AJC Urges Worldwide Condemnation of Syrian President's Speech Greeting Pope

American Jewish Committee
Tuesday, 8 May 2001

The American Jewish Committee expressed outrage today at the vicious anti-Semitic speech delivered by Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad as he greeted Pope John Paul II in Damascus on the Pontiff's current three-nation tour of sites visited by the Apostle Paul.

The American Jewish Committee issued the following statement:

"Political and religious leaders across the world should condemn unequivocally President Assad's hateful and incendiary tirade against Israel and the Jewish people. In particular, we look to the Vatican, which has made enormous strides in repudiating ancient slanders against the Jewish people, to take immediate steps to distance itself from the Syrian leader's comments.

"Further, we urge the Asian bloc nations in the United Nations, which have been prepared to select Syria later this year for a rotating seat on the UN Security Council, to deny this promulgator of hate the position of global influence he seeks – a position for which he has proven himself gravely unqualified."

"In greeting Pope John Paul II in Damascus, President Assad repeated the vile and centuries-old slander that Jews were responsible for killing Jesus, and compounded that monstrous assertion – repudiated by the Roman Catholic Church a generation ago – with the baseless and incendiary charge that Jews 'tried to commit treachery against Prophet Mohammed.

"Assad used the occasion of his welcoming ceremony for the Pope to fuel the anti-Israel propaganda machine that has consistently and blatantly twisted the truth of the Arab-Israeli conflict. He falsely charged Israel with 'violating the sanctity' of Al-Aqsa Mosque, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem and the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, knowing full well that those institutions are under their own, appropriate religious control.

"Most hypocritically of all, Assad charged Israel with occupying 'land and houses' in Lebanon – when, in fact, it is Syria that occupies and controls Lebanon with some 30,000 troops.

"That Assad would debase truth and defame the Jewish people was an outrage, and an incitement to interreligious violence. That he would do so by way of greeting on this first visit to Syria by Pope John Paul II, and thereby seek to enlist the Pope in his assault on the Jewish people, magnifies his offense."

For more information, or to contact American Jewish Committee, see their website at: www.ajc.org