BY SHAY KHATIRI AND MICHAEL MAZZA, OPINION CONTRIBUTORS

 The Hill - 01/19/24

China’s ambitions in the Middle East are not a secret. Since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, China has been taking advantage of the U.S. support for Israel to align itself with Arab populations, hoping that this would in turn force their governments to distance themselves from the United States.  

In most of the Middle East, from Turkey to the Arabian Peninsula, anti-Israel demonstrations have occurred. Even though many of those governments quietly support Israel’s efforts to quash Hamas, America’s support for the Jewish state is a diplomatic liability for its traditional partners in the region. 

In China, anti-Israel demonstrations have been confined to the online space, but they have been allowed to flourish nonetheless — both in official media and on social media. Chinese Communist Party propagandists and “netizens” have espoused anti-Jewish sentiments, likening Jews to Nazis, accusing Israel of being “crazed with killing,” and praising Adolf Hitler. 

“Positive” stereotypes about Jews have long been commonly held in China, with the Jewish people seen as hardworking, intelligent, and good with money. But in the wake of the Chinese government’s refusal to even condemn Hamas for its brutal attacks, and with the subsequent days reminding China of Israel’s steadfast partnership with the United States, that essentialist esteem for Jews has unsurprisingly been turned on its head. 

Externally, Beijing has thrown the full weight of its influence behind Hamas. Its support for a ceasefire and its criticisms of Israel both amount to a cynical instrumentalization of the conflict to gain sway in the Middle East at America’s expense. Internally, the party-state’s stoking of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish passions reinforce China’s nationalistic turn, serving to underscore Xi Jinping’s efforts to paint China as besieged by the United States and its allies — with the Communist Party all that stands between the country and utter ruin. 

America must continue its support for Israel on moral and strategic grounds, but the United States must also consider how to mitigate the costs to its diplomatic standing in Muslim-majority societies. 

Realistically, the United States cannot simply win Arab and Turkish populations to its side. The best it can do is to make sure that China doesn’t win the ground that America, due to its support for Israel, is ceding. 

China’s anti-Israel public diplomacy campaign is an appeal to Middle Easterners’ religious identity as Muslims and as victims of infidel Israelis. It is as crude as it is effective and appealing, but it is also an act of shameless gaslighting. 

The silent genocide of Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang is the greatest persecution of Muslims at the hands of non-Muslims since at least the Yugoslav wars. China is conducting what Israel’s harshest critics accuse the Israeli Defense Forces of: a systemic cleansing of innocent Muslims at the hands of infidels. That genocide is also a guarded secret in the birthplace of Islam. 

The governments of the region have done a thorough job of censoring the news about Uyghurs. Their newspapers and TV networks never raise the issue out of concern for maintaining their burgeoning relations with China. In June, Arab League representatives visited Xinjiang, only to conclude that the reports of the genocide are false. That same month, Mahmoud Abbas visited Beijing and supported Chinese policies in Xinjiang. 

In Iran, the government is strengthening its ties with China faster than others in the region despite the majority opposition to this change. It can do so as long as the regime’s base of support does not oppose ties with Beijing. Such opposition might arise with greater knowledge of the plight of Chinese Muslims.  

To prevent Beijing from becoming the dominant external power in the Middle East, the United States should make China, among Middle Easterners, a synonym for the genocide. This will require a State Department plan for disseminating information about Chinese crimes, to include purposeful engagement with local media outlets and civil society organizations in the Middle East, and increased resources for the U.S. Agency for Global Media. Those charged with public diplomacy must get comfortable engaging with and outsourcing their messaging to indigenous influencers, especially on social media, who will be far more effective in disseminating information. Perhaps most importantly, senior government officials should mention the genocide in every public appearance in those countries. 

Two great obstacles will be a hesitation to upset partner governments — most notably Turkey, a treaty ally — and America’s hollowed-out public diplomacy apparatus. The former is a reasonable worry, and it will cause short-term headaches and unpleasant conversations, as do most worthy undertakings. The latter is a more serious challenge and another wakeup call that the return of great power antagonism requires the U.S. government to recover some of its Cold War muscles.

Ideally, a successful campaign to force a conversation in the Middle East about the Uyghurs will lead China to moderate its policies in Xinjiang. Even a minor improvement in conditions for China’s oppressed Muslims would be a major win for American policy. But if Washington only succeeds in preventing China from gaining greater sway in the Middle East, it will still be a worthy outcome. 

Shay Khatiri is vice president of development and senior fellow of the Yorktown Institute. 

Michael Mazza is a senior director at the Project 2049 Institute and a senior non-resident fellow at the Global Taiwan Institute.