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How the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Sought the Jews’ Destruction — and Paved the Path to War Today
The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, meets with Adolf Hitler in 1941. Photo: German Federal Archives via Wikimedia Commons.
In 1946, the future son-in-law of Harry Truman, who eventually decided to recognize Israel, met with the man whose life ambition was to destroy the Jewish State. Until recently, the resulting New York Times profile was seemingly lost to posterity.
But it tells us a great deal about how notorious antisemites were viewed in the wake of the Holocaust.
Clifton Daniel was a veteran journalist who would go on to lead the New York Times editorial section and, in 1956, marry Margaret Truman, the sole child of Harry Truman. Among his many accomplishments, President Truman created the architecture that eventually helped win the Cold War, oversaw the Marshall Plan, and recognized the newly created nation of Israel. To be sure, the Zionists fighting on the ground, many of them Holocaust survivors, secured Israel’s existence. Yet American support was crucial.
But in the summer of 1946, all of this was in the not-too-distant future. Daniel was then a 33-year-old reporter who had made his way to Cairo. He had secured a meeting with Amin al-Husseini, the founding father of Palestinian nationalism and an infamous Nazi collaborator.
In 1921, Husseini was appointed by ruling British authorities to the position of Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, making him the preeminent Muslim cleric in the land. Husseini had little to recommend him for the post. He was a mere 26 years of age and had little in the way of religious training. Yet he came from one of Jerusalem’s leading Arab families. And he had served the British as a spy and recruiter during the Great War and its aftermath.
The British had defeated the Ottomans and sought to administer the area as a Mandate. In 1917, the government of David Lloyd George declared its support for the creation of a “national home” for the Jewish people in their ancestral land. The 1920 San Remo Conference and 1924 Anglo-American convention further enshrined Jewish territorial claims into international law. But Husseini was unalterably opposed.
In 1920, Husseini helped incite an anti-Jewish pogrom in Jerusalem, with the hopes of influencing British authorities to drop their support for the Zionist project. To the cries of “the Jews are our dogs” and “kill the Jews; there is no punishment for killing Jews,” Husseini and other Arab rioters attacked Jerusalem’s Jewish citizens, murdering five Jews and injuring hundreds more.
At the time, Husseini proclaimed that “Faisal is our King,” hoping that the area would become part of Faisal’s short-lived Syrian kingdom. Put simply: his goal wasn’t so much the creation of a Palestinian Arab state as we would understand it today. Rather, he was an Islamic supremacist who opposed living in social and political equality with Jews. In 1920, that meant working to ensure that the area would be ruled by Faisal of the Hashemite family. Later, he would seek power on his own terms — indeed, his henchmen would eventually murder Faisal’s own brother, King Abdullah of Jordan, in 1951. And the British would unwittingly help him along the way.
In 1921, Herbert Samuel, the governor of the Mandate, appointed Husseini to be Grand Mufti over other, more qualified candidates. Historians have long speculated as to why Samuel would offer the position to a man who opposed one of its foundational tenets. Perhaps Samuel was rewarding Husseini for his wartime intrigues. Or perhaps he hoped that he could co-opt a “hardliner” opposed to Jewish self-determination and convert him, via patronage and support, to the great power’s objectives. If so, Samuel was the first, but hardly the last, to indulge in such self-delusions.
Husseini actively worked against ruling Mandate authorities, fomenting other, bloodier, pogroms in 1929. In the 1930s, he solicited, and received, support from the burgeoning fascist movements in Italy and Germany.
Husseini, gifted with fascist arms and money, played a leading role in the 1936 Arab revolt, in which terrorists attacked and murdered British authorities, Jews, and Arab “collaborators.” The revolt was eventually quashed, but not before the British government, worried about the gathering storm clouds of war in Europe, pursued appeasement.
In 1938, the Woodhead Commission recommended the first outline of what would later become known as the “two state solution” — one Arab state, and another Jewish one, carved out of the original Mandate. Arab leaders, pressured by a now-exiled Husseini, rejected it. The British, desperate to appease the Arabs, responded with more appeasement, issuing the 1939 White Paper, which closed the Mandate’s doors to Jews seeking to flee Hitler’s Europe.
Husseini, unbowed and unmoved, made his way to Nazi Germany, where he toured death camps, broadcast Arab propaganda, recruited a Waffen SS regiment, and in a November 1941 meeting with the Fuhrer, sought support for the elimination of Jewry in the Middle East that he hoped to one day rule.
By 1946, Husseini was a wanted Nazi war criminal, who had made his way from France, where he lived comfortably in a villa with a chef and bodyguards, to Egypt. The Third Reich was dead, but Husseini’s goals for a Judenrein Middle East lived.
Egypt’s King Farouk, Daniel noted, received Husseini with “cordiality, and offered him every comfort in exile.” And “it soon became apparent that the Mufti was a popular hero, and that there was no way short of actual imprisonment to keep him from continuing the work that has been his passion for a lifetime-keeping Zionism out of Palestine.”
To his supporters, Husseini’s virulent antisemitism was a recommendation. When Husseini left France, rumors swirled that he would return to Mandate Palestine where, Daniel reports “the Arabs of Palestine went delirious. Some of them did not sleep for three nights. They posted pictures of him all over Palestine, festooning them with garlands. They strung lights around the minarets, and with alarming abandon-built gasoline fires on the roofs of mosques and fired off guns which they threaten someday to turn again against the Jews and British.”
“Tributes of such fervency are not paid to a man unless he is something special,” Daniel observed. Husseini, the New York Times correspondent noted, displayed great “charm” and “excessive courtesy.” He was a “renowned spellbinder” who spoke “softly, with a well-modulated voice.” Daniel noted a young Arab supporter meeting the Mufti for the first time. “What a sweet guy!” the man exclaimed. “Oh, he’s beautiful! His eyes are something to hypnotize you. So polite, so nice. He’s lovely!”
But Husseini wasn’t without his detractors and rivals, many of whom he sought — often successfully — to have murdered during his long career.
Daniel noted that Husseini sparked “internecine” war among Arabs living in the Mandate and that, in 1946, some Arab leaders were lukewarm about the prospect of his potential return. Some of them, he remarked, referred to him as “just another Arab leader.” And “others feel privately that he has besmirched the Arab cause by his association with Germans and Italians.” Yet, “the controlling factor, however, is that this association with the Axis does not seem to have damaged him with the [Arab] masses.”
Husseini hoped to use this support, his ambitions undiminished.
The Mufti’s critics, Daniel noted, claimed “that he has not had a new idea for a quarter of a century.” But “another interpretation would be that he is single-minded.” And while future academics, journalists, and apologists would attempt to minimize or obfuscate Husseini’s ideology, Daniel didn’t do so. The Mufti’s life “has been dominated by a single idea to recreate the unity of the Arab nation, and particularly to prevent that one corner of the Arab world which is Palestine from being occupied by people whom he regards as intruders.” Those “intruders” were the Jewish people, whose suffering and death he actively sought. And his “devotion to this cause,” Daniel wrote, “is unflagging.”
The Mufti may have “played the role of the savior of Palestine” as Daniel put it, but his legacy, in all its blood drenched failure, is readily apparent today.
The writer is a Senior Research Analyst for CAMERA, the 65,000-member, Boston-based Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis
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The Netherlands will return to Eurovision after boycott over Israel
(JTA) — The Netherlands will return to the Eurovision Song Contest, overriding a broadcaster that withdrew over Israel’s actions in Gaza.
The Dutch organization that oversees public broadcasting, the Nederlandse Publieke Omroep, said on Wednesday that it will take over the country’s entry to Eurovision after Avrotros, the broadcaster that usually takes part in Eurovision for the Netherlands, pulled out of the 2027 event in Burgas, Bulgaria.
Avrotros said last month that it withdrew because the event “can no longer be considered neutral,” citing Israel’s inclusion amid “the severe humanitarian suffering in Gaza and the ongoing restrictions on press freedom.”
Avrotros dropped out of the most recent contest in May 2026, and the Netherlands did not participate after the NPO ruled out identifying another broadcaster. Spain, Ireland, Iceland and Slovenia also boycotted this year’s Eurovision. Israel’s participation in the world’s largest music contest has become a source of intense controversy, sparking mass protests. The contest drew 35 million fewer viewers this year.
For the next Eurovision, NPO is assigning the broadcaster NOS to provide coverage of the event and an “independent team of experts” to select the Dutch act.
“We understand that participation in the Eurovision Song Contest evokes mixed feelings in the Netherlands,” said Jet de Ranitz, the chairman of the NPO’s executive board. “We have explicitly asked the [European Broadcasting Union] to once again make the unifying character of the festival an important part of the event, in recognition of a time of geopolitical unrest, war, and polarization.”
The NPO added that the EBU, which owns the contest, has “taken significant steps regarding the rules of the Eurovision Song Contest.” The EBU introduced changes in August that included barring countries involved in armed conflict from hosting the competition. It also made adjustments to the voting process after accusations of politically motivated voting.
Avrotros said the new rules were not sufficient to ensure that Eurovision remains “independent and neutral.”
Martin Green, the director of Eurovision, said in a statement that the contest was “delighted to welcome the Netherlands back” in 2027.
Ireland is set to boycott Eurovision again in 2027 after RTÉ, the national broadcaster, said last week that its position “remains unchanged.”
RTÉ cited “the appalling and ongoing loss of lives in Gaza and the humanitarian crisis there which continues to put the lives of so many civilians at risk,” adding that it was “deeply concerned by the continued denial of independent access to international journalists to the territory.”
Spain could also stay out of Eurovision next year. José Pablo López, the president of Spanish broadcaster RTVE, announced at a Senate hearing on Tuesday that he supported a continued boycott, saying it was “painful that Israel continues to participate.”
Meanwhile, Belgium confirmed its participation despite calls for a boycott by its public media unions.
“Participation is in no way an endorsement or normalization of what is happening in Gaza and the rest of the world,” said Frederik Delaplace, the CEO of the Flemish broadcaster VRT. “We do note, however, that the EBU is no longer shying away from these difficult societal and geopolitical issues.”
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Police label shooting in Belleville, Ontario, a hate-motivated attack against the Jewish community
(JTA) — TORONTO – The shooter who opened fire on a Belleville, Ontario, synagogue Sunday evening committed an anti-Jewish hate-motivated offense, according to the city’s police chief.
“This was a deliberate attack directed at members of the Jewish community during one of the holiest observances of the year,” Belleville police chief Murray Rodd said at a press conference on Thursday, adding that the shooter had combustible materials, including gasoline, in his truck.
He said the threat posed to Jewish communities required increased alertness on the part of Canadian law enforcement. Police stationed outside the Sons of Jacob synagogue had engaged in a shootout with the assailant, Sean Ward, that prevented him from entering the building as members of the congregation were about to begin Yom Kippur services.
Rodd noted that the force had a long-time relationship with the Jewish community that involved “our proactive pre-positioning of on-duty staff” to ensure the safety of Jewish worshippers. “One of the messages to my colleagues around the province and the country is: It is clearly time that we all be proactive.”
Rodd said the efforts of Constables Jeff Smith and Michael McCurdy prevented the attacker from using the explosive materials he had with him, as well as a “significant” amount of ammunition.
Smith, who was stationed outside of Sons of Jacob to provide security, remains in critical condition but is making progress, according to Rodd. Ward later died of his wounds from the exchange with police.
“[The shooter] had the means, the mechanism, and the motive to perpetrate a greater act. The only thing that stopped entry into the synagogue to execute the intent were the two officers,” said Rodd. “He was equipped with other weapons and the means to carry on a gun battle for a long period of time.”
The CBC reported that police obtained a video of the attack in Belleville, a town over 100 miles east of Toronto on the north shore of Lake Ontario. On the video, Ward is heard shouting. Police report he is saying, “You are going to die for the Jews.”
Rodd confirmed that before Ward targeted the Sons of Jacob, he scoped out the synagogue grounds. “We know that there was a reconnaissance in the presence of our officer, but nothing that would have alarmed him or would have triggered him to be on the defensive,” Rodd said.
Ward was a former member of the Canadian Armed Forces. Rodd noted.
“He was shot multiple times in multiple places,” Rodd said. “He has everything extending from fractures to wounds, and is still bearing shrapnel.”
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US Senate Democrats seek sanctions on those facilitating controversial West Bank settlement project
(JTA) — A slate of U.S. Senate Democrats, led by staunch Israel supporter Chris Coons, is seeking to sanction individuals and businesses linked to a controversial settlement expansion in the West Bank.
The massive E1 project, which would add 3,401 housing units east of Jerusalem, would effectively bisect the West Bank, inhibiting the prospects for a contiguous Palestinian state in the West Bank. It would also further separate the West Bank from East Jerusalem, which Palestinians seek as the capital of a future state. Israel recently issued new construction tenders for the project, following the government’s approval of the plans last summer.
Coons, of Delaware, introduced legislation this week that would target “any foreign person” deemed “responsible for or complicit in” the construction or financing of, or investment in, the planned E1 settlement, as well as the leaders of any entity that has engaged in such activities.
“As Palestinian civilians face a campaign of devastation and fear from violent extremist settlers, the United States must send a strong message that this behavior is unacceptable,” Coons said in a statement.
Israel, he added, must demonstrate “that it remains committed to freedom, security, prosperity, and self-determination for all Israelis and Palestinians.”
Global leaders have slammed the prospective development, as have many U.S. lawmakers. Yet even amid the increased criticism of the Israeli government, the bill is unlikely to advance in a Congress with Republican majorities in both chambers.
Coons thus far has garnered support from 18 of the Senate’s 44 other Democrats, including three co-authors: Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Ron Wyden of Oregon and Ruben Gallego of Arizona. Wyden is Jewish and a longtime Israel supporter.
“For decades, American presidents from both parties have warned successive Israeli governments that construction in E1 threatened the viability of a Palestinian state and was unacceptable to the United States,” Coons said.
As unlikely as it is that the bill will pass, its introduction is symbolic of the chasm that has grown in recent years between Israel and the Democratic Party. The legislation is led by Coons, who has a solid pro-Israel record. Previous sanctions backed by Democrats, including by former President Joe Biden, have generally targeted settler violence and offensive weapons, while this bill centers on what Israel’s government would regard as a conventional building project.
Warren, Wyden and Gallego all voted in favor of a failed resolution authored by independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, which sought to stop the sale of military bulldozers to Israel. Coons, who voted against the measure, was one of just seven Democrats to do so.
While Warren’s position on Israel has fluctuated in recent years, she has consistently maintained that Israel has a right to defend itself and has voted against measures to boycott, divest from and sanction Israel. But she has been a sharp critic of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and suggested conditioning military aid to Israel on compliance with U.S. and international humanitarian law.
Regarding the E1 settlement sanctions bill, Warren said the U.S. “must use all diplomatic and economic tools available to counter rapid settlement expansion and extremist settler violence.” These “spiraling trends” risk undermining “the prospect of lasting peace for Israelis and Palestinians,” she added.
The bill would sanction “foreign persons that have facilitated Israeli settlement construction in the E1 area,” including those who have submitted tender bids, offered guarantees to such bids, signed development or lease agreements, provided construction-related services or financed related infrastructure.
The sanctions would “block and prohibit all transactions in property and interests in property” of such a person in the U.S., with exceptions made for those providing humanitarian assistance or conducting intelligence activities in the area.
“The E1 settlement project is a move towards de facto annexation of the West Bank,” Warren stated. “Those who choose to facilitate settlement construction should understand that they risk losing access to the U.S. financial system.”
Wyden, who has a similar record of backing Israel while criticizing Netanyahu, slammed the prime minister’s “disgraceful policy of expanding West Bank settlements,” noting that such activity “crosses a clear red line and makes Palestinian statehood and lasting peace even more difficult.”
He, too, urged the U.S. to “stand up against Netanyahu’s campaign of violence and aggression against Palestinian civilians” by sanctioning those who “are complicit in this unlawful action.”
The fourth co-author, Gallego, in recent months has shifted his stance from pro-Israel centrist to a fierce and outspoken opponent of the country’s current military operations.
“Proposed Israeli construction of new settlement homes in the E1 area would cut off East Jerusalem from the West Bank and threaten a viable Palestinian state,” he said.
Describing the project as “a step in the wrong direction,” he noted that “for decades, Democrats and Republicans alike have pushed for a two-state solution.”
Coons, Warren, Wyden and Gallego are not alone in hammering the advancement of the E1 project. Their bill followed collective action taken by the United Kingdom, France and Canada earlier this month, when the countries decided to ban goods from West Bank settlements and Jewish areas of East Jerusalem.
At the same time, the U.K. and 11 other nations released a joint statement announcing “their intention to introduce national and/or support European restrictions on trade in goods with settlements which are illegal under international law.”
At the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday, British Prime Minister Andy Burnham warned that the E1 settlement’s construction would “threaten to put a viable Palestinian state beyond reach.”
“We want to see the suffering and death finally come to an end,” Burnham added. “We want to see Israeli and Palestinian people living side by side in peace and security.”
Back in Washington, joining the four co-authors of the bill were 15 other senators who signed on as cosponsors, most of whom are likewise long-time allies of Israel but sharp critics of the Netanyahu government.
The co-sponsors include Michael Bennet of Colorado, Tammy Duckworth of Illinois, Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, Tim Kaine of Virginia, Mark Kelly of Arizona, Andy Kim of New Jersey, Jeff Merkley of Oregon, Chris Murphy of Connecticut, Patty Murray of Washington, Jack Reed of Rhode Island, Brian Schatz of Hawaii, Adam Schiff of California, Elissa Slotkin of Michigan, Chris Van Hollen of Maryland and Peter Welch of Vermont.
The liberal pro-Israel group J Street welcomed the legislation, with its president, Jeremy Ben-Ami, declaring “the end of the era in which right-wing Israeli governments could ignore U.S. demands to halt settlement expansion.”
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