(JTA) — An Al Jazeera anchor promoted an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory on Twitter on Thursday.
“This Holy Land belongs to Palestinians Because Palestinians are Semitic unlike the Israeli Khazars who are occupiers !!” tweeted Ghada Oueiss, a Qatar-based news presenter.
The Khazar theory claims that European Jews are the descendants of Khazars, a Turkic people who lived in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, rather than from Jews who originated in the Middle East. The theory has been used by anti-Semites and anti-Zionists to discount Jewish claims to the land of Israel. Scholars have discounted the theory.
Oueiss sparred with critics and defended her comment, sharing a photo of a book that supported the hypothesis.
In May, the Qatari news channel suspended two journalists for making a video in which they said the Holocaust is “different from how the Jews tell it.”
