When Baghdad Burned The June 1941 Farhud Massacre

When Baghdad Burned The June 1941 Farhud Massacre

By: Edwin Black / Published: June 1st, 2015 / Latest update: May 31st, 2015

Haj Amin al-Husseini “Violent dispossession.” In an Arabic dialect, the word is farhud. For decades after it occurred, many thought the nightmare was a sudden and unexpected convulsion that afflicted the Iraqi Jewish community, a community that had lived in that land for some 2,600 years. But in truth, the wild rape and killing spree of June 1–2, 1941 was not unexpected. For years, the Jew hatred, anti-British rage, and Nazi agitation seethed just below the surface, like a smoking volcano waiting to erupt.

AL HUSSEINI and AL GAYLANI

Soon after Hitler took power in 1933, Germany’s chargé d’affaires in Baghdad, German Arab specialist Fritz Grobba, acquired the Christian Iraqi newspaper Al-Alem Al Arabi, converting it into a Nazi organ that published an Arabic translation of Hitler’s Mein Kampf in installments. Then, Radio Berlin began beaming Arabic programs across the Middle East. The Nazi ideology of Jewish conspiracy and international manipulation was widely adopted in Iraqi society, especially within the framework of the Palestine problem that dominated Iraqi politics.

As Arab nationalism and Hitlerism fused, numerous Nazi-style youth clubs began springing up in Iraq. One pivotal group, known as , was nothing less than a clone of the Hitler Youth. In 1938, Futuwwa members were required to attend a candlelight Nazi Party rally in Nuremberg. When the delegation came back from Germany, a common chant in Arabic was, “Long live Hitler, the killer of insects and Jews.

Futuwwa

By the outbreak of World War II in September 1939, the grand mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, and a coterie of transnational Palestinian agitators had thoroughly permeated Baghdad’s ruling circles. For example, Taha al-Hashimi, Iraqi chief of staff, doubled as the head of the Committee for the Defense of Palestine.  To lure more Arabs to the Nazi cause, Grobba employed such tactics as dispensing cash among politicians and deploying seductive German women among ranking members of the army. German radio broadcasting in Baghdad regularly reported fallacious reports about non-existent Jewish outrages in Palestine. Grobba, in conjunction with the mufti, cultivated many Iraqis to act as surrogate Nazis.

By April 1, 1941, with World War II in full swing, a group of pro-Nazi Iraqi military men known as the Golden Square staged a coup, ousting the British-dominated government. Quickly, the Golden Square welded Iraqi actions to Berlin’s iron will. The Golden Square wanted Germany to destroy the British and Jewish presence in their country. The Third Reich craved what was beneath the ground – oil. Without that oil, still controlled by a British oil company, Germany could not invade Russia.

An abortive effort to seize British oil and military facilities in Iraq roiled throughout May 1941. But on May 28, 1941, a British military column determined to protect the oil installations finally punched toward the outskirts of Baghdad to defeat the insurgency. The Nazi-allied Golden Square and the Reich’s wirepuller, Grobba, fled the capital. On May 31, at 4 a.m., with the morning still more dark than dawn, the acting mayor emerged with a white flag on behalf of the residuum of official authority in Iraq. The next day, on June 1, with British authority nominally restored but still withdrawn beyond the outskirts of Baghdad and the Golden Square coup plotters out of the country, the British puppet regent, Prince ‘Abd al-Ilah, returned to Iraq. During the few hours surrounding the regent’s return, a power vacuum existed in the country. It resulted in the bloodbath of June 1–2 that became known as the Farhud.

HITLER and AL HUSSEINI

The original plans for a sweeping anti-Jewish action on June 1 were intended to mimic Nazi mass murder campaigns in Europe. Lists of Jews had already been compiled. Jewish homes had been marked in advanced with a blood-red hamsa, or palm prints, to guide the killing. The text announcing the mass murder and expulsion was already prepared and scheduled for radio broadcast. But Jewish leaders who learned of the impending disaster begged for mercy from the temporary local mayoral authorities, who successfully engineered the expulsion from Baghdad of the massacre planners. The radio broadcast of May 31 merely announced that the British-appointed regent would return to his palace from his temporary refuge in Trans-Jordan.

Baghdad’s Jews had every reason to celebrate. June 1 was the joyous holiday of Shavuot. Baghdad’s Jews thought stability had returned. They were so wrong. At about 3 p.m. on June 1, Regent ‘Abd al-Ilah landed at the airport near Baghdad. He was making his way across al-Khurr Bridge to the palace when a contingent of Baghdadi Jews went out to greet him. As the group came to the bridge, they encountered a contingent of dejected soldiers just returning from their dismal surrender to British forces. The mere sight of these Jews, bedecked in festive holiday garb, was enough to enrage the soldiers. Suddenly, the Jews were viciously attacked with knives and axes. Several were hacked to death on the bridge. The planned systematic extermination, now foiled, broke down into a spontaneous citywide slaughter.

Frenzied mobs raced throughout Baghdad and murdered Jews openly on the streets. Women were raped as their horrified families looked on. Infants were killed in front of their parents. Homes and stores were emptied and then burned. Gunshots and screams shattered the city for hours. Beheadings, torsos sliced open, babies dismembered – the horrid tortures and mutilations were widespread. Severed limbs were waved as hideous trophies. A synagogue was invaded and its Torahs burned in classic Nazi fashion. British troops remained minutes away, but were under orders from London not to move in. The British government was determined not to stir up Arab sentiment stir against the oil infrastructure. The streets were not safe for Jews. Their homes, already well-marked as Jewish residences, were even less safe. Gangs comprised of soldiers, police, and civilian looters invaded Jewish neighborhoods with impunity.

In home after home, furniture was moved up against the door to create a barricade. As the invaders pushed at the doors, heavier furniture was shoved into place. The ceaseless battering and kicks continued, and inevitably, in house after house, the killers broke in. As the attackers breached the entrances, many families would escape to the roof, one step ahead. Fleeing Jews jumped from one roof to another. In some instances, parents and siblings threw children down from roofs to waiting blankets below. When there was no place beyond the roof, some Jews held off their attackers with boiling oil, stones, and whatever other makeshift defenses they could muster. Women were defiled everywhere. Arabs broke into the girl’s school and the students were raped. Six Jewish girls were carted away to a village fifteen kilometers north and located only later. One young girl had not only raped but mutilated as well.

Finally, the mayor telephoned the regent, momentarily the supreme authority in the country, and beseeched him to issue orders to loyal troops. As the order circulated, loyal units began opening fire on the rioters, especially when they turned to Muslim neighborhoods to continue their pillage. Once the shooting began, the rioters fled. Days later, after the regent eventually restored order, the British entered the city limits. The oil was secure. The Jews of Baghdad were not.

In truth, no one will ever know many were murdered or maimed during those two dark days. Official statistics, based on intimidated and reluctant witnesses, listed about 110 Jews dead. Hundreds were reported injured. But Jewish leaders said the real numbers were far greater. One Iraqi historian suggested that as many as 600 were murdered. The Jewish Burial Society was afraid to inter the bodies. The corpses were ignominiously collected and entombed in a large, long, rounded mass grave that resembled a massive loaf of bread.

“Farhud“ means violent dispossession. It was a word the Jews of wartime Europe never knew. “Holocaust” was a word the Jews of wartime Iraq never knew. But soon they would all know their meaning regardless of the language they spoke. With the events of June 1–2, 1941, both words came together.

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The Golden Square was a group of four officers of the Iraqi armed forces who played a part in Iraqi politics throughout the 1930s and early 1940s. The activities of the Golden Square culminated in supporting Rashid Ali al-Gaylani in his overthrow of government in 1941. The "Golden Square" included the four most important leaders of the "Circle of Seven." The Circle of Seven was a group of Sunni Arab nationalist military officers who were greatly influenced by German Ambassador Fritz Grobba and, in turn, greatly influenced politics in Iraq during the 1930s and early 1940s.  The members of the Golden Square were Colonel Salah al-Din al-Sabbagh, Colonel Kamal Shabib, Colonel Fahmi Said, and Colonel Mahmud Salman. During theAnglo-Iraqi War, the four members of the Golden Square commanded units located in the Baghdad area. Salah ad-Din al-Sabbagh was commander of the Iraqi 3rd Infantry Division. Kamal Shabib commanded the 1st Infantry Division. Fahmi Said commanded the Independent Mechanized Brigade. Mahmud Salman, the one non-Army officer, was the Chief of the Air Force.  The members of the Golden Square were virulently anti-British. In time, these men represented real power as successive Iraqi governments sought the support of the military for survival. The members of the Golden Square looked to Germany to support them and, for his part, Grobba enthusiastically encouraged them to do so.  On 1 April 1941, Rashid Ali and the Golden Square launched a coup d'etat to topple the government of the Regent, Prince 'Abd al-Ilah. The subsequent Anglo-Iraqi War ended disastrously for Rashid Ali and the members of the Golden Square who, for the most part, fled Iraq as the British closed in on Baghdad.

FOR MORE INFORMATION:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1941_Iraqi_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat