From Newsweek
by Taylor Wofford
Yesterday I and many others received a press release titled “Stop Hamas – Princess Yasmine become terrorist” [sic]. Attached to the release were a boatload of jpegs depicting Prince Aladdin, Princess Jasmine, Bart Simpson, and a variety of other cartoon characters as “terrorists of Hamas.”
The artist, “aleXsandro Palombo,” called them “A powerful series of Art Piece about the war in Gaza. A powerful series to meditate. An original awareness campaign focused on the devastating problem of terrorism that affects Israel and Palestine and on child soldiers.”
While the images might appear to some to be funny in a perverse sort of way — the Jewish Daily Forward called them “more than a little racist” — they underlie shifting attitudes towards Arabs and Muslims in America, especially among Republicans.
Since 2010, Americans’ opinions of Arabs and Muslims have declined steadily, according to a poll released by the Arab American Institute on July 29:
Since we first began our polling on American attitudes toward Arabs and Muslims in 2010, there has been continued erosion in the favorable ratings given to both communities, posing a threat to the rights of Arab Americans and American Muslims. Favorable attitudes have continued to decline – from 43% in 2010 to 32% in 2014 for Arabs; and from 35% in 2010 to 27% in 2014 for Muslims.
