It is a sad fact that Saudi Arabs remain noxiously anti-Semitic. The lack of knowledge about Judaism and the history of the Jews, the result of abysmal education and the official blocking of outside information concerning the Jews and Israel, leads inevitably to ignorant conclusions.
As distressing as this is, there is still hope. In March, 2002 Al-Riyadh published another series of articles that claimed that the "Blood Libel" (see Part II of this MEMRI report) against the Jews was fact. As head of the Public Affairs section of the US Embassy, I undertook a strong protest to the Saudi government over this. My protest led to the editor of the paper offering a former apology and the government's direction to newspapers to not report such stories as fact again. It also led to the writer's being banned from writing for several years. But anti-Semitism is hydra-headed; when one head is cut off, another two pop up. Other fictions, like the perennially popular "Protocols" and the so-called "Franklin Prophecy" still have great currency in the country and throughout the region.
Attempts to refute such stories are very difficult as they seem to have become part of the cloud of forgeries that inform the general public. It is going to take years of effort to change "conventional wisdom". It's also going to take a future state of being in which Israel is not seen as the personification of evil. That is going to require a permanent peace settlement in the region first.
Before we start
The sad fact of anti-semitism in the Arab world is somewhat more nuanced than mere regurgigation of the Protocols (recall: they're Russian anti-semitism only recently transplanted here). Just a decade ago, one would find many who would attempt to distinguish "Jews" from "Zionists," and even a few who perceived a meaningful existence between "Labor," "Likud," "Israelis," and "people who shoot innocent Palestinians/Lebanese and pretend to be justified."
ReplyDeleteSuch distinctions have faded rapidly in the Arab world.
Thanks for your comment.
ReplyDeleteI am idealistic enough to hope that one day there can be meaningful exchanges of young people between Israel and her Arab neighbors. Only then can the wall start to crack. It's hard to remain prejudiced against someone whom you have learned about.
I don't expect to live to see such a development, but I have been privileged to witness in person the end of segregation in the American South. We have a long way to go, but the core evils I saw in my younger years are now against the law and have been replaced by others far more benign. It's like watching trees grow. Many years come and go before big changes become apparent.