While in Baghdad, Husseini may not have understood the full meaning of “the Final Solution.” However, after speaking with Hitler in Berlin, or before, he knew that it meant genocide of the Jews. On his visit or visits to Auschwitz he was able to observe just how this Final Solution was being carried out. The Germans provided Husseini, the British-appointed Mufti of Jerusalem [1922], with a headquarters and money to support a large entourage and used him to make pro-Nazi, pro-Arab nationalist, anti-Jewish propaganda over Radio Berlin. [such as: Kill Jews wherever you find them (see Lukasz Hirszowicz, The Third Reich and the Arab East)].
In their discussion at Hitler’s headquarters, Hitler promised Husseini that “solving” the Jewish Question in the Arab lands was part of Nazi Germany’s plan. Husseini, the Mufti, was “fully reassured and satisfied by the words which he had heard from the Chief of the German State. . .” He was pleased with Hitler’s promise.
Later in the war, Husseini addressed the Bosnian Muslim SS division [the Handschar, khanjar]. He told them that Nazi ideology, National Socialism, had much in common with Islam (see Joseph Schechtman’s biography of Husseini, The Mufti and the Fuehrer).
This article originally appeared at Emet m’Tsiyon.
