ABSTRACT
The Axis Powers were not slow to exploit this favourable situation. It appears that they had reached an agreement that the Levant and Egypt fell within the Italian sphere of interest, while
Iraq and Persia should come under the influence of Germany. From 1935 Radio Bari devoted itself through its broadcasts to inciting the Arab world against Britain, especially over the raging question of Palestine. The Italians had built up a powerful propaganda organization in Egypt, working under the auspices of the Italian Legation and through the medium of the 60,000 Italian inhabitants of the cities of Lower Egypt, who were brought under the aegis of the Fascist organizations; there can be no doubt that they were also used to spy on British activities. Having completed the conquest of Abyssinia in 1936, Italy proceeded to build up her strategic position against Britain in the Southern Red Sea. She fortified the port of Assab in southern Eritrea and, by playing on the suspicions of British policy in Aden in the mind of the Imam of the Yemen, persuaded that conservative monarch to admit into his country an Italian medical mission which was a convenient cover for anti-British propaganda and espionage. During the Palestine Rebellion both the German Protestant (Templar) colonies and some Italian Catholic orders extended their protection and material help to the Arab rebels, and some arms and money were smuggled in to them from the Axis Powers.1 In 1938 the German radio took over from the Italians the broadcasting of antiBritish propaganda in Arabic. In Iraq the German Minister, Dr. Grobba, was assiduous and open-handed in cultivating the young nationalists. Germans played cleverly on the Persians’ hatred of both Britain and Russia and flattered their boundless vanity by emphasizing their Aryan origins. German propaganda films were provided free, and were believed to have amounted to 40 per cent, of all films shown in Persia. The Lufthansa obtained permission to land at Tehran on their Berlin-Tokyo route. Persian students, like those of the Arabic-speaking countries, were tempted by low fees to finish their studies in German universities; and in 1939-40 a number of German university lecturers and directors of technical institutes were imported into Persia. Leading Nazi personalities, such as Goebbels, Schacht, General von Blomberg, and Baldur von Schirach, paid official visits to Middle Eastern capitals.
