On May 23 , 1940 , Pinhas Rutenberg had suggested to a British official , Bruce Lockhart , that the Mufti be assassinated . The idea was broadly discussed only months later . The War Office and Winston Churchill formally approved his assassination in November of that year , but the proposal was shelved after objections arose from the Foreign Office , concerned at the impact an attempt on his life might have in Iraq where his resistance to the British was widely admired . After the coup of April 1941 , British called on assistance from the Irgun , after General Percival Wavell had one of their commanders , David Raziel , released from his imprisonment in Palestine . They asked him if he would undertake to kill or kidnap the Mufti and destroy Iraq 's oil refineries . Raziel agreed on condition he be allowed to " acquire " ( kidnap ) the Mufti and bring him back to Palestine . Raziel and other Irgun militants were flown to the R.A.F base at Habbaniyya where he died two days later , on May 20 , 1941 , when the car he was travelling in was strafed by a German plane . Al-Husseini used his influence and ties with the Germans to promote Arab nationalism in Iraq . He was among the key promoters of the pan-Arab Al-Muthanna Club , and supported the coup d'état by Rashid Ali in April 1941 . When the Anglo-Iraqi War broke out , during which Britain used a mobile Palestinian force of British and Jewish troops , and units from the Arab Legion al-Husseini used his influence to issue a fatwa for a holy war against Britain . The situation of Iraq 's Jews rapidly deteriorated , with extortions and sometimes murders taking place . Following the Iraqi defeat and the collapse of Rashid Ali 's government , the Farhud pogrom in Baghdad , led by members of the Al-Muthanna Club , which had served as a conduit for German propaganda funding , erupted in June 1941 . It was the first Iraqi pogrom in a century , one fueled by violent anti-Jewish feelings stirred over the preceding decade by the ongoing conflict between Arabs and Jews in Palestine
Farhud
Farhud
Amin al-Husseini