Kindertransport' Broadens View of Holocaust. Movie review.
Sacramento Bee [California] May 11, 2001 
"There's a feeling in Hollywood that if you've made a documentary that's been nominated for an Oscar and you're up against a film about the Holocaust, your movie doesn't have a chance of winning."

Auschwitz and the Professors, by Gabriel Schoenfeld. Commentary. June 1998
"Already, in American high schools, the Holocaust has taken its place alongside such other causes du jour as values enhancement and AIDS prevention. Already, in American popular culture, the Holocaust is rapidly replacing Christmas as a marketable icon of man's humanity to man (see the Holocaust Memorial Museum, with its carefully calibrated upbeat message; or see Schindler's List). Already, in the Jewish community, well-meaning organizations and individuals are mindlessly sponsoring Internet 'sites' offering a 'Holocaust cybrary' or a 'virtual tour of Dachau.' Already, an academic conference has been scheduled in Washington on the subject of 'Deaf People in Hitler's Europe,' where for four days scholars in three separate victimological fields--'Holocaust Studies, Deaf Studies, and Deaf History'--will have an opportunity to 'interact.' Do we really need more of this?"

Jewish Human Rights Group Condemns Holocaust Meeting.
CNN.com. May 14, 2001
"An influential Jewish human rights group [the Simon Wiesenthal Center] condemned Monday a group of Jordanian writers who had alleged that Jews exaggerated the Holocaust to gain world sympathy."

As Legend of Anne Frank Grows, So Do Claims of Misperceptions.
JTA (Jewish Telegraphic Agency), May 13, 2001
"What accounts for the continuing, even escalating, fascination with Anne, which arguably has made her the foremost icon of the Holocaust?"

Time to Just Say No -- to Holocaust Obsession. Jewish World Review. May 23, 2001
"It would be helpful -- in fact, it may already be necessary -- for Hollywood to impose a moratorium concerning the Holocaust. No more films, television dramas, or Broadway tragedies about the Holocaust and its one-dimensional portrayal of Jews as sympathetic yet hapless victims, or the equally extreme depiction of all mid-century Germans as Nazi co-conspirators."

Busted! World News Daily. May 25, 2001
"The tragedy is the Holocaust industy. There are thousands of Holocaust professionals -- professors, museum curators, moviemakers, foundation fundraisers, book writers, television producers -- most of whom never experienced the Holocaust, but are making good money off of it and backs of those who suffered it ... According to a documents in a class-action lawsuit ... ICHEIC [the International Commission on Holocaust Era Insurance Claims] has spent 10 times ($30 million) more on administrative costs -- including salaries, luxury hotel bills, and newspaper ads -- than the $3 million it paid out to survivors."

Holocaust Reparations: A Growing Scandal, by Gabriel Schoenfeld.
Commentary, September 2000
"In the face of this portrait of avaricious Jews exploiting the Holocaust for pecuniary gain--a portrait that draws upon time-honored anti-Semitic images--it is hardly unnatural that a general (if silent) consensus should reign within the Jewish community on the rightness of pressing restitution claims. But there have also been one or two notable dissenters. The syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer, for example, has worried aloud about what he terms a "grotesque scramble for money," a scramble whose only certain result is the "revival of Shylockian stereotypes." Abraham Foxman, chairman of the Anti-Defamation League, has voiced a related concern: thanks to the continuing demands for reparations, he has said, people around the world may be led to believe 'that the Jews died [not] because they were Jews, but because they had bank accounts, gold, art, and property.'"

Goldhagen for Beginners: A Comment on Jan T. Gross's 'Neighbors.'
Norman Finkelstein Home Page. June 2001
"Gross's book is standard Holocaust industry literature. Two dogmas inform this literature: 1. The Holocaust marks a categorically unique historical event; 2. The Holocaust marks the climax of an irrational Gentile hatred of Jews. Neither dogma withstands scholarly scrutiny. Both, however, are politically useful: unique Jewish suffering confers unique Jewish moral entitlement; and, if Gentile hatred of Jews is irrational, Jews bear no responsibility for this animus."

Survivors' Lawsuit Seeks 40 Billion from U.S. for Not Bombing Auschwitz.
[Jewish] Forward, April 6, 2001
"In a bizarre addition to the Holocaust-related suits now winding their way through the courts, two German-Jewish survivors of the Auschwitz death camp are suing the American government for its failure to bomb the camp. The plaintiffs in the class-action suit, Kurt Julius Goldstein, 87, and Peter Gingold, 85, are asking for $40 billion in compensation for survivors and the descendants of the Jews killed in Auschwitz in the closing months of World War II. They claim that a decision to bomb the camp would have rescued some 400,000 Hungarian Jews who were deported there in 1944 and 1945 ... In the past few years, Jewish survivors have filed numerous lawsuits against Swiss banks, German companies and other European entities and governments, leading to several multi-billion-dollar settlements. Recently, however, the focus has been shifting toward America's role in the Nazi atrocities and their aftermath. A lawsuit, since dropped, was filed against IBM alleging that its German subsidiary colluded with the Nazi regime. The Auschwitz bombing suit, despite its remote chances of success, is creating a sense of unease among Jewish organizations. The $40 billion sought in compensation is also raising eyebrows."

A Tale of Intrigue, Feuds, Hollywood Tycoons. Toronto Star, July 8, 2001
"Emilie Schindler weighs maybe 70 pounds. She is old, sick and a long way from the World War II era in which she and her husband, Oskar Schindler, saved more than 1,300 Jews from Nazi death camps. And yet, around this tiny, frail woman, confined to a wheelchair and totally dependent upon others, hangs a web of intrigue involving lawsuits, missing bank deposits, bitterness among Holocaust survivors and literary squabbles. At heart, it seems to be pretty much about money. People's names have been smeared, including Hollywood director Steven Spielberg. His 1993 Academy Award-winning film, Schindler's List, popularized the story of the German industrialist who made a list to save Jewish slave labourers from the gas chambers of the Third Reich ... Emilie is 93 now. Once she was Oskar's gorgeous wife, who stood by through all his mistresses and spoke proudly of their wartime legacy after he died, at age 66, in 1974. Since then, her life has taken a dreadful turn and, at this moment, she languishes in a German hospital, drugged, and appearing to be under the complete control of one Erika Rosenberg. Over the past decade, Rosenberg, 50, an Argentine writer who has made a literary career out of the Schindlers, has played an increasingly central role in Emilie's life, whittling down her contact with former friends and supporters and taking charge of her affairs."

Foreward to the Paperback Edition [of The Holocaust Industry]. Norman Finkelstein Home Page, 2001
"The New York Times serves as the main promotional vehicle of the Holocaust industry. It is primarily responsible for advancing the careers of Jerzy Kosinski, Daniel Goldhagen, and Elie Wiesel. For frequency of coverage, the Holocaust places a close second to the daily weather report. Typically, the New York Times Index 1999 listed fully 273 entries for the Holocaust. By comparison, the whole of Africa rated 32 entries."

Holocaust Creationism. The Nation, July 12, 1999
"[Jewish scholar Peter] Novick shows that while the Holocaust as such was scarcely talked about from 1945 to 1965, from the seventies on it became increasingly central to Jewish self-consciousness. Despite the fact that after World War II Jews became the best-educated, most politically effective and wealthiest ethnic group in American society, official Judaism since the seventies has increasingly drawn on the Holocaust to portray Jews as victims, pitting them against other groups seeking redress -- especially through affirmative action -- for their own victimization ... As a historian, Novick is profoundly critical of the argument that the Holocaust as 'unique' ... The uniqueness argument serves primarily to denigrate or minimize the suffering of others."

Rabbi Calls Holocaust Victims Reincarnations of Sinners. Jefferson City News Tribune [from the Associated Press], August 7, 2000
"In a fireside chat that ended up setting the Mideast tinderbox political culture ablaze, a powerful rabbi crucial to Prime Minister Ehud Barak's peace moves described Holocaust victims as 'sinners; and Arabs as 'snakes.' Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, spiritual leader of the ultra-Orthodox Shas party, started the Jewish week by saying victims of the Nazi Holocaust were reincarnated souls seeking redemption for past sins. He also said in a sermon broadcast Saturday night that Barak 'lacked sense' for seeking to make peace with the Arabs, whom he described as 'snakes.'"

Fragments of a Fraud. Guardian [Great Britain], October 15, 1999
"Christopher Hope called it 'achingly beautiful'; the New York Times said it was written 'with a poet's vision; a child's state of grace'; Anne Karpf in this paper described it as 'one of the great works about the Holocaust'; all were agreed it was a masterpiece. There is just one problem - Binjamin Wilkomirski's memoir of surviving as a Jewish child alone in the Nazi concentration camps of Majdanek and Auschwitz was a fabrication, invented from beginning to end, one of the great hoaxes in publishing history."

The Mission of Sylvia Wygoda. Atlanta Jewish Times, June 18, 1999
"Today [the Georgia Commission on the Holocaust] operates on a budget of nearly $214,000 and plays a prominent role in the education of every Georgia student who studies the horrors of the Holocaust ... In recent months, a gay activist in Atlanta tookthe agency to task for minimizing the plight of homosexual Holocaust victims. That led to more scrutiny and a focus on Sylvia Wygoda, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor who until last week was both the commission's paid executive director and head of its volunteer board. With a $70,000 annual salary and as much as $20,000 a year in benefits, Wygoda earns more than any other Holocaust commission director in the country ... Wygoda, however, is unable to produce substantial minutes and records of commission meetings where money was allocated and spent. And at least two of her 15 commissioners say they're not sure how money is allotted ... The Georgia Holocaust Commission caused a rift with the city's gay community. The commission made repeated headlines in January with the deletion of two paragraphs from a Holocaust teachers' guide about gay and lesbian persecution. The incident triggered a confrontation between the gay community and the commission. Allegations of lies and even death threats played out in the press."

Opinion: The Holocaust Industry, by Norman Finkelstein.
Index on Censorship, Issue 2, 2000
"'Holocaust awareness,’ the Israeli writer Boas Evron observes, is actually ‘an official, propagandistic indoctrination, a churning out of slogans and a false view of the world, the real aim of which is not at all an understanding of the past, but a manipulation of the present.’ Two central dogmas underpin the Holocaust framework: the Holocaust marks a categorically unique historical event and the climax of an irrational Gentile hatred of Jews. Although they became the centrepieces of Holocaust literature, neither figures at all in genuine scholarship on the Nazi Holocaust. On the other hand, both dogmas draw on important strands in Judaism and in Zionism ... The uniqueness dogma makes no sense. Every historical event is unique, if merely by virtue of time and location, and every historical event bears distinct features as well as features in common with other historical events. The anomaly of the Holocaust is that its uniqueness is held to be crucial. What other historical event, one might ask, is framed largely for its categorical uniqueness? Typically, distinctive features of the Holocaust are isolated in order to place the event itself in a category apart."

Gahunna Mayor Says He Erred in Flying Israeli Flag.
Columbus Dispatch, April 19, 2001
"Flying the Israeli flag in remembrance of the Holocaust was 'not such a good idea,'' Gahanna [Ohio] Mayor Jim McGregor said yesterday. 'No one asked me to do it. It was my idea alone,'' said McGregor, who removed the flag from a pole at City Hall on Tuesday morning after meeting Monday with representatives of the Arab-American community. McGregor said he has been reading about the Holocaust and was saddened and appalled at the failure of nations in the 1930s to provide refuge for Jews fleeing Nazi Germany persecution. He had planned to display the Israeli flag, which had been raised Monday, until Friday as part of a weeklong remembrance. It was intended to symbolize the place where Jews were able to go after the persecution ... 'The desire to honor and remember all those who died at the hands of the Nazis is unrelated to flying the Israeli flag,' said Ahmad Al-Akhras of the Council on American-Islamic Relations-OHIO ... Andy Amid of the Islamic Council of Ohio also attended the meeting. 'Americans cannot, without a strong sense of hypocrisy, praise the principles of Holocaust remembrance on the one hand, and turn a blind eye to the daily atrocities committed by Israel on the other,' he said."

IRS: No Taxes on Holocausts Payments,
Washington Post [from Associated Press], August 30, 2001
"A small piece of this year's tax cut law ensures that payments related to the Holocaust are not subject to the income tax ... The 10-year, $1.35 trillion tax cut signed into law in June by President Bush says that no income taxes are due on Holocaust restitution payments made by European governments and industry. The provision applies to payments after Jan. 1, 2000, made to Holocaust victims, their heirs and their estates. 'This is an important symbolic act by the U.S. government on behalf of Holocaust survivors,' said Rabbi Israel Miller, president of the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, which is overseeing distribution of payments from Germany ... Exempting the payments from U.S. income tax will reduce federal revenue by an estimated $31 million over the next decade."

Nazi-Themed Shows Take Four Awards at This Year's Emmy Awards,
JTA (Jewish Telegraphic Agency), November 6, 2001
"Three prime-time television dramas on Holocaust themes won top honors at Sunday night´s Emmy Awards, proving once again the lasting impact of the Nazi horror in our popular culture ... Actress Ellen DeGeneres emceed the event and drew the evening´s biggest laugh when she observed, 'I´m in a unique position as host because, think about it, what would bug the Taliban more than seeing a gay woman in a suit surrounded by Jews?'"

Why Have Christian Victims of Nazi Genocides Been Forgotten?,
by Richard C. Lukas, Holocaust Forgotten
"When it comes to the history of World War II, the American media has developed a black hole concerning the genocidal policies of the Nazis against Christians. Everyone should know by now that not all of Nazism’s victims were Jews. Millions—we do not know and probably will never know the precise number—were Christians, mostly civilians selected for destruction for ethnic, religious, social, cultural, or political reasons. When Christians of that era are mentioned in the media, their victimization is either ignored, trivialized or distorted. Too often false generalizations about pandemic Christian collaboration with the Nazis against the Jews are made to deflect attention away from the huge numbers of Christian victims during the most destructive war in history. No group’s victimization has been more distorted in American film, television and journalism than the Polish nation, which lost 3 million of its largely Catholic citizenry, most of whom died at the hands of the Nazis. Among the last few refugees of bigotry in the United States are the anti-Catholicism and anti-Polonism. Since most Poles are Catholic, they have been especially vulnerable. The most disturbing Polonophobic slander is the obscene claim, repeated with nauseating regularity, that Catholic Poles were complicit in the Holocaust of the Jews."

Deporting the Defenceless, Toronto Sun, November 28, 2001
"[A] trial opens in Hamilton today to deport a 91-year-old deaf man with Alzheimer's, who the government thinks lied to get into Canada 54 years ago. Immigration Minister Elinor Caplan wants Jacob Fast deported because he 'probably' didn't tell the truth about being coerced into auxiliary police attached to a Nazi SS unit during the war. Fast was born in Soviet Ukraine in 1910. When he was accused, a couple of years ago, of working with the Nazis and mistreating prisoners, he denied it (don't they all?). Ottawa has no records to show he lied when he and his family came to Canada in 1947 -- a time when refugee screening was casual, and displaced persons were being settled in the thousands. Fast now lives in an old-age home in St. Catharines, cannot maintain a conversation because of Alzheimer's, can't defend himself, and won't appear at his Hamilton trial today. This is a civil case, not a criminal one, so Mr. Justice Denis Pelletier of the Federal Court has ruled it's not necessary for the defendant to appear in person. I have no knowledge of Mr. Fast (a retired auto worker), but the fact that he's another Ukrainian targeted by immigration, smacks of prejudice, vindictiveness, vendetta. Wasyl Odynsky, of Toronto, who at age 17 was forced into auxiliary police in World War II as a perimeter guard at a concentration camp, is another Ms Caplan is determined to deport. The record shows that when young Odynsky refused to report to the auxiliary police and ran away, he was caught and told if he ran away again, his parents and family would pay the price. Another Ukrainian, Helmut Oberlander, has already been ordered deported. He was a teenaged translator for the Germans in World War II. As for Mr. Fast -- what does it matter today what he did or didn't do in World War II? We know the Nazis viewed Ukrainians as 'subhuman' and punished them rather as they punished Jews in Ukraine -- Babi Yar in Kiev was a massacre of Ukrainians and Jews."

Nazis Plan Protests as Atrocities Exhibition Reopens,
Independent [London], November 28, 2001
"Neo-Nazis from across Europe are planning a protest rally in Berlin this weekend after the reopening last night of a controversial exhibition which has sparked riots in several other German cities. The new, improved version of  'Crimes of the Wehrmacht' sets out to prove that ordinary German soldiers, not just a Nazi hard core, took part in atrocities against civilians during the Second World War. The original exhibition was closed two years ago when a Polish historian discovered that some of the pictures showed not German troops, but the Soviet NKVD secret service at work." [Jews were prominent in the Soviet NKVD: "Some of the main instruments of the Terror [against everyone] were also of Jewish origin: M. I. Gay, who headed a special secret police department; A.A. Slutsky and his deputies Boris Berman and Shpiegelgas, who were in charge of terror and espionage abroad; and NKVD operations chief Pauker. None of these mass executioners survived [later purges of them]." [RAPOPORT, Louis, Stalin's War Against the Jews, Free Press, 1990, p. 49-50]

The ADL Versus Superman, by Danny Goldberg,
Tikkun [this article is cached at Google.com]
"In a most amusing and absurd manifestation of the disconnect between much of the political, academic, and journalistic elite and their constituency, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), supported by The Washington Post and The New York Times, has attacked Superman and Rugrats. Abraham Foxman, national director of the ADL, pillar of the 'organized' Jewish world, wrote an op-ed piece in The New York Times of October 31, 1998, which lamented the 'trivialization of Holocaust imagery.' Amidst requisite praise for Schindler's List and Life is Beautiful, Foxman criticized three recent issues of Superman comic books in which Superman goes back in time to fight the Nazis. According to Foxman, 'he never names the victims. The intent was to send a universal message. The result proved offensive to Holocaust victims.' (Note the hubris of the last sentence--Foxman purports to speak not only for his organization but for the entire universe of Holocaust survivors!) To clarify the Superman 'issue': although the publishers did not use the word 'Jew' in the comics in question, the victims were shown wearing yarmulkes and prayer shawls, had Jewish names like Mordechai and Baruch, and referred to each other using Yiddish terms such as 'bubeh' and 'zayde. Jenette Kahn, CEO of DC Comics, the publisher of Superman, explains, 'There was no attempt at all to disguise the fact that the primary victims were Jewish.' Kahn, who is Jewish, prominently printed critical letters from Foxman and the Simon Weisenthal Institute in subsequent issues of Superman, and apologized for not using the word 'Jew' in the story, while pointing out that the creators felt the characters' Jewishness was, in fact, conveyed."

Swiss Holocaust Cash Revealed to Be Myth,
Times [of London], October 13, 2001
"Most dormant Swiss bank accounts thought to have belonged to Holocaust survivors were opened by wealthy, non-Jewish people who then forgot about their money. The announcement marks the end of a four-year independent investigation into the archives and vaults of the world’s most secretive banking system. It will come as a disappointment to many Jewish families, who were sure that their dead relatives left behind fortunes in Switzerland. A 17-member tribunal based in Zurich was set up in 1997 to investigate the identities of 5,500 foreign accounts and 10,000 Swiss accounts that have lain dormant since the end of the Second World War. The tribunal said that it had processed about 10,000 claims in response to the list of dormant account names published by the Swiss Bankers’ Association five years ago. Only 200 accounts — containing £6.9 million — could be traced to Holocaust victims. 'It was a very difficult and often sad process,' Alexander Jolles, the secretary-general of the Independent Claims Tribunal, said. 'When we first set up the tribunal, we were sure that nearly all these accounts would be those of Nazi victims. But few were.' Seventy-nine per cent of the accounts declared dormant by the Swiss banks were traced to wealthy families who had lost trace of their money."

Catholic Heroes of the Holocaust,
Augustine Club (Columbia University), 1998
"By the end of 1943, some 650 Jewish children were hidden in Warsaw churches and convents. According to [Jewish author Pinchas] Lapide, in Poland as a whole, hundreds of Catholic clergy and religious saved at least 15,000—perhaps as many as 50,000 ... [In Lithuania] Church and Underground leaders protested. Priests, peasants and nuns hid many Jews. Some Jews found refuge in the forests, where people brought them food and clean clothes."

Health Minister: Assimilation Worse Than Holocaust,
Jerusalem Post, December 30, 2001
"Assimilation was a greater catastrophe for the Jewish people than the Holocaust, [Israeli] Health Minister Nissim Dahan said this morning. Dahan (Shas) first made the comments to a convention of Rabbinical Council of America meeting in Jerusalem on Friday. He repeated the allegation in an interview with Israel Radio this morning. Dahan said the Jewish people should number some 500 million today, asking, 'Where has this nation disappeared to?' 'This phenomenon [assimilation], was 'another huge disaster, maybe parallel' to the Holocaust, Dahan said."

Holocaust Heirs Losing Millions to Jewish Organizations,
Jerusalem Post, January 15, 2002
"World Jewish organizations are set to 'rake into their coffers' some $1 billion in unclaimed funds allocated by Swiss banks to compensate for assets from dormant Holocaust-era accounts, Herut MK Michael Kleiner said. Only some 3 percent, or $37 million, of the $1.25 billion coming from the settlement with the Swiss banks is likely to be paid to the legal heirs of the assets, according to an estimate obtained by Kleiner. The deadline for submitting claims was January 1. Kleiner attributes the failure to locate the heirs to the publication of details for only 31,000 of some 300,000 dormant accounts he says fit the profile of Holocaust victims. Kleiner is demanding that the government push for the publication of the names of the asset owners, and is to put the matter on the Knesset agenda today. 'There are heirs, and it is not too late to find them,' Kleiner said yesterday. 'If the Jewish organizations had any morals, they would push for the publication of the names, instead of making plans...to spend the money on projects.' A founder of the local Generali Fund, which is settling claims from Israelis for Holocaust-era insurance policies, Kleiner also charges that only some 24,000 of 300,000 names of Generali insurance policyholders have been released."

German Jewish Leader Testifies in Holocaust Denial Case,
JTA (Jewish Telegraphic Agency), January 16, 2002
"The president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany has faced off in court against a German lawyer charged with denying the Holocaust. Council president Paul Spiegel was called as a witness last Monday in the trial of Udo von B., an attorney from Dusseldorf. Von B. is accused of Holocaust denial, which is a crime in Germany. At issue is whether the claim to 'not have seen anything' in the period between August 1944 and January 1945 can legally be defined as 'Holocaust denial.' The incident in question took place at a November 2000 dinner for more than 70 German notables hosted by Deutsche Bank. Following after-dinner remarks by Spiegel, von B. allegedly expressed doubt that there had been any murders committed at Auschwitz. He also suggested that discussion of the Holocaust contributes to anti-Semitism ... [H]e asked if Spiegel didn´t think that constant reminders of the Holocaust — such as Spiegel´s own speech — hindered good relations between Jews and Gentiles in Germany, especially considering the reparations Germany has paid. According to Spiegel, none of the guests at the dinner reacted to von B.´s comments, which Spiegel called 'a subtle form of Holocaust denial.'"

The 'Second Generation' of Holocaust Survivor, spiked.com, January 24, 2002
"From the Jewish Lesbian Daughters of Holocaust Survivors to Children of the Holocaust Anonymous, children whose parents died in the Holocaust are lining up to claim the status of Holocaust victims. - There is a growing tendency to interpret victimisation as a kind of disease that can be handed down from generation to generation. - What is it about today's society that makes people so keen to get a piece of their parents' trauma? In our therapeutic culture, the politics of memory is on the rise. On an individual level, and now across societies, past experiences are continually reinterpreted. The cultural manipulation of memory has been particularly controversial in relation to what one side characterises as recovered memory syndrome and the other as false memory syndrome. Yet from a sociological standpoint, the most interesting aspect of this debate is not who is right and who is wrong, but the fact that memory itself has become so politicised, and that the representation of the past is so contested ... Today, the rewriting of history is driven by a very different impulse. The manipulation of collective memory makes no grand claims on the future. On the contrary, the historic memory serves as a monument to a people's historic suffering. In a perceptive contribution on this subject, Ian Buruma has drawn attention to the tendency of many minorities 'to define themselves as historic victims'. The Holocaust has become the icon for therapeutic history. The extreme and singular brutality of this event ensures that those who perished or suffered in the concentration camps are regarded with a reverence unmatched by any other groups of victims. Jewish identity - even Israeli identity - has been fundamentally recast around the Holocaust. Zionism, which had traditionally promoted an optimistic modernist vision of the pioneering new Jew, has in recent decades sought to forge a sense of community around an emotional connection with the Holocaust ... There are numerous constituencies demanding to be recognised as possessing a distinct victim identity: including the International Association of Lesbian and Gay Children of Holocaust Survivors, Descendants of the Jewish Community of Augsburg, Second Generation Children from Nuremberg, and the Jewish Lesbian Daughters of Holocaust Survivors ... But whatever the facts of the matter, activists are busy constructing a victim identity through rendering their family existence pathological. Aping the American addiction and co-dependency movement, some second-generation activists have even launched 'Children of the Holocaust Anonymous'. This initiative has self-consciously borrowed the Alcoholics Anonymous '12-step' support programme to support its constituents. And there is more to come, as publicists are promising to bring the third generation of survivors into the frame."

Wiesel Words, The Nation, February 19, 2001
"Is there a more contemptible poseur and windbag than [famous Holocaust speaker] Elie Wiesel? I suppose there may be. But not, surely, a poseur and windbag who receives (and takes as his due) such grotesque deference on moral questions. Look, if you will, at his essay on Jerusalem in the New York Times of January 24. As a Jew living in the United States, I have long denied myself the right to intervene in Israel's internal debates.... My critics have their conception of social and individual ethics; I have mine. But while I grant them their right to criticize, they sometimes deny mine to abstain. Such magnificent condescension, to grant his critics the right. And it is not certain from when Wiesel dates his high-minded abstention from Israel's internal affairs; he was a member of Menachem Begin's Irgun in the 1940s, when that force employed extreme violence against Arab civilians and was more than ready to use it against Jews ... But for Wiesel all Arabs are Muslims, and even if they happen to live in Jerusalem, this is nothing to the way that Jerusalem dwells within Wiesel. Indeed, it would evidently dwell more comfortably within him if they did not live in it at all. Do I exaggerate? I don't think so. In a propaganda tour of recent history, he asserts that in 1948, 'incited by their leaders, 600,000 Palestinians left the country convinced that, once Israel was vanquished, they would be able to return home.' This claim is a cheap lie and is known by Wiesel to be a lie. It is furthermore an utterly discredited lie, and one that Israeli officialdom no longer cares to repeat. Israeli and Jewish historians have exposed it time and again."

No Business Like Shoah Business,
Sydney Morning Herald, March 3, 2002
"Until prime-time television rammed home the story, most Americans cared little about the genocide of the Jews. Now, writes Detlef Junker, the Holocaust belongs to Uncle Sam and his mission to save the world ... During the past 30 years the Holocaust has moved from the periphery to the centre of American culture. Foreign visitors encounter almost everywhere Holocaust-related products of research and education, as institutionalised in museums, memorials, research centres, universities and schools. In the process, however, the Shoah has been politicised, trivialised and commercialised. Above all, the Holocaust has become the centre of Jewish identity in the United States. In a poll published in 1999 by the American Jewish Committee, 98 per cent of American Jews said they consider the Holocaust to be an important or very important part of their identity, whereas only 15 per cent said that they observe Jewish religious obligations and traditions. The Holocaust has gained a totally new meaning in American society, due in large part to this shift in the self-perception of what, since 1945, has been in many ways America's most successful minority. It was predictable that the tension between the Americanisation of the Holocaust and its meaning to the identity of American Jews at some point would initiate a new wave of reflection and criticism. Exactly this reaction now seems to be developing among American intellectuals ... There are now more than 100 Holocaust museums and research centres throughout the US and a Holocaust monument in nearly every major US city, including New York, Boston, Detroit, Los Angeles, Tampa Bay, Houston and Dallas. The trend seems to be growing. Americans seem to have in a sense taken trusteeship of one of the worst crimes many believe the worst crime in European history. The omnipresence of the Holocaust is evident in the coverage devoted to the subject in the two most politically influential US newspapers, The New York Times and The Washington Post. In 1996, for example, The New York Times published more than 500 Holocaust-related articles, The Washington Post more than 300. And the trend seems to be growing."

Gilbert Teacher: Fired for 'Jewishness?',
Arizona Republic, April 5, 2002
"Gilbert school officials say Michelle Moore interactions with staff have been problematic. But the Highland Junior High English teacher believes her contract is not being renewed because she spooned a little too much of her 'Jewishness' into the curriculum for the administration's liking. Four members of the district's governing board voted Thursday night for Moore's ouster at the end of the school year while one member abstained. Moore, 58, said she has yet to be provided with examples of non-compliance. School officials had no comment. She said she began to feel the heat while teaching a Holocaust unit. 'I think they (staff) felt, as I was told, I probably put too much of my Jewishness into it,'Moore said ... Moore said she plans to file a lawsuit against the district and may lodge a complaint with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission."

Berkeley Clash Seen as Glimpse of Future Strife,
[Jewish] Forward, April 12, 2002
"Bearing signs equating Israelis with Nazis and comparing Israel to South Africa under apartheid, hundreds of pro-Palestinian student activists wound their way through the University of California at Berkeley Tuesday. They all but drowned out a nearby Holocaust Remembrance Day observance and outnumbered pro-Israel counter-demonstrators by approximately three to one, observers said. By the end, 78 pro-Palestinian protesters were arrested for occupying a university building and disrupting academic activity, the chancellor's office said. Organized by a group called Students for Justice in Palestine, which seeks to link like-minded activists at universities nationwide, the protest was one of many held on campuses across the country Tuesday. Yet communal activists say the tenor of debate — or lack of debate — at Berkeley is a bellwether for spreading protests that are evolving far beyond legitimate criticism of the Israeli government and its policies into complete delegitimization of the Jewish state ... Since the outbreak of the intifada in September 2000, the northern California university has become a flashpoint for anti-Israel activism and even antisemitic attacks, creating what activists call one of the most heated political climates in decades."

Were There Jews in the Nazi Army?
Chronicle of Higher Education, May 3, 2002
"This month, the University Press of Kansas releases Hitler's Jewish Soldiers: The Untold Story of Nazi Racial Laws and Men of Jewish Descent in the German Military, on which Mr. Rigg has been laboring since his sophomore year of college. Controversy has shadowed his work for years. Articles about Mr. Rigg's research in the London Daily Telegraph, The New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times in late 1996 and 1997 -- when he was just starting graduate school -- brought it exceptionally high visibility for such an embryonic dissertation. It also brought him into contact with the people who would form the core of his study: the several hundred soldiers of partly Jewish origin in the Nazi military who told him their extraordinary stories ... What surfaces in those papers, and in Mr. Rigg's in-depth interviews, is a glimpse into how the several thousand men of partial Jewish origin who served in Hitler's army saw themselves -- how they felt about their Germanness, their Jewishness, the war, the Holocaust, and their own participation therein. Mr. Rigg estimates that there were upwards of 100,000 such "Mischlinge" -- German for mixed-blood or half-breed -- as they were known in Nazi parlance, and possibly as many as 150,000, a calculation that some of his critics regard as wildly overblown ...The more he learned about these soldiers -- and how little-known their part in the war was -- the more passionately he began to feel that the chronicling of their history depended on him. 'If I didn't tell these stories,' he says, his voice rising with enthusiasm, "nobody would."

Germans Less Willing to Treat Israel with Kid Gloves,
Faz.net, April 8, 2002
"It would appear that even in Germany, Israel's closest European friend, officials are no longer willing to trust everything Israel says ... All last week, Israel was able to follow in the press how its latest offensive has brought about a change of mood in Germany and how the old German reluctance to voice criticism of the Jewish state has melted away. Former Labor Minister Norbert Blüm, a Christian Democrat, set the ball rolling. In a letter to Israel's ambassador in Berlin, Shimon Stein, he described the current Israeli offensive as a "war of annihilation" -- a term Hitler used to describe Nazi Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union. When the letter was published on Tuesday, it seemed to open the floodgates. The next day, Karl Lamers, parliamentary foreign affairs spokesman for the Christian Democratic Union/Christian Social Union, said that, as a "last resort," Europe must be prepared to respond to the violence in the Middle East with sanctions. Free Democratic Party Deputy Chairman Jürgen Möllemann confirmed his reputation as political maverick by going to the limit beyond which support for Palestinian terror begins. "I would resist, too, and use force to do so," he said, "not just in my own country but in the aggressor's country as well." And an Emnid poll followed on Friday showing that 73 percent of Germans thought "Israel's tough action against the Palestinians" was unjustified. Two things are unusual here. First, the kid-glove era of German relations with Israel seems to be over. Against the backdrop of Berlin, the new capital, the historical drama of German-Jewish relations is seen in a new light."

Panhandle Students Get Realistic Holocaust Experience,
tbo.com (Tampa Bay, FL), May 1, 2002
"The children looked at the German sign 'Arbeit Macht Frei' - 'Work Makes One Free' - while strains of Wagner filled the air. 'You there, eyes down! No talking, or no food,' a teacher shouted Tuesday as sixth-grade students, all volunteers, silently ate dry bread and watery potato soup, washed down with diluted coffee, at a mock concentration camp soup kitchen. State law requires teaching children about the Nazi persecution of Jews and others during the Holocaust. The lunchtime activity is only one way that requirement is being met at Pryor Middle School in this Florida Panhandle. Teacher Sonnie Durrett, who serves on the Fort Walton Beach Holocaust Remembrance Committee, organized the lesson with help from some parents and another committee member, Bonnie London, of Temple Beth Shalom. Durrett wore a striped prisoner's uniform for added realism, but students playing the roles of Holocaust survivors had a hard time stifling nervous giggles. Food was taken away from those unable to stay in character. 'I think it is just so awesome that our kids are learning about this in this way,' said parent Robin Aldredge, who helped ladle soup. 'With what's going on in the world now, it's important for us to show them what hatred does, how people are treated just because they are different.' Her son Scott didn't like the soup - he called it 'nasty' - nor being yelled at, but he now has at least a small idea of how the prisoners felt. Krista Eubanks said she will never read another book or watch another movie about the Holocaust without identifying more closely with the characters. The Okaloosa County school district normally teaches the subject by studying such works as 'The Diary of Anne Frank' or through social studies and history classes. The soup kitchen activity was conducted here once several years ago and Durrett revived the idea. She is a leading figure in Holocaust education locally and has attended training seminars at Florida State University and the U.S. Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C."

As Tolerance Museums Proliferate, French Tycoon To Fund One in Paris,
JTA (Jewish Telegraphic Agency), May 7, 2002
"A French multimedia mogul will spearhead a five-year project to build a European museum of tolerance in Paris, modeled largely on the Simon Wiesenthal Center´s Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles. Jean-Marie Messier, the chairman and CEO of Vivendi Universal announced plans for the Museum of Mutual Respect while accepting the Wiesenthal Center´s 2002 Humanitarian Award at its national tribute dinner May 2. The planned museum in Paris will be one of a growing number of tolerance museums planned around the world. At the same event, Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder and dean of the Wiesenthal Center, presented plans for a New York Tolerance Center. In a separate interview, he detailed progress on the projected tolerance museum in Jerusalem ... Messier said that "to be a Jew is to understand, deep in your bones and right through your heart, that intolerance is wrong. Absolutely wrong." Preceding Messier´s address, Hier showed plans for the Wiesenthal Center´s New York Tolerance Center, currently under construction in the old Daily News building at 42nd Street and Second Avenue in Manhattan. The New York center will serve a dual function. During the day, law enforcement officers and educators will participate in the four-day Tools for Tolerance program, which aims to sensitize "front-line professionals" to the problems of dealing with diverse ethnic and religious groups in a large city. In the evenings, the facility will be used as a leadership training center for young men and women active in the Jewish community ... New York´s state legislature, governor´s office and the federal government are providing some funding for the center. About 750,000 persons from 33 states have participated in the Tools for Tolerance training sessions in Los Angeles since its beginning six years ago, said Liebe Geft, director of the Museum of Tolerance. At the same time, plans are going ahead for a Wiesenthal Center-sponsored museum of tolerance in Jerusalem, with Frank Gehry as the architect. The center will bear the name Winnick Institute, in recognition of a $40 million pledge by Los Angeles business executive Gary Winnick toward the project, which will cost a total of $200 million, including an endowment. Hier said Messier had shown an interest in supporting the Jerusalem center."


THE HOLOCAUST YOU PROBABLY NEVER HEARD ABOUT:

(Tens of millions of people were killed by Soviet Union communism. The Jewish dimension in the communist elite was great, including extraordinary prominence in the early terrorist communist secret police: the "Cheka." Information about Jewish influence in the hierarchy of this mass murder systemn is here).

Lethal Politics, by R.J. Rummel, University of Hawaii
"Probably 61,911,000 people, 54,769,000 of them citizens, have been murdered by the Communist Party--the government--of the Soviet Union. This is about 178 people for each letter, comma, period, digit, and other characters in this book. Old and young, healthy and sick, men and women, and even infants and infirm, were killed in cold-blood. They were not combatants in civil war or rebellions, they were not criminals. Indeed, nearly all were guilty of ... nothing. Some were from the wrong class--bourgeoisie, land owners, aristocrats, kulaks. Some were from the wrong nation or race-- Ukrainians, Black Sea Greeks, Kalmyks, Volga Germans. Some were from the wrong political faction--Trotskyites, Mensheviks, Social Revolutionaries. Or some were just their sons and daughters, wives and husbands, or mothers and fathers. And some were those occupied by the Red Army--Balts, Germans, Poles, Hungarians, Rumanians. Then some were simply in the way of social progress, like the mass of peasants or religious believers. Or some were eliminated because of their potential opposition, such as writers, teachers, churchmen; or the military high command; or even high and low Communist Party members themselves. In fact, we have witnessed in the Soviet Union a true egalitarian social cleansing and flushing: no group or class escaped, for everyone and anyone could have had counter-revolutionary ancestors, class lineage, counter-revolutionary ideas or thought, or be susceptible to them. And thus, almost anyone was arrested, interrogated, tortured, and after a forced confession of a plot to blow up the Kremlin, or some such, shot or sentenced to the dry guillotine--slow death by exposure, malnutrition, and overwork in a forced labor camp. Part of this mass killing was genocide, as in the wholesale murder of hundreds of thousands of Don Cossacks in 1919, the intentional starving of about 5,000,000 Ukrainian peasants to death in 1932-33, or the deportation to mass death of 50,000 to 60,000 Estonians in 1949. Part was mass murder, as of the wholesale extermination of perhaps 6,500,000 "kulaks" (in effect, the better off peasants and those resisting collectivization) from 1930 to 1937, the execution of perhaps a million Party members in the Great Terror of 1937-38,5 and the massacre of all Trotskyites in the forced labor camps.6 And part of the killing was so random and idiosyncratic that journalists and social scientists have no concept for it, as in hundreds of thousands of people being executed according to preset, government, quotas."



* Not Enough? There's much, much more about the Holocaust.