— Musings —02.04.2024 06:18 PM
The worst photo op in history
Fascinating debate between Jewish and Palestinian historians in the new New York Times magazine. The only point they really agreed on was that the Holocaust accelerated the migration of surviving Jews to Israel.
The Grand Mufti’s alliance with Hitler, then, was a massive strategic error – more than I ever considered. It’s not hard to understand how the arriving European Jews, hundreds of thousands of them, would forever distrust the Palestinian side after the appalling choice their supreme leader had made.
It was a photo op that would (understandably) never be forgotten – or forgiven.
Warren,
Once again, the historical fact is all about the nuance: at least 6,500 Arabs served in the Wehrmacht and that number is estimated to be as high as tens of thousands. Meanwhile, 12,000 Palestinian Arabs and 30,000 Palestinian Jews served jointly in the British Army. Other allied Arab forces included 134,000 Algerians, 73,000 Moroccans and 26,000 Tunisians.
Ronald,
It’s basically impossible to tell anyone passionate about either end of Israel/Palestine relations to accept nuance and context in their arguments. Such as how in the decades prior to this photo, the enemies of Hitler had proclaimed and begun plotting the means to repopulate a large portion of Mandatory Palestine. Knowing that, is it even reasonable to think the Mufti should have called up FDR and Churchill to say, “you know what, you guys have a point?”
It is possible to support Israel and Jewish people without drinking Bibi’s Koolaid. I hope we figure out how to get there, because the alternative at this point appears to be all-out carnage.