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1. Setting forth aspects of the terrorist blitzkrieg of 9/11/2001 that pertain to the petroleum industry, we begin with discussion of Muslim/Jewish relations in the United States. The broadcast highlights the tensions wrought between these two religious communities by the fallout from the attacks of 9/11. (“Jewish-Muslim Dialogue Falters” by David Firestone [New York Times]; San Jose Mercury News; 10/22/2001; p. 4A.)
2. Elements of the Islamic community in this country have echoed a line of disinformation widely accepted outside of the U.S. that the Mossad (Israeli intelligence) was behind the attacks. (Idem.)
3. Interestingly (and, perhaps, significantly) the Saudis have devoted a great deal of effort to promoting Wahhabism among U.S. Muslim congregations. (“Saudis Seek to Add U.S. Muslims to Their Sect” by Blaine Harden; New York Times; 10/20/2001; p. A1.)
4. Next, the broadcast touches on Hanan Ashrawi, a Palestinian spokeswoman who has been very visible in the United States, particularly in the so-called progressive sector. (“Palestinian Lawmaker Discusses Peace in S.F.” by Thyche Hendricks; San Francisco Chronicle; 11/4/2001; p. A14.)
5. A protégé of former Bush (Senior) Secretary of State James Baker, Ashrawi is one of a number of apparent CIA Palestinian assets, dubbed by the Agency “Baker’s dozen.” (The Secret War Against the Jews: How Western Espionage Betrayed the Jewish People; John Loftus and Mark Aarons; Copyright 1994 [HC]; St. Martin’s Press; ISBN 0–312-11057‑X; p. 476.)
6. These “moderate” Palestinians comprised the negotiating team for the PLO in their peace talks with the Israelis. (Idem.)
7. In that context, it is interesting to note that the day that petroleum industry professional Dick Cheney (another Bush Sr. cabinet officer) was named as George W’s Vice-Presidential candidate, Yasser Arafat walked out of the Camp David peace talks that were being brokered by President Clinton. (“Clinton Ends Deadlocked Peace Talks” by Jane Perlez; New York Times; 7/26/2000; p. A1.; “Bush Names Cheney , Citing ‘Integrity’ and ‘Experience’ ” by Frank Bruni; New York Times; 7/26/2000; p. A1.) The possibility that the Republican/petroleum industry/Saudi connection may have played a backchannel role in interdicting the peace talks is not a possibility to be too readily discarded. (It should be noted that, as noted in FTR#284, the elder George Bush was in touch with the Saudi Royal family during the 2000 campaign through the Carlyle group. The Bush/Saudi connection appears to have helped to destroy Jimmy Carter’s election prospects in 1980. Had President Clinton successfully brokered the Israeli/Palestinian peace process, it might have very well given the 2000 election to Al Gore.)
8. The week before the attacks, the Saudis changed intelligence chiefs. (“Status Quo in the Persian Gulf” by Jim Hoagland; Washington Post; 9/9/2001; p. B7.)
9. In addition, the Saudi government had members of the Bin Laden family flown out of the U.S. before the FBI. could question them about the 9/11 attacks! (“U.S. Is Really Alone in this War” by Anthony Lewis [New York Times]; San Francisco Chronicle; 10/29/2001; p. A17.)
10. Interestingly (and, perhaps, significantly) the Bin Laden family ended their financial involvement with the above-mentioned Carlyle Group in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. (“Bin Laden Family Liquidates Holdings with the Carlyle Group” by Kurt Eichenwald; New York Times; 10/26/2001; p. C6.) (See more about the business relationships between both Georges Bush and the Bin Laden Family.) As noted, in addition to both Georges Bush, the Carlyle group also connects Hanan Ashrawi mentor James Baker to both the Bin Laden family and the Saudi royal family.) The Carlyle Group specializes in takeovers of companies involved in military manufacturing.
11. The program sets forth: connections between the Bin Ladens and former Secretary of State George Shultz; Bin Laden family holdings in biotechnology (anthrax?); Bin Laden connections to Deutsche Bank and Citigroup; the Bin Laden family’s geographical base in Boston (both planes that crashed into the World Trade Center took off from that city) and Bin Laden communications with Osama while he was taking refuge in Sudan. (“Bin Laden Family, with Deep Western Ties, Tries to Re-Establish a Name” by Leigh Cowan, Kurt Eichenwald and Michael Moss; New York Times; 10/28/2001; p. B3.)
12. Although it has been commonly reported that Osama has been “cut out“of the enormous family fortune, one of his sons apparently helps run the family business. (“Royal Support of Bin Ladens Appears to Slip” by Yaroslav Trofimov; Wall Street Journal; pp. A15-A16.)
13. With 25% of the world’s proven oil reserves, Saudi Arabia appears to help dictate, rather than help to pursue American foreign policy. Important liaison functions between the U.S. and the Saudis were carried out by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, President Reagan’s former special envoy to the Middle East. (“Naming of Hijackers as Saudis May Further Shake Ties to U.S.” by Elaine Sciolino and Neil MacFarquhar; New York Times; 10/28/2001; p. B4.) As noted, all of Reagan’s appointments were selected from a list of individuals drawn up by Otto Von Bolschwing protégé Helene Von Damm, adding possible additional significance to Rumsfeld’s role in the Middle East.
14. Bush recently signed an executive order empowering ex-Presidents to block the release of their papers. (“Presidents’ Papers to Be Kept Secret” by Mike Allen and George Lardner Jr. [Washington Post]; San Francisco Chronicle; 11/2/2001; p. D3.)
15. Critics have charged that this may have been done to protect members of the Reagan and Bush administrations who hold office under George W. (Idem.)
16. It is interesting to note that the Clinton administration had warned the Saudis (to no avail) about charities that have allegedly been involved in funding terrorism. (“Clinton Told Saudis of How Charities Funded Al Qaeda” by Glenn R. Simpson; Wall Street Journal; p. A2.)
17. Despite this, the Saudis have yet to freeze these alleged Bin Laden assets. (“Saudi Arabia Has Yet to Join U.S. Drive To Block Assets Tied to Terrorist Groups” by Glenn R. Simpson; Wall Street Journal; p. A28.)
18. Supplementing information presented in FTRs 182 and 329, the program highlights Russian president Vladimir Putin’s offer of Western access to Russian oil in exchange for U.S. acceptance of Russian military action in Chechnya. (“Russia and U.S. See a Breakthrough on Divisive Issues” by Patrick E. Tyler; New York Times; 10/19/2001; pp. A1-B4.) One can speculate that Al Qaeda, controlled by the Underground Reich, may have fulfilled the goal of Friedrich von Paulus’ Sixth Army, the capture of the Russian oil fields of the Caucasus.
19. A pipeline across Afghanistan to carry oil from the Caspian Sea is being pushed by Unocal—in which the elder George Bush has a stake—British Petroleum and the Saudis. (“The Blowback Chronicles” by Giles Foden; The Guardian; 9/15/2001.)
20. The current war in Afghanistan would appear to be furthering the prospects for realization of the Unocal/BP/Saudi project. (“It’s About Oil” by Ted Rall; San Francisco Chronicle; 11/2/2001; p. A25.)
21. It is worth noting that, even as Bush is calling for Americans to unite, he is using the 9/11 attacks to push a right-wing, partisan agenda. One of the elements of that agenda is Bush’s advocacy of drilling for oil in the Alaska Wildlife Refuge. (“Bush Calls on California to Support Energy Package” by Paul Rogers; San Jose Mercury News; 10/18/2001; p.4A.)
Looking Back from 1984
https://theconversation.com/why-the-protocols-of-the-elders-of-zion-is-still-pushed-by-anti-semites-more-than-a-century-after-hoax-first-circulated-145220
Why the ‘Protocols of the Elders of Zion’ is still pushed by anti-Semites more than a century after hoax first circulated
Stephen Whitfield September 2, 2020 8.20am EDT
An anti-Semitic hoax more than a century old reared its ugly head again as the Republican National Convention was underway last week.
Mary Ann Mendoza, a member of the advisory board of President Trump’s reelection campaign, was due to speak on Aug. 25. But she was suddenly pulled from the schedule after she had retweeted a link to a conspiracy theory about Jewish elites plotting to take over the world.
In her now-deleted tweet, Mendoza urged her roughly 40,000 followers to read a lengthy thread that warned of a plan to enslave the “goyim,” or non-Jews. It included fevered denunciations of the historically wealthy Jewish family, the Rothschilds, as well as the top target of right-wing extremism today, the liberal Jewish philanthropist George Soros.
The thread also made reference to one of the most notorious hoaxes in modern history: “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.” As a scholar of American Jewish history, I know how durable this document has been as a source of the belief in Jewish conspiracies. The fact that it is still making the rounds within the fringe precincts of the political right today is testament to the longevity of this fabrication.
Fake news
Surely no outright forgery in modern history has ever proved itself more durable. In the early 20th century, the Protocols were concocted by Tsarist police known as the Okhrana, drawing upon an obscure 1868 German novel, “Biarritz,” in which mysterious Jewish leaders meet in a Prague cemetery.
This fictional cabal aspires for power over entire nations through currency manipulation and seeks ideological domination by disseminating fake news. In the novel, the Devil listens sympathetically to the reports that representatives of the tribes of Israel present, describing the havoc and subversion that they have wrought, and the destruction that is yet to come.
The Okhrana – “protection” in Russian – worked for what was then the most powerful anti-Semitic regime in Europe and wanted to use the hoax to discredit revolutionary forces hostile to the reactionary policies and religious mysticism of Tsarist rule.
The document became a global phenomenon only about two decades after the Okhrana’s fabrication. Widespread publication and republication coincided with both the influenza pandemic of 1918–20 and the aftermath of the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 – both of which stirred fears of obscure forces that menaced social control.
Scapegoating Jews for disease and political unrest was nothing new. Medieval Jews had been massacred in the wake of accusations of having poisoned wells and spreading plagues.
But a century ago, the crisis in public health probably mattered less than the Communists’ seizure of power in Russia, which, if unchecked, might overwhelm the political order that the Great War had destabilized. That some of the revolutionary leaders were of Jewish birth seemed to reinforce the predictions of the Protocols.
Tsar Nicholas II, the last of the Romanovs, was known to have read the Protocols before being executed by the Bolsheviks in 1918. In the following year, Hitler delivered his first recorded speech, in which he depicted an international conspiracy of Jews – of all Jews – to weaken and poison the Aryan race and to extinguish German culture.
Hitler himself was unsure of the authenticity of the Protocols – a question of verification that may not have mattered all that much to the Nazis. The Führer told one of his early associates that the Protocols were “immensely instructive” in exposing what the Jews could accomplish in terms of “political intrigue,” and in demonstrating their skill at “deception [and] organization.”
‘Americanized’ conspiracy
In the U.S., the hoax was given a wide distribution by the most admired businessman of his time: Henry Ford. By 1920, Ford had “Americanized” the forged document as “The International Jew: The World’s Foremost Problem.” It ran as excerpts in his newspaper, the Dearborn Independent, for 91 straight weeks. “The International Jew” was translated into 16 languages.
Henry Ford published anti-Semitic conspiracies. Library of Congress
Though Jewish communal leadership mounted a lawsuit that forced the auto magnate to issue a retraction in 1927, the malignant hatred behind the Protocols continued to seep into the public conversation.
In the 1930s, the popular anti-New Deal “radio priest” Charles E. Coughlin excerpted the Protocols in his newspaper, Social Justice. But Father Coughlin was wary about endorsing its accuracy, and merely stated that it might be of “interest” to his readers.
History as conspiracy
Why is it that this demonstrably false document continues to hold sway today?
Perhaps the simplest explanation is human irrationality, which neither education nor enlightenment has ever managed to defeat.
The willingness to believe in the fantasy of a surreptitious Jewish stranglehold on the international economy and on mass media also validates the insight of the Columbia University historian Richard Hofstadter. He traced in political extremism of both right and left an apocalyptic strain and a belief in an imminent confrontation between good and absolute evil.
Hofstadter was well aware that conspiracies punctuate the annals of the past. But especially for those Americans who hanker for the security of a settled way of life, political paranoia is tempting, such as the belief – as Hofstadter wrote – that “history is a conspiracy,” in which unseen forces are the shadowy driving mechanisms of human destiny.
Because anti-Semitism has survived nearly a couple of millennia, no form of prejudice has yet found a more vivid place in the imagination. And the fact that no international Jewish conspiracy was ever located has never depleted the power of the Protocols to tap into subterranean currents of demonization.
From the Rothschilds to Soros
What sustains the influence of the Protocols among cranks and extremists is not the language of the text itself – which few of them are likely to have fully read in its various versions – but what this forgery purports to underscore, which is the astonishingly cunning influence of Jews in modern history.
The Protocols thus have no importance in themselves; they are spurious. But they do bestow precision upon apocalyptic fears, which could not survive without some ingredient of plausibility – however wildly far-fetched.
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The Rothschild family was pivotal to the emergence of finance capitalism in 19th-century Europe. The family firm had branches in Germany, France, Austria, Italy and England, which lent credence to the charge of “cosmopolitanism” during an era of rising nationalism. The boom-and-bust oscillations of the economy generated not only misery but also grievances against financiers who seemed to benefit from such uncertainties.
Today, Soros, a Hungarian-born, British-educated American Jew, has become an especially hated figure for the far-right. Among the world’s canniest investors, he has spent billions of dollars promoting progressive causes. He seems to personify what Ford called “the international Jew.”
Venom against minorities other than Jews has not resulted in any equivalent to the Protocols. Judeophobia produced a specious documentation that bigotry against no other minority has ever elicited. Perhaps the very explicitness of the Protocols helps strengthen the suspicion that majority beliefs and interests are under attack, and keeps this dangerous form of anti-Semitism alive.