Hatred, Arab Style
(Published in December 1994)
When reservist Shmuel Meiri was attacked by Arabs in Ramallah on December 14, 1994, the photographs taken of the faces of his assailants convey a hatred of visceral and demonic proportions.а To appreciate how much Moslems hate Jews, consider first what Moslem Chechens think and feel about Russians.
Writing on the
subject in The New York Times
(Dec. 18, 1994), Steven Erlanger quotes two celebrated Russian authors, Tolstoi
and Lermontov.а Tolstoi writes of the
Russian destruction of a Chechen village:а
"The emotion felt by every Chechen, old and young, was stronger
than hatred.а It was not hatred, it was
a refusal to recognize these Russian dogs as men at all, and a feeling of such
disgust [and] revulsion ... that the urge to destroy them, like the urge to
destroy rats, venomous spiders, or wolves, ִwas an instinct
as natural as self-preservation."
Lermontav
summarized the Chechen in the Russian imagination this way:а "Their god is freedom, their law is war
... Their hatred is as boundless as their love."а That this boundless hatred describes the feelings of Muslims
toward Jews is evident in the faces of those Arabs who attacked Shmuel Meiri.
If further
evidence is wanted, let me remind the reader of how Syrian president Hafaz
Assad celebrated the tenth anniversary of the Yom Kippur War.а He had Syrian militia girls killing
four-foot snakes with their teeth, blood running down their cheeks.а The pieces were then roasted and served to
Syrian militia men.а The men
subsequently twisted off the necks of puppies and drank their blood.а This is what Arabs and Muslims think of and
feel toward Jews.
May the same
be said of Arabs citizens of Israel?а
Not only have they participated in hundreds of terrorist attacks against
Jews, slashing the faces of Jewish children.а
But as reported even by Knesset Member Yossi Sarid (a dove) in August
1990, 62% of these Arabs supported Saddam Hussein's rape of Kuwait, and despite
his threat to incinerate half of Israel.а
That survey, bear in mind, was made by Jewish pollsters.а The reader can draw his own conclusions.
Arab hatred
and contempt for Jews are fundamental aspects of Arab culture.а True, one can find in the Koran occasional
passages favorable to Jews.а However,
those who focus on, and draw conclusions from, such passages suffer from what
the eminent psychologist Harry Stack Sullivan called "selective
inattention."
It is common
knowledge that the jihad is a basic religious precept for Muslims.а The Koran teaches them:а "Believers, take neither Jews nor
Christians for your friends" (Sura 5:50).а
"Allah does not forbid you to be kind and equitable to those who
have neither made war on your religion nor driven you from your homes.... But
he forbids you to make friends with those who have fought against you ... or
abetted others who do so" (Sura 60:8-9).а
From this passage comes the necessity on the part of Arabs to describe
Jews--and not only Jews--as "aggressors."а The Koran's imperative on dealing with aggressors"?а "Kill them wherever you find them"
(Sura 2:190).
Moreover, according
to the Koran, the Jews should be in a permanent state of humbleness; they
should be paying tribute to the faithful (Sura 9:29).а Instead, the Jews now have an independent state of their own.а Indeed, these Jewish infidels, in
contradiction to the Koran, have repeatedly conquered the armies of the
faithful (Sura 3:112; 8:66).а Is it any
wonder that Arabs hate Jews?
Yet there are
naive and demophrenic Jews who nonetheless believe that Arabs can live in
abiding peace with Jews, and that there is a basis for such peaceful
coexistence in the Koran!
This escape
from reality, this refusal to face--dare I say evil?--is of long-standing
occurrence among Jews.а Thus, referring
to the Jewish community (the Yishuv) in the pre-State period, Professor Gil
Carl AlRoy observed:а "One cannot
help being astounded at the sheer determination with which the Yishuv for so
long denied conflict with Arabs--in the face of conflict.а There was an extraordinary tension here
between the empirical world and personal and group conceptualization."а Even when conflict was admitted, Zionists
explained it away by saying the "Arabs did not truly wish it, but were put
up to it by others [their leaders]"; or that Arab hostility, while real,
"was contrary to the essence of the [brotherly] relationship [between
Semitic peoples]" and the "historic alliance of Jews and
Muslims."а Nor is this all.
In contrast to
ecumenical or demophrenic Jews, the most humble Muslim is incredibly
proud.а Writes AlRoy:а "The illiterate Muslim, living in squalor
and filth ... actually feel[s] as naturally superior to the Jew as English
aristocrats would in olden days feel toward Cockneys ..."
Still, a
picture often reveals more than words.а
Those who believe that Arabs can live in genuine peace with Jews in the
Land of Israel should look at the faces the Arabs who attacked Shmuel
Meiri.а For them he was not a human
being but a Jew--in their eyes something more repulsive than a rat or a
venomous spider.
Postcript October 27, 2000:а Now ponder the recent butchery of two Jewish
reservists in Ramallah..