What does Shaheen mean when he writes that the Arab demon of today is much like the Jewish demon of yesterday?

Answer 1

Meaning of the Quote

The quote indicates that Shaheen believes that the European treatment of Arabs is reminiscent of the Anti-Semitism that plagued Europe through much of Europe's history. In this way, he claims that we are beginning to see the "Nazification" of Europe, but this time the antagonism will be shifted towards Muslims as opposed to Jews who are no longer a threat.

Additionally, the portrayal of Arabs in the Western media is of a sort where Arabs are treated like menacing militants, burgeoning billionaires, or aggressive grunts. He makes the assertion that Westerners' views of Arabs are informed by these singular types of portrayals which do not reflect the honest humanity of Arabs.

To read the quote in context, please see "The Media's Image of Arabs" by Jack Shaheen in the Related Links below. It is a very short essay.

Discussion of the Quote

Of course, the comparison is ridiculous, biased, and insulting to the Anti-Semtism and Judenhass (Jewish hatred) that manifested throughout European history.

Arabs in Europe have equal rights with all indigenous Europeans, acts of Judenhass are more common than acts of Anti-Mohammedanism (Muslim hatred) even when all non-Arab Muslims are added to the Arab Muslim population. The inequalities that separate Arabs from indigenous Europeans are linguistic issues, assimilation issues, and ideological issues. Many Arabs immigrants do not speak the local European languages whereas their children do, making it hard for them to reap the rewards of the system. The assimilation and ideological issues refer to how Arabs typically either wish to put their children in private religious schools or do not promote their success in secular public schools, how the children hold suberversive views about how the state should treat other minorities (especially Jews), how Arabs believe that it is completely proper to shout down or murder someone that they disagree with, and finally, that many aspire to replace democratic secular governments with theocratic institutions.

By contrast, the Jews were second-class citizens, if that for most of the history of Europe. Jews actively joined with European non-Jews to create modern, liberal, secular societies. They were active in government ministries and did not promote any sort of theocratic agenda. They actively contributed to the sciences and education of all Europeans and promoted assimilation with the Europeans. While there was certainly a backlash against this from more religious Jews, these religious Jews generally avoided European non-Jews and lived in small villages called shtetls where they could effectively vanish from Europeans' sight.

As a result, anti-Arab sentiment in Europe actually has some justification whereas Anti-Semitism and Judenhass do not.