When did you last visit the library? Friday? In search of leisure reading for Shabbat? A relaxing visit with the little ones, encouraging their thirst for knowledge?
Unfortunately, with the recent incursion of “woke” ideology, public libraries—and school libraries—have become breeding grounds for malicious propaganda.
Equally malicious is the strategic campaign of Islamic indoctrination that has slithered onto library shelves. CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) has designed a Palestine Beyond Borders Toolkit (2023) to promote “cultural diversity, understanding, and inclusivity”—today’s bywords—in libraries and bookstores, showcasing the “Palestinian experience.” This guide instructs, in meticulous detail, how to advance specific pro-“Palestine” literature. And how to deal with staff, patrons or customers who object to anti-Israel displays.
Most notably diabolical—promotion of children’s literature promoting sympathy for “Palestinians” and animosity towards Israelis. For example, “These Olive Trees,” written and illustrated by Aya Ghanameh, tells the story of a little girl whose family is forced to flee their beloved land and olive trees in 1967. A heart-wrenching tale to the American psyche. What is hidden under wraps is the author’s reputation as a rabid Jew-hater who glorifies terrorists and violence against Israeli civilians and Zionists.
Another anti-Israel website, Teach Palestine, advocates “Children’s Books About Palestine.” The pro-Israel CAMERA Education Institute has composed an annotated list of these “biased books.” One example: “A Little Piece of Ground,” by Elizabeth Laird, relates the fears of a 12-year-old Arab boy towards the Israeli soldiers in their tanks, depicted as green, scaly monsters. This book was mandated reading for sixth graders in Newark, New Jersey public schools but has since been removed—only due to protests.
Among CAIR’s adult selections, we find such “histories” as “Palestine: A Four Thousand Year History” (2018), by Nur Masalha, a text replete with falsehoods. The author denies the existence of any empirical evidence of the Israelite kingdoms, despite ample archeological findings. Akin to Darwin’s “missing link,” the author fails to show any connection between the long-extinct Philistines and the Arabs who today demand the land “from the river to the sea.”
From where does this name “Palestine” originate? In 135 CE, after vanquishing the Judean Bar-Kochba revolt, Roman Emperor Hadrian (117-138 CE), in his mad desire to erase any vestige of Judaism from the land of Judea, renamed the land Syria Palaestina, alluding to the Philistines, an arch enemy of the Hebrews, as recounted in the Bible. The Holy City of Jerusalem was defiled with the pagan name Aelia Capitolina. It was a clear affront to the conquered Jews. The derogatory name “Palestine” was continuously adopted by subsequent invaders. There never was a “Palestine,” nor any ancient “Palestinians.”
Who are these “Palestinians,” claiming to be the indigenous people of “Syrian Palestine”? Prior to 1948, the British incited an illegal flooding of foreigners from lands such as Morocco, Yemen and Iraq to appease surrounding Middle Eastern nations. Even thugs and terrorists were allowed illegal entry. The plan was to overwhelm the Jewish population by instigating an Islamic demographic takeover of Israel (then under the degrading misnomer “Palestine”).
Arabs who did live in Israel considered the land to be part of Syria, certainly not a distinct Islamic territory with its own people and culture. In a 1970 interview on Thames TV, Golda Meir emphatically stated: “There were no ‘Palestinians,’ only Jews and Arabs.” She had been Palestinian and had even carried a Palestinian passport under the British mandate. From personal experience, Chaim Malachi of Passaic, New Jersey, a former resident of Pardes Hanna, Israel, showed me a building constructed in 1960 by Arab workers, mostly from the town of Umm al-Fahm. He recounted how an Arab angrily answered when he was referred to as “Palestinian” by a Jew: ”Ana la Falasteen! Ana Arab! Enta Falasteen!” (“I’m not a Palestinian! I’m an Arab! You’re a Palestinian!”) “Palestinian” Arabs living in “Palestine” were insulted if you called them “Palestinians.”
According to Sha’i ben-Tekoa, author of “Phantom Nation: Inventing the ‘Palestinians’ as the Obstacle to Peace,” “Under the Turks for four centuries prior to WWI (1914-18), there had been no administrative district called ‘Palestine’ and no Arab/Muslim called himself a ‘Palestinian.’”
In 1917, The Balfour Declaration pledged a homeland for the Jews. But the allotted sliver of land was ultimately dissected, 78% cropped out by the British to appease Muslim interests. Jordan—created by the British—included land originally designated for the Jews. But this chunk of soil robbed from the Jews did not suffice for Arab interests.
1948: Islamic nations united to wipe out the nascent reestablished Jewish State.
Arabs living or working in Israel fled, nursing promised dreams from their Muslim brethren of abundant spoils from slaughtered Jews. Victory for Islam assured, the Arab League planned to divide Israel among the victors: Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan. No mention of any “Palestine” for “Palestinians.” When the Jews miraculously won, the Arabs who fled became refugees—refused succor by their Muslim brethren. Refugee centers, set up by the U.N., attracted more foreign Arabs, who falsely claimed refugee status to receive free health care and food. It suited the Islamic states well to keep these refugees impoverished, better to blame the Jewish State as oppressive invaders inhabiting Arab soil. Zahir Muhsein, PLO leader, declared: “The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel…”
The Association of Jewish Libraries has done little, if anything, to counter this Islamic anti-Israel campaign. The American Library Association indulges this jihad of American libraries by promoting anti-Israel books and condemning Israel for destroying “Palestinian” schools, libraries, and museums—institutions which are exploited by terrorist factions as shields for rocket launchers and arsenals aimed at innocent Israeli civilians.
Yes, Islamomania, the biggest lie, is on the rise.
For a full version of this essay read: “Jihad—Coming to a Library Near You” (yu.edu), by Hindishe Lee: https://bit.ly/3T1pRZK
