Special Dispatch - Reform Project/Arab Antisemitism Project
December 2, 2003
No. 618

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U.S. Liberal Arabic Website
Rebuttal to Mahathir's Speech

In response to former Malaysian prime minister Mahathir
Muhammad's address at the Islamic Summit Conference on
October 16, 2003, Bassam Darwish, editor of the
U.S.-based liberal Arabic site http://www.annaqed.com,
wrote an article, titled "A Complex Waiting to be
Solved."(1) The article was a rebuttal to Mahathir
Muhammad's speech in which he claimed that Jews control
the world and encouraged Muslims to unite to achieve a
"final victory." The following are excerpts from the
article:

Mahathir's Speech Encouraged Ignorance Among Muslims

"'Despite its relatively small size, the Jewish society
has become a force, and we [the Muslims] cannot fight
it only by means of force [but must] fight it also by
means of our wits... We need today cannons, missiles,
bombs, fighter planes, tanks, and destroyers in order
to protect ourselves...'

"These are some of the words included in the speech of
[former] Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Muhammad at
the opening of the conference of the Organization of
Islamic Countries, which demanded of Muslims 'to use
their wits' and urged them 'to adopt science and
education as means' in the war against the Jews - whom
he described as 'ruling the world.' The leaders of the
Muslim countries who were present at the conference all
stood up and roundly applauded the speech.

"Certainly, none disagree with Mahathir's call 'to
adopt science and education,' and no one in the free
and civilized world longs to see one-fifth of mankind
rotting in the darkness of ignorance - as their
ignorance causes more damage to the world than it does
to them. The problem is that this statement came from a
man who does not understand the meaning of science...
When a Muslim leader... encourages the Muslims to adopt
science for only one purpose - in order to be better
and stronger than the Jews, Christians, Buddhists, and
others, and in order to be able to annihilate the Jews
- he is actually not urging Muslims to cling to science
but to cling to ignorance itself, and to a mad dash backwards...

"When Louis Pasteur consumed his days and nights with
searching for a cure for rabies, the goal before him
was man, whoever he may be, and not proof that he was
better than the Jews or the Muslims. This is true for
every Western scientist, whether he be a Christian or a
Jew, and there is no doubt that it is also true for
every Muslim scientist. When Ibn Sina wrote his medical
books... he did not state that their goal was to
achieve superiority over the Jews, Christians, or
Hindus... and when the heads of universities in the
West speak before students, they reiterate to them that
they [i.e. the students] are about to obtain for
themselves higher scientific education so as to take
part in building a better world - and not that the
purpose of their scientific studies is to achieve
superiority over the Muslims and other people."

Muslims' 'Jewish Complex' Began With Islam

"The Arab Muslims are not the only ones suffering from
a 'Jewish complex'... Even a Muslim living on the most
remote island suffers from this complex, which appeared
not because of the founding of the Zionist movement or
the establishment of the State of Israel, but with the
creation of Islam itself.

"For the sake of balance, we must point out that even
in the West they suffered from this disease, but with
one difference: the roots of the disease among
Westerners are religious, [but] man-made, while the
roots of the disease among the Muslims were and remain
religious and made by Allah. Therefore, it is no wonder
that it was easier for the Westerners to rid themselves
of their disease, while among the Muslims the disease
became malignant, and can only be gotten rid of by a
divine instruction that will 'abrogate' Allah's
previous instruction...

"'The Jews control the world' is the chorus of all
those who cannot swim with the flow [and cannot use
their minds like] the Jews use their minds. The Jews
never controlled the world. They survived in this world
despite their small number, and despite the persecution
that they suffered throughout history. They were
merchants, scientists, physicians, lawyers, and wealthy
men, as well as ordinary people who worked hard for
their bread and their existence. They helped each
other, lived a communal life, and united [as a society]
not with the goal of taking over and controlling the
world but in order to continue to exist in it as a
minority, against the majority that never stopped
attempting to destroy them.

"Had this basis of the Jewish existence developed to
the point of ruling the world... they would have
deserved it by rights, because they did not consume
their days and nights with consulting over questions
[such as] whether it is legitimate for a Muslim or a
Christian to greet them first, or whether it is
permitted for a Muslim to wish the Christian well on
the occasion of his holiday. [Instead], the Jews
devoted themselves to learning and working, and in this
way preserved and based their existence.

"Mahathir Muhammad urged the Muslims of our time 'to
cling to science' in order to produce cannons,
missiles, bombs, fighter planes, tanks, and destroyers
to defend themselves - but to defend themselves from
whom? From a mere 14,000,000 [Jews] who managed,
throughout history and by their wits alone, to protect
themselves from persecution and annihilation?!

"The Muslims do not need missiles, tanks, and cannons
to rid themselves of their 'Jewish complex.' This
complex will be resolved when the Muslims try to see
the world through non-religious glasses. The Muslims'
belief that the entire world is a single front against
Islam is correct... and how can it not be correct, if
the Muslims [themselves] see the world strictly through
religion?"

The Muslims are Responsible for Creating A Cultural
Separation Fence

"Everywhere in the world, and in Israel as well,
people, politicians, and Christian and Jewish clerics
go to demonstrations and declare their solidarity with
the Palestinians and the Arabs. And what, in contrast,
is happening on the Arab and Islamic side? It is not
the Israelis who elected Sharon as Israeli prime
minister but the Arabs and Muslims. It is not the
Israelis who are working to build the separation fence,
but the Arabs and Muslims.

"When we hear of spontaneous marches in the streets of
the Arab and Muslim countries condemning the suicide
and terror operations aimed at innocent people in
Israel and other places, and demands for trials for
those who encourage them - then the fence will fall
without using a single axe.

"When we hear of an Arab leader standing and delivering
a speech fervently before his people, saying that the
time has come to reach out to the Israelis and
cooperate with them in order to create a just peace in
the region for us and for them, then Sharon will retire
and open a coffee shop in Tel Aviv.

"When we hear of an imam in a mosque giving a sermon to
the worshippers and saying to them that the most
supreme form of worship is for them to go out and shake
the hands of their Jewish and Christian neighbors, or
bear in their hands olive branches and throw them [at
their neighbors] rather than stones - then the
separation fence will fall by itself and the Israelis
will beat their tanks into plowshares for building both
Israel and Palestine.

"Then the memory of Mahathir Muhammad and his ilk will
fade into the dustbin of history."

(1)
http://www.annaqed.com/news/complex_waiting_to_be_solved.html,
November 2, 2003. The site states that it is for "Arabs
in the U.S..... to work as a catalyst to their minds,
educating them about the importance of loving this
great country, by criticizing the wrong and the
wrong-doers whatever and whomever they might be." For
the English section, see http://www.annaqed.com/english.html

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