In his May 17, 2011 column in the Saudi daily Al-Iqtisadiya, Dr. 'Abd Al-Rahman Al-Trairi, who is also a professor at King Sa'ud University, expressed support for claims by Roger Garaudy and other well-known Holocaust deniers questioning the number of people who perished in the Holocaust, and said that the Jews had taken advantage of the Holocaust in order to coerce the world into establishing the state of Israel. Al-Trairi protested a recent decision by the Israeli Ministry of Education requiring Israeli Arab pupils to study the Holocaust as part of their matriculation curriculum, claiming that Israel's schoolbooks ignore the Palestinian narrative and do not consider the "other" to be equal. He also dismissed as groundless claims which first arose in the wake of 9/11 that Saudi schoolbooks convey messages of hatred and encourage terrorist acts.
Following are excerpts from the column:[1]
"It is Irrational that Six Million [Jews] were Killed"
"The Jews have [long] kept the world preoccupied with the Holocaust, and continue to do so... They have excelled in their tactics, legislating laws that forbid questioning the Holocaust and accusing anyone who does so of antisemitism. They have taken advantage of schoolbooks to publish only material that encourages solidarity with [the Jews], as a persecuted people that has suffered tragedies at the hands of the peoples among whom they live. They even succeeded in convincing the West, particularly Britain and the U.S., to establish their state on the soil of Palestine and to support it in all realms: economic, military, political, and technological.
"In order to prove that they are loyal to the Jews, and not antisemitic, the Western countries have prosecuted philosophers and prominent figures, such as French philosopher Roger Garaudy. [Garaudy] did not question whether there was a Holocaust, but [only] the number of its [victims] – since it is irrational that six million people were killed, particularly when we know there are not many Jews worldwide, no more than 15 million. How [then] can it be believed that in Germany alone six million Jews were killed during the Second World War? A British historian was also subjected to the same fate when he was sentenced to prison for raising doubts about how many were killed in what the Jews call 'the Holocaust.'
"Recently, the Zionist entity's Ministry of Education mandated that Arab high school students with Israeli citizenship answer a question on the Holocaust [as part of their history matriculation exam]. [This was done] with the aim of forcing Jewish history on the Palestinians and cutting them off from their own history, which is full of nakbas [catastrophes] carried out by the Jews, who pretend to weep over what befell them [i.e. the Palestinians] throughout history.
"This move reveals the perception of those in charge of education and culture in the Zionist entity vis-à-vis the critical and important role of education in shaping minds and emotions. Jewish history is forced on the residents of Palestine, while as far as the official educational institutions of the Zionist entity, the Palestinians' history does not exist. The Palestinians are a minority in the [Zionist] entity state, and they are required to study the history of the majority... even if the majority is a hangman, and a plunderer of lands."
"Claims that the Saudi Curricula Contained [Messages of] Hatred and Extremism were a Lie"
"When 9/11 happened, Western media and politicians, especially in the U.S., claimed that the schoolbooks and curricula in the [Saudi] kingdom feed terrorism and produce extremism... With the increased attacks against the kingdom, I, along with my colleagues in the [university's] education department, felt a need to confront these accusations with scientific data based on studies of schoolbooks and curricula of several countries. In the year 1424 of the Hijra calendar [2003], we held a convention... at which 44 such studies [were discussed], including studies on the Zionist entity... the U.S., Britain, France, Russia, Australia, South Africa, and others, scientifically and rigorously analyzing the content [of these countries' school curricula]. The results of these studies showed that claims that the Saudi curricula contained [messages of] hatred and extremism were a lie [fabricated to facilitate] extortion and self exoneration. The studies' findings [also] made clear that the curricula of the Zionist entity are full of slander and imprecation directed at the other, whom they portray in a negative light, while emphasizing a sense of superiority over him. The curricula even state that foreigners are meant to tend to the welfare of the Jews and to serve them. [In them,] the Arabs are described as scorpions, snakes, crooks, and swindlers. The curricula of other countries also have plenty [of content] portraying the other as repulsive...
"Harnessing education, through its official and unofficial institutions... is considered vital and fundamental for any nation wishing to merit a place alongside the rest of the nations of the world, so that it can maintain its identity and its interests."
[1] Al-Iqtisadiya (Saudi Arabia), May 17, 2011.
