Just some instinctive thoughts. I’m no historian. So. Would it be fair to say the Jewish people left the Middle east 2000 years ago, and migrated north to Europe where they excelled? I would assume, if they never left the M/E they would might be somewhat backwards like the masses that stayed down there.
Decades ago an old man coworker Bill Hatfield was his name. Said to me, the words anti-semitic didn’t make sense, because everybody over there were semites? I just looked it up. I guess its a language. So anti-semitic really means anti Jews and Arabs?
Semite: “a member of any of the peoples who speak or spoke a Semitic language, including in particular the Jews and Arabs.”