Nazi Propaganda for the Arab World (33 page)

Three days later, in its "Weekly Talk" on "Jewish Preparations for the Future," VFA reported that "a number of Jewish documents have been found dealing with the Jewish plan to control public opinion throughout the world." It claimed that one of the documents, about which no specific information was given, asserted, "We [ Jews] must dominate all the governments of the world secretly by means of controlling public opinion." This goal would be achieved "by controlling the press." Yet a far more dire fate was in store for Arabs and Muslims: "The Jews are preparing death for us at the hands of the Americans." In case Arab rulers did not do so, it was "the duty of the Arabs to fight against this Jewish menace. If we have continued to exist up till today, it is because of the virility of the Arabs." Fortunately, Islam had "taught us how to fight the Jews. We hope to see that the Jews in our countries will find every Arab crying for the victory of Islam and Arabism."62 The parallels between Nazi propaganda in Germany and its Arabic-language radio broadcasts went beyond a common indictment of the alleged Jewish domination of the United States. Goebbels and others fanned the flames of German hysteria about the coming "extermination" of the Germans by "international Jewry." The Arabic-language broadcasts sent additional warnings that the Jews were intent on killing the Arabs. Mention of nonexistent documents that referred to previously hidden conspiracies was a commonplace both in the Nazi's daily newspaper in Germany, Volkischer Beobachter, and on Arabic radio. Although the Nazi regime occasionally evoked Christianity on its behalf, the focus of its propaganda was a secular cult surrounding Hitler. The Arabic-language programs gave Islam a significantly more important role in political propaganda than Christianity possessed in propaganda aimed at Germans and Europeans.63

Although up through 1943, the attentive reader of the American press was informed of Hitler's and Goebbels's declarations that they were in the process of exterminating Europe's Jews, the fate of the Jews remained a secondary issue in the press coverage of the war.64 This relative lack of focus on the Final Solution in the American media did not prevent the Arab Nation broadcast of June 22 from attacking efforts by American Jews to draw attention to the Final Solution in Europe. The Berlin announcer said that a conference of Jews in Philadelphia "revealed the lies;" that is, descriptions of Nazi crimes in Europe, "of the Jews who are trying to gain the sympathy of the world through their tears. However, let the Jews cry and talk as much as they like, the Arabs will not answer them verbally, but they will use the sword, rifles, bombs and even stones to reply to the Jews' cursed lies." The broadcast suggested the motive for such "lies." The Jews believed that they would not "be able to take Palestine" unless they made "the world believe that they are worthy of sympathy." The broadcast was an early example of what would later be called "Holocaust denial" and of anti-Zionism resting on the claims that the Holocaust was a myth used to justify a Jewish state in Palestine. On June 27, Bari in Arabic, in "The Jews and Their Ravings," warned Muslims again of "the Jewish menace" and held the Jews responsible for provoking and spreading the war "throughout the world" in cooperation with the "Jewish countries" of the Anglo-American alliance.65

The flood of anti-Semitic propaganda on Germany's Arabic-language radio in the first six months of 1943 caught the attention of the Middle East desk of the U.S. Military Intelligence Division. Its summary of themes from Axis broadcasts issued in June 1943 suggested that the anti-Semitic offensive was even greater than that recorded by Kirk's staff in Cairo. The MID reported that the broadcasts repeated the following points: Only Axis victory would prevent the Jews from realizing their ambitions. Jews were the prophets of Bolshevism. The Arabs would be impoverished living under the British and Americans. The Jews needed to be suppressed. All Arabs who failed to boycott Jews should be destroyed. The Jews were demanding the annexation of certain Syrian territories as a reward for their sacrifices during the present war. North Africa was the bridge for Jews from New York to Palestine. The United States was completely dominated by the Jews and was interested in a Jewish homeland because it did not want Jews in the United States. The United States was also planning a Jew ish homeland in Morocco, Tunisia, and Eritrea. President Roosevelt promised to expedite the formation of a Jewish state and the immigration of Jews to Palestine. The United States had granted 500,000 visas to Jews for Palestine.66 This military intelligence summary confirmed what officials in Washington who had been reading the Kirk dispatches already knew: the fusion of antiSemitism with anti-Zionism was the key ideological weapon of the Nazi regime in its efforts to win support from Arabs and Muslims in North Africa and the Middle East.

On July io, the Arab Nation asserted that "the most serious problem in Arab life is the Jewish problem." The danger resulting from it would not pass unless it was "solved in a drastic way.... If this Jewish problem is solved drastically and energetically ... the seven heads of the Jewish snake will be chopped off." Half measures and half-hearted solutions were "futile" and did "more harm than good." It did not specify what it meant by drastic and energetic measures, though it did say that "the future of the Arab countries for many centuries to come will depend on the outcome of the solution of that question."67 The following day, Berlin in Arabic attacked American efforts to appeal to Arabs. "All this pseudo friendship is nothing other than a Jewish manoeuver based on lies and hypocrisy." The Arabs were convinced that their interests were "absolutely opposed to those of the Americans because the latter care only for the Jews, the mortal enemies of the Arabs and of Islam." American policy had "become a purely Jewish policy." The Arabs' duty was to do what they could to "speed the defeat of the Anglo-Saxons."68

On July 15, VFA repeated the claim that the United States was replacing Britain as the major foreign power in the Arab countries. The Americans' "first task" was "to place Africa at the disposal of the American capitalists, another name for the Jews. 1169 On July 26, Berlin in Arabic asserted that when American leaders, such as Secretary of State Hull or Republican leader Wendell Wilkie, expressed sympathy for the Jews, they did "not take into consideration the possibility of hurting the feelings of the Arabs and Moslems and making them turn against them." In fact, despite the well documented reluctance of the U.S. State Department and the Office of War Information to give the fate of Europe's Jews a prominent place in American political warfare, Nazi Arabic propaganda hammered away at the links between Jews and the United States and described the latter as "a strong Jewish fortress. '170

On July 30, Berlin in Arabic broadcast a speech by the Mufti in which he again placed the Arab cause in Palestine in the continuity of the history of Islam.

We thank the Lord and we ask for His help. We worship the Lord faithfully and are strong in belief in his religion. The Lord is one and Mohammed is his Prophet. May the blessing of the Lord be upon Mohammed, his people and his friends. On this day for over thirteen centuries we have celebrated the journey of the Prophet from the Mecca Mosque to the Omar Mosque, the principal mosque of Islam. On this day also, the 27th Ragab, Sultan Salah el Dine el Ayoubl threw Crusaders out of Holy Jerusalem and drove them away from the Omar Mosque [in Jerusalem]. Moslems all over the world celebrate this day. The Moslems have sacrificed their most precious possessions since the beginning of their history to restore their rights in Palestine because of the presence of the Omar Mosque. The Moslems fight for Palestine because it is a sacred piece of Islam. At the same time the Jews plot against the Arabs and Palestine and claim that the Omar Mosque is on the site of their ancient temple. In this they depend on the support of foreign powers. Their actions do not weaken the determination of Moslems but give them more confidence in their struggle. The entire Moslem world supports the Arab cause in Palestine, particularly the Moslems of India.

Extending his gaze beyond Palestine, Husseini stressed that "all believers are brothers" who, like parts of a building, depend on one another. Unfortunately, he continued, some Muslims had not done their duty to engage in mutual support. "May Moslems on this occasion swear to cooperate. May all Moslemskings, lenders, individuals, take the oath on this sacred occasion and undertake to struggle so that the Omar Mosque is not controlled by the Jews" and that the Jews instead are expelled from the Holy Land .71 As the tide had turned against the Axis and their Arab allies in North Africa and the Middle East, Husseini reiterated the specifically Islamic dimension of his politics. In so doing, he deepened his ties to the most hard-line elements of the Nazi regime.

The radio broadcasts of late summer and early fall 1943 hammered away at the theme of Jewish menace and domination. On August 5, VFA attacked the United States and the Soviet Union for "helping the Jews who still constitute the most deadly threat, casting their shadow over our future. The Jews are our mortal enemy and the victory of the Reds or their allies will mean a victory for the Bolsheviks and the realization of Jewish imperialistic domination throughout the world."72 On August 10, VFA in its broadcast "Why Did the Jews Increase Their Activities Recently?" drew on the conspiracy theorist's stock in trade, namely, the spurious connection between unrelated events. First it asserted that Jews had held meetings in Palestine and the United States to discuss "the Jewish cause in Palestine." Then it stated that "it was not a coincidence" that these meetings took place at the same time that the Arabs were seeking to realize Arab unity. "To put it more clearly, the Jews have been active because they found that Nuri El Said [the Iraqi prime minister] had left his Arab country for another Arab country in order to confer with the Arab leaders regarding an Arab union." During this time, which was never precisely specified, Chaim Weizmann was said to have met with President Roosevelt to discuss a Jewish national home in Palestine, the same Roosevelt who "has become a tool in the hands of that race;" that is, the Jews.73 For VFA, the causal links were clear. Weizmann met Roosevelt because Iraq's prime minister traveled to other Arab countries to discuss Arab unity. It offered not a shred of evidence to demonstrate that Jewish political activity in the United States had anything to do with the comings and goings of Arab political leaders. Moreover, the obvious, plausible alternative explanation for American Jewish political activism lay readily at hand: it was a desperate effort to stop the slaughter of Europe's Jews. The broadcast was a lesson in conspiracy thinking and a demonstration of how one could take events with no causal connection to one another and weave them into a seemingly coherent narrative that narcissistically revolved around the Arabs as victims and the Jews as the driving force of world events.

"The American Mission Is Jewish;" the August 14 broadcast of a rarely heard station called Independent Egypt, illustrated another feature of Nazi broadcasting: the invented quotation attributed to unnamed persons which was said to prove the truth of anti-Semitic stereotypes.

A Jewish writer addresses non-Jews as follows: "Now you unbelievers, time will teach you how to fear the Jews. They constitute a great danger for you. The opposition of the Jew is taking an effective turn. We Jews are a people of destruction because we are a people without a home and Jews will ever remain people of destruction and will never desist from their demands."

It is thus admitted that the Jewish message is that of destruction; it is the message of [Bernard] Baruch, [Felix] Frankfurter and [Henry] Morgenthau. It is never the message of peace and justice. The alluring words, the enticing projects are meant to trap their victim and we Arabs are their greatest prey. We must beware of them! Every other country has awakened but we, we are still deep in slumber. We do not move. Our brethren are being killed, we are surrounded by snakes which try to strangle us. America is spreading her net over the oil of Arab countries. She has entangled Iraq in the Lend Lease Act. Her troops are spreading over Egypt and other Arab countries yet we are asleep. The fatal danger threatens not only our wealth or our property, it threatens our very existence.74

The broadcast was an education in sloppy thinking. It did not reveal the identity of the speaker or offer evidence that such a comment had ever been made. It assumed what remained to be demonstrated, namely, that there was such a thing as a unitary Jewish message of any kind, not to mention one about destroying unbelievers. The connection to three oft-mentioned but probably vaguely known persons with the last names of Baruch, Frankfurter, and Mor- genthau remained unproven. In August 1943, in the main death camps and in villages and towns all over Eastern Europe, Jews were being massacred in a murderous spasm of unprecedented speed. They were in no position to threaten anyone in any way. Their powerlessness could not have been more evident. Yet the message of Nazism's Arabic broadcasts was that these very Jews threatened "the existence" of the Arabs. The projection and paranoia that was central to Nazi propaganda at home found expression in these messages aimed at Arabs and Muslims, whom they depicted as the primary victims of the era.

In Germany, Goebbels' "Do You Want Total War?" speech of February i8, 1943, set the tone for Nazi propaganda in the aftermath of the German defeat at Stalingrad. Although he expressed confidence in victory in the longer term, Goebbels turned to increasingly vivid descriptions of the disasters to befall the Germans should they lose the war. The Arabic-language broadcasts also focused on the awful plans the Jews had in store for Arabs and Muslims. On September 8, Berlin in Arabic described "The Ambitions of the Jews." The Jews would not be satisfied until they made "every territory between the Tigris and the Nile Jewish." Their goal was to "remove the Cross and the Crescent from all Arab countries." If they succeeded "there will remain not a single Arab Moslem or Christian in the Arab world. Arabs! Imagine Egypt, Iraq and all the Arab countries becoming Jewish with no Christianity or Islam there."75 On September 24, VFA continued this line of attack when it asked "What Are the Aims of International Zionism?" The Jews did not only want Palestine. Rather, they sought "possession of all Arab countries in the East and the West" up to the Atlantic Ocean. In the west they sought Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia, and in the east they wanted to connect Syria to Lebanon and then add both to Palestine. This "Jewish plan" was the "greatest danger" that would face the Arabs and Muslims if "our enemies the British, Americans and Bolsheviks emerge victorious." It was the "sacred duty" of Arabs to unite in order to "repulse this Jewish menace" and prevent "Jewish imperialism" from being established with the assistance of the British. The broadcast expressed concern that the Arab world was not rising up against this menace. It warned Arabs not to be deceived by British efforts to befriend them. They should not be "negligent" or "inactive." Yet the Arabs and Muslims did not appear to be rising up against the looming danger. Presumably, if they failed to act now, "when the great catastrophe" came the Arabs would "meet it only with their tears and laments, with their suffering and regret." Either they would have freedom and independence or a "life of servility, drudgery-a life fit for cattle only."76 On September 26, VFA announced that the Jews intended to "seize all the Arab countries and settle Jewish communities in them" and claim Palestine as "not only as a home but as a base to ride roughshod over the other Arab countries." A British and American victory would enable the Jews to realize these dreams and to force the Arabs "to live as nomads." Predictions of catastrophe if the Allies and "the Jews" won the war remained a key theme of Nazi propaganda and Nazi Arabic-language propaganda until the war's end.77