad (Egypt)
Al-Jazseera (Qatar)
Al Manar Television (Lebanon-Hizbullah)
Al-Monitor (Turkey)
Al-Mujahidin (al-Qaida, online)
Al-Mustaqbal (Lebanon)
Al-Quds (Palestinian Authority)
Al-Quds al-Arabi (London)
Al-Risalah (Gaza)
Al-Riyadh (Saudi Arabia)
Al-Shab (Egypt)
Al-Sharq al-Awsat (London)
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Al-Watan (Syria)
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FARS News Agengy (Iran)
Haaretz (Tel Aviv)
Hurriyet (Turkey)
ICJS Research (Melbourne)
Iqra Television (Saudi Arabia and Egypt)
Iran News (Tehran)
IRNA (Islamic Republic News Agency)
Israel Defen se (Tel Aviv)
Jerusalem Post (Jerusalem)
Jerusalem Review
Journal of Terrorism and Political Violence
Le Point (Paris)
Maariv (Tel Aviv)
MEMRI (Jerusalem and Washington)
Middle East Journal of Culture and Communication
National Post (Washington)
Nativ (Ariel)
New York Times
October (Cairo)
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339
Analytical Index
A
Abu Dhabi, 58
Abu Mazen (President Mahmud Abbas),
2, 93, 2335, 243, 251, 327
Achille Lauro , 51, 121
Afghanistan, 2830, 32, 51, 63, 6870, 72,
77, 131, 140, 208, 327
Africa, 23, 64, 68, 95, 129, 192
Liberia, 21, 197
North , 71, 84, 147, 14950, 1645
Organization of African Unity, 116
Rwanda, 21
Sierra Leone, 21
Somalia, 21
Sudan, 21
Aftonbladet , 123, 129
Ahmadinejad, President Mahmud, 2,
15, 35, 68, 85, 207, 223, 242, 274, 277,
281, 327
(Al)Ahram , 134, 171, 185
al-Iqtisadi , 197
Albania, 300
Aleppo, 237
Algeria, 32, 119, 125, 127, 228
Islamic Groups in , 32
Ali, Imam, 274
Allah, 2, 201, 23, 31, 39, 42, 49, 53, 59,
65, 70, 83, 156, 170, 194
Path of , 37, 49, 69
Alliance Israelite Universelle , 164
America (see also US), 72
North , 119
South , 1, 64, 68
Amrozi, Ali, 83
Andalusia/ Iberia, 29, 39, 71, 84
Golden Age in 164
Andric, Ivo, 4
Annan, Ko, 119
Ansar al-Islam, 34
Antisemitism, 4, 156, 22, 64, 723,
7780, 823, 85, 92, 96, 99, 111, 118,
131, 147, 167, 195, 277, 286, 325
European , 24
Global Forum for Combating , 15
Antwerp, 21
(Al) Aqsa Mosque and Dome of the Rock
(see also Jerusalem/ Temple Mount),
184, 220, 237, 239, 2424, 264,
305
Al-Aqsa TV, 260
Ankara, 3134
Arab, 22
League, 107, 116, 185, 228, 254
media, 108, 171
Revolt, 248
Spring, 1213 (see also Spring)
Summit, 254
Union of Lawyers, 213
Arafat, Yasser, 2, 8, 40, 501, 57, 93, 104,
121, 144, 171, 195, 209, 229, 233, 253,
269
Arinc, Bulent, 313
Arikat, Saeb, 53
Arieli, Dan, 1213
Asia, 68, 95
Central , 72, 3001, 313
Southeast , 64
Assad, President Hafez, 232
Bashar, 32, 118
Ataturk
Legacy, 301
Revolution, 299
Australia, 16, 83, 132, 205, 217
Ayatullah, 274, 281
Uzma , 276
(al-Azhar), 91, 168, 170, 185, 246

340
B
Baghdadi, Ahmed, 28, 203
Balfour Declaration, 204
Balkans, 71, 300, 311
Ban Ki-moon, 119, 131
Banna, Hssan, 4
Banu Nadir Tribe, 294
Baz, Osama, 1845
BBC, 118
Bedouin, 62
Beijing, 5
Beirut, 1034
Ben-Zvi, President Yitzhak, 1323
Berlin, 101
Bethlehem, 86, 218
Church of Nativity, 121
Tomb of Rachel, 132, 242
Bildt, Carl, 1235
Bin Laden, Osama, 445, 72, 11020,
140, 187
Bir Zeit University, 247
Bismarck, Chancellor, 204
Blood Libel, 9, 15, 85, 93, 99, 1112,
1178, 1256, 1312, 146
Damascus , 144, 1712, 200
into Islam, 173
Bonnier, Elisabet, 123
Bosnia, 71, 300
War, 104, 125
Bostom, Andrew, 845, 147
Bostrom, Donald, 1278
Bourguiba, President Habib, 73
Bouteika, President Abdelaziz,
127
Brahimi, Lakhdar, 119
Britain/ England, 63, 67, 71, 118, 122,
126, 142, 220
Brussels, 71, 313
Bush, President George W., 345, 501,
66, 87, 205, 2167

C
Cairo, 25
Caliphate, 36, 59
Camp David, 197, 248
II, 234, 248, 255
Canaanites, 1213, 48, 240, 2457
Canada, 132
Cartoon Aair, 3, 41, 578, 293
Charles, Prince, 55
Chechnya, 69
China, 56, 94
s military, 5
Christians, 32, 57, 73, 823, 101, 104, 110,
115, 117, 240
attacks on , 34, 40
Catholic Church, 86
Crusades, 36, 88, 308
Eastern , 86
Solidarity International, 134, 139
Churchill, Winston, 92, 171, 246
Clinton, President Bill, 129, 248, 308,
314
Hillary , 171
Coventry, 101, 256
Cuillar, Perez de, 138

D
Darwin, Charles, 320
Davos, 146, 218, 317
Davutoglu, F.M., 320
Defensive Shield Operation, 53
De Gaulle, Charles, 92
Deir Yassin, 134, 197
Denmark, 578, 123
Dhimmi, 834, 86, 1491, 154, 157ff,
273
Dresden, 101, 256
Dreyfus Aair, 111
Dura, Muhammed, 23, 102, 116, 145
Durie, Mark, 823, 2056, 217, 331
Durban, 115, 117, 130

E
(Te) Economist, 280
Eitan, General Rafael, 124
Egypt, 19, 24, 26, 3940, 48, 512, 934,
228
Christians in , 228
Doctors Union, 127
Lawyers Association, 4
media, 25, 73
Einstein, Albert, 320
Emirates, 24, 57, 72, 192, 277
Erbakan, Necmettin, 283, 258, 300, 302,
3123
Erdogan, PM Teyyip, 2, 1178, 146, 170,
183, 206, 218, 258, 299, 3002, 308,
327
European Union, 56, 64, 71, 119, 122, 128,
146, 250, 299, 302, 313
Fatwa Council, 66

Analytical Index
341
F
Fatimids, 274
Faurisson, Robert, 9
Favela, 68
Fayad, PM Salam, 125, 251
Fes, 148
Fethullah Gulen, 303
Fidaiyun/ Islamikaze/ Shahid, 301, 39,
47, 55, 76, 90, 125
Florence, 42
France, 16, 23, 30, 39, 100, 102, 104, 118,
126, 142, 172
Southern , 71
G
Galilee, 101
Gantz, General Benny, 279
Garaudy, Roger, 9
Gaylin, Willard, 145
Gaza, 5, 11, 15, 23, 29, 63, 77, 102, 117,
12930, 142, 192, 210
Israeli withdrawal from , 235
War, 24, 31, 40, 53, 115, 140, 192,
229, 295, 319
Geneva, 48, 93, 131, 138
Germany, 73, 92, 126, 204
Nazis, 334, 53, 734, 84, 88, 103, 117,
138, 171
Ghali, Butrus, 138
Ghannouchi, Mohamed, 316
Gibb, Hamilton, 6, 47
Goebbels, Josef, 6, 325
Goldstone, Justice Richard, 115, 1423
Greece, 63, 290, 300
Guantanamo, 53
Gul, Abdallah, 300, 313
H
Haiti, 1289
Hama Massacre, 178
Hamas, 29, 31, 33, 35, 45, 53, 634, 6970,
712, 767, 90, 102, 117, 140, 142, 148,
234, 260
Charter, 15, 66, 87, 119, 228, 280
Mahmud al-Zahar, 182
Al-Risalah , 28
State, 15
TV, 192
Hammerskjold, Dag, 137, 140
Hasmoneans, 247
Hebron, 3, 117
Tomb of the Patriarchs, 1323
Herzl, Teodor, 223
Hidden Imam, 273
Mahdi, 274
Twelver Shia, 273
Hiroshima and Nagasaki, 46
Hirsi Ali, Ayaan, 2022, 2045
Hitler, Adolf, 74, 88, 912, 142, 204,
216
Hizbullah, 2, 29, 31, 334, 38, 456, 53,
634, 6970, 72, 76, 83, 1178, 142,
148, 255, 282
Holocaust/ Shoa, 9, 12, 15, 21, 75, 93, 111,
142, 243, 283, 287
, denial, 16, 48, 86, 93, 149, 173, 185,
278, 285, 328
Yad Vashem, 21
Holy Land, 12, 266
Hudaibiyya, 3940, 48, 234
Hungary, 16
Hussain, Imam, 34, 277
Hussain, Saddam, 20, 35, 46, 213, 228
Husseini, Haj Amin, 148, 248
I
Ibn Kathir, 823, 183
India, 46, 64, 68, 72
Indonesia, 40, 72, 83
Bali, 83
Internet, 16, 186
Google, 15
Iran, 12, 15, 20, 22, 31, 64, 69, 73, 77, 90,
117, 131, 148, 172, 273
Ambassador, 57
Basij, 279
Iraq War, 20, 31, 281
Republican Guards, 281
Revolutionary Guards, 2234
Safavids, 274
Shah of 2, 274, 140, 208
Iraq, 20, 2930, 32, 46, 634, 68, 77, 131
Karbala, 277
Najaf, 274
Islam
ic bomb, 64
Dawa, 37, 70
Deobandi School, 67
Muslim Brothers, 20, 117, 178, 186, 196,
206, 220, 229, 242, 251, 257, 285, 302,
315
342
Organization of the Islamic Conference,
46, 116, 228
phobia, 3, 159, 167, 285
ic Revolution, 273
Shia, 20, 312, 34, 72, 77, 273
Sunna, 20, 32, 77, 273
Umma, 29
Islamic Jihad, 29, 31, 33, 64, 90
Israel, 72, 119
Knesset, 4
Mossad, 19, 47, 52, 207
ophobia, 122
President of , 104
Istanbul, 2, 314
Italy, 16, 1201, 126

J
Jahiz, Abu-Uthman, 4, 84
Japan, 110, 115
Jedda, 2122
Jenin, 49, 53
massacre, 53, 327
Jericho
Synagogue in , 40, 219
Jerusalem, 12, 72, 88, 132, 182, 195, 206,
2489
East , 767
Mt Scopus/ Hebrew University, 250
Mufti of 84, 148, 206, 264
Post , 131
Temple Mount/ Haram al-Sharif, 12,
412, 182, 238, 341, 264
Wailing Wall/ Burak, 242, 264
Jihad, 12, 289, 39, 64, 67, 75, 82, 156,
203, 222, 260
Jordan, 24, 26, 41, 94, 230, 328
Black September, 230
King of 230
Judaism/Jewry, 2, 12
First and Second Temples, 247
Judeophobia, 80, 122, 147
World Jewish Conspiracy, 15, 85, 88, 294

K
Karine A, 512
Kashmir, 29, 39, 46, 64
Kerry, John, 66
Khamenai, Ali, 223, 280, 294
Khaybar, 82, 2945
Khomeini, Ayatullah, 2, 4, 57, 91, 242, 275
Revolution, 31
Kirkpatrick, Jeane, 100
Klinghoer, Leon, 121
Korea, 94
Kosovo, 34, 71, 140, 300
Kuala Lumpur, 46
Kurds, 301
Kuwait, 28, 77, 203, 254
L
Lashkar e-Taiba , 29, 64
Lebanon, 2831, 33, 40, 53, 63, 99, 101,
105, 124, 295
Lenin, 73
Le Pen, Jean-Marie, 93
Lewis, Bernard, 35, 85, 147
Libya, 122, 131, 228
Lockerbie, 56, 122
London, 76, 101, 256
M
Macedonia, 71, 300
MAD theory, 27780
Madrid Conference, 228
Mahatir, PM, 119
Maimonides, 164
Malaysia, 119
Mali, 31
Malraux, Andre, 73
Mamluks, 147, 156
Mansur, Anis, 87, 196
Margarethe, Queen, 48
Marxism, 73
Post- , 121
Maskoyama, 310
Mavi Marmara (see also Turkey/Flotilla),
2, 304, 314, 318
Milli Gorus, 3034, 315, 322
Milner, Jen-Claude, 77
Mitterand, President Francois, 103
Modan, Dr. Baruch, 103
Mongols, 33, 73
Morocco, 24, 64, 119, 149, 192, 315
Alawi Dynasty, 153, 165
Sultan of , 73
Mubarak, President Husni, 51, 59, 121,
184, 257, 302
Muhammad, the Prophet, 4, 12, 19, 31,
39, 42, 49, 66, 82, 84, 147, 1678, 170,
174, 234, 273
Munich
Agreement, 246
Olympics, 121, 211
Analytical Index
343
Mursi, President Muhammad, 3, 19, 186,
217, 239, 311, 315

N
Nablus
Josephs Tomb, 2, 40, 219
Nasrallah, Hassan, 90, 295
NATO, 34, 689, 71, 140, 299, 301, 308,
312
Nazareth, 156, 218
Basilica of Annunciation, 42, 218
Nepal, 72
Netanyahu, PM Benjamin, 245, 280
Netherlands/ Holland, 16, 20, 22, 71, 104,
123, 220
Amstelven, 16
New York (see also Twin Towers), 14,
76, 106
Times , 111
Wall Street, 287
Nigeria, 40, 228
Nile o Euphrates, 8, 184, 209
Nobel Prize, 4, 23, 119, 192, 199, 296
Norway, 118

O
Obama, President Barack, 71, 205, 2167,
310, 328
Olmert, PM, Ehud, 146
Oslo Process, 23, 3940, 48, 5051, 134,
170, 206, 219, 229, 233, 246, 254
Ottomans, 84, 88, 147, 164, 242, 299,
300
Ozal, Turgut, 302

P
Pakistan, 313, 512, 64, 67, 72, 77,
11920
Palestinians (see also Hamas), 1, 3, 112,
29, 33, 39, 46, 69, 120, 125, 227
Al-Aqsa Brigades, 31
Authority (PA), 23, 27, 117, 120, 192,
213, 236, 327
Fatah, 121
Intifadah, 23, 8, 23, 312, 40, 57, 90, 93,
102, 120, 127, 134, 143, 219, 228, 250
Liberation Organization, (PLO), 2, 71,
78, 1002, 104, 108, 121, 134, 227
Mufti, 84
National Council (PNC), 22, 227
Tanzim, 31
Paris, 71, 104, 132, 171
Patai, Raphael, 47
Pearl, Daniel, 33
Peres, President Shimon, 217
Poison Aair, 49, 101, 105, 1078, 1112,
1316, 325
Poland, 16
Port Said, 51, 121
Protocols of the Elders of Zion, 15, 53, 73,
857, 93, 111, 115, 181, 185, 196, 2203,
247, 289, 325, 329

Q
Qadda/Gadda, Muammar, 56, 59
(Al-) Qaida, 29, 345, 38, 64, 6970, 117,
119, 216
Qaradawi, Yussuf, 4, 65, 69, 84, 173
Qaraqe, Issa, 125
Qatar, 24, 107, 192
Doha, 107
Quran, 19, 29, 47, 4950, 59, 67, 8082,
84, 167, 270, 173, 248, 260, 293
Jalalayn (see also Ibn Kathir and Tabari),
82
Qut b, Sayyid, 4, 196, 220, 242, 274,
276

R
Rabin, PM Yitzhak, 51, 233
Rafsanjani, President, 303
Ramallah, 2, 1201
Ramlawi, Abdallah, 93
Rand, Ayn, 1
Rantisi, Abd al Aziz, 260
Rashomon , 7, 100
Reagan, President Ronald, 103
Red Cross, 33, 94, 100, 135
Red Sea, 51
Riyadh, 21
Roosevelt, President, 92
Rouhani, President, 280, 286
Rothschild, 878
Rumsfeld, Donald, 56
Rushdie Syndrome, 159, 199
Russia, 69, 111, 223, 300

S
Sabra and Shatilla, 104, 124, 134, 197
Sadat, President Anwar, 8, 87
Saida, 101
Salah, Sheikh Raid, 181
344
Saudi Arabia, 2122, 39, 41, 445, 52,
59, 72, 119, 128, 168, 179182, 205,
220
King Abdallah, 120
Wahhabism, 168
Scandinavia, 3, 37, 118
Schindlers List , 9
Serbs, 125, 140
Sharia, 39, 59, 61, 65, 79, 155, 165, 275,
317
Sharm al-Sheikh, 20
Sharon, PM Ariel, 25, 104, 124, 1456,
184, 194, 205, 217, 245
Sicily, 71
Silwan/ Hashiloah, 2389, 2489, 250
Sinai, 20, 145, 197
Somalia, 2022
Soviets, 289, 287, 300
Spain, 126, 156, 164
Spring (Arab/Islamic), 34, 29, 31, 36,
210, 2345, 2389, 2423, 248, 250,
277, 317
Srebrenica, 104, 124
Stalin, Joseph, 92
Stockholm, 69
Strasbourg, 71
Sudan, 77, 228
Darfur, 78, 228, 327
Janjaweed, 78
Sweden, 9, 63, 118, 123, 144
Swift, Jonathan, 78, 10910
Switzerland, 126
Syria, 323, 48, 69, 73, 126, 128, 171,
183, 2323
War, 31

T
Tabari, Muhammed, 84
Taliban, 53, 70, 72, 77
Tantawi, Sheikh Muhammed, 84, 185
Tehran, 35, 90, 223, 235, 283
Tailand, 72
(Te)Times , 67
Tiananmen, 5
Tlas, General Mustafa, 48, 144, 171,
1789, 200
Turkey, 2, 5, 24, 64, 150, 192, 206, 258,
299
Flotilla, 12, 116, 170, 206, 217, 314
IHH, 314
Pan-Turkism/Turanism, 301
Twin Towers/ September 11, 1415,
1920, 28, 35, 38, 4648, 502, 57,
713, 76, 94, 119, 170, 203, 207, 216

U
Umayyads, 147
United Nations (UN), 3, 112, 27, 69, 72,
94, 100, 115, 118, 133
Commission on Human Rights, 48, 93,
130, 134, 139
Durban Conference, 15, 130, 138
General Assembly, 138, 248
General Secretary, 138
International Criminal Court, 131
Partition Plan, 910, 220
Resolution, 228
UNESCO, 132, 242
UNRWA, 445, 257
UN Watch, 131
WHO (World Health Organization),
100, 1357
Yearbook, 1356
United States (US), 16, 289, 44, 945
CIA, 19, 47
Defense Secretary, 56
News and World Report, 103
White House, 216
Usmani, Muhammed Taqi, 67
U Tant, 138

V
Vatican, 104
Vietnam, 94

W
Waldheim, Kurt, 138
Waqf , 12, 41
War, 49, 64
WW I, 88, 204, 289, 301
WW II, 5, 14, 16, 21, 84, 88, 286, 289
19489 , 910, 15, 28, 64, 203
1967, 5, 10, 238, 241
1973 , 28, 64, 94, 197
Gaza , 31, 40, 53, 116, 145, 192, 229,
295
Iran-Iraq , 20, 31
Lebanon 28, 31, 40, 53, 99, 105, 124
Washington DC, 14, 72, 311, 313
Institute, 184
Post , 103
Weber, Max, 274
Analytical Index
345
Weizmann, Chaim, 204
West Bank, 49, 99, 101, 1056, 107, 110,
129, 131, 210, 251

Y
Yang Yalin, 1314
Yassin, Ahmed, 234
Yemen, 78, 328

Z
Zawahiri, Muhammed, 328
Zionism, 70, 72, 82, 92, 1189, 150, 192,
240, 244
Anti- , 9, 22, 73, 75, 85, 89, 116, 138
Congress, 223
entity, 12, 25, 193

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