Salah Naseawi writing for the AP reports that Egyptian television has announced plans to broadcast a miniseries based on the perennial bestseller Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion.

This little gem of western lit is the quintessential anti-Semitic tract and granddaddy of all conspiracy theories. Ostensibly the minutes of a meeting of rabbis outlining their plot for world domination, it was published in 1897 by the Okhrana, the Czarist secret police, as a justification for pogroms. This little screed has legs. It has found its way into Mien Kampf, the teachings of the Nation of Islam and various manifestos of anti-globalization protesters.

Surprisingly, it does have a literary pedigree—albeit a shaky one.

The Skeptics Dictionary states: “The basic story was composed by [Hermann] Goedsche, a German novelist and anti-Semite who used the pseudonym of Sir John Retcliffe. Goedsche stole the main story from another writer, Maurice Joly, who's Dialogues in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquieu (1864) involved a Hellish plot aimed at opposing Napoleon III. Goedsche's original contribution consists mainly of introducing Jews to do the plotting to take over the world.”

Since the Egyptian government finances and runs their television network, I’m willing to bet this will add a whole new dimension to the phrase “Must See TV”.