Translations

French: Les Musulmans et la Machine de Guerre Nazie (Paris: La Découverte, 2019).
German: Für Prophet und Führer: Die Islamische Welt und das Dritte Reich (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 2017).
Spanish: Los Musulmanes en la Guerra de la Guerra Alemania Nazi (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 2020).
Italian: Hitler e l’Islam nella Seconda Guerra Mondiale (Gorizia: Leg Edizioni, 2020).
Dutch: Voor Profeet en Führer: De Islamitische Wereld en het Derde Rijk (Amsterdam: Prometheus, 2021).
Russian: Islam v Politike Nazistkoi Germanii (1939-1945) (Moscow: Delo, 2020).
Serbo-Croat-Bosnian: TBA (Belgrade: Čigoja, forthcoming).
Turkish: İslam ve Naziler (Istanbul: Alfa, 2015).
Persian: Dunja-ye Islam va Jang-e Alman Nazi (Tehran: Saless, 2019).
Arabic: Fi sabil Allah wa l-Fuhrer: Al-Naziyun wa l’Islam fi al-Harb al-Alamiya al-Thaniya (Cairo: Madarat, 2021).

The German edition was re-published by the Federal Agency for Civic Education of the German Ministry of the Interior: Für Prophet und Führer: Die Islamische Welt und das Dritte Reich (Bonn: Bundeszentrale für Politische Bildung, 2018).

Prizes

∙ Fraenkel Prize, 2014
∙ Prince Consort Prize and Seeley Medal of the University of Cambridge, 2011
∙ Doctoral Dissertation Prize of the British International History Group, 2011
∙ Doctoral Dissertation Prize of the German Historical Institute London, 2011

Reviews

‘Based on remarkable research, David Motadel has written an outstanding book on an important topic, providing fascinating and original insights into Nazism’s attempts to win followers of Islam to support Germany’s war.’
— Sir Ian Kershaw, University of Sheffield

‘David Motadel presents a deeply researched, finely written, and fascinating account of how the Nazis understood Islam and how they sought to mobilize, manipulate, and utilize it. There is no study quite like it, and it has much to teach not only to students of German history and Islamic studies, but also to those of international relations and geopolitics more broadly.’
— Michael A. Reynolds, Princeton University

‘An original contribution to the modern history of Islam, David Motadel’s book is a powerful and timely reminder of Western colonial efforts to manipulate and mobilize jihadist rhetoric in the service of empire.’
— Robert D. Crews, Stanford University

‘David Motadel shows that the Nazi regime pushed a crude but fairly consistent anti-Orientalist line in order to forge a Muslim alliance. This went beyond the coincidence of shared enmities against the British, the Bolsheviks and the Jews, and promised to open up a true partnership based on shared key values: obedience to the leader, belief in the family and commitment to a holy war. Mastering this complex story and showing it from radically contrasting points of view is a remarkable achievement.’
— Nicholas Stargardt, University of Oxford

‘David Motadel’s book is erudite, thorough, and elegantly written. It will be the reference on its subject for a long time to come.’
— Saul Friedländer, UCLA

‘Islam and Nazi Germany’s War will surely become one of the most important books on international history as well as global intellectual history, demonstrating the sophistication and theoretical rigor of both fields. It not only provides the most comprehensive account of Nazi Germany’s engagement with Islam but also fascinating insights into the nature of modern Europe’s complex relationship with Muslim societies. It will reorient the way we think about the geopolitics of European Orientalism and will be compulsory reading for everyone interested in debates on Islam and the “West.”’
— Cemil Aydin, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

‘Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is the first book to provide an in-depth study of this complex relationship, charting its twists and turns as Hitler’s paladins sought to bring Muslims onside. It is academically impeccable, drawing on a wealth of archival resources in a multitude of languages, yet it wears its erudition lightly. In the current climate, a subject such as this might be considered controversial. Motadel, however, is never less than resolutely serious and rigorous. The whiff of sensationalism never offends the nostrils… Motadel’s book is a brilliantly original study that achieves that rare feat of combining rigor with accessibility. Most impressively, in the hugely crowded field of the second world war and Nazi Germany, it manages to explore an area of profound significance that had previously been overlooked.’
— Roger Moorhouse, FINANCIAL TIMES – Read Review

‘Impeccably researched and clearly written, [Motadel’s] book will transform our understanding of the Nazi policies that were, Motadel writes, some “of the most vigorous attempts to politicize and instrumentalize Islam in modern history.”’
— Dominic Green, WALL STREET JOURNAL – Read Review

‘Motadel’s treatment of an unsavory segment of modern Muslim history is as revealing as it is nuanced. Its strength lies not just in its erudite account of the Nazi perception of Islam but also in illustrating how the Allies used exactly the same tactics to rally Muslims against Hitler. With the specter of Isis haunting the world, it contains lessons from history we all need to learn.’
— Ziauddin Sardar, THE INDEPENDENT – Read Review

[Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is a] comprehensive and discerning history…[and it has] implications for understanding current history. Motadel…offers a portrait of continuity in the West’s strategies for mobilizing Islam in wartime or for using Islam for its geopolitical ends…Motadel’s sophisticated narrative suggests at least two reasons why such Western strategies typically fail. One is the panners’ ignorance of Islam’s diversity and of the subtle part that faith plays in the daily lives of so many self-identified Muslims. That is, Westerners often overestimate Islam’s coherence and thus its pliability. The second reasons is written across the vast history of colonial and postcolonial European and American interventions in Muslim territories…Muslim populations…have seen countless promises betrayed and one traumatic outcome of Western intervention after another.’
— Steve Coll, THE NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS – Read Review

‘As David Motadel points out in Islam and Nazi Germany’s War, it was only in 1941, when German troops became involved in North Africa, advancing towards the Middle East, that policy-makers in Berlin began a systematic study of the strategic role of Islam…These propaganda efforts were unsuccessful, and Motadel cites a number of reasons for this…The author also makes the important point that Germany committed the mistake (as Western powers still do) of underestimating the complexities of the Muslim world and the huge variety of local customs and traditions. The potential of pan-Islamic unity was, and is, overestimated.’
— Gerald Butt, THE TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT – Read Review

‘In offering an interesting and important account of Islam in Nazism’s war, Motadel reveals a little-known chapter in the conflict. This is a nuanced and sensitive account of a topic that is too important to ignore.’
— Robert Gellately, TIMES HIGHER EDUCATION – Read Review

‘Thanks to David Motadel’s exhaustive scholarship we now have the first “comprehensive study of German policy towards Islam during the Second World War”. In fact, it is even more than that, since it explores the roots of Nazi policy in Imperial Germany and the Great War and follows its tracks through the Weimar years into the Third Reich. Throughout the book Motadel also addresses “the relationship between religion and power”, analysing one of several attempts in recent history to use religion as an instrument of politics and military strategy. Needless to say, this inquest into the previous weaponisation of Islam has uncomfortable resonances for today.’
— David Cesarani, LITERARY REVIEW – Read Review

‘There’s one Nazi propaganda battle you don’t hear much about. Now, Motadel details Hitler’s efforts to promote himself as a backer of Islam. The Nazis saw the Muslim people as sharing common enemies, including the British Empire and Zionism. “The peoples of Islam will always be closer to us than, for example, France”, Hitler said. But despite the Third Reich’s best efforts, the Islam–Nazi relationship remained tempestuous. A new look at how World War II profoundly changed the Middle East.’
— Billy Heller, THE NEW YORK POST (A Book of the Week) – Read Review

‘Mr. Motadel’s Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is a superb analysis of little-known but important facts about World War II…Mr. Motadel’s book should be part of every major library with a World War II history section.’
— Herman J. Obermayer, THE WASHINGTON TIMES – Read Review

‘Motadel (Cambridge) is thorough, balanced in his judgements, and clear in his exposition of facts…An outstanding contribution.’
– R. S. Levy, CHOICE – Read Review

‘This is a major work of scholarship, examining the various ways the Nazis fostered a relationship with Muslims both before the war and especially during the war.’
– Susannah Heschel, JTA (‘SEVEN NEW BOOKS ABOUT THE HOLOCAUST YOU SHOULD READ’) – Read Review
    (See also HAARETZ – Read Review and TIMES OF ISRAEL – Read Review)

‘Islam and Germany’s War by David Motadel is an important contribution to our understanding of the relationship of Nazi Germany to the Islamic world.’
– Jack Fischel, JEWISH BOOK WORLD – Read Review

‘Hitler’s failed effort to put Muslim boots on the ground still stands as the most far-reaching Western attempt to use Islam to win a war. Such is the judgment of David Motadel, the author of a new, authoritative book, Islam and Nazi Germany’s War. Motadel’s detailed and fascinating explanation of how and why the Nazis failed to get Muslims on their side is a must-read for serious students of World War II, and it has an important message as well for our own policy in the Middle East.’
— David Mikics, THE TABLET – Read Review

‘Islam and Nazi Germany’s War by David Motadel — make[s] fascinating reading and highlight the variety of ways in which the German state sought to subvert the Muslim soldiers’ professional loyalty to the Allied armies in the two wars…The [author] must be lauded for [his] painstaking research in producing [this] highly readable [volume] that include[s] relevant photographs as well.’
— Muhammad Ali Siddiqi, DAWN – Read Review

‘This research and deep historical examination offers new insights…Motadel illustrates the profound impact of World War II on Muslims around the world…Motadel’s book analyzes material that is critically important for thinking about religion and ideology as part of World War II as well as today, especially in a historical moment in which the conversation about religion and politics tends too often toward the sensational.’
— Mehnaz M. Afridi, MARGINALIA – Read Review

‘Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is a valuable ground-breaking work, energetically readable and unabashedly complicated… Through an extensive amount of research in some fairly recondite primary sources, Motadel tells the story of Nazi Germany’s interaction with its Muslim conquests and would-be conquests in greater detail and with greater skill than any English-language historian before him. He stresses the at first odd-seeming fact that when it came to dealing with Muslims, the Nazis were almost jarringly accommodating… At heart, Motadel’s revelatory book describes a mutual bafflement, and in that sense alone it’s perhaps prescient. Either way, Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is an indispensable enlargement of our understanding of the Second World War’s Eastern European theater.’
— Steve Donoghue, OPEN LETTERS MONTHLY (A Book of the Year) – Read Review

‘David Motadel’s Islam and Nazi Germany’s War…is meticulously researched. Indeed, the author uses a large number of secondary sources and research archives in several countries. The endnotes constitute around a third of the entire book. What is the implication of Motadel’s monograph? As any other good scholarly work, it elucidates not just a comparatively small segment of human history but provides important insight which facilitates the understanding of other similar periods…The importance of Motadel’s book is manifold… a strong work, providing anyone interested in the Nazi period and the role of Islam with a wealth of information and insight.’
— Dmitry Shlapentokh, NEW EASTERN EUROPE – Read Review

‘Islam and Nazi Germany’s War offers food for thought.’
— Robert M. Citino, WORLD WAR II – Read Review

‘This is an important book with a different view of the world war, superbly researched, and elegantly produced.’
— Arnold Krammer, THE JOURNAL OF MILITARY HISTORY – Read Review

‘[An] extensively researched and easily read book…[Motadel] bases his account on German, English, French, Bosnian (Serbo-Croatian), Albanian, Arabic, Persian, and Tatar sources from more than thirty different local and national archives in fourteen countries…The author provides the most comprehensive study yet of Germany’s policy toward Islam during the Second World War.’
— Donald M. McKale, DIPLOMACY AND STATECRAFT – Read Review

‘David Motadel’s impressive and excellent new book will take some heat out of the debates as a standard reference providing definitive information about the German side of the encounter between Nazism and the world of Islam during the Second World War. The wealth of material that Motadel presents is astounding…he left no page unturned or document un-scrutinized in relevant libraries and archives worldwide…Motadel’s account is at its best when he details the obsession of Nazi leaders with ideas about the subversive potential of what they termed “Universal Islam”…Motadel’s account offers chilling insights into the ideological meanderings of Nazi grandees about the assumed fierceness and prowess of Muslim soldiers, who they hoped would tip the balance in a global struggle against British and French imperialism…In his balanced account, Motadel makes clear that Germany’s exploitation of Islam and the deployment of Muslim legionnaires were driven by the contingencies of strategic overstretch.’
— Peter Wien, WAR IN HISTORY – Read Review

‘Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is a well-written survey of Nazi attempts to compensate for military manpower shortages in World War II by seeking to mobilize support among Muslims from North Africa to Eurasia…Author David Motadel’s nuanced analysis reveals the efforts of Nazi policymakers to market their cause to populations with which they had little historical connection…In summation, Motadel’s study includes much original research and pulls together in a coherent narrative the separate experiences of a variety of Muslim populations. The work is highly readable and provides fresh coverage of a seldom-addressed aspect of the war. Overall, the book draws upon a broad range of sources…and is a valuable contribution to scholarship on the war. For students and scholars alike, it serves as useful background for understanding many developments of the post-Cold War period across the Middle East, the Balkans, and western Eurasia.’
— Robert F. Baumann, MILITARY REVIEW – Read Review

‘This ambitious, well researched study explores under-publicized German efforts to “promote an alliance with the Muslim world against their alleged common enemies, most notably the British Empire, the Soviet Union, and the Jews”. David Motadel (Univ. of Cambridge) has gathered a trove of engaging materials from over thirty archives in fourteen countries; his footnotes occupy nearly a third of his book. It is an important story well told…Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is a fine work of scholarship that clarifies the role of the people of Islamic territories in various theaters of World War II.’
— Cathal J. Nolan, MICHIGAN WAR STUDIES REVIEW – Read Review

‘[Motadel] carried out…painstaking, meticulous research…His book sets new standards for research in this field, not only for the extraordinary scope of his archival research, but also due to the immense amount of secondary literature and memoirs referenced in his 150 pages of footnotes…He has discovered a plethora of important new sources. He has succeeded in processing a vast amount of material and synthesizing it all into a compelling study. His book should be seen as required reading for all researchers in this field.’
— Matthias Küntzel, ISRAEL JOURNAL OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS – Read Review

‘David Motadel uses various collections of primary sources from fourteen different countries to illustrate how Nazi Germany used the Islamic world to its own political advantage in 1941 and 1942.’
— Niss Boughout, REVIEW OF MIDDLE EAST STUDIES – Read Review

‘[An] important book…Through remarkable and pioneering research…Motadel has documented the previously underexamined extent to which the National Socialists embraced Islam…Motadel’s deep and path-breaking research…also draws attention to an overlooked aspect of the Nazi military policy toward Muslims in Eastern Europe…Islam and Nazi Germany’s War merits close attention by historians who seek a deeper understanding of the complex interaction between race and religion during the Holocaust. David Motadel has written a pioneering work that should foster rethinking about not only that relationship but also the one between Nazi Germany and Islam.’
— Jeffrey Herf, CENTRAL EUROPEAN HISTORY – Read Review

‘Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is a carefully researched and detailed book drawing on archives in a half dozen different countries including Germany, Britain, the United States, the Czech Republic, Russia, Latvia, Albania and Iran…One particularly intriguing issue developed in the book is the Nazis’ shifting accommodation of Muslims at the expense of Nazi ideological and racial categories… Motadel…convincingly demonstrate[s] that the regime’s policies reveal the Third Reich’s desire for strategic partnerships with Muslims, and more significantly, [he] reveal[s] the Reich’s misguided belief that it shared a common worldview with its potential Muslim allies.’
— Mia Lee, CONTEMPORARY EUROPEAN HISTORY – Read Review

‘David Motadel’s Islam and Nazi Germany’s War [is] based on an extraordinary range of archival sources from the US to Germany to Russia to the Crimea to Iran. Motadel analyses Germany’s concerted attempts to use, through the Grand Mufti and other key figures, the entire Islamic world from Morocco to the Balkans to the Middle East to the Caucasus for its own strategic ends…Some of Motadel’s most fascinating sections concern the German understanding of Islam going back to the archaeologist and adventurer Max von Oppenheim, who before World War I had viewed Islam as the Achilles heel of Germany’s potential enemies and thus a geopolitical weapon…Was Germany able through such efforts to mobilize the Islamic world against its enemies? For Motadel, the answer is regional, and aside from examining German efforts in great detail, he analyses Allied and Soviet counter-measures as well as indigenous politics.’
— Norman J. W. Goda, EUROPEAN HISTORY QUARTERLY – Read Review

‘In this meticulously researched book Motadel makes use of more than 30 local and national archives, in fourteen countries but mostly in Eastern Europe and Germany…[an] excellent analysis of Nazi Germany’s engagement with Islam.’
— Sophie Spaan, SEHEPUNKTE – Read Review

‘Motadel’s book provides a vast panorama of the Third Reich’s Islampolitik and clearly presents various aspects of this policy and various questions that it raises. Motadel loves details, and the book sometimes reads like historical anthropology…More generally, this book is virtually exhaustive in its approach, and would therefore be hard to surpass…Motadel uses an impressive number of sources, including diverse secondary sources and archives.’
— Xavier Bougarel, SOUTHEAST EUROPEAN AND BLACK SEA STUDIES – Read Review

‘This is a very detailed study of Germany’s efforts during World War II to mobilize the Muslim world against the Reich’s enemies, generally defined as the British, the Soviet Union, and the Jews… The author has worked in archives in several countries, has turned up material in an enormous variety of places…this is a major work of scholarship… The plans, projects, and problems of the German effort, as well as the actual role of Muslims in Germany’s war…appear here in full and fair detail.’
— Gerhard L. Weinberg, HOLOCAUST AND GENOCIDE STUDIES – Read Review (See also BUSTAN – Read Review)

‘Drawing on an extraordinarily wide range of archival materials in several countries he analyses how German authorities…”engaged with Islam in an attempt to build an alliance with Muslims in Germany’s occupied territories and in the wider world”…Motadel…painstakingly traces the German authorities’ efforts to mobilize and recruit Muslims for their aims…He proves…that Islam played a ‘significant role’…in German policies by tracing these policies in detail, not only in one area, but also in North Africa, the Middle East, the Balkans, and the Eastern Front.’
— Nils Riecken, GERMAN HISTORICAL INSTITUTE LONDON BULLETIN – Read Review

‘Islam and Nazi Germany’s War is a groundbreaking and exhaustive study on German policy towards Islam during World War II. Using a wealth of sources, including numerous archives, secondary literature and memoirs not only in European languages but also in Arabic and Persian, David Motadel, a research fellow in History at Cambridge University, weaves a fascinating account of the views on Islam and Muslims among German political and intellectual elites well before the National Socialists came to power, and on their translation into practice in the Nazi policies towards the Muslims in their occupied territories.’
— Esther Webman, GERMAN HISTORY – Read Review

‘Motadel’s book highlights the very broad, active, and sustained Nazi engagement with the Islamic world, especially the areas under temporary German control… The most interesting aspects…come from Motadel’s sections on the occupied Soviet Union and on the German recruitment of Muslim soldiers. For many Soviet Muslims, as for many non-Russian people in the western Soviet Union, Nazi Germany appeared to be a liberating force—at least initially, although many Soviet Muslims remained attached to the German forces to the bitter end for fear of harsh Soviet reprisals.’
— Raffael Scheck, JOURNAL OF MODERN HISTORY – Read Review

‘David Motadel’s pioneering work, Islam and Nazi Germany’s War, represents a groundbreaking portrayal of a previously neglected aspect of the Third Reich’s religious policies during the years 1939–45…This study affords a range of fascinating insights into the complex religious attitudes of the Nazi regime…In combining analysis of social relations on the ground with an examination of the Nazi regime’s grand geopolitical ambitions for Islamic mobilisation, Motadel has written a superb book, which highlights the significance of religion to the study of the Second World War, and international history more widely.’
— Thomas Brodie, THE ENGLISH HISTORICAL REVIEW – Read Review

‘Motadel is a historian’s historian. He gives a vital yet neglected subject all the depth and breadth of knowledge it requires…he handles the present relevance—the legacies and genealogies—in an unobtrusive, measured way. With a precision of empirical-analytical intelligence, he moves back and forth from the macro-political operations of the Nazi state and its rivalrous policymaking arms…to the local messiness of action on the ground. These virtues are brilliantly on display in part II; likewise in the treatments of military mobilization in part III….The book’s contributions are manifold…Motadel’s exposition includes an endnote apparatus of 154 pages (almost a third of the book), where the archival learning and command of literatures are sovereign.’
— Geoff Eley, THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW – Read Review

German Reviews

‘David Motadel hat eine umfassende Darstellung der Islampolitik des NS-Regimes vorgelegt. Elegant und ohne Effekthascherei zeigt er, wie die Muslime für den Rassekrieg instrumentalisiert werden sollten…Eine bahnbrechende Studie zu dieser Propaganda und der nationalsozialistischen Islampolitik liegt nun auf Deutsch vor. Das in Fachkreisen gepriesene Buch von David Motadel erschien vor drei Jahren zunächst im Verlag der Harvard-Universität…Sein Buch beruht auf einer Quellenarbeit in mehr als 30 Archiven aus 14 Ländern. Es zeigt in frappierenden und erschreckenden Details, wie das NS-Regime versuchte, den Islam für seine Zwecke zu instrumentalisieren…David Motadel erzählt diese verblüffende Geschichte elegant und ohne Effekthascherei…Sein Buch ist bereits jetzt ein Standardwerk.’
— Tanjev Schultz, SÜDDEUTSCHE ZEITUNG – Read Review

‘Die ebenso panoramatische wie differenzierte Studie „Für Prophet und Führer. Die islamische Welt und das Dritte Reich“ des Historikers David Motadel ist das neue Standardwerk zum Thema. Motadels Studie ist für alle, die an den Beziehungen zur islamischen Welt interessiert sind und sich nicht durch oberflächliche historische Kontinuitäten täuschen lassen wollen, ein unverzichtbares Handwerkszeug. Er hat schwer zugängliche und verschiedensprachige Quellen gesichtet.’
— Micha Brumlik, TAGESZEITUNG – Read Review

‘Der aus Deutschland stammende und an der London School of Economics unterrichtende Historiker hat mehr als ein bloßes Kompendium islampolitischer Maßnahmen von NS- Institutionen vorgelegt. Es gelingt ihm, die Quellen…zu einer Erzählung zu verknüpfen, die vor Augen führt, wie sich der Islam in Freund-Feind-Schemata einpassen und entsprechend nutzen ließ…Ohne die in diesem Buch so kundig untersuchte deutsche Islampolitik der Jahre 1941 bis 1944 lassen sich diese Hinterlassenschaften kaum verstehen.’
— Reinhart Schulz, FRANKFURTER ALLGEMEINE ZEITUNG – Read Review

‘Das NS-Regime, so schreibt der deutsche Historiker David Motadel in seinem spannenden Buch „Für Prophet und Führer. Die Islamische Welt und das Dritte Reich“, habe seit 1941 erhebliche Anstrengungen unternommen, um „Muslime als Verbündete zu gewinnen…Motadels Studie beruht auf Recherchen in vielen Archiven …; die englische Originalausgabe wurde hochgelobt und mit Preisen ausgezeichnet…Besonders bedrückend lesen sich jene Passagen des Buches, in denen David Motadel über den Einsatz von Muslimen bei der SS und der Wehrmacht berichtet.’
— Martin Doerry, DER SPIEGEL – Read Review

‘Das Werk ist die erste umfassende Untersuchung der deutschen Islampolitik jener Zeit…Motadels abschließendes Kapitel beschäftigt sich…mit der ‘Instrumentalisierung des Islams für Großmachtinteressen’ nach dem Krieg, bei der vor allem die USA eine gewichtige Rolle spielten. Die Folgen sind noch heute täglich in den Fernsehnachrichten zu bestaunen.’
— Ernst Reuss, TAGESSPIEGEL – Read Review

‘Das ist ein Buch, das einem das Blut in den Adern gefrieren lässt. Hochgradig spannend – gerade, weil es so nüchtern und sachlich ist.’
— Andreas Main, DEUTSCHLANDFUNK – Read Review

‘Als Nazi-Deutschland und seine Verbündeten die Welt mit Krieg überzogen, gerieten Abermillionen von Muslimen unter ihre Herrschaft, in Nordafrika, auf dem Balkan, von der Krim bis zum Kaukasus. Bis heute hat die Geschichtsschreibung, zumal die deutschsprachige, diesem Faktum interessanterweise nur wenig Aufmerksamkeit geschenkt….Nun legt der junge, in Deutschland geborene und an der London School of Economics lehrende Historiker David Motadel eine aufschlussreiche und stilsicher geschriebene Untersuchung vor. Man fragt sich, weshalb dieser Stoff bisher unbeachtet blieb, denn er gibt einiges her.’
— Claudia Kühner, NEUE ZÜRCHER ZEITUNG – Read Review

‘Die umfassende Studie zur Islampolitik des nationalsozialistischen Regimes während des Zweiten Weltkriegs bietet einen spannenden Einblick in die Strategien deutscher Stellen,…Muslime als Verbündete zu Gewinnen. Das…sehr gut lesbare Werk veranschaulich beispielhaft, wie Großmächte Religion politisch und militärisch instrumentalisieren.’
— Klaus Lederer, CICERO – Read Review

‘Den Namen wird man sich merken müssen, lautet eine populäre Phrase, die immer dann zum Einsatz kommt, wenn irgendjemand irgendwo fulminant die öffentliche Bühne betritt. Im Fall von David Motadel trifft der Satz zu. Gerade einmal 36 Jahre alt ist der deutsche Historiker, doch bereits sein erstes grösseres Werk, das 2014 auf Englisch und im Herbst auf Deutsch erschien, hat ihn bekannt gemacht.’
— Hansjörg Müller, BASLER ZEITUNG – Read Review

‘Motadel, der an der renommierten London School of Economics internationale Geschichte lehrt, fördert erstaunliche Erkenntnisse zutage…MotadelsBuch ist ein schlagendes Beispiel dafür, dass neue Herangehens- und Sichtweisen noch immer spannende und lehrreiche Erkenntnisse über das Denken und Handeln des Nationalsozialismus bringen.’
— Armin Fuhrer, FOCUS Online – Read Review

‘“Hitler hatte mehr Muslime nach Deutschland gebracht, als dort je gelebt hatten, und einige von ihnen blieben auch nach dem Krieg im Land“, resümiert der Historiker David Motadel in seinem lesenswerten Buch.’
— Michael Wolffsohn, DIE WELT – Read Review

‘Über die Beziehungen zwischen der islamischen Welt und dem Dritten Reich hat der Historiker David Motadel schon 2015 ein umfangreiches Buch vorgelegt; es erscheint jetzt unter dem Titel „Für Prophet und Führer“ auch auf Deutsch. Sein Autor wurde soeben mit dem Philip-Leverhulme-Preis ausgezeichnet, einem der wichtigsten britischen Wissenschaftspreise, dotiert mit 100.000 Pfund.’
— Johann Althaus, DIE WELT Online – Read Review

‘David Motadel gelang ein großartiges, 568 Seiten umfassendes Werk. Es ist die erste Gesamtdarstellung der deutschen Bemühungen im NS, sich den Islam und seine Angehörigen während des Zweiten Weltkriegs zunutze zu machen.’
— Karl Pfeifer, NEUE WELT – Read Review

‘Prädikat sehr lesenswert.’
— Frank Willmann, WELT EXPRESS Online – Read Review

‘Als deutsche Truppen 1941/42 in muslimisch bevo¨lkerte Territorien auf dem Balkan, in Nordafrika und auf der Krim einmarschierten und in Richtung Naher Osten und Zentralasien vordrangen, kamen auch die in diesen Gebieten lebenden Muslime ins Blickfeld deutscher Milita¨r- und Propagandainteressen. Hier liegt der Ausgangspunkt von David Motadels profunder und ausgesprochen gut geschriebener Studie u¨ber die Islam-Politik der Nationalsozialisten.’
— Heike Talkenberger, DAMALS (Ein Buch des Jahres 2018) – Read Review

‘Die besten Bücher des Monats Februar, Kategorie Sachbuch.’
— PERLENTAUCHER – Read Review

‘David Motadel…legt mit dem zu besprechenden Buch eine grundlegende, umfassende und – man möchte das abgegriffene Wort eigentlich vermieden – erschöpfende Studie vor. Um es vorwegzuschicken: Dieses Buch dürfte für lange Zeit das Standardwerk zum Thema sein und in den Kanon derjenigen Schriften eingehen, die in den umfangreichen Forschungen zum Nationalsozialismus Maßstäbe gesetzt haben…Das Buch ist in einer präzisen, sehr flüssigen und gut lesbaren Sprache geschrieben.’
— Boris Barth, BEITRÄGE ZUR GESCHICHTE DES NATIONALSOZIALISMUS – Read Review

German Summarizing Articles (Not Reviews)

Bodo Mrozek, ‘Politische Religionen’ | Tagesspiegel (27 September 2016).

Ronen Steinke, ‘Hakenkreuz und Halbmond’ | Süddeutsche Zeitung (3 June 2016).

Gottfried Niedhart, ‘Für Adolf Effendi nach Stalingrad’ | Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (25 January 2016).

Sven Felix Kellerhoff, ‘So eng war der Pakt der Nazis mit Muslimen’ | Die Welt (27 October 2015).

Stefan Ihrig, ‘Den Islam stellt mancher gern in die Nazi-Ecke’ | Die Zeit (24 October 2015).

French Reviews

‘Dans un livre somme, l’historien David Motadel dépeint les stratégies de l’Allemagne en direction du monde islamique et démonte la thèse d’une proximité idéologique entre nazis et musulmans…C’est dire ce que le livre de David Motadel «les Musulmans et la machine de guerre nazie»,d’abord paru en anglais en 2014, contient d’enjeux historiographiques et politiques…le jeune historien allemand invite à une investigation approfondie dans les documents militaires et diplomatiques allemands et alliés. Les archives de quatorze pays différents ont été sondées en vue d’exhumer une réalité aux contours difficiles à cerner… Alors que les mémoires nationales sont de nouveau réactivées, le livre de David Motadel constitue une étape importante pour lever les malentendus et écrire une histoire enfin universelle.’
— Omar Saghi, L’OBS – Read Review

‘L’historien David Motadel détaille les politiques nazies visant à mobiliser, avec un succès variable, les musulmans contre les Alliés…Depuis plusieurs années, les relations entre le IIIeReich et l’islam occupent une place grandissante dans l’historiographie de la seconde guerre mondiale, non sans certaines polémiques ou instrumentalisations. L’étude de David Motadel, Les Musulmans et la machine de guerre nazie, qui ne relève pas de ces catégories, se penche en premier lieu sur les politiques mises en œuvre par le IIIeReich afin de rallier les musulmans à sa cause. ’
— Tal Bruttmann, LE MONDE – Read Review

‘Dans son étude appuyée sur un solide appareil de preuves, David Motadel détaille la stratégie allemande en Afrique du Nord, sur le front de l’Est et dans le Balkans…Ce mélange de cynisme et d’orientalisme est intéressant à observer chez les dirigeants nazis dans la mesure où il éclaire notre présent. La ruse n’a guère réussi à la politique et à la propagande des puissances occidentales dans les territoires musulmans.’
— Sébastien Lapaque, LE FIGARO – Read Review

 ‘L’historien David Motadel montre comment le IIIe Reich a mis de côté
son idéologie raciste pour obtenir, sans succès, le soutien des musulmans…La démarche opportuniste des dirigeants nazis n’obtint que des résultats bien limités, un bilan qu’établit, avec subtilité et précision, l’historien David Motadel.’
— Olivier Wieviorka, LIBÉRATION – Read Review

‘L’ouvrage de David Motadel, appuyé sur de nombreuses archives inédites, détaille ces opérations de séduction du IIIe Reich à destination du monde musulman.’
— Mathieu Léonard, LE MONDE DIPLOMATIQUE – Read Review

‘La première tentative de réécriture de l’histoire de la Shoah par Nétanyahou remonte à octobre 2015 quand, devant le congrès sioniste mondial à Jérusalem, il avait accusé Amine al-Husseini, le « grand mufti » de Jérusalem, exilé de Palestine depuis 1937, d’avoir inspiré en 1941 à Hitler l’idée même de la « solution finale ». Ces allégations, fermement démenties par Angela Merkel, avaient déjà suscité un tollé en Israël et provoqué les plus vives protestations de Yad Vashem.Une somme historique particulièrement documentée, « Les musulmans et la machine de guerre nazie» de David Motadel, tout juste publiée en français, montre entre autres, au-delà de l’inanité des accusations de Nétanyahou, l’impact discutable des harangues antisémites proférées par Husseini sur Radio-Berlin. De manière générale, le contraste est criant entre les ressources affectées par le régime hitlérien à sa « politique musulmane » et les résultats limités des nazis au Moyen-Orient (Motadel parle même d’un « échec total » de la formation militaire de « volontaires arabes »).’
— Jean-Pierre Filiu, LE MONDE Online – Read Review

‘Dans cette étude magistrale, l’historien britannique David Motadel décrit la mise en œuvre d’un discours nazi de séduction adressé aux peuples musulmans…Dépouillant des archives dispersées sur trois continents, D. Motadel suit le parcours des responsables allemands et de leurs collaborateurs musulmans chargés de promouvoir le Troisième Reich en tant que «protecteur de l’islam».’
— Tigrane Yégavian, SCIENCES HUMAINES – Read Review

‘Alors que, dans « Mein Kampf », Hitler évoque l’infériorité raciale des peuples non européens, pendant la dernière guerre, la propagande allemande en Afrique du Nord tentait de le présenter comme « le protecteur de l’islam »…C’est que nous révèle David Motadel, professeur d’histoire internationale à la London School of Economics and Political Sciences, dans l’ouvrage Les Musulmans et la Machine de guerre, qui vient d’être traduit en français.’
— Ian Hamel, LE POINT Online – Read Review

French Summarizing Articles (Not Reviews)

Géraldine Schwarz, ‘Croissant fertile et croix gammée’ | Le Monde (8 January 2016).

Anne Vidalie, ‘Le Caire et Damas, nids de nazis’ | L’Express (5 August 2015).

Lasha Otkhmezuri, ‘Benyamin Netanyahu instrumentalise la rencontre entre Hitler et Haj Amin’ | Guerres et Histoire 28 (2015).

Other International Reviews

Christian Rocca, ‘L’islamismo jihadista e noi’ | Il Sole 24 Ore (20 February 2015). (Italian)

José Pedro Teixeira Fernandes, ‘Allah über Deutschland? A Alemanha entre o fascínio e a rejeição do Islão’ | Publico (6 February 2015). (Portuguese)

Salomon Schulman, ‘Det tredje rikets muslimska vapenbröder’ | Sydsvenskan (16 February 2015). (Swedish)

Carl Rudbecks, ‘Banden till fiendens fiende’ | Axess (April 2015). (Swedish)

Peter Harmsen, ‘Allieret med muslimer’, Weekendavisen (1 September 2017). (Danish)

Aleksander Piński, ‘Emiraty III Rzeszy’ | Historia (8 May 2015). (Polish)

Alexander Kahn, ‘Kak nacysm savlekal musulman’ | BBC World (4 January 2015). (Russian)

Georgios Skafidas, ‘Oi Nazi kai to Islam’ | Istoria Eikonografimeni 564 (2015). (Greek)

Muhammad M. Al-Arnaout, ‘Al-Islam fi ajandat almanya al-naziyya khilal al-harb al-‘alamiyya al-thaniyya’ | Al-Hayat (9 March 2018). (Arabic)

Abdeslam Kadiri, ‘Quandles Nazis instrumentalisaient l’Islam’ | TelQuel 847 (7 March 2019), Cover Story (Dossier of 3 Articles). (French Moroccan)

Print Interviews on the Book

Interview with Nastassja Shtrauchler, ‘Historiker Motadel: Nazis umwarben Muslime, um Verluste an der Front auszugleichen’ | Deutsche Welle Online (12 November 2017.) Translated into English, Spanish, Serbo-Croatian, Arabic, Malay, and Chinese.

Interview with Hansjörg Müller, ‘“Hitler verherrlichte den Islam”’ | Basler Zeitung (7 March 2018).

Interview with Benedikt Schülter, ‘“Hitler war vom Islam fasziniert”’ | Neue Westfälische (6 February 2018).

Interview with Jana Beckmann, ‘Nazis machten sich Islam zunutze’ | Lippische Landeszeitung (13 January 2015).

Interview with Till Schmidt, ‘Die Deutschen als Schutzmacht des Islam’ | Jungle World (12 July 2018).

Interview with Patrick Wagner, ‘“Viele Juden konvertierten während des Kriegs zum Islam”’ | Zenith Online (16 February 2018).

Interview with Judith Kubitscheck | EPD Online (3 January 2018). Also: ‘Antisemitische Füchtlinge: Historiker warnt vor Überheblichkeit’ | EPD Press Release Online (5 January 2018).

Interview with Jasmin Agić, ‘Motadel: Hitler je zloupotrebljavao islam za političke ciljeve nacista’ | Al Jazeera Balkans Online (15 April 2018).

Interview with Lasha Otkhmezuri, ‘ “En 1943, 200 000 musulmans sous uniforme allemand”’ | Guerres et Histoire 27 (2015).

Interview with Bjarne Nørum, Da nazisterne gjorde kur til islam’ | Kristeligt Dagblad (5 January 2015).

Interview with Vartan Estukyan, ‘“Çarpıtılmış tarih anlatısını Netanyahu uydurmadı”’ | Agos (31 October 2015).

Radio Interviews on the Book

Interview with Sonja Striegl, Kulturgespräch | SWR 2 (Radio) (22 November 2017).

Interview with Dominic Jozic, Resonanzen | WDR 3 (Radio) (11 January 2018).

Interview with Andreas Main, Religion und Gesellschaft | Deutschlandfunk (Radio) (22 January 2018).

Interview with Almut Engelien, Schabat Schalom | NDR Info (Radio) (28 January 2018).

Interview with Konstantin Flaming | ZDF Info (Television Podcast) (18 April 2018).

Interview with Stephan Karkowsky, Die Profis | Radio Eins (Radio) (12 May 2018).

Interview with Thomas Schaaf, Morgenecho | WDR 5 (11 December 2006).

Excerpts and Summary Articles

David Motadel, ‘Muslims in Hitler’s War’ | History Today 66, 9 (2015), 19-25. (Cover Story)

David Motadel, ‘Jihad 1914’ | History Today 64, 9 (2014), 41-2.

David Motadel, ‘Swastika and Crescent’ | The Wilson Quarterly (Winter 2014), Online.

David Motadel, ‘The Muslims’ War’ | The Scholar 12 (2015), 14-15.

David Motadel, ‘Wie die Nazis den Islam vereinnahmen wollten’ | Deutschlandradio Kultur (4 November 2015), Online.

David Motadel, ‘Das heftige Werben um die Muselmanen’ | Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (7 November 2017), 14.

David Motadel, ‘Halbmond und Hakenkreuz: Muslime in Wehrmacht und SS’ | Militärgeschichte 4 (2017), 4-9.

David Motadel, ‘Wie Hitler Muslime als Verbündete gewinnen wollte’ | Focus Online (13 January 2018).

David Motadel, ‘Muslime im Zweiten Weltkrieg’ | Die Zeit Online (17 March 2018).

Muslime und Juden unter Deutscher Herrschaft, 1941-1945 | Münchner Beiträge zur Jüdischen Geschichte und Kultur 14, 2 (2020), 38-51.

Stunde Null im Nahen Osten | Neue Zürcher Zeitung (23 April 2020), 1 and 3. (Cover Story)

Les musulmans sous le régime nazi (1941-1945) | Le Patriote Résistant 959 (January 2021), 12-13.