I PURELY COMMENTARY
Testing Language, Translating Anti-Israel Double-Talk
PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor Emeritus
L
anguage and tricks of
the mind have their
propagandistic effects in
resort to diplomacy that
develops into double-talk. If it
is in areas where there are
racial disputes it does not
begin to match the contradic-
tions of the Middle East.
There are no secrets about
such confusions which are
really diplomatic falsehoods in
the anti-Israel Arab
statesmanship. They are the
clever pronouncements,
especially by Yassir Arafat,
pledging recognition of Jewish
rights to sovereignty for Israel
without the slightest for-
malism of support by the Arab
world.
It is really a simple pro-
cedure on an over-all Arab
political tactic. Arafat pro-
mises recognition of Israel and
an end to terrorism and his
disputants reiterate threats
garbed in declarations that
there will never — with the
emphasis on "never" — be a
friendly Arab gesture for Jews
and for Israel.
In news and commentaries,
one detects a tendency to ab-
sorb the pledges, promises,
assurances. Why is there an
ignoring of the counterpart,
the actual threats to Israel's
very life, in the language of
those who do not hesitate to
say there is only one mind in
Arab leadership, the destruc-
tion of the Jewish State. Why
the failure to detect the Arab
mind, spoken and written in
Arabic?
When a responsible editor
undertakes to expose the
rhetorical fraud and to delve
into the mind and intentions
of the threatening enemies of
Israel and Jewry, with a
revelation of the actual
language of the intent, he
earns gratitude for
truth-seeking.
U.S. News and World Report
places the neglected facts on
the public record in the
language of a program for
destruction.
In an analysis of the Arab
spoken tongue, its editor and
publisher, Morton B. Zucker-
man, writes under the title,
"The PLO as Image Maker"
and introduces Israel's
enemies in the statements in
which they expose themselves:
The menace is as great as
ever, despite Yassir Arafat's
new user-friendly image
and the PLO's so-called
dialogue with America:
• Witness the 30 PLO at-
tacks against Israel since
Arafat supposedly re-
nounced terrorism in-
December, 1988.
• Witness the PLO acts of
terrorism against West
Bank Palestinians to pre-
vent local leaders and
public
figures
euphemistically called col-
laborators — from moving
in the direction of peaceful
dialogue with Israel. One
hundred and forty have
been killed in a year, many
by the "Revolutionary
Eagles" under explicit PLO
instruction, as a warning
not to deviate from the
PLO's line. How can the
An editor's peace
plan gets to the
heart of the matter.
Israelis trust the PLO if the
Palestinians who cooperate
in any way with Israeli
authorities are executed as
traitors?
• Witness the recent state-
ment of the Grand Mufti of
Jerusalem, Sheik Sa'ad al-
Din al-Alami, who was
quoted in a Kuwaiti
newspaper repeating a
famous Islamic hadith:
"Kill the Jews until the
stone shall cry, 'Oh,
Moslem, if this Jew is
hiding behind me, come
and kill him: "
• Witness Farouk Kad-
doumi, head of the PLO's
political department, in a
BBC interview last April:
"The rifle will remain in
our hands until we regain
our land . . . We will pitch
our tent in those places
which our bullets can
reach. The extent of the
Palestinian people's might
will determine the location
of this tent, which will then
form the base from which
we will later pursue the
next phase."
• Witness Mr. Kaddoumi
in the Danish newspaper
Politiken, responding to a
question on Arafat's public
declarations of renouncing
terrorism and recognizing
Israel. Q: "Does this mean
that the words that made
Shultz begin a dialogue are
null and void?" Kaddoumi's
answer: "Shultz can go to
hell. I suppose he is already
on his way there."
• Witness on April 23,
1989, a PLO march through
one of the West Bank
towns. There, in perfect
military formation, row
after row of Palestinian
youth, their eyes showing
through the slits of their
checkered kaffiyehs, mar-
ched through the streets
under PLO flags to the
cheers of their community.
This was the new Palesti-
nian army. These are not
the children of the intifada
throwing rocks, but a
disciplined paramilitary
force. To the Israelis who
watched it on Israeli TV,
this is the enemy in their
next war.
Appropriate weight must
be given to what the PLO
leadership has said in
Arabic to its own people —
namely, that any territorial
settlement achieved
through the intifada will be
used as a staging ground
for future attacks on Israel.
So Israel's presumption
that the Arabs are trying to
destroy it and not just free
the West Bank is the proper
policy guide. Israel remains
a country that will be
wiped out if it loses a war.
Is anything else needed for
an exposure of the Arab mind?
Will this fact-finding set at
rest the collaboration with the
plotters to destroy Israel's
existence?
With our gratitude to Zuck-
erman goes the hope that his
assembled facts will be circu-
lated widely in the interest of
truth as a contributing factor
to peace in the troubled area.
Zuckerman had more to of-
fer in the quest for peace. In
a supplementary editorial,
"Four Steps to Mideast Peace,"
Zuckerman outlined this pro-
gram for action:
How can America break
the deadlock?
One: Make it clear that all
else depends on everyone
unequivocally embracing
Continued on Page 40
The 'Christian Century' Strikes At Anti-Semitism
R
acism, religious big-
otry, anti-Semitism,
and related hatreds
are the accumulations of
human illness to be fought not
by the prejudiced alone but by
those sharing in the guilt of
inhumanities. There is always
the shocking surprise when
such fakes as the blood libels
and the Protocols of the Elders
of Zion keep being repeated
even after it becomes apparent
they are disgustingly
poisonous. There is always the
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Vol. XCVI No. 24
2
February 9, 1990
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 1990
deep regret that such hatreds
are not especially condemned
in Christian ranks. Therefore
the welcome evidence of such
concern in one of the leading
Christian organs of our time.
Christian Century, in its Jan.
24 issue, editorialized in a new
item under the headline "Jail-
ed for Anti-Semitism," about
a court decision condemning
anti-Jewish hate-spreading in
Sweden. This court case was
given emphasis in Purely
Commentary, Dec. 15, 1989,
headlined "Warning Against
Complacency in Rising Anti-
Semitism."
Here is the Christian Cen-
tury editorialized story:
Ahmed Rami, a former
Moroccan military officer
who is the manager of an
Islamic radio station in
Stockholm, Sweden, was
recently convicted of anti-
Semitism and jailed for six
months. Under Swedish
law, the defaming of a peo-
ple, a race or an ethnic
group is forbidden. Found
guilty on 21 counts of stirr-
ing up hatred against Jews,
Rami said he would appeal.
Prosecutor Per Hakan
Bondestam said Rami's
Radio Islam had repeated-
ly advanced the Nazi view
that Jews are conspiring to
achieve worldwide
hegemony. In addition to
broadcasting excerpts of
Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf,
Radio Islam broadcast ex-
perts from Nazi news-
papers published in 1940
and 1941 and portions of
the long-discredited forgery
Protocols of the Elders of
Zion; it told its listeners that
"it lies . . . in Judaism's
nature to collude, to
weaken from the inside,
and to ravage. Judaism, the
Torah and the Talmud
stink of racism and con-
tempt for other peoples."
Writing about the case in
the New York Times, Per
Ahlmark, former deputy
prime minister of Sweden,
commented that the most
disturbing aspect of the
case was not Rami's hatred
but the lack of public reac-
tion against it. "Are we
back to the 'normal' Euro-
pean climate, in which anti-
Jewish statements were in-
jected as an acceptable
contribution to a public
debate? . If we accept this
old-new anti-Semitism as
part of our culture and
lives, we are taking a
tremendous risk, because
while Jews as a minority
are often the first group to
be denigrated, they are
never the last. Anti-
Semitism has always been
a way of attacking liberal
values, democratic institu-
tions and government-by-
law?'
While this occurrence
already had considerable at-
tention on this page some
weeks ago, the importance
given it merits added
attention.
My Dec. 15, 1989, column
was inspired by a New York
Times Op-Ed page article en-
titled, "Old-New Anti-
Semitism — In Sweden 'Radio
Islam' Has Rim Amok" by Per
Ahlmark, former Deputy
Prime Minister of Sweden,
and columnist for the
Stockholm Daily Espressen. I
quoted Ahlmark:
Anti-Semitism is on the
rise in Europe again. Since
Israel's invasion of
southern Lebanon in 1982,
anti-Jewish headlines and
articles have appeared in
mainstream newspapers
and magazines. Before
1982, anti-Semitic letters
would have been thrown in
the wastebasket. Now they
are published.
Before 1982, denying the
Holocaust or trivializing it
by cheap comparisons
would have been unaccep-
table in the media. Now
such comparisons are
commonplace.
The condemnation of the
"Old-New Anti-Semitism" by
the Christian Century is
heartening at a time when it
remains difficult to battle
against prejudices. Therefore
this appreciation for advocacy
of human decencies in an im-
portant Christian
magazine. ❑