Hateful Arab ship cartoons draw rebuke

ADL says surge of anti-Semitic cartoons in Arab media post-flotilla.

By HAVIV RETTIG GUR
311_Arab cartoon (photo credit: Al Watan, Qatar, June 2, 2010)
311_Arab cartoon
(photo credit: Al Watan, Qatar, June 2, 2010)
In the wake of the Gaza flotilla affair, the Arab world’s media hasseen a surge in publication of political cartoons depictinganti-Semitic stereotypes and “hateful caricatures,” the Anti-DefamationLeague says.
“In the days since the Israeli naval operation... editorial cartoonistsacross the Arab world have turned the incident into a cause célèbre,with cartoons punctuated by vicious anti-Israel and anti-Semiticimages,” according to a statement published by the ADL over the weekendtogether with a report that compiled some of the drawings.
RELATED:Flotilla activists: Go back to AuschwitzNasrallah calls for 'Freedom flotilla II', praises Turkey Among the cartoons flagged by the organization as anti-Semitic was one published on Wednesday in Qatar’s Al-Watan daily that depicted  “a stereotypical hook-nosed, black-hatted Jew” floating in water. He holds a bloody machete in one hand and an assault rifle in another, while his lower body is composed of tentacles arranged to spell “dawlat il-irhab,” or “terror state” in Arabic.
In another, published on the same day in Saudi Arabia’s Al-Iqtisadiyya, an Israeli flag flies over a pirate’s skull-and-bones, with the Star of David replaced by a swastika.
Such cartoons amount to “an acceptance, even an obsession with deeply offensive and hateful caricatures of Israelis and Jews” in the Arab world, according to the ADL’s national director, Abe Foxman. “The cartoonists are fanning the flames of hatred across the region,” he said.
In particular, the report objects to the repeated depiction of Jews as monstrous marine wildlife and satanic figures. The cartoons appeared in mainstream newspapers in Jordan, Egypt, Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.