Saudi prince’s ally Mohammed al-Issa, other Muslim religious leaders and AJC officials also slated to tour a Jewish museum and a mosque in Warsaw, share a Shabbat meal

A senior Saudi religious leader is slated to visit the Auschwitz death camp in Poland on Thursday ahead of the 75th anniversary of its liberation by the Soviet Red Army.

Mohammed al-Issa, the secretary-general of the Mecca-based Muslim World League (MWL) and a former Saudi justice minister, is scheduled to arrive at Auschwitz alongside Muslim religious leaders from more than 24 countries and a delegation of American Jewish Committee (AJC) officials.

Issa, the Muslim clerics and the AJC officials will tour the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw on Friday as well as visit the Nozyk Synagogue in the Polish capital and a local mosque, Kenneth Bandler, a spokesman for AJC said, adding that the group will share an interfaith Shabbat meal too.

They also plan to meet with Holocaust survivors on Friday at the synagogue, according to an individual familiar with the details of the trip who asked not to be name.

Issa’s expected visit to Auschwitz comes after he visited the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC, in May 2018 and wrote an opinion article in the Washington Post in January 2019 condemning the Nazis’ “heinous crimes.” He also declared that “Muslims around the world have a responsibility to learn” about the lessons of the Holocaust.

“I urge all Muslims to learn the history of the Holocaust, to visit memorials and museums of this horrific event and to teach its lesson to their children,” Issa, who is considered an ally of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, wrote in the article.

From 1940 to 1945, the Nazis killed some 1.1 million people, mainly European Jews, at Auschwitz. They murdered most of the victims in gas chambers.

The AJC’s Harris described Issa’s scheduled visit to Auschwitz as highly significant, emphasizing that he believes it will enhance Muslim understanding of the Holocaust.

“This trip will be groundbreaking. That is no exaggeration,” he said in a phone call.

Pawel Sawicki, an official in the Auschwitz Memorial’s press office, said in an email that while Arab and Muslim clerics, leaders and activists have previously toured the camp, it seemed that Issa is to be the most senior religious leader to visit it.

In May 2019, AJC and MWL signed a memorandum of understanding, in which they agreed to take part in a trip to Auschwitz together this week.

Since 2016, Issa has been the head of the Muslim World League, which carries out Islamic missionary work around the world.

 

Posted by times of israel