The Holocaust according to Fatah:
Jews deserved to be killed because of “who they are”
- Fatah justifies murder of Jews in the Holocaust with fictitious story Jewish selfishness and evil
By Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques Zilberdik
On Facebook, Fatah posted the three photos above from World War II together with a story it presented as authentic. According to the version posted by Fatah, Jews willingly and eagerly agreed to bury Russian civilians alive in order to save their own lives. Seeing this, a Nazi soldier proclaimed to the Russians:
"I just wanted you to know who the Jews are and why we are killing them!"
[Official Fatah Facebook page, Feb. 27, 2019]
Fatah presented the story as an authentic quote from the purported memoirs of a Russian civilian:
"One of the Russian prisoners in World War II wrote in his memoirs: 'In 1941 the Germans made us dig deep pits in the ground. When we finished doing what they wanted, they brought a group of Jews, threw them into the pits, and ordered us to bury them. We refused to carry out this atrocious act. So the Germans ordered to throw us in instead of the Jews, and ordered them to bury us. The Jews began to pour dirt on us without hesitation. The dirt almost covered us, but the Germans stopped them and took us out. We were surprised when the German commander shouted at us: "I just wanted you to know who the Jews are and why we are killing them!"'"
[Official Fatah Facebook page, Feb. 27, 2019]
Fatah chose to post the text without comment. It did not condemn this story for portraying Jews as evil, selfish, and ungrateful. Nor did it distance itself from the Nazi commander’s justification of the murder of Jews in the Holocaust based on the antisemitic libel that Jews are defined by these character traits.
Fatah’s antisemitic story justifying the murder of Jews in the Holocaust does bear some similarities to a historical account documented by a JTA news release on Nov. 27, 1942. However, in reality, Jews and Ukrainians all acted heroically by refusing to bury each other alive, and therefore were all murdered by the Nazis.
The following is the historical account of Jewish and Ukrainian heroism released by JTA in 1942:
“Ten old men in a Ukrainian town - five of them Jews and the other five Ukrainians - were all buried alive by the Nazis when each group refused to inter (sic., bury) the other, it was reported by a Red Army sergeant today, who was told of the mass burial by Zuni Greilich, the grandson of one of the Jewish victims.
When the Germans invaded the village of Skarlivka, in the Kiev province, the greater part of the population fled and those who remained hid in the gardens and the fields. Young Greilich, who had taken refuge in the attic of his house, could see everything that was happening in the street below. A German officer, with whip in hand, selected ten bearded, elderly men - five Ukrainians and five Jews. They were each given a spade and ordered to dig a pit. When the pit had been half dug the Nazi ordered the Ukrainians to get out and instructed the Jews to continue digging. After a while he told the Ukrainians to take up their spades and to cover the Jews, who were still digging the pit, with the earth that had been dug up.
The Ukrainians, however, just looked horrified when they heard the German officer’s command and did not pick up their spades. When the Nazi saw that they would not obey his orders, he forced the Ukrainians to get into the pit and told the Jews to climb out and bury their neighbors. The Jews, among whom was Rachmiel Greilich, Zuni’s grandfather, likewise refused to move. Using his foot, so that the old Ukrainians in the pit should not see him, the Nazi shoved some earth on top of them and called; “Look, the Jews are willing to hury (sic., bury) you. You’d better get out and bury them.” But the old men did not budge.
Thoroughly infuriated by this time, the Nazi shoved the old Jews into the pit, on top of the Ukrainians, and, together with his men, buried them all alive. Young Zuni succeeded in escaping from Skarlivka that night and after several days he encountered a Red Army detachment, including Sergeant Leizer Lieberman, to whom he told the story.”
Palestinian Media Watch has documented Palestinian Antisemitism in many reports, most recently on International Holocaust Day when PMW detailed PA leaders' spreading of antisemitic hatred.
One antisemitic message expressed by the PA is that the Jews are the source of all evil in the world, and that they possess wicked character traits and therefore must be eliminated for the good of all humanity. The following sermon, which was broadcast on official PA TV only a few months ago, illustrates this and other antisemitic messages:
Sheikh Osama Al-Tibi: "These are the Jews who haven't changed throughout history... These are the Jews who expose their fangs whenever they get the chance. They are causing devastating corruption throughout the land... We must mention... the truth about these Jews, which Allah wrote in his book [the Quran] Among the Jews' characteristics is that they have offended Allah... They murdered the prophets... They strove to kill Prophet [Muhammad]... Another characteristic is that they are cursed, and they have been denied Allah's mercy... And among their vile characteristics is that they have breached contracts, conventions, and agreements. 'So for their breaking of the covenant We cursed them' [Quran]. 'And made of them apes and pigs and slaves of Taghut' [Quran]. These are the Jews... Always fighting, always corrupting, always scheming, and always plotting against humanity - not just against the Muslims, but rather against all humanity... And another characteristic is that Allah has imposed on them humiliation and misery... So how did Allah curse them, the Jews at the time of Prophet [Muhammad], since these things [sins] were done by their ancestors? The [Quran] commentators explained: ... these malignant genes and cursed characteristics continue in them. They transfer them - Allah save us - from generation to generation. They inherit it from father to son... Humanity will never be able to live together with them. And that's why, my brothers, even Europe, America, and others have spit them out, down to the last one... Our prophet [Muhammad] informed us [that] at the end of time the Muslims will fight the Jews until the Jews hide behind a stone or a tree... The tyranny of the Jews did not just reach humans, but also the inanimate objects and all creatures:
'Until the Jews hide behind a stone or a tree, and the stone or a tree will say: “Muslim, servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him”... Allah, strike your enemies, the enemies of the religion, count them and kill them one by one, and do not leave even one.’"
[Official PA TV, Dec. 14, 2018]
Fatah posted the World War II pictures that accompanied its story as part of a collection of historical photos under the headline: “These are important documents that should be reviewed."
Relying on sources on the internet showing these same three photos from Fatah’s post, they seem to have been taken at the following places (left to right):
- The Bataan Death March in the Philippines, when US and Filipino soldiers were taken captive and forced to march around 65 miles by the Japanese army in 1942; several thousand reportedly died.
- Mass grave in Deblin, a camp for POWs in German-occupied Poland.
- Mass grave in Belzec death camp in German-occupied Poland, 1942.
