Wiesenthal Center Urges Key Mideast Leaders to Ban Palestinian Hate Preacher Who Invoked the Infamous “Blood Libel” to “Explain the Nazi Holocaust”

The Simon Wiesenthal Center today urged King Abdullah of Jordan and Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas to immediately take action against Sheikh Khaled al-Maghrabi, a religious teacher at the Al-Aqsa Mosque who is on thepayroll of the Waqf (the PA religious authority), for using his class to promote the infamous “blood libel” screed that “explains" why the NaziHolocaust took place. The “Blood Libel” is a Christian medievalcanard that accuses Jews of using the blood of children to make Passover matzah. In a video posted on YouTube, Al-Mughrabi says,“The Children of Israel... would look for a small child, kidnap and steal him, bring a barrel called the barrel of nails... They wouldput the small child in the barrel and his body would be pierced by these nails. In the bottom of the barrel they would put a faucet and pour the blood." He told his students to Google “Jews’Bread” for proof.

In letters to both King Abdullah of Jordan and PA PresidentMahmoud Abbas, Wiesenthal Center Founder and Dean Rabbi Marvin Hier and Associate Dean Rabbi Abraham Cooper, wrote:

"The Temple Mount is a site of ultimate religious importance to Judaism and revered also by both Christianity and Islam. It should be an areathat promotes peace, tolerance, and mutual understanding. However, the Al Aqsa Mosque has now been used to repeat horrific lies and legitimize genocide. Left unchallenged, the Sheik’s ‘sermon’will only spawn more hatred and violence.

We note the outrage expressed by Muslim leaders and many others who felt that Islam was defamed when the Prophet Mohammad was depicted incartoons. But where is the outrage, when a religious leader on the payroll of the Waqf defames Judaism?"

In their letter to King Abdullah, Hier and Cooper recalled his father King Hussein’s special relationship with the holy site. “Your father’slegacy and hopes of moderates of all faiths have been desecrated and threatened by a spiritual leader who invokes a horrific lie to justify the Nazi genocide and the mass murder of millions ofinnocent Jews,” they wrote.

Rabbi Hier and Rabbi Cooper urged both King Abdullah and Abbas to denounce al-Maghrabi’s hateful speech and to call on the Waqf toremove him from its payroll and “to permanently ban Sheikh Khaled al-Maghribi from ever using the grounds holy to our faiths to spread his deceitful and dangerous lies.”

(Translation of video courtesy Palestinian Media Watch)

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The Simon Wiesenthal Center is one of the largest international Jewish human rights organizations with over 400,000 member families in theUnited States. It is an NGO at international agencies including the United Nations, UNESCO, the OSCE, the OAS, the Council of Europe and the Latin American Parliament (Parlatino).