The Lie That Wouldn’t Die: The “Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion”
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It’s amazing how many people actually believe this blatant forgery, plagiarized from French satirist Maurice Joly’s 1864 book, Dialogue aux enfers entre Machiavel et Montesquieu (Dialogues in Hell between Machiavelli and Montesquieu) is fact, not fiction, despite its having been proven a forgery several times in European courts.
The book was apparently written under the initiative of Pyotr Ivanovich Rachkovsky, head of the Okhrana (the Tsarist equivalent of the KGB) Paris office in an attempt to “justify” the pogroms in Russia.
What is pathetic is the fact that the “Protocols”, along with “Mein Kampf”, is, in the Arab world, among the best-selling foreign-language books translated into Arabic, and is considered a work of non-fiction.
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Arabic book debunks “Protocols of Zion”
Justice Hadassah Ben-Itto
An Arab-Israeli publishing house has translated an important book debunking the Protocols of Zion and is selling copies throughout the Arab World. A free online copy (abridged) has also been posted on the internet.
“The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion”, often shortened to “The Protocols of Zion” or just the “Protocols”, is an anti-Semitic propaganda piece that describes a vast Jewish conspiracy to control the world. First published in Russia in 1903, it became a key element of most modern anti-Semitism, used as incontrovertible “proof” against the Jews.
Today, the Protocols are present at every level of Arab society, as the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum notes:
“Many school textbooks throughout the Arab and Islamic world teach the Protocols as fact. Countless political speeches, editorials, and even children's cartoons are derived from the Protocols. In 2002, Egypt’s government-sponsored television aired a miniseries based on the Protocols, an event condemned by the U.S. State Department. The Palestinian organization Hamas draws in part on the Protocols to justify its terrorism against Israeli civilians.”
When Israeli judge Hadassa Ben-Itto travelled to international law conferences, she was stunned at the extent to which the Protocols were published throughout the world, and even more so at their widespread acceptance as fact. Although in Israel nobody paid any notice to the ridiculous old forgery, outside Israel it had been translated into virtually every language under the sun, and was constantly being republished and read, including in countries that had no Jewish communities at all.
Ben-Itto, who quickly became obsessed, retired from the court and dedicated herself to study. She then wrote a detailed book in which the ‘evidence’ of the Protocols is examined and the forgery thoroughly debunked.
Titled The Lie That Wouldn’t Die: The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the book was a success and was published in English and in several other languages, but Ben-Itto felt that an Arabic version would be an important contribution to the fight against anti-Semitism.
Arabic-language copies of the Protocols have been published throughout the Middle East over the years, and also distributed to Arab communities in the Western countries. They have been a very influential agent in fomenting Arab anti-Semitism and in increasing hostility towards the Jewish people.
Ben-Itto notes the staggering degree to which the forgery is accepted as truth in the Arab World, so much so that the people who worked on translating her book into Arabic were initially shocked to discover that the Protocols were completely false.
Part of what contributes to this state of affairs is that the protocols are often published by official government printing houses, and, as Ben-Itto highlights, new editions of the Protocols are often prefaced by introductions written by noted and respected Arab scholars and writers, who thus lend their own reputation and credibility to the work. The preface for each new edition also attempts to tie in the latest international and local events to Jewish conspiracies, keeping the protocols actual for their new readers.
As a possible counter to this state of affairs, the new Arabic translation of Ben-Itto’s book has recently been completed. It is now being introduced by distributing advance copies to universities and media organizations throughout the Arab World, and an abridged version has been posted online for free access (in Arabic): (http://www.terrorism-information.com/book/).
The Lie That Wouldn’t Die: The Protocols of the Elders of Zion
Arab interest has been intense, and some of the reception has been surprisingly positive. Leading pan-Arab newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat published a lengthy interview with Ben-Itto, gaining much notice. Several anti-Israeli commentators took up an anti-Protocols position, making the point that the Arabs should not ‘contaminate’ their legitimate grievances against the Jewish state by bundling them with the ‘despicable forgery’ of the Protocols.
Hadassa Ben-Itto is quite pleased at the discussion that her book has raised in the Arab World, where no one had previously countered the false Protocols. She is now planning to continue her single-handed battle against the Protocols with a translation of her book to the Persian language for Iranian readers, an important move due to intense government-sponsored holocaust denial and anti-Semitism in Iran (which also includes publishing the Protocols and other anti-Semitic tracts in English for international distribution). A version in Turkish is also planned, an essential step given the prevalence of local versions of the Protocols in that country and the growing demonization of Israel by Turkish politicians and media.
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This effort is long overdue. The fact that such a poorly done work has duped so many people for so long is a testimonial to the power of hate. I have no doubt that a significant number of people will dismiss Justice Ben-Itto’s work as an attempt to deny the “truth” of the protocols.
Here are some examples of Arabic versions of the "Protocols":
Egypt, 2005
Lebanon, 2002
Syria, 2005
Einstein was wrong—there are three things that are unlimited, not two: the Universe, the stupidity of some humans and the depth of hatred some humans can feel for others.
