Palestinian Lie of the Day: The Waldorf Astoria

From the PA's official Wafa News Agency:

The Israeli authorities announced Wednesday the opening of a Waldorf Astoria branch hotel, part of the Hilton chain of hotels, which manages the Waldorf brand, on the site of the Supreme Islamic Council building in West Jerusalem, said Al-Aqsa Foundation of Waqf and Heritage in a press release.

The foundation stated that the construction of Waldorf Astoria hotel, which is located opposite from Maˈman Allah cemetery, was commenced on the ruins of the Supreme Islamic Council building, which was demolished except for its facades that are utilized for tourist attraction purposes.

The foundation considered the seizure of the site of the Council building and the construction of the hotel on its ruins as a seizure and Judaization of an Islamic waqf that comes as a part of the overall Judaization of Jerusalem.

The old building was built in 1929 on the initiative of the Mufti of Palestine, Haj Amin Al-Husseini, and designed by Turkish architect Nahas Bey in the Islamic architectural style.

In 1936 the building was seized by the British mandatory authorities and turned into administrative and military offices. In 1948 it was seized by the Israel under the Absentees’ Property Law. It used to house the Israeli Ministry of Industry and Trade until 2003. Three years later, it was purchased by Reichmann, a US Jewish tycoon, for $20 million.

Reichmann announced later his intention to transform the building into a luxury hotel, which came as part of the ‘Mamilla project; ‘Alrov Mamilla' project is one the largest Israeli construction projects in Jerusalem.

How insensitive for Israel to build a hotel at that site!

After all, in 1929, it was built by the Mufti of Jerusalem as   - a hotel!

That's right. He didn't build the Supreme Muslim Council building in 1929, he built the Palace Hotel. Much of the facade is being kept or restored for the Waldorf.

Here are some details about this supposedly holy Islamic site and how respectfully the Mufti (Abbas' hero) treated the cemetery, from the book "One Palestine, Complete: Jews and Arabs Under the British Mandate," by Tom Segev and Haim Watzman:

The mufti remained in power and at one point got himself into an embarrassing situation over dealings with Jews: he signed an agreement with a Jewish contractor, Baruch Katinka, to build a luxury hotel in Jerusalem. The Palace was to be built across from the large Muslim cemetery in Mamilla. Katinka had reasoned that a Jew would not get the job, so he entered into a partnership with an Arab contractor. The two of them, together with Tuvia Dunia, another Jewish builder and Chaim Weizmann's brother-in-law, concluded their deal with the Supreme Muslim Council, which was backing the project, and got to work. The mufti demanded that preference be given to Arab workers and that any day of rest during the course of the work would be on Friday. But when he was forced to choose between religious piety and business interests, he chose the latter and made Katinka, the Jewish contractor, his confidant.

A short time after excavation began on the hotel's well, it turned out, as it often does in Jerusalem, that there were graves under the hotel lot—the excavations had turned up several skeletons. Katinka asked the mufti what he wanted to do about the discovery of what seemed to be a Muslim burial site, and Haj Amin ordered that the matter be kept secret. He feared that the matter would become known to Mayor Nashashibi, who, seeking to discredit a rival Husseini, would take the opportunity to halt construction. The skeletons were carted away secretly, and work continued.

Nashashibi nevertheless did manage to outmaneuver his great enemy by refusing to link the building to the city sewage system. Katinka suggested to the mufti that an alternative system of pumps and pipes could direct the hotel's sewage, after partial treatment, into the Mamilla cemetery. The mufti agreed, again on condition that the pipes be laid in total secrecy, at night. Under no circumstances should anyone find out.

And here's some more information about the Palace Hotel.

The hotel was unable to compete with the plush King David Hotel a few blocks away and closed its doors in 1935. The building was expropriated by the British Mandate Government.

...When the British attempted to arrest the Mufti in 1937 he fled Palestine, and the British made do with confiscating his property. The Husseini clan owned several well-known buildings in Jerusalem, among them the Palace Hotel, the Orient House, and the Shepherd Hotel in Sheikh Jarrah on a plot of land known as Karam al Mufti, named for Husseini.

After the British departed Palestine in 1948 and Israel's creation, the Palace Hotel became Israel’s Ministry of Industry and Trade.

So what about this Supreme Muslim Council headquarters? Evidently, it was planned to be built as part of a business center on top of the "sacred" Mamilla Cemetery in 1945:

An area of over 450 dunams in the heart of Jerusalem, now forming the Mamilla Cemetery, is to be converted into a business centre. The townplan is being completed under the supervision of the Supreme Moslem Council in conjunction with the Government Town Planning Adviser. A six-storeyed building to house the Supreme Moslem Council and other offices, a four-storeyed hotel, a bank and other buildings suitable for it, a college, a club and a factory are to be the main structures. There will also be a park to be called the Salah ed Din Park, after the Moslem warrior of Crusader times.

...In an interview with "Al-Wihda." the Jerusalem weekly, a member of the Supreme Moslem Council stated that the use of Moslem cemeteries in the public interest had many precedents both in Palestine and elsewhere....

This business center was never built. A few years ago a parking lot next to the cemetery was earmarked for a museum, causing great outrage - even though Muslims planned to build an office park on top of the cemetery in 1945, and move the bodies elsewhere.

You can see in Google Street View how the Waldorf looked under construction a year or two ago, along with the Mamilla cemetery still across the street - a huge open space in the middle of an expensive part of Jerusalem.

The Jews have had greater respect for the Muslim cemetery than the Mufti and the Supreme Muslim council ever did.


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Oh, and notice how Wafa calls the cemetery the "Maˈman Allah" cemetery? That's a lie too: it was named after a St. Mamillah and the Muslims afterwards stole the name and pretended it was Islamic.