The French ‘Nazi hunter’ Serge Klarsfeld has urged Muslims and Jews to learn about their mutual suffering as a way to bring them closer, after a series of conferences on the Shoah held in Arab countries and Israel. "We must spread knowledge about works showing the common ties between Jews and Muslims, because Muslims also suffered from colonialism and humiliation," he said during a conference at the residence of France's ambassador in Baghdad, Iraq. Klarsfeld lost his father in the Holocaust. He and his wife Beate later became famous when they tracked down the Nazi Klaus Barbie in South America and brought him to face trial in France.
His tour of the Middle East also took him to Tunis, Cairo, Amman, Istanbul, Rabat, Jerusalem and Nazareth as part of the ALADIN (Adult Learning Documentation and Information Network) project, which is sponsored by the United Nations cultural organization UNESCO and also supports Holocaust education in Muslim countries. "The question remains as to know how this genocide could have taken place and how the Israelis can act in the manner in which they act?" Klarsfeld was quoted as saying by the news agency AFP. He added: "We must combat revisionism, but I understand that those who have lived under English and French colonialism also want to speak of their suffering and of those who suffer of Israel's presence on what they consider their land."
Iraqi Science and Technology Minister Raid Jahid Fahmi said that any person committed to human rights could not but condemn the crimes of the Nazis. "It must be the same principles which push us to condemn the Holocaust and to reject injustice, especially those suffered by the Palestinians, even if they are not of the same nature," he said.