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Two months ago my father, Eugene Elsner, a Holocaust survivor, passed away at age 97 and was buried in Israel. As his generation increasingly departs the scene, I am very aware that the responsibility of bearing witness now passes to my generation, the second generation — the children of survivors.

That’s one reason why I was so personally offended by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent statement attempting to pin responsibility for the Holocaust on the Palestinian grand mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini.

There is no doubt that the mufti was an ally of Hitler and an enemy of the Jews, an anti-Semite and a despicable man. But to state, as Netanyahu did, that he inspired the Nazi dictator to carry out the Final Solution is nothing short of a big lie.

Netanyahu said in a speech to the World Zionist Congress last week: "Hitler didn't want to exterminate the Jews at the time; he wanted to expel the Jews. And Haj Amin al-Husseini went to Hitler and said, 'If you expel them, they'll all come here (to Palestine).' " Hitler then asked, according to Netanyahu, "What should I do with them?" The mufti replied: "Burn them."

Ironically, the title of Netanyahu’s speech was “The Ten Big Lies Hurled at Us.”

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The mufti met Hitler for the first time on Nov. 28, 1941. By then, the Final Solution was well underway. Thousands of Jews had already been slaughtered by mobile killing squads — the Einsatzgruppen. The massacre at Babi Yar on the outskirts of Kiev, where more than 33,000 Jews were slaughtered, happened Sept. 29 and 30, 1941.

According to an account by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, “By late summer 1941 ... wherever the Einsatzgruppen went, they shot Jewish men, women and children without regard for age or sex, and buried them in mass graves.” They also introduced mobile gas chambers in trucks in late 1941.

My own grandparents were murdered in an extermination camp, Belzec in eastern Poland, which began operations in March 1942. They were among almost half a million Polish Jews killed within nine months. To suggest, as Netanyahu does, that this industrial killing machine could have been set up and begun operations within four months of the mufti’s meeting with Hitler is absurd.

In the 1990s, I worked to build a fitting memorial for the victims, which was finally unveiled in 2004. My grandfather’s picture hangs near the entrance to the museum on the site. Memory is extremely important to me — as is truth.

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In the endless conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, truth has become a victim on both sides. Each advances a separate narrative, and the dispute encompasses textbooks, maps, archaeology — and now the Holocaust.

For years, Israel has accused Palestinians of trying to rewrite history, denying Jewish connections to the Holy Land and the Temple Mount. Now, the elected prime minister of Israel is trying to rewrite history to place the burden of guilt for the Holocaust on Palestinian shoulders.

What a tragedy.

Alan Elsner is communications director for J Street.

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