The Gisborne Herald. IN WHICH IS INCORPORATED "THE TIMES." GISBORNE, SATURDAY, AUGUST 25, 1945. GRAND MUFTI AS WAR CRIMINAL?

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 21801, 25 August 1945, Page 4

The Gisborne Herald. IN WHICH IS INCORPORATED "THE TIMES." GISBORNE, SATURDAY, AUGUST 25, 1945. GRAND MUFTI AS WAR CRIMINAL?

I N its usual forthright manner tlic Jugoslav Government has asked the Allies to hand over Alhaj Amin el Husseini, the former Mufti of Jerusalem, as a war criminal. The charge is that the Grand Mufti visited Bosnia during the German occupation and organised a section of the Moslems into an S.S. Division whose members had no compunction about handing over British and American airmen to the Germans. The Grand Mufti’s record down through the years lends support to the view that lie could be guilty of something of the sort without straying far from his chosen way of living. Leader of the Palestine Arab Party and chief enemy for a score of years of Zionism, he has been a man of many parts. lie started well enough in the First World War by serving with Colonel Lawrence’s friend Feisal at Damascus and assisting in recruiting. Later he became a clerk in the British Administration offices and dabbled in intelligence work. According to an Arab writer, however, his intelligence was not always f*-' "Tie British. The Balfour Declaration setting Palestine apart as a homeland for the Jews aroused bis wrath, especially as the Arabs were not consulted. In 1920 be fled to Transjordan to avoid.serving a sentence of ten years’ imprisonment for anti-British activities. Returning next year under a generous amnesty he was appointed by the British authorities to the position of Grand Mufti and in 1922 was elected President of the Supreme Moslem Council. These two positions gave him immense influence over the Faithful, who required no conversion to his motto of “Palestine for the Arabs.” He issued a decree forbidding land sales to Jews, and the sales dropped by 30 per cent. 'When the headquartres of the Higher Arab Committee was raided in 1937 for evidence of anti-British machinations and all national committees were declared unlawful the Grand Mufti fled to Syria, then under French control, for refuge. In all movements to unite Arabs in resistance to Jewish settlement in Palestine he was suspected of having the most active hand. It has been said that, knowing they could get more economic comfort from a live Jewish National Home'than from an independent Arab State, many Palestine Arabs would prefer to live in peace with their Jewish neighbours. But that creed found no support from the Grand Mufti. Recently he has been held by the French Army as a prisoner in Paris and it was expected that he would be handed over to the British. For the reason that the British Labour Government is pledged to foster the move for the consolidation of the Jewish National Home and will be in no mind to tolerate interference, the fate of the Grand Mufti becomes a matter of topical interest.