Acknowledging the Holocaust & Regaining the Moral High Ground for Muslims




I keep reading about Muslims who want to question the severity of the Holocaust, or straight out deny that it ever happened. This has come to the forefront in the media recently because of the conference in Iran that seeks to question the Holocaust.

I read this recent article about a group of Jews who are against the state of Israel, arguing that the teachings of Judaism instruct that only the coming of the Jewish Messiah can lead to the creation of a Jewish state:

The book of Jewish law or Talmud, they say, teaches that believers may not use human force to create a Jewish state before the coming of the Messiah.

They also go on to make a valid point about how the Holocaust has been used by the Jewish people:

He [Austria-based Rabbi Moishe Ayre Friedman] says the Holocaust was being used to legitimise the suffering of other peoples and he wanted to break what he called a taboo on discussing it.
The main thing, he argued, was not Jewish suffering in the past but the use of the Holocaust as a "tool of commercial, military and media power".

These Jews were at the conference in Iran but they were there to object at Israel, not debate the valdity of the Holocaust, which they believe happened without a doubt. However, I believe just examining this group is important because they can teach us Muslims that you can accept the Holocaust and still find objection to Israel - which Muslims don't seem to understand.

Let us Muslims face the facts:

Any reasonable Jew would find any statement questioning if the Holocaust happened as offensive, and rightly so.

One the flip side, any Palestinian has a right to be offended when people (Jewish or non-Jewish) speak about Israel’s legitimate right to Palestinian land, especially using the Holocaust as a justification.

The Holocaust and Israel are two distinct issues that often get messed together because of emotions.

First, the issue of the Holocaust. As a Muslim and a human being, I find it offensive and foolish that anyone would try denying this horrible crime. People may debate about the specific ways or precise number of deaths that occurred but outright questioning whether it happened is absurd. The Holocaust was genocide, and genocide is a grave crime against humanity – humanity is something all people, regardless of creed are members of, and crimes against humanity are an offensive to us all.

The second issue is the state of Israel. The fact that the Holocaust happened doesn't give one the privilege to arrive in a foreign land (although historically Jewish) establish a new state and marginalize the native population. There were Jewish people living in Palestine before Israel was created but those seeking the creation of the Jewish state were European Jews who created the impetus and pressure upon England (i.e. Balfour Declaration) towards supporting a Jewish homeland in Palestine. This is one of the reasons, the main reason in my opinion, Arabs and Muslims in the world perceive Israel as a permanent mark and continuation of colonization (a period where the Arab/Muslim civilization was humiliated by Western Imperialists) upon the Arab/Muslim world.

I find it unfortunate that because of the creation of Israel, Muslims feel enmity towards the Jewish people because we really shouldn’t since Muslims and Jews have both suffered at the hands of a common oppressor: Western powers. Jews suffered through hundreds of years of persecution in Europe culminating to one of the greatest crimes ever committed. Likewise, the Arab/Muslim world also suffered at the hands of the Western colonialists and imperialistic powers for much of the 19th and 20th century.

Muslim should accept the Holocaust at its face value and take the moral high ground by pointing out that both of us have suffered but Jewish suffering didn’t privilege Jews to come into a land they left over two millennia and reclaim it as the state of Israel. The last they should be doing is having conferences that have former KKK leader David Duke.

However at this point, Arabs/Palestinians/Muslims should also realize there is no way to “get rid” of Israel since the state is clearly established. We should just focus on at least getting any Palestinian state because it seems like that option may not be available to Palestinians soon, even though in principle Palestinians had a greater claim to more land.