Shahak escaped from a Nazi concentration camp and later served in the Israeli army. He is an organic chemist who combines a research scientist's objectivity with a humanist's commitment to universal ideals.

It appears that Judaism made a mistake when it rejected Christ's gospel of Love. As a consequence, Judaism may have become a primitive and possibly dangerous anachronism in the 21st Century. According to Shahak, Judaism is a xenophobic totalitarian belief system that has morphed into a fanatical Zionist ideology that now threatens the whole world. I must admit that, even as an assimilated Jew, reading this book was like taking cod liver oil, not pleasant.

Shahak writes:

1. The Talmud, which consists of rabbinical interpretations of the law, treats Christ and Christians with contempt. Unlike the Koran, which regards Christ as a great prophet, the Talmud contains "very offensive precepts and statements directed specifically against Christianity. For example, in addition to a series of scurrilous sexual allegations against Jesus, the Talmud states that his punishment in hell is to be immersed in boiling excrement. . . Jews are instructed to burn, publicly if possible, any copy of the New Testament that comes into their hands." (p. 21)
2. The Talmud treats non-Jews as sub human and directs Jews to discriminate against them. For example, the concept of adultery "does not apply to intercourse between a Jewish man and a gentile woman; rather, the Talmud equates such intercourse to the sin of bestiality." (87) Robbery (with violence) is strictly forbidden if the victim is Jewish, but is permitted if the victim is Gentile, "when they are under our rule." "The whole [rabbinical] debate is concerned only with the relative powers of Jews and gentiles rather than with universal considerations of justice and humanity, " Shahak writes. "This may be why so few rabbis have protested over the robbery of Palestinian property in Israel." (90)
3. Shahak disputes whether Judaism is in fact monotheistic: "In many if not most of the books of the Old Testament, the existence and powers of 'other Gods' are clearly acknowledged, but Yahweh (Jehovah) is the most powerful of his rivals, and forbids his people to worship them." The decay of monotheism came about through the spread of Jewish mysticism (the cabbala), which is now dominant and includes many prayers and actions designed to propitiate Satan. (32-33)
4. The Old Testament does not have the same place in Judaism as the New Testament has for Christianity. Most biblical verses are reinterpreted by the Talmud in a sense that is distinct and quite contrary to their literal meaning. For example, the famous verse 'thy shall love thy fellow as thyself' (Leviticus 19:18) is understood as an injunction to love one's fellow Jew not any fellow man. (37)

According to Shahak, classical Judaism is not so much a religion as an tyrannical system of social control administered by rabbis. Ordinary Jews were forced to obey a labyrinth of capricious laws on pain of fines, beatings or even murder, administered by the non-Jewish aristocracy that would get a share of the fines.

Aristocrats and the Jewish elite had other common interests. Throughout the middle ages, Jews served as middlemen, or bailiffs administering the oppression of the peasants by Gentile kings and nobles. Often the king would give Jews the concession to manage his holdings. Without condoning pogroms or the holocaust, this and the above-mentioned teachings are probably the real causes of anti Semitism.

The tyranny of aristocrats and rabbis was broken by the Enlightenment, which gave rise to the nation state, the middle class, democracy and the rule of reason. Jews and non-Jews alike were liberated. The New World Order represents a kind of neo feudalism, an attempt to restore the old order. Aristocrats and their moneylenders, organized in secret societies like the Freemasons (who believe in the cabbala) make up the Illuminati. It also includes dynastic families, which control large cartels in partnership with the moneylenders. For more than a hundred years, these people have worked behind the scenes to destroy the four pillars of Western Civilization: The nation-state, Christianity, democracy and the family.

Communist Russia and Israel are both Illuminati states, created to foster oligarchic world government. Israel is intended to be the seat of world government/religion. The Star of David is also a Masonic symbol.

In Communism, the sons of rabbis built a new worldly religion that mirrored the fanaticism and oppression of classical Judaism. After visiting Bolshevik Russia in 1920, Bertrand Russell wrote to Lady Ottoline Morrell: "Bolshevism is a closed tyrannical bureaucracy, with a spy system more elaborate and terrible than the Tsar's, and an aristocracy as insolent and unfeeling, composed of Americanised Jews. No vestige of liberty remains, in thought or speech or action." (The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell, paperback ed. 354)

Since World War One, the United States and England have been controlled by this IIluminati conspiracy. New York bankers financed the Bolshevik Revolution (1917) and transferred Trotsky and 270 Jewish revolutionaries to Russia to carry it out. "See Antony Sutton's Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution," They had England conquer Palestine for the Zionists at the same time.

As a result, here is the current state of American democracy:

Senate Majority leader Tom Daschle says Congress doesn't want to "rubber stamp" Bush's invasion of Iraq but "doesn't want to be uncooperative either." Senator Robert Byrd, made of sterner stuff, says his belief in the American Constitution will prevent him from voting for Bush's war resolution. "But I am finding that the Constitution is irrelevant to people in this administration." (Charleston Gazette, Sept. 21.)

Perhaps Senator Daschle is afraid of AIPAC, the powerful Zionist lobby that recently defeated Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney. In his 1985 book, "They Dare to Speak Out" Paul Findley, an Illinois Congressman who was defeated by AIPAC after serving 22 years writes: "It is no overstatement to say that AIPAC has effectively gained control of Capitol Hill's action on Middle East policy.... AIPAC means power... raw intimidating power."(25)

George W. Bush, a member of an illuminati family, as well as a creature of big oil, needs little incentive to do Israel's bidding. Nevertheless, Lyndon Larouche has amassed evidence of a cadre of Zionist agents at the highest levels of the US government who control policy much like Communist agents controlled FDR . See also Michael Hoffman "The Wolf of the Whitehouse."

This Zionist network, which includes Richard Perle and David Wolfowitz, pressed Bill Clinton to invade Iraq in 1998. When he resisted, they may have paralysed his administration with the Lewinsky scandal. Similarly, Sherman Skolnick believes the Mossad is blackmailing Bush with pictures of a homosexual nature.

In his 1995 book, "The Other Side of Deception: A Rogue Agent Exposes the Mossad's Secret Agenda" Victor Ostrovsky asked his superiors why they were trying to instigate a war between the US and Iraq. The reply was that Israel does not have the manpower and aircraft carriers to do the job. As you know, five young Mossad agents were arrested doing high-fives Sept. 11 in a parking lot across the river from the WTC where they were "documenting" the "terrorist" attack with video cameras.

In a speech at Harvard last week, the president Lawrence Summer, a Jew, lamented the rising tide of anti-Semitism. He attributed this to "prejudice" and says he thought "the right of the Jewish state to exist" had been decided.

It is curious that while Palestinians are being dispossessed and persecuted, Summers thinks "Israel's right to exist" is the issue. According to Israeli commentator Uri Avnery, Arafat accepted Israel's right to exist 28 years ago but Ariel Sharon "wants a greater Israel, the extension of the settlements and eventually the elimination of the Palestinian presence west of the Jordan."

The hoisting of an Israeli flag above the ruins of Yasser Arafat's Ramallah compound tells the story. Many Israelis feel just as helpless as we do. In an article in Ha'aretz, Yoel Marcus writes of Ariel Sharon, "Our democracy has been commandeered by one man."

Curious how Lawrence Summers refers to opposition to the Zionist agenda as "prejudice." Anger over Zionist control of the US government, its muzzling of education and the media, and possible involvement in Sept. 11 is hardly what I would call "prejudice." For generations Jews have dehumanized other people by denying their legitimate grievances. In Shahak's words, "an enslaved peasant [who rebels] is transformed into a racist monster if Jews profited from his state of slavery and exploitation." (73)

No people should be tarred by the actions of a few. Most Jews (including Israelis) are themselves victims of the Illuminati Zionist conspiracy. Yitzak Rabin was murdered because of his sincere desire to make peace. I believe people are individuals and should be judged as such.

Nonetheless Jews must confront the reasons for anti Semitism or else it will spread. We must confront Jews (and non-Jews) who have become bailiffs in the New World Order, and join our neighbors in trying to restore democracy, freedom and truth to our beleaguered planet.