Mahmoud Abbas’s antisemitic rant draws condemnation
Mahmoud Abbas, who is at the same time president of the Palestinian Authority, chairman of the PLO and chairman of the Fatah movement, shared his theories about Ashkenazi Jews on Aug. 24, claiming they are the descendants of Khazars and that Adolf Hitler had Jews slaughtered not because they were Jews but because of their “social role” as moneylenders.
Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas in New York City in 2018. Credit: A Katz/Shutterstock.
“The truth that we should clarify to the world is that European Jews are not Semites,” he said, according to a translation by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI). “They have nothing to do with Semitism.
“So when we hear them talk about Semitism and antisemitism, the Ashkenazi Jews, at least, are not Semites,” he added.
“They say that Hitler killed the Jews because they were Jews and that Europe hated the Jews because they were Jews. Not true. It was clearly explained that [the Europeans] fought [the Jews] because of their social role, and not their religion,” Abbas said. “Several authors wrote about this. Even Karl Marx said this was not true. He said that the enmity was not directed at Judaism as a religion but to Judaism for its social role.
“The Europeans fought against these people because of their role in society, which had to do with usury, money and so on and so forth,” the P.A. president continued.
In response to the remarks, the city of Paris stripped Abbas of the Grand Vermeil medal, the city’s highest honour. Abbas was given the medal in 2015.
Denial and Distortion
Steffan Siebert, Germany’s ambassador to Israel, tweeted, “The recent statement of President Abbas on Jews and the Holocaust is an insult to the memory of millions of murdered men, women and children. The Palestinians deserve to hear the historical truth from their leader, not such distortions.”
Yad Vashem Chairman Dani Dayan also took to X (formerly Twitter), saying, “P.A. Chairman’s statement is not only an example of Holocaust denial & distortion, they use deeply entrenched antisemitic stereotypes. These reprehensible remarks must be unequivocally condemned by global leaders. We can’t stay silent.”
Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Gilad Erdan said, “Just as Abbas blames the Jews for the Holocaust, he also blames the Jews for all the Middle East’s issues. The world must wake up and hold Abbas and his Palestinian Authority accountable for the hatred they spew and the ensuing bloodshed it causes. There must be zero tolerance for Palestinian incitement and terror!”
Abbas, whose doctoral dissertation—“The Connection between the Nazis and the Leaders of the Zionist Movement 1933–1945”—contained Holocaust denial, drew similar ire last year when he accused Israel of “committing 50 Holocausts,” prompting German Chancellor Olaf Scholtz to express his disgust.
“For us Germans in particular, any relativization of the singularity of the Holocaust is intolerable and unacceptable. I am disgusted by the outrageous remarks made by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas,” the chancellor said.
American officials have yet to comment on or sanction Abbas for his recent comments.
Dan Diker, president of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs (JCPA), told the Tazpit Press Service, “Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’s latest Nazi conspiracy theory rant is neither new nor surprising. It reflects his 1982 doctoral dissertation written under Soviet sanction and today serves as the basis for Holocaust studies in the Palestinian Authority schools. What is shocking is that Israel and the United States and Europe have somehow tolerated this Hitler- and Stalin-style Jew-hatred in service of maintaining the P.A.’s stability as the lesser of other evils.”
Abbas has drawn condemnation for the remarks he made at a meeting of the Fatah Revolutionary Council—the terrorist movement’s parliamentary body—repeating a number of antisemitic comments he has made in the past.
Abbas also took the opportunity to once again lambast the British and Americans for the 1917 Balfour Declaration.
“The Balfour Declaration saw the light of day only because of the complete agreement between [Foreign Secretary Arthur] Balfour and U.S. President [Woodrow] Wilson. They were in full agreement about this phrasing. So America was a partner to the Balfour Declaration. Who invented that [Jewish] state? It was Britain and America—not just Britain.”
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