Eurabia: The Founding Myth of Contemporary Islamophobia - Part One

Islamophobic conspiracy theories are as old as the faith itself; with such theories becoming popular through historical periods like the Crusades, through to the fall of the Ottoman Empire. Reinvigorated by the works of recent writers and independent historians, these theories continue today; where they form source material for thought-leaders, propagandists, politicians, content creators, and even film-makers.  

One of the figureheads behind the development of contemporary Islamophobic ideologies is Ba’at Yeor, whose influential theses Dhimmitude and Eurabia, established a historical bedrock for subsequent Islamophobic movements and ideologies. Dhimmitude constructs a history of non-Muslim subjugation under Muslim rule; where Christians and Jews were dominated and subservient to their Muslim overlords. Eurabia projects this history of dhimmitude into the future; warning of the domination of Europe by Arab powers creating Eurabia. She warns that soon this domination will extend its reach across the Western world. It is regarded as a dangerous conspiracy theory that signals a call for resistance to what it describes as Muslim invasion and conquest.  

Her hypotheses have become foundational mythologies for contemporary Islamophobia; contributing greatly to the anxieties and paranoia around Muslims and multiculturalism. Her work has become a resource for far-right politicians; from the American Republican party, the AfD in Germany, the Dutch Freedom Party and more, and has also inspired Islamophobic movements like the Counter Jihad Movement and Stop the Islamization of Europe. Critically, it has directly motivated acts of terror like the Oslo and Camp Utoya killer, Anders Behring Breivik. 

Survivors of the Camp Utoya massacre by Anders Breivik

Yeor’s Eurabia as well as her history of dhimmitude have been considered conspiracy theories and rejected by most academics and historians; the main criticism is not that she manufactures her own history, but rather that she selectively submits factual historical events without providing the complete picture. The ideology she communicates is evident not only in what she includes, but importantly, by what she excludes; failing to portray a balanced objective history and rather developing a particular version of history that presents an anti-Muslim ideology. Israel’s own Haaretz newspaper considers her works entirely conspiratorial, even reflecting them as a Jewish version of The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion – a famous antisemitic conspiracy document popular amongst the Nazi party (Schwartz, 2006). 

Similarly, the complicity of governmental elites in facilitating this invasion is also common to both Eurabia and the Great Replacement, as well as the White Genocide conspiracy theory. This has led to critics of Yeor highlighting the fact that in developing her Islamophobic mythology, she has developed her own version of a centuries old antisemitic conspiracy – the Jewish elites who control government; referred to as the Zionist Occuptaional Government conpisracy theory. 

Who is Bat Yeor? 

Bat Yeor, real name Giselle Littmann

Bat Yeor – whose real name is Giselle Litmann – a Jewish academic and writer, was herself born in a Muslim nation, Egypt. Litmann’s pseudonym, “Bat Yeor”, translates to “Daughter of the Nile”. Her family fled to Egypt from Italy when Mussolini came to power. Her personal experiences as a Jewish child growing up in a Muslim land – from which they eventually also fled (during the Suez Crisis in which Israel, along with the French and British, invaded Egypt) – have likely impacted her perceptions of Islam and Muslim.  

In a 2007 interview for the Israel Magazine; Yeor describes her upbringing:  

My father decided to renounce Italian nationality as a result of Mussolini's racist laws, but when Nasser came to power, my mother's goods were confiscated because she was French and my father's because he was Jewish. We were forced to stay home, we were chased out of public places and at that moment we decided to flee Egypt. Many fled secretly from fear of being imprisoned. (Darmon, 2007)  

Yeor’s mythologies – from Eurabia to Dhimmitude – seem to stem as much from her own personal traumas than they do from history. Her writing is heavily loaded with ideological weight and criticisms of antisemitism under Muslim governance. She staunchly defends Israel; and much of her criticism seems to stem from Arab-Israeli antagonism; which she experienced first hand when Israel invaded Egypt during the Suez Crisis from which her family fled. Her Eurabia thesis claims that antisemitism (which she often conflates with a resistance to Israel) is a shared commonality amongst the European and Arab powers – and highlights their guilt in attempting to subjugate Jewish populations in Europe. This resistance to Israel is, for her, also a resistance to the United States – Israel's key ally.

In Eurabia – The Euro-Arab Axis, Yeor explains: 

In this book, Euro-Arab Judeophobia will be examined only as an indicator of the common Euro-Arab culture that is permeating, even overwhelming, all levels of West European society. It is no easy task to avoid an analysis of the current European Judeophobic trend. 

Under the euphemism of ‘‘peace process,’’ the EU has made Israel the cornerstone of its relations with the Arab states, with the USA, and of its own security—as a quid pro quo against Islamist terror.  

Hence, from whatever angle we observe these three positions, we find that Israel is at the core of Europe’s strategies. In fact, as it will become clearer in the following pages, under Arab pressure, the EU has willingly made Israel hostage to its own Arab policy and its security.

(Yeor, 2005, p11) 

Furthermore, her writing echoes the ideology of American Exceptionalism (which sees America as unique and exceptional compared to other countries); and reflects right-wing American critiques of Europe, which see it as having fallen to multiculturalism. This, claims Yeor, is the same policy that Europe is subjecting Israel to.

In recent times, Elon Musk and other far-right online pundits have contributed to the rising panic of multiculturalism in Europe; specifically framed through an American lens which sees Europe as a fallen empire whose resistance has waned, eroded, or been bought. From Elon Musk’s resurrection of the grooming gangs scandal, to the narratives of ‘no-go’ Sharia zones in European countries perpetuated by right-wing media outlets and popular amongst right-wing American conservative circles.  

What we see from Yeor’s writings is very much a telling of history within a consistent ideological framework that supports a particular mythology. She does not fabricate history, but rather appropriates certain historical events to develop a particular ideological framework consistent with far-right beliefs. According to Roland Barthes, the semiotician who developed the study of mythologies, myth is based on history; however, myth appropriates and distorts history into constructing its mythology. This is what we see the selective history of Bat Yeor. 

Yeor was long considered an amateur historian and not someone taken particularly seriously in academics. However, following 9/11 and the panic around Muslims and Islam that it inspired; her works started becoming increasingly popular. In an article by Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Yeor as quoted as saying: "In Europe I was only invited to small conferences at first. They didn't even mention my name in publications. In the United States, I am certain that the September 11 attacks woke people up, including the Jewish community that had previously ignored me, because it belongs more to the left." (Schwartz, 2006) 

Yeor would go onto give speeches to the United States Congress and the United Nations, as well as many pretigious Universities like Yale and Brown. Her talks often focus on the historical subjugation of non-Muslims under Muslim rule; which she calls dhimmitude. Dhimmitude is the foundation from which her theory of Eurabia is based on. ‘Dhimmi’ means a ‘pact’, between the Muslim leadership and the non-Muslim subjects. It specifically implies a pact of protection in which the dhimmis pay a tax called jizya which relinquises them from military service and similar obligations towards the state. Additionally, this only applies to healthy men of military age; and Muslim citizens were subjected to separate taxes and other civil obligations. Yeor coined the term ‘Dhimmi-tude’ to describe dhimmi as servitude and subjugation of non-Muslim populations under Muslim rule; seeing them at best as second-class citizens, and at worst as a persecuted minority.   

Here I wish to stress a point: When, in 1983, I coined a new term, "dhimmitude," all those processes by which a society - an ethnic collective group - either managed to survive, defending itself, or was ultimately destroyed. The study of dhimmitude is not the same as the study of the dhimmi condition itself, because dhimmitude concerns the inner politics and inter-relations of a collectivity, which coexists encapsulated within its Islamic environment.  (Yeor, 2005) 

The fears conjured up by (what I call) Dhimmi-tudism (the belief and fears of Dhimmitude emerging in the West) reflect anxieties of immigrant Muslim populations becoming the majority and subjugating the native non-Muslim population. Thus, dhimmitudism realizes the fears of Eurabia and theories like it; like Renaud Camus’ the Great Replacement, which also sees the white non-Muslim population of France, Europe, and the world, becoming subjugated under a growing Muslim majority. 

Yeor even begins her talk to Congress with the words, “The Past is Prologue”, a phrase from Shakespeare’s The Tempest, meaning that the past demonstrates to us the future that is to come; which in this case, means that the past era of Muslim rule and non-Muslim subjugation is prologue to another era of non-Muslim subjugation under Muslim rule. Phrases like these powerfully connote the ideological nature of Yeor’s theses; one of fears and anxieties of a past repeating itself. Her work on dhimmitude seems to draw on the historic persecution of Jewish minorities to cultivate a sense of inherited trauma amongst a non-Muslim audience; which she then projects into the future with Eurabia, claiming that the reinstitution of dhimmitude is imminent as a result of immigration and left liberal policies. 

Eurabia – The Euro-Arab Axis 

Eurabia is a conspiracy theory that claims immigrants from Arab Muslim nations are eclipsing the populations of the European countries they immigrate to; leading to Europe becoming Arab, or, “Eurabia” (a portmanteau of Europe and Arabia). The term actually has its roots decades to prior to Yeor’s work; however, Yeor reinvigorated the term, reintroducing it as a completely packaged discourse with allegedly supporting historical evidence. This is similar to Renaud Camus’ Great Replacement; the term (‘the Great Replacement’) had originated many years prior, through a racist dystopian novel titled The Camp of the Saints (1975) by Jean Raspail – in which France is overrun by Indian refugees. 

The Eurabia claim posits that European governments and other elite classes in society are conspiring with Arab governments in order to secure lucrative oil deals; in exchange, these European elites facilitate the incoming immigration of these Arab and Muslim immigrants. It frames Europe as being in a state of subjugation to Arab nations; in essence, it claims that Europe is in a state of dhimmitude. 

In Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis, Yeor details a history of European and Arab relations dating to the Euro-Arab Dialogue that began after the 1973 Arab-Israeli War (also known as the Fourth Arab-Israeli War, the Ramadaan War, and the Yom Kippur War) with the combined Arab oil trading countries determining to place trade embargos on all the nations that supported Israel in anytime during the war. The war was a failed attempt by Egypt and Syria to reclaim territories it had lost to Israel during previous Israeli-led expansionist invasions into these territories (like the Six Day War).  

Following the war, the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Companies (OAPEC) declared a total oil embargo on the Israeli-allied countries – these included the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Japan and the Netherlands. Later, Portugal, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), and Apartheid-era South Africa were also added to the list. This event became known as the First Oil Shock, or the 1973 Oil Crisis, and had global ramifications for all countries cut off from trade with the Arab oil powers.  

This led to the beginning of the Euro-Arab Dialogue; wherein both European powers and Middle Eastern powers recognized the need for cooperation in the face of shared strategic interests. It is this union that Yeor highlights and heavily criticizes, seeing it as a failure of European culture, and the cost of European greed, in the face of the Arabian oil market. In Yeor’s Eurabia book, she writes of the perceived dwindling power of Europe: 

European powers instinctively resisted jihad— militarily when necessary—to protect their independence. The response of post–Judeo-Christian Europe of the late twentieth century has been radically different. Europe, as reflected by the institutions of the EU, has abandoned resistance for dhimmitude, and independence for integration with the Islamic world of North Africa and the Middle East. The three most apparent symptoms of this fundamental change in European policy are officially sponsored anti-Americanism, antisemitism/anti-Zionism and ‘‘Palestinianism.’’ p10 

Observing this disturbing phenomenon, one gets the impression of a sinking continent, a colossal Titanic wreck, where the passengers run from one desperate situation to another.  

(Yeor, 2006. p11) 

Eurabia places the blame for incoming immigration on elites within European society; specifically, the European Community and its relations with the Arab League; and the French government of Charles de Gaulle.  

Former French President Charles de Gaulle

The original villain of Littman’s (Bat Yeor) story was General Charles de Gaulle. It is difficult for an outsider to understand how De Gaulle, who led the French resistance to the Nazis and was probably the greatest conservative statesman in French history, could be reinvented as the man who betrayed western civilisation for money.  

But Littman had lived many years in France, and the French far right hated De Gaulle, and indeed tried several times to assassinate him.  

Not only had De Gaulle fought the Vichy government, he had also admitted defeat in the long and hideously bloody war of Algerian independence – granting an Arab Muslim country its freedom at the expense of the French-Christian settler population, who had to retreat to France (and whose descendants formed the backbone of Jean-Marie Le Pen’s National Front).  

(Brown, 2019) 

Algeria was seen by the far-right French public as an area being struggled over by Christian and Muslim colonial entities; the relinquishing of French control over the region was seen as a surrendering of power between the European right and the growing Arab oil power.  

Al Haj Amin Al Husseini, Grand Mufti of Jerusalem

In Yeor’s history, she cites another famous figure in Islamophobic conspiracies regarding Israel; Al Haj Amin Al Husseini – the Amir of Jerusalem. Yeor highlights De Gaulle’s collaboration with Al Husseini, which has a conspiratorial connection to the Nazi party and the Holocaust. Al Husseini’s associations with the Nazi regime have long been dramatized by Zionist entities and far-right Islamophobes.

Notably, Benjamin Netanyahu, in an interview which has begun doing the rounds again on social media, claimed that Hitler got the idea for the holocaust from Al Husseini. Netanyahu excuses Hitler, claiming that he only wanted to expel the Jews; but it was Al Husseini who insisted to Hitler to “burn them”.

In her book, Yeor says: 

Gaullist practitioners of realpolitik had formulated a strategy to restore France’s influence. This entailed two convergent policies, which they hoped to implement both in Europe and in the Arab-Muslim world: the unification of Europe as an international counterweight to America and an alliance with the Arab and African Muslim world, which they considered an economic and geopolitical element of France’s postcolonial sphere of influence. The latter position was strongly advocated in 1945 by Haj Amin al-Hussaini, the former mufti of Jerusalem and a notorious Nazi ally who was Hitler’s guest in Berlin from 1941.  

(Yeor, 2006. P39) 

Al Hussaini and Hitler did meet, and the records of their meeting have long been public. The timing of the meeting was at a point where Hitler’s intentions, policies, and even actions, were already underway. The idea of exterminating the Jewish people did not come from Al Hussaini; he met with Hitler to propose a simultaneous Arab revolt if necessary. This narrative, overtly stated by Netanyahu, and suggested at by Bat Yeor, is used to blame the Holocaust on Al Husseini – a Muslim Palestinian.

Meeting between Al Husseini and Adolf Hitler  

According to TIME magazine:  

Al-Husseini had obviously come to Berlin in the middle of the play, and could not possibly have had any influence on decisions that had already been taken. Nor did he say anything about the fate of the millions of Jews—most of them Polish and Soviet nationals—who had already come under Hitler’s control. What he wanted, and did not get, was the authorization to proceed immediately to a revolt against the colonial powers in the Middle East and a war against the British and the Jews in Palestine. 

The full text of Netanyahu’s speech to the World Zionist Congress shows that he made this claim to argue that Palestinian Arabs are never really angry about specific acts taken by the Israeli government, but rather at the existence of Israel itself. For him to suggest that a Palestinian leader, rather than Hitler, conceived of the Final Solution, prompted a negative reaction. The German government responded with an almost instantaneous acknowledgement of Germany’s responsibility for the Holocaust. In our highly politicized age, facts are frequently a casualty of controversy, but for those who are Interested, the internet makes the truth nearer at hand than ever before. 

(Kaiser, 2015) 

Thus, while Yeor does cite actual historical events, she frames them within a particular ideology, while failing to include historical events or facts about certain historical events that do not contribute to the history she is trying to perpetuate. One example is a lengthy portion on Saddam Hussein; in which she demonizes him based on his actions against his own people, the invasion of Kuwait, and the war with the United States – nowhere in this portion does she mention Hussein’s famous and well documented allegiance with the United States. Furthermore, her reading of recent history presents Israel as the victim of a united Arab world, backed by Europe. According to her, Europe presents its logic for intervention not according to the Euro-Arab Dialogues and the oil trades, but with a facade of humanitarian concern for the plight of the Palestinians.  

In fact, this Euro-Arab collusion appears mainly in Arab texts; in European sources, it is carefully disguised as a humanitarian concern for ‘‘the suffering Palestinians abandoned by the world.’’  

Anglican Canon Kenneth Cragg described this identification with the Palestinians as ‘‘to be on behalf of the people in the voicing of despair, so that evil is not silenced, dismissed, disregarded—which is the way of untruth—but held, pilloried, taken for the evil it is.’’  

Israel’s metaphysical identification with evil had to be constantly exposed by shedding light on the sufferings of those who worked for its destruction.  

The creation and dissemination of the image of the victimized and abandoned Palestinian was therefore of pivotal importance.  

The coalition of churches and mosques, of European and Islamic states, was cemented in a joint attack against four million Jews living on less than half of their historical land—survivors of the tyranny of both. 

(Yeor, 2005) 

Al-Andalus – A Precursor to Eurabia 

Cordoba, once the capital of Al-Andalus

When she casts her net further into history, she tackles the famous historical perception of non-Muslim life in Al-Andalus (Spain and Portugal during the era of Muslim rule); which she claims was a far cry from the harmonious image that is popularized. For her, this period was one of subjugation, servitude, and dhimmitude; and the notion of a ‘golden period’ of tolerance and interrelations between the faiths is not only exaggerated – but a fiction.  

While historians do agree that the image of perfectly harmonious interrelations is a mythology; they also agree that it was a generally a far more balanced and equitable social environment in which tolerance of various faiths was established in a manner which was considerably different to interfaith dynamics in other territories of the time. Particularly regarding the treatment of Jewish communities.

Historical records not only show favourable relations between the faiths, ranging from intermarriages (amongst both the nobility and their subjects) to the adoption of mixed cultural practises and religious observances; but also show dissension, conflict, and even invasions between the Muslim powers in the regions – consisting of a diverse mix of Arabs, Syriacs, Berbers and more. Bat Yeor discounts the complexities of this time period in favour of presenting a monolithic argument about Muslims. Yeor’s extremist historical interpretation of this period frames it only with selective pieces of history; and has led to many dismissing her from the community of historians and academics.  

Yeor ignores the roles of Jewish citizens in the administration, as well as their contributions to medicine and the sciences within Al Andalus. The famous Hasdai ibn Shaprut, the right-hand of the Caliph Abdur Rahman III, is not mentioned at all. Hasdai was famously the caliph's unnamed vizier, and his minister of foreign affairs. Hasdai wrote letters to various Jewish communities and scholars from across the known world, inviting them to Al Andalus. He is recognized for moving the centre of Jewish theological sciences from Baghdad (another Muslim empire) to the Iberian Peninsula.

Additionally, in the pages where she describes history of Jewish and Christian life in the Iberian Peninsula, she fails to mention major events like the Reconquista or the Spanish Inquisition at all – which subjected the Muslims and Jews of Andalusia to forced conversion or expulsion (and in some cases burning at the stake). This spawned new classes of Christians – the ‘conversos’ (new Jewish converts to Christianity) – and Muslims – ‘moriscos’  (new Muslim converts to Christianity).

(Please note; mentioning the Spanish Inquisition in my argument against Yeor's hypotheses is not to demonize the Christian faith; please be aware when reading this - our efforts are to challenge biases, not confirm them. We are simply pointing out the faults in Yeor's logic and highlighting the deliberate anti-Muslim ideology her theory cultivates.) 

Spanish Inquisition is a drawing by Tony Robert-Fleury; uploaded to Fine Art America, 25th March 2020.

These groups became the target of systemic suspicion and persecution. Some conversos and moriscos were suspected of being “crypto-Jews” or “crypto-Muslims”; these were newly converted Christians or Muslims who still practised their faith in secrecy. The inquisition would not only investigate and persecute crypto-religiosity; but in some cases, even pursued crypto-Jews that had fled to the Americas (many of whom were captured and burnt at the stake). The inquisition feared that conversos and crypto-Jews would perpetuate the traditions of their faith through what they called, Judaizing; practising the Jewish faith and spreading its teachings (This notion of hidden Jews within a population trying to undermine it from within has become a cornerstone of antisemitic conspiracies).   

Final page of the Alhambra decree, also known as the Edict of Expulsion; credit: Pinterest

I would assert that highlighting the Reconquista and Spanish Inquisition in relation to Yeor’s history of Jewish and Christian life in Andalusia is not a deflection (or ‘whataboutism’) of Yeor’s criticism of Muslim rule in Andalusia. Rather, if we are examining the history of the Iberian Peninsula as it relates to Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, then such a discussion is thoroughly incomplete without mentioning the Spanish Inquisition and the Alhambra Decree – which expelled the Jews from the Iberian Peninsula.   

Additionally, when her history of Jewish and Christian life under Muslim rule moves onto the Ottoman Empire - she does not mention that the Ottoman Sultan Beyazid II offered sanctuary to the Sephardic Jews leaving Andalusia after their expulsion at the hands of the Inquisition. The Sultan even dispatched the Ottoman navy to facilitate their passage to Istanbul; where, during the 16th and 17th centuries, Istanbul became a cultural centre of Jewish life. He issued missives throughout the empire, ordering for the safe passage of Jewish communities. At the same time, he admonished and criticized the actions of Ferdinand and Isabella of Castille; claiming that they have expelled a people of value who would enrich his country.  

The Great Fire of Istanbul in 1660, which destroyed an estimated two-thirds of the city, marked the beginning of a decline in relations between the Ottoman administration and the Jewish and Christian communities. The fire, which destroyed over 200 000 homes, was considered a mark of God’s displeasure; this resulted in a change of policies towards Christian and Jewish places of worship – this also altered policies towards subsects of Muslims as well. This is not to suggest that Jewish life in the Ottoman Empire was hostile; on the contrary, Jewish immigration continued, as well as their presence in court and in administrative roles.  

Arab and Muslim Culture in the West 

Yeor goes further in her quest to challenge these narratives of the interrelationships and influences between the Muslim world and the Western world (like that of peaceful coexistence in Andalusia). She claims that the rhetoric about Islamic contributions to Western civilization is simply a tool of Euro-Arab propaganda (Yeor, 2005).  

The Six Day War; a sudden and rapid invasion that changed the map of the Middle East. Image credit: History Hit

According to her, following the Arab defeat during the Six Day War – in which Israel invaded Egypt (and laid claim to the Sinai Peninsula), Jordan (from which it claimed the West Bank and East Jerusalem) and Syria (from which it claimed the Golan Heights) – and the territorial expansion of Israel; the Al-Azhar University in Cairo held the Fourth Conference of the Academy of Islamic Research at which a directive was put forth to develop material in many languages that taught of the contributions of the Arab/Muslim world to the West (Yeor, 2005). This she says, was received with support from European leaders, who even suggested teaching Islamic history in schools, as well as teaching Arabic, and including Islamic material and literature from the Muslim world in school libraries (Yeor, 2005).  

Even the development of films and music reflective of Arab culture is for her, a subversive threat and a project to Islamize western culture (Yeor, 2005). Yeor effectively says that, in the face of Israeli military might, the Arab cultural expansion took on a more subversive form through this operation of cultural influence and propaganda. However, many of the events she cites occurred over decades, rather than the simple sequence she seems to suggest.   

“Palestinianism” 

The clear ideologically pro-Israel sentiment is evident in her writings on Palestine. Islam, which, as one of the Abrahamic faiths, recognizes figures from Judaism and Christianity – from Abraham to Moses and Jesus. Yeor suggests this notion was propaganda asserted to establish a new Eurabian cult; one where Christianity was ‘Islamized’.  Yeor details a talk given at the 1974 Lahore Summit of the Organization of the Islamic Conference by Secretary General al-Tohami:  

His address conformed to the Qur’anic dogma of Islam’s precedence over Judaism and Christianity and the Islamization of biblical history. He referred to Jesus as a Muslim prophet, together with other biblical persons mentioned in the Qur’an. The Muslim interpretation of Jewish and Christian Holy Scriptures negates the links between Judaism and Christianity and rejects them as opposed to Islamic doctrine.  

A full-blown ‘‘Palestinian replacement theology’’ was created and spread throughout Europe, encouraged by EAD (Euro-Arab Dialogue) pro-PLO (Palestinian Liberation Organization) indoctrination.  

(Yeor, 2005) 

The discourse of Jesus’ Palestinian heritage – used to highlight common ground between the faiths – is also identified by Yeor as subversive propaganda wielded by the Muslim world to sway Christians against Israel.  

The new Arab Jesus unites in his Palestinianism both Muslims and Christians against Israel. This holy synthesis sanctified the Palestinian Arab cause against a demonized and isolated Jewish state. Palestinians are thus endowed with the divine mission to remove Israel from Arab Palestine, thereby upholding the honor and truthfulness of Christianity and Islam.  

(Yeor, 2005) 

She goes further to identify the war against Palestine by Israel with the crucifixion of Jesus, which occurred at the hands of the Jewish community in collusion with the Romans. 

‘‘Palestinianism,’’ the new Eurabian cult, thus conferred a theological value upon Palestinian sufferings. Palestinian victimology—the Jewish victimization of innocent Palestinians—was drummed into the European political conscience through the church institutions, the media, and Eurabian networks. Arab Palestine came to symbolize the crucifixion of Jesus by Jewish evilness.  

(Yeor, 2005) 

First Europe, Then the World 

Yeor’s Eurabia goes beyond Europe. She claims that the Euro-Arab Axis of power that is collectively bent against Israel is merely a portent of what is to come - from the Arabs conquering Europe (which she claims has already happened), to their current attempt to conquer Israel, and eventually, to a future attempt at conquering the world. 

Has the European Union, through the Euro-Arab Dialogue superstructure, become the instrument for the neutralization of America? What would a Euro-Arab dominion represent for America and the freedom of the world? Does an Arab-Palestinian jihad against Israel aim at the elimination of the Jewish state only? Or is this jihad focused deceptively on Israel to conceal its true global ambitions and designs? 

(Yeor, 2005) 

Muslims as a Monolith 

Another major flaw in Eurabia’s hypothesis is that it depicts Muslims as a monolith; meaning that it portrays all Muslims as being the same, without any differences, divisions, dissensions between them. This is entirely untrue; aside from the broad Sunni and Shia schism which exists throughout the Muslim world (including European Muslim populations) – within Sunni Islam and Shia Islam there exist further subdivisions. 

Beyond that, there are varying schools of thought which govern the Muslim populations originating out of varying regions; this has a historic legacy and has produced dramatically different cultural traditions amongst these groups. Linguistically, even speakers of common languages like Arabic experience tremendous differences in their dialects as well as their cultural patterns.  

Furthermore, throughout history there have been conflicts between Muslim empires and nations; the Umayyads and Abbassids, the Fatimids, the Seljuks, the Kurds. All the great Muslim empires in history have at a time been in conflict. Even within the romanticized histories and mythologies popular amongst the far-right – like the history of the Crusades or Al-Andalus and the Reconquista – there is distinct evidence of antagonism and divisions between the Muslim powers.  

Salah-ad-Din (Saladin) declaring an end to Fatimid rule in Egypt; the Fatimids often found their interests aligned with the Crusaders as opposed to the Sunni Muslim powers in the region. Credit: History-Maps.com

Depiction of a Templar Knight - original name, Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and the Temple of Solomon, which became shortened to 'the Knights of the Temple', and eventually just simply, the Templar Knights (or Knights Templar). credit Pinterest

The establishment of the Crusader states after the First Crusade and the conquest of Jerusalem was facilitated by internal division between the Muslim powers in the region. This allowed the invading Crusader armies to move between certain territories unhindered as certain Muslim states granted them passage, seeing them as the enemy of their enemy.   

I mention the Crusades specifically because it has been romanticized and mythologized by the same far-right types that perpetuate replacement rhetoric; seeing the Crusaders as hero-figures to idolize because they went to war with Muslims to expel them from the Holy Lands. Anders Breivik called himself Knight Justiciar; a rank amongst the Templar Knights, the famous Crusader-monks of history (and incidentally whose downfall was the result of conspiracy theories and propaganda – a discussion for another time). The cover of his manifesto had the Red Cross of the Templars emblazoned across it. Similarly, Brenton Tarrant claimed to be inspired by “Knight Justiciar Breivik” and his “reborn” Knights Templar.  

In his manifesto, Tarrant says: “no group ordered my attack. I make the decision myself. Though I did contact the reborn Knights Templar for a blessing in support of the attack, which was given.” 

Eurabia and the Future 

Eurabian rhetoric has grown dramatically since October 7th; particularly owing to its framing of the allegiance between Israel and the United States, and the fears of Muslims and Muslim immigration that it is able to conjure. Furthermore, influencers and content creators have taken Eurabia into the digital age; where it is accompanied by Renaud Camus’ the Great Replacement Theory, almost seen as a successor to the Eurabian mythology. 

In Part Two, we continue our exploration of Eurabia by focusing on its cultural impact; from the Counter Jihad Movement, its impact on world politics, as well as its influence on terrorism as with the systematic mass killings by Anders Behring Breivik – the Oslo Bomber and Camp Utoya Killer. 

References

Blumenthal, M. 2012. Santorum warns of "Eurabia," issues call to "evangelize and eradicate" Muslims. Al Akhbar. 01 May. Available: Santorum warns of "Eurabia," issues call to "evangelize and eradicate" Muslims | Al Akhbar English 

Breivik, A. B. 2011. 2083: A European Declaration of Independence (Manifesto).  

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