GILBERT ACHCAR, who grew up in Beirut, is Professor at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. His many books include The Clash of Barbarisms: The Making of the New World Disorder (Saqi Books, 2006), published in thirteen languages, The 33-Day War: Israel’s War on Hezbollah in Lebanon and Its Aftermath (with Michel Warschawski, Saqi Books, 2007), and Perilous Power: The Middle East and U.S. Foreign Policy, a book of dialogues with Noam Chomsky. ‘A work of breath-taking empathy, examining one of the most painful and emotion-laden topics in the modern world with dispassion, sensitivity and high erudition … [A] magisterial study’ Rashid Khalidi, Edward Said Professor of Modern Arab Studies, Columbia University ‘Essential reading for anyone who seeks a balanced understanding of the place of Jews and the Holocaust in Arab thinking today. Whether or not one agrees with Gilbert Achcar on every issue, he provides a welcome and well-informed counterpoint to caricaturists and hate-mongers and fear-promoters of every persuasion.’ Michael R. Marrus, Chancellor Rose and Ray Wolfe Professor Emeritus of Holocaust Studies, University of Toronto ‘An erudite, perceptive, and highly original study that shines much-needed light on a field which has tended to be dominated by partisanship and propaganda’ Avi Shlaim, Professor of International Relations, St Antony’s College, University of Oxford ‘A sensitive and insightful exploration of an important dimension of the Middle East conflict … Achcar’s book, which combines meticulous scholarship and an engaging style, is a significant contribution to the mutual understanding that is in such short supply.’ Peter Novick, Professor Emeritus of Modern History, University of Chicago ‘A penetrating analysis of the multiplicity of attitudes and responses in the Arabic-speaking world toward Nazism, anti-Semitism, and the Holocaust’ Francis R. Nicosia, Raul Hilberg Distinguished Professor of Holocaust Studies, University of Vermont ‘A courageous undertaking … [Achcar] succeeds in treating the subject of the relationship of Palestine and the Nazi Holocaust with original thinking, profound scholarship, and meticulous analysis.’ Naseer Aruri, member of the Palestine National Council; Chancellor Professor (Emeritus) of Political Science, University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth ‘In a field fraught with bad faith and sheer propaganda, Gilbert Achcar’s book stands out as scholarly and even-handed.’ Idith Zertal, Senior Research Fellow, Institute of Jewish Studies, University of Basel ‘A systematic and scholarly refutation of the simplistic myths that have arisen following the formation of Israel … the best book on the subject so far’ Tariq Ali, Guardian ‘A refreshing and original study, showing clearly that Muslim anti-Semitism is neither universal, nor inevitable, nor subject to pat explanations.’ The Economist ‘Gilbert Achcar’s The Arabs and the Holocaust is for the most part a fascinating, subtle and original analysis of Israeli and Arab historical narratives.’ Simon Sebag Montefiore, BBC History Magazine ‘Achcar is in full mastery of both the Arabic and the Western sources on his subject. His exhaustive survey of Arabic sources is particularly important in correcting the many distortions circulated by polemicists seeking to paint Arabs and Muslims as anti-Semites … Policy makers would do well to heed Gilbert Achcar’s call for a more balanced approach to the tragedies that make the Palestinian-Israeli conflict so intractable.’ Eugene Rogan, Times Literary Supplement ‘Lucid and penetrating’ Stephen Howe, Independent ‘[Achcar] carefully examines the long history of Arab-Jewish conflict back through the 19th century, illuminating the range of opinions’ The Washington Post ‘Calm and judicious in tenor yet unyielding in its intellectual rigor, this selection may show the path out of a seemingly intractable dispute.’ Booklist Gilbert Achcar The Arabs and the Holocaust The Arab–Israeli War of Narratives Translated from the French by G. M. Goshgarian SAQI First English edition published in 2010 by Saqi Books This ebook edition published in 2011 EBOOK ISBN: 978-0-86356-835-0 Copyright © Gilbert Achcar, 2010 and 2011 Translation copyright © G. M. Goshgarian, 2010 and 2011 Originally published in France by Actes Sud as Les Arabes et la Shoah Indexer: [email protected] All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. A full CIP record for this book is available from the British Library. A full CIP record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. SAQI 26 Westbourne Grove, London w2 5RH, UK www.saqibooks.com And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? MATTHEW 7:3 Contents Preface Introduction: Words Laden With Pain Shoah, Holocaust, Jewish Genocide Zionism, Colonialism, Uprootedness Nakba PART 1: THE TIME OF THE SHOAH Arab Reactions to Nazism and Anti-Semitism 1933–1947 Prelude 1. The Liberal Westernizers 2. The Marxists 3. The Nationalists The Baath Party The Syrian Social Nationalist Party The Lebanese Phalange Young Egypt and Egyptian Nationalism The High-School Student Movement Futuwwa in Iraq Iraqi Arab Nationalists and Nazism Syrian Arab Nationalists and Nazism Arab Nationalism and Anti-Semitism The June 1941 Pogrom in Baghdad: The Farhūd 4. Reactionary and/or Fundamentalist Pan-Islamists Pan-Islamism and Fundamentalist Counter-Reformation The Religion of Islam and the Jews Rashid Rida Shakib Arslan ‘My Enemy’s Enemy’: Alliances of Convenience, Affinity and Complicity Amin al-Husseini: The Grand Mufti ‘Izz-ul-Din al-Qassam Amin al-Husseini and the 1936–1939 Arab Revolt in Palestine Amin al-Husseini’s Exile and Collaboration with Rome and Berlin Amin al-Husseini and the Jewish Genocide Amin al-Husseini, Architect of the Nakba Amin al-Husseini’s Divergent Legacies PART 2: THE TIME OF THE NAKBA Arab Attitudes to the Jews and the Holocaust from 1948 to the Present Prelude The Nakba as seen by Benny Morris: A Symptomatic Trajectory 5. The Nasser Years (1948–1967) ‘Throwing the Jews into the Sea’? Nasserism and Anti-Semitism The Eichmann Trial, Reparations, Comparisons and Holocaust Denial 6. The PLO Years (1967–1988) The Programmatic Redefinition of the Palestinian Position toward the Jews Transposing the Image of the Holocaust: the Battle of Comparisons with the Nazi past 7. The Years of the Islamic Resistances (1988 to the Present) Hezbollah, Hamas and Islamized Anti-Semitism From Garaudy To Ahmadinejad: Reactive Exploitation of the Memory of the Holocaust Conclusion: Stigmas and Stigmatization Of Anti-Semitism, Anti-Zionism, Philosemitism, Islamophobia and Exploitation of the Holocaust Of Zionism, the State of Israel, Racism, the End of Denial and Peace Acknowledgements Notes Bibliography Index Preface This book had its inception early in 2006, when my friend Enzo Traverso asked me to contribute a chapter on the reception of the Holocaust in the Middle East to the monumental work on the history of the Shoah that he and three other scholars were co-editing for the Italian publishing house UTET in Turin. The 1 editors were looking for someone who could write about the reception of the Holocaust in the Middle East. I accepted the invitation, but only after much hesitation: the short six months I was given to complete my essay – an author who had been approached before me had bowed out late in the day – made the task, given its scope and complexity, a perilous one. I took it on nonetheless, motivated by what might be called a sense of duty. The work being put together would, I knew, be a good one, and I did not want to see the issue I had been asked to discuss – a delicate question if ever there was one – treated incompetently or left aside. Out of a concern for intellectual rigour, I limited the field of my research to countries that lay directly in my area of competence, countries whose language I knew – those of the Arab world from which I come. After my editors had approved this restriction, I began intensively researching and writing, and I eventually turned out the long chapter that closes the second and final volume of that work. Enzo was the first to suggest, 2 insistently, that I work this chapter up into a book. At the time, I was not particularly inclined to plunge back into intensive research on the same topic. But I continued to give it thought, since the questions raised were being posed ever more sharply in the Middle East. For example, late in 2006 a Tehran conference called ‘Review of the Holocaust: Global Vision’ promoted Holocaust denial, with the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, contributing his own deliberately provocative statements. Urged on both by readers of the original chapter – including the publishers of the French, British and American editions of the present book – and by my own desire to discuss the problem in a form more widely accessible than the voluminous compendium published solely in Italian, I undertook the project of transforming the chapter into a book.