Sane Muslim response to the Holocaust Denial Conference in Teheran

I am glad that there are sane voices in the Muslim world condemming the hate-mongering activities of the Iranian government (which are not, as some people think, a tool to further the Palestinian cause, but rather a distraction from the country's oppressive regime). The original piece appeared two days ago in the LA Times.

Why they deny the Holocaust

On top of nearly constant anti-Semitic propaganda, much of the Muslim world hasn't even heard of it.

By Ayaan Hirsi Ali
AYAAN HIRSI ALI, a Somali immigrant who served in the parliament of the Netherlands until earlier this year, is the author of "Infidel," an autobiography to be published in February.
LA Times, December 16, 2006

ONE DAY IN 1994, when I was living in Ede, a small town in Holland, I
got a visit from my half-sister. She and I were both immigrants from
Somalia and had both applied for asylum in Holland. I was granted it;
she was denied. The fact that I got asylum gave me the opportunity to
study. My half-sister couldn't.

In order for me to be admitted to the university I wanted to attend, I
needed to pass three courses: a language course, a civics course and a
history course. It was in the preparatory history course that I, for
the first time, heard of the Holocaust. I was 24 years old at that
time, and my half-sister was 21.

In those days, the daily news was filled with the Rwandan genocide and
ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia. On the day that my
half-sister visited me, my head was reeling from what happened to 6
million Jews in Germany, Holland, France and Eastern Europe.

I learned that innocent men, women and children were separated from
each other. Stars pinned to their shoulders, transported by train to
camps, they were gassed for no other reason than for being Jewish.

I saw pictures of masses of skeletons, even of kids. I heard
horrifying accounts of some of the people who had survived the terror
of Auschwitz and Sobibor. I told my half-sister all this and showed
her the pictures in my history book. What she said was as awful as the
information in my book.

With great conviction, my half-sister cried: "It's a lie! Jews have a
way of blinding people. They were not killed, gassed or massacred. But
I pray to Allah that one day all the Jews in the world will be
destroyed."

She was not saying anything new. As a child growing up in Saudi
Arabia, I remember my teachers, my mom and our neighbors telling us
practically on a daily basis that Jews are evil, the sworn enemies of
Muslims, and that their only goal was to destroy Islam. We were never
informed about the Holocaust.

Later, as a teenager in Kenya, when Saudi and other Persian Gulf
philanthropy reached us, I remember that the building of mosques and
donations to hospitals and the poor went hand in hand with the cursing
of Jews. Jews were said to be responsible for the deaths of babies and
for epidemics such as AIDS, and they were believed to be the cause of
wars. They were greedy and would do absolutely anything to kill us
Muslims. If we ever wanted to know peace and stability, and if we
didn't want to be wiped out, we would have to destroy the Jews. For
those of us who were not in a position to take up arms against them,
it was enough for us to cup our hands, raise our eyes heavenward and
pray to Allah to destroy them.

Western leaders today who say they are shocked by Iranian President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's conference this week denying the Holocaust need
to wake up to that reality. For the majority of Muslims in the world,
the Holocaust is not a major historical event that they deny. We
simply do not know it ever happened because we were never informed of
it.

The total number of Jews in the world today is estimated to be about
15 million, certainly no more than 20 million. On the other hand, the
world's Muslim population is estimated to be between 1.2 billion and
1.5 billion. And not only is this population rapidly growing, it is
also very young.

What's striking about Ahmadinejad's conference is the (silent)
acquiescence of mainstream Muslims. I cannot help but wonder: Why is
there no counter-conference in Riyadh, Cairo, Lahore, Khartoum or
Jakarta condemning Ahmadinejad? Why are the 57 members of the
Organization of the Islamic Conference silent on this?

Could the answer be as simple as it is horrifying: For generations,
the leaders of these so-called Muslim countries have been
spoon-feeding their populations a constant diet of propaganda similar
to the one that generations of Germans (and other Europeans) were fed
— that Jews are vermin and should be dealt with as such? In Europe,
the logical conclusion was the Holocaust. If Ahmadinejad has his way,
he shall not want for compliant Muslims ready to act on his wish.

The world needs to be informed again and again about the Holocaust —
not only in the interest of the Jews who survived and their offspring
but in the interest of humanity.

And this, this is just wrong. In soooo many ways!