Arab anti-Semitism
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Genuine anti-Semitism is widespread in the Arab world. This article is specifically about anti-Semitic comments and propaganda, espoused by influential Arabs to incite or promote further hatred towards Jews. Hostility to Israel is sometimes claimed to constitute anti-Semitism as well, which is why #The Palestinian Authority's view of Israel was included.
In recent years, a small but growing number of Arabs have worked to fight racism towards Jews, including a few high-profile leaders in the Middle East.
Some Arab newspapers (notably Al-Hayat Al-Jadidah, Palestinian Authority's official newspaper) write that "the Jews" control all the world's governments, and that "the Jews" plan genocide on all the Arabs in the West Bank. Others write less sensational stories, and states that Jews have too much of an influence in the US government. Sometimes the leaders of other nations are said to be controlled by Jews.
Articles in many official Arab government newspapers (notably those of the Palestinian Authority, Libya and Saudi Arabia) claim that The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, an infamous anti-Semitic forgery, reflects actual facts, and thus points to an international Jewish conspiracy to take over the world.
The entire matter, as many French and British scientists and researchers have proven, is nothing more than a huge Israeli plot aimed at extorting the German government in particular and the European countries in general. But I, personally and in light of this imaginary tale, complain to Hitler, even saying to him from the bottom of my heart, 'If only you had done it, brother, if only it had really happened, so that the world could sigh in relief [without] their evil and sin.'
A summary of Arab Anti-Semitism is available in the following review.
Across the Arab world, a fair number of Arab media outlets, some government-sponsored (such as those of Libya and Saudi Arabia, and some of those of the Palestinian Authority), published pieces arguing that the attack was actually carried out by Jews, Zionists, Israelis, or even Americans. Many within the Arab world viewed this terrorist act as a conspiracy to make the world hate all Arabs, and therefore believed that people perceived to be enemies of the Arabs must really be to blame; many others disagreed. This is despite the fact that an actual Mossad conspiracy to carry out major terrorist attacks against the United States in the hope that Arab terrorists would be blamed would be an insanely risky course of action for Israel. After Al Qaeda acknowledged their role publicly, these claims lost credibility, and came to be widely seen as a conspiracy theory. The Jewish community was and is concerned about this new form of Anti-Semitism.
Some people claim that the Palestinian Authority's hostility to Israel constitutes anti-Semitism in itself; others regard this claim as absurd, noting that hostility to an enemy nation need not imply hostility to the associated ethnicity, and that the Palestinian Authority includes representatives from Neturei Karta. Examples of hostility to Israel follow, as translated by MEMRI.
The Palestinian Authority's official television channel has shows which teach 6 and 7 year old kids to kill Israelis. Episodes of a program called “The Children's Club,” broadcast in early 1998, showed a group of young Arab children, one of whom stood up, raised her fist, and shouted: “When I wander into Jerusalem, I will turn into a suicide warrior in battle dress! In battle dress!” She was cheered and applauded by the other children in the group, and their adult leader declared, “Bravo! Bravo!” On another segment, a young girl sang: “Each and every part of your soil I have drenched with all my blood. And we shall march as warriors of Jihad. Oh, my exalted martyr, you are my example. Oh, my sister, sing constantly about my life as a suicide warrior, how we remain steadfast. On, my country, you are my soul.” (Videotape of “The Children's Club”, Peace for Generations, Jerusalem, 1998)
An investigation by the Philadelphia Inquirer (September 7, 1997) found children's programs on PA television in which an 8 year-old girl was shown singing: “I am a daughter of Palestine. Koran in my right hand, in my left — a knife,” and another in which a young girl recites a poem she said she wrote for Yassir Arafat: “I am finished practicing on the submachine gun of return... We swear to take vengeful blood from our enemies for our killed and wounded. We will board a bustling boat which will take us to Jaffa.” On the show, the girl then approached Arafat, who kissed her on both cheeks. The Inquirer continued:
"In a show about the opening of Palestinian schools, girls in frilly white dresses were shown dancing with Kalashnikov rifles that they twirled like batons. In another broadcast, a schoolboy, asked what he got out of summer camp, answered: 'I am defending the homeland and undergo training like army drills.' "
"There is a children's quiz show about great figures in Palestinian history — many of whom are considered heroes by Palestinians, but terrorists by Israelis. One show featured Izz al-Din al-Qassam, a shaikh who was killed by the British in 1935. The military wing of Hamas, which has carried out many terrorist bombings in Israel, was named for Qassam. The heroine of another episode was Dalal al-Maghribi, a woman who commanded a bus hijacking near Haifa in 1978. Thirty-four Israelis and nine Palestinian commandos, Magribi among them, were killed. The quiz-show emcee referred to Magribi as "our sacred martyr."
Senior PA officials also regularly engage in hostile propaganda against Israel, and Arafat has taken no action against them. For example, the Deputy Minister of the PA Ministry of Supplies has accused Israel of giving Palestinian Arabs “food containing material that causes cancer and hormones that harm male virility and other spoiled food products in order to poison and harm the Palestinian population.” (Yediot Ahronot, June 25, 1997)
The PLO's representative to the United Nations in Geneva has accused Israel of injecting “300 Palestinian children with HIV.” (Jerusalem Post, March 17, 1997)
The director of the Inspection Department of the PA Ministry of Supplies has claimed that Israeli chewing gums sold in PLO-controlled areas “contain a sexually-stimulating adrenaline substance.” (Jerusalem Post, March 27, 1997)
Senior PA officials and the PA-controlled media have also repeatedly made statements denigrating Jewish religious beliefs and Jewish history, such as denying that modern Jews have any connection to the Jews in the Bible; denying that Jews have any historical connection to Jerusalem; denying that the Temple Mount and Western Wall have any religious significance in Judaism. Senior PA officials and the PA-controlled media have also repeatedly made statements distorting or denying the Holocaust.
In some cases, they have claimed that Jews invented the “myth” of Nazi genocide in order to gain world sympathy and reparations money. In other instances, they have acknowledged that some Jews were murdered by the Nazis, but charged that Jews vastly exaggerated the death toll for political purposes. Thus Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), Arafat's number-two man and the architect of the Oslo Accords, is the author of a book claiming that the Nazis may have really killed less than one million Jews. (Jerusalem Post, January 26, 1995) Numerous senior PA officials have also compared Israel to the Nazis, in some cases declaring that Israel's treatment of Arabs is even worse than the Nazis' treatment of Jews.
Examples of Anti-Semitic laws and policies in Arab countries:
The Saudi Ministry of Tourism announced on its web site in early 2004, that visas to enter the country will not be issued to "Jewish people".[1].
The Jordanian Nationality Law of 1954 states that "Any man [in the West Bank] will be a Jordanian subject if he is not Jewish."
These examples of anti-Semitism in the Arab press are provided by MEMRI:
There are a number of projects working for peace among Israelis and Arabs, and projects which include Jewish-Islamic theological dialogue. One of their goals is to reduce anti-Semitism.
See also: Peace process, Anti-Semitism, Judaism, Conspiracy theory, Islam and anti-Semitism, Religious pluralismArab anti-Semitism in the 20th and 21st century
Arab Newspapers
The Egyptian government run newspaper, Al-Akhbar, on 29 April 2002, published an editorial denying the Holocaust as a fraud. The next paragraph decries the failure of the Holocaust to eliminate all of the Jews [1]:
With regard to the fraud of the HolocaustÃÂ
Many French studies have proven that this is no more than a fabrication, a lie, and a fraud!! That is, it is a 'scenario' the plot of which was carefully tailored, using several faked photos completely unconnected to the truth. Yes, it is a film, no more and no less. Hitler himself, whom they accuse of Nazism, is in my eyes no more than a modest 'pupil' in the world of murder and bloodshed. He is completely innocent of the charge of frying them in the hell of his false Holocaust!!
Arab Zionist conspiracy theories regarding the September 11, 2001 attacks
The Palestinian Authority's view of Israel
The Palestinian Authority's view of Jews
Anti-Semitic laws and policies in Arab countries
Quotes
Sources
Jewish-Arab dialogue