Encyclopedia of Islam

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of a European scholarly effort to rationally catego-
rize the languages and races of the world. It was
derived from the name of Shem, a son of noah,
considered to be one of the ancient ancestors of
the Hebrews in the Bible. It acquired negative
meaning when white European racists, especially
in Germany, asserted that their Indo-European, or
Aryan, cultural and biological heritage was supe-
rior to that of other races, including that of the
“Semites.” Both Jews and Arabs were classified as
Semitic peoples, but during the late 19th century
and early 20th century the term Semite came to
be used in a deliberate propaganda campaign to
dehumanize the Jews of Europe. This campaign
culminated in the Holocaust of 1933–45, which
involved the mass extermination of millions of
Jews and members of other minority groups in
concentration camps built by Nazi Germany and
its allies in Europe.
Anti-Semitism was imported to Muslim lands
from Europe in the 20th century. Prior to that
time, Jews in these lands held dhimmi status, a
kind of second-class citizenship, and, except for
sporadic outbreaks of violence, they were bet-
ter integrated into Islamicate societies than into
Christian European ones. Indigenous elites in
Muslim countries became influenced by Euro-
pean intellectual trends and political ideologies
of all kinds—including ant-Semitism—during
the decades they were under direct or indirect
colonial rule. With the breakup of the colonial
empires after World War II, the emergence of new
arab nation-states, and the creation of israel,
anti-Semitic rhetoric found widespread use in the
speeches of Arab leaders and the Middle Eastern
media. There were also violent attacks on eastern
Jews living in iraq, libya, Morocco, and Aden
(yemen). These attacks, and growing Arab nation-
alist rhetoric, together with the desire of Jews to
live in their own homeland, caused Jews in many
Arab lands to immigrate to Israel.
At first, anti-Semitic hostility in the Middle
East was expressed mainly by secular states and
political parties. After the 1967 Arab-Israeli war,


however, it was also promoted by radical Islamic
movements, beginning with the mUslim brother-
hood in egypt and other Arab countries. Publica-
tions of this organization repeated dehumanizing
caricatures and stereotypes of Jews that had origi-
nated in Europe. The demonization of Jews and
of Israel intensified in the wake of the iranian
revolUtion oF 1978–1979, the Israeli invasion
of Lebanon (1982), escalation of hostilities in the
arab-israeli conFlicts during the late 1980s and
1990s, and the U.S. and British invasion of Iraq
in 2003. Arabic and Persian translations of The
Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a fraudulent Russian
document alleging a Jewish plot to dominate the
world, circulated widely in the Middle East, and it
continues to be cited in anti-Israeli speeches and
even television dramas. Saudi schoolbooks refer to
it as if its slanderous allegations were true. Other
examples of anti-Semitic ideology in the religiopo-
litical rhetoric of the Middle East include iterations
of a medieval Christian libel against the Jews and
denial of the Holocaust. loUis Farrakhan, the
African-American leader of the nation oF islam,
has also been condemned for making anti-Semitic
remarks. In some Jewish circles, anyone who
criticizes the policies and actions of the Israeli
government, especially with regard to the question
of Palestine, is labeled an anti-Semite. Extremist
rhetoric appears to be increasing in the first decade
of the 21st century among different factions and
movements, a development that inhibits the peace-
ful resolution of political conflicts in the Middle
East. It also undermines efforts to achieve better
interfaith understanding.
See also colonialism; JUdaism and islam.

Further reading: Jane S. Gerber, “Anti-Semitism and the
Muslim World.” In History and Hate: The Dimensions of
Anti-Semitism, edited by David Berger, 73–94 (Philadel-
phia: Jewish Publication Society, 1986); Bernard Lewis,
The Jews of Islam (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University,
1984); Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clare, eds.,
The Politics of Anti-Semitism (Oakland, Calif.: AK Press,
2003).

anti-Semitism 47 J
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