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Stan Goodenough is an experienced journalist who has written about politics in South Africa and the Middle East for such organizations as The Daily Dispatch of East London, South Africa, the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, The Jerusalem Post, and the Virtual HolyLand website. He has been a South African gentile resident in Israel for 12 years. Stan is editor of and .
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By Stan Goodenough
October 10, 2004
The most surprising thing about the Sinai bombings that have just killed at least 19 holidaying Israelis is the fact that they came as a surprise.
Surprise and indignation were also expressed at the Egyptian authorities' unwillingness to cooperate with the Israeli fire and rescue teams. These highly skilled workers, with their heavy equipment that could have been put to quick use to perhaps save some lives, were reportedly kept standing helplessly on the Egyptian border within sight of the burning and pulverized Taba Hilton Hotel.
Surprise and anger were expressed by other Israelis at the scene who were prevented by the Egyptians from pulling dead, and possibly some still living, victims out of the rubble.
Shocked and lightly wounded Israelis were surprised and infuriated when they were held at gunpoint by Egyptian troops who would not let them flee across the border into their own land.
Eyewitnesses reported that the dead bodies of Israelis were looted by Egyptians.
There should have been no surprises.
Egypt is a country seething with anti-Israel hatred. Such attacks, and official Egyptian interference in efforts to save Jewish lives following the attack -- we have seen all this before.
Like all Israel's Muslim neighbors, Egypt's masses have for generations been raised on a daily diet of anti-Israelism and anti-Semitism. It comes at them from all directions: from their president, from their media, from their imams, their school teachers and their academic scholars.
In the publishing and dissemination of classic and modern anti-Semitic literature, only Iran is more prolific than Egypt.
As reported by Katherine Grace Johnson, the Egyptian press frequently portrays Arab terrorist attacks, including the bombing of a Pan Am airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland, as Israeli acts.
Israel has been accused of introducing hoof-and-mouth disease in Egypt, of exporting radiation-contaminated food to Egypt; of introducing "most of the plagues that afflict agriculture and animal health; of causing earthquakes in Egypt; of bombing the World Trade Center in New York while contriving to throw blame on the Arabs; of introducing AIDS into Egypt; and of polluting the entire globe.
Egyptian newspapers blamed Israel for the 9-11 attacks on the United States, saying America was targeted because of its support for Israel's "repression" of the Palestinian Arabs.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Amr Moussa, in his capacity as Secretary General of the Arab League, blamed Israel for terrorist attacks on a synagogue in Turkey and for the general upsurge of terrorism in the Middle East.
According to Steven Stalinsky, executive director of the Middle East Media Research Institute writing in the National Review on May 6 this year: "In March 2004, the deputy editor of the Egyptian government daily Al Jumhuriyah wrote an article that accused the Jews of perpetrating every terrorist attack throughout the world."
"Regarding the Madrid bombings which took place March 11, Abd Al-Wahhab Adas claimed, in reference to the explosives and cassettes of the Koran found near the site, 'It is obvious that the Jews are the ones who placed these things, in order to prove to the entire world that the Arabs and Muslims are behind these bombings.' Adas added about the Jews: 'It is they who are behind the events of September 11.'"
Egyptian school textbooks published instill this hatred of the Jew in the tender years of an Egyptian child's life.
"Malice, greed, treachery, exploitation of others, fomenting of dissension, deception, racism, arrogance, hypocrisy, trickery and hostility - all are presented as characteristics of Jews," according to a report by the New York based Center for Monitoring of the Impact of Peace on textbooks used in both religious and secular Egyptian schools.
"In the context of the Middle East conflict, the Jews are referred to as a treacherous people and as enemies of the Egyptian people - in one case, even after the conclusion of the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel."
A movie based on czarist-era anti-Semitic publication The Protocols of the Elders of Zion was recently screened on prime time, government controlled, TV, which weekly broadcasts mosque sermons demonizing the Jews and instilling a sense of duty in all devout Muslims to help destroy Israel.
Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf is a best seller in the souks of Cairo. The only thing we have against Hitler, wrote one Egyptian columnist, is that he did not complete the destruction of the Jews.
Peace treaty or no peace treaty, Egypt continues to arm apace for war, spending billions of dollars in US aid to upgrade its military. It is currently believed to be building the largest air force in the Middle East. None of the country's neighbors are threatening to invade Egypt. And when Cairo carries out military maneuvers - war games - its "mock" enemy is a powerful nation from the east, one it has to confront in the Sinai - the nation of Israel.
Former Egyptian Minister of War General Abu Ghazzala told the Defense and National Security Committee of the Egyptian People's Assembly in 1989 that Israel was Egypt's "principal and sole enemy," over which, in alliance with Syria, Egypt could achieve a crushing victory.
And Osama el-Baz, the top advisor to President Hosni Mubarak, announced in 1988 that "Egypt's commitment to its Arab sisters outweigh any other commitments to any other side."
While these war drums, if muted, have throbbed on, Israeli tourists have been attacked in the Sinai. It's important to note that, since the signing of the Israel-Egypt treaty, hundreds of thousands of Israelis have visited Egypt as tourists. Hardly any Egyptians have toured Israel in return.
In 1985, Israelis visiting the area were shot by an Egyptian soldier who, according to the Egyptians, had been out of his mind. Seven of those wounded, including four children, bled to death on the desert sand while Israeli medical personnel were forced to stand helplessly by, prevented by armed Egyptian troops from coming to the victims' aid.
President Hosni Mubarak referred to that incident as "a small matter," while the soldier who perpetrated the murders was accorded hero's status by the Egyptian press.
In 1990, nine Israeli tourists were murdered in a bus in Ismailiya. The Egyptian media again found no room to offer any sympathetic coverage to the victims.
One year later, an Egyptian tour guide writing in the publication Siaha wrote:
"The odor which the Israeli tourist gives off is unbearable. Even the Israeli woman doesn't worry about her clothing and hates cleanliness. She showers only infrequently because the water and soap cost money. Other tourists have learned to recognize the Israeli by his smell."
No, the latest massacre of Jews in Egyptian territory was not surprising. It was an event just waiting to happen.
What is surprising is the unwillingness of Israelis to recognize the truth about Egypt, a country that they have for years almost proudly referred to as their peace partner. They ignored the danger and flocked to the beautiful peninsula despite unusually specific warnings that a terror attack was imminent.
As the Taba Hilton casino reopens for business, it's a safe bet that Israelis will continue to play Russian roulette with their lives.
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
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