Shoah through Muslim Eyes

Mehnaz M. Afridi earned her PhD in Religious Studies from the University of South Africa. She currently serves as Assistant Professor of Religious Studies and Director of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Interfaith Education Center at Manhattan College (Riverdale, NY). Her research interests include the Holocaust; interreligious identity; post-genocide identity; Diaspora and Transnational Studies; and feminist post-colonial theory. Her publications and presentations have focused on the Qur’an and human rights, Islamic Literature and Culture; Judaism & Islam, Holocaust and antisemitism, including her co-edited book, Global Perspectives on Orhan Pamuk: Existentialism and Politics (Palgrave MacMillan, 2012). She received a National Endowment for Humanities Institute Grant in 2006 to study "Venice, the Jews, and Italian Culture: Historical Eras and Cultural Representations"; a Coolidge Fellow Grant from Union Theological School in 2003; and attended the Hess Seminar on "Teaching Testimony and Holocaust" at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2011. She has been a Board Member of the Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Ethics since 2004.

"At long last we have a book on the Shoah authored by an objective Muslim, written in a way that makes for a truly fascinating and enlightening read." —Khaleel Mohammed, San Diego State University"This is a book by a religious Muslim–on the faculty of a Catholic college–teaching about the Holocaust and other genocides. Professor Mehnaz Afridi has taken a remarkably courageous stance by breaking down facile stereotypes and revealing the sad truth of rampant antisemitism and Holocaust denial in the Muslim world. Yet she also bravely notes how Muslims served as rescuers of Jews both in Europe and North Africa. Shoah through Muslim Eyes is an honest and scholarly work that naturally evolved out of Afridi’s Holocaust research (which included personal interviews of survivors) along with a series of courses she has taught on the Holocaust and on religion and genocide at Manhattan College. An extraordinary achievement, Mehnaz Afridi’s insistence on speaking truth and seeking justice epitomizes the true meaning of 'jihad:' striving to do what is right in the path of God." —Reuven Firestone, Regenstein Professor in Medieval Judaism and Islam, Hebrew Union College"This is a powerful book, written by a courageous scholar, which helps Jews and Muslims to better understand each other. One hopes that it is widely read and discussed in Muslim and Jewish circles, and especially in those circles where Jews and Muslims sit together." —Amir Hussain, Professor of Theological Studies, Loyola Marymount University

• Acknowledgements Introduction Chapter One: Why the Shoah?Chapter Two: My Journey through Academia, Jerusalem, and DachauChapter Three: Why is the Shoah Unprecedented?Chapter Four: The DocumentChapter Five: Is Islam Antisemitic? No.Chapter Six: Muslims and the Memory of a Colonial Holocaust ConclusionAfterword BibliographyIndex