Rawan Osman, a Lebanese-Syrian/German activist and writer, is founder of Arabs Ask, an Instagram platform aimed at fostering dialogue between Arabs and Israeli Jews. Osman spoke to a November 11 Middle East Forum Podcast (video). The following summarizes her comments:
As a Syrian woman who considers herself a “recovered antisemite,” Osman’s move from Damascus to Europe in 2011 opened her eyes. The “official history curriculum” at the French Catholic School in Lebanon where she attended taught that “the Jews came from Eastern Europe, and they had planned to steal Palestine.” Antisemitic propaganda widely available in the Arab world such as Mein Kampf and the Protocols of the Elders of Zion “continues to brainwash tens of millions of Arabs who believe whatever they are told about Jews.” After freely accessing “uncensored information” in the West, Osman was angry at the extent to which she had been deceived. “I could not believe how misleading the information we were taught” about Middle East history had been.
The Jews, “according to the Bible and the Quran,” originate from the region as “historical and archeological evidence” supports, yet they are “labeled as thieves.”
Although Jewish history occurred in the places in Israel mentioned in the Bible, the “very notion of the Jews governing” in their indigenous land was rejected by the Arabs. Today, “the romantic idea of a Palestinian national identity is invented to counter and reject the Jewish narrative.”
The world is exercised about the Israeli presence in the West Bank, “but how about we take a look at the East Bank of the Jordan River?” Jordan, a.k.a. the Hashemite kingdom, was carved out of the Mandate of Palestine and “given its independence in 1946.” However, the ruling royal family originates from Saudi Arabia’s Hejaz region, but the world does not object. In contrast, the Jews, “according to the Bible and the Quran,” originate from the region as “historical and archeological evidence” supports, yet they are “labeled as thieves.”
Arabs and Muslims who make the distinction that they are not “antisemitic, but rather anti-Zionist,” ignore historical fact by speciously claiming that Jews lived “safely and peacefully under Islamic rule” in the past. Countless examples of persecution and terror, such as the Farhud against the Jews of Baghdad in 1941, the 1929 Hebron massacre against Jews who had been “living in the land [of Israel] for centuries,” and the Damascus affair in 1840, give the lie to the claim. Imposition of antisemitic decrees such as the Orphans’ Decree under the Zaydi Shiite imams in Yemen during the early 1900s mandated the forced conversion of Jewish orphans to Islam and enacted the humiliating Decree of the Dung-Gatherers, which forced Jewish men to clean human feces from latrines and sewers.
Muslim clerics of today should be sermonizing about the few verses in the Quran that are “pro-Zionist,” but these imams are “either intimidated by extremists, or are they are secretly extremists themselves.” Muslims who have never met Jews but know the Quran are familiar with the “B’nai Israel” described therein. Thus, the Quran itself offers evidence that Jews are “indigenous to the Middle East.”
The massive influx of millions of mostly Muslim men into Germany under Angela Merkel’s open border policy in 2015 came from a “mostly antisemitic and misogynist” culture.
In light of the atrocities committed against Israelis by Hamas on October 7, “I can explain that Arabs are brainwashed to hate” Jews, but “I fail to understand what is happening today in the West.” The Obama administration’s failure in 2013 to follow through with threatened repercussions against Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad after using chemical weapons against his own people “let the Syrian people down.” The Syrians who fled tyranny and flooded into Europe by foot were unvetted. The massive influx of millions of mostly Muslim men into Germany under Angela Merkel’s open border policy in 2015 came from a “mostly antisemitic and misogynist” culture.
“People think sometimes I’m bigoted against the refugees. I am Syrian myself. My brother and mother came to Europe as Syrian refugees,” but “we need strict regulations. We need serious consequences” for criminal acts “of gang rape incidents, of sexual harassments, of domestic violence.” Many Muslims who accosted Jews in Europe had never seen a Jew before but acted because they were fed “controversial verses” from the Quran ordering Muslims to “chase them [Jews] because they are cursed ones, and everybody should be invited to join Islam whether they like it or not.” Such religiously sanctioned incitement fuels increasingly bolder acts of violence against non-Muslims. “Antisemitism in the Arab world must be addressed, researched, and cured for the region to know peace.”
Earlier this month, a pro-Hamas Muslim mob in Amsterdam erupted into a “Jew hunt” against Israeli fans after a football match. Video clips showing the Muslim rampage of Jews being beaten in the street were posted online to incite followers. The attackers “were probably born in the Netherlands.” Last year, October 7 torture videos taken by Hamas had a twofold purpose: to recruit followers online and terrorize viewers. But even ISIS terrorists “did not gloat and cheer in the background” of their execution videos as Hamas did. Absent “serious consequences” from the authorities imposing “serious prison time” for the perpetrators, it may be too late to save Europe. It bears repeating that radicalized Muslims “share the same ideology” with the terrorists who committed 9/11. “If what happened in Amsterdam is tolerated, we are doomed in the West.”
It bears repeating that radicalized Muslims “share the same ideology” with the terrorists who committed 9/11. “If what happened in Amsterdam is tolerated, we are doomed in the West.”
The problem is not just the radicalized Muslim in the street, but global institutions such as the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which should be “dismantled” for its support and participation in the October 7 invasion and massacre. “It [UNRWA] should disappear. No mercy.” Other institutional bodies “should be cleaned up, not dismantled.” If they are antisemitic, “we should call them out.”
Radical Islam is “not only anti-Judaism” but “anti-LGBTQ, it’s anti-women, anti-freedom,” and fascist. The Maronites in Lebanon, the Copts in Egypt, the Kurds, the Druze, and the Yazidis are all minorities who have experienced hatred and suffered “hell” under Muslim rule. Even though Christians and Jews under Islamic rule are afforded the status of “dhimmitude” extended to “Ahl al-Kitab, the people of the book,” dhimmis are second-class subjects forced to pay a tax, or “jizya,” for the “privilege.” If their women were raped, their money stolen, or debts were not repaid, “the authorities would often turn a blind eye” to avoid prosecuting Muslim perpetrators.
“I’m hoping the Trump administration will help the world navigate our way out of this mess. I hope they are strict enough on Iran because I don’t know if people have the sense of urgency, but we are currently witnessing the final battle in a war that is 1,400 years old. It’s a vendetta between Shia and [Sunni] Muslims, and we are stuck in between, and the pretext is Jerusalem that’s not mentioned once in the Quran. They are fighting over who’s going to dominate the Middle East region … and join a fascist camp on Russia and China’s side.”
