PhDiva provides a link to an interview in which Egypt's Antiquities Pharaoh, Zahi Hawass, maintains that "Jews control the entire world." See: http://phdiva.blogspot.com/2009/04/zahi-hawass-anti-semite.html Unfortunately, Hawass' views are common not only in Egypt, but in other parts of the Arab world as well. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabs_and_antisemitism
Hawass' anti-semetic comments also have some relevance to cultural patrimony issues. Archaeology has been promoted in places like Egypt for blatantly nationalistic purposes. In extreme cases, such as in Baathist Iraq, nationalism and anti-semetism have even combined to promote the erasure of evidence of the presence of Jewish culture in the archaeological record. See: http://culturalpropertyobserver.blogspot.com/2008/07/joffee-critiques-justifications-for.html
Yet, archaeological activists continue to promote the jingoistic nationalism of countries like Egypt and Iraq and in so doing lionize individuals like Zahi Hawass. Why?
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2 comments:
Hello Peter,
For what it is worth, Zahi Hawass has responded saying his words were taken out of context. His account is
here on his blog.
Criticising Jews is not anti-Semitic as a group when they themselves act as a tightly knit bunch with strong and overt ethnocentrism which in itself is blatant racism against non-Jews.
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