Are Claims of Nazi Genocidal Treatment of Jews Affecting Islam True?

 

There are often claims made in editorials and historic allegories when attempting to explain the appearance of a similarity between the animosity and murderous intents against the Jewish People by many in Islam by comparing these effects to those from Nazism and their execution of the Final Solution and the concentration death camps. The ongoing supposition appears to lay the origins of the Islamic animosity towards the Jews as having its origins in Nazi Germany despite the verses in the Quran which dictate genocidal animosity against the Jewish People. Such a supposition crediting the Nazi hatred and attempted annihilation of all Jews within their borders ignore some of the earliest writings in Islam which demand treatment of the Jews which can only be described as genocidal. A pair of such writings can be found in the writings of Bukhari who wrote the Hadiths during the mid to late ninth century which included the verses which are of interest in Hadiths Volume 4 (52:176-7) which read as follows:

Bukhari 52:176
Allah’s Apostle said, “You (i.e. Muslims) will fight with the Jews till some of them will hide behind stones. The stones will (betray them) saying, ‘O ‘Abdullah (i.e. slave of Allah)! There is a Jew hiding behind me; so kill him.’”

Bukhari 52:177
Allah’s Apostle said, “The Hour will not be established until you fight with the Jews, and the stone behind which a Jew will be hiding will say. “O Muslim! There is a Jew hiding behind me, so kill him.”

These relatively well-known verses dictate an obvious animosity against the Jewish People and are not the only references from earliest Islam which impart a genocidal series of references regarding the Jewish People. These particular Hadiths are accepted completely by Hamas as they have incorporated a version of them within their charter as the concluding paragraph of Article Seven which reads:

The Day of Judgment will not come about until Muslims fight the Jews, when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Muslims, O Abdullah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. Only the Gharkad tree, (the Boxthorn tree) would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Jews.

The above quotes depict the early and the consistent overriding and driving impetus for hatred of the Jewish People as well as how these exact phraseologies were retained and carried virtually word for word to the present as they appear in the Hamas Charter echoing the Hadiths from the ninth century.

 

The fact is that Islam held a particularly viscous hatred against the Jewish populations around Medina which resulted in Muhammad making war against the two main tribal elements of Jews living around the areas of Medina. In the year 628 Muhammad attacked the Banu Qaynuqa tribe of Jews defeating them and sent them into exile northward out of the Arabian Peninsula. They were rumored to have eventually settled in the lands of Syria. The Banu Nadir battled with Muhammad’s forces and lost their claim to the oasis later in 628 forcing them to resettle with the neighboring tribe of Jews, the Banu Qurayza. The Banu Nadir and the Banu Qurayza were allied before becoming involved in the battle of Khaybar resulting in their final defeat in 629 leaving none of the males of fighting age and all the older Jews while taking the younger women and children who were young enough to be raised as Muslims without the threat of their revolting. The Islamic animosities towards the Jewish tribes surrounding Medina are evidence that such hatred was evident in early Islam.

 

Moving forward to the years leading to and including World War II we can trace some of the events and influences which shine some revealing light on the Nazi-Islam influences. The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini fled from Jerusalem and the lands under the British Mandate journeying to Berlin in 1941. During the war, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem al-Husseini repeatedly made requests to “the German government to bomb Tel Aviv.” Grand Mufti of Jerusalem al-Husseini was involved in the organization and recruitment of Bosnian Muslims into several divisions of the Waffen SS and other units and also blessed sabotage teams trained by Germans before they were dispatched to Palestine, Iraq, and Transjordan to fight the British which the Grand Mufti held a hatred almost equal to his despising of the Jewish People. The most well remembered unit formed and virtually commanded by the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem al-Husseini was the 13th Waffen Mountain Division of the SS Handschar, formed mostly of Muslims in 1943 and was the first non-Germanic Waffen SS division. The Grand Mufti was known to have had meetings with Fuhrer Adolf Hitler, Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler (also held Waffen-SS, Nazi Minister of the Interior and Commander over the Gestapo), Foreign Minister Joachim Von Ribbentrop and other Nazi leaders. Most of the Grand Mufti’s efforts were expended towards persuading them to extend the Nazis’ anti-Jewish program to the Arab world.

 

The Grand Mufti pressed the Nazi leadership to declare their objections to the formation of a Jewish state within the British Mandate lands and that they would negate all treaties which were being used to bring such into reality as well as to form an alliance with the Arab populations throughout the Middle East offering that they would gladly rise up and fight the British and French occupiers. There is one fact which damns the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini more than any other action he took and stands above all else he may have attempted in his lifetime, that he was instrumental in the proceedings at the Wannsee Conference in January 1942. The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem had met previously with Adolf Eichmann and Heinrich Himmler to discuss the Jewish problem stating that it was most unacceptable for the Jews to be exiled to the areas under the British Mandate and they could not be simply put in camps and quarantined just to have them eventually make their way after the war to the Middle East. The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini pressed for the extermination of the European Jews and demanded that the Nazis dedicate themselves and declare their intent to also exterminate the Jews across the Middle East after they defeated the Allies and took possession of the lands of the Middle East and beyond. This went hand in hand with his discussions with the Fuhrer Adolf Hitler about the Islamic concept of Jihad, of an all-out holy war which was all encompassing and how such was the dream of all Muslims which the Reich could use to their advantage by forming Muslim divisions and utilizing them to hunt down and exterminate undesirable groups such as Jews, Roma, homosexuals and other enemies of the Reich. There are those who claim that it was the persuasive arguments made by the Grand Mufti which pressed the Nazi decision to exterminate the Jews of Europe. Further evidence shows that the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem toured Auschwitz concentration camp with Eichmann as well as later testimony at the Nuremburg Trials where top Adolph Eichmann aide SS-Hauptsturmführer Dieter Wisliceny stated under oath during questioning that the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem al-Husseini constantly urged greater haste in the Nazi’s rate of the killing of the Jews.

 

The Muslims did not take a page from the Nazis genocidal mania against the Jewish People and the slaughter of six-million or more Jews along with the totals of approaching fourteen-million undesirables which also included homosexuals, Roma (Gypsies), Christian ministers, Catholic Priests, Polish citizens and prisoners of war, Russian prisoners of war, Serbs and various others who were denoted as inferior or a threat to the purity of the master race. Another item of interest is it was during World War II and as a result of the claims by the German Nazis that they were members of a master race that the leadership of Persia changed their names to Iran, the Farsi pronunciation for Aryan, the so-called master race. This was likely the greatest influence the Nazis held over the Islamic peoples, both the peoples and their leaders. Such an effect pales when compared to the influence which Islam played in the Nazi actions during World War II as it was the input and persuasion coming from the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini with Adolph Hitler, Adolf Eichmann, Heinrich Himmler and speaking before the high ranking decision makers attending the Wannsee Conference both during meetings and potentially even more-so in private speaking between sessions and at the end or beginning of every day. There have been claims which have credited the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini with almost singlehandedly bending the direction of the Wannsee Conference into taking the genocidal elimination of the Jews of Europe. That summation alone quantifies the direction and degree of influence from the history of Jew hatred in Islam flowing into the Nazi camp and debunking the mainstream media myth that Islam has been corrupted by the Nazis and their implementation of the Final Solution. The mainstream media’s choice to whitewash the entirety of the history of Islam and the facts which prove beyond any doubt that the Holocaust and everything right down to the yellow Star of David Jews were required to wear having originated with the second Caliph of Iraq, Umar bin al-Khat’tab, who demanded not only that Jews wear the yellow star but the Jews were required to walk down the street on the opposite side of the Muslims. When all is taken into account and we have said all there is to say, it becomes obvious and beyond doubt that the Muslims have not learned very much about hatred of the Jews from the Nazis but rather the Nazis were schooled by Islam and took virtually everything they used against the Jews in the Holocaust and simply modernized the methods and introduced to the world industrialized slaughter of human beings simply because they were different, be it they were Jews, Roma, homosexuals, mentally challenged, physically handicapped, political prisoners, the wrong nationality or anything which caused one to catch a hateful glance from one of the politically correct in the society. The similarity between the Nazi persecuted classes and the historically persecuted under Islam have a frightening similarity, the Nazis were simply the first to use the assembly line as a means of murdering millions efficiently and speedily. Perhaps this was the one lesson the Islamic radicals may prove to have learned, and if they have, then G0d help us all.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

What Does Naqba Day Commemorate?

There can not be a celebration of Israeli Independence Day without an Arab Palestinian commemoration of Naqba Day, the day of catastrophe. Taking the most cursory look these two days will always have to be observed on the same day but have completely separate views of the events from the day Israel declared their existence and what actually occurred. Israelis celebrating Independence Day are joyously remembering the declaration by David ben Gurion signifying the resurrection of an ancient land birthing its new incarnation for the modern day that would celebrate, honor, and reconstruct the ancient customs and traditions of the Jewish nations from two thousand to three and a half thousand years in history while incorporating those items from antiquity into a modern state where technology, scientific developments at the cutting edge of modern research also exist, ancient farming mixed with modern discoveries in order to produce the highest quality crops possible, and a blend between all that was with the hopes for what can be. The celebration of the declaration of this new and brave mix of challenges with promises of renewed hopes while fulfilling the prophesies of antiquity making a blend which melds items which should clash over anachronisms yet are smelted together forming something new and wonderful. Israeli Independence Day is the celebration of the realization of a people of their collective dream which has waited almost two-thousand-years to come to fruition.

 

The commemoration by the Arabs of Naqba Day are mourning not only the coming into existence of the Jewish State but also the inability of the invading Arab armies allied with the Palestinian Arabs to squash the nascent Jewish state and commit a genocidal massacre of the Jews while destroying their hopes. The Armies from Jordan, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon combined with the organized militias under the Mufti of Jerusalem with additional units coming from as near as Saudi Arabia all the way to as far as Yemen and Algeria in an all-out military push to utterly destroy every vestige of the new state of Israel. The war to extinguish the nascent state of Israel continued through cease-fires for over a year before the fighting was finally permanently halted with the front-lines as of the exact hour the cease-fire order passed became the 1949 Armistice Lines also known as the Green Line. The Naqba commemorates the simple truth which had sent shockwaves throughout the Arab and Muslim worlds; the little Jewish state of Israel had managed to resist the onslaught by these combined Arab forces against all the odds and stood defiantly holding more land at the close of the conflict than they held at the onset. The catastrophe was that despite massive odds and facing overwhelming military superiority of those forces gathered against them, the newly declared Israelis managed to initially hold out and eventually to push back and by the end of the conflict was routing the combined Arab forces. This impossible loss and the fact that Israel survived and the Israeli Jews remained and were not vanquished in a glorious slaughter reminiscent of Mohammed’s slaughter of the Jews of the Banu Qurayzah Tribe in the year 627 was the reason for the catastrophe, the Naqba, in the eyes of the Arabs, particularly the native Arab populations who had been promised all the wealth, possessions, lands, properties and all else that belonged to the Jews once they had been completely vanquished.

 

Another misconception concerning the reasons behind the whole concept of the Naqba was the Jews had pushed the Arabs from their towns, farms, homes and properties forcing them into refugee camps where they and their descendants continue to languish today. Some have gone as far as to claim that the Jews when declaring the state of Israel call upon their fellow Jews to rise and expel the Arabs and all other non-Jews from their midst and this was the impetus which caused the combined Arab armies to arrive to rescue the native Arabs from the planned Jewish slaughter. There was no organized extermination of Arabs conducted by the Jewish forces defending the nascent state of Israel. There is some truth to the claims that Jewish forces pushed Arabs from their lands, homes and possessions but most were usually committed due to security purposes. When Israeli units passed by Arab towns they originally attempted to bypass them and not interact. Should the residents attack the Jewish units then these towns were cleared in order to prevent an enemy force to gather behind the front lines of the Jewish forces. After having some towns attempt to allow these Jewish units to pass and then use a tactic of following them and engaging them from behind once the troops became engaged with the Arab front lines. This resulted in great danger and difficulties and resulted in the Jewish troops finding it necessary to at the least remove the fighting age males from any Arab town in order to keep a secure rear area free of antagonists. Even with this added situation, these removals proved to be fairly minor in scope with the vast majority of refugee Arabs resulting from the Arab population’s response to the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem making a request for all Muslim Arabs to pick-up their families and move them to safety behind the attacking Arab forces. This was requested so that the advancing Arab forces could concentrate on simply shooting everybody they would meet simply assuming that all the Arabs had fled as told. In return for clearing the area so the Arab armies could have free-fire zones the Arabs were promised a generous share in the spoils of the conquest to come. The defeat of the Arab armies meant that these Arabs were cut-off from their homes and properties when the fighting ended. Despite an invitation to return to their property had they chosen to do so being extended by the Jewish ruling body, the Arabs were prevented from returning to their towns, farms, homes and belongings and were instead forced by their own brother in arms from the Arab armies into refugee camps where they became political pawns in a campaign of lies and distortions in order to work to destroy Israel.

 

So, the Naqba is less a result of action by the Jews and Israel unless you were to find fault in the Israelis defending themselves. What the Arab demonstrators commemorating the Naqba within Israel will never bother to tell the world is that their forbearers were among the Arabs who did not take up arms against their fellow Israelis just because they were Jews. Their parents, grandparents or great-grandparents remained on their farms or in their homes or possibly even fought alongside their Jewish neighbors helping to save the nascent state of Israel and remained within Israel with full rights and privileges as a citizen of Israel. Their main complaint concerning the Naqba was likely their regret that friends, family and acquaintances that fled at the request of the Mufti of Jerusalem were betrayed by their fellow Arabs and ended up being forced into refugee camps in the surrounding Arab lands. The vast majority of the Arabs incarcerated into the refugee camps found themselves in Jordan, Syria, Egypt, Lebanon, and other Arab countries but there were no Arab refugees within the borders of Israel at the end of the fighting. No Arab refugee was denied citizenship in Israel, was denied decent housing in Israel, was refused a decent education by Israel, or was imprisoned behind barbed wire by Israel. These conditions were imposed by their brother Arabs who refused to allow them to return to their residences inside Israel despite the invitation which was initially extended by the Israelis. It was not until after time had passed and the Arab expatriation of their Jewish populations which within ten years of the founding of Israel had caused the immigration of over three-quarters of a million Jewish refugees entering and being absorbed by Israel. This is the reason that today there are no camps with Jewish refugees in Israel and the Israeli population consists of Sephardic Jews in near even numbers as there are European Ashkenazi Jews. Meanwhile the unfortunate Arab generations which have grown-up inside permanent refugee camps have served their purpose of extending the fiction of the Naqba caused by the Jews while suffering an Arab imposed catastrophe. Oddly enough, there are Arab refugee camps which exist today in Area A of the West Bank and within Gaza who are within areas under the complete political, security and physical control of Palestinian leadership, one group under the rule and restrictions by the Palestinian Authority while the other are under the rule and restrictions by Hamas. If either of these presumed defenders of the Palestinian Arab people would commit a simple act of decency by granting these refugees citizenship, they could relieve these tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of Palestinian refugee’s sufferings. Since the refugee camps consist of cement block apartments, all that would be required is granting them citizenship for these Palestinian refugees in their respective Palestinian societies which are already ruled by Palestinian leaders and their refugee status and demeaned lives would be transformed immediately to free citizens within an area of Palestinian autonomy. Now their condition being perpetrated any longer qualifies as a true Naqba.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Survival of the Jewish People; Who Really Cares and Whose Problem is It?

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, speaking at a special plenary meeting to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day, addressed the threats to Israel and potentially Jews everywhere stated, “Seventy years after the Holocaust, much of the world remains silent in the face of Iran’s declared intent to wipe Israel off the earth. Much of the world are silent in the face of calls by Hezballah for the destruction of Israel, and its continued murderous activities. Many remain silent in the face of calls by Hamas to kill Jews wherever they are. These are days when most of the governments of the world remain silent in the face of cries of Palestinian Muftis to kill Jews wherever they are. Where is the condemnation of the Mufti? Not the Mufti of history, but the Mufti of today? International Holocaust Remembrance Day should be the day the world stands behind the words ‘Never Again.’”

Netanyahu went further stating, “This is a day when the world should unite against weapons of mass destruction falling into the hands of dark regimes, led by the Ayatollah and his regime in Iran. I send greetings to leaders of Europe and praise them for the important step of taking sanctions against Iran. It is important that other countries around the world will join this action. I mean China, Japan, India, and South Korea. Only a combination of crippling sanctions and a credible military threat on the table can force Iran to reconsider its nuclear program.”

Yuli Edelstein, Israeli Minister of Public Diplomacy, told the World Jewish Congress in Brussels, while marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day on Tuesday, that it was a misnomer to say Iran has a “nuclear program.” Instead, he stated that, Tehran has “a program to destroy Israel. The technological advances of today mean that there is no need to have a conference to pronounce a ‘Final Solution’ to exterminate the Jews the way the Nazis did 70 years ago. Today you can just push a button to send a missile to do the job.”

Edelstein took the opportunity to comment on the 2011 report on anti-Semitism released earlier this week, “Every corner of the World is infected with anti-Semitism, even when it has no connection to Jews and Israel. According to some social protesters the global economic crisis was caused by Jews. Arab Spring revolutions blame Jews for the regimes that oppressed them. The ousters of rulers like Qaddafi claimed that his mother was Jewish and that Mubarak was a Mossad agent,”

Edelstein concluded his comments, “The international community must act to prevent this phenomenon.” But is it really and even if it was, would the world actually bother and care enough to even lift a finger to help? Furthermore, Netanyahu similarly concluded, “The Iranian regime openly calls for Israel’s destruction, is planning the destruction of Israel, and is working daily to destroy Israel. The lesson should spur the world to action.” But is their conclusion that the world should care an honest assessment or a pipedream?

Upon whose shoulders should this urgent task fall? Should anybody actually care or should the Jews remember how the world ignored the truths when faced with the knowledge of the Nazi genocidal efforts. Do the Jews need reminding that the allied powers saw absolutely no need to divert even one plane to bomb the rail lines used to transfer Europe’s Jews to the death-camps and crematoria. Did anybody even notice the rising anti-Semitism that is rising, not only in the Muslim world, not only in Europe, but universally? The presence of anti-Semitism was evident during the Occupy Movement demonstrations with references to Jewish bankers, Jewish control over government, Jewish greed and many of the anti-Jewish blood libels which had been briefly dormant after the horrors of the Nazi Concentrations Camps were made widely known after their liberations. But do not refuse to notice as left unopposed, anti-Semitism will lead to the same ends it has spawned throughout history for endless centuries.

Some people will explain away the need to protest or act by making excuses and protesting that it cannot happen here. Some will point out that it cannot be much of a problem as the Jews do not seem alarmed, so why should they get all worked up. But, even if the Jews were expressing their apprehensions and protested their fear of the return of hatreds, would anybody actually notice? Do you really think so? Before you read the words quoted above from Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and Israeli Minister of Public Diplomacy Yuli Edelstein had you had even an inkling of these threats to Israel? Had you realized that this threat is no longer something way off in the future but roaring into the near present and becoming an imminent threat? Don’t feel bad, most Jews in the West have ignored these threats too. My reason for this article is to attempt to wake both Jews and non-Jews alike and hope that they can find common cause. The other thing everybody needs to remember from history, it almost always starts with the Jews but it never ever is simply the Jews, it always spread on to the rest of the world. It always has done so and I would sagely bet that fact will not have changed this time as well. Whatever comes for the Jews will come for the rest as sure as one day follows the other and time marches on.

Beyond the Cusp