Arab hate literature of the 1950s shows the transition from blaming "Jews" to blaming "Zionists"

Here is an excerpt from the Congressional Record, June 27, 1956, part of a very lengthy testimony about the Arab boycott of Israel and of Jews.

What is especially interesting here is that the section on Arab anti-Jewish propaganda shows that there was a transition period between direct anti-Jewish statements and seeming "anti-Zionist" statements, for all intents and purposes identical. The testimony says that the change was prompted by American public relations firms retained by Arab countries.

This is an early blueprint of today's anti-Zionist propaganda, just today it is slightly better disguised.

ARAB ANTI-JEWISH PROPAGANDA ACTIVITIES IN THE UNITED STATES

Perhaps the most vicious offense committed by Arab governments against Jewish citizens in the United States is their deliberate fomenting of domestic anti-Semitism in this country and their collaboration with and sponsorship of elements in the American hate movement.

Collaboration with American hatemongers

In carrying out its anti-Jewish campaign, the Arab Information Center has determined upon a course of intimate cooperation with professional anti-Semites in this country.

A policy statement sent by [Kameel Abdul] Rahim on October 25, 1954, from Cairo before his departure for the United States to head the center. to Dr. Omar Haliq. Arab League representative tn New York (Jewish Telegraphic Agency dispatch of March 17, 1955) declared that the Arab Information Center henceforth would welcome the cooperation and assistance of professional anti-Semites in all fields and ways. Rahim emphasized that such activities were to be handled discreetly so as not to expose the center to charges of anti-Semitism or compromise its character as a cultural exchange. Rahim indicated that he intended to deal with this facet of the center's activities personally.
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Distribution of anti-Semitic literature

The increasing voluminous literature published directly by Arab official propaganda agencies bears a comparable stamp of anti-Jewishness although, significantly, it does not usually bear any imprint identifying its source. Mort of the anti-Jewish items now being freely distributed across the country, often elaborately and handsomely printed, are published by the embassies of the Arab states and distributed by the Arab Information Center.

Generally, Arab officials obey the advice given them by American consultants to avoid heavy-handed anti-Jewish themes in their propaganda. On the other hand, the Arabs understand that the term “Zionist” and “Jew” are so closely identified in the United States by the general public that the theme of anti-Zionism can be handled adroitly to produce anti-Jewish implications, thus the continually repeated refrain concerning “the influence of the American Zionists in Washington.”

Occasionally, however, the Arab line is directed into an unmistakable excursion into overt anti-Jewish incitement. This is especially true in two pamphlets now widely in circulation, Story of Zionist Espionage in Egypt and Jewish Atrocities in the Holy Land..... These pamphlets clearly seek not only to inspire antipathy toward Israel but, in addition, to invoke a feeling of anti-Jewish prejudice and bias generally. And as a matter of fact, domestic anti-Semites in the United States already have distributed and exploited these documents for their own purposes.

The Story of Zionist Espionage In Egypt is openly anti-Jewish as well as anti-Israel...[It describes Zionism and communism this way:]

“Zionism and communism are two distinctive forces with one political objective— world domination. Both powers cooperate secretly and in public without friction since the power in the end will  eventually go to Zionism.

"They will not achieve supremacy until they destroy the Islamic and Christian countries all over the world. Therefore communism helps Zionism and each in its own way completes the other: only thus will they reach their aim—Zionlist world supremacy.”

Jewish Atrocities In the Holy Land includes:

“Now we have once more to hear the horrible tale of sadistic cruelties and wanton brutalities perpetrated against an innocent population, mainly composed of women, children and old men. But this time the aggressors are those very Jews who were lately so loud tn their outcry against the Nazis.

"When reading of these atrocious acts, one unconsciously thinks of their perpetrators as being  untaught savages, or barbarians of the remote past. Yet these same Jews have for centuries, by virtue of their money-amassing activities, gathered to themselves the cream of culture, and refinement of whatever country they have settled in. The wealthy, educated Jew surrounded by all the culture and art that his riches can command has long been a familiar figure in civilized society.”

An even more outrageous document, published by the World Truth League of POB 44, Jerusalem, Jordan-Arab side, is distributed widely in the United States through embassy offices of the Arab delegations to the U.N. as well as by the Arab Information Center. The sheet, composed in a sensational format, contains touched-up photographs of alleged Israeli massacres of Arab children, old men, and women. It quotes liberally from the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion to the effect that the Jews believe the gentiles are a flock of sheep and we are the wolves and you know what happens when the wolves get hold of the flock. This Jordanian leaflet maintains that Jews. not Israelis, are the unconscionable exploiters of the gentile world and they have very well proved it once again by their recent Judaic barbarities against innocent Arab shepherds. It declares that the basic material in all Jewish propaganda is composed of lies and distortion of facts as is known by now all over the world.

...
It is apparent that crude and vicious canards of this kind are not intended to be limited merely to  incitement of hostility against Israel. They are designed for the larger purpose of promoting hatred toward Jews of every national allegiance throughout the world.

For those who insist that anti-Zionism has nothing to do with antisemitism, this history shows that they were identical in the 1950s and everyone knew it. The accusations against Israel today mirror those in the Arab antisemitic literature of 60 years ago. Given that the accusation of antisemitism was considered toxic, the Arab world slowly replaced "Jew" with "Zionist" but the intent was the same - to foment Jew-hatred worldwide.

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