Antisemitism, social science, and the Muslim and Arab world.

SCHOLARS WHO STUDY GENOCIDE AND MASS ATROCITIES have identified considerable danger in dehumanizing rhetoric of the sort that has become common across much of the Arab world. (1) Few people, after all, would accept peaceful coexistence with a pestilence or malignancy, when they have an alternative.

Conclusive quantitative data about the extent and distribution of hostile ideology are unavoidably lacking, but it appears likely that segments of the billion-strong Arab and Muslim population--probably large segments--now endorse a full-blown antisemitism, replete with indigenous Islamic themes, new and old, as well as imported hate imagery from elements of the Western world. This often intensely-experienced hatred is not restricted to fringe elements, not a mere outgrowth of the Arab-Israeli conflict, and not constrained by the geographical confines of the Middle East.

The Muslim and Arab world during the past few years has witnessed an exponential increase in conspiracy theorizing about Jews. The most widely shared fiction, of course, blames them for perpetrating the attacks of September 11. Sometimes the villain is the Israeli secret service, sometimes a vague Jewish cabal. (2)

Consider in this light an interviewer on an Arabic television broadcast, "The Muslim Woman Magazine," who queried a three-year-old guest on the matter of Jews. The purportedly unrehearsed little girl announced that she did not like them and, upon further probing, explained that they were "apes and pigs." Asked for the source of this insight, the youngster responded, "Our God ... in the Koran." No correction, clarification, or rebuke was offered but, at the conclusion of the segment, the obviously pleased adult interviewer declared: "No [parents] could wish for Allah to give them a more believing girl than she ... May Allah bless her, her father and mother. The next generation of children must be true Muslims ..." What is, perhaps, most noteworthy about this exchange is that it took place on Iqraa, a joint Saudi-Egyptian satellite network which purportedly aims to highlight a "true and tolerant picture of Islam," to refute "the accusations directed against Islam," and to open "channels of cultural connection with the cultures of other nations." (3)

What is less noteworthy about the brief interview is its reference to Jews as apes and pigs. In recent years, such allusions--which, indeed, have roots in several (arguably misunderstood) Koranic verses--have become commonplace in many parts of the Muslim world. For example, in April 2002, about a month before the little girl offered her views on satellite television, Egyptian Sheikh Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi, one of the most important Sunni clerics, described Jews in his weekly sermon as "the enemies of Allah, descendants of apes and pigs." Sheikh Abd Al-Rahman Al-Sudayyis, the imam of the most important mosque in Mecca, similarly sermonized that the Jews are "the scum of the human race, the rats of the world, the violators of pacts and agreements, the murderers of the prophets, and the offspring of apes and pigs." The imam further advised Arabs to abandon all peace initiatives with the Jews and asked Allah to annihilate them. (4)

Physician Abdel Aziz Rantisi, a top leader of Hamas' non-military, "political" wing agrees with the sheikh. In June 2003, he told reporters: "I swear we will not leave one Jew in Palestine." And Ayatollah Khamenei, Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran--knowingly or unknowingly--borrowed some imagery from Hitler's Mein Kampf, describing Israel as a "cancerous tumor." (5)

Similar sentiments can be found among Muslims at the grass-roots level, including those residing outside the Middle East. In Derby, England, for example, eighteen-year-old Basu Hussain, a fast food worker at Lick'n Chick'n, was asked his views concerning a Muslim from his city who had bombed a Tel Aviv nightclub. He answered: "What he's done is very good, and they won't ever find him ... We should all get together and kill all the Jews." (6)

As in the case of its historic Western counterparts, Islamic antisemitism's greatest enthusiasts often consider themselves devout--but Jew-hatred can be readily detected among many secular Arabs and even among some dubbed moderates in the West. An example is Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas (a.k.a. Abu Mazen), briefly hailed in 2003 as the great hope for a Middle East peace process but also the author of a work of Holocaust denial that he has never retracted. (7) The world's oldest and deadliest variety of mass hatred has once again proved that rumors of its death have been greatly exaggerated.

A few commentators would go much further, drawing ominous comparisons with the 1930s. For example, the noted Holocaust historian Yehuda Bauer argues that: "The radical Islamist attack on the Jews is a first, potentially genocidal, step." And Andrew Sullivan, former editor of The New Republic, wrote that: "Fanatical anti-semitism, as bad or even worse than Hitler's, is now a cultural norm across much of the Middle East." (8) Still, most political scholars and the mainstream mass media regard Muslim antisemitism as no more than a sideshow meriting little coverage.

Antisemitism, in my view, is only one of four virulent strains of mass hatred emanating from the Muslim and Arab world. The other three are anti-Zionism, anti-Hinduism, and anti-Americanism. Though they contain some distinctive conceptual, political, and moral elements, these forms of mass hatred may be empirically interrelated and may stem from common aspects of life in the Muslim and Arab world. Each of the four strains potentially endangers global peace, the Western way of life, and--most immediately--the lives and security of those who live in the Middle East. Each has inspired terrorism on a large scale and each has been associated with wars in the Middle East. Each is apt to be compounded as nations and non-state actors in the region acquire weapons of mass destruction.

Most of the remainder of this essay explores the extent and danger of antisemitism in the Muslim and Arab world, seeking some historical, social, and psychological insight into its causes. First, however, we must examine two preliminary issues: just what we mean by Muslim antisemitism and why it is that social psychologists and other social scientists have devoted so little attention to the topic.

Where's the Literature?

One might expect to find psychologists, sociologists, social psychologists, and other social scientists hard at work studying mass hatred in the Middle East. This is not the case. Recent years have seen investigations of the psycho-social and political origins of terrorism, and research has begun to explore the foundations of anti-Americanism around the world. But an examination of the research literature quickly reveals that few social scientists of any stripe have paid much attention to antisemitism in the Middle East. It is worth pausing for a moment to ask why.

The PSYCHINFO database, where much social scientific research is indexed, shows 458 entries on antisemitism since 1940, 99 of which appeared during the past ten years. These studies cover a broad range of topics, mainly using American subjects and/or reflecting on historical events. Not a single one deals directly with Jew-hatred in the contemporary Muslim and Arab world, arguably the most widespread and virulent type of mass hatred today. At best, a few psychologically-oriented authors have touched tangentially on Muslim antisemitism in studies focusing on Jew-hatred in other contexts and a few political writers on the topic have offered psychological speculation. An analysis of Sociological Abstracts tells much the same story. One-hundred-thirty entries since 1963 have dealt with antisemitism, but none center on Jew-hatred in the Middle East.

Social scientists who have become aware of the problem and wish to conduct empirical research on antisemitism in the Muslim and Arab world face nearly insurmountable obstacles, beginning with the critical problem of access. For starters, few Arab and Muslim countries welcome indigenous or Western interviewers--whether journalists or social scientists--who are apt to ask pesky questions. Recently, a Palestinian mob attacked a well-known Palestinian social scientist whose findings did not square with the local political agenda. (9) The region's regimes tend to be non-democratic and to place strict limits on journalists and social scientists. They are especially likely to prohibit Jews, and those suspected of sympathizing with Israel, from conducting their professional activities. Such people are, of course, the ones most likely to address antisemitism.

Assuming access, funding, and successful navigation of linguistic problems, there remains what might be called "the Daniel Pearl effect." (10) When probing questions are directed to the wrong people, dangerous consequences may ensue. It would require uncommon bravery for Western or indigenous social scientists, especially Jewish ones, not to pause once or twice before embarking on a serious empirical study of Jew-hatred in the Middle East. (Analysis from a distance is possible, but limited to assessment of print and broadcast communications.)

Finally, there may be some political motivation to avoid the topic altogether. Most political psychologists, I suspect, approach current international disputes in the Middle East with a conflict resolution perspective similar to that articulated by the influential social psychologist Morton Deutsch just after the 9/11 attacks. Speaking to "those of us who have been working for a just, peaceful, humane and sustainable world," he urged cooperation with Muslim religious authorities "in de-legitimizing violence against civilians whatever their religious background" and in encouraging "leading Islamic religious figures to broadcast statements that people who engage in terrorism are not acceptable in the Islamic community." He further maintained that Islam, like all the major religions, respected the sanctity of human life and that only a small group of "deviant radical 'fundamentalist[s]'" condoned or encouraged politically inspired violence against innocent victims. Above all, the highest goal, according to Deutsch, was to prevent the "conflict with terrorism" from escalating into a "conflict with Islam or Muslims." (11) In all these regards, Deutsch's goals were not so very far from those of the Bush administration.

Yet gaining the cooperation of Muslim religious leaders has proved more difficult than expected and hostility toward the United States appears more broad-based than initially believed in the days following 9/11. In this context, attempts to focus attention on mass hatred emanating from large segments of the Muslim and Arab world may be seen as fanning the flames of conflict by identifying negative characteristics of the community with whom we seek to get along. Thus, well-intentioned observers may have sensed that it is best, at this historic moment, to leave this stone unturned. By doing so, however, they may be shielding a significant danger from scrutiny.

Definitions

Those who believe, as I do, that Muslim hatred of Jews is a matter worthy of attention must generally respond to two objections or, more correctly, two attempts to end the discussion before it starts. The first is the contention that Arabs cannot be antisemites since they are, in fact, Semites and themselves the victims of antisemitism. The second objection charges that opposition to Jews in the Middle East is not hatred but rather a form of political expression.

These specious arguments may reveal something about the motivation of their champions. As Bernard Lewis explained in 1986: "the term 'Semite' has no meaning as applied to groups as heterogeneous as the Arabs or the Jews, and indeed it could be argued that the use of such terms is in itself a sign of racism and certainly of either ignorance or bad faith ... [Moreover] anti-Semitism has never anywhere been concerned with anyone but Jews, and is therefore available to Arabs as to other people as an option should they choose it." Historian Robert Wistrich notes that the membership of Palestinian Arab nationalist leader Haj Amin al-Husseini in "... the Arabic-speaking branch of the 'Semitic' linguistic family did not deter Heinrich Himmler, the ruthless head of the SS, from wishing ... [him] every success in his fight 'against the foreign Jew.'" (12)

Thus, nothing is gained from applying the antisemitism label to anti-Arab and anti-Islamic discrimination, abhorrentin their own right, except to confuse matters and take attention away from anti-Jewish hostility. This is precisely what happened at the disturbing 2001 United Nations World Conference Against Racism in Durban, South Africa, when the non-governmental organizations (NGOs) declared Zionism a form of racism and anti-Arab racism "... another form of anti-semitism ..." (13) As an Israeli diplomat quipped at the time: "Attempts to eradicate the plain meaning of the word are not only anti-semitic, indeed they are anti-semantic." (14)

The question of where legitimate criticism of Israel ends and antisemitism begins is a trickier matter that cannot be fully addressed here, though two extreme views can be readily rejected. It makes little sense to classify as antisemitic all criticism of Israel's actions, especially when such criticism is a defining feature of the Israeli political landscape. At the other extreme, we ought not excuse anti-Jewish bigotry simply because it bears some connection to the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Between these extremes, we find several efforts to sketch lines distinguishing antisemitism from legitimate criticism of Israel. In 1968, Martin Luther King responded to a student in Cambridge, Massachusetts, who had made anti-Zionist remarks by snapping: "Don't talk like that. When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews. You're talking anti-Semitism." (15) King never offered much elaboration on the brief quote. Apparently he thought that extreme anti-Zionist utterances often provided cover for traditional forms of hostility toward Jews that by the mid-sixties could no longer be voiced in the Western public arena without discrediting their source.

Standards for evaluating whether criticism of Israel is motivated by antisemitism might ask whether such disapproval involves: (1) efforts to delegitimize the state as such, (2) double standards, or (3) calls to harm (Jewish) civilians because they live in or support Israel. The ultimately-rejected proposal made by Jewish non-governmental organizations at the Durban conference articulates the first standard, objecting to: "... attempts to delegitimize the State of Israel through wildly inaccurate charges of genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, ethnic cleansing and apartheid." (16) The French writer Jacques Givet writes that: "The anti-Zionist becomes an overt anti-Semite as soon as he goes beyond criticism of the policies of the Jerusalem government (a favorite activity of the Israelis themselves) and challenges the very existence of the state of Israel. For to refuse the Jews their right to nationhood is to perpetuate their bondage." (17)

Abraham Foxman, national director of the ADL, argues for the second standard: "... if you're this good person outside Israel who feels you have a responsibility to criticize, fine. Then set a standard of behavior ... But you better hold to that standard around the world. Because if I find you setting that standard only to Israel, but it's okay what happens in Lebanon ... and it's okay in Tibet and it's okay in Saudi Arabia and it's okay in Sierra Leone ... And if I don't hear your voice, journalist or politician, criticizing or asking questions, if you are calling only for divestment of Israel, then the answer is simple: you are an anti-Semite." (18)

The third standard rests on the fact that Israel is principally populated by Jews, most of whom support the state. If one calls for "driving Israelis into the sea," one is ipso facto antisemitic, regardless of motivation.

Though reasonable, there is room to argue with each of these standards. One might, for example, pay more attention to Israeli transgressions simply because they receive greater coverage in the news media or are deemed more relevant to American national interests. Or one might hold Israel to a higher standard out of respect rather than disdain. And, though the point may have little moral or practical significance, one might in theory wish to kill Israeli Jews only until Israel has been defeated, at which time the surviving Jews would acquire citizenship in a successor state. Thus, analysts ought not reflexively equate anti-Israel expressions with antisemitism, even those based on double standards; instead, there should be a case-by-case evaluation. But however one resolves these questions, there remains the matter of abundant Jew-hatred in the Arab and Muslim world that, more or less, fits the classic antisemitic mold.

Assessing the Danger

How dangerous is the antisemitism that emanates from the Muslim and Arab world? Elsewhere, I have argued that: "Some of the raw materials of mass hate can be found in almost every society on earth, often in plentiful supply. People everywhere tend to think in terms of "us" and "them," and to prefer their own group. Across the globe, even the most tolerant people sometimes rely on simplistic stereotypes. No society has yet been able to free itself of sociopaths, extreme bigots, and aggressive personalities. And frustrating life conditions of one sort or another exist in every nation. [Moreover,] [f]anatics always seem to be sprouting evil schemes." (19)

Still, bigotry reaches murderous proportions in only a relatively small number of societies. To assess the danger of Muslim and Arab antisemitism, we must address the way the raw materials of mass hatred can combine in an explosive mixture.

No simple formula can account for the many routes by which societies grow destructive. Each travels down an idiosyncratic path inflected by history, politics, culture, tradition, and leadership. Yet there are certain societal characteristics that distinguish relatively normal (though, of course, undesirable) animosities from those likely to erupt into genocidal hatred. The characteristics of potentially genocidal societies include (but are not limited to): (1) widespread and intense public anger directed against a scapegoat, (2) dissemination by leaders of dehumanizing rhetoric, (3) cultural norms and values that tolerate or encourage violence against outgroups, (4) the existence of special cadres prepared to carry out violent acts, and (5) the lack of a strong constitutionally-based tradition of tolerance and checks and balances. (20) Perhaps most important, there is great danger when ideologies of hatred capture large numbers of supporters, convincing them that the hated group is the source of their problems and that elimination of that group is the solution. There is even greater danger when such ideologies lack vocal domestic opponents.

No conclusive data can determine the extent to which the Muslim and Arab world exhibits these dangerous predisposing societal conditions. Yet few fair analysts who attend to media reports from the Middle East would argue against the proposition that there is widespread and intense public anger, dehumanizing rhetoric directed against Jews, and a lack of a constitutionally-based tradition of checks and balances.

Many Arabs and Muslims experience rage associated with the perception that their society's stagnation--and, hence, their own problems--have been a consequence of mistreatment by "others." Perhaps this is why one recent survey showed solid majorities in five Muslim nations expressing confidence that Osama bin Laden would "do the right thing" in world affairs. (21) Varying by time, place, ideology, and subgroup membership, the preferred targets have sometimes been secular Arab leaders, religious leaders, the British, the infidel West, Americans, Hindus, Christians, and others. But, above all, Jews, Zionists, and Israelis have been the principal recipients of rage and, even when they are not centrally targeted, they are nearly always included as a secondary object of hatred. (22)

In the eyes of many Muslims, Israel and Jews around the world bear responsibility for a series of political and military defeats inflicted on the Arab and Muslim polities; these external losses frequently translate into internal ego threats. As Roy F. Baumeister explains, violence against the perceived source of the threat "... may often fall short of providing proof of the disputed self-worth, but it does intimidate, silence, and punish the critic, and it boosts the ego by establishing dominance over the critic." (23)

The events of the past few years have testified to the existence of abundant Muslim and Arab groups willing to carry out violence against civilians, and it seems plain that most, if not all, of their recruits are available for antisemitic action. The leaders of several Islamic extremist groups including Hezbollah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, al-Qaeda, and others have issued threats against Jews as such, sometimes specifically mentioning those who live in the United States or elsewhere outside of the State of Israel. For example, Dr. Ahmad Abu Halabiya, former acting Rector of the Islamic University in Gaza and a member of the Fatwa Council appointed by the Palestinian Authority, has sermonized on television: "Have no mercy on the Jews, no matter where they are, in any country. Fight them, wherever you are. Wherever you meet them, kill them. Wherever you are, kill those Jews and those Americans who are like them--and those who stand by them--they are all in one trench, against the Arabs and the Muslims ..." (24)

Iran, Syria, and Saudi Arabia lend support to some of these groups, though countries in the region thus far have not developed public killing organizations with specific plans to murder Jews qua Jews. Polls typically show majorities across the Arab world condoning terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians, with about 60% of Palestinians expressing strong support. (25) To my knowledge, no questions have pinpointed whether such support stops short of attacking Jews outside of Israel, unaffiliated with the Zionist movement, or unsupportive of the state of Israel.

In sum, several of the conditions associated with budding genocidal hatred are present in portions of the Muslim and Arab world. Elsewhere, I have argued that anger tends to be most extreme in those parts of the Muslim world where economic, political, military and cultural gains have failed to keep up with rising expectations. (26) Still, the region about which we are speaking is huge and includes a great diversity of countries with considerable variation in sociohistorical experience. In some parts of the Muslim world, there would appear to be relatively little hostility toward Jews.

Moreover, even in a culture with a great deal of hatred and anger, one would expect to find a full range of individual attitudes. We do not know, for example, the extent to which the expressed anger of the politically active reflects deeply-felt emotion in the broader population. Indeed, a non-negligible segment of that population may well be free of antisemitic hostility. Clearly, however, there is not even a small minority willing to be vocal in straightforward support of Jews.

The most ominous signs of danger come from an analysis of the nature of the antisemitic ideology found, to one degree or another, across most of the Muslim and Arab world. However, without in-depth studies of individual antisemites, we must reconstruct the mind-set mainly from utterances reported in the mass media and translated by Western organizations.

Ervin Staub, author of a major work on the psychology of genocide, notes that destructive ideologies "... usually identify a devalued, vulnerable group, often the scapegoated group and sometimes a historical antagonist, as an enemy that stands in the way of the ideology's fulfillment. The presence of such an ideology, leaders propagating it, and its wide appeal are all important sources and indicators of potential violence." (27) Speaking specifically about how antisemitic ideology functioned in the Western world, psychoanalyst Mortimer Ostow argues that every antisemitic campaign has two sets of motivations, one real and the other a mythic fantasy. He writes that: "In each case some person or persons are blamed for current distress, whether or not there is a real reason for that blame. In each case the Jew or the Jewish community is selected for that role and a myth is created that explains how the Jew brings about Christian suffering ... [T]he essence of antisemitism ... [is] the readiness to select the Jew as the responsible agent." (28) Concerning antisemitism in the Muslim and Arab world, the real component would seem to be the desire to prevail or otherwise gain some satisfaction in the Arab-Israeli conflict. The mythic component is more complex.

Speaking about Egypt, the ADL documents that: "Over the past decades, caricatures in the Egyptian media have regularly featured anti-Semitic depictions of Jews as stooped, hook-nosed, money-hungry and conspiratorial. Israeli leaders are depicted as Nazis, while other articles deny or diminish the Holocaust." (29) Marvin Perry and Frederick M. Schweitzer, the authors of a recent historical study of antisemitic myths in the Christian world, have concluded that: "All the elements of the [Christian] anti-Jewish myths ... reappear in Muslim sources, some of them endorsed by mainstream journalists, academics, clerics, and even heads of state." (30) We even find Bashar al-Assad, the president of Syria, in whom Western analysts once vested much hope, telling the Pope (who did not protest) that the Jews have tried "... to kill the principles of all religions with the same mentality with which they betrayed Jesus Christ" and in "the same way they tried to betray and kill the prophet Muhammad." (31) Thus, although many sources of Jew-hatred are indigenous to the Muslim world, we may conclude with Ostow that "Antisemitism is exportable. It can easily invade a population that needs help in contending with distress and anguish but that is not overburdened with considerations of rationality, civility, or decency." (32)

The specific content of the anti-Jewish hate ideology varies considerably, depending on whether its proponent is a Muslim extremist, a secular Arab nationalist, a true believer, or a mere fellow traveler. Its content also depends greatly on whether it is intended for Western or local audiences and whether its defender desires Western support.

Still, it is possible to identify the core ideology and to note how it transforms and mythologizes the Jew. In reality, Jews have been engaged for about a century in a conflict over land with certain Arabs in the Palestine/Israel region. They have also been a sometimes tolerated, sometimes persecuted religious minority in the Islamic world since its inception in the seventh century. But the reality of history and Jewish behavior counts for very little, ideologically-speaking.

In the mythology of the modern Muslim antisemite, Jews become hyper-competent, superpowerful, money-hungry, blood-thirsty, bent on ruling the world, and paradoxically subhuman. Paralleling antisemites throughout history--for example, Edouard Drumont in La France Juive--Muslim Jew-haters rely on a warped and heavily edited version of history that sees "the Jews" as responsible for all the wrong turns and defeats of the past, dating back to the days of the prophet. In particular, the Jews--as Zionists, as the deus ex machina behind America, and in other forms--are the reason why the naturally superior Muslim civilization has fallen on hard times.

Thus, in this vision, the Muslims must act against the Jews as a matter of self-defense. Paranoid ideology, here as in many other situations, transforms apparent evil into perceived good and helps justify mass hatred as a form of selfprotection. Baumeister has written: "When people believe firmly that they are on the side of good and are working to make the world a better place, they often feel justified in using strong measures against the seemingly evil forces that oppose them ... When the perpetrators are driven by idealism, the victims do not get much mercy." (33)

Antisemitism as Conspiracy Theory

The conspiratorial component of the antisemitic ideology deserves special attention for it has received sanction from high places in the Arab world and reveals much about the anti-Jewish mind-set. Conspiracy theories are needed to reconcile the claims of the hate ideology with the facts about Jews and Israel as they are generally presented in responsible Western circles. The basic idea is that the Jews are bent on taking over and ruling the world, though sometimes--to avoid the charge of antisemitism--the word "Zionist" is substituted for the word "Jew."

Consider "findings" published by the Zayed Center, the official think tank of the League of Arab States and a purportedly mainstream institute that has hosted lectures by Jimmy Carter, Al Gore, and James Baker. These "studies" hold that "Zionists" control 70% of the print media and 80% of the broadcast media in the United States, that the Holocaust is a "false fable" perpetuated by Israel, and that John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and Ronald Reagan "... were greatly influenced by Zionist thought and believed that everything is ready for 'Armageddon.'" (34)

More generally, Middle Eastern antisemitic conspiracy theorists count as Jews many people who do not classify themselves as such; they typically publish lists of "Jews" occupying positions of influence in the American government, determining religious affiliation apparently on the basis of the sound of surnames. See, for example, postings in 2003 on the Radio Islam web site such as one that first ran in January 1998 under the headline: "USA's Rulers--They are all Jews! Clinton's list." (35) A key debate that surfaces periodically among the theorists concerns whether the Jews are king and America is pawn or vice versa.

Facts and historical occurrences are manufactured with impunity to buttress claims of conspiracy. Thus, to support the theory that Jews were behind the 9/11 attacks, elements in the mainstream Arab media reported nonexistent events including: arrests in America of Jews rejoicing in the streets, American media confirmation that 4000 Jews had not shown up for work at the World Trade Center, and arrests of Israelis in Florida with large quantities of anthrax. (36)

Similarly, antisemitic beliefs are themselves taken as confirmatory evidence. For example, in some versions, well-known Jewish avarice provided the motivation for the 9/11 attacks. It was claimed that Jews were trying to manipulate the stock markets. The belief in extreme Jewish competence also contributed to the myth, as in the self-hating argument that no group, besides the Jews, could have pulled off such an effective strike.

The claims of antisemites often border on the absurd. Consider, for instance, the allegation that Zionists sent HIV-positive prostitutes to Egypt to spread AIDS and, also, distributed two varieties of evil chewing gum, one to cause sterility, the other sexual lust. (37) Also hard to believe in the twenty-first century are revivals of the medieval blood libel, coming from, among others, a book, The Matza of Zion, by the Syrian defense minister, Mustafa Tlass. Some disagreement apparently concerns whether Jews need non-Jewish blood more for their Passover matza or their Purim pastries. (38)

Past antisemitism is taken as proof of the nefarious nature of world Jewry, and supporters from other, non-Islamic, non-Arab antisemitic traditions are typically welcomed. To this end, antisemitic publications--even when they have been thoroughly discredited in their countries of origin--may enjoy new life in the Muslim and Arab world. Hitler's Mein Kampf has, for some time, been a wide seller in the region. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, long known to be a forgery created by the Tsarist secret police, has also become a favorite. By one estimate, there are currently more than sixty different Arab-language editions, describing--in detail--a historic Jewish plan for world conquest. (39)

In 2002, the Protocols became the partial basis for a 41-part Egyptian television series called "A Knight Without a Horse." While--atypically--there was some local criticism of the production in response to Western objections, most local media commentaries were supportive. One pundit even argued that the historical truth of the Protocols was essentially irrelevant, holding that: "The most important question is: in practice, doesn't Zionism seek to take over the world with money, murder, sex, and the most despicable of means, primarily in our generation?" (40) Such commentaries--regarding a document that no mainstream historian regards as authentic--highlight the impermeability of the antisemitic ideology of hate and its resistance to refutation.

In recent years, this ideology has spread to the Muslim and Arab communities of Western countries and has found allies in their general populations as well. The diffusion process has advanced furthest in Europe, but the United States has also seen a share of the hate. Thus, for example, the Paterson, New Jersey, weekly Arab Voice published an Arabic translation of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion in the Fall of 2002. When local Jewish and Christian religious leaders protested, the editor of the publication refused to back down, noting that "... some major writers in the Arab nation accept the truth of the book." Waheed Khalid, the president of a mosque in nearby Teaneck, New Jersey, said that he did not want to make any comment about the authenticity of the document, but said he had no problem with Egypt's airing of the series based on the Protocols. He further noted that he had spoken with many people, most wondering why it had taken so long for the document to appear and concluding that publication was delayed because "... so little in the U.S. that is printed is anti-Jewish." Shai Goldstein, New Jersey Director of the ADL drew an appropriate lesson: "Whether it's Amiri Baraka as poet laureate or this paper in Paterson, it underscores that New Jersey is not immune from the global anti-Semitism that has spread from the Arab world to Europe and is also affecting us here ... It's all interconnected. The anti-Semitism that occurs in Egypt has a directimpact from Clifton [N.J.] to Cherry Hill [N.J.]." (41)

The Global Dimension of Muslim Antisemitism

Plainly, Muslim antisemitism has a global dimension. But can it be described as potentially genocidal? To address this matter, we must first examine several barriers that, so far, have blocked the infliction of large-scale casualties. Some of these barriers are practical. For one thing, there are not many Jews left to harm in Arab countries. As a result of mass expulsions in the late 1940s, past discrimination, and the Jews' own Zionist inclinations, only a tiny remnant remains of the once large Jewish community in Arab and Muslim lands. For example, Iraq was home to 150,000 Jews in 1947. Within a few years, intimidation that rose to the level of ethnic cleansing had reduced their numbers to 6,000 and today only a handful remain, (42) While the few Jews who live in the Muslim world are often subject to harassment, the antisemitic ideology does not, at present, target them for extermination.

Although casualties from terrorist attacks in Israel have been high--barring the use of weapons of mass destruction, they are not apt to reach genocidal proportions. Similarly, antisemitic violence in Europe and the United States has been increasing, but police, with some exceptions, have been effective in minimizing its body count. (43)

Additional protection comes from the diversity of groups against which Muslim and Arab rage has been directed. For example, some Muslim militants focus more on combating the perceived American and Hindu threats than in targeting Jews. Such anger towards major power centers, particularly since 9/11, has drawn attention to the Jewish predicament and, to some extent, has strengthened Israel's essential alliance with the United States.

One of the strongest protective factors for Jews, however, derives from the desire of Arab and Muslim constituencies not to offend Western sensibilities. For several decades, mainstream leaders in the United States and Europe have regarded overt antisemitism as unacceptable in public discourse. Holocaust denial, propagation of the blood libel, and calls for "death to the Jews" arouse sufficient disgust in many Americans and Europeans to adversely affect subsequent relations. For this reason, as noted, much Muslim antisemitism merely substitutes the word "Zionist" for "Jew" and this, apparently, provides some Westerners with a measure of comfort.

On occasion, the desire to avoid Western reproach has led to efforts to keep hatred focused on Israel, rather than Jews. Of course, pathological hatred of Israel is in itself a problem. But, very recently, there have been some published arguments by prominent Arabs rejecting the overt antisemitic aspects of anti-Israel hostility. In one instance worthy of note, Osama Al-Baz, political adviser to Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak, published in December 2002 a series of articles in the prominent government daily, Al-Ahram, in which he effectively debunked many antisemitic myths. What animated his argument was the sense that an Arab must know "... that when he harms the Jews collectively as a race or as a people--and thus presents himself as one who expresses inhuman racist approaches that are outmoded--he harms the interests of his nation." Several months later, Egypt's Al-Azhar University's Institute for Islamic Research issued a recommendation to stop referring to contemporary Jews as "apes and pigs." (44) Much of this small but perceptible change has occurred in response to Western, largely American, pressure. But any attempt to douse the fires of hate represents a step in the right direction that should not be ignored.

Whether it can make a dent in the overwhelming antisemitism of the region remains to be seen. At present, Muslim and Arab antisemitism remains extremely dangerous and, in my view, potentially genocidal. That potentiality could become a reality overnight if Iran's antisemitic leadership acquires nuclear weapons and carries out the plan articulated by former president Ali Akhbar Hashemi Rafsanjani in a December 2001 sermon. He said that if the world of Islam comes to possess the weapons currently in Israel's possession (i.e. nuclear weapons), Israel's "method of global arrogance" would come to a dead end. He reasoned that the use of a nuclear bomb in Israel would leave nothing on the ground there, while a nuclear exchange would "only" damage the world of Islam. (45)

One reason so many people in the Muslim and Arab world are likely to hold antisemitic beliefs and even more likely to hold anti-Zionist beliefs is that their political world permits very little reality testing. Even in the so-called moderate states, there is no open debate on Israel, little debate about antisemitism, and only traces of unbiased information about either. If political, religious, or intellectual leaders ever felt inclined to offer any pro-Israel sentiments, they could not do so without endangering their prominence and perhaps their lives. A few brave leaders have been willing to face the risk. President Sadat of Egypt and Kings Hussein and Abdullah of Jordan come to mind. Each was fairly circumspect in his utterances, yet Sadat and Abdullah were assassinated while Hussein survived many threats, dying of natural causes. Most other leaders--even otherwise reasonable ones--have understandably felt content to parrot the party line concerning Israel and accept the status quo. For years, Arab leaders speaking to domestic audiences have ignored the subtle distinction between anti-Zionism and antisemitism that Arab spokespersons have often emphasized when addressing Western audiences. Very recently, a few have spoken out against overt antisemitic bigotry, but most often to criticize the blatant hate ideology as bad tactics. (46)

Generations of propaganda and childhood indoctrination have produced populations in which public opinion bears little connection to reality. For example, a recent review of 93 Saudi Arabian schoolbooks, for use in grades 1-10, concluded that such texts were sadly biased. They imparted a world view holding, among other things, that: "The Jews are a wicked nation, both in their relations with Arabs and Muslims, and in the context of world history. The Jews' disappearance is, therefore, desired"; and "Palestine in its entirety should be liberated by force and purified of its Zionist filth." Another examination of textbooks, this time texts approved by the Palestinian Authority, included examples from a fourth-grade "Islamic Religious Education" text holding that: "Treachery and disloyalty are character traits of the Jews and one should be aware of them." Saudi Arabia has made many efforts to finance and export the teaching of antisemitism, Islamic extremism, and--more generally--anti-Westernism. But Jew-hatred also appears in many curricula that are secular and free of Saudi influence. (47)

In addition, the mass media throughout the Muslim and Arab world bombard adults with selective coverage of the Arab-Israeli conflict, anti-Israel incitements, and--sometimes-overt Jew-hatred. The most extreme Arab media, including Hezbollah's Al-Manar television, feature calls to attack the Jews "... with the stone, sling, or knife, day and night ..". Their broadcasts describe Israel as "... a rapist, violent, occupying, terrorist, cancerous entity that has no legitimacy or legality whatsoever and never will." (48A) Even the state-run newspapers in states such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia regularly disseminate antisemitic messages that one historian describes as "... no different from those in Germany in the 1930s." (49)

Muslim religious leaders who might provide antidotes to all this hate-mongering are typically its chief proponents or are silent for one reason or another. Under such circumstances, it is not hard to understand how a person becomes antisemitic. Indeed, one would require extraordinary character and strength of mind to develop an alternative perspective.

Any efforts to achieve peace in the Middle East must include a means of addressing and reducing the murderous antisemitism that new flourishes unchecked in many segments of the Arab and Muslim world. Such efforts must aim to bring about unambiguous public denunciation of Jew-hatred--even that masquerading as anti-Zionism--by religious, political, and intellectual leaders.

Muslim and Arab leaders and educators must cease corrupting the minds of youth through the propagation of hatred. Not only should textbooks cease promoting antisemitism and anti-Zionism but informal means of indoctrination should stop as well. The greatest benefits would ensue were mainstream clerics to highlight the inappropriateness of using religious scripture, history, and tradition in support of Jew-hatred. No doubt, militant imams would reject their advice but, at least, there would then be a highly vocal and countervailing religious force. It would surely be progress if significant discourse on tolerance were incorporated into educational curricula, religious sermons, and public speech.

Ultimately, the establishment of tolerant and constitutionally-based political cultures in the Middle East would permit open debate and, thereby, facilitate progress on many dimensions. This would, in turn, diminish the need for Jews and others as scapegoats. But quickly-established democracy would not, in itself, be a guarantor of tolerance or progress in the war against antisemitism. In fact, free elections, in isolation from other changes, might lead to the empowerment of the antisemites. After all, majority rule without respected constitutional protections can easily become a tyranny of the majority over minorities.

Anti-Americanism

In the huge post-9/11 debate in the popular press concerning "Why They Hate Us," one line of argument attributes Muslim anti-Americanism primarily to America's purportedly bedrock support for Israel. To buttress this position, one can cite numerous polls showing that Arabs overwhelmingly believe that the United States has treated the Palestinians unfairly, as well as some evidence that a substantial percentage of Arabs view some American institutions sympathetically. Although many believers of the "Muslims and Arabs hate America because America supports Israel" explanation reject American support for Israel and call for greater "evenhandedness," or even an about-face in American policy, others argue that American principles demand a policy supportive of Israel despite its ramifications. (50)

Most commonly, however, those who perceive the pro-Israel policy as the prime source of anti-Americanism call for an intensification of American peace efforts in the region. Thus, Washington Post religion reporter and former Cairo bureau chief Carlyle Murphy concludes: "If we want to avoid creating more terrorists, we must end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict quickly and in a way both sides see as fair." (51) Such a resolution would allow the United States to maintain its ties with Israel and enable it to build new bridges to the Muslim and Arab world. The key, according to this approach, is to get Israel to behave better, to be more conciliatory and responsive to legitimate Palestinian demands. If this occurs, the argument goes, the "Arab street" will abandon the unreachable Muslim extremist elements and make common cause with Americans and Israelis. This approach underestimates the size and influence of that segment of the Arab population animated by irrational antisemitism and hostility toward the Jewish state. It also underestimates the impact of similarly motivated states like Iran. These elements would never support a solution that America could endorse and--until they are incapacitated, disarmed, and/or delegitimized--they will continue to possess the capability to torpedo any resolution encompassing coexistence. (52)

There is another very different perspective on the connection between antisemitism, anti-Zionism, and anti-Americanism, one that I believe squares better with the facts. Numerous writers have spoken of antisemitism as a "canary in a coal mine," meaning that Jew-hatred reveals something fundamentally wrong with a society and that, although the Jew is the first to be attacked, he or she will not be the last. (53) Muslim extremists are not wrong in judging America as their enemy. America, in theory and generally in practice, stands for tolerance, separation of church and state, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, democracy, modernity, women's rights, and a host of other policies inimical to the Islamic extremist mind-set. Many of these tenets also conflict with the views of more moderate Muslims and secular Arab leaders. American support for Israel and American rejection of antisemitism are only two aspects of American political culture that draw the wrath of many in the Muslim and Arab world. There is little future in a strategy that rests on trying to get Holocaust deniers, antisemites, and fanatical anti-Zionists to like us more. As one writer born in Egypt argues in an essay on anti-Americanism, "To subsidize societies which nourish ideologies of hate will not suppress terrorism, rather such pusillanimity will reinforce it." (54) So, too, I suspect, with antisemitism.

The only approach that makes sense for the United States and like-minded Western states is to seek out, support, and empower genuine moderates. In the identificatiion of such moderates, a willingness to disassociate oneself publicly and vocally from antisemitism and fanatical anti-Zionism would seem a reasonable prerequisite.

NOTES

1. See, for example, Ervin Staub, The Roots of Evil (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp. 58-62; Neil J. Kressel, Mass Hate: The Global Rise of Genocide and Terror (New York: Plenum, 1996; rev. ed., Boulder, CO: Westview, 2002), p.216; James Waller, Becoming Evil: How Ordinary People Commit Genocide and Mass Killing (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. 244-249.

2. See MEMRI, A New Antisemitic Myth in the Middle East Media. MEMRI Special Report No. 8. (Washington, DC: MEMRI, 2002), accessed 3 July 2003, available from http://www.memri.org/bin/articles.cgi? Page=subjects&Area=antisemitism&ID=SR00802.

3. These remarks are quoted and discussed in Aluma Solnick, Based on Koranic Verses, Interpretations and Traditions, Muslim Clerics State: The Jews Are Descendants of Apes, Pigs, and Other Animals. Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) Special Report No. 11. (Washington, DC: MEMRI, 2002), accessed 3 July 2003, available from http://memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=subjects&Area=antisemitism&ID=SR01102.

4. Tantawi and Al-Sudayyis quoted in Solnick, para. 2.

5. Rantisi quoted in Uri Dan, "Israel Fails to Kill Him, But Might Have Dealt Blow to Peace," New York Post, 11 June 2003, 9. Khamenei quoted in CNN.com, "Iran Leader Urges Destruction of 'Cancerous' Israel," CNN.com, 15 December 2000, accessed 4 August 2003, available from http://www.cnn.com/2000/WORLD/meast/12/15/mideast.iran.reut.

6. Hussain quoted in Sarah Lyall, "What Drove 2 Britons to Bomb a Club in Tel Aviv?" New York Times, 12 May 2003, A3, accessed 3 August 2003, available from Lexis-Nexis Academic database.

7. Robert S. Wistrich, Muslim Anti-Semitism (New York: American Jewish Committee, 2002), accessed 5 August 2003, available from http://ajc.org/InTheMedia/PublicationsPrint.asp?did=503.

8. Yehuda Bauer, "Nazis, Communists, and Radical Islamists," Jerusalem Post, 29 November 2002, 9B, accessed 3 August 2003, available from Lexis-Nexis Academic database. Andrew Sullivan, "Anti-semitism Sneaks into the Anti-War Camp," Sunday Times (London), 20 October 2002, accessed 3 August 2003, available from Lexis-Nexis Academic database.

9. James Bennet, "Palestinian Mob Attacks Pollster," New York Times, 14 July 2003, A1,A5.

10. Neil J. Kressel, "How Terror Skews the News," New York Post, 24 March 2002, 27.

11. Morton Deutsch, Response to the Terrorist Actions: The Best Long-Term Strategy for a Just, Peaceful, Humane, and Sustainable World. A Letter from Morton Deutsch, Ph.D. Accessed 10 July 2003, available from the Canadian Psychological Association World wide web home page: http://cpa.ca/epw/epw/Deutsch.html.

12. Bernard Lewis, Semites & Anti-Semites (New York: Norton, 1986; paperback, 1987), p. 117. Wistrich, 2002, "introduction," para. 3.

13. Non-Governmental Organizations at World Congress Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, WCAR NGO Forum Declaration (2001), accessed 14 July 14 2003, available from http://www-personal.umich.edu/~hfc/mideast/NGO_WCAR.htm.

14. Shimon Peres and Michael Melchior, Briefing by Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Deputy Foreign Minister Michael Melchior to the Diplomatic Corps (Jerusalem: Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 4 September 2001), accessed 4 August 2003, available from-http://www.israel-mfa.gov.il/mfa/go.asp?MFAHOkg20.

15. King quoted in Seymour Martin Lipset, "'The Socialism of Fools:' The Left, the Jews and Israel," Encounter (December 1969), 24. A longer pro-Israel document, "Letter to an Anti-Zionist Friend," purportedly written by King, has turned out to be a hoax. See the discussion in Lee Green, Camera Alert: Letter by Martin Luther King a Hoax (Boston: Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America, 2002), accessed 15 July 2003, available from CAMERA home page: http://www.camera.org/index.asp?x_context=7&x_issue=369&x_article=369. See, also, John Lewis, "'I Have a Dream' for Peace in the Middle East: King's Special Bond with Israel," San Francisco Chronicle, 21 January 2002, accessed 4 August 2003, available from: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/01/21/ED115336.DTL.

16. Proposal cited in Anne Bayefsky, "Since Durban: An Entrenchment of Hatred," Jerusalem Post, 13 September 2002, 9A, accessed 3 August 2003, available from Lexis Nexis Academic database.

17. Jacques Givet, The Anti-Zionist Complex, translated by E. Abel and N. Langford (Englewood, NJ: SBS Publishing, 1982), p. 39.

18. Abraham Foxman, On Global Anti-Semitism (Washington, DC: Anti-Defamation League-ADL-2002), p. 3.

19. Kressel, Mass Hate, p. 213.

20. Kressel, Mass Hate, pp. 214-223.

21. Meg Bortin, "Muslims Lament Israel's Existence," A International Herald Tribune, 3 June 2003, accessed 3 July 2003, available from http://www.iht.com/articles/98399.html.

22. Social psychologist Roy Baumeister, who has written on the origins of mass atrocities, suggests that "Showing disrespect, attacking someone's honor, insulting or humiliating someone, or in some other way causing a person to lose face will often elicit an aggressive response. The people (or groups or countries) most prone to violence are the ones who are most susceptible to ego threats ..." In this regard, historian David Pryce-Jones has amassed considerable evidence that people in Arab cultures are particularly motivated by shame and honor considerations. Roy F. Baumeister, Evil: Inside Human Violence and Cruelty (New York: Freeman, 1997), p. 376. David Pryce-Jones, The Closed Circle: An Interpretation of the Arabs (New York: HarperPerennial, 1991), pp. 34-57.

23. Baumeister, pp. 376-377.

24. Ahmad Abu Halabiya, PA TV Broadcast Calls for Killing Jews and Americans (Trans. By MEMRI). MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 138. (Washington, DC: MEMRI, 2000). (Originally broadcast date October 13, 2000, from Zayed bin Sultan Aal Nahyan mosque, Gaza). Accessed 4 August 2003, available from http://www.memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=subjects&Area=antisemitism&ID=SP13800.

25. See, for example, Martin Asser, "Palestinian Support for Suicide Bombers," BBC News Online, 28 June 2002, accessed 18 July 2003, available from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2072851 .stm; Council on Foreign Relations, "Hamas, Islamic Jihad," in Terrorism: Questions and Answers, accessed 18 July 2003, available from http://www.terrorismanswers.com/groups/hamas2.html.

26. Kressel, Mass Hate, pp. 64-72, 215.

27. Staub, p. 3.

28. Mortimer Ostow, Myth and Madness (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction, 1996), pp. 135-136.

29. ADL, ADL: Egyptian Anti-Semitism "Diminished but Still Potent" (New York: ADL, 2003), accessed 2 July 2003, available from http://www.adl.org/PresRele/ASInt_13/4277_13.asp.

30. Marvin Perry and Frederick M. Schweitzer, Antisemitism (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002), p. 12.

31. Assad quoted in Perry and Schweitzer, p. 12.

32. Ostow, p. 148.

33. Baumeister, p. 377.

34. ADL, ADL Backgrounder: The Zayed Center (Washington, DC: ADL, 2002), paragraphs 4,18,20, accessed 2 July 2003, available from http://www.adl.org/Anti_semitism/zayed_center.asp.

35. Radio Islam, USA's Rulers-They're AllJews! Clinton's List, accessed 4 August 2003, available from http://www.abbc2.com/islam/english/toread/collect.htm.

36. See MEMRI, A New Antisemitic Myth, passim.

37. Zbeir Sultan, Fears of Normalization with Israel in the Syrian Media. (Trans. By MEMRI). MEMRI Special Dispatch Series No. 67. Washington, DC: MEMRI. (Original published 1 January 2000, under different title in Arabic weekly, Al-'Usbu' Al-Adabi). Accessed 21 July 2003, available from http://www.memri.org/bin/opener.cgi?Page=archives&ID=SP6700.

38. Perry & Schweitzer, preface. See, also, David Littman, "Syria's Blood Libel Revival at the UN: 1991-2000," Midstream 46, no. 2 (February/March 2000), accessed 4 August 2003, available from http://www.midstreamthf.com/0200/feature.html.

39. See Perry & Schweitzer, 73-117; Wistrich, Muslim Anti-semitism, passim.

40. Quoted in MEMRI, Arab Press Debates Antisemitic Egyptian Series: "A Knight Without a Horse"--Part II. MEMRI Inquiry and Analysis No. 113. (Washington, DC: MEMRI, 2002), accessed 4 August 2003, available from http://www.memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=subjects&Area=antisemitism&ID=IA11302. See, also, MEMRI reports 109 and 114.

41. This account is based on Joanne Palmer, "Protocols of Paterson,"--Jewish Community News (New Jersey), 20 December 2002 and Amy Sara Clark, "Publisher Won't Back Down on Protocols," Jewish Standard "(New Jersey), 15 November 2002, accessed from 4 August 2003, available from www.danielpipes.org/499.php.

42. See Carole Basri, The Jews of Iraq: A Forgotten Case of Ethnic Cleansing (Jerusalem: American Jewish Congress, 2003); Ya'akov Meron, "Why Jews Fled Arab Countries," Middle East Quarterly 2, no. 3 (1995), accessed 28 July 2003, available from http://www.meforum.org/article/263.

43. See ADL, "The Fight Against Global Anti-Semitism,"--ADL NewsBrief 5 (2002), 1-4; Craig S. Smith, "Racism Up after 9/11, European Monitor Says," New York Times, 11 December 2002, A17.

44. The Al-Baz quote and the Al-Azhar recommendation are discussed in Yigal Carmon, Harbingers of change in the antisemitic discourse in the Arab world. MEMRI Inquiry and Analysis Series No. 135 (Washington, DC: MEMRI, 2003), accessed 9 February 2004, available from http://memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=archives&Area=ia&ID=IA13503.

45. Rafsanjani quoted in MEMRI, Former Iranian President Rafsanjani on Using a Nuclear Bomb Against Israel. Special Dispatch No. 325. (Washington, DC: MEMRI, 2002), accessed 3 July 2003, available from http://www.memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=countries&Area=iran&ID=SP32502. See, also, Doug Frantz, "Iran Closes in on Ability to Build a Nuclear Bomb," Los Angeles Times, 4 August 2003, 1, accessed 6 August 2003, available from Lexis-Nexis Academic database.

46. See the discussion in Carmon.

47. This discussion is based on three sources: American Jewish Committee, The West, Christians and Jews in Saudi Arabian Schoolbooks (New York: American Jewish Committee, 2003) accessed 5 August 2003, available from http://www.ajc.org/InTheMedia/Publications.asp?did=750; B'nai B'rith Foundation, The Portrayal of Israel and Jews in School Textbooks of the Palestinian Authority (Washington, DC: B'nai Brith, n.d.); Neil MacFarquhar, "Anti-western and Extremist Views Pervade Saudi Schools," New York Times, 19 October 2001, B1, B3.

48. Both quotations appear in A. Jorisch, "Broadcasting Hatred," Near East Report 47, no. 2 (3 February 2003): 7.

49. Victor D. Hanson, "On Hating Israel," National Review (7 May 2002), accessed 4 August 2003, available from http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson050702.asp. See, also, Yehuda Kraut, Palestinian Spokesmen, Jenin Lies and Media Indifference (Boston: Committee for Accuracy in Middle East reporting in America, 2002), accessed 9 February 2004, available from CAMERA home page: http://www.camera.org/index.asp?x_print=1 &x_context=7&x_issue=394&x_article=394

50. Bortin, "Muslims Lament Israel's Existence;" John Waterbury, "Hate Your Policies, Love Your Institutions, "Foreign Affairs, 82, no. 1, 58, accessed 3 August 2003, available from Lexis-Nexis Academic database; David Gelernter, "They Hate Us Because They Hate Israel," Wall Street Journal, 8 October 2001, A26.

51. Murphy quoted in Jim Naureckas, "Why They Hate Us: Looking for a Flattering Answer," Extra![Electronic version], para. 9, accessed 22 February 2003, available from FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting) home page: http://www.fair.org/extra/0110/wtc-why.html.

52. Writing in the New York Times, columnist Nicholas D. Kristofimplies that Arab hostility toward America is a consequence of "Mr. Bush's coziness with Ariel Sharon" and that it might be substantially reduced by a serious and balanced peace initiative. The problem is that relatively few Arabs draw the distinction between Sharon and Peres that looms so large for Kristof and that it is precisely Mr. Bush's balanced approach that draws their wrath. And for a substantial segment, the problem is not Sharon or Peres but Jews in general. Nicholas D. Kristof, "The Ring of Truth?" The New York Times, 8 April 2003, A23.

53. See, for example, JeffJacoby, "A Wave of Jew-Bashing in Europe," Boston Globe, 28 April 2002, E7, accessed 3 August 2003, available from Lexis-Nexis Academic database.

54. Bat Yeor, "Eurabia," National Review Online, 9 October 2002, accessed 3 August 2003, available from Lexis-Nexis Academic database.

NEIL J. KRESSEL, a Harvard-educated social psychologist, directs the Honors Program in Social Sciences and is Professor of Psychology at William Paterson University of New Jersey. He is author of Mass Hate: The Global Rise of Genocide and Terror (2002), and writes frequently for the New York Post and other popular periodicals.