Mahathir´s Party Hands Out Anti-Semitic Books
Sat June 21, 2003 09:15 AM ET

By Simon Cameron-Moore

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Officials of Malaysian
Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad´s party gave out
copies of U.S. industrialist Henry Ford´s
anti-semitic book "The International Jew" to
delegates at their annual assembly on Saturday.

The 77-year-old Mahathir, who steps down in
October after 22 years of rule, told a news
conference afterwards that the distribution of the
book was nothing to do with him.

"I don´t need that book to tell me what is right
and what is wrong. I´m not responsible for the
distribution," said Mahathir, who had earlier
basked in the adulation of his party faithful.

Tens of thousands of Muslim Malays attended the
last day of the three-day United Malays National
Organization (UMNO) assembly to see Mahathir
deliver his final speech as party president.

Party workers at the assembly´s secretariat handed
out free copies of an abridged version of Ford´s
book, translated into Bahasa Malay and published
in Johannesburg.

The book, first published in the 1920s, also
contained the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" --
originally published in Russia in the early 20th
century and used down the decades to peddle
theories of an international Jewish conspiracy.

Mahathir said he had read the book years ago, but
was not influenced by it, adding that it was the
injustice of the West handing Palestinian land to
the Jews which upset him.

UNREPENTANT

The final speech to UMNO was vintage Mahathir,
although there were none of the tears an emotional
audience had expected.

He ripped into the main Malay opposition, which
seeks to build an Islamic theocracy in Malaysia,
although just less than half the country is
non-Muslim.

And he was unrepentant about remarks earlier in
the week that characterized white Westerners as
warlike and greedy and their liberal societies as
breeding grounds for low sexual morality.

"We...have reached a level that we are able to
thumb our nose at them," Mahathir said. "I
challenge anyone who says my speech about the
Europeans is not true."

Mahathir denied being racist but said the lessons
of history compelled him to speak out against the
Europeans, who he said included the white peoples
of European descent in the Americas, Australia and
New Zealand.....""


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