Haj Amin al-Husseini meets Adolf Hitler in Berlin in
November 1941
Image source,Hulton Archive
Haj Amin al-Husseini allied himself with the
Nazis and met Adolf Hitler in 1941
Netanyahu
Holocaust remarks: Israeli PM criticised
Published
21
October 2015
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-34594563
PM
Benjamin Netanyahu has been widely criticised for the remarks
Israel's
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been criticised for saying a Palestinian
leader persuaded the Nazis to carry out the Holocaust.
Mr
Netanyahu insisted Adolf Hitler had only wanted to expel Jews from Europe, but
that Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini told him: "Burn
them."
However,
the chief historian at Israel's memorial to the Holocaust said this account was
factually incorrect.
Angela
Merkel said Germany "abides by its responsibility for the Holocaust".
"We
are very clear in our minds about the Nazis' responsibility for the break with
civilisation that was the Shoah," the German chancellor said.
A senior
Palestinian official meanwhile said it showed Mr Netanyahu hated Palestinians
so much he was willing to absolve Hitler.
Speaking
alongside Mrs Merkel in Berlin, Mr Netanyahu said "no one should deny that
Hitler was responsible for the Holocaust".
But Mr
Netanyahu insisted the Mufti of Jerusalem "told the Nazis to prevent Jews
fleeing from Europe and supported the Final Solution".
Tensions
between Israelis and Palestinians have been worsened since early October by a
spate of stabbing and shooting attacks - several of them fatal - on Israelis by
Palestinians, and one apparent revenge stabbing by an Israeli.
Israeli
security forces have also clashed with rioting Palestinians, leading to deaths
on the Palestinian side. The violence has also spread to the border with Gaza.
'Sad day'
Husseini,
who died in 1974, was a Palestinian nationalist leader who led violent
campaigns against Jews and the British authorities in what was then British
Mandate Palestine in the 1920s and 1930s.
He fled
the territory in 1937, but continued his campaign to oppose British plans to
partition it into a Jewish state and an Arab one, allying himself with the
Nazis during World War Two.
Husseini
met Hitler in Berlin in November 1941, when he tried to persuade the Nazi
leader to declare his support for the creation of an Arab state, according to
German press reports at the time, external.
But in a
speech at the World Zionist Congress, external in Jerusalem on Tuesday, Mr
Netanyahu gave a different account.
"Hitler
didn't want to exterminate the Jews at the time - he wanted to expel the
Jews," the Israeli prime minister said.
"And
Haj Amin al-Husseini went to Hitler and said: 'If you expel them, they'll all
come here.'
"'So
what should I do with them?' he [Hitler] asked. He [Husseini] said: 'Burn
them.'"
However,
the chief historian of the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem,
Professor Dina Porat, said Mr Netanyahu's statement was factually incorrect.
"You
cannot say that it was the mufti who gave Hitler the idea to kill or burn
Jews," she told the newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, external. "It's not
true. Their meeting occurred after a series of events that point to this."
Opposition
leader Isaac Herzog said the prime minister's remarks played into the hands of
Holocaust deniers.
"This
is a dangerous historical distortion and I demand Netanyahu correct it
immediately as it minimises the Holocaust, Nazism and... Hitler's part in our
people's terrible disaster," he wrote on his Facebook page.
Palestine
Liberation Organisation's Secretary General Saeb Erekat said in a statement,
external: "It is a sad day in history when the leader of the Israeli
government hates his neighbour so much that he is willing to absolve the most
notorious war criminal in history, Adolf Hitler, of the murder of six million
Jews."
Husseini
was sought for war crimes but never appeared at Nuremberg.
How
Israeli media reported the story
The
Jerusalem Post says the chief historian at Israel's memorial to the Holocaust
has "responded harshly, external" to Mr Netanyahu's speech. Professor
Dina Porat told the newspaper he should backtrack.
Yedioth
Ahronoth says Mr Netanyahu has been "slammed" for his remarks and
quotes experts as saying, external Hitler did indeed meet the mufti - but only
after the Final Solution began.
Haaretz
says Mr Netanyahu has been "widely ridiculed, external" and has a
piece looking at the subsequent online mirth, saying the prime minister
"broke the internet, external".
The Times
of Israel leads with Germany's insistence, external that it was responsible for
the Holocaust and continues by saying Mr Netanyahu has been "roundly
denounced".
+972
Magazine, an online current affairs magazine, says ordinary Israelis and
Palestinians are "not letting Mr Netanyahu get off that easy" after
his comments and published a series of internet memes, external mocking the
prime minister.
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