| The War of the Minds: An Analysis of Arab Propaganda | |
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8 Dec 2003 @ 17:37, by Bruce Kodish
The following story "I am Abdul"... The War of the Minds: How to Win It and How to Lose It" by William R. Perl was first published in the Times of Israel and World Jewish Review v.1:no.11 Apr. 1975.
Perl, an American Jew born in Czechoslavakia, helped rescue thousands of Jews from Nazi hands before World War II, later managed to escape to the U.S., and then had a distinguished military career in U.S. Army Intelligence, where he specialized in the psychology of communications and propaganda. After retirement, he worked tirelessly for Soviet Jewry. He died in 1998 at the age of 92 having devoted his life to the Jewish people, to his country--the United States of America, and to the cause of human liberty.
As the Times of Israel described Perl's story, it gives "...a U.S. Army propaganda expert's astonishing analysis of Arab propaganda--and how Jews can still win the war for people's minds. His analysis is presented in a unique fashion--[as a fictional account, after the destruction of the State of Israel, as told] through Arab eyes."
Reading this 1975 story in late 2003, I find that its alternate universe reveals in many ways a soberingly prescient picture of Arab propaganda efforts over the last quarter-century. I have not found this story elsewhere on the World Wide Web and consider it of enough potential interest that I've decided to republish it electronically on this newslog.
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"I am Abdul É The War of the Minds: How to Win It and How to Lose It." by William R. Perl (Times of Israel and World Jewish Review v.1:no.11 Apr. 1975).
I am Abdul Ibn Youssuf Khoury, a professor at American University in Cairo. My specialty is the psychology of public relations or "Propaganda." Now that it is all over, as our flag is flying over Jerusalem, Greater Jaffa and Haifa, the story can be told of how I directed our propaganda. And how we succeeded in turning the trend of world opinion, starting right after the shameful summer of 1967.
Do you remember that June and the rest of the summer and fall of that year? Do you recall how not only the Jews, but the people of the whole world praised Israel's victory as the overcoming of cruel, aggressive Goliath by heroic little David. Well, we have certainly turned the tables on the Jews!
In July, 1967, those truly concerned with Arab unity and Arab power came to me. They knew that the tide in favor of Zionism had to be stemmed and that propaganda is a power more potent than tanks or planes. Propaganda can make the attacked appear the aggressor. More important, it can undermine the enemy's morale.
I have proved that all this can be done and because I am not only a political man, but also an academician, I am recording it all for history. With our final victory, the total elimination of the "State of Israel," the time has come to present this record, to show how we outdid the Jews in intellect, a field they so arrogantly considered their specialty.
I employed the following strategy: I developed a Blueprint of the Arab's War for People's Minds.
First, of course, was to clarify our target. It was not just to regain lands lost in 1967 or even in 1947. Our unalterable aim was the total destruction of the "Jewish State."
To achieve this aim, we applied the following principles: one was to assess our own strengths and weaknesses. Realistically, our target could not be reached without the active aid of one of the superpowers. We had, even before 1967, the support of the Soviet Union, because she wanted to establish herself in the Eastern Mediterranean and, through the Suez Canal, in the Indian Ocean. But as important as these interests were to the Soviets, they would not go to war for them against the United States. Therefore, we had to undermine support for Zionist Israel in America. We had to work with the Soviets on the one hand, and, in America and the rest of the world, against the Jews on the other.
Ultimately the Jews would have to be fought and conquered on the battlefield. We could not close our eyes to the fact that Jewish morale in Palestine was extremely high in '67, and that support of Israel among Jews in the world was a matter of course. Therefore, we decided even then on a seemingly impossible task: first, to reduce, and finally to break the morale of the Jews in Palestine, and to paralyze the support of world Jewry for the "Zionist State." Then, after we had broken their morale by successful propaganda, could we break their necks.
The most important part of the Blueprint was to change the image of Israel in the eyes of the world. The image of a hard-working people who had turned deserts into garden; of an oppressed people who had, after persecutions of many centuries--and finally, the holocaust--obtained a home of their own, had to be altered. We had to convert this image finally in the eyes of the Jews themselves, into one of stubborn victors, of intruders, who by force occupied Arab land.
This almost impossible task proved unbelievably easy! The "clever" Jews did not realize the role propaganda plays in today's life. I almost danced with happiness when, after the '67 disaster, the Israeli government--and, like parrots, Jewish leaders and Jewish newswriters all over the world--called the newly conquered land "occupied territories." For them it was absolutely suicidal from the beginning, and has proven to be so in the long run. Of course "occupied territories" conjures memories of Nazi-occupied France, Poland, Belgium, etc. It carries the connotation of brutal military rule, of oppressing the real will of the population, of shooting hostages, looting and rape. All on their own, the stupid Jews had put on themselves the label of aggressor! They had achieved the, for us, almost unachievable breakthrough of that fable of good little David fighting bad Goliath.
The argument the Jews gave all the time for keeping the "occupied territories" was, believe it or not, an argument that showed them unlawfully sitting on OUR ARAB LAND. They claimed that they held the "territories," not because they were now theirs, but because they "needed" them for their security. The Zionists did not realize that public attitude finally boils down to the individual. The man who owns something figures that nobody is entitled to take it away just because that other person "needs" it.
When after about five years, the Jews started sensing what they were doing to themselves and half-hearted began to speak--sometimes--of "administered territories," they had themselves so firmly established the concept of "occupied territories" that the media all continued to use the Jew-introduced terminology.
"Occupied territories" was truly the great windfall for our Arab propaganda blueprint. We exploited it to the full, charging Israel with militarism, aggression and imperialism and all that goes with it. This included racism and--as unlikely as it seems for so small a country--striving in collusion with Zionists abroad for the domination of the world. We built a Zionist-Nazi monster--made completely out of Jewish parts.
Within several months after the '67 war, the isolation of Israel--until then, the darling of nations--started and progressed from month to month until finally we began slicing off one piece after another. Israel was as isolated as no country has ever been.
It was particularly the young--the idealistic and progressive ones--who not only turned away from Israel, but soon started supporting us. First in America, then in other countries, finally even in Palestine, young Jews started feeling that we Arabs had been robbed--and they turned against Zionism! "Give the Arabs back their land," they would say. And during all this time, the Jew leaders continued shouting, "We shall not return the land because we need their land ourselves." Who would have imagined it!
"PALESTINIANS"
This part of our blueprint was applied simultaneously with "Change of Israel's Image" and was no less important. We had to create the image of a Palestinian nation. Of course, we are all Arabs and aim for one encompassing Arab country, just as Hitler wanted one Greater Germany. As every educated person knows--and can check in the history books--neither a "State of Palestine" nor a "Palestinian people" ever existed. We are all Arabs! But it is much easier to arouse people for the "re-establishment" of a "Palestinian homeland" for the Palestinians than to drum up enthusiasm, sympathy and support for a pan-Arab ideology.
Up to 1967, the struggle was perceived as one between Arabs and Jews. The Arabs, who had fled in 1948, were referred to always as "Arab refugees." We poured many millions of dollars into the propagation of the term "Palestinian." Madison Avenue firms were fed huge amounts of money and one of the largest in America, Hall and Ferris, properly registered as foreign agents with the American authorities, did an admirable job in promoting the feeling that there was once a State called "Palestine" and that a "Palestinian nation" had been displaced by the Jews.
Here, too, the stupid Jew himself did part of our job. The use of the terminology "Palestinian" was never once opposed by him, and so he was beaten from the start. Everyone would understand that if there are Palestinians, they should also have a Palestinian country. And what other country could it be but Palestine? And were not Jerusalem, Jaffa--and its Jew surroundings--Haifa, and Beersheba, always Palestine?
TURNING THE TABLES
In establishing and maintaining their State, the Jews had successfully appealed to humanitarian emotions. I decided to turn the tables on them. The alleging by Jews of their being a homeless people had attracted many young Jews to establish the "Jewish homeland." The appeal of a homeless people for its homeland had proved to be powerful, internationally. So we too demanded a homeland for the "Homeless Palestinians" and thereby found international sympathy and support. We presented our freedom fighters as "refugees" who, by Jewish persecution and intransigence, had suffered for years in dismal tents.
KEEPING UP THE PRESSURE
To achieve our ultimate aim, the disappearance of the State of Israel, the disguising issue of "justice for the homeless Palestinians" had to be kept in the public eye at all times. We had to keep up the pressure. For this we created a terrorist division.
The foolish Jews believed that terrorism would turn the world against us. I knew from principles of propaganda that single acts of terrorism might cause revulsion, but cumulatively, they make the world aware that a solution has to be found. A few dozen of our men made once-proud countries bend--in fact, break--their own laws! Our men, though they had killed citizens of these countries, were released without exception. Finally, these acts caused Secretaries of State of powerful governments, even of the U.S., which claimed to be a country of law, to sit down with those whom they had called barbaric mass murderers and to negotiate with them--as equals!
To make certain of ultimate success, we first had to reduce Israel to undefendable borders, just as in the 1930's the Germans--before they started the war--so ingeniously demanded and got smaller parts of Europe to purchase peace. The world was so eager to find a solution to the problem of "the Palestinians" that it exercised heavy pressure on Israel and on us to defuse the Mideast situation. Again we were the smarter ones. Each time, when demanding a slice, we said "this we want and on this we insist, or else there will be war." As the Israelis showed readiness to compromise and we did not, the pressure, of course, bore entirely on them. And they gave. And they gave.
With the aid of the Soviets, and with the passive aid of silenced American Jews, who had stood quietly by during our preparations, dabbling in what they grandiosly called "quiet diplomacy," the final stroke was delivered. The morale of the Jews was by then so broken that the final war against Israel, although hard, and though it cost us many lives, was not as prolonged as we had anticipated. Our effective propaganda blueprint had undermined full American support and had caused world Jewry to remain just as silent as during the Hitler years.
At the end, the American 6th Fleet saved and evacuated almost 80, 000 Jews. These 80, 000 will never return, just as those German Jews who survived never returned to Germany.
THE COUNTER METHOD: THOUGHTS OF A CHESS PLAYER
For the military leader, warfare is like a chess game. Equally important to one's own move is the anticipation of the opponent's. In psychological warfare, anticipation of enemy measures is not less part of the operation. This report being an analysis of a war for people's minds, I shall briefly outline the other side's actions and omissions, the way the chess player analyzes a game he has played--and won.
A Jewish propaganda campaign would have been simple. Just by publicizing the true facts, they would have completely defeated our own blueprint. Luckily, they never did.
Not only was our effort to change Israel's image not countered, it was actively supported by the enemy, as stated in my notes above. More specifically, the Jews, by their hesitation to annex the conquered lands, and by speaking of "occupied territories," enabled us to construct the joint Arab-Soviet Golem of "Nazi-Zionism."
Chess player that I am, I would have anticipated, from the clever opponent, the following moves regarding our attack on the image:
Announce that the conquered lands were taken after a "ruthless" attack had "again" been waged from them: that they paid for by floods of Jewish blood.
The emphasis should have been: "the lands liberated in 1967 are Jewish lands, stolen from the Jews."
To counter our image of "Arab refugees, driven from the land by force," I would have pointed out that the Jews, as a nation, returned--yes, returned to Palestine in this century under international law. I would have paraded the Balfour Declaration, which promised the Jews re-establishment--and I would have stressed "re-establishment"--of their national home in Palestine and that the League of Nations Mandate to Britain made this a world-wide commitment.
I would have driven home the point that not the tiny portion of Palestine which even recently constituted Israel, including the liberated portions, was the object of these international agreements, but that they included both Cis-and Trans-jordanian lands. And all of this was true; they did not even have to make it up!
I would have published over and over that the British in 1922 "robbed" the Jews of the east bank of Palestine (now Jordan). After all, it was in fact the British who pressured the Jews to give up these 70,000 of the original 96,000 square kilometers--the trans-Jordanian area--against the promise of eternal peace on the part of the Arabs.
I would have trumpeted to the world that from 1918 on, until the invasion by six Arab countries in 1948, the Jews ploughed, seeded and worked the remaining part of Palestine, which of course included the ancient Jewish provinces of Judea and Samaria, an integral part of the Holy Land. That it was Jews who transformed it from deserts and swamps into gardens and lively cities, not Arabs.
I would not have failed to remind the world constantly that during WWII Jews formed the Palestine Brigade which, consisting exclusively of Jews, fought on the side of America, while the Arabs supported Hitler. That it was the Jews and not us, the Arabs, who, after WWII threw the colonial British occupiers out of Palestine, while we Arabs were supported by and then supportive of the British imperialists.
I would have pressed the point that in 1967, after our blockade and all our preparations for Israel's total destruction, the Jews only took back what they had been robbed of in 1948.
I would have based my claim to the re-united lands on the need to punish aggression. The one who loses a war--particularly if he started it--has always had to pay a penalty. In this connection I would have emphasized not just the last thousands of years of history, but also recent events. Did not German-speaking Alsace and Lorraine become French after Germany lost WWI?
If I were a Jewish propagandist, and the USSR would have want[ed] me to give up any land liberated in 1967, I would have said, "Look who's talking! How about returning to the Poles the half of Poland you took from your Polish Ally after WWII? And Moldavia and Bukowina to Rumania? And the Baltic countries to their people? And how about the U.S.A. giving up its southwest to Mexico--and actually all of its land to the American Indians?"
There is nothing as powerful in politics as a fait accompli. The Jewish hesitation, "occupied" "administered" "territories" put the Jews in the wrong from the start, and helped us win our propaganda chess game.
But perhaps worse was the image of the existence of a "Palestinian nation." It was deadly for Israel. I would have pointed out that the last time a state existed in this area, it was the Jewish state, destroyed by the invading Romans in 70 A.D. with the capture of the eternal Jewish capitol of Jerusalem. To capture the world's attention, I would have reminded it that the Romans then minted a coin that read "Judea Capta" and would have hammered it home that, to further irk the conquered Jews, they renamed the Jewish land "Palestine" after the Jews' perennial biblical enemy, the Philistines. I would have shouted to the rooftops that the word "Palestine" entered Latin and Church literature this way, and that "Palestine" always simply meant the Holy Land. Holy to whom? Certainly not holy to the Arabs, who pray towards Mecca, not towards Jerusalem. Christians as well as Jews believe the Bible. I would have reminded them all that, according to the Bible, G-D told Abraham, "And I shall give thee and thy seed after thee all the land of Canaan for an everlasting heritage." Think of it! The Jews had even the Bible on their side. What egregious fools!
As for our success with the image of the homeless Palestinian refugees, I would have countered this by pointing out that three times as many Jews fled from Arab countries into Israel as there were Arabs who, in 1948, without being forced, left Israel in the hope of returning with the victorious Arab armies. I would have reminded the world of the population exchange between the Turks and the Greeks in the 1920's. The world forgot that 3 million Sudeten Germans, driven out of Czechoslavakia, were smoothly integrated into the West German economy. I would have made it clear that the Arabs in camps were not real refugees at all, but political pawns of pan-Arabism.
In every other way, I would have worked to keep the world's sympathy. I would have distributed world-wide the photographs of every murdered Jewish child and mother, of those soldiers who were found after the Yom Kippur War, obviously tortured, with their throats slit, and their hands and feet bound by their own "tefilin". But the stupid Jew amateur in charge of propaganda did not want to hurt the feelings of those soldiers' relatives! Well, this tenderness might have spared feelings, but at what an enormous cost! In our final victory, supported by world opinion, we made certain that there would be no relatives left to feel anything!
Our own terrorism could have been countered by theirs. With Jews living all over the world, this would have been much easier for them than it was for us. I would have directed Jewish terrorism directly against our terrorists anywhere in the world. Instead, they attacked "camps" in Lebanon (and of course, for every attack, we had photographs ready showing women and children killed in the camps). I would also have exercised pressure for the release of Jewish terrorists arrested after their attack abroad. World reaction would then have been against terrorism as such and just pressuring Israel to give in so that our terrorism should stop.
When standing in my opponent's boots, I also wondered why they never mobilized other groups against us, as we so successfully aroused others against them. Our propaganda with the Blacks in Africa and America would have boomeranged on us if the Jews had powerfully focused on the continuing Arab slave trade and on the historical fact that for centuries it was Arabs who rounded up the African Blacks and sold them all over the world. The Jews should have put the limelight on what we were doing to the Blacks in the Sudan, and should have called it--I must admit, correctly--genocide.
I would not have neglected the weapon of historical Arab enmity against the Christians! For this, too, other media than just news items could have been used by the Jews: movies about the Crusades depicting the Arab's refusal to let Christians worship at their Holy Sepulchre and the thousands of Christians we killed. Coins, stamps, songs, novels--all could have served the same coordinated purpose of placing the facts before the public.
I would have ordered and enforced certain "dos" and "don'ts." For example, all Jewish leaders, when speaking of 1948, speak of the "establishment" of the Jewish State. This should have been a "don't"--the "do": "re-establishment"; "Jerusalem"--never! "Our capitol, Jerusalem" or "Our eternal capitol, Jerusalem"--always! Announcements or interviews coming from Tel Aviv--never! All announcements from the capitol--always! East Jerusalem, Arab Jerusalem--never, never, never! Never "Golan Heights"--always "Israeli Height." Never "Sinai"--always "Israeli Sinai, which we Jews put on the map." "Israeli Sinai where Judeo-Christian ethics originates."
Propaganda must be directed towards the primitive as well as towards the educated. After all, by definition, half of all people are below average point of intelligence. For them, matters must be simplified, with the focus on their own interests. Among other slogans, I would have used one which doubtless would have proved very effective: I would have had it printed in hundreds of thousands of leaflets, painted on buildings, set to music. I would have made it an inescapable part of everyone's thoughts: "63 ILLITERATE ARABS AND 40 GOATS CONTROL THE WORLD'S OIL! WILL YOU LET THEM DESTROY YOU?" It would have had appeal even for the not-so-mediocre!
But nothing about all this was done by the bumbling Jews. We Arabs have achieved the greatest change in world public opinion known to history. All the odds were against us in 1967. By the end of 1974, all the odds were against the Jews. Never in history has the result of capable versus impotent propaganda been so dramatically demonstrated.
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Category: Stories
3 comments
8 Dec 2003 @ 17:44 by vibrani : Scarey
The most important part of the Blueprint was to change the image of Israel in the eyes of the world. This is what I have called "buying the big lie," and it's been highly successful and the propaganda has become truth. Everything is turned upside down and made to view it as being rightside up. Tell people the truth now results in being called a racist, a murderer, a liar, and taking sides. Oh yeah, I do take the side of truth! Although it's getting closer and closer to coming to fruition, let's hope that this article never fulfills its complete prophecy. I just posted this in my log from today's news:
Hamas founder and spiritual leader Ahmed Yassin has told the prominent German magazine Der Spiegel, that a Jewish state could be established in Europe in an interview due to be published on Monday.
Opposing any two-state vision of a Palestinian state coexisting next to Israel, Yassin insisted it could only be an interim solution, that could not ultimately work. The Israelis claim 80 per cent of the territory and will only let us have 20 per cent, Yassin argued. Asked if there was no place at all for a Jewish state, he said, "They could set up a state in Europe."
Bruce, care to comment on this one in my log?
15 Dec 2003 @ 12:33 by @24.126.196.158 : fascinating
Hi Bruce,
that opens a completely new point of view for me.
It is extremely interesting for me as a german - seeing how a completely pro-israel state of mind has already turned to suspicion now:
During the six-day war we, as students, had radios in school - generally forbidden - to follow the success of israel ... all that has now changed dramtically where elections can be won with a stance against israel.
I had my own experience being subject to pervasive propaganda, as I described in my blog, and with that in mind, I really have to say now - even more convinced - hell, I don't know what is going on, who is right and who is wrong (I know, there is no right and wrong anyways, ok), but it sure is fascinating what power propaganda has - - - shouldn't there be a way to use that more egotistically ;-)
22 Dec 2003 @ 12:26 by Bruce @24.205.69.22 : The Power of Pervasive Propaganda
Hi Gunter,
Your good sense is showing. 8-)
If only the Arab governments, includng Israel's 'peace' partners of Egypt and Jordan spent as much time, effort and money on peace as on the propaganda effort and building up their militaries against the 'EVIL ZIONISTS', there might actually be peace. As things stand, such policy would not benefit the current Arab governments. The fact that the Arab masses for the most part hate Jews and Israel doesn't really mean that they benefit however. Their government's propaganda barrage must continue to demonize Israel and the Jews in order to reduce the pressure of reforming their tyrannical regimes, such as Arafat's police state (more policemen per capita than any other government in the world--one year after its establishment the Palestinian Police force had one policeman for every 40 residents, and Arafat used them to crush any opposition to his terrorists rule).
Many Arabs actually know this in their heart of hearts but most except for some exceptional extraordinarily brave souls cannot or will not say it.
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