Following are excerpts from an interview with Egyptian expert on Israeli studies Ahmad Hammad, who heads the Hebrew Studies department at 'EinShamsUniversity.
The interview aired on Al-Rafidein TV on January 24, 2009.
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"What Hitler Did [To the Jews] Was 'Incidents' of the Kind That Happen to Any Minority in the World"
Ahmad Hammad: "What underlies the Israelites' mechanism of hating the other? When they were in Egypt, the Israelites were slaves and felt persecuted. Therefore, when they gained independence or some sovereignty, it was inevitable that the hatred of the other would grow in their inner selves, because this 'other' represented a sickly past, in their view. Therefore, they had to separate themselves from this 'other.' All the condescending concepts that appeared in the Talmud, in the Mishnah, and in the Torah are based on the concepts of 'we were slaves and foreigners in the land of Egypt.'"
Interviewer: "In Iraq too, they were abject slaves."
Ahmad Hammad: "Right.
[...]
"What Hitler did - and I don't call it a massacre or anything of the sort... What Hitler did was 'incidents' of the kind that happen to any minority in the world. It happened to the Gypsy minority, to the Turkish minority, and to the Jewish minority. What Hitler did happened to all these minorities." [...]
"Was What Hitler Did to the Jews... a Reaction to Something They Did?"
"Was what Hitler did to the Jews random, or was it a reaction to something they did?"
Interviewer: "You are referring to the economic crises the Jews caused Germany during the war, and the conspiracies they hatched with other countries. When they realized that Germany would not fulfill the plan they had in mind, they placed themselves at the service of another force."
Ahmad Hammad: "They are always at the service of all the forces."
