Nazi Propaganda for the Arab World (24 page)

In the face of this barbaric procedure by the British we think it best, if the life of the Egyptian nation is to be saved, that the Egyptians rise as one man to kill the Jews before they have a chance of betraying the Egyptian people. It is the duty of the Egyptians to annihilate the Jews and to destroy their property. Egypt can never forget that it is the Jews who are carrying out Britain's imperialist policy in the Arab countries and that they are the source of all the disasters, which have befallen the countries of the East. The Jews aim at extending their domination throughout the Arab countries, but their future depends on a British victory. That is why they are trying to save Britain from her fate and why Britain is arming them to kill the Arabs and save the British Empire.

You must kill the Jews, before they open fire on you. Kill the Jews, who have appropriated your wealth and who are plotting against your security. Arabs of Syria, Iraq and Palestine, what are you waiting for? The Jews are planning to violate your women, to kill your children and to destroy you. According to the Moslem religion, the defense of your life is a duty which can only be fulfilled by annihilating the Jews. This is your best opportunity to get rid of this dirty race, which has usurped your rights and brought misfortune and destruction on your countries. Kill the Jews, burn their property, destroy their stores, annihilate these base supporters of British imperialism. Your sole hope of salvation lies in annihilating the Jews before they annihilate you. 116

Here, applied to the Arab and Muslim context, was the same logic of projection and paranoia that was the defining feature of Nazism's radical anti-Semitism. It was impossible to be more blunt. The broadcast combined the political accusations of Nazism with an evocation of the religious demands of Islam and the tactical use of propaganda to aid in the conventional war with incitement to mass murder that would extend the Final Solution to North Africa and the Middle East.

Three days later, the Americans in Cairo recorded another broadcast with similar evocations of Jewish menace and conspiracy. It came from the Arab Nation station and was intended for listeners in Palestine as well. In the ubiquitous and menacing passive voice, the station stated that "it was known that at a recent meeting of the Zionist Committee, it was decided to arm as many Jews in Palestine as possible." Now that the Jews saw danger looming, "they wish to defend the land which they have obtained by treachery from the Arabs" and to "defend Palestine as if it were their own country whereas all know it belongs to the Arabs."

Arabs, do you not know that the British are the servants of the Jews? Once these men have been recruited, armed and trained, their bayonets will be turned against you. They will attack you, your women and your children. They will plunder your wealth.

Will you stand by with folded arms in the face of this great rising danger? You must start your fight and stop them short. Unite, close your ranks and work for the future of your country and nation. We must wait for the call of our leaders. When the time comes we will rise and save our country. Allah is with us and he will protect US. 117

Although this broadcast did not include specific incitements to murder the Jews, the logic of the accusation was identical. The powerful Jews were about to attack the innocent Arabs. Now the Arabs, with the help of the Germans, Ital ians, the great leaders Husseini and Kilani, and not least of all, Allah himself, needed to rise up to protect themselves against the Jewish threat.

Axis radio repeated the Joint Declaration every day for the following week at the same hour. It continued to do so many times during the summer, accompanied by fervent assertions that "the hour of deliverance is at hand. The liberation of which we have dreamed is near."' 'I But in July, in the first battle of El Alamein, sixty-six miles west of Alexandria on the Mediterranean coast, British forces fought Rommel's Panzerarmee to a stalemate, thus preventing it from driving to the Suez Canal and putting a damper on Berlin's expectations for a quick and decisive victory in North Africa. In August, Bernard Montgomery became the commander of the Eighth Army. Reinforcements and supplies arrived from Britain and the United States, but the Germans and Italians could send only limited reinforcements due to the demands of the fighting on the Eastern Front in Europe.119 Alexander Kirk wrote to Cordell Hull on July 17 that "in the event that the tide of battle moves to the east;" Axis broadcasts "would probably drop into the limbo of abortive propaganda efforts with a withdrawal of the Axis forces. 11120 Conversely, a German-Italian victory in Egypt would lend credibility to its message. He, too, believed that the success or failure of propaganda was inseparable from the outcome of the battles.

Following the British disaster at Tobruk, Roosevelt decided to send tanks and other military supplies to aid the British; in spring and summer 1942, defeating the Axis in North Africa became an American priority as well. The more the United States entered the fray, the more Axis propaganda linked its two favorite American targets, Franklin Roosevelt and the Jews. On July 2, Grobba in Berlin wrote a directive entitled "The Jews Are the Wire-pullers of the Americans." Now, more than in the past, German propaganda in Arabic needed to stress that every American who "comes to the Orient comes in service of the Jews. He is sent here by the Jews, even if he does not know it. The Jews are the wire-pullers of the Americans. 11121 His memo called for diffusion into Arabic propaganda of the anti-Semitic interpretation of Franklin Roosevelt that had been standard fare in German-language propaganda. This propaganda began with Roosevelt's New York roots and his supposed indebtedness to the Jews. It continued by listing the usual suspects among his supporters: Felix Frankfurter, Henry Morgenthau, Bernard Baruch, Samuel Irving Rosenman, Herbert Lehman, Benjamin Cohen, Chaim Weizmann, and (Catholic mayor) Fiorello La Guardia.' 22 The report included two- or three-page biographical sketches of the people who had become the poster boys of the regime's anti-Semitic propaganda at home. The Grobba directive and its inclusion of Weizmann were examples of the Foreign Ministry's effort to adapt the general propaganda line to the particular circumstances of the Arab, Persian, and Muslim worlds.

This adaptation was evident in a July 18 broadcast by Berlin in Arabic. It referred to a meeting between Roosevelt and Chaim Weizmann. According to the broadcast, the meeting went very well because "they are the two outstanding persons who instigated the war." Although Roosevelt insisted that all decisions about a Jewish state had to be postponed until after the war, Berlin in Arabic claimed that he shared Weizmann's goal of creating a Jewish National Homeand one not only in Palestine. According to the broadcast, both agreed that "the welfare of the Jews means the expulsion of the Arabs from Syria, Palestine and Lebanon. May God curse them both. 11123 In fact, Roosevelt consistently insisted on postponing a definitive American decision regarding the possibility of supporting a Jewish state in Palestine until after the war had been won. Throughout the war, neither Weizmann nor other Jewish and Zionist leaders nor proZionist politicians in the United States Congress were able to bring about a change in FDR's policies. Roosevelt's reticence made no difference to the Nazi propagandists. On July 20, the Arab Nation's evening broadcast on "U.S.A. and Jews versus Arabs" returned to the issue. It added that "the Jew Roosevelt" cabled a Zionist congress to express "all his sympathy to the Jews." Roosevelt's meeting with Weizmann showed that the two were "working in the dark and planning secretly against the Arabs. Should Bolshevism and Democracy be victorious, the Arabs will be dominated forever and all traces of Islam will be wiped out and Islamic civilization will crumble." 124 A meeting between the president and Weizmann was presented as evidence that the United States wanted to wipe out "all traces of Islam."

The specifically Islamist tone of German broadcasts was evident on the evening of July 29. Berlin in Arabic chose to comment on the Koranic verse: "Call the name of God whenever you meet evil."

The Prophet, in the verse referred to above, calls on the name of Allah, so that evil may be kept away in whatever form it may appear. It may be in the shape of the sinful Jew, of destructive bombs or prevailing intrigues, for God alone is able to meet such evils and destroy them. It is the duty of Moslems, whenever the British exaggerate in their evil doings and oppressions, to invoke the name of Allah to fight them. It is their dutywhenever the Jews carry on their misdeeds, plundering our wealth, exploiting our resources, to call upon Allah to defeat them. It is the duty of Moslems, when bombs fall causing fires and destruction and harming people, to ask for the help of God. For God is omnipotent. He can defend us from evils, can defeat our enemies and oppressors.

Immediately following, the station broadcast a "Warning to Egyptians" to "get away from British fortifications, do not stay near their camps, their aerodromes, their living quarters. Keep away from them." 125 The same station that was bringing the Koran to bear on contemporary events was also offering practical advice about saving one's life in a potential coming battle for Egypt between the Axis and the Allies.

Appeals to Muslims as Muslims continued. On August 4, Bari in Arabic praised "His Grace Sheikh Mustapha El Maraghi, the rector of the Al Azhar University and the great popular Moslem leader;" who had issued a declaration urging all Muslims to "adhere to the teachings of their religion and to act for the welfare of the Moslems, so that Moslems' aspirations may be realized, and the glory of Islam may be restored. 11126 Bari in Arabic implied that Islamic glory would be served by the cause of the Axis. The following evening, Berlin in Arabic spoke about "The Axis and the Moslems." In contrast to the Soviet Union, the Axis countries "respect the Koran, sanctify the mosques and glorify the prophet of Islam." 127 On August io, Bari in Arabic stated that "all faithful Moslems should be united. God, Majesty of Majesties, said: `Fight the unfaithful in mass as they have fought you in mass: The Arabs lost Spain through their dissension, but the call of the faithful should be answered by all Moslems throughout the world.... Oh Arabs, rise up as one man for Jihad. The blood already shed for these high ideals calls out to you to fight. Cling to your convictions, the unity and independence of the Arab nation, which by the grace of God, will triumph. The chosen of God will triumph. 11128

Axis propaganda attacked the British not only for their sins of secular politics but also, as VFA put it on July 29, for being, together with the Jews, "enemies of Arabism and Islam." In that broadcast, VFA reported that "Arab youth shout daily, `The British are our enemies, let us fight them. The Jews are foes, let us kill them. Life without liberty is worthless, let us have liberty or let us die."' Such slogans would resound throughout the Arab world "until the day when the British and the Jews are crushed and until their puppets, including those of the B.B.C, are punished." 129 On August 6, VFA, in a broadcast on "Britain and Islam," called the BBC "this Jewish station" and the "Jewish broadcasting station in London." It added that it "must never be forgotten" that "the latest enemies of Islam are the British, even if they suddenly professed to be the most faithful friend of Islam.." 13o The bizarre premodern category of an "enemy" or "friend" of Islam had a certain parallel with Nazi and fascist political categories of friend and enemy in modern politics. Britain's vigorous efforts during the period of the White Paper to prevent more Jewish immigration to Palestine in the hope of not antagonizing the Arabs made not a whit of difference to Axis propagandists. They constantly associated Britain and the United States with the Jews and described all three (as well as the Soviet Union) as enemies of both the Arabs and of Islam.

The Atlantic Charter signed by Roosevelt and Churchill in August 1941 asserted "the right of all peoples to choose the form of government under which they will live." 131 Axis propaganda in the Middle East attacked the United States and Britain for hypocrisy in light of the existence of the British Empire. VFA went further in a broadcast of August 15 when it explained that the Jews were "fighting this war to abolish Nazism and Fascism only to restore in their place the world-domination of the British." The "whole world" was convinced that the Atlantic Charter was "merely another Jewish scheme" no better than the Versailles settlement by the League of Nations, which had "rendered the life of the Arab people intolerable." The Americans, the British, and the Jews had waged "this war," that is, World War II, "to satisfy their imperialistic aims." 132 Just as Nazi propaganda in Europe held the Jews responsible for the war in Europe, so the Arabic-language broadcasts blamed the Jews and British imperialism. Though the logic of radical anti-Semitism in both cases was identical, the Arabic radio broadcasts adapted the general conspiracy theory to the specific features of modern Middle Eastern history. In every instance, Goebbels's main point in the German context matched that made in the Arabic propaganda: the Jews were guilty.

The German leaflet offensive continued in July 1942. On July 15, following the orders from the Army High Command and the Foreign Office, the Luftwaffe flew 760,000 additional leaflets to North Africa intended for distribution in varying numbers in Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Iraq, and unspecified other parts of the Middle East. They included 200,000 copies of an appeal by Husseini and Kilani to support the Axis;loo,ooo copies of the leaflet "Awaken, You Who Are Sleeping" ("Erwache, oh Schlafender"); and 60,000 colored postcards entitled "Roosevelt, Churchill, and the Arabs" ("Roosevelt, Churchill and die Araber").' 33 In August, Ribbentrop was informed that the Italians had agreed with the distribution of the following 1.3 million Arabic language leaflets: an "Appeal to Arab Youth" ("Aufruf an die arabische Jugend") intended for Egypt and Syria (144,000 copies); "Egypt for the Egyptians" ("Agypten den Agyp- tern") for distribution only in the event of a German victory in El Alamein (300,000); "The New Jewish Kingdom" ("Das neue judische Konigreich") for Syria (296,000); "Oh Egyptians" ("0 Agypten") for Egypt (300,000); "The Partition of Palestine" ("Die Teilung Palastinas") for Palestine, Syria, and Iraq (loo,ooo); "Reception for Rashid al-Gailani" ("Gailani Empfang"), showing a photo of Kilani with Hitler intended for North Africa and "all of Arabia" (ioo,ooo); and a postcard showing King Abdullah of Jordan on the Dead Sea to be distributed in Palestine (60,000) .134 On June 30,1942, four Luftwaffe planes flew this material to North Africa.135