That is true, Caity, that there is no “Christian civilization”. Or, as they call it today (all of a sudden, after Huntington) “Judeo-Christian values”. Here is an invaluable piece by Asa Winstanley in Middle East Monitor, he talks about Islamophobia being fueled by Zionism and Israel, as documented in Al Jazeera doc “Israel Lobby In the US”.
“Zionism, the political movement which founded Israel, is a settler-colonial ideology intended — not to shelter Jews from persecution — but to compel European Jewish communities to abandon their homelands and instead become settlers in Palestine who can dispossess and displace the indigenous population — the Palestinians.
The fact that the indigenous population which Zionism wanted to displace was in majority Muslim means that it was inevitable that Zionism would develop strong Islamophobic currents — currents which have only gotten stronger in recent years as Israel has gotten more and more right-wing.
The Islamophobia industry and the Israel lobby both emphasise a common myth, one which has become increasingly popular in the years since the 11 September 2001 attacks: “Judeo-Christian civilisation”.
This neologism is intended, not to build common bonds, but to exclude Muslims and build support for Israel and its crimes in the West. The idea of a common “Judeo-Christian civilisation” is a total myth propagated by reactionary forces in the West.
Considering the fact that nominally Christian states in Europe were at war with each other — on and off — for centuries, there is not even a single unified “Christian civilisation”, let alone a “Judeo-Christian civilisation”.
The reality is that historically, majority-Muslim countries in the Middle East sheltered European Jews fleeing European Christian persecution, such as the Spanish inquisition.
But racist and imperialist movements always require an irrational “Other” to contrast unfavourably to the “rational West”. In past times, Jews were viewed by racists at that sly, backwards “Other”, culminating in the horror of the Nazi Holocaust.
In these times, Jews in the West and in Israel are viewed as “the White man” who civilises the “savage jungle” of the supposedly backwards Arabs and Muslims of the Middle East.
Islam is just the most popular scape goat of contemporary demonology. As in all imperialisms, the attempt is made to divide and rule.” https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20180530-the-islamophobia-industry-and-the-israel-lobby/?fbclid=IwAR1cGyRRcLtOZUXbZ8avqCPhDbHIDbkwQBBbInu0hpJHCpUzbPvHxHEUzZM
