From the Liveblog of
Wednesday, October 21, 2015
Rivlin says ‘no one like Hitler’ for Jewish tragedy
President Reuven Rivlin weighs in on the Hitler-mufti comment, which has been dominating Israeli media today ad nauseum.
Rivlin says there was “no one like Hitler” for tragedy in the whole world, and for Jews in particular.
“Hitler and the mufti were both very clear Israel-haters,” says the president, “but I’m not well-versed in all the details.” Rivlin is using a phrase which Hebrew speakers use interchangeably with “Jew-haters.”
Historians and opposition MKs are having a field day with Netanyahu’s comment.
Speaking to the Knesset Channel with no media adviser to give him the lines, opposition leader Isaac Herzog goes as far as saying that the comments are “doing a service to Holocaust deniers.”
Netanyahu has since clarified his comment to indicate that he did not mean to “absolve Hitler” but to demonstrate that the Palestinians’ hatred of Jews – dating back to pre-state days – has nothing to do with settlements, or what the Palestinians call the occupation of areas they claim for a land.
The farce today reached a new height when PA President Abbas said Netanyahu was “distorting history.” Abbas wrote his doctoral thesis about the “secret relationship between Nazism and Zionism.”
In a somewhat ironic turn of events the prime minister is in hot water for the Hitler-mufti comments just on the day he heads to Germany for an official visit.
The comment by the prime minister dominated Israeli media intensely today. It rippled abroad as well, with the Germans even issuing a statement saying they bore responsibility for the Holocaust.
