Arabs, the Holocaust and Israel - A New Twist

Gilbert Achcar, whose new boook, The Arabs and the Holocaust, will be published this month by Saqi, has an op-ed in The Guardian. If I understand him, he claims Arabs are misunderstood for their complex relationship with the issue of Holocaust denial and those Arabs calling themselves "Palestinian" somehow have begun expressing sympathy.

Weird.

And how?

Excerpts:-

There is no dispute that Holocaust denial has been on the rise in Arab countries during the last two decades...Yet western-style Holocaust denial – that is, the endeavour to produce pseudo-scientific proofs that the Jewish genocide did not happen at all or was only a massacre of far lesser scope than that commonly acknowledged – is actually very marginal in the Arab world...Holocaust denial is not primarily an expression of antisemitism, as western Holocaust denial certainly is, but an expression of what I call the "anti-Zionism of fools".

...Much less reported, however, are public acknowledgements by Palestinians of the Holocaust and of the universal lessons it bears for all persecuted peoples and groups. When researching my book, The Arabs and the Holocaust, I found innumerable reports about the enunciation by Palestinians or other Arabs of insanities about the Holocaust, while I noticed that expressions of Palestinian compassion with the victims of the Holocaust were barely reported, if not blatantly ignored.

...on 9 January 2009, at the peak of the brutal Israeli onslaught on Gaza, inhabitants of Bi'lin, another West Bank village known for standing at the forefront of the struggle against the Israeli occupation, organised a demonstration in protest, wearing striped pyjamas similar to those of Nazi concentration camp inmates. An account by the Bil'in Popular Committee states: "Protesters also wore small yellow cutouts in the shape of Gaza with the word 'Gazan' written on them to symbolise the yellow 'Jude' stars of David worn by European Jews during World War II." The BBC briefly broadcast a glance at this astounding event: a video is still available. That the message the Palestinian demonstrators conveyed was "exaggerated" is obvious (and natural); but the point is that they were identifying with the Jewish victims of Nazism and regarding the Holocaust as the highest standard of horror, rather than denying it. [rather backward, no? they asserted the Jews are Nazis]

...most media – often unconsciously – play a negative role in putting much more emphasis on the dark side of the Arab world or the Muslim world than on the bright side. This increases public prejudices against Arabs and Muslims, and sends back to the latter a detestable image of themselves with damaging consequences.

One would wish that the media instead promoted expressions such as...reported above. Unlike counterproductive pronouncements by apostates of Islam busy outdoing the neocons in pro-western or pro-Israeli statements, these are expressions by credible and respected fighters against the national oppression that their people endure. Such are the most truthful Arab or Muslim upholders of the universal lessons of the Holocaust – like the Palestinian demonstrators in striped pyjamas.

This is a new form of pro-Pal. apologetics.

The media is blamed while actually, without going to the root of the Pal. denial of the Holocaust, or rather their adoption of its paradigm which then transfers to them the role of victim while demonizing the state of Israel, they assure the increasing depth of antisemtism.

Good old Guardian.

Gets it wrong always.

A new twist, like twisting the knife in Israel's back.