by dan pine
staff writer
Haj Amin al-Husseini may be the worst S.O.B. you never heard of. But author John F. Rothmann hopes his new biography of al-Husseini –– aka the Mufti of Jerusalem –– will snag him a far more visible perch in history’s Hall of Shame.
Often called the George Washington of the Palestinian national movement, the mufti was one of the most influential Arab leaders of the 20th century. In “Icon of Evil,” co-written by Rothmann and David G. Dalin, a dark portrait emerges of a bloodthirsty anti-Semite and Nazi collaborator.
Though he died in 1974, the mufti’s contributions to world chaos live on, notably his framing of the Arab-Israeli struggle in religious-political terms. He helped create the culture of jihad, urged the extermination of Jews and bequeathed hatred to subsequent generations —starting with his cousin, Yasser Arafat.
“He laid down those conditions in the 1920s and 1930s,” said Rothmann in a recent interview. “He rejected any notion of Jewish rights in Palestine. He was indeed an evil man.”
Given that the mufti cozied up to top Nazis, met with Hitler and even toured Auschwitz to study mass murder with the experts, pinning the “evil” label on him wasn’t all that hard.
Rothmann, a KGO radio talk show host and political consultant, is a veteran cheerleader for Jewish causes. So to inoculate himself and Dalin against charges of self-serving bias, the co-authors conducted meticulous research and provide hundreds of footnotes. “We were precise and careful over every fact and every word,” Rothmann said.
The book’s origins stretch back 40 years, when the two writers were studying in Jerusalem. At Yad Vashem, a blow-up photo of the mufti meeting with Hitler caught their eye.
“We were intrigued,” Rothmann recalled. “We were living in the Arab section of Jerusalem and we got to know the Arab merchants. There was always an undercurrent of disaffection and anger. There was no question it was deep-seated and went far beyond 1948.”
Dalin, now the Taube Research Fellow in American History at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution (and son of former Congregation Ner Tamid Rabbi William Dalin) worked with Rothmann on the book ever since.
They learned about the powerful al-Husseini clan, how the mufti dropped out of Islamic studies in Cairo yet arrogated to himself the imam’s robes, and came to hate Jews.
Back in Jerusalem, the charismatic cleric persuaded the occupying British to declare him mufti. He used his new position to give spellbinding sermons over the radio. In one, he issued the infamous call: “Kill the Jews wherever you find them.”
He meant it, too: Al-Husseini engineered multiple murder sprees against Jews during the 1920s and ’30s. He further twisted anti-Semitism into a Muslim religious imperative; when Hitler came along, he found an ideological soulmate. With his blondish hair and blue eyes, the mufti was even made an honorary Aryan.
“This is a guy who goes to Berlin in 1941,” Rothmann said, “meets with Hitler and dreams of the day when the Final Solution emerges in Palestine. He pushed for it, planned for it. He becomes the godfather of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah.”
Had the war gone Hitler’s way, the mufti expected not only a Judenrein Palestine, but the defunct caliphate to be re-established, and that he would become caliph, the leader of the Muslim world.
As poisonous as the mufti was, Rothmann insists he does not feel hatred toward his subject. Rather, he strived to present an accurate portrait. “He was a gentle man, soft-spoken, charming, a very nice guy. He was an advocate for his people.”
Rothmann quickly added that the mufti also ordered rivals killed. He was close with an Iraqi man who would later be Saddam Hussein’s uncle and foster parent. So the mufti obviously taught his lessons well.
Rothmann’s fondest wish for the book is not that Jews learn better about their enemies, though he does hope for that. Rather, he wants Arab and Muslim readers to understand they’ve been fed a diet of anti-Semitic hatred for too long.
“We hope this generation of Palestinian nationals will understand and repudiate the hate which runs through the Muslim world today,” he said. “That hatred must be exposed and expunged.”
John F. Rothmann and David G. Dalin will appear 1 p.m. Wednesday, June 25 at Book Passage, 51 Tamal Vista Blvd., Corte Madera. Information: (415) 927-0960.
“Icon of Evil” by David G. Dalin and John F. Rothmann (227 pages, Random House, $26)
CopyrightJ, the Jewish news weekly of Northern California