The Palestine Liberation Organization, whose basic charter makes it "a national duty to... to eliminate the Zionist presence from Palestine," is only the latest in a long line of irredentists and militants to dream of wiping the Jews out of the Jewish homeland. But it may be the first that also dreams of wiping the Jews out of Jewish history.
Arab efforts to delegitimize Jews are as old as the Koran. In Sura 2:61, the Prophet Mohammed decrees that Jews be forever "consigned to humiliation and wretchedness," an injunction that Muslim rulers have often cited to justify anti-semitism.
"Our hatred for the Jews," proclaimed King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia, "dates from God's condemnation of them for their... rejection of his chosen Prophet." Arab regimes take special pains to indoctrinate that hatred into children. A textbook used in West Bank schools during the Jordanian occupation ("The Religious Ordinances Reader") instructed students that "Jews are scattered to the ends of the earth, where they live exiled and despised, since by their nature they are vile, greedy, and enemies of mankind."
From PALESTINIAN PROPAGANDISTS REWRITE JEWISH HISTORY By Jeff Jacoby The Boston Globe Thursday, July 10, 1997
| Arab Propaganda | Associated Press | BBC | Boston Globe | Chicago Tribune | ABC NBC CBS | CNN | European Press |
| Los Angeles Times | Newsweek | New York Times | NPR | Philadelphia Inquirer | Reuters | Shockers | Time Magazine |