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October 24, 2003
Jews "a world power"
B.C. politicians condemn Malaysian PM's speech.
PAT JOHNSON SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH BULLETIN
Vancouver-area politicians of all stripes are condemning the anti-Semitic
speech made last week by the Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.
Speaking as host of the 57-member Organization of Islamic Conference
that opened in his country last week, Mahathir, who has previously
spoken of Jewish conspiracies to manipulate Asian economies, made
what appear to be his most explicitly anti-Semitic statements yet.
Though he expressed his disapproval of suicide bombings, Mahathir
called for a "final victory" over Jews, whom he accused
of oppressing 1.5 billion Muslims.
"The Europeans killed six million Jews out of 12 million,"
Mahathir said. "But today the Jews rule the world by proxy.
They get others to fight and die for them."
The prime minister, who ends 22 years as Malaysia's leader this
month, said Jews, despite being vastly outnumbered, hold sway over
the world's Muslims as well as over the rest of the world.
"We are up against a people who think," he said. "They
survived 2,000 years of pogroms by not hitting back but by thinking....
They invented socialism, communism, human rights and democracy ...
so that they can enjoy equal rights with others. With these, they
have now gained control of the most powerful countries and they,
this tiny community, have become a world power."
Though some observers have suggested his comments were directed
at Israel, Mahathir appears to make little differentiation between
the Jewish state and the Jewish people worldwide. He did, however,
single out the Israeli-Arab conflict as an example of Jewish victory
over larger populations.
"For well over half a century, we have fought over Palestine,"
he said. "What have we achieved? Nothing. We are worse off
than before. If we had paused to think, then we could have devised
a plan, a strategy that can win us final victory."
The Malaysian leader's opposition to suicide bombings seems to rest
less on the inhumanity they inflict on innocent victims than on
the loss of the lives of Muslim suicide bombers themselves. He called
for a better strategy than Muslim suicides in the ongoing battle
against Israel.
Mahathir's comments spread quickly through the Jewish community
in British Columbia and Canada. From a state visit in Thailand,
Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham telephoned Keith Landy, the
national president of Canadian Jewish Congress, to convey the Canadian
government's outrage over the comments and to to tell Landy that
the government will "call in" Malaysia's high commissioner
to Canada. (Malaysia and Canada, as members of the Commonwealth,
are represented in each other's capitals by high commissions, not
embassies.)
Despite Graham's explicit attack on Mahathir's comments, Prime Minister
Jean Chretien shook the Malaysian prime minister's hand at the APEC
summit in Thailand Monday and refused to add any criticism to Graham's
earlier condemnation.
In an interview with the Bulletin, Landy's colleague Nisson Goldman,
chair of CJC, Pacific Region, expressed optimism over the fact that
Mahathir's tenure as a world leader appears to be in its last days.
"He's 77 years old," said Goldman. "He's about to
retire, thank heaven."
But Goldman added, "I don't think he can be dismissed."
Politicians representing local constituencies seemed unanimous in
condemning the comments.
Stephen Owen, Liberal member of Parliament for Vancouver-Quadra
and secretary of state for western economic diversification and
Indian affairs and northern development, said Mahthir's comments
conflict with the intentions of political and religious leaders
who are struggling to bridge the misunderstandings and mistrust
between peoples.
"I was appalled as I think many, many people should have been,"
Owen told the Bulletin Monday. "It's just fanning the flames
of hate."
Acknowledging that Mahathir's speech received a standing ovation
from the Muslim leaders in the audience, Owen expressed the hope
that the ovaiton represented something more general than widespread
support for Mahathir's anti-Semitic comments.
"As I saw the reports, he made a number of comments,"
said Owen, though he acknowledged that, in light of the hateful,
inciting comments Mahathir had just made, any expression of support
appears unseemly.
Stockwell Day, Canadian Alliance foreign affairs critic, was unavailable,
but John Reynolds, that party's house leader and MP for West Vancouver-Sunshine
Coast, said Canada's prime minister should demand an apology and
international condemnation should be directed at the Malaysian leader
through Commonwealth channels.
"Those are unacceptable comments from any world leader,"
said Reynolds, who expressed larger concerns about Malaysia's government.
"I've been to Malaysia. It's supposed to be a democracy, but
I've met some of the leaders of the opposition [who don't think
it is]."
Svend Robinson, New Democratic party MP for Burnaby-Douglas, called
Mahathir "an international embarrassment."
"My first reaction when I heard it was 'thank god this guy's
on his way out,' " said Robinson. "[The comments] feed
the most offensive and racist stereotypes of Jews, the sort of world
conspiracy stuff we've heard from the Zundels and Keegstras in Canada."
Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs called Mahathir's comments
a "desecration of the memory of six million innocent victims
of anti-Semitism" and said its tenor came straight from "classic
anti-Semitic propaganda."
Defending the comments fell to Malaysia's Foreign Minister Syed
Hamid Albar, who issued an apology Friday, not for the comments
themselves, which he denied were anti-Semitic, but because, said
the minister, Mahathir's comments had been misunderstood. Syed Hamid
said Islam is not anti-Jewish, but has legitimate issues with Israel.
Pat Johnson is a native Vancouverite, a journalist and
commentator.
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