Wiesenthal Center: Jihadist Website Underscores Dangers Confronting Jews of Yemen

February 2, 2007

WIESENTHAL CENTER: JIHADIST WEBSITE UNDERSCORES DANGERS CONFRONTING YEMEN’S JEWS

Center researchers uncover website that calls for an “Elimination of all different forms of Jewish and Christian existence in the Arabian peninsula.”


The Simon Wiesenthal Center called on the government of Yemen to take all necessary steps to safeguard the remnants of its historic Jewish community when a Shiite extremist group responsible for last week’s gun battle, in which six Yemeni Army soldiers were killed, also threatened death to the Jewish community for allegedly selling wine.

“We are deeply concerned over reports that 45 Jews from this community had to be evacuated from their homes last week after threats were made against their safety by Islamic extremists,” said Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Wiesenthal Center. The Center was also informed yesterday of the possible kidnapping of a Yemeni Jew on his way to the capital city of Saana.

Center researchers uncovered a Yemeni jihadist website, www.hanein.net, that called for the “General elimination of all different forms of Jewish and Christian existence in the Arabian peninsula….The Jihad must generate waves, starting from Yemen, through the Arab peninsula until it reaches all the Muslim countries….The Jihad will strike all of the Jewish, American, Christian and Heathen interests in the area.”  

 The Simon Wiesenthal Center is one of the largest international Jewish human rights organizations with over 400,000 member families in the United States. It is an NGO at international agencies including the United Nations, UNESCO, the OSCE, and the Council of Europe.
  
For more information, please contact the Center's Public Relations Department, 310-553-9036.

 

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