Anti-semitism: Myth and Hate from Antiquity to the Present

JEWISH-MUSLIM RELATIONS IN HISTORY
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turn for taxes, particularly the poll tax, or jizya; it followed Muhammad’s formulation
that infidels were to be fought “until they pay the jizya out of hand, and have been
humbled.” Dhimmi discrimination was often merely theory, and de facto toleration
usually prevailed. Nevertheless, this battery of legislation was a perpetual potential
menace to the dhimmis—a danger that materialized whenever a revolutionary or pious
reactionary came to power. “Dhimmitude” was invoked very often down to our times,
as by Egyptian president Anwar el-Sadat in 1972 before his journey to Jerusalem, when
he urged the necessity of defeating Israel “so that they go back to be once again as our
Book told us: ‘Humiliation is destined for them, and poverty.’” 4
The dhimmi system and Jewish status in Islamic society have been subjected to
very varied judgments, from the more traditional “golden age” school to revisionists’
“persecution and pogrom” interpretation. The traditional school follows the “pro-Islamic
Jews,” who were pioneering and empathetic historians of Islam, especially of the
Arab and Ottoman periods, among whom were the German Moritz Steinschneider
(1816–1917), the Hungarian Ignaz Goldziher (1850–1921), and several others. In response
to Christian persecutions, from the Crusades on, which victimized Jews and
Muslims alike, these scholars propounded the myth of a golden age or several great
ages—notably Muslim Spain—when Jews prospered in economic freedom and presumably
enjoyed equality and acceptance virtually undisturbed by persecution or discrimination;
these pioneering scholars ignored the historical record of pervasive humiliation,
discrimination, and periodic violence in a kind of solidarity with fellow “Semites” in the
face of Christian hostility. The myth, says Bernard Lewis, was fashioned by Jews “as a
reproach to Christians” and is now taken up by Muslims—invoking putative golden
ages—“as a reproach to Jews.” 5 According to Arab Muslim claims, frequently reiterated
since 1948, Jews always enjoyed equality and social harmony under Islam: Muslims
were “merciful brothers who regarded the Jews as fellow believers and did not allow religious
differences to affect their treatment or attitude toward them.” It was only with
the twentieth century, in this view, that anti-Jewish feelings mounted in response to
Zionism, ending the age-old idyllic pattern of fraternity and tolerance and prosperity.
Such a romanticized interpretation serves as an Arab-Islamist weapon in what is primarily
an ideological and political struggle against Israel. Fundamentalists also argue
that under the yoke of the dhimmi system, Muslim-Jewish relations were good because
Jews were held in check and Muslims were thus “protected” from them; the demise of
the system under colonial rule and, worse, the coming of the state of Israel meant that
Jews became “dangerous” to Muslims and Islam.
Such idealization of the past ignores a catalog of lesser-known hatred and massacres.
Hostile attitudes manifested in the ninth century resulted in persecution and
outbreaks of violence that took a heavy toll. Antisemitic propaganda of the tenth and
eleventh centuries made Jews out to be untrustworthy, treacherous oppressors, and exploiters
of Muslims, which inspired outbreaks of violence and caused many casualties in
Egypt. Maimonides lamented that “a more hating nation [than Ishmael] has never risen
against Israel, nor one which has come to degrade us and decimate us and make hating
us their chief desire.” 6 In Muslim Spain there were violent outbreaks in Cordoba in
1011 and Granada in 1066, because (some) Jews were wealthy and others, as viziers and
the like, exercised authority over Muslims—that is, they “oppressed” Muslims. Muslim
Spain exhibits as much ghetto as golden age. A Moorish poem of the eleventh century
dubs the Jews a criminal people and complains that society is nearing collapse on account
of Jewish wealth and domination, their exploitation and betrayal of Muslims; that
Jews worship the devil, physicians poison their patients, and Jews poison food and