Editorial cartoonists across the Arab and Muslim world have once again turned to using "deeply offensive and hateful caricatures of Israelis and Jews" in their criticism of Israel in the aftermath of the Gaza flotilla affair.
The following compilation shows how in the days following the Israeli naval operation in the Mediterranean Sea to stop the flotilla from reaching Gaza, editorial cartoonists across the Arab world turned the incident into a cause célèbre, with cartoons punctuated with vicious anti-Israel and anti-Semitic images.
Bahrain
Akhbar al-Khalij, June 3, 2010
Akhbar al-Khalij, June 1, 2010
Headline: "Monster of the High Seas Created by the West."
The ship is labeled "Freedom Flotilla (Marmara ship)."
Egypt
Ruz al-Yusuf, June 2, 2010
Headline: "The Israeli Attack on the Freedom Flotilla." The Israeli soldier is saying: "I don't understand why the world is so shocked by me. I've been killing innocent people all my life and no one spoke to me (about it)…"
Ruz al-Yusuf, June 1, 2010
Sign on the ship's mast reads "Aid." Man on the Island of "Gaza."
Al-Yaum as-Sabe', June 1, 2010
Headline: "A Zio-American Arab Massacre."
The ship is labeled: "Freedom Flotilla to Gaza."
Gaza - Hamas
Filastin, June 2, 2010
Headline: "Washington is Preventing the Condemnation of the Flotilla Massacre."
Jordan
As-Sabil, June 2, 2010
Ad-Dustur, June 1, 2010
Headline: "Gaza is Receiving the Peace Activists."
Al-Yaum as-Sabe', June 1, 2010
Headline: "A Zio-American Arab Massacre."
The ship is labeled: "Freedom Flotilla to Gaza."
Al-Ghad, June 1, 2010
Headline: "Freedom Flotilla."
Al-'Arab al-Yawm, May 31, 2010
The ship is labeled: "Freedom Flotilla."
The world and the shark with the Israeli helmet are awaiting the ship.
Kuwait
Al-Jarida, June 2, 2010
Al-Jarida, June 1, 2010
Lebanon
Al-Balad, June 2, 2010
Al-Balad, June 1, 2010
Headline: "19 were killed in the Israeli Massacre against the Freedom Flotilla."
The ship is labeled "Gaza" and on the flag it says "Freedom."
An-Nahar, June 1, 2010
Headline: "Israeli Attack against the Freedom Flotilla."
The sign is pointing to "Gaza."
Oman
Al-Watan, June 2, 2010
The ship is labeled "The Freedom Flotilla" the man on the left represents "The West."
Oman, June 1, 2010
The ship is labeled "Freedom Convoy."
The man being beaten by the Jewish man is holding a sign that reads: "Free Gaza."
Al-Watan, May 30, 2010
On the upper part of the sand watch: "Life," on the lower part: "Gaza."
Palestinian Authority
Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 2, 2010
Qatar
Ash-Sharq, June 3, 2010
Headline: "International Criticism Regarding the Massacre."
Ar-Raya, June 2, 2010
Al-Watan, June 2, 2010
In Arabic: "Terror State."
Ar-Raya, June 1, 2010
Headline: "The Latest Israeli Horror Movie."
Ar-Raya, June 1, 2010
Headline: "The Israeli Naval Attack against the Freedom Flotilla."
Ar-Raya, May 30, 2010
Saudi Arabia
Al-Iqtisadiyya, June 2, 2010
Okaz, June 2, 2010
Al-Watan, June 1, 2010
Al-Madin, May 31, 2010
The ship on the left is the "Freedom Flotilla," its flag reads "Aid." The ship on the right is "The Israeli Navy." The piece of land on the right: "Gaza."
Al-Madin, May 30, 2010
Headline: "Expectation:" on the sign: "Gaza."
Syria
Syria News, June 1, 2010
United Kingdom
Al-Quds al-'Arabi, June 3, 2010
On the dolphin: "Freedom Flotilla."
Yemen
Al-Jumhuriyya, June 2, 2010
In Arabic: "The Blood of the Freedom Flotilla Martyrs."
Articles
- "Pirates, killers, barbarians, violators of the international law, people who have nothing to do with humanity, people who are possessed with force as a response to the entire world, people and nations, racists, fascists and some other descriptions…All the descriptions are right, but they have been used for a long time already against the arrogant enemy…"
Fathi al-Bass, "The Sea Battle and the Compromise," Al-Hayat al-Jadida, June 3, 2010 (PA)
- "The massacre committed by the Israeli forces against the peace activists in the Mediterranean will not be the last as long as its government is convinced that it will escape from punishment as happened in all previous crimes…"
"This is not the Last Massacre," (editorial) Al-Ahram, June 3, 2010 (Egypt)
- "… The human conscience should wake up. The world should rise against this era's pirates, the killers of the prophets and the servants of the Satan…"
Saleh bin 'Afsan al-Kawari (editor in-chief), "The Israeli Mask Failed," Ar-Raya, June 3, 2010 (Qatar)
- "…The UAE is Calling for Gulf Coordination that will Punish Israel for its Behavior
The UAE renewed its condemnation of the criminal and inhumane attack committed by Israel against the human naval aid flotilla to Gaza, which led to the death of 19 civilians and some injured…."
"The UAE National Committee is Condemning the Attack against the Human Freedom Flotilla," Al-Ittihad, June 2, 2010 (UAE)
- "..We did not need to see the Israelis murdering the peace activists in international waters to realize that Israel is a criminal state. This is because Israel can be summed up in its entirety by one word: 'crime'. Also, the Israelis' dominant feature is that they are thieves who have been stealing the land from its original owners since 1948…"
Jihad al-Khazen, "The Governments' Failure and Popular Ignorance Are Sufficient," Al-Hayat, June 2, 2010 (UK)
- "…There is no lower, impure, evil-smelling and humiliating than someone who puts his hand in the hands of the Jews, without differentiating between them as a non-Zionist may become a Zionist one day. There is no despicable more than someone who extends his hand to them or does them a favor. The Zionists are committing the ugliest crime in the middle of the sea against the Turk relief group, who came to help the besieged Gaza... "
Muhammad al-Walidi, "Jews without Conscience and Heart," Watan, June 2, 2010 (Jordan)
- "The whole of Israel has veered to extremism and to the right. There is no difference between right and left anymore. Everyone is an extremist, and Israel is exposing itself to the world. There are no peace doves among Israelis…
Israel has stripped its legitimacy with its own hands. It is an illegal settlement outpost in the first place, which was established on the lands of the Palestinians, after killing, destroying and dispossessing [the Palestinians], and after lying to the whole world under the guise of the Holocaust, while its government and army committed the same crimes against the Palestinians that the Nazis committed against the Jews.
After decades of lies, the world no longer believes Israel's claims about a country under siege and a moral army, when Israel is blockading the Palestinians to the point where the Gaza Strip has become an open-air Nazi concentration camp. Israel also threatens neighboring countries and their peoples, and even Iran a thousand miles away. As for its army, it is devoid of morality and is nothing short of a neo-Nazi gang…
Israel has lost its legitimacy, and anyone who supports it is a war criminal just like its government, army, settlers and their myths."
Jihad al-Khazen, "I Condemn Myself As I Am One of Them," Al-Hayat, June 1, 2010 (UK)
- "The Israeli massacre against European, Turk, Jordanian, Algerian and Lebanese civilians, who went to Gaza to help innocent, delivering bread and pills. They were innocent people, who went to express solidarity with innocent people; innocent people who rode the high seas and took the risk in order to wipe the tears of the Gaza children and to break the silence of the civilized world in regards to the biggest scandal of humanity in the modern era. The Israeli massacre occurred at the sea, in international water, without there being any provocation of any kind against the Israeli soldiers who went in submarines and war vessels and aircraft to face the fleet of freedom.
The Israeli massacre is simply an expression of the true face of the Israeli racial apartheid regime; it is also the embodiment of the Nazi regime by all means. It does not differ from what the Nazis did to the Jews, if indeed what the Nazis did to the Jews is a historical fact. The Israeli massacre against unarmed civilians is simply a clear message to all Arabs and to the entire civilized world that (Israel) is over the law and that Jewish blood is sacred and that non-Jews are the Goyim, as alleged in the Zionist movement's racial Talmud and in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion…"
"Statement Issued by the Jordanian United Front Regarding the Massacre against the 'Liberty Fleet'," Ammon News, June 1, 2010 (Jordan)
© 2010 Anti-Defamation League
