I will post information about Hitler’s Mufti
from Wikipedia and other links.
Amin al-Husseini
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In
office
1921 – 1937 |
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Preceded by
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Kamil al-Husayni
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Succeeded by
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Hussam ad-Din Jarallah
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President
of the Supreme Muslim Council
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In
office
1922–1937 |
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Personal
details
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Born
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c. 1895-7
Jerusalem, Ottoman Empire |
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Died
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4 July 1974
Beirut, Lebanon |
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Political
party
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Arab Higher Committee
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Profession
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Religion
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Sunni Islam
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Military
service
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Allegiance
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Mohammed Amin al-Husseini (Arabic:
محمد أمين الحسيني; c. 1897 – 4 July 1974) was a Palestinian Arab nationalist and Muslim leader
in Mandatory Palestine.
Al-Husseini
was the scion of a family of Jerusalemite notables, who trace their origins to the
grandson of Muhammad.
After receiving an education in Islamic, Ottoman and Catholic
schools, he went on to serve in the Ottoman army in World War
I. At war's end he stationed himself in Damascus as a
supporter of the Arab Kingdom of Syria. Following the fiasco
of the Franco-Syrian War and the collapse of the Arab Hashemite rule in Damascus, his early
position on pan-Arabism shifted to a form of local nationalism for
Palestinian Arabs and he moved back to Jerusalem. From as early as 1920 he
actively opposed Zionism,
and was implicated as a leader of the 1920 Nebi Musa riots. Al-Husseini was
sentenced to ten years' imprisonment but was pardoned by the British. In 1921
the British High
Commissioner appointed him Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, a position he
used to promote Islam
while rallying a non-confessional Arab
nationalism against Zionism.
His
opposition to the British peaked during the 1936–39 Arab revolt in Palestine.
In 1937, evading an arrest warrant, he fled Palestine and took refuge
successively in the French Mandate of Lebanon and the Kingdom
of Iraq, until he established himself in Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany.
During World
War II he collaborated with both Italy and Germany by making propagandistic
radio broadcasts and by helping the Nazis recruit Bosnian Muslims for the Waffen-SS
(on the ground that they shared four principles: family, order, the leader and
faith). Also, as he told the recruits, Germany had not colonized any Arab
country while Russia and England had. On meeting Adolf
Hitler he requested backing for Arab independence and support in opposing
the establishment in Palestine of a Jewish national home. At the war's end he
came under French protection, and then sought refuge in Cairo to avoid
prosecution.
In
the lead-up to the 1948 Palestine war, Husseini opposed both the 1947 UN
Partition Plan and King Abdullah's designs to annex the Arab part of
British Mandatory Palestine to Jordan, and,
failing to gain command of the 'Arab rescue army' (jaysh al-inqadh al-'arabi)
formed under the aegis of the Arab League, formed his own militia, al-jihad
al-muqaddas. In September 1948 he participated in the establishment of an
All-Palestine Government. Seated in Egyptian-ruled Gaza, this
government won limited recognition by Arab states but was eventually dissolved
by Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser in 1959. After the war and
subsequent Palestinian exodus, his claims to
leadership were wholly discredited and he was eventually sidelined by the Palestine Liberation Organization,
losing most of his residual political influence. He died in Beirut, Lebanon in
July 1974. Husseini was and remains a highly controversial figure. Historians
dispute whether his fierce opposition to Zionism was grounded in nationalism or
antisemitism
or a combination of both.
Early
life
Amin
al-Husseini was born around 1897 in Jerusalem,
the son of the mufti of that city and prominent early opponent of Zionism, Tahir
al-Husayni. The al-Husseini clan consisted of wealthy landowners in
southern Palestine, centered around the district of Jerusalem.
Thirteen members of the clan had been Mayors of Jerusalem between 1864 and
1920. Another member of the clan and Amin's half-brother, Kamil
al-Husayni, also served as Mufti of Jerusalem. In Jerusalem Amin
al-Husseini attended a Qur'an school (kuttub), and Ottoman government
secondary school (rüshidiyye) where he learnt Turkish,
and a Catholic secondary school run by French
missionaries, the Catholic Frères, where he learnt French. He also studied
at the Alliance Israélite Universelle with
its non-Zionist Jewish director Albert
Antébi. In 1912 he studied Islamic law briefly at Al-Azhar University in Cairo and at the Dar
al-Da'wa wa-l-Irshad, under Rashid
Rida, a salafi
intellectual, who was to remain Amin's mentor till his death in 1935. Though
groomed to hold religious office from youth, his education was typical of the
Ottoman effendi
at the time, and he only donned a religious turban in 1921 after being
appointed mufti.
In
1913, approximately at the age of 16, al-Husseini accompanied his mother Zainab
to Mecca and
received the honorary
title of Hajj.
Prior to World
War I, he studied at the School of Administration in Constantinople,
the most secular of Ottoman institutions.
World War I
With
the outbreak of World War I in 1914, al-Husseini received a commission
in the Ottoman Army as an artillery officer and was assigned to the
Forty-Seventh Brigade stationed in and around the city of Izmir. In November
1916 he obtained a three-month disability leave from the army and returned to
Jerusalem. He was recovering from an illness there when the city was captured
by the British a year later. The British and Sherifian
armies, for which some 500 Palestinian Arabs were estimated to have
volunteered, completed their conquest of Ottoman-controlled Palestine and Syria
in 1918. As a Sherifian officer, al-Husseini recruited men to serve in Faisal
bin Al Hussein bin Ali El-Hashemi's army during the Arab
Revolt, a task he undertook while employed as a recruiter by the British
military administration in Jerusalem and Damascus. The
post-war Palin Report noted that the English recruiting
officer, Captain C. D. Brunton, found al-Husseini, with whom he cooperated, very
pro-British, and that, via the diffusion of War Office pamphlets dropped from
the air promising them peace and prosperity under British rule, 'the recruits
(were) being given to understand that they were fighting in a national cause
and to liberate their country from the Turks'. Nothing in his early career to
this point suggests he had ambitions to serve in a religious office: his
interests were those of an Arab nationalist.
Early
political activism
In
1919, al-Husseini attended the Pan-Syrian Congress held in Damascus where
he supported Emir Faisal for King of Syria. That year
al-Husseini founded the pro-British Jerusalem branch of the Syrian-based 'Arab
Club' (Al-Nadi al-arabi), which then vied with the Nashashibi-sponsored
'Literary Club' (al-Muntada al-Adabi) for influence over
public opinion, and he soon became its President. At the same time, he wrote
articles for the Suriyya al-Janubiyya (Southern
Syria). The paper was published in Jerusalem beginning in September 1919 by the
lawyer Muhammad Hassan al-Budayri, and edited by Aref
al-Aref, both prominent members of al-Nadi al-'Arabi.
Al-Husseini
was a strong supporter of the short-living Arab Kingdom of Syria, established in March
1920. In addition to his support to pan-Arabist policies of King Faisal I,
al-Husseini tried to destabilize the British rule in Palestine, which was
declared to be part of the Arab Kingdom, even though no authority was exercised
in reality.
During
the annual Nabi Musa procession in Jerusalem in April
1920, violent rioting broke out in protest at the
implementation of the Balfour Declaration which supported the
establishment in Palestine of a homeland for the Jewish people. Much
damage to Jewish life and property was caused. The Palin
Report laid the blame for the explosion of tensions on both sides. Ze'ev
Jabotinsky, organiser of Jewish paramilitary defences, received a 15-year
sentence. Al-Husseini, then a teacher at the Rashidiya
school, near Herod's Gate in East Jerusalem, was charged with
inciting the Arab crowds with an inflammatory speech and sentenced in
absentia to 10-years imprisonment by a military court, since by then he
had fled to Syria. It was asserted soon after, by Chaim
Weizmann and British army Lieutenant Colonel Richard Meinertzhagen, that al-Husseini had
been put up to inciting the riot by British Field-marshal
Allenby's Chief
of Staff, Colonel Bertie Harry Waters-Taylor, to demonstrate to the world
that Arabs would not tolerate a Jewish homeland in Palestine. The assertion was
never proven, and Meinertzhagen was dismissed.
After
the April riots an event took place that turned the traditional rivalry between
the Husseini and Nashashibi clans into a serious rift, with long-term
consequences for al-Husseini and Palestinian nationalism. According to Sir Louis
Bols, great pressure was brought to bear on the military administration
from Zionist leaders and officials such as David Yellin, to have the Mayor
of Jerusalem, Musa Kazim Pasha al-Husayni, dismissed, given his
presence in the demonstration of the previous March. Colonel
Storrs, the Military Governor of Jerusalem, removed him without further
inquiry, replacing him with Raghib al-Nashashibi of the rival Nashashibi
clan. This, according to the Palin report, 'had a profound effect on his
co-religionists, definitely confirming the conviction they had already formed
from other evidence that the Civil Administration was the mere puppet of the
Zionist Organization.'
Until
late 1920, al-Husseini focused his efforts on Pan-Arabism
and the ideology of the Greater Syria in particular, with Palestine
understood as a southern province of an Arab state, whose capital
was to be established in Damascus. Greater Syria was to include territory of
the entire Levant, now occupied by Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestinian Authority and Israel. The
struggle for Greater Syria collapsed after France defeated
the Arab forces in Battle of Maysalun in July 1920. The French army
entered Damascus at that time, overthrew
King Faisal and put an end to the project of a Greater Syria, put under the
French Mandate in accordance with the prior Sykes-Picot Agreement. Palestinian notables
responded to the disaster by a series of resolutions at the 1921 Haifa conference, which set down a
Palestinian framework and passed over in silence the earlier idea of a south
confederated with Syria. This framework set the tone of Palestinian nationalism
for the ensuing decades.
Al-Husseini,
like many of his class and period, then turned from Damascus-oriented
Pan-Arabism to a specifically Palestinian ideology, centered on
Jerusalem, which sought to block Jewish immigration to Mandatory Palestine. The frustration of
pan-Arab aspirations lent an Islamic colour to the struggle for independence,
and increasing resort to the idea of restoring the land to Dar al-Islam. From his election as
Mufti until 1923, al-Husseini exercised total control over the secret society, Al-Fida’iyya
(The Self-Sacrificers), which, together with al-Ikha’ wal-‘Afaf
(Brotherhood and Purity), played an important role in clandestine anti-British
and anti-Zionist activities, and, via members in the gendarmerie, had engaged
in riotous activities as early as April 1920.
Mufti
of Jerusalem
Sir Herbert Samuel, recently
appointed British High Commissioner,
declared a general amnesty for those convicted of complicity in the riots of
1920, excluding only Amin and Al Aref. During a visit later that year to the
Bedouin tribes of Transjordan who harboured the two political refugees, Samuel
offered a pardon
to both and al- Al Aref accepted with alacrity. Husseini initially rebuffed the
offer, on the grounds that he was not a criminal. He accepted the pardon only
in the wake of the death of his half-brother, the mufti Kamil
al-Husayni, in March 1921. Elections were then held, and of the four
candidates running for the office of Mufti, al-Husseini received the least
number of votes, the first three being Nashashibi candidates. Nevertheless,
Samuel was anxious to keep a balance between the al-Husseinis and their rival
clan the Nashashibis.
A year earlier the British had replaced Musa
al-Husayni as Mayor of Jerusalem with Ragheb al-Nashashibi. They then moved to secure
for the Husseini clan a compensatory function of prestige by appointing one of
them to the position of mufti, and, with the support of Ragheb al-Nashashibi,
prevailing upon the Nashashibi front-runner, Sheikh Hussam ad-Din Jarallah, to withdraw. This
automatically promoted Amin al-Husseini to third position, which, under Ottoman
law, allowed him to qualify, and Samuel then chose him as Mufti. His initial
appointment was as Mufti, but when the Supreme Muslim Council was created in
the following year, Husseini demanded and received the title Grand Mufti that
had earlier been created, perhaps on the lines of Egyptian usage, by the
British for his half-brother Kamil.
The position came with a life tenure.
In
1922, al-Husseini was elected President of the Supreme Muslim Council which had been
created by Samuel in 1921. Matthews argues that the British considered the
combinations of his profile as an effective Arab nationalist and a scion of a
noble Jerusalem family 'made it advantageous to align his interests with those
of the British administration and thereby keep him on a short tether.'. The
Council controlled the Waqf
funds, worth annually tens of thousands of pounds and the orphan funds, worth
annually about £50,000, as compared to the £600,000 in the Jewish
Agency's annual budget. In addition, he controlled the Islamic courts
in Palestine. Among other functions, these courts were entrusted with the power
to appoint teachers and preachers.
The
British initially balanced appointments to the Supreme Muslim Council between the Husseinis
and their supporters (known as the majlisiya, or council supporters) and
the Nashashibis and their allied clans (known as the mu'aridun, the
opposition). The mu'aridun, were more disposed to a compromise with the
Jews, and indeed had for some years received annual subventions from the Jewish
Agency. During most of the period of the British mandate, bickering between
these two families seriously undermined any Palestinian Arab unity. In 1936,
however, they achieved a measure of concerted policy when all the Palestinian
Arab groups joined to create a permanent executive organ known as the Arab Higher Committee under al-Husseini's
chairmanship.
Haram ash-Sharif and the Western Wall
The
Supreme Muslim Council and its head al-Husseini, who regarded himself as
guardian of one of the three holy sites of Islam, launched an
international campaign in Muslim countries to gather funds to restore and
improve the Haram ash-Sharif (Noble Sanctuary) or Temple
Mount, and particularly the Al-Aqsa
Mosque and the shrine Dome
of the Rock (which houses the holiest site in Judaism). The whole area
required extensive restoration, given the disrepair into which it had fallen
from neglect in Ottoman times. Jerusalem was the original direction towards
which Muslims prayed, until the Qibla was reorientated towards Mecca by Mohammed in
the year 624. Al-Husseini commissioned the Turkish architect Mimar Kemalettin.
In restoring the site, al-Husseini was also assisted by the Mandatory power's
Catholic Director of Antiquities, Ernest
Richmond. Under Richmond's supervision, the Turkish architect drew up a plan,
and the execution of the works gave a notable stimulus to the revival of
traditional artisan
arts like mosaic
tesselation, glassware production, woodcraft, wickerwork and iron-mongering.
Al-Husseini's
vigorous efforts to transform the Haram
into a symbol of pan-Arabic and Palestinian nationalism were intended to
rally Arab support against the postwar influx of Jewish immigrants. In
his campaigning, al-Husseini often accused Jews of planning to take possession
of the Western
Wall of Jerusalem, which belonged to the waqf of Abu Madyan
as an inalienable property, and rebuild the Temple
over the Al-Aqsa Mosque. He took certain statements, for example, by the Ashkenazi chief
rabbi of Palestine, Abraham Isaac Kook regarding the eventual return
in time of the Temple Mount back to Jewish hands, and turned them to a concrete
political plot to seize control of the area. Al-Husseini's intensive work to
refurbish the shrine as a cynosure for the Muslim world, and Jewish endeavours
to improve their access to, and establish a ritually appropriate ambiance on
the plaza by the Western Wall, led to increased conflict between the
two communities, each seeing the site only from their own traditional
perspective and interests. Zionist narratives pinpointed al-Husseini's works
on, and publicity about, the site and threats to it, as attempts to restore his
own family's waning prestige. Arab narratives read the heightened agitation of
certain Jewish groups over the Wall as an attempt to revive diaspora
interest in Zionism after some years of relative decline, depression and
emigration. Each attempt to make minor alterations to the status quo,
still governed by Ottoman law, was bitterly protested before the British
authorities by the Muslim authorities. If Muslims could cite an Ottoman
regulation of 1912 specifically forbidding objects like seating to be
introduced, the Jews could cite testimonies to the fact that before 1914
certain exceptions had been made to improve their access and use of the Wall.
The decade witnessed several such episodes of strong friction, and the
simmering tensions came to a head in late 1928, only to erupt, after a brief
respite, into an explosion of violence a year later.
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Arab protest delegations, demonstrations and
strikes against British policy in Palestine (subsequent to the foregoing
disturbances [1929 riots]). An Arab "protest gathering" in session.
In the Rawdat el Maaref hall.
From left to right : unknown - Amin
al-Husayni - Musa al-Husayni - Raghib al-Nashashibi – unknown
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1929 Palestine riots
Main
article: 1929 Palestine riots
Prelude
On
10 August 1928, a constituent assembly convened by the French in
Syria was rapidly adjourned when calls were made for a reunification with
Palestine. Al-Husseini and Awni
Abd al-Hadi met with the Syrian nationalists and they made a joint
proclamation for a unified monarchical state under a son of Ibn Sa'ud.
On the 26th. the completion of the first stage of restoration work on the
Haram's mosques was celebrated with great pomp, in the presence of
representatives from the Muslim countries which had financed the project, the
Mandatory authorities, and Abdullah, Emir of Transjordan. A month later,
an article appeared in the Jewish press proposing the purchase and destruction
of houses in the Moroccan quarter bordering on the wall to improve pilgrim
access and thereby further the 'Redemption of Israel.' Soon after, on 23
September, Yom
Kippur, a Jewish beadle introduced a screen to separate male and female
worshippers at the Wall. Informed by residents in the neighbouring Mughrabi
quarter, the waqf authority complained to Harry Luke,
acting Chief Secretary to the Government
of Palestine, that this virtually changed
the lane into a synagogue, and violated the status quo, as had the collapsible
seats in 1926. British constables, encountering a refusal, used force to remove
the screen, and a jostling clash ensued between worshippers and police.
Zionist
allegations that disproportionate force had been employed during what was a
solemn occasion of prayer created an outcry throughout the diaspora.
Worldwide Jewish protests remonstrated with Britain for the violence exercised
at the Wall. The Jewish National Council Vaad Leumi
‘demanded that British administration expropriate the wall for the Jews’. In
reply, the Muslims organized a Defence Committee for the Protection of the
Noble Buraq, and huge crowd rallies took place on the Al-Aqsa plaza in protest.
Work, often noisy, was immediately undertaken on a mosque above the Jewish
prayer site. Disturbances such as opening a passage for donkeys to pass through
the area, angered worshippers. After intense negotiations, the Zionist
organisation denied any intent to take over the whole Haram Ash-Sharif, but
demanded the government expropriate and raze the Moroccan quarter. A law of
1924 allowed the British authorities to expropriate property, and fear of this
in turn greatly agitated the Muslim community, though the laws of donation of
the waqf explicitly disallowed any such alienation. After lengthy deliberation,
a White
Paper was made public on 11 December 1928 in favour of the status quo.
After
the nomination of the new High
Commissioner Sir John Chancellor to
succeed Lord
Plumer in December 1928, the question was re-examined, and in February 1929
legal opinion established that the mandatory authority was within its powers to
intervene to ensure Jewish rights of access and prayer. Al-Husseini pressed him
for a specific clarification of the legal status quo regarding the Wall.
Chancellor mulled weakening the SMC and undermining al-Husseini's authority
by making the office of mufti elective. The Nabi Musa
festival of April that year passed without incident, despite al-Husseini's
warnings of possible incidents. Chancellor thought his power was waning, and
after conferring with London, admitted to al-Husseini on 6 May that he was
impotent to act decisively in the matter. Al-Husseini replied that, unless the
Mandatory authorities acted, then, very much like Christian monks protecting
their sacred sites in Jerusalem, the sheikhs would have to take infringements
of the status quo into their own hands, and personally remove any objects
introduced by Jews to the area. Chancellor asked him to be patient, and
al-Husseini offered to stop works on the Mount on condition that this gesture
not be taken as a recognition of Jewish rights. A change of government in Britain in
June led to a new proposal: only Muslim works in the sector near where Jews
prayed should be subject to mandatory authorisation: Jews could employ ritual
objects, but the introduction of seats and screens would be subject to Muslim
authorisation. Chancellor authorised the Muslims to recommence their
reconstructive work, while, responding to further Zionist complaints, prevailed
on the SMC to stop the raucous Zikr ceremonies in the vicinity of the wall. He also asked the
Zionist representatives to refrain from filling their newspapers with attacks
on the government and Muslim authorities. Chancellor then departed for Europe
where the Mandatory Commission was deliberating.
Riots
With
Chancellor abroad, and the Zionist Commission itself, with its leader Colonel Frederick
Kisch, in Zurich
for the 16th Zionist Congress (attended also by Ze'ev
Jabotinsky), the SMC resumed works, confidentially
authorised, on the Haram only to be met with outcries from the Jewish press.
The administration rapidly published the new rules on 22 July, with a serious
error in translation that fueled Zionist reports of a plot against Jewish
rights. A protest in London led to a public declaration by a member of the
Zionist Commission that Jewish rights were bigger than the status quo, a
statement which encouraged in turn Arab suspicions that local agreements were
again being overthrown by Jewish intrigues abroad. News that the Zurich
Congress, in creating the Jewish Agency on 11 August., had brought unity among
Zionists and the world Jewish community, a measure that would greatly increase
Jewish investment in British Palestine, set off alarm bells. On 15 August, Tisha B'Av,
a day memorializing the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem, the
revisionist Betar movement,
despite Pinhas Rutenberg's plea on 8 August to the acting
High Commissioner Harry Luke to stop such groups from participating,
rallied members from Tel Aviv to join them in the religious commemoration.
Kisch, before leaving, had banned Jewish demonstrations in Jerusalem's Arab
quarters. The Betar youth gave the ceremony a strong nationalist tinge by
singing the Hatikvah,
waving the flag of Israel, and chanting the slogan 'The Wall is
Ours'. The following day coincided with mawlid (or mawsin al-nabi),
the anniversary of the birth of Islam's prophet, Muhammad.
Muslim worshippers, after prayers on the esplanade of the Haram, passed through
the narrow lane by the Wailing Wall and ripped up prayer books, and kotel
notes (wall petitions), without harming however three Jews present.
Contacted by Luke, al-Husseini undertook to do his best to maintain calm on the
Haram, but could not stop demonstrators from gathering at the Wall.
On
17 August a young Jewish boy was stabbed to death by Arabs while retrieving a
football, while an Arab was badly wounded in a brawl with Palestinian Jews.
Strongly tied to the anti-Hashemite party, and attacked by supporters of Abdullah in Transjordan for misusing funds marked out
for campaigning against France, al-Husseini asked for a visa for himself and
Awni Abd al-Hadi to travel to Syria, where the leadership of the Syrian
anti-French cause was being contested. Averse to his presence in Syria, the
French asked him to put off the journey. Meanwhile, despite Harry Luke's
lecturing journalists to avoid reporting such material, rumors circulated in
both communities, of an imminent massacre of Jews by Muslims, and of an assault
on the Haram ash-Sharif by Jews. On 21 August a funeral cortège, taking the
form of a public demonstration for the dead Jewish boy, wound its way through
the old city, with the police blocking attempts to break into the Arab
quarters. On the 22nd, Luke convoked representatives of both parties to calm
things down, and undersign a joint declaration. Awni Abd al-Hadi and Jamal
al-Husayni were ready to recognize Jewish visiting rights at the Wall in
exchange for Jewish recognition of Islamic prerogatives at the Buraq. The
Jewish representative, Yitzhak Ben-Zvi, considered this beyond his
brief—which was limited to an appeal for calm—and the Arabs in turn refused.
They agreed to pursue their dialogue the following week.
On
23 August, a Friday, two or three Arabs were murdered in the Jewish quarter of Mea
Shearim. It was also a day of Muslim prayer. A large crowd, composed of
many people from outlying villages, thronged into Jerusalem, many armed with
sticks and knives. It is not known whether this was organized by al-Husseini or
the result of spontaneous mobilisation. The sermon at Al-Aqsa was to be
delivered by another preacher, but Luke prevailed on al-Husseini to leave his
home and go to the mosque, where he was greeted as 'the sword of the faith' and
where he instructed the preacher to deliver a pacific sermon, while sending an
urgent message for police reinforcements around the Haram. Deluded by the
lenitive address, extremists harangued the crowd, accusing al-Husseini of being
an infidel to the Muslim cause. The same violent accusation was launched in Jaffa against sheikh
Muzaffir, an otherwise radical Islamic preacher, who gave a sermon calling for
calm on the same day. An assault was launched on the Jewish quarter. Violent
mob attacks on Jewish communities, fueled by wildfire hearsay about ostensible
massacres of Arabs and attempts to seize the Wall, took place over the
following days in Hebron, Safed and Haifa. In all, in
the killings and subsequent revenge attacks, 136 Arabs and 135 Jews died, while
340 of the latter were wounded, as well as an estimated 240 Arabs.
Aftermath
Two
official investigations were subsequently conducted by the British and the League
of Nations's Mandatory Commission. The former, The
Shaw Report, concluded that the incident on 23 August consisted of an
attack by Arabs on Jews, but rejected the view that the riots had been
premeditated. Al-Husseini certainly played an energetic role in Muslim
demonstrations from 1928 onwards, but could not be held responsible for the
August riots, even if he had 'a share in the responsibility for the
disturbances'. He had nonetheless collaborated from the 23rd. of that month in
pacifying rioters and reestablishing order. The worst outbreaks occurred in
areas, Hebron, Safed, Jaffa, and Haifa where his Arab political adversaries were dominant. The
root cause of the violent outbreaks lay in the fear of territorial
dispossession. In a Note of Reservation, Mr. Harry Snell, who had apparently
been swayed by Sir Herbert Samuel's son, Edwin Samuel states that,
although he was satisfied that the Mufti was not directly responsible for the
violence or had connived at it, he believed the Mufti was aware of the nature
of the anti-Zionist campaign and the danger of disturbances. He therefore
attributed to the Mufti a greater share of the blame than the official report
had. The Dutch Vice-Chairman of the Permanent Mandates Commission, M. Van Rees,
argued that 'the disturbances of August 1929, as well as the previous
disturbances of a similar character, were, in brief, only a special aspect of
the resistance offered everywhere in the East, with its traditional and feudal
civilisation, to the invasion of a European civilisation introduced by a Western
administration' but concluded that in his view 'the responsibility for what had
happened must lie with the religious and political leaders of the Arabs'.
Many
observers saw al-Husseini as the mastermind behind the riots, accusing him of
dispatching secret emissaries to inflame regional passions [citation]. In
London, Lord Melchett demanded his arrest
for orchestrating all anti-British unrest throughout the Middle
East. Consular documentation discarded the plot thesis rapidly, and
identified the deeper cause as political, not religious, namely in what the
Palin report had earlier identified as profound Arab discontent over Zionism.
Arab memoirs on the fitna (troubles) follow a contemporary
proclamation for the Defence of the Wall on 31 August, which justified the
riots as legitimate, but nowhere mention a coordinated plan. Izzat
Darwaza, an Arab nationalist rival of al-Husseini, alone
asserts, without details, that al-Husseini was responsible. Al-Husseini in his
Judeophobic memoirs (Mudhakkirat) never claimed to have played such a
role.
The
High Commissioner received al-Husseini twice officially on 1 October 1929 and a
week later, and the latter complained of pro-Zionist bias in an area where the
Arab population still viewed Great Britain favorably. Al-Husseini argued that
the weakness of the Arab position was that they lacked political representation
in Europe, whereas for millennia, in his view, the Jews dominated with their
genius for intrigue. He assured Chancellor of his cooperation in maintaining
public order.
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Al-Husseini (center) in a visit to Saudi
Arabia in the early 1930s. To his left is Hashim
al-Atassi, who later became president of Syria and to
al-Husseini's right is Shakib Arslan, an Arab
nationalist philosopher from Lebanon.
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Political activities, 1930–1935
By
1928–1929 a coalition of a new Palestinian nationalist group began to challenge
the hegemony so far exercised by al-Husseini. The group, more pragmatic, hailed
from the landed gentry and from business circles, and was intent on what they
considered a policy of more realistic accommodation to the Mandatory
government. From this period on, a rift emerged, that was to develop into a
feud between the directive elite of Palestinian Arabs.
In
1931, al-Husseini founded the World Islamic Congress, on which he was to
serve as president. Versions differ as to whether or not al-Husseini supported Izz ad-Din al-Qassam when he undertook
clandestine activities against the British Mandate authorities. His appointment
as imam of the
al-Istiqlal mosque
in Haifa had been approved by al-Husseini. Lachman argues that he secretly
encouraged, and perhaps financed al-Qassam at this period. Whatever their
relations, the latter's independent activism, and open challenge to the British
authorities appears to have led to a rupture between the two. He vigorously
opposed the Qassamites' exactions against the Christian and Druze communities.
On
1933, According to Alami, The mufti expressed interest in Ben Gurion's proposal
of a Jewish-Palestine as part of a larger Arab federation,"
By
1935 al-Husseini did take control of one clandestine organization, of whose
nature he had not been informed until the preceding year, which had been set up
in 1931 by Musa Kazim al-Husayni's son, Abd al-Qadir al-Husayni and recruited from
the Palestinian Arab Boy Scout movement, called the 'Holy Struggle' (al-jihad
al-muqaddas). This and another paramilitary youth organization, al-Futuwwah,
paralleled the clandestine Jewish Haganah.
Rumours, and occasional discovery of caches and shipments of arms, strengthened
military preparations on both sides.
1936–39 Arab revolt in Palestine
Main
article: 1936–39 Arab revolt in Palestine
On
19 April 1936, a wave of protest strikes and attacks
against both the British authorities and Jews was unleashed in Palestine. Initially, the riots were
led by Farhan al-Sa'di, a militant sheik of the
northern al-Qassam group, with links to the Nashashibis. After the arrest and
execution of Farhan, al-Husseini seized the initiative by negotiating an
alliance with the al-Qassam faction. Apart from some foreign subsidies,
including a substantial amount from Fascist Italy, he controlled waqf and orphan funds
that generated annual income of about 115,000 Palestine
pounds. After the start of the revolt, most of that money was used to
finance the activities of his representatives throughout the country. To
Italy's Consul-General in Jerusalem, Mariano de Angelis, he explained in July that
his decision to get directly involved in the conflict arose from the trust he
reposed in Italian dictator Benito
Mussolini's backing and promises. Upon al-Husseini's initiative, the leaders
of Palestinian Arab clans formed the Arab Higher Committee under the Mufti's
chairmanship. The Committee called for nonpayment of taxes after 15 May and for
a general
strike of Arab workers and businesses, demanding an end to the Jewish
immigration. The British High
Commissioner for Palestine, Sir Arthur Wauchope, responded by engaging in
negotiations with al-Husseini and the Committee. The talks, however, soon
proved fruitless. Al-Husseini issued a series of warnings, threatening the
'revenge of God Almighty' unless the Jewish immigration were to stop, and the
general strike began, paralyzing the government, public transportation, Arab
businesses and agriculture.
As
the time passed, by autumn the Arab middle class had exhausted its resources.
Under these circumstances, the Mandatory government was looking for an
intermediary who might help persuade the Arab Higher Committee to end the
rebellion. Al-Husseini and the Committee rejected King Abdullah of Transjordan as mediator because of his
dependence on the British and friendship with the Zionists, but accepted the Iraqi Foreign Minister
Nuri
as-Said. As Wauchope warned of an impending military campaign and
simultaneously offered to dispatch a Royal Commission of Inquiry to hear the
Arab complaints, the Arab Higher Committee called off the strike on 11 October.
When the promised Royal Commission of Inquiry arrived in Palestine in
November, al-Husseini testified before it as chief witness for the Arabs.
In
July 1937, British police were sent to arrest al-Husseini for his part in the
Arab rebellion, but, tipped off, he managed to escape to the sanctuary of
asylum in the Haram. He stayed there for three months, directing the revolt
from within. Four days after the assassination of the Acting District
Commissioner for that area Lewis Yelland Andrews by Galilean members
of the al-Qassam
group on 26 September, al-Husseini was deposed from the presidency of the
Muslim Supreme Council, the Arab Higher Committee was declared illegal, and
warrants for the arrest of its leaders were issued, as being at least 'morally
responsible', though no proofs existed for their complicity. Of them only Jamal
al-Husayni managed to escape to Syria: the remaining five were exiled to
the Seychelles.
Al-Husseini was not among the indicted but, fearing imprisonment, on 13–14
October, after sliding under cover of darkness down a rope from the Haram's
wall, he himself fled via Jaffa to Lebanon, disguised as a Bedouin, where he
reconstituted the committee under his leadership. Al-Husseini's tactics, his
abuse of power to punish other clans, and the killing of political adversaries
he considered 'traitors', alienated many Palestinian Arabs. One local leader,
Abu Shair, told Da'ud al-Husayni, an emissary from Damascus who bore a list of
people to be assassinated during the uprising "I don’t work for Husayniya
('Husayni-ism') but for wataniya (nationalism)." He remained in Lebanon for two years, under French surveillance in the Christian
village of Zouk, but, in October 1939, his deteriorating
relationship with the French and Syrian authorities led him to withdraw to
the Kingdom of Iraq. By June 1939, after the
disintegration of the revolt, Husseini's policy of killing only proven
turncoats changed to one of liquidating all suspects, even members of his own
family, according to one intelligence report.
The
rebellion itself had lasted until March 1939, when it was finally quelled by
British troops. It forced Britain to make substantial concessions to Arab
demands. Jewish immigration was to continue but under restrictions, with a
quota of 75,000 places spread out over the following five years. On the expiry
of this period further Jewish immigration would depend on Arab consent. Besides
local unrest, another key factor in bringing about a decisive change in British
policy was Nazi Germany's preparations for a European war, which would develop
into a worldwide conflict. In British strategic thinking, securing the loyalty
and support of the Arab world assumed an importance .of some urgency. While
Jewish support was unquestioned, Arab backing in a new global conflict was by
no means assured. By promising to phase out Jewish immigration into Palestine,
Britain hoped to win back support from wavering Arabs. Husseini, allied to
radical elements in exile, hailing from provincial Palestinian families,
convinced the AHC, against moderate Palestinian families
who were minded to accept it, to reject the White Paper of 1939, which had recommended an
Arab-majority state and an end to building a Jewish national home. The
rejection was based on its perceived failure to promise an end to immigration;
the land policy it advocated was thought to provide imperfect remedies: and the
promised independence appeared to depend on Jewish assent and cooperation.
Husseini, who also had personal interests threatened by these arrangements,
also feared that acceptance would strengthen the hand of his political
opponents in the Palestine national movement, such as the Nashashibis.
Schwanitz and Rubin argued that Husseini was a great influence on Hitler and
that his rejectionism was, ironically, the real causal factor for the establishment
of the state of Israel, a thesis Mikics, who regards Husseini as a 'radical
anti-semite, finds both 'astonishing' and 'silly', since it would logically
entail the collateral thesis that the Zionist movement triggered the Holocaust.
Neve
Gordon writes that al-Husseini regarded all alternative nationalist views as
treasonous, opponents became traitors and collaborators, and patronizing or
employing Jews of any description illegitimate. From Beirut he continued to
issue directives. The price for murdering opposition leaders and peace leaders
rose by July to 100 Palestine pounds: a suspected traitor 25 pounds, and a Jew
10. Notwithstanding this, ties with the Jews were reestablished by leading
families such as the Nashashibis, and by the Fahoum of Nazareth.
Ties
with the Axis Powers during World War II
Throughout
the interwar period, Arab nationalists bore Germany no ill-will, despite its
earlier support for the Ottoman Empire. Like many Arab countries, it was
perceived as a victim of the post-World War I settlement. Hitler himself
often spoke of the 'infamy of Versailles'. Unlike France and Great Britain it
had not exercised imperial designs on the Middle East, and its past policy of
non-intervention was interpreted as a token of good will. While the scholarly
consensus is that Husseini's motives for supporting the Axis powers and his
alliance with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy were deeply inflected by anti-Jewish
and anti-Zionist ideology from the outset, some scholars, notably Renzo
De Felice, deny that the relationship can be taken to reflect a putative
affinity of Arab nationalism with Nazi/Fascist ideology, and that men like
Husseini chose them as allies for purely strategic reasons, on the grounds
that, as Husseini later wrote in his memoirs,'the enemy of your enemy is your
friend'. When Husseini eventually met with Hitler and Ribbentrop in 1941, he
assured Hitler that 'The Arabs were Germany's natural friends because they had
the same enemies... namely the English, the Jews, and the Communists'.
Pre-war
In
1933, within weeks of Hitler's rise to power in Germany,
the German Consul-General in Palestine, Heinrich Wolff, sent a telegram to
Berlin reporting al-Husseini's belief that Palestinian Muslims were
enthusiastic about the new regime and looked forward to the spread of Fascism
throughout the region. Wolff met al-Husseini and many sheikhs again, a month
later, at Nabi
Musa. They expressed their approval of the anti-Jewish boycott in Germany
and asked Wolff not to send any Jews to Palestine. Wolff subsequently wrote in
his annual report for that year that the Arabs' political naïvety led them to
fail to recognize the link between German Jewish policy and their problems in
Palestine, and that their enthusiasm for Nazi Germany was devoid of any real
understanding of the phenomenon. The various proposals by Palestinian Arab
notables like al-Husseini were rejected consistently over the years out of
concern to avoid disrupting Anglo-German relations, in line with Germany's
policy of not imperilling their economic and cultural interests in the region
by a change in their policy of neutrality, and respect for British interests.
Hitler's Englandpolitik essentially precluded significant assistance to
Arab leaders. Italy also made the nature of its assistance to the Palestinian
contingent on the outcome of its own negotiations with Britain, and cut off aid
when it appeared that the British were ready to admit the failure of their
pro-Zionist policy in Palestine. Al-Husseini's adversary, Ze'ev
Jabotinsky had at the same time cut off Irgun ties with
Italy after the passage of antisemitic racial legislation.
Though
Italy did offer substantial aid, some German assistance also trickled through.
After asking the new German Consul-General, Hans Döhle on 21 July 1937 for
support, the Abwehr
briefly made an exception to its policy and gave some limited aid. But this was
aimed to exert pressure on Britain over Czechoslovakia.
Promised arms shipments never eventuated. This was not the only diplomatic
front on which al-Husseini was active. A month after his visit to Döhle, he met
with the American Consul George Wadsworth (August 1937), to whom
he professed his belief that America was remote from imperialist ambitions and
therefore able to understand that Zionism 'represented a hostile and
imperialist aggression directed against an inhabited country’. In a further
interview with Wadsworth on 31 August, he expressed his fears that Jewish
influence in the United States might persuade the country to side with
Zionists. In the same period he courted the French government by expressing a
willingness to assist them in the region.
Al-Husseini
in Iraq
See
also: 1941 Iraqi coup d'état, Anglo-Iraqi
War, and Anglo-Soviet invasion of Persia
With
the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939 the Iraqi
Government complied with a British request to break off diplomatic relations
with Germany, interned all German nationals, and introduced emergency measures
putting Iraq on a virtual war-footing. A circle of 7 officers opposed this
decision and the measures taken. With Nuri
as-Said's agreement—he wished to persuade al-Husseini of the value of the
British White Paper of 1939—they invited al-Husseini to Iraq in October 1939,
and he was to play an influential role there in the following two years. A quadrumvirate
of four younger generals among the seven, three of whom had served with
al-Husseini in World War I, were hostile to the idea of subordinating Iraqi
national interests to Britain's war strategy and requirements. In March 1940,
the nationalist Rashid Ali replaced Nuri as-Said. Ali made covert
contacts with German representatives in the Middle
East, though he was not yet an openly pro-Axis supporter, and al-Husseini's
personal secretary Kemal Hadad acted as a liaison between the Axis powers and these
officers. As the European situation for the Allies deteriorated, Husseini
advised Iraq to adhere to the letter to their treaty with Great Britain, and
avoid being drawn into the war in order to conserve her energies for the
liberation of Arab countries. Were Russia, Japan and Italy to side with Germany
however, Iraqis should proclaim a revolt in Palestine.
In
mid May 1940, despairing of their ability to secure control of Iraq's oil
fields and deny access to Germany, the British turned to the extremist Irgun, approaching
one of its commanders, David Raziel, whom they had imprisoned in Mandatory Palestine. They asked him if he would
undertake to destroy Iraq's oil refineries, and thus turn off the spigots to
Germany. Raziel agreed on condition he be allowed to "acquire"
(kidnap) the Mufti and bring him back to Palestine. The mission plan was
changed at the last moment, however, and Raziel was killed by a bomb dropped by
a German plane.
Al-Husseini
used his influence and ties with the Germans to promote Arab nationalism in
Iraq. He was among the key promoters of the pan-Arab Al-Muthanna
Club, and supported the coup d'état by Rashid Ali
in April 1941. The situation of Iraq's Jews rapidly deteriorated, with
extortions and sometimes murders taking place. When the Anglo-Iraqi
War broke out, al-Husseini used his influence to issue a fatwa for a holy war
against Britain. As the British advanced on the capital, the Farhud pogrom in
Baghdad, led by members of the Al-Muthanna Club, which had served as a conduit
for German propaganda funding, erupted in June 1941, following the Iraqi defeat
and the collapse of Rashid Ali's government. The pogrom was rooted in
antisemitic incitement during the preceding decade against the backdrop of the
conflict between Arabs and Jews in Palestine.
When
the war failed for the Iraqis—given its paucity, German and Italian assistance
played a negligible role in the war—al-Husseini escaped to Persia
(together with Rashid Ali), where he was granted legation
asylum first by Japan, and then by Italy. On 8 October, after the occupation of Persia by the Allies and after the new Persian government
of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi severed diplomatic
relations with the Axis powers, al-Husseini was taken under Italian
protection and conveyed through Turkey to Axis Europe in an operation organized by Italian Military Intelligence (Servizio
Informazioni Militari, or SIM).
In
Nazi-occupied Europe
Al-Husseini
arrived in Rome on
10 October 1941. He outlined his proposals before Alberto Ponce de Leon. On
condition that the Axis powers 'recognize in principle the unity,
independence, and sovereignty, of an Arab state, including Iraq, Syria,
Palestine, and Transjordan', he offered support in the war against Britain and
stated his willingness to discuss the issues of 'the Holy Places, Lebanon, the Suez Canal,
and Aqaba'. The
Italian foreign ministry approved al-Husseini's proposal, recommended giving
him a grant of one million lire, and referred him to Benito
Mussolini, who met al-Husseini on 27 October. According to al-Husseini's
account, it was an amicable meeting in which Mussolini expressed his hostility
to the Jews and Zionism.
Back
in the summer of 1940 and again in February 1941, al-Husseini submitted to the Nazi
German Government a draft declaration of German-Arab cooperation,
containing a clause:
Germany and Italy recognize the right of the Arab countries to solve the question of the Jewish elements, which exist in Palestine and in the other Arab countries, as required by the national and ethnic (völkisch) interests of the Arabs, and as the Jewish question was solved in Germany and Italy.
Encouraged
by his meeting with the Italian leader, al-Husseini prepared a draft
declaration, affirming the Axis support for the Arabs on 3 November. In three
days, the declaration, slightly amended by the Italian foreign ministry, received
the formal approval of Mussolini and was forwarded to the German embassy in
Rome. On 6 November, al-Husseini arrived in Berlin, where he
discussed the text of his declaration with Ernst von Weizsäcker and other German
officials. In the final draft, which differed only marginally from
al-Husseini's original proposal, the Axis powers declared their readiness to
approve the elimination (Beseitigung) of the Jewish National Home in
Palestine.
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Haj Amin al-Husseini meeting with Adolf
Hitler (November 28, 1941).
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On
20 November, al-Husseini met the German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop and was officially received
by Adolf
Hitler on 28 November. He asked Adolf Hitler for a public declaration that
'recognized and sympathized with the Arab struggles for independence and
liberation, and that would support the elimination of a national Jewish
homeland'. Hitler refused to make such a public announcement, saying that it
would strengthen the Gaullists against the Vichy
France, but asked al-Husseini 'to lock ...deep in his heart' the following
points, which Christopher Browning summarizes as follows,
that
‘Germany has resolved, step by step, to ask one European nation after the other to solve its Jewish problem, and at the proper time, direct a similar appeal to non-European nations as well'. When Germany had defeated Russia and broken through the Caucasus into the Middle East, it would have no further imperial goals of its own and would support Arab liberation... But Hitler did have one goal. "Germany’s objective would then be solely the destruction of the Jewish element residing in the Arab sphere under the protection of British power". (Das deutsche Ziel würde dann lediglich die Vernichtung des im arabischen Raum unter der Protektion der britischen Macht lebenden Judentums sein). In short, Jews were not simply to be driven out of the German sphere but would be hunted down and destroyed even beyond it.’
A
separate record of the meeting was made by Fritz Grobba,
who until recently had been the German ambassor to Iraq. His version of the
crucial words reads "when the hour of Arab liberation comes, Germany has
no interest there other than the destruction of the power protecting the
Jews". Al-Husseini's own account of this point, as recorded in his diary,
is very similar to Grobba's. According to Amin's account, however, when Hitler
expounded his view that the Jews were responsible for World War I, Marxism and
its revolutions, and this was why the task of Germans was to persevere in a
battle without mercy against the Jews, he replied: "We Arabs think that
Zionism, not the Jews, is the cause of all of these acts of sabotage."
In
December 1942, al-Husseini held a speech at the celebration of the opening of
the Islamic Central Institute (Islamisches Zentralinstitut) in Berlin, of which
he served as honorary chair. In the speech, he harshly criticised those he
considered as aggressors against Muslims, namely "Jews, Bolsheviks and
Anglo-Saxons." At the time of the opening of the Islamic Central
Institute, there were an estimated 3,000 Muslims in Germany, including 400
German converts. The Islamic Central Institute gave the Muslims in Germany
institutional ties to the 'Third Reich'.
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Al-Husseini meeting with Muslim volunteers,
including the Azerbaijani Legion, at the opening of the
Islamic Central Institute in Berlin on 18 December 1942, during the Muslim festival Eid
al-Adha.
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The
Holocaust
Al-Husseini
and the Holocaust
Much
of the case against Husseini's role in The
Holocaust emerged in the immediate aftermath of WW2, with those collecting
evidence working for the Jewish Agency in the context of an intensive public
relations exercise to establish a Jewish state in Mandatory Palestine. Husseini
has been described by the American Jewish Congress as "Hitler's
henchman" and some scholars, such as Schwanitz and Rubin, have argued that
Husseini made the Final Solution inevitable by shutting out the
possibility of Jews escaping to Palestine.
Although
some historians have questioned al-Husseini's knowledge of the Holocaust while
it was in progress, Wolfgang G. Schwanitz notes that in his
memoirs Husseini recalled that Heinrich Himmler,
in the summer of 1943, while confiding some German war secrets, inveighed
against Jewish "war guilt", and revealed the ongoing extermination
(in Arabic, abadna) of the Jews.
Gilbert
Achcar, referring to this meeting with Himmler, observes:
The Mufti was well aware that the European Jews were being wiped out; he never claimed the contrary. Nor, unlike some of his present-day admirers, did he play the ignoble, perverse, and stupid game of Holocaust denial... . His amour-propre would not allow him to justify himself to the Jews... .gloating that the Jews had paid a much higher price than the Germans... he cites... : 'Their losses in the Second World War represent more than thirty percent of the total number of their people ...'. Statements like this, from a man who was well placed to know what the Nazis had done ... constitute a powerful argument against Holocaust deniers. Husseini reports that Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler ... told him in summer 1943 that the Germans had ‘already exterminated more than three million’ Jews: "I was astonished by this figure, as I had known nothing about the matter until then." ... Thus. in 1943, Husseini knew about the genocide... .
The
memoir then continues:-
Himmler asked me on the occasion: 'How do you propose to settle the Jewish question in your country?' I replied: 'All we want from them is that they return to their countries of origin.' He (Himmler) replied: 'We shall never authorize their return to Germany.'
Wolfgang G. Schwanitz doubts the sincerity of
his surprise since, he argues, Husseini had publicly declared that Muslims
should follow the example Germans set for a "definitive solution to the
Jewish problem".
Subsequently,
the Mufti declared in November 1943:
It is the duty of Muhammadans [Muslims] in general and Arabs in particular to ... drive all Jews from Arab and Muhammadan countries... . Germany is also struggling against the common foe who oppressed Arabs and Muhammadans in their different countries. It has very clearly recognized the Jews for what they are and resolved to find a definitive solution [endgültige Lösung] for the Jewish danger that will eliminate the scourge that Jews represent in the world.
At
the Nuremberg trials, one of Adolf
Eichmann's deputies, Dieter
Wisliceny, stated that al-Husseini had actively encouraged the
extermination of European Jews, and that al-Husseini had a meeting with
Eichmann at his office, during which Eichmann gave him a view of the current
state of the "Solution of the Jewish
Question in Europe" by the Third
Reich. The allegation is dismissed by most serious historians. A single
affidavit by Rudolf Kastner reported that Wisliceny told him that
he had overheard Husseini say he had visited Auschwitz incognito in Eichmann's
company. Eichmann denied this at his trial in Jerusalem in 1961. He had been
invited to Palestine in 1937 with his superior Hagen by a representative of the
Haganah,
Feival Polkes, Polkes supported German foreign policy in the Near East and
offered to work for them in intelligence. Eichmann and Hagen spent one night in
Haifa but were refused a visa to stay any longer. They met Polkes in Cairo
instead. Eichmann stated that he had only been introduced to al-Husseini during
an official reception, along with all other department heads, and there is no
evidence, despite intensive investigations, that show the mufti to have been a
close collaborator of Eichmann, exercising influence over him or accompanying
on visits to death camps. The Jerusalem court accepted Wisliceny's testimony
about a key conversation between Eichmann and the mufti, and found as proven
that al-Husseini had aimed to implement the Final Solution. Hannah
Arendt, who was present at the trial, concluded in her book, Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality
of Evil, that the evidence for an Eichmann- al-Husseini connection was
based on rumour and unfounded.
Rafael
Medoff concludes that 'actually there is no evidence that the Mufti's
presence was a factor at all; the Wisliceny hearsay is not merely
uncorroborated, but conflicts with everything else that is known about the
origins of the Final Solution.' Bernard
Lewis also called Wisliceny's testimony into doubt: 'There is no
independent documentary confirmation of Wisliceny's statements, and it seems
unlikely that the Nazis needed any such additional encouragement from the
outside.' Bettina Stangneth called Wisliceny's claims "colourful
stories" that "carry little weight".
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Arabs, rise as one man and fight for your
sacred rights. Kill the Jews wherever you find them. This pleases God, history,
and religion. This saves your honor. God is with you. - Mufti
Amin al-Husseini
[PHOTO
SOURCE: http://www.azquotes.com/quote/593649]
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Al-Husseini's
attempts to block Jewish refugees
The
Mufti opposed all immigration of Jews into Palestine. No evidence has been
forthcoming to show he was opposed to programmes to take Jews to safety outside
the Middle East, be it Sweden, or Switzerland or Far eastern countries. The
Mufti’s numerous letters appealing to various governmental authorities to
prevent Jewish emigration to Palestine have been widely republished and cited
as documentary evidence of his collaboration with Nazis and his participative
support for their genocidal actions. For instance, Husseini intervened on 13
May 1943, before the meeting with Himmler when he was informed of the
Holocaust, with the German Foreign Office to block possible transfers of Jews
from Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania to Palestine, after reports reached him that
4,000 Jewish children accompanied by 500 adults had managed to reach Palestine.
He asked that the Foreign Minister "to do his utmost" to block all
such proposals and this request was complied with. According to Idith Zertal,
none of the documents presented at Eichmann's trial prove that it was the
Mufti's interference, in these 'acts of total evil,' that prevented the
children's rescue. In June 1943 the Mufti recommended to the Hungarian minister
that it would be better to send Jews in Hungary to Concentration Camps in Poland rather than let
them find asylum in Palestine. A year later, on 25 July 1944 he wrote to the
Hungarian foreign minister to register his objection to the release of
certificates for 900 Jewish children and 100 adults for transfer from Hungary,
fearing they might end up in Palestine. He suggested that if such transfers of
population were deemed necessary, then:
I ask your Excellency to permit me to draw your attention to the necessity of preventing the Jews from leaving your country for Palestine, and if there are reasons which make their removal necessary, it would be indispensable and infinitely preferable to send them to other countries where they would find themselves under active control, for example, in Poland, thus avoiding danger and preventing damage."
Achcar
quotes the Mufti’s memoirs about these efforts to influence the Axis powers to
prevent emigration of Eastern European Jews to Palestine:
We combatted this enterprise by writing to Ribbentrop, Himmler, and Hitler, and, thereafter, the governments of Italy, Hungary, Rumania, Bulgaria, Turkey, and other countries. We succeeded in foiling this initiative, a circumstance that led the Jews to make terrible accusations against me, in which they held me accountable for the liquidation of four hundred thousand Jews who were unable to emigrate to Palestine in this period. They added that I should be tried as a war criminal in Nurenberg.
In
November, 1943 the Mufti said:
It is the duty of Muhammadans in general and Arabs in particular to … drive all Jews from Arab and Muhammadan countries….Germany is also struggling against the common foe who oppressed Arabs and Muhammadans in their different countries. It has very clearly recognized the Jews for what they are and resolved to find a definitive solution [endgültige Lösung] for the Jewish danger that will eliminate the scourge that Jews represent in the world. ….
In
September 1943, intense negotiations to rescue 500 Jewish children from the Arbe concentration camp collapsed due to
the objection of al-Husseini who blocked the children's departure to Turkey
because they would end up in Palestine.
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Haj Amin al-Husseini meeting with Heinrich
Himmler (1943).
|
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Haj Amin al-Husseini and Nazi collaborator
Mile Budak in occupied Sarajevo (1943).
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Intervention
in Palestine and Operation Atlas
The
Mufti collaborated with the Germans in numerous sabotage and commando
operations in Iraq, Transjordan, and Palestine, and repeatedly urged the
Germans to bomb Tel Aviv and Jerusalem 'in order to injure Palestinian Jewry
and for propaganda purposes in the Arab world', as his Nazi interlocutors put
it. The proposals were rejected as unfeasible. The Italian Fascists envisaged a
project to establish him as head of an intelligence centre in North Africa, and
he agreed to act as commander of both regular and irregular forces in a future
unit flanking Axis troops to carry out sabotage operations behind enemy lines.
Operation
ATLAS was one such joint operation. A special commando unit of the Waffen
SS was created, composed of three members of the Templer religious sect in Palestine,
and two Palestinian Arabs recruited from the Mufti's associates,
Hasan
Salama and Abdul Latif (who had edited the Mufti's Berlin radio addresses).
It has been established that the mission, briefed by al-Husseini before
departure, aimed at establishing an intelligence-gathering base in Palestine,
radioing information back to Germany, and buying support among Arabs in
Palestine, recruiting and arming them to foment tensions between Jews and
Arabs, disrupting the Mandatory authorities and striking Jewish targets. The
plan ended in fiasco: they received a cold reception in Palestine, three of the
five infiltrators were quickly rounded up, and the matériel seized. Their
air-dropped cargo was found by the British, and consisted of submachine guns,
dynamite, radio equipment, 5,000 Pound sterling, a duplicating machine, a
German-Arabic dictionary, and a quantity of poison. Michael
Bar-Zohar and Eitan Haber, report that the mission included a plan to
poison the Tel
Aviv water supply, There is no trace of this poison plot in the standard
biographies, Palestinian and Israeli, of Husseini.
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I declare a holy war, my Moslem brothers!
Murder the Jews! Murder them all. - Mufti Amin al-Husseini
[PHOTO
SOURCE: http://www.azquotes.com/quote/736660]
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Propaganda
Throughout
World War II, al-Husseini worked for the Axis
Powers as a broadcaster in propaganda targeting Arab public opinion. He was
thereby joined by other Arabs such as Fawzi
al-Qawuqji and Hasan Salama. The Mufti was paid "an absolute
fortune" of 50,000 marks a month (when a German field marshal was making
25,000 marks a year), the equivalent today of $12,000,000 a year. Walter
Winchell called him "the Arabian Lord
Haw-Haw".
The
Mufti also wrote a pamphlet for the 13th SS Handschar
division, translated as Islam i Zidovstvo (Islam and Judaism) which
closed with a quotation from Bukhari-Muslim by Abu
Khurreira that states: "The Day of Judgement
will come, when the Muslims will crush the Jews completely: And when every tree
behind which a Jew hides will say: 'There is a Jew behind me, Kill him!". Some
accounts, ignoring the historical record, have claimed that the Handschar was
responsible for killing 90% of Bosnian Jews. In fact, Handschar units were
deployed only after most of the Jews in Croatia had been deported or
exterminated. One report, however, of a Handschar patrol murdering some Jewish
civilians in Zvornik
in April 1944 after their real identity was revealed, is plausible.
On
1 March 1944, while speaking on Radio Berlin, al-Husseini said: 'Arabs, rise as one man and fight for your sacred rights.
Kill the Jews wherever you find them. This pleases God, history, and religion.
This saves your honor. God is with you.'
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| Bosniak soldiers of the SS 13 Division, reading Husseini's pamphlet Islam and Judaism |
 |
|
November 1943 al-Husseini greeting Bosnian
Waffen-SS volunteers with a Nazi salute. At right is SS General Karl-Gustav Sauberzweig.
|
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Haj Amin el-Husseini reviewing SS 13th
Division soldiers from a car
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Recruitment
Among
the Nazi leadership, the greatest interest in the idea of creating Muslim units
under German command was shown by Heinrich Himmler, who viewed the Islamic
world as a potential ally against the British Empire and regarded the
Nazi-puppet Independent State of Croatia as a
'ridiculous state'. Himmler had a romantic vision of Islam as a faith
‘fostering fearless soldiers’, and this probably played a significant role in
his decision to raise three Muslim divisions under German leadership in the Balkans from Bosnian Muslims
and Albanians: the 13th Handschar,
the 21st Skanderbeg,
and the 23rd Kama
(Shepherd's dagger). Riven by interethnic conflict, the region's Jewish, Croat,
Roma,
Serb and Muslim communities suffered huge losses of life, Bosnian Muslims
losing around 85,000 from a genocidal Chetnik ethnic
cleansing operations alone. The Muslims had three options: to join the Croatian Ustaše, or
the Yugoslav partisans, or to create local defense
units. Following a tradition of service in the old Bosnian regiments of the
former Austro-Hungarian army, they chose an
alliance with Germany, which promised them autonomy. Husseini, having been
petitioned by the Bosnian Muslim leaders, was well informed of their plight.
Dissatisfied with low enlistenment, Himmler asked the mufti to intervene.
Husseini negotiated, made several requests, mostly ignored by the SS, and
conducted several visits to the area. His speeches and charismatic authority
proved instrumental in improving enlistment notably. In one speech he declared
that:
Those lands suffering under the British and Bolshevist yoke impatiently await the moment when the Axis (powers) will emerge victorious. We must dedicate ourselves to unceasing struggle against Britain -that dungeon of peoples - and to the complete destruction of the British Empire.We must dedicate ourselves to unceasing struggle against Bolshevist Russia because communism is incompatible with Islam.'
One
SS officer reporting on impressions from the mufti's Sarajevo
speech said Husseini was reserved about fighting Bolshevism,
his main enemies being Jewish settlers in Palestine and the English. During a
visit in July 1943 the Mufti said: "The active
cooperation of the world's 400 million Muslims with their loyal friends, the
German, can be of decisive influence upon the outcome of the war. You, my
Bosnian Muslims, are the first Islamic division [and] serve as an example of
the active collaboration....My enemy's enemy is my friend." Himmler
in addressing the unit on another occasion declared "Germany
[and] the Reich have been friends of Islam for the past two centuries, owing
not to expediency but to friendly conviction. We have the same goals."
In
an agreement signed by Husseini and Himmler on 19 May 1943, it was specified
that no synthesis of Islam and Nationalism was to take place. Husseini asked
that Muslim divisional operations to be restricted to the defense of the Moslem
heartland of Bosnia and Herzegovina; that partisans be
amnestied if they laid down their arms; that the civilian population not be
subject to vexations by troops;that assistance be offered to innocents injured
by operations; and that harsh measures like deportations, confiscations of
goods, or executions be governed in accordance with the rule of law. The
Handschar earned a repute for brutality in ridding north-eastern Bosnia of
Serbs and partisans: many local Muslims, observing the violence, were driven to
go over to the communist partisans. Once redeployed outside Bosnia, and as the
fortunes of war turned, mass defections and desertions took place, and Volksdeutsche
were drafted to replace the losses. The mufti blamed the mass desertions on
German support for the Četniks. Many Bosnians in these divisions who survived
the war sought asylum in Western and Arab countries, and of those settling in
the Middle East, many fought in Palestine against the new
state of Israel. Reacting to the formation by Great Britain of a special Jewish
legion in the Allied cause, Husseini urged Germany to raise a similar Arab
legion. Husseini helped organize Arab students and North African emigres in
Germany into the "Arabisches Freiheitkorps", an Arab Legion in the
German Army that hunted down Allied parachutists in the Balkans and fought on
the Russian front.
Activities after World War II
Arrest and flight
After
the end of the Second World War, al-Husseini attempted to obtain asylum in Switzerland
but his request was refused. He was taken into custody at Konstanz by
the French occupying troops on 5 May 1945, and on 19 May, he was transferred to
the Paris region and put under house
arrest.
At
around this time, the British head of Palestine’s Criminal Investigation
Division told an American military attaché that the Mufti might be the only
person who could unite the Palestinian Arabs and 'cool off the Zionists'.
Henri
Ponsot, a former ambassador of France in Syria, led the discussions with him
and had a decisive influence on the events. The French authorities expected an
improvement in France's status in the Arab world through his intermediaries and
accorded him "special detention conditions, benefits and ever more
important privileges and constantly worried about his well-being and that of
his entourage". In October, he was even given permission to buy a car in
the name of one of his secretaries and enjoyed some freedom of movement and
could also meet whoever he wanted. Al-Husseini proposed to the French two
possibilities of cooperation: 'either an action in Egypt, Iraq and even
Transjordan to calm the anti-French excitement after the events in Syria and
because of its domination in North Africa; or that he would take the initiative
of provocations in [Palestine], in Egypt and in Iraq against Great Britain', so
that the Arabs countries will pay more attention to British policy than to that
of France. Al-Husseini was very satisfied with his situation in France and
stayed there for a full year.
As
early as 24 May, Great Britain requested al-Husseini's extradition, arguing
that he was a British citizen who had collaborated with the Nazis. Despite the
fact that he was on the list of war
criminals, France decided to consider him as a political prisoner and refused to comply with
the British request. France refused to extradite him to Yugoslavia where the
government wanted to prosecute him for the massacres of Serbs. Poussot believed
al-Husseini's claims that the massacre of Serbs had been performed by General
Mikhailovitch and not by him. Al-Husseini also explained that 200,000 Muslims
and 40,000 Christians had been assassinated by the Serbs and that he had
established a division of soldiers only after Bosnian Muslims had asked for his
help, and that Germans and Italians had refused to provide any support to them.
In the meantime, Zionist representatives—fearing that al-Husseini would
escape—backed Yugoslavia's request for extradition. They stated that
al-Husseini was also responsible for massacres in Greece and pointed out his
action against the Allies in Iraq in 1941; additionally they requested the
support of the United States in the matter.
The
reputation of Haj Amin al-Husseini among Jews in the immediate postwar period
is indicated by the observation by Raul
Hilberg that when culpability for the destruction of the European Jews was
debated in 1945, al-Husseini was the only specific individual singled out to be
put on trial. In June, Yishuv leaders decided to eliminate al-Husseini. Although
al-Husseini was located by Jewish Army members who began to plan an
assassination, the mission was canceled in December by Moshe
Sharett or by David Ben-Gurion, probably because they feared
turning the Grand Mufti into a martyr.
A
campaign of intimidation was launched to convince the mufti that at Léon Blum's
request he would be handed over to the British. In September, the French
decided to organize his transfer to an Arab country. Egypt, Saudi Arabia or
Yemen were considered and diplomatic contacts were made with their authorities
and with the Arab League.
On
29 May, after an influential Moroccan had organized his escape, and the French
police had suspended their surveillance, al-Husseini left France on a TWA
flight for Cairo using travel papers supplied by a Syrian politician who was
close to the Muslim Brotherhood. It took more than 12 days
for the French foreign minister to realize he had fled, and the British were
not able to arrest him in Egypt, after that country granted him political
asylum.
On
12 August 1947, al-Husseini wrote to French foreign minister Georges
Bidault, thanking France for its hospitality and suggesting that France
continue this policy to increase its prestige in the eyes of all Muslims. In
September, a delegation of the Arab Higher Committee went to Paris and
proposed that Arabs would adopt a neutral position on the North African
question in exchange of France's support in the Palestinian question.
Post-War Palestinian Political Leadership
In
November 1945, at the initiative of the Arab League, the 'Arab Higher
Committee' (AHC) was reestablished as the supreme executive body that
represented the Arabs in Mandatory Palestine. This 12-member AHC included
Husseini supporters and some members of political parties that opposed the
Grand Mufti and his allies. The dispute between Husseini-supporters and their
opposition was inflamed by the return of Jamal al Husseini to the Middle East
and his resumption of political activity. In March 1946 the AHC was disbanded,
and then Jamal reconstituted it as an organization exclusively staffed by
Husseini political allies and family-members. The Arab League foreign ministers
intervened in June 1948 by replacing both the AHC and the opposing 'Arab Higher
Front' with the 'Arab Higher Executive' (AHE) to represent Palestinian Arabs.
Haj Amin al Husseini was the Chairman of the AHE, even though he was absent,
and Jamal acted as Vice-Chairman. The Husseini faction dominated the
nine-member AHE. Subsequently Haj Amin returned to Egypt and began his
practical leadership of the Palestinian Arabs while residing in Cairo. The name
of the AHE was changed back to AHC in January, 1947.
1948 Palestine war
See also: 1948 Palestine war and All-Palestine Government
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|
and conquer all of Palestine, to burn all the
middle east and cancel the U.N partition resolution
|
The U.N. Partition Resolution
When
the United Nations Special
Committee on Palestine delivered its recommendations for the partition of
Palestine, the High Commissioner of Palestine, Alan
Cunningham sent emissaries to Cairo to sound out the Mufti, though
transferring any power of state to him was unthinkable. Interviewed on the 1st
of September, he said that the proposed partition was unjust, since it deprived
the Arabs of Palestine of what belonged to them, and would not satisfy in any
case the Zionists, who desired all of the country. He cited the example of Chaim
Weizmann, who opposed the idea of a Jewish state in 1922, approved
partition in 1937, and at the Biltmore Conference in 1942, laid claim to the
whole of Palestine. It was said of Hitler, he added, that he would never try to
apply the ideas he set forth in Mein Kampf.
The Zionists, he asserted, would never restrict their programme to a part of
Palestine, for l'appétit vient en mangeant(the more you get the more you
want). The English would never have ceded a part of their country in
exchange for peace with the Nazis. Zionism was a bluff like Italian fascism,
which would collapse at the first shock.
Musa Alami
surmised that the mufti would agree to partition if he were promised that he
would rule the future Arab state". According to Issa Khalaf there are no
indications to substantiate this claim.
The
wartime reputation of Haj Amin al-Husseini was employed as an argument for the
establishment of a Jewish State during the deliberations at UN in 1947. The Nation
Associates under Freda Kirchwey prepared a nine-page pamphlet with
annexes for the United Nations entitled The Arab Higher Committee, Its
Origins, Personnel and Purposes. This booklet included copies of
communications between Haj Amin al-Husseini and high ranking Nazis (e.g. Heinrich
Himmler, Franz von Papen, Joseph
Goebbels), the Mufti's diary account of meeting Hitler, several letters to
German officials in several countries where he requested that Jews never be
permitted to emigrate from Europe to a Jewish Home in Palestine, and many
photographs of the Mufti, Rashid Ali, and other Arab politicians in the company of
Nazis and their Italian and Japanese allies. It claimed to demonstrate that
German Nazis and Palestinian politicians (some of whom were requesting
recognition at the UN in 1947 as representatives of the Palestinian Arab
population) had made common cause during World
War II in their opposition to the establishment of a Jewish State in
Palestine. In May 1948, the Israeli government thanked Kirchwey for
"having a good and honorable share of our success", at least partly
as a consequence of distributing information on al-Husseini to the UN
representatives.
On
the eve of the United Nations' partition of Mandatory Palestine, King Abdullah,
who shared with Zionists a hostility to Palestinian nationalism, reached a secret
entente with Golda Meir to thwart the mufti and annex the part of
Palestine in exchange for Jordan's dropping its opposition to the establishment
of a Jewish state. The meeting, in Shlaim's words, 'laid the foundations for a
partition of Palestine along lines radically different from the ones eventually
envisaged by the United Nations'. Husseini's popularity in the Arab world had
risen during his time with the Nazis, and Arab leaders rushed to greet him on
his return, and the masses accorded him an enthusiastic reception, an attitude
which was to change rapidly after the defeat of 1948. Elpeleg writes that 'to a
certain extent' Husseini was chosen as the 'scapegoat' for this defeat.
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| Haj Amin al-Husseini meeting with Gamal Abdel Nasser, the future Egyptian president in 1948 |
The war
On
December 31, 1947, Macatee, the American consul general in Jerusalem, reported
that terror ruled Palestine, and that partition was the cause of this terror.
According to Macatee, the Palestinian Arabs did not dare to oppose Haj Amin,
but they did not rally en masse around his flag in the war against the
Zionists.
From
his Egyptian exile, al-Husseini used what influence he had to encourage the
participation of the Egyptian military in the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. He was involved in
some high level negotiations between Arab leaders—before and during the War—at
a meeting held in Damascus in February 1948, to organize Palestinian Field
Commands and the commanders of the Holy
War Army. Hasan Salama and Abd al-Qadir al-Husayni (Amin al-Husseini's
nephew), were allocated the Lydda district and Jerusalem
respectively. This decision paved the way for undermining the Mufti's position
among the Arab States. On 9 February 1948, four days after the Damascus
meeting, he suffered a severe setback at the Arab
League's Cairo
session, when his demands for more Palestinian self-determination in areas
evacuated by the British, and for financial loans were rejected. His demands
included, the appointment of a Palestinian Arab representative to the League's
General Staff, the formation of a Palestinian Provisional Government, the
transfer of authority to local National Committees in areas evacuated by the
British, and both a loan for Palestinian administration and an appropriation of
large sums to the Arab Higher Executive for Palestinian Arabs entitled to war
damages.
The
Arab League blocked recruitment to al-Husseini's forces, and they collapsed
following the death of one of his most charismatic commanders, Abd al-Qadir al-Husayni, on 8 April 1948.
Anwar
Nusseibeh, a supporter of the Mufti, said the Mufti refused to issue arms
to anyone except his loyal supporters and only recruited loyal supporters for
the forces of the Holy War Army. This partially accounts for the
absence of an organized Arab force and for the insufficient amount of arms,
which plagued the Arab defenders of Jerusalem.
Establishment of All-Palestine
Government
Following
rumors that King Abdullah I of Transjordan was
reopening the bilateral negotiations with Israel that he had previously
conducted clandestinely with the Jewish
Agency, the Arab League—led by Egypt—decided to set up the All-Palestine Government in Gaza on 8
September 1948, under the nominal leadership of al-Husseini. Avi Shlaim writes:
'The decision to form the Government of All-Palestine in Gaza, and the feeble attempt to create armed forces under its control, furnished the members of the Arab League with the means of divesting themselves of direct responsibility for the prosecution of the war and of withdrawing their armies from Palestine with some protection against popular outcry. Whatever the long-term future of the Arab government of Palestine, its immediate purpose, as conceived by its Egyptian sponsors, was to provide a focal point of opposition to Abdullah and serve as an instrument for frustrating his ambition to federate the Arab regions with Transjordan'.
The
All-Palestine Government was declared in Gaza on 22 September, in a way as a
countermeasure against Jordan. According to Moshe Ma'oz this was "a mere
tool to justify Cairo’s occupation of the Gaza Strip" Pre-conference by
the Arab League obtained an agreement to have Ahmad Hilmi Pasha preside over the
government, while giving al-Husseini a nominal role, devoid of
responsibilities. A Palestinian National Council was
convened in Gaza on 30 September 1948, under the chairmanship of Amin
al-Husseini. On 30 September, al-Husseini was elected unanimously as President,
but had no authority outside the areas controlled by Egypt. The council passed
a series of resolutions culminating on 1 October 1948 with a declaration of
independence over the whole of Palestine, with Jerusalem as
its capital.
The
All-Palestine Government was hence born under the nominal leadership of Amin
al-Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem, named as its President. Ahmed
Hilmi Abd al-Baqi was named Prime
Minister. Hilmi's cabinet consisted largely of relatives and followers of
Amin al-Husseini, but also included representatives of other factions of the
Palestinian ruling class. Jamal
al-Husayni became foreign minister, Raja al-Husayni became defense
minister, Michael Abcarius was finance minister, and Anwar
Nusseibeh was secretary of the cabinet. Twelve ministers in all, living in
different Arab countries, headed for Gaza to take up their new positions. The
decision to set up the All-Palestine Government made the Arab Higher Committee irrelevant, but Amin
al-Husseini continued to exercise an influence on Palestinian affairs.
Jordan's
Abdullah retaliated on 2 October by organizing a Palestinian congress, which
countermanded the decision taken in Gaza. Abdullah regarded the attempt to revive
al-Husseini's Holy War Army as a challenge to his authority and on
3 October, his minister of defense ordered all armed bodies operating in the
areas controlled by the Arab Legion to be disbanded. Glubb
Pasha carried out the order ruthlessly and efficiently.
Nonetheless, Egypt, which manipulated its formation, recognized the
All-Palestine Government on 12 October, followed by Syria and Lebanon on 13
October, Saudi Arabia the 14th and Yemen on the 16th. Iraq's decision to the
same was made formally on the 12th, but was not made public. Both Great Britain
and the US backed Jordan, the US saying that the mufti's role in World War II
could be neither forgotten nor pardoned. The sum effect was that:
'The leadership of al-Hajj Amin al-Husayni and the Arab Higher Committee, which had dominated the Palestinian political scene since the 1920s, was devastated by the disaster of 1948 and discredited by its failure to prevent it.'
The
nakba narratives, according to Hillel
Cohen, tend to ignore the open resistance to al-Husseini by many influential
Palestinians. A member of the Darwish family on expressing dissent with
Husseini's war objective in favour of negotiation was told by the mufti: idha
takalam al-seif, uskut ya kalam—'when the sword talks, there is no place
for talking'. Many recalled his policy of assassinating mukhtars in the Revolt
of 1936–39 and viewed Husseini and his kind as 'an assembly of traitors'. The
opposition of a relevant percentage of the Palestinian society to al-Husseini
goes back to an earlier period and was also connected to the British way of
dealing with the local majority: 'The present administration of Palestine',
lamented for example the representatives of the Palestine Arab Delegation in a
letter to British public opinion in 1930, 'is appointed by His Majesty’s
Government and governs the country through an autocratic system in which the
population has no say'.
Exile from Palestine
Although
al-Husseini had been removed from the Supreme Muslim Council and other
administrative roles by the British government in 1937, they did not remove him
from the post of mufti of Jerusalem. They later explained this as due to the
lack of legal procedure or precedent. However, on December 20, 1948, Abdullah announced his replacement as mufti by
his long-term rival Husam Al-din Jarallah.
The
king was assassinated on 20 July 1951, on the eve of projected secret talks
with Israel, by a militant, Mustafa Ashu, of the jihad al-muqaddas,
while entering the Haram ash-Sharif to pray. There is no evidence al-Husseini
was involved, though Musa al-Husayni was among the six indicted and executed
after a disputed verdict. Abdullah was succeeded by King
Talal—who refused to allow al-Husseini entry into Jerusalem. Abdullah's
grandson, Hussein, who had been present at the murder,
eventually lifted the ban in 1967, receiving al-Husseini as an honoured guest in
his Jerusalem royal residence after uprooting the PLO from Jordan.
The
Palestinian Government was entirely relocated to Cairo in late October 1948 and
became a government-in-exile, gradually losing any importance. Having a part in
the All-Palestine Government, al-Husseini also
remained in exile at Heliopolis in Egypt throughout much of
the 1950s. As before 1948, when the Yishuv believed
the ex-Mufti's hand could be detected 'behind every anti-Jewish pogrom, murder,
and act of sabotage', Israel persisted in asserting that al-Husseini was behind
many border raids from Jordanian and Egyptian-held territory, and Egypt
expressed a readiness to deport him if evidence were forthcoming to
substantiate the charges. The All-Palestine Government was eventually dissolved
in 1959 by Nasser himself, who envisaged a United Arab Republic embracing Syria, Egypt
and Palestine. That year he moved to Lebanon. He
refused requests to lend his support to the emergent PLO after the Six Day
War of 1967, was opposed to the creation of a Palestinian state on the west
Bank after 1967. and his closest collaborator, Emil Ghuri,
continued to work for the Jordanian monarchy even after the Jordanian Civil War there in 1970.
Al-Husseini
died in Beirut,
on 4 July 1974. He had wished to be buried on the Haram
ash-Sharif in Jerusalem. However, Israel had captured
East Jerusalem during the 1967 Six-Day
War. The Supreme Muslim Council asked the Israeli
government permission to bury him there but permission was refused. Three days
later, al-Husseini was buried in Beirut. Within two years, the Christian
Lebanese Phalange sacked his villa, and stole his files and
archives. His granddaughter married Ali Hassan Salameh, the founder of PLO's Black September, who was later killed by Mossad for his
involvement in the Munich massacre. According to Zvi
Elpeleg, almost all trace of his memory thereafter vanished from
Palestinian awareness, and Palestinians have raised no monument to his memory,
or written books commemorating his deeds.
Amin al-Husseini and antisemitism
Al-Husseini's
first biographer, Moshe Pearlman, described him as virulently
antisemitic, as did, a decade and a half later, Joseph
Schechtman. There is no doubt Husseini became robustly judeophobic and
convinced himself, using arguments based on Biblical, Talmudic, and Quranic
passages, that Jews were enemies of God, engaged in a global conspiracy, and
practicing the ritual use of Christian blood. More recent
biographers like Philip Mattar and Elpeleg, writing in the late 1980s
and early 1990s, began to emphasize his nationalism.
While the Palestinian historian Mattar blames him as the main culprit of sowing
the seeds of the Arab–Israeli conflict, Elpeleg compares him to Chaim
Weizmann, David Ben-Gurion, and even to Theodor
Herzl. Peter Wien judges that his behaviour in World War II deserved the
image among Zionists of him as an 'arch villain', but adds that Israeli and
Zionist leaders have long since used this to denigrate the Palestinian
resistance against the Israeli occupation as inspired by Nazism and
anti-semitism.
Scholarly
opinion is divided on the issue, with many scholars viewing him as a staunch
antisemite while some deny the appropriateness of the term, or argue that he
became antisemitic. Robert Kiely sees Husseini as moving "incrementally
toward anti-Semitism as he opposed Jewish ambitions in the region."
Historian Zvi Elpeleg, who formerly governed both the West Bank
and the Gaza
Strip, while rehabilitating him from other charges, concludes his chapter
concerning al-Husseini's involvement in the extermination of the Jews as
follows:
'[i]n any case, there is no doubt that Haj Amin's hatred was not limited to Zionism, but extended to Jews as such. His frequent, close contacts with leaders of the Nazi regime cannot have left Haj Amin any doubt as to the fate which awaited Jews whose emigration was prevented by his efforts. His many comments show that he was not only delighted that Jews were prevented from emigrating to Palestine, but was very pleased by the Nazis' Final Solution'.
Walter
Laqueur, Benny Morris, Klaus-Michael Mallmann and Martin Cüppers,
the evidential basis for whose claims in their book, translated as "Nazi
Palestine" have been questioned as based on selective statements by a few
writers taken at face value, share the view that al-Husseini was biased against
Jews, not just against Zionists. Morris, for instance, notes that al-Husseini
saw the Holocaust as German revenge for a putative Jewish sabotaging of their
war effort in World War I, and has written that "Haj Amin al-Husseini was
an antisemite. This is clear from his writings. I am not saying he was just an
anti-Zionist, he hated the Jews, 'Jews were evil'". In a study dedicated
to the role and use of the Holocaust in Israeli nationalist discourse, Idith
Zertal reexamining al-Husseini's antisemitism, states that 'in more correct
proportions, [he should be pictured] as a fanatic nationalist-religious
Palestinian leader'.
Evaluations of Husseini's historical
significance
Robert
Fisk, discussing the difficulties of describing al-Husseini's life and its
motivations, summarized the problem in the following way:
'(M)erely to discuss his life is to be caught up in the Arab–Israeli propaganda war. To make an impartial assessment of the man's career—or, for that matter, an unbiased history of the Arab–Israeli dispute—is like trying to ride two bicycles at the same time.'
Philip
Mattar suggests that on 1939 al-Husseini should have accepted the favorable White Paper of 1939, or compromise with the
Zionists. But the Mufti adapted a strategy of active and futile opposition and
rejection, which contributed to the ultimate defeat of the Palestinians.
Peter
Novick has argued that the post-war historiographical depiction of
al-Husseini reflected complex geopolitical interests that distorted the record.
'The claims of Palestinian complicity in the murder of the European Jews were to some extent a defensive strategy, a preemptive response to the Palestinian complaint that if Israel was recompensed for the Holocaust, it was unjust that Palestinian Muslims should pick up the bill for the crimes of European Christians. The assertion that Palestinians were complicit in the Holocaust was mostly based on the case of the Mufti of Jerusalem, a pre-World War II Palestinian nationalist leader who, to escape imprisonment by the British, sought refuge during the war in Germany. The Mufti was in many ways a disreputable character, but post-war claims that he played any significant part in the Holocaust have never been sustained. This did not prevent the editors of the four-volume Encyclopedia of the Holocaust from giving him a starring role. The article on the Mufti is more than twice as long as the articles on Goebbels and Göring, longer than the articles on Himmler and Heydrich combined, longer than the article on Eichmann—of all the biographical articles, it is exceeded in length, but only slightly, by the entry for Hitler.'
In
October 2015, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed that Hitler at the
time was not thinking of exterminating the Jews, but only of expelling them,
and that it was al-Husseini who inspired Hitler to embark on a programme of
genocide to prevent them from coming to Palestine. Netanyahu's remarks were broadly
criticized, and dismissed by Holocaust scholars from Israel and Germany. Christopher Browning called the claim a
"blatantly mendacious attempt to exploit the Holocaust politically",
"shameful and indecent" as well as fraudulent, aimed at stigmatizing
and delegitimizing "any sympathy or concern for Palestinian rights and
statehood".
In
the testimony of Fritz Grobba confirm that an associate of
al-Husseini's together with three associates of the former Iraqi Prime
Minister certainly did visit the Sachsenhausen concentration camp
as part of a German secret police "training course" in July 1942. At
the time, the Sachsenhausen camp housed large numbers of Jews, but was only
transformed into a death camp in the following year. Their tour through the
camp presented it as a re-educational institution, and they were shown the high
quality of objects made by inmates, and happy Russian prisoners who, reformed
to fight Bolshevism, were paraded, singing, in sprightly new uniforms. They
left the camp very favourably impressed by its programme of educational
indoctrination. The official German transcript of the meeting with Hitler
contains no support for Netanyahu's assertion. In his memoirs, he recalls
Himmler telling him how shocked he was to observe Jewish kapos abusing fellow Jews and that
Himmler claimed he had the culprits punished.
In
1947 Simon Wiesenthal alleged that Eichmann
had accompanied Husseini on an inspection tour of both Auschwitz and Majdanek,
and that the mufti had praised the hardest workers at the crematoria. His claim
was unsourced. The charge was recycled with added colour by Quentin
Reynolds, unfounded on any evidence, at the time of the trial of Adolf
Eichmann. Various sources have repeatedly alleged that he visited other
concentration camps, and also the death camps of Auschwitz, Majdanek, Treblinka
and Mauthausen,
but according to Höpp there is little conclusive documentary evidence to
substantiate these other visits. The one exception is late testimony taken by
Emerson Vermaat, in what circumstances is unknown. A survivor of the Monowitz camp (Auschwitz III) told him
in 2008 that he had observed 50 strangely dressed men accompanied by the SS and
was told by an SS officer that they were the Mufti and his retinue who wanted
to see how the Jews were killed by work, so he could adopt the practice in
Palestine.
Gilbert
Achcar sums up al-Husseini's significance:
"One must note in passing that Amin al-Husseini's memoirs are an antidote against Holocaust denial: He knew that the genocide took place and boasted of having been perfectly aware of it from 1943 on. I believe he is an architect of the Nakba (the defeat of 1948 and the departure of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who had been driven out of their lands) in the sense that he bears a share of responsibility for what has happened to the Palestinian people."
INTERNET
SOURCE: http://www.catholic.com/magazine/articles/hitlers-mufti
Hitler's Mufti
Recent work by historians and apologists has
revealed that an influential, international religious leader was also an ardent
supporter of Adolf Hitler. His name was not Pope Pius XII but Hajj Amin
al-Husseini. This Grand Mufti of Jerusalem recruited whole divisions of
fanatics to fight and kill in the name of extremism.
Revered
in some circles today as one of the fathers of modern radical Islam,
al-Husseini has been the subject of a number of modern studies. Scholars such
as David Dalin, John Rothmann, Chuck Morse, and others have courageously
brought al-Husseini’s actions to light. "Hitler’s Mufti," as many
have called him, had a direct hand in some of the darkest moments of the
Holocaust, the slaughter of tens of thousands of Christians, and the formation
of some of the most hate-filled generations of modern history. Al-Husseini is a
testament to the way that evil finds evil.
A Radical Shaped by War
Al-Husseini
was born sometime in the late 1890s in Jerusalem when that city was in the
hands of the dying Ottoman Empire. He belonged to an old family of nobles and
was the son of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Tahir al-Husseini. Sent to Cairo
for his education, he studied Islamic jurisprudence at Al-Azhar University and
then at the Cairo school Dar
al-Dawa wal-Ershad (The Institute for Propagation and Guidance)
founded by a Syrian member of the Muslim Salafi sect (one of the most extreme
in Islam). The school, a haven for radical thought, gave al-Husseini an early
grounding in practical revolutionary planning. Al-Husseini went on to the
College of Literature at Cairo University and then the Ottoman School for
Administrators in Istanbul, which trained future leaders of the then far-flung
Ottoman Empire.
After
taking the mandatory pilgrimage to Mecca (the Hajj) in 1913, al-Husseini was
drafted into the Ottoman Army. He was assigned to the College of Reserve
Officers and subsequently named to an infantry regiment as a non-commissioned
officer. With the onset of World War I in 1914, the Ottoman Empire entered into
the bloody conflict as a member of the Central Powers with Germany and Austria.
Al-Husseini found himself in an inefficient army that, compared to the highly
mechanized forces of the West, was lacking in leadership and modern equipment.
He soon heard of the genocide of the Armenian people—one of the most horrendous
incidents in the terrible global conflict.
In
1916, al-Husseini departed the Ottoman Army on disability leave and spent the
rest of the war in Jerusalem. Angered by the decision of the Allied victors to
deny Arab participation in the discussions leading to the Treaty of Versailles,
al-Husseini was even more infuriated by the sudden increase of Jewish
immigrants into British-controlled Palestine. An ardent anti-Semite who hated
Jews with a deep fervor, he first came to the attention of the British in 1920
when he organized riots against Jews. Charged with inciting violence that left
five Jews dead and another 211 injured, he fled to Syria and was sentenced in absentia to 10 years’
imprisonment.
The Grand Mufti’s Ascent
In
April 1921, however, British High Commissioner Sir Herbert Samuel, seeking to
achieve some semblance of peace in the Holy Land, granted amnesty to Arab
nationalists. Al-Husseini was allowed to return to Jerusalem, and the British
officials—disregarding his long record of anti-Semitism—named him Grand Mufti
of Jerusalem. This title was granted to a Sunni Muslim cleric, granting him
oversight of the holy sites of Islam in Jerusalem, in particular the Al-Aqsa
Mosque. For Sunni Muslims, the Grand Mufti is honored as the chief religious
authority in Jerusalem. Notably, from the appointment of the first Grand Mufti
of Jerusalem in the 1860s, the position was customarily filled by the governing
power in charge of Jerusalem.
After
the death of the first Grand Mufti, Mohammed Tahir al-Husseini, in 1908, the
position stayed in the family when the Turks awarded the title to his son Kamil
al-Husseini. Although the British assumed control of Jerusalem during World War
I, Kamil al-Husseini remained in his post until his death in 1921, when the
British decided that Kamil’s brother Hajj Amin would be an acceptable
choice—despite his criminal past and known extremist ties. Al-Husseini remained
as Grand Mufti under the British in spite of his activities and was removed
only in 1948, when King Abdullah I of Jordan banned him from Jerusalem and
named Hussam Al-din Jarallah as Grand Mufti.
Once
in power in Jerusalem, al-Husseini was appointed by the British to head the
newly established Supreme Muslim Council, created to prepare the way for Arab
self-governance in Palestine. Al-Husseini took the chance given to him by the
appeasement-minded British to call for the deaths of Jews and set out on a
campaign of terror against the Jews in Palestine. In subsequent years,
al-Husseini was involved in plots to massacre Jews, among them 60 Jewish
immigrants in Hebron and 45 more in Safad in 1929. In 1936, he helped lead a
rebellion in Palestine against the British. The following year the British
condemned al-Husseini (though permitting him to retain the title of Grand
Mufti), and he fled to Syria once more. From there he continued to plot against
the British control over Palestine.
Fascist Bedfellows
Events
outside the Middle East were presenting new opportunities for fanatics to find
allies and possible patrons. The 1930s witnessed the rise of National Socialism
in Italy under Benito Mussolini and in Germany under Adolf Hitler. Soon after
the appointment of Hitler as German Chancellor in 1933, the German
Consul-General in Palestine, Heinrich Wolff, expressed his belief that many
Muslims in the Holy Land would be supportive of the new Nazi regime. This view
was confirmed when Wolff met with al-Husseini and other radical local leaders.
For al-Husseini, the anti-Jewish policies of the Nazis were appealing, and he
hoped for German help in ousting the British from Palestine.
Al-Husseini
deepened his outreach to the Nazis in 1937 when he met with two Nazi SS
officers, including Adolf Eichmann, one of the architects of the Holocaust in
Damascus, Syria. The SS representatives had been sent at the express order of
Reinhard Heydrich, the deputy head of the SS under Heinrich Himmler and chief
of SS Intelligence and the Nazi security services, including the Gestapo. Heydrich
recognized immediately that al-Husseini was a potentially valuable asset for
Nazi interests in the Middle East and worked to cultivate him.
Four
years later, al-Husseini threw his support to a pro-Nazi revolt in Iraq against
the British-backed prime minister, Nuri Said Pasha. Going to Baghdad,
al-Husseini issued a fatwa
for a jihad against the British. Barely a month later, British troops ended the
coup and occupied the country, whereupon al-Husseini fled to Iran. Although
given sanctuary in the embassies of Japan and Italy, al-Husseini was again
forced to be on the move when Iran was itself occupied by the British and
Soviet armies. Al-Husseini made his way out of Iran with Italian diplomats who
provided him with an Italian passport. He shaved his beard and dyed his hair to
avoid being recognized by British agents and Iranian police.
Al-Husseini
reached Rome in October 1941 and began serious discussions with the Mussolini
regime. The result was twofold. First, he secured a meeting with Mussolini himself
and then completed a practical agreement with the Italians. In return for Axis
recognition of an Arab state of a fascist nature that would encompass Iraq,
Syria, Palestine, and the Transjordan, he agreed to support the war against
Britain. The Italian foreign ministry also urged Mussolini to grant al-Husseini
one million lire.
The Mufti Meets the Führer
Over
the next few days, al-Husseini drafted a proposed statement of an Arab-Axis
cooperative effort by which the Axis powers would recognize the right of the
Arabs to deal with Jewish elements in Palestine and in the other Arab countries
according to their own interests. The declaration was approved by Mussolini and
sent to the German embassy in Rome. Pleased with the declaration, al-Husseini
was invited to Berlin as an honored and useful guest of the Nazi regime. He
arrived in Berlin on November 6 and met with Ernst von Weizsäcker, German
secretary of state under Nazi Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop. Two
weeks later, he met with von Ribbentrop himself, a prelude to his triumphant
reception on November 28, 1941, with Adolf Hitler.
At
their meeting, al-Husseini requested German assistance with the Arab
independence movement and Nazi support in the extermination of any Jewish
homeland. For his part, Hitler promised to aid that liberation movement, but
went still further, promising that the aim of Nazi Germany would be the
elimination of all Jews living under British protection once such territories
had been conquered. This was described by al-Husseini in his own memoirs:
Our
fundamental condition for cooperating with Germany was a free hand to eradicate
every last Jew from Palestine and the Arab world. I asked Hitler for an
explicit undertaking to allow us to solve the Jewish people in a manner befitting
our national and racial aspirations and according to the scientific methods
innovated by Germany in the handling of its Jews. The answer I got was:
"The Jews are yours." (Ami Isseroff and Peter FitzGerald-Morris,
"The Iraq Coup Attempt of 1941, the Mufti, and the Farhud")
The Axis’ Kept Man
For
the Nazis, al-Husseini was an ideal propaganda tool, a powerful spokesman among
radical Arabs, and an excellent instrument for their anti-Jewish campaign in
Europe and in the Holy Land. Portrayed by the Nazis as the spiritual leader of
all Islam, al-Husseini was given a grand formal welcome in Berlin. The official
Nazi newspaper, Volkischer
Beobachter, proudly published a photo of Hitler and al-Husseini,
and Radio Berlin proclaimed on January 8, 1942 that the Grand Mufti of
Jerusalem had consented to take part in the effort against the British, the
Communists, and the Jews.
Satisfied
with his newly concretized relations with the Nazis, al-Husseini chose to
remain in the service of the Axis and settled in Berlin in a lavish mansion
that had been confiscated from a Jewish family. The Nazis paid him a monthly
stipend of 62,500 Reichsmarks
(approximately 20,000 dollars), payments that continued until April 1945, when
only the fall of Berlin to the Red Army ended Hitler’s financial support. From
his post, al-Husseini headed the Nazi-Arab Cooperation Section and helped build
a network of German spies across the Middle East through his followers.
Scheming for a desired dark future of Nazi-Islamic leadership, the Mufti founded
an Islamic Institute in Dresden to provide training for young radical Muslims
who would serve as chaplains for his field units and also head out across the
Middle East and the world to sow the seeds of jihadism and anti-Semitism.
The Mufti’s Final Solution
Scholars
have long studied how actively engaged al-Husseini was in the implementation of
the Holocaust. There is no question that he supported the aims of the Nazis in
perpetrating genocide and believed perversely that all Arabs should join that
cause. He declared on German radio on March 1, 1944: "Arabs, rise as one
man and fight for your sacred rights. Kill the Jews wherever you find them.
This pleases God, history, and religion. This saves your honor. God is with
you" (qtd. in Norman Stillman, "Jews of the Arab World between
European Colonialism, Zionism, and Arab Nationalism" in Judaism and Islam: Boundaries,
Communications, and Interaction: Essays in Honor of William M. Brinner).
According
to the testimony of Adolf Eichmann’s chief deputy Dieter Wisliceny (who was
hanged for war crimes) the Mufti played a role in encouraging the Final
Solution and was a close friend and advisor to Eichmann in the Holocaust’s
implementation across Europe. Wisliceny testified further that al-Husseini had
a close association with Heinrich Himmler and visited the gas chambers at
Auschwitz, where he exhorted the staff to be even more dedicated in its
important work.
To
assist the practical slaughter of Jews and Christians, al-Husseini built an
army of Muslim volunteer units for the Waffen-SS
(the combat units of the dread SS) to operate for the Nazi cause in the
Balkans. While the appeal for volunteers from among Muslims always struggled to
meet the demands for new recruits, al-Husseini was able to organize three divisions
of Bosnian Muslims who were then trained as elements of the Waffen-SS. The largest
radical Muslim unit was the 13th Waffen-SS
Handzar ("Dagger") division that boasted over 21,000 men.
They were joined by the Bosnian 23rd Waffen-SS
Kama Division and the Albanian Skanderbeg 21st Waffen-SS Division. The
Muslim Waffen-SS
forces fought across the Balkans against Communist partisans and then assisted
in the genocide of Yugoslavian Jews and in the persecution and slaughter of
Gypsies and Christian Serbs in 1944 and 1945. The brutality extended to
Catholics as well, for the Muslim Waffen-SS
cut a path of destruction across the Balkans that encompassed a large number of
Catholic parishes, churches, and shrines and resulted in the deaths of
thousands of Catholics. By the end of the war, al-Husseini’s fanatical soldiers
had killed over 90 percent of the Jews in Bosnia.
Meanwhile, in Rome
While
al-Husseini carried out his decimation of Jews in Eastern Europe, the situation
facing Jews in Rome in late 1943 was also grave. Following the deposition of
Mussolini by his own people, Hitler invaded the country and briefly
re-installed Il Duce.
Then followed the first mass arrests of Italian Jews and a planned deportation
of all Italian Jews to the death camps. Pope Pius XII protested these arrests
and used the Vatican’s newspaper, L’Osservatore
Romano, to speak out further against the Nazi campaign against the
Jews of Italy. Among his many acts during this dangerous period, the holy
pontiff sheltered 3,000 Jews at his summer residence, Castel Gandolfo, and hid
thousands more in some 180 convents, monasteries, parish buildings, rectories,
churches, and even in Vatican City itself. Through his leadership, Pius
ultimately helped to save or rescue 80 percent of the Jews of Rome. In June
1944, the pontiff sent a telegram to Admiral Miklos Horthy, the leader of
Hungary, and implored him not to proceed with the planned deportation of the
country’s 800,000 Jews.
As
Pius was risking his safety and that of the Church in Italy, al-Husseini
continued to call for the extermination of all Jews. On November 2, 1943, as
the Nazis tried to press forward with the roundup of Italian Jews, the Grand
Mufti declared on German radio of the Jewish people, "They cannot mix with
any other nation but live as parasites among the nations, suck out their blood,
embezzle their property, corrupt their morals."
The Untouchable Cleric
With
the collapse of the Third Reich, al-Husseini fled from Germany to Switzerland
and then to Paris. Incredibly, he was not a target of the International
Military Tribunal at Nuremberg. He was sentenced merely to house arrest in
Paris on the basis of charges made by the Yugoslav Supreme Military Court,
which sentenced him to three years of imprisonment and two years of deprivation
of civil rights because of his involvement in the atrocities throughout the
Balkans. As for Nuremberg, despite the testimony of Eichmann’s aide, there was
scant interest in the mufti because of his assumed immense sway in the Middle
East.
With
little effort, al-Husseini escaped from his comfortable house arrest. From
there he traveled to Cairo, where he considered himself safe thanks to the
patronage of Egypt’s King Farouk. Even with the fall of Farouk and the rise of
Gamal Abdel-Nasser as head of Egypt in 1952, al-Husseini remained safe. His
influence was felt throughout the Arab world, most so in galvanizing opposition
to Zionism and the birth of Israel. He supported the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, was
involved in the assassination of King Abdullah I of Jordan in 1951, and served
as president of the World Islamic Congress. His last public appearance came in
1962 when he delivered a speech to that conference. He used his final
opportunity to speak to the world to call for the ethnic cleansing of the Jews.
He died in Lebanon in 1974, a beloved and revered figure among radical Muslims
all over the world.
Hajj
Amin al-Husseini’s legacy was to inspire generations of terrorists, Islamic
jihadists, and such dictators as Saddam Hussein of Iraq. The foremost exemplar
of his influence was a young terrorist and distant relative who became one of
his most ardent students: Yasser Arafat, the future leader of the Palestinian
Liberation Organization. Rabbi David Dalin—one of Pope Pius XII’s greatest
defenders—offers a fitting final word:
The "most dangerous" cleric in modern history, to use John
Cornwell’s phrase, was not Pope Pius XII but Hajj Amin al-Husseini, whose
anti-Jewish Islamic fundamentalism was as dangerous in World War II as it is
today . . . The grand mufti was the Nazi collaborator par excellence.
"Hitler’s mufti" is truth. "Hitler’s pope" is myth. (The Myth of Hitler’s Pope,
137)
SIDEBARS
Child Murderer
In late 1942, Heinrich Himmler gave his permission for 10,000 Jewish children to be transferred from Poland to Theresienstadt with the eventual aim of allowing them to go to Palestine in exchange for German civilian prisoners, through the International Red Cross. The plan was abandoned, however, because of the protests of the Grand Mufti.
The following year, al-Husseini blocked the emigration of 4,000 Jewish children and 500 accompanying adults to Palestine that was proposed by the governments of Bulgaria, Romania, and Hungary. The children were sent instead to the gas chambers.
- Dalin, David and John Rothmann, Icon of Evil: Hitler’s Mufti and the Rise of Radical Islam (Random House, 2008)
- Elpeleg, Zvi, The Grand Mufti: Haj Amin Al-Hussaini, Founder of the Palestinian National Movement (Frank Cass, 1993)
- Morse, Chuck, The Nazi Connection to Islamic Terrorism: Adolf Hitler and Haj Amin al-Husseini (iUniverse, 2003)
- Perlman, Moshe, Mufti of Jerusalem (Pavilion Press, 2006)
- Dalin, David, The Myth of Hitler’s Pope (Regnery, 2005)
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