Husseini’s alliance with Nazi Germany began before he stepped foot in Europe. Upon orders to establish an Arab coalition, with the first steps to take place in Iraq, Germany started to play anti-British propaganda in Baghdad. Pearlman says, “From the Berlin radio stations pronouncements were blared forth, calling upon the Arabs to rise and join their Nazi friends in casting out the British tyrants. The Nazi victors of the world would create a grand Arab dominion to be sovereign and all-powerful in the Middle East.”[1] Radio broadcasts like these enabled the Mufti and Rashid Ali to gather support for their upcoming coup d’état. Husseini and his agents also secured Iraqi newspapers to publish propaganda materials. Newspapers like Al Istiqlal and Al-Alam-al-Arabi[2] published pro-Nazi propaganda for the Mufti. The coup included Yunis es-Sabawi, who translated Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf from German to Arabic. The core belief behind propaganda in Iraq in April 1941 was that if the Arabs were serious in their aspiration for self-determination, they would turn their arms on the British occupiers.
German broadcasts reached everyone in the Middle East, and there were many Arabs who were intrigued by the calls of the German government. The themes that began in the winter of 1940 and 1941 included “quotations from the Koran and abundant reports of British setbacks and German successes.”[3] Broadcasting German advancements in the war was a way to gain Arab support. If the Germans were winning these key battles, then surely, they would be able to assist in any revolt against the British and Jewish refugees.
Husseini spent the first half of the 1940s in Germany broadcasting anti-Jewish rhetoric through the German airwaves. Initially, the broadcasts contained quotes from the Quran to Arab listeners. From 1944 to 1945, his rhetoric had reached a peak in pleas to incite violence. Jeffry Herf said, “Husseini and other unnamed inciters used the Arab radio broadcasts to appeal for audience participation in the killing of Jews ‘wherever you find them.’”[4]
During Husseini’s European tenure, he was sent to tour the Balkan states to recruit Muslims to the Nazi military. The mufti would travel to Bosnia, Herzegovina, Croatia, and the Sandžak, where he gave grandiose religious speeches, to which he was hailed as an “Islamic pope.”[5] Husseini was tasked with promoting support for Germany and Axis alliances from Muslim leaders, clerics, and warlords. On the authority of the Germans, Husseini contributed materials to the Croatian Muslims for war relief, totaling 50,000 tons of potatoes and 10,000 tons of sugar.[6] Husseini’s trip to the Balkans proved successful, as he had gained the appeal of the Muslims in the region. Because of this success, the Muslim SS division was formed, and the Germans won their campaign to win the support of the Muslim civil population for Hitler’s New World Order.
[1] Pearlman, The Mufti Over the Middle East, 31.
[2] Ibd.
[3] Herf, Jeffry, Nazi Propaganda for the Arab World, 62.
[4] Herf, Nazi Propaganda for the Arab World, 213.
[5] Nicosia, Francis R, and Ergene Boğaç A, eds. Nazism, the Holocaust, and the Middle East: Arab and Turkish Responses. 188
[6] Nicosia, Francis R, and Ergene Boğaç A, eds. Nazism, the Holocaust, and the Middle East: Arab and Turkish Responses. 194
