If the Arabs cite Israel as the main cause of their extremism, it means that their extremism can only be halted once they change their attitude to Israel. The present threat will not diminish until the Arab world begins to adapt to the process of democratization that the West has been undergoing for a few hundred years. The first requirement of such adaptation is self-accountability, and the essential sign of such self-accountability will be the ability to accept the reality of a Jewish state. The fuel of antisemitism is more explosive even than the jet fuel that brought down the World Trade Center. The longer it is accommodated or encouraged, the greater the danger to the world's leading democracy. Once we understand that, we will better know what is to be done and what isn't. The example of Europe in the 1930s is a blueprint of what happens when antisemitism is ignored.

Ruth Wisse is Professor of Yiddish Literature and of Comparative Literature at Harvard and is author of the book, If I Am Not for Myself: The Liberal Betrayal of the Jews. This article was originally published in The Harvard Crimson.

From the Imam of New York's Islamic Center

The following are excerpts from an October 4, 2001 interview given in Egypt by Sheikh Muhammad Al-Gamei'a, Imam of New York's Islamic Cultural Center and Mosque on East 96th Street in Manhattan, posted on an Al-Azhar University site and purportedly giving "eye-witness" testimony of what is transpiring in New York City. Note that Sheikh Al-Gamei'a is Imam of a so-called "moderate" mosque, connected to Egypt, not the Wahhabite Saudis. The translation is thanks to MEMRI, the Middle East Media Research Institute.

Questioner: What was the situation of the Muslims before the incident (the September 11 attacks), and what are the negative ramifications for Muslims?

Gamei'a: Before the incident, the situation of Muslims was normal (in America)....Following the incident, Muslims and Arabs stopped feeling that it was safe to leave [their homes]....Muslims do not feel safe even going to the hospitals, because some Jewish doctors in one of the hospitals poisoned sick Muslim children, who then died.

Q: The media has reported firing on mosques and ha-rassment of Muslim women, and the situation has gotten so bad that Arabs are murdered in the streets....

Gamei'a: It's true. The Muslims are being persecuted by the people and the federal government. This is the result of the bad image of Muslims created by the Zionist media, and of their presenting Islam as a religion of terrorism. That is why the Americans have linked the recent incidents to Islam. I personally have suffered; my home was attacked and my daughters were harassed.

Q: What did you do about this harassment?

Gamei'a: When a group of people attacked my home, I went out to them and asked why they were doing this....During my conversations with this group, it became clear to me that they knew very well that the Jews were behind these ugly acts, while we, the Arabs, were innocent, and that someone from among their people was disseminating corruption in the land. Although the Americans suspect that the Zionists are behind the act, none has the courage to talk about it in public.

Q: Why can't they talk about it? It's their country, and the Jews are a minority.

Gamei'a: When I asked them whether they had the courage to talk about it openly, they said: 'We can't.' I asked why, and they said: 'You know very well that the Zionists control everything and that they also control political decision-making, the big media organizations, and the financial and economic institutions. Anyone daring to say a word is considered an anti-Semite.

Q: Does this mean that the Jewish element played a role in igniting the flame of fitna (internal strife)?

Outpost               - 8 -               November 2001