THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume XII, Issue # 82, May 23, 2010
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
REVIVING JEWISH RACE SCIENCE
By Brendan Goldman
ANTI-SEMITISM IN ACADEMIA U.S.A.: UNIVERSITY PROFESSORS DISPENSING WITH THE USUAL FIG LEAF OF
"ANTI-ZIONISM" TO EXPOUSE CLASSIC ANTI-SEMITISM -- SEEKING TO PROVIDE A LEGITIMATE FACADE FOR JEWISH
RACIAL STEREOTYPES -- EXPOUNDING THE THEORY THAT AMERICAN JEWS, THOUGH A MERE THREE PERCENT OF THE U.S.
POPULATION, CONTROL AMERICAN GOVERNMENT & POLITICS & DETERMINE U.S. RELATIONS WITH THE STATE OF ISRAEL
FULL STORY:
"The population of Jews in the U.S.A. is three percent, but
[their 'genius'] leads to their controlling so much power
that even Presidents are scared [of them]. Whether
[President Barack] Obama will be able to escape the notion
that three percent of the country is so powerful that the
top gentile in the land cannot criticize Israel is not clear."
The above statement was made not by a Hamas or KKK leader, but by Ali al-Amin Mazrui, Director of the Institute of
Global Cultural Studies at SUNY - Binghamton. He was addressing the Ifriqiyya Colloquium Conference, held on the top
floor of Columbia University's International Affairs Building, on Thursday, May 6, 2010. Mazrui is a darling of the Far
Left, appearing prominently in venues such as Democracy Now, as well as at Islamist forums like the Muslim Public
Affairs Council.
Columbia Professor Mahmood Mamdani and Barnard College Professor Nadia Abu El-Haj also sat on the panel, the
former serving as Moderator. Mamdani introduced the speaker, telling the audience that the Ifriqiyya Colloquium was
about "gain[ing] some depth to the study of Africa." It may require a Ph.D. to appreciate how Mazrui's anti-Semitic
diatribe relates to that mission statement.
Mazrui's lecture was entitled "Euro-Jews and Afro-Arabs: The Semitic Divergence in History," but he spent most of his
time discussing the development of Jewish "genius" and "cultural impurity" in a European context. Ostensibly, Mazrui
was comparing the impact of Jews on Europe to the impact of Arabs on Africa. However, he was more interested in
why "Arabs lagged behind Jews in manifest genius." After admitting he knew little about Arab history and even less
about Jews, Mazrui proceeded to spend his allotted time talking about the history of both peoples.
Mazrui did not flinch in asking rhetorical questions, such as "What aspects of Marxism are taken from Judaism?" He
made the nuanced argument that, since Karl Marx was ethnically Jewish, he clearly made "the Chosen People [into] the
proletariat." Mazrui's lecture was also peppered with statements like "Jews have been at their best when they were
Europeanized ... almost as if you needed a mixture of Jewishness and Europeanness [for Jewish genius]."
He also claimed that Jews, as a people, are insular and racist. "Arabs are far less race-conscious and ethnic-conscious
than Jews are," he said. "Acceptance of race mixture was more developed in Arab culture than in Jewish culture."
In case anyone thought he was referring to ancient history, Mazrui made it clear that his observation applied to the
modern period. He told his audience that Kuwait formerly had a black prime minister, which was not widely reported in
the media, but, if Israel had one, "that definitely would make world news." He neglected to mention that Kuwait's Prime
Minister is not elected, so the fact that a Kuwaiti Prime Minister was black tells us little about Kuwaiti society. Israel,
on the other hand, is a multi-ethnic democracy with Arabs and Jews of every color serving in the Knesset, the Israeli
parliament.
Abu El-Haj took the stage after Mazrui and attempted to give the conference a more academic tone. She spoke
articulately about Mazrui's research and largely succeeded in obfuscating the issue of Mazrui's flirtation with race
science. Abu El-Haj brings plenty of baggage to the debate: She has drawn criticism for working on a book claiming
Ashkenazi Jews are not genetically related to the ancient Israelites, although she is not a geneticist and there is
definitive scientific evidence to the contrary. Her controversial book, Facts on the Ground, argues that Israeli
archaeologists have distorted the country's material record in the service of nation-building. The book was subjected
to harsh reviews.
Yet, even Abu El-Haj was taken aback by Mazrui's research: "I don't fully understand what you're doing [in the
section of his paper discussing 'Jewish Genius']," she exclaimed.
Mazrui clarified that Jews had "a certain kind of impurity" that led them to be "like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," but now
they have "landed with Mr. Hyde's evil identity."
This statement was too much even for Mamdani, a vociferous critic of the Jewish state, who said, "I'm not comfortable
with the direction this conversation is going in." Abu El-Haj then made the astute observation that the conversation
had "racial-genetic undertones" and that "it's dangerous to talk about the biology of any group."
Mazrui was offended, apparently unaware that he had said anything that could be construed as racist. He clarified
that he was talking about "cultural," not "racial," "impurity." He then went off on a political tangent.
This digression led him to the above statement about the "control" exercised by "three percent of the population"
over the "highest gentile in the land," determining American ties with Israel. Mazrui must have missed the fact that
Americans support Israel over its adversaries at a ratio of over four to one, making the 2.2 percent of the U.S.
population that is Jewish relatively trivial in the President's calculations of Middle Eastern policy. Mazrui continued
with this theme anyway, saying toward the end of his speech that "[the Nobel Committee] gave [Egyptian President]
Anwar Sadat the Nobel Peace Prize for being a good boy toward the Jews."
The conference ended at the completion of Mazrui's diatribe. It was a surreal experience to bear witness to a professor
of Mazrui's professional stature dispensing with the usual fig leaf of "anti-Zionism" to espouse classic anti-Semitism.
Academia ostensibly supports a world without prejudice, but professors like Mazrui now provide a legitimate façade
for Jewish racial stereotypes. This is rank hypocrisy, and it's time we call it what it is.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Jews & Anti-Semitism
Europe, Europeans, & Anti-Semitism
Israel & the Arabs -- The Israeli-Arab Conflict
Brendan Goldman is a senior at New York University majoring in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies and an intern at
the Middle East Forum. This essay was sponsored by Campus Watch, a project of the Middle East Forum.
The foregoing article by Brendan Goldman was originally published in the American Thinker and MEF
NEWS (May 23, 2010) and
can be found on the Internet website maintained by the Middle East Forum, a foreign policy think tank which seeks to
define and promote American interests in the Middle East, defining U.S. interests to include fighting radical Islam,
working for Palestinian Arab acceptance of the State of Israel, improving the management of U.S. efforts to promote
constitutional democracy in the Middle East, reducing America's energy dependence on the Middle East, more robustly
asserting U.S. interests vis-à-vis Saudi Arabia, and countering the Iranian threat.
(Article URL: http://www.meforum.org/2658/jewish-race-science-columbia-university)
Republished with Permission of the Middle East Forum
Reprinted from the Middle East Forum News
mefnews@meforum.org (MEF NEWS)
May 23, 2010
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Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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