American Nazi “Prophecy” and Dr Daud Abdullah: Deja Vu?

This is a cross post by Mark Gardner from the CST Blog

Allegations of antisemitism are mounting against Sheikh Raed Salah of the Islamic Movement, as legal squabbles continue over Britain’s attempts to deport him back to Israel.

Salah’s public relations defence is being led by MEMO (Middle East Monitor), a UK Islamist lobby / media group under the directorship of Dr Daud Abdullah, a senior operator in the UK Islamist scene.

MEMO describe Salah as “the Gandhi of Palestine“, but they will now need to overcome a new allegation: that he – Salah, not Gandhi – wrote an article citing an antisemitic American Nazi hoax, the “Franklin document”. (More commonly known as the “Franklin prophecy”.)

As we shall see below, this is not the first time that Dr Daud Abdullah has found himself in the company of this particular American Nazi hoax.

First, a brief recap –

Last week, CST blog ran what claims to be a transcript of a speech by Salah repeating the Christian medieval ‘Blood Libel’: the filthy lie that Jews use the blood of children for making Matzos.

Then, on the Daily Telegraph blog, Michael Weiss ran what claims to be a scan (see here and here) of an Arabic language article by Salah, stating that “4,000 Jews…4,000 Jewish clerks” were warned to avoid work in the Twin Towers on 9/11. This supposedly appeared in the 5th October 2001 edition of Sawt al-Haq w’al-Huriyya (Voice of Justice and Freedom: the journal of Salah’s Islamic Movement in Israel, Northern Branch). It has been translated by MEMRI, the Middle East Media Research Institute. According to MEMRI, Salah’s article includes this:

Considering these endless mysteries, [we may conclude that] the unique mover had no problem adding yet another unprecedented mystery to American history, which is [has always been] riddled with ambiguities and with 1,001 questions, from the [Benjamin] Franklin document until today.

MEMRI claim that the next paragraph contains the antisemitic 9/11 hoax:

…to warn the 4,000 Jews who worked at the World Trade Center, so that they did not come to work on September 11, 2001, which is what actually happened. Was it a coincidence that 4,000 Jewish employees were absent from work, or what? On the other hand, this warning did not reach the 2,000 Muslims who worked at the World Trade Center. Consequently, there were hundreds of Muslim victims.

So, what is this “Franklin document” that MEMRI claim was cited by Salah immediately preceding the 9/11 hoax?

The “Franklin document / prophecy” is a foul little antisemitic hoax, written in the mid 1930s by an American Nazi, William Dudley Pelley. It falsely claims to be a contemporary account from 1789, of a speech by Benjamin Franklin warning against Jewish immigration to the USA “because they are vampires”. In 1942, Pelley was sentenced to 15 years imprisonment for Nazi sedition.

This is not an antisemitic hoax that is especially well known. It is not, for example, on a par with the notorious Protocols of the Elders of Zion; nor with the aforementioned Blood Libel, or even the thoroughly modern 9/11 lie. It is one for aficionados.

Of course, time will tell if the allegations against Salah in regard to the “Prophecy”are true, or if he himself has also fallen victim to a vicious forgery (and elaborate mistranslation). Nevertheless, it is not the first time we have seen the Franklin hoax here in Britain in a pro-Palestinian (rather than Nazi) context.

One version of it, entitled “Prophecy of Benjamin Franklin in regard of the Jewish race”, caused a minor outrage when it was distributed as a flyer by pro-Palestinian students to those queueing to enter a student debate at Manchester University in February 2002. The flyers bore the name General Union of Palestine Students. The debate motion was to boycott Israeli goods. It failed, but the preamble stated “Anti-Zionism or criticism of Israel is not anti-Semitism” and Jewish students suffered antisemitic atttacks in the days after it. (See para 203 of Parliamentary Inquiry into Antisemitsim pdf, here.)

There is, however, a slightly more extreme variant of the “prophecy”. This is entitled“The Jewish Threat on the American society”. (Both versions appear to be carried on, for example, the notorious American neo-Nazi website, Stormfront.) It warns of Jews:

…they are Vampires and Vampires do not live on Vampires. They cannot live only amongst themselves

…I warn you gentlemen if you do not exclude Jews for all time, your children will curse you in your graves.

This is the version that appeared, in its entirety and without further comment, in issue 2 (Oct-Nov 2000 / Rajab-Sha’ban 1421H) of the English-language Muslim Association of Britain magazine, “The New Dawn”.

Two scans of this appear below. The first shows the article close up. It is short, so you should read it in full.

The second scan shows the article in context, comprising the bottom quarter of page 6 (the “Opinion” page). The only other thing on the opinion page is a continuation of the front page article. This is by Dr Daud Abdullah, one of two people then on the editorial board of The New Dawn, in addition to the General Editor.

This was before Dr Abdullah’s stint at the Muslim Council of Britain, and well before his current role as Director of Middle East Monitor.

Lucy Lips adds:

Here is a photograph of Andy Slaughter MP, Labour’s Shadow Minister for Justice on a platform with Daud Abdullah.