By Steven Stalinsky, executive director of the Middle East Media Research
Institute.
May 6, 2004.
Abd Al-Munim Said, head of the Al-Ahram Research Center in Egypt, once said:
“We thought that by the end of the 20th century, the Arab mind would be open
enough not to explain everything with a ‘conspiracy theory’…the biggest
problem with conspiracy theories is that they keep us not only from the truth
but also from confronting our faults and problems…This way of thinking relates
any given problem to external elements, and thus does not to a rational
policy to confront the problem.”
Since 9/11/01, conspiracy theories against the U.S., the Jews, and the Zionists
have been rampant in the Arab world. These notions are spread not only by
marginal personalities and media outlets, but, more important, by prominent
members of mainstream governments and media.
Some of last year’s most far-fetched conspiracy theories in the Arab world
include: U.S. soldiers cannibalized Iraqi civilians; the U.S. was responsible for
the car bomb that killed Iraqi Shia leader Muhammad Bakir Al-Hakim; the Jews
were behind the explosion of the space shuttle Columbia; the U.S. was behind
the SARS virus; and the Iraq war was launched to coincide with the Jewish
holiday Purim.
The following highlight the top ten Arab conspiracy theories in recent
months:
10. Pakistani Jamaatud-Dawa chief Hafiz Muhammad Saeed was quoted in the
Islamic Republic News Agency on November 13, 2003, stating that al Qaeda
was not responsible for the Riyadh bombing that month.
Rather, “It is a Jewish and American conspiracy against the mujahadeen
and al Qaeda.”
9. According to an editorial in the November 20 Yemen Times, the Istanbul
bombings during Ramadan this past November could not have been committed
by Muslims, as “the international Zionist establishment was keen on instigating
this crime. This is strongly supported by the fact that no Muslim in his right
mind could ever condone such crimes.”
8. The Islamic Republic News Agency reported on February 28 that the U.S.
captured Osama bin Laden in a tribal region of Pakistan. It claimed that Donald
Rumsfeld’s recent trip to Pakistan was related to the capture. The report said
that the U.S. will announce the capture shortly before the November
presidential elections.
7. Professor Galal Amin, a professor at the American University of Cairo,
writing in the April 1 edition of Egypt’s Al-Ahram Weekly, explained:
“There is still doubt that the September [11] attacks were the outcome
of Arab and Islamic terror…. Many writers…suspect that the attacks were
carried out by Americans.”
6. Writing in Kuwait’s Al-Watan on March 14, columnist Adnan Zayid Al-Kazimi
identified the real culprit in the Madrid bombings:
“I claim with certainty that the ones who attributed all evil to the Arabs
and the Muslims are the Zionists, those who are closest to carry out such an
operation like the other operations .”
5. Said Al-Subki, columnist for the Saudi daily Al-Watan, also blamed the
Madrid bombings on the Jews in its March 19 edition. He criticized Arab
intelligence services for being “incapable of discovering the hidden Zionist
fingers planning many terror operations in order to entangle the Arabs and
Muslims.”
4. Deputy editor of the Egyptian government daily Al-Gumhouriyya wrote an
article on March 18 that accused the Jews of perpetrating every terrorist attack
throughout the world.
Regarding the Madrid bombings that took place March 11, Abd
Al-Wahhab Adas claimed, in reference to the explosives and cassettes of the
Koran found at the site, “It is obvious that the Jews are the ones who placed
these things, in order to prove to the entire world that the Arabs and Muslims
are behind the bombings.” Adas added about the Jews: “It is they who are
behind the events of September 11.”
3. In an interview with Al-Arabiyya TV, Lebanese Druze leader and
parliamentarian Walid Jumblatt stated on March 21 that, as part of a
“born-again Christian” scheme that included 9/11, the CIA controls Osama bin
Laden.
2. According to the Iranian Mehr News Agency, Hossein Sheikholeslam, the
former Iranian ambassador to Syria, stated that the series of bombings that hit
Damascus in the last week of April were “a bid to force Iraq’s neighbors to
submit to their Iraq policy, the U.S. and the Zionist regimes orchestrated such
terrorist attacks.”
He noted, “This is not the first time that the U.S. and Israel have
employed al Qaeda elements to help them reinforce their terrorist objectives.”
1. After the bombing in Yunbu, Saudi Arabia, on May 1, Crown Prince Abdullah
stated: “Zionism is behind terrorist actions in the kingdom. I can say that I am
95 percent sure of that.”
