The Jews of Baghdad."There is a trend to demonize the Jew, and it has to be confronted," says Shuker. "If we are fearful and we don't do something about it, then we are contributors, too." Author Joseph Braude, an American of Iraqi Jewish decent, argues that "exiles serve as an important bridge of mentality between their past country and their new country."
But every report of Israeli business initiatives in Iraq, often in partnership with Jordanian or Turkish companies, feeds rumors on the street that the U.S. occupation is a Zionist plot to take the country away from the Arabs. Stories about a firm called the Iraqi International Law Group (IILG), for instance, are an anti-American propagandist's dream: its president is Salem (Sam) Chalabi, nephew of Iraqi Governing Council member, Ahmad Chalabi, a Pentagon favorite. One of the partners of the company is Marc Zell, an American-born Israeli and outspoken advocate of the settler movement in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.