The recent attacks on Jewish targets are still being investigated by Dutch authorities. The new Prime Minister Rob Jetten denounced antisemitic attacks, the Minister of Justice David van Weel updated parliament, and many people expressed shock over the attack on the Netherlands’ small Jewish community. But that is not all that happened.

Ongoing investigation

As of now, several people have been detained for an attack on a synagogue in Rotterdam. The clip of the arson attack displays a message in Arabic and it was claimed by a new group that caught intelligence services unawares. However, experts pointed out Arabic spelling errors in the original message uploaded to social media. For now, it is not clear who sponsored the perpetrators, but Dutch authorities are suspecting Iranian handlers. It would fit the profile, as the Iranian theocracy tends to make use of criminal elements that cannot easily be traced to them. In Israel, it emerged that Iranians have tried to lure in various Israelis through payment. Moreover, it is very common in the Dutch drug crime scene that youngsters are paid a few hundred euros to carry out comparable attacks.

While the investigation continues, social media has become a battleground rife with speculation once again. And then one prominent voice decided to insert a new possibility: what if Israel was behind the attacks? The author: Anja Meulenbelt.

Meulenbelt is the latest recipient of the P.C. Hooft Award, the most prestigious literary prize in the Netherlands. Her selection surprised quite a number of her colleagues, as well as the author herself. She stated that she had not expected that “the elites” would ever grant her this honor – yet, that did not prevent her from accepting it. Meulenbelt’s surprise is understandable, because she is a far-left activist.

A devout Marxist, Meulenbelt decided to get involved with the Palestinian cause, since visiting Gaza in the 1990s. She was married to a Palestinian and has written several books about Gaza. On X, Meulenbelt argued that since the investigation into the identity of the instigators was ongoing, it would be wise to consider the “Zionists,” as an option, too. Far-left activists tend to refer to Zionists, as they do not recognize the State of Israel, thus borrowing from the rhetoric used by Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Iranian theocracy. She was careful not to accuse Israel outright, but shrewdly planted the seed that it could very well have been the culprit. Pretending to speak with gravitas and an extraordinary command of history, she pointed readers toward two sources: Avi Shlaim – misspelled as “Schlaim” – and Dutch historian and politician Chris de Ploeg. Not surprisingly, both authors identify as staunch anti-Zionists. Moreover, Meulenbelt questioned whether these should be considered attacks at all.

First of all, even in a hypothetical situation where Israel could be the culprit, that does not change the nature of the events. These were attacks on Jewish targets. There is no need to question this.

But the most important reference is to Shlaim, the venerated British-Israeli historian. Though he has provided more and more surprising claims in the last two years, Meulenbelt is clearly referring to his autobiography, which was published months before October 7th. In that book, Shlaim argued that some of the 1950-1951 bombings that targeted the Iraqi Jewish community in Baghdad were authorized by Israel, in an attempt to encourage Jews to leave Iraq. An interesting theory, but there is one issue: it has been exposed as tremendously flimsy by other historians.

In his autobiography, Shlaim claimed that Iraqi Zionists were responsible for the deadly bombing of the courtyard of the Massouda Shemtob synagogue in Baghdad in January, 1951. In that attack, four Jews were killed and twenty were wounded. Moreover, Shlaim argues that the Iraqi Zionists involved in bombings had paid an Iraqi Muslim to carry them out, and that they, in turn, were controlled by an Israeli Mossad handler called Meir Max Binnet. Out of five bombings over the course of 1950 and 1951, Shlaim alleged that three of the five bombs were planted by Zionists, and the only references he uses are a dubious Iraqi police report and one informant’s version given to Shlaim 67 years after the fact that Zionists had bribed a Muslim perpetrator. That is it.

Seems plausible, right? Not exactly, when it turns out that Shlaim ignores the chronology of events, downplays everything the Iraqi state had done before 1950, ignores the analyses of his colleagues, indulges himself in wild speculation, and pretends to provide definitive evidence, without actually offering it.

History, of course, is not an exact science; debates exist and mistakes can be made. A historian needs to critically evaluate primary and secondary sources, pay attention to the historiography, and could be limited by classified material and other sources that may not have been available at the time of writing. Because new evidence can emerge over time – declassified documents or new archives that have been found, for instance – it means that the conclusions can change within a few years or over decades. In Shlaim’s case, however, his anti-Zionism bleeds into his work.

First, the chronology. In 2023, Philip Mendes criticized Shlaim’s conclusions, based on colleagues that the latter had chosen to ignore.

On March 19, 1950, the American Cultural Center and Library in Baghdad was bombed, a location frequented by many Jews. No one was killed, several were injured – Shlaim refers to this incident, while an expert, Moshe Gat, did not. On April 8, 1950, a hand grenade was thrown from a moving car at a Jewish-owned coffee shop in Baghdad. Four Jews were injured. The following day, 3,400 Jews registered to emigrate. By the end of April, the figure was 25,300. On January 14, 1951, the attack on the Massouda Shemtob synagogue took place, killing four Jews and injuring twenty. By the beginning of March 1951, the number of Jews registering for emigration had risen to 105,400 people. In May 1951, a hand grenade was thrown at the front of a Jewish-owned car dealership in the middle of the night – there was property damage, but no injuries. And, in June 1951, an explosive device was detonated near the entrance of another Jewish-owned car dealership. Again, damage but no casualties. By the end of 1951, more than 120,000 Jews had registered to leave. And, by the start of 1952, almost all had departed.

Shlaim contends that three of the five attacks were carried out by Iraqi Zionists, echoing the trial of Yusef Ibrahim Basri and Shalom Salih Shalom, two Iraqi Jews and members of the Zionist underground, who were executed in 1952. What Shlaim ignores is that it was based on Shalom’s confession, which was extracted under extreme torture – such confessions are dubious, as Elizabeth Tsurkov shared that she had made false confessions to her Iraqi captors, in an attempt to appease them. Also, Colin Shindler mentions that Basri was tortured as well and that both later retracted their confessions, but to no avail.

As to the perpetrators, Shlaim accuses the Mossad of involvement, because the two Iraqi Zionists mentioned earlier fell under Binnet’s responsibility. However, Shlaim also admits that Israel has always categorically denied any involvement in the bombings.

According to Shlaim, these bombings frightened the Iraqi Jewish community to such an extent that all of them rushed to register for emigration. Yet, Shlaim willingly ignores or minimizes several other facts that destabilize his narrative.

In a panel discussion in 2023, Shlaim argued that registering for emigration was optional – this is patently false. He was countered by David Basson, another panelist whose family remained in Iraq after Operation Ezra and Nehemiah. As he explained, the Iraqi Denaturalization Act, which was created in March 1950, allowed Jews to leave by registering for emigration. The caveat was that they would forfeit their Iraqi citizenship as a consequence. The act would remain in effect for a year. Moreover, historian Esther Meir-Glitzenstein has affirmed that registration was irrevocable. Also, the registration phase ended in March 1951, while two bombings took place afterwards. For this reason, Shlaim maintains that the deadline was extended to July 1951 – a false statement, as mentioned by Lyn Julius.

In addition, Edwin Black argued in his book on the Farhud, that the act was introduced to stem the flow of Jews leaving illegally through Iran – long before the bombings. Iraq had hoped that it could get rid of poor Jews this way and keep the more prosperous Jews within its borders.

Another important comparison can be made with Diaspora Jews in the present. Shlaim argues that a few bombings, even if only one caused fatal injuries, had shocked the Iraqi Jewish community to such an extent that it was the prominent reason for it to leave en masse. But does that make sense? How many attacks have American Jews suffered over the past decades, several of them with lethal consequences? Did millions of American Jews move to Israel in response? The same goes for the small Jewish community in the Netherlands. Would the explosion of antisemitism, complete with physical violence and now attacks on Jewish sites, cause all of them, not simply a part, to make aliyah? This argument has been offered by investigative journalist David Collier in 2023 as well, by using French Jews as an example.

Shlaim’s attempts to create causality between the bombings and spikes in registrations are faulty, too. As Lyn Julius pointed out, by late 1950 80,000 Jews, the majority of the community, had registered for emigration and thus were effectively stateless. Why would the Mossad or Iraqi Zionists bomb the synagogue in the next year, if such a large number had already registered to leave? It makes little sense. Moreover, the synagogue was used as a center for Jews who had registered to leave. Why attack people who had already decided to come?

More criticism was expressed in a review published on Raseef22, a Lebanese media outlet. There Shlaim’s methodology was considered shoddy, riddled with fallacies and speculations. For instance, the outlet refers to an article written by Gat, which mentions that the Iraqi government was the first to accuse the Mossad of perpetrating the bombings. However, correspondence provided by the relevant British and Israeli authorities denied these allegations. Furthermore, Iraqi political historian Salam al-Azzawi is quoted, who argued that it was impossible to completely rule out any Israeli involvement. However, he refers to the fact that involvement of Arab Iraqi groups was documented, explained by a political crisis and economic stagnation. Resentment towards Iraqi Jews increased as a consequence. Also, al-Azzawi notes that Iraqi nationalist groups preferred such small-scale bombing attacks, while the Zionist underground operated differently. Moreover, Ibrahim al-Rubaie, another historian, argues that Shlaim deviated from neutrality and allowed himself to lean into conspiracy theories. He criticized Shlaim for not presenting any clear evidence and the application of an inaccurate historical methodology.

Finally, Shlaim does not refute other evidence, such as the arrest of a Christian army officer by the name of Jamil Mamo, who was arrested and found in possession of a number of similar explosive devices that were used to attack the synagogue in 1951. Jamo was a member of the antisemitic Istiqlal Party. Julius refers to Tom Segev, another Israeli “New Historian” critical of traditional Israeli narratives, who found no evidence for Zionist involvement and instead accused Iraqi nationalists. Also, Shlaim does not refute the confession of an Istiqlal member to Iraqi historian Shamel Abdul Kader, who stated to have been involved in one of the bombings. Finally, the convictions of Basri and Shalom rested on confessions extracted through torture alone, no other witnesses provided direct evidence.

The Iraqi assault on its Jews

Shlaim also tries to minimize the impact of the Farhud and Iraqi government measures implemented against its Jewish citizens. After Israel was established, Iraqi authorities started punishing its own Jewish community. A law that criminalized Zionism and the Denaturalization Act were implemented; and in October 1948, 1,500 Jews were dismissed from Iraqi government jobs. Another shock was the show trial and public execution of prominent Jewish businessman Shafiq Ades in 1948. Ades had been a non-Zionist, but was accused of being a Communist and of being connected to Israel. He was hanged in front of his home.

In an article published in December 2024, Julius returned to Shlaim’s autobiography, after he had received an award for it in the United Kingdom. She argued that his troubled youth, ending with the divorce of his parents in Israel, have led him to romanticize his childhood in Iraq. Shlaim ignores the persecution of other minorities, such as Assyrian Christians in the 1930s, and argues that Iraq was an example of cosmopolitanism, coexistence, and fruitful interaction. And yet, he does admit that his family, despite their wealth and connections, were legally dhimmi, reliant on the tolerance of their Muslim countrymen. It does seem that this trauma from his childhood and the fact that his parents struggled to regain their prominence in Israel are now used by Shlaim as an excuse to blame Israel for their misfortune and the suffering of all Iraqi Jews. Nonetheless, his parents were able to build a bungalow in Ramat Gan and did not spend a second in a ma’abara. That is not an issue, but it does put Shlaim’s grievances a bit more into perspective.

A prize for anti-Israel activists

Shlaim has presented a shoddy analysis based on the flimsiest shreds of evidence. In fact, he simply repeats the accusations leveled by the Iraqi government in the 1950s. Moreover, his faulty analysis has been criticized by Iraqi political historians, as well as by other professionals mentioned in this post, such as Colin Shindler, Philip Mendes, Tom Segev, Benny Morris, Lyn Julius, and ignores the arguments shared by Moshe Gat, David Basson, and Esther Meir-Glitzenstein. But one thing happened that everyone expected: it was immediately embraced and hailed by the anti-Israel activists. Shlaim’s political activism has certainly paid him dividends, as he has become one of the figureheads of the anti-Zionist movement, being quoted by its small anti-Zionist Jewish minority and the overwhelming majority of non-Jewish anti-Israel activists; you can now see him appearing regularly on outlets such as Al Jazeera and TRT World, both of whom exhibit a clear anti-Israel bias.

It is exactly how now, three years later, his autobiography is cited as evidence to suggest that Israel might be behind the attacks on Jewish sites in the Netherlands. And it comes as no surprise that Meulenbelt uncritically accepts his smoking gun thesis, that refuses to smoke. That is how his shoddy analysis of the Baghdad bombings is now used by someone in the Netherlands. I imagine he must be pleased.

Yet one thing is certain: any historical analysis presented by Shlaim on Israel or the Middle East should be taken with a grain of salt, at least.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)