Other interesting reactions to Joel Pollak’s zany oped in the Washington Post are surfacing. Many refute his characterization of a standard Arabic textbook, Al-Kitaab, as propagandistic. Far from being based on facts, his piece exposed the currency of anti-Arab bias. Even esteemed outlets like the Post drop the evidentiary standards for gobbly-gook such as Pollak’s.
Pollak, a research assistant for prolific torture advocate Alan Dershowitz, was recently called a “precocious neo-con” by Phillip Weiss. The journalist dismissed Pollak’s analysis as “condescending” out-dated Orientalism.
The Atlantic’s Matthew Yglesias hit back at Pollak with a sharp, satirical riff applauding his courage to “speak truth to weakness and stand up for the view that as narrow a range of opinions as possible should be expressed in America.” [The comments section of his blog are quite illuminating as well -- one commenter used the book at the US Military's Defense Language Institute.]
These comments mirror our own QuiQui’s introduction to his piece. She warned you “might get a kick out of this alarmist, and I must say ridiculous, dangerous, and outrageous article.” That is, his arguments would be laughable if they were not so potentially destructive — only because absurdist vilification has been the name of the game in the Bush administration. We laughed at Bush and his silly mumblings…
Pollak’s analysis — like Bush’s imagined WMDs claims — falls apart at the seams. One commenter on Yglesias’s blogs argued:
Pollak is basically trying to cow Middle East studies departments by calling for more governmental oversight. This threat is based on a total disregard for facts:
1. Al-Kitaab’s 3 maps either DO show Israel or come from the WWI period — before Israel even existed.
2. The passage on Nasser that Pollak refused to recite because it was “propaganda” translates as follows (p. 338):
“Gamal Abdel Nasser was born in Egypt in 1918 and spent his childhood in Alexandria where his father worked in the post office. When his mother died, his father sent him to his uncle in Cairo. After his graduation from high school, he joined the Egyptian army and became an officer. He and a group of young officers called the ‘Free Officers’ ejected King Faruq from Egypt on 23 July 1952 and thus Egypt became a republic. In 1954 Abdel Nasser became the first president of Egypt, and remained president until his death in 1970. Afterwards, Anwar al-Sadat assumed the presidency of Egypt. Nasser’s most noted achievements included the nationalization of the Suez Canal, the United Arabic Republic, and the High Dam in Aswan.”
Not sure how that’s supposed to turn loyal Americans into west-hated fanatics.
Out of Pollak’s smoke-and-mirrors show, one thing is clear: Pollak is more than an innocent student hoping to learn Arabic. The Washington Post failed to pick up on his agenda.
He is a rabidly pro-Israel activist who plants suspicion of all things Muslim and Arab in every shadow. For instance, on his blog, he actually suggests that Harvard Law School is promoting Jihad. Why? It sponsored an Islamic finance forum. Like one of Pavlov’s dogs, Pollak waters at the mouth with images of terrorism when he hears the word “Islamic.” In the paranoid style of an Islamophobe, Islamic activities necessarily imply terrorism connections:
Shari’a-compliant funds must apparently donate money to charity to compensate for investments in non-shari’a-compliant enterprises. These charitable funds (zakat) have on several occasions been linked to terror funding networks.
Maybe Pollak should be spending more time studying the Al-Kitaab textbook and less time dreaming up Islamist conspiracies. “Zakat,” despite his junior attempt at translation, does not refer to the “charitable funds” of Pollak’s concerns. Zakat means “almsgiving” and is one of the pillars of Islam. It refers to donations, not the organized charity groups Pollak is thinking. A simple Wikipedia search could have helped.
There is something more ludicrous about his argument. American politicians have on occasion ripped off the public. So let’s have a panel on corruption in every conference on American politics. Or how would Pollak react to the argument that the many occasions of Israeli espionage in the United States means there should be a panel on Israeli spying during forums about US-Israel relations (though Israeli espionage in the US is a vastly under-discussed topic).
That the Washington Post gave voice to such a amateurish attempt at hatemongering, supported by deceptive distortion of a book too many are familiar with (and therefore was so easily refutable), is disappointing.
Related posts:
- LEARNING ARABIC WITH AL-KITAAB as interpreted by a Zionut
- In Maha’s Defense
- The World Loses Naguib Mahfouz
- Awkwardness in Arabic Class
- On The Arabic Joke
Yeah, this guy's a douche. There's one or two on every campus, and while everybody on campus knows not to take them too seriously, they seem to be the only ones who make the press.
The "one or two douchebags in every bunch" rule applies to most Israel Alliance clubs I've seen, but no side has a monopoly. Take, for instance, this remarkably stupid NYT op-ed from 2005, so hilariously bad that I remember it three years later:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/23/opinion/23abdrabboh.html?_r=1&oref;=login&oref;=slogin
Or, for instance, the Muslim Students Association at UCI, a little ways down the road from me, who always seem to be in the news for getting up to some College-Republicans-esque bullshit or another.
College campuses get a lot of people. Some of them are not the brightest bulbs, even at top schools. Some of the dimmer bulbs still get their op-eds published.
So, any thoughts on the prisoner swap Israel is doing? Less of a 'swap' and more of a give-away, amirite?
Posted by Joe | July 17, 2008, 5:40 pmNo, it is a swap. After all, if Israel didn’t value the bodies of those soldiers enough, it wouldn’t trade them for those it holds captive. Swap is a fair term here.
Posted by Anonymous | July 17, 2008, 10:50 pmJoel Pollak: what is he good for? ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. This idiot tried weasel attacks on my law school professor for a semester but it backfired and he ended up alienating everyone with his blind loyalty to the State That Can Do No Wrong. I’d pay for him to spend 48 hours at a Palestinian refugee camp.
Posted by S.T. | July 18, 2008, 6:35 amI’d pay for him to spend 48 hours at a Palestinian refugee camp.
I thought it was me paying for Palestinians to stay in refugee camps? I probably paid for that stupid ass propaganda piece posing as an Arabic language primer too! You know, back when I was in school we only got propagandized about the coming Ice Age and the horrors of marijuana. But that was in social studies, not in language courses. I wonder what “Maria” is going through in Spanish class? She was such a good hardworking girl! But I bet she’s a crack whore and wannabe marxist these days, right QuiQui? Thank God for progress! It’s good to “educate” people while they try to learn foreign languages, isn’t it?
Posted by programmer craig | July 20, 2008, 4:39 amI thought it was me paying for Palestinians to stay in refugee camps?
Yup, with all the tax money that goes towards supporting Israel’s occupation:)
What is it that offends you about learning foreign cultures?
Posted by Mohammad | July 20, 2008, 9:12 amYou sent this to the Post, right?
Posted by Guns | July 20, 2008, 12:11 pm“Yup, with all the tax money that goes towards supporting Israel’s occupation”
No, he means the billions we’ve spent giving the 38th generation of Palestinians free food, medical care, education, housing, etc. through UNRWA. Possibly the most subsidized people in the history of mankind, with no end in sight.
The “thanks” to our billions? Hatred. Violence. Jihad. KabobFest.
Posted by Anonymous | July 21, 2008, 4:14 pmThe United States has spent ‘billions’ on Palestinian refugees?
Why do you embarrass yourself so?
If you want though, you can try to advocate for the end of occupation, oppression and dispossession that keeps us refugees. You might save a couple bucks.
Posted by Mohammad | July 22, 2008, 7:29 amas for al-Kitaab, honestly – propaganda? I know the textbook well. one of my professors was a contributor to it. he said that all the literature in it was taken from material published elsewhere, nothing was written for the textbook (as far as essays and the like)but wait….could khalid and maha be sending subliminal messages? lol
p.s. – I am sad to see the trolls are back at it….just when you think it’s safe to have a real discussion….haziin!
Posted by alfannaan | July 23, 2008, 12:29 amHello, also like the Madagaskar movies, very good film!
Posted by Daryl Bacigalupi | June 17, 2010, 3:17 am