Williamson Still Stuck in “Irving” Mode.

Trying to prize any sense or reason from Holocaust deniers is a thankless task, even the Vatican can see that, as the Guardian reports:

“The Vatican has rejected an apology by a British bishop who questioned the truth of the Holocaust, saying that his statement was not good enough to let him to serve as a clergyman in the Catholic church.

Bishop Richard Williamson, whose readmission to the church caused international outcry, apologised last night for remarks in which he denied the scale of the Nazis’ genocidal campaign against the Jews.

In a statement on the website of the Rome Catholic news agency Zenit, he said his views on the Holocaust were not those of an historian. They had been “formed 20 years ago on the basis of evidence then available, and rarely expressed in public since.” Williamson added: “To all souls that took honest scandal from what I said, before God I apologise.”

The chief Vatican spokesman, Father Federico Lombardi, said today that Williamson’s statement “does not seem to respect the conditions” for his readmission to the church. Earlier this month, the Vatican said Williamson would only be allowed to serve as a clergyman if he recanted his views “in an absolutely unequivocal and public way”.

In a TV interview broadcast in January, Williamson said there were no gas chambers in the Nazis’ concentration camps. He challenged the accepted figure of six million victims, saying he believed no more than 300,000 Jews had died.

“I can truthfully say I regret having made such remarks, and that if I had known beforehand the full harm and hurt to which they would give rise, especially to the church, but also to survivors and relatives of victims of injustice under the Third Reich, I would not have made them,” Williamson said “

Update 1: Over at the Holy See, Zenit has more:

“The Vatican spokesman was not the only one who found Bishop Williamson’s apology Thursday lacking. Jewish groups from various countries have also expressed their dissatisfaction. Dieter Graumann, vice-president of the Central Council for Jews in Germany, told the Handelsblatt newspaper that the prelate’s statement “leads one to the conclusion that he still believes in the Holocaust-denial.” “

Update 2: Seismic Shock has another angle to Williamson.

Oxbridge Denial?

Not sure what’s going on in Oxford, but Cherwell, Britain’s oldest student publications, is having problems:

“Editors of the prestigious Oxford University paper Cherwell have been forced to resign over a row about a mock issue.

The Lecher was produced as an obvious spoof and distributed to editorial staff at a private meal last year and despite only being appointed last month, and in no way responsible for the publication, the current editors have resigned amid protests.

The satirical edition contained a piece mocking the Holocaust and another which poked fun at the sexual abuse and murder of babies. And following condemnation from students and tutors the editors Sian Cox-Brooker and Michael Bennett were forced to resign. “

News In From Caracas.

AP is reporting:

“CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Assailants threw an explosive at a Jewish community center on Thursday, but nobody was hurt in the blast — the second assault against Venezuela’s Jewish community this year.

Abraham Garzon, president of the Jewish Community Center, told the local Globovision television news channel that a small explosive resembling a pipe-bomb was lobbed at the building in Caracas before dawn on Thursday. The explosion damaged the doors to the center.

“It seems there are people in the country dedicated to sowing terrorism,” Garzon said.

No one claimed responsibility for the attack, which immediately reignited fears of rising anti-Semitism in Venezuela.

It was the second attack against a Jewish institution this year.

A Caracas synagogue was ransacked and vandalized last month. The assailants shattered religious objects, spray-painted “Jews, get out” on the temple’s walls and stole a computer database containing names and addresses of Jews living in Venezuela.”

Meanwhile in Germany:

“Uwe Luthardt was a senior member of the NPD but quit to inform on the party which Germany tried unsuccessfully to ban several years ago.

He told of weapons stores and how members greet each other with “Heil Hitler” salutes, sing the banned songs of the Third Reich and relish the idea of a new Holocaust against the Jews.

Last year neo-Nazi attacks in Germany reached an all-time high and authorities are battling to stop youngsters from being attracted to the politics of the right – particularly now that Germany is in a deep recession and jobs are being lost by the thousands every day.

Luthardt, a former board member of the party, said he was threatened that he could “disappear” if he informed on its inner workings.

“Someone who just quits usually gets a lot of problems, and can find himself waking up in intensive care,” he said.

“It wasn’t really my world. When you went along to evening meetings, you saw all the shaven heads, and a black sun or other Nazi symbols tattooed on arms. They usually just boozed or were abusive. If there’s no opponent around, they just fight among themselves. “

Sidux and Mulitmedia.

Sidux is very handy, you can have either a LiveCD working away, not touching the hard drive or do an installation of it in about 5 minutes, but there is a small downside.

It is not a big problem, but for a number of strange reasons getting information on codecs and multimedia is harder than it needs to be.

For example, if you were using Ripper X and wanted to extract to MP3 that wouldn’t be possible without the presence of the correct codec.

Here’s the solution:

1. edit /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian.list
2. and the line:
deb http://www.debian-multimedia.org sid main, close the editor (I use nano) and return to the command line.
3. using a browser add in or update the debian-multimedia-keyring package, see the FAQ, first question.
4. execute from root:
apt-get update
5. assuming that goes well, next do:
apt-get install lame
6. follow the prompts, when the installation has finished successfully, bring up Ripper x
7. click on Config, next MP3, look at the Encoder plugin, select Lame MP3 Encoder.
8. It works!

Also see the sidux-Underground Forum for helpful tips.

Hagiography, Gilad Atzmon and Citizendium.

Wiki comes in for a lot of flak, in terms of the quality of information provided, the editorial control and its internal conflicts, so I was delighted when the Citizendium fork took place (or didn’t).

I had hoped that it would usher in a new era of higher quality articles, reflecting shared knowledge and critical thinking, as Citizendium says:

“We aim at reliability and quality, not just quantity.”

Instead what do we find? Gilad Atzmon’s hagiography, that’s the study of Saints.

How they never do anything wrong, how their lives are guided as if from above, and in the end they prove themselves to be faultless. That’s Saints (if you believe in such things), but it isn’t Gilad Atzmon.

Readers will remember Atzmon’s long association with the SWP, and how they lionised him at their premier yearly event, Marxism xxxx. Those with long memories won’t forget how Jewish socialists picketed Bookmarks, SWP’s book shop, outraged that such a racist should be given a platform. Those who read SWP’s Socialist Worker will recall Mike Rosen’s letter condemning Atzmon’s racism:

Inviting Gilad Atzmon to play is a bad move

Great news about the Cultures of Resistance musical programme, but I have to say I’m mightily dismayed that you have saxophonist Gilad Atzmon on board.

He is someone who has frequently expressed racist ideas and surely we have always said that you can’t fight racism with racism? I fear that the racism he expresses is seen by some in the liberation movements as a racism that doesn’t matter as much.

That’s to say, it’s said by some that racism towards peoples from countries oppressed and exploited by the West is the main racism we’re fighting, but a racism directed towards peoples seen as heavily implicated in the West’s oppression matters less.

Thus, antisemitism in the 21st century is seen perhaps as “mistaken” within the liberation movement, much as we might say that going on about Rupert Murdoch being Australian is “mistaken”.

This is a disastrous route to go down. Antisemitism imagines the removal or elimination of a group of people from the world system.

All we have to ask ourselves is: 1) would eliminating that group change the system for the better? 2) what ghastly processes would a state create in order to do the removing and eliminating?

I think Cultures of Resistance is making a great mistake taking Atzmon on board with them and this will undermine and weaken what we are all trying to do.

Michael Rosen, East London”

More recently, Atzmon has been ranting on about Jewish bankers and seemingly sourcing his material from David Duke’s web site.

There is all that and much more, but scanning Citizendium’s entry on Atzmon, you won’t see much of that, and certainly little, if any, critical comment.

Clearly, any semi-serious entry on Atzmon must include critical commentary of his views, more recently his racist statements and the wider reaction to them.

So, on the above evidence, Citizendium does not appear to be much of an improvement on Wiki.

Shame, a lost opportunity.

Update: It seems that one of the article’s main authors, Edna Spennato, has form.

Apparently, she is one of Atzmon’s friends and sometimes posts on his behalf.

Edna’s blogs are worth a read, crop circles not withstanding.

I suppose it is not surprising that people who have peculiar views about Jews also have decidedly strange opinions elsewhere. The Citizendium editors discuss Atzmon’s entry here.

Edna on Atzmon:

“This is one of my most beloved friends, Gilad, whose light shines very brightly, and whose courage, integrity, passion and sense of humour is an inspiration to me and to everyone who knows him. He is a truly remarkable individual, who follows his heart and sticks his neck out for what he believes in, and his love for the people of Palestine is profound.

A great saxophonist and composer of beautiful music, a philosopher and a writer whose ideas are fresh, original and independant of the prevailing consensus reality, Gilad works harder and has more energy than anyone else I know. Like Mahatma Gandhi, he has zero tolerance for the brutality of the zionist project, and he reaches thousands of people each month with his message of uncompromising solidarity with Palestine.

I regard him as one of the great lightworkers on the planet at this time, and feel very honoured to know him and to support him in every way I can.

Edna Spennato
March 2008”

So there you have it, one of Gilad Atzmon’s friends writing his entry on Citizendium!!

Well done Citizendium, you’ve out wikied Wiki and taken hagiography to a new level, what next ?

Articles on National Socialism written by David Irving, a fan of Adolf Hitler?

Or perhaps Citizendium will take the next logical step and just sub-contract Atzmon’s entry to his PR firm? Quid pro quo?

But enough of my sarcasm, this random sampling and particularly the Talk on Atzmon’s entry reveal that Citizendium suffers from many of the problems that Wiki had and still has.

Until the biographical entries of individuals, as Atzmon, do not consciously seek to re-write the past, erase criticism, contain truthful and critical information then they will be largely worthless and discredited, as the internet age has little use for hagiography or Saints.

I hope that the editors at Citizendium make a serious effort to correct their mistakes, use the above links and avoid getting friends of the subject to write their entries.

Update 1: Edna Spennato has kindly reminded me that Engage wrote much more on Atzmon, I shall try to add them over the next day or 2.

February 19, 2006
Antisemitic Saxophonist Gilad Atzmon Plays SOAS:

“Gilad Atzmon is influenced by Israel Shamir and he links to Shamir’s website from his own site. Shamir wrote the following about the anti-Zionists’ campaign against Atzmon’s antisemitism and the SWP support for him:

‘This is a talk he gave in Bookmarks, London’s Marxist bookshop; while outside, a group of Jews picketed and demanded to shut him up. … As Gilad was speaking in a Marxist bookshop, they [the Jews] sent antizionist Jews. Thus these protesters revealed their most important inner quality – they felt they weren’t antizionists of Jewish origin, but representatives of Jewry within the antizionist Left…. It is hardly a question of religion as these picketers are irreligious. Indeed, it is a question of spirit, the Judaic spirit we find at the basis of Zionism.’ “

Update 2:

November 30, 2006, Open antisemitism is challenging ‘antiracist’ anti-Zionism in the Palestine solidarity movement – David Hirsh:

“When Atzmon spoke in Edinburgh last week he chose to focus his critique on these anti-racist anti-Zionists. His argument was that the clean distinction that anti-Zionists make between “Zionists” and Jews, anti-Zionism and anti-semitism is largely fictional. He argued that Israel is a “fascist state” supported by “the vast majority of Jewish people around the world”. Anti-Zionist Jews in the Palestine solidarity movement, therefore, play a “Jewish” role there, as “gatekeepers” who try to control the Palestinian narrative:

As soon as anyone identifies the symptoms of Zionism with some fundamental or essential Jewish precepts a smear campaign is launched against that person.

Atzmon is fighting for openly anti-Jewish politics within the Palestine solidarity movement and in order to do so, it is necessary first to defeat the anti-Zionist Jews and their anti-racist allies.

I would use this opportunity and appeal to our friends amongst the Jewish socialists and other Jewish solidarity groups. I would ask them to clear the stage willingly, and to re-join as ordinary human beings. The Palestinian Solidarity movement is craving for a change. It needs open gates rather than gatekeepers. It yearns for an open and dynamic discourse. The Palestinians on the ground have realised it already. They democratically elected an alternative vision of their future.

It seems that the “democratically elected … alternative vision” that he refers to is the open and stark, racist anti-semitism of Jihadi Islam as set out in the Hamas charter.

Atzmon is trying to lead an anti-semitic purge of the anti-Zionist movement and one that will ditch the formal anti-racism onto which some anti-Zionists still cling.”

Update 3:

March 23, 2007, Antisemite Atzmon is guest of Swedish Social Democrats, a flavour of the article:

“Atzmon, a jazz musician regarded as one of the finest saxophonists in the world, has long been accused of anti-Semitism.

“We must begin to take the accusation that the Jewish people are trying to control the world very seriously,” he said in 2003.

“American Jewry makes any debate on whether the ‘Protocols of the elder of Zion’ are an authentic document or rather a forgery irrelevant. American Jews (in fact Zionists) do control the world, by proxy,” he added.

The ‘Protocols of the Elders of Zion’, a document describing a Jewish plot to achieve world domination, is widely accepted to have been an anti-Semitic forgery drafted by the Russian secret police in 1903. It was later used as a propaganda tool in Nazi Germany.” [My emphasis.]

Update 4: The following is a letter from the Jewish Socialist Group to Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign on the topic of Atzmon’s racist outbursts (I have tidied up the original format a bit, it is cached from the Way Back Machine’s version, as the current JSG site has misplaced it.)

“Open letter to Scottish Palestine Solidarity

November 2006

Dear Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign,

The terrible situation of the Palestinians today,
especially in Gaza, demands the broadest possible
unity by those who wish to challenge oppression,
racism and human rights abuses. Those who disrupt that
unity, or make pro-Palestinian activity vulnerable to
charges of antisemitism cannot be friends of the
Palestinian people.

Against this background, the Jewish Socialists’ Group
strongly oppose Scottish PSC’s invitation to Gilad
Atzmon to speak and perform on November 22 at an event
called “Zionist control”. Apart from the SWP, which
has inexplicably invited Atzmon to its annual Marxism
events, and to a book launch at its Bookmarks shop
(which was picketed by “Jews Against Zionism and other
anti-racists), Atzmon is shunned by other progressive,
pro-Palestinian organisations. They completely reject
his statements – regurgitating world Jewish conspiracy
theories and diminishing the crimes of Nazism – which
have been widely denounced as antisemitic.

Atzmon’s outbursts have been a gift to Zionist
journalists, providing them with an opportunity to
discredit and smear those who support Palestinian
rights and justice for the Palestinian people.
If you are not familiar with the views of the person
you have invited, here are some examples from his
article “On antisemitism” December 2003 on his own
website (www.gilad.co.uk) and reprinted in
Al-Jazeerah:

“We must begin to take the accusation that the Jewish
people are trying to control the world very
seriously…American Jewry makes any debate on whether
the ‘Protocols of the elders of Zion’ are an authentic
document or rather a forgery irrelevant. American Jews
do try to control the world, by proxy.”

“Israel’s behaviour throws some light on the
persecution of Jews throughout history.”

In 2005 Atzmon approvingly distributed Paul Eisen’s
essay “Holocaust Wars” which the Socialist Unity
website described as “a full-blooded exposition of
Holocaust denial material and a tribute to notorious
neo-Nazi Ernst Zundel.” Atzmon said he had only
“slight differences” with Eisen’s article.

In 2006 he wrote an article called “Beyond comparison”
for Al-Jazeerah (August 12) about Israel and Nazism:
“Nazis were indeed proper expansionists, they were
trying to take towns and land intact…unlike the Nazis
who had respect for other national movements including
Zionism, Israel has zero respect for anyone including
its next door neighbours. The Israeli behavior should
be realised as the ultimate vulgar biblical barbarism
on the verge of cannibalism.

“While Nazism was a nationalist expansionist movement
with extensive yet limited ambitions, the Jewish State
and its Zionist lobbies are trying to revive the
spirit of a global crusade in the name of a bizarre
religious war.

“It is about time to … say it all loudly… We have to
admit that Israel is the ultimate evil rather than
Nazi Germany”.

Since the early 1980s the Jewish Socialists’ Group has
worked closely with Palestinian organisations and
solidarity campaigns and more recently with Jews for
Justice for Palestinians, Just Peace UK and European
Jews for a Just Peace in the struggle against
occupation and for equality and self-determination for
Palestinians. We have challenged Jewish communal
“leaders” when they denounce opponents of Israel as
antisemitic and Jewish opponents of Zionism as
“self-haters”.

At the same time we remain vigilant about antisemitism
and other forms of racism. We agree entirely with the
Britain’s former PLO representative, Afif Safieh, who
frequently told pro-Palestinian demonstrations and
meetings that antisemitism was an enemy of the
Palestinians as well as the Jews.

As Jewish socialists and outspoken opponents of
Zionism, racism and fascism, we cannot understand how
it benefits the Palestinian struggle to invite and
promote an individual who speaks as Atzmon does,
regardless of his origins. The Palestine Solidarity
Campaign has long had a clause in its aims to oppose
antisemitism and all forms of racism. We cannot
understand why SPSC seem intent on exposing the
pro-Palestinian movement to charges of antisemitism.

We appeal to Scottish PSC to rescind the invitation
and we appeal to Palestinian organisations and
solidarity organisations to make their views on this
known to Scottish PSC.

Yours

Jewish Socialists’ Group”

Update 5: For Atzmon’s groupies, all unknown comments are moderated under WordPress, that’s the way it works.

However, unless they are grossly offensive and dripping with anti-Jewish racism I will be publishing them, but there might be a small delay whilst that is done, so please be patience.

Update 6:

Judeosphere covered Atzmon’s Holocaust denial last year:

“Atzmon has a history of distributing Holocaust denial literature, and of endorsing Holocaust revisionists. Of course, he angrily denies that he himself is a Holocaust denier.

I found myself curious about the source of this Atzmon quote, which I have never seen before. (Stoltz used the same quote while defending neo-Nazi Rigolf Hennig in 2006.)

After much searching, I found it: In 2005, a local newspaper, Ruhr Nachrichten, reported on his lively performance in Bochum, Germany:

What followed was a heated debate…during which several spectators left the room in protest. Atzmon described the known history of the Second World War and the Holocaust as a whole, as a forgery initiated by Americans and Zionists….Particularly fierce debate erupted as Atzmon argued that there is “no forensic evidence” that the number of Jews killed during the Holocaust is really six million.”

Here’s the PressTV link on Sylvia Stolz.

Update 7:

I hope this will be the final update. I know that the Engage site has a lot more material on Atzmon’s ranting and racist attitudes, I barely scratched the surface, but I will leave readers with a piece on Atzmon and Paul Eisen by gehrig:

“Gilad Atzmon has distributed — and defended in general terms — an essay by Paul Eisen designed to promote Holocaust denial. The Eisen essay, titled “Holocaust Wars,” claims among other things that the gas chambers of Auschwitz are fraudulent and couldn’t work. It “backs up” this claim using the same lies used by the leading lights (such as they are) of the Holocaust denial movement — people like David Irving, the self-described “Hitler-lover” Ernst Zündel, and the faux engineer Fred Leuchter.

When you defend Paul Eisen’s essay, you’re defending the very same lies promulgated by the “Hitler-lover” Zündel, his flunky Leuchter, and his admirer David Irving. Yet this is what Gilad Atzmon does.

Now, if you think I’m exaggerating by calling Paul Eisen’s essay “Holocaust denial propaganda,” you might want to skip to the last section of the post, in which I document exactly that. For now, it suffices to say that Eisen has said “… the evidence for the use of homicidal gas-chambers [at Auschwitz] is not good at all. The evidence against it is much, much stronger.” http://www.haloscan.com/comments/thecutter/117192641046077827/

And the following paragraph from the essay Atzmon circulated gives little room for doubt on where Eisen stands:

“Many will take the view that Holocaust revisionism [the boilerplate euphemism for the Holocaust denial movement] is but pernicious nonsense motivated only by a hatred of Jews and a desire to rehabilitate Hitler and National Socialism specifically, and fascism in general, and therefore not even worthy of scrutiny. I don’t agree, and those with sufficient curiosity to wish to research the subject can visit the website of the premier Revisionist think tank, the [fascist-founded, though Eisen doesn’t mention that] Institute for Historical Review, locate the Journal of Historical Review and its archive of articles and papers and start reading.”

I’ll describe the “Institute for Historical Review” in a little more detail below. You can find the Eisen essay itself, the one Gilad Atzmon thought was so brilliant, by googling “Eisen ‘Holocaust wars'”; you’ll pull it up on a number of “Poor Hitler was misunderstood” sites like Ernst Zündel’s.

What was Gilad Atzmon’s reaction recently when he was challenged over having distributed a stack of standard-issue Holocaust denier lies? “I am happy i circulated Eisen and he is indeed a friend of mine.” http://www.haloscan.com/comments/thecutter/8761647492477468265/ “

Time For a Technology Post!

I always mean to write more on technological developments, but never seem to, either the moment passes me by, someone else writes a far better, well informed post elsewhere or my mind wanders and the moment is lost.

So whilst I have my failing wits about me I’ll cover a few of the latest Linux distributions.

There is no shortage of viable alternative to Microsoft rubbish and Distrowatch covers most of them, but also see Tuxmachines, USA Linux Users Group Forum, LinuxLeak and Lxer.

They will keep you informed on Linux news, views and reviews.

Still, there is plenty to choose from, maybe too much?

Not really in my view, but you need to experiment a bit to find one that suits all of your requirements.

For example, I need a bit of word processing, a good browser, low operating system overheads, strong package management, quick to install, some media utilities and the ability to run the latest version of Wine.

I could have chosen either Ubuntu, Mint, Mandriva, OpenSuse, even Fedora, but I lived with MEPIS for ages and despite KDE resource hungry attitudes I found it very useful and easy. The others are equally as good, if you do your research, read the release notes and prepare carefully for any gotchas.

I quite like Gnome, KDE is OK if you are on a fast machine and certainly E17 is pretty, but I stuck with LXDE for ages under Arch Linux, which almost remains my favourite distro.

Arch Linux is not for the faint hearted and it helps if you read the wiki pages a bit, I didn’t initially and managed to kibosh an installation twice. Lesson learnt.

Having said that, Arch Linux once installed is light weight, nippy and very flexible. It meets 95% of my requirements and normally I’d pick it, but then came along Sidux.

Sidux is a LiveCD version of Debian’s “unstable” branch and then some, which can be installed on a hard drive without too much trouble, in about 5-6 minutes. It comes in essentially three shades: KDE, KDE lite and XFce. I plumbed for the latter.

XFce under Sidux is very usable and allows access to a vast array of Debian applications.

As for being on the “unstable” branch, I think that is exaggerated, apart from a slight hiccup with the new release I have had less problems with Sidux than a bucket load of XPs, Vista, Windows-ME, Windows 98, even 95.

Recommended.

Don’t forget that AntiX is very elegant too, I haven’t tried out the very latest version but if it is anything like the previous ones it should be very good. When I have a bit more time and brains I will re-install Arch Linux.

Remember to give them a try out, on a spare machine, firstly.

Gilad Atzmon, David Duke and CiF.

I use to read the Guardian, and even signed up to Comment is Free early on, but it soon became apparent that CiF was infested by extreme right-wing cranks.

These posters would invariably monopolise the comments box of any article on the Middle East, or relating to Jews, then fill it full of racist filth.

Months went by and the Guardian did nothing about that racism.

Latterly they introduced some half-hearted moderation, but CiF is still not a place for intellectual discussions or topical debates on current events, as a recent post showed.

David Toube recently posted a piece on the UAF and to illustrate one of his points he mentioned Gilad Atzmon’s racism:

“For years, the Socialist Workers party promoted and toured the self-described “ex-Jew” Gilad Atzmon. When SWP supporter and Childrens’ Laureate Michael Rosen criticised the party for giving a platform to a performer who, he argued, voiced racist and antisemitic ideas,”

No sooner was that point out of the bag than some posters in the comments box were denying Atzmon’s racism.

Silly me, I pointed them to Atzmon’s ludicrous comments concerning Jewish bankers as an illustration of his racism, but to no avail.

“Atzmon’s comments on the recent financial problems:

“Throughout the centuries, Jewish bankers bought for themselves some real reputations of backers and financers of wars [2] and even one communist revolution [3].”
…
[2] http://hubpages.com/hub/Nathan_Rotschild_and_the_Battle_Of_Waterloo

[3] Jacob Schiff (the head of Kuhn, Loeb & Company) is credited with giving twenty million dollars to the Bolshevik revolution. A year after his death the Bolsheviks deposited over six hundred million rubles to Schiff’s banking firm Kuhn & Loeb. (New York Journal American 1949. February 3.)” “

http://palestinethinktank.com/2008/09/30/gilad-atzmon-credit-crunch-or-rather-zio-punch/
[warning: some really nasty material and links there, use caution]

Then I remembered that I covered this previously at Harry’s Place and how it revealed that Atzmon was probably a secret reader of David Duke’s web site.

The key was Atzmon’s use of a footnote, [“New York Journal American 1949. February 3.“] It appeared a bit strange to me, so I threw it into Google, with quotes.

Oh, what a surprise, out pops the very same reference from David Duke’s web site.

David Duke 2 out of 7 links, one to my own post at HP, another to Soccer Dad, one Tony Greenstein, Atzmon’s original and an unrelated racist post at ISO Hunt.

Three of those links post-date Atzmon’s article, which means the pre-dated ones are Duke’s original filth (two lots), the ISO Hunt rubbish and Atzmon’s work.

All of which suggests to me that Gilad Atzmon picks up his reference material from David Duke’s web site, or some neo-Nazi sewer.

Still, the news that Atzmon is probably reading David Duke and looking for inspiration won’t come as any shock to those who follow his antics, or I suspect put people off at CiF from defending him.

Pity that ranting on about Jewish Bankers, revolutions, etc doesn’t even count as anti-Jewish racism on CiF? Would David Duke’s racist filth even turn heads at CiF?

I suppose not.

What Do Stephen Sizer, Mike Cushman, David Duke And The National Front Have In Common?

Seismic Shock reveals all.

Update: Reader who are unfamiliar with Mike Cushman or David Duke might do well to read my previous posts on the topic.

Decline in Antifascism and the Consequences.

Don’t Exclude Mike Cushman.

The Implications of Silencing Harry’s Place.

Duke, Cushman and Delich – Silly and Counter-productive.

For UCU Activists – How To Avoid Re-posting from Neo-Nazi, Ku Klux Klan or White Power Web Sites.

Mr Cushman, Sue Me Too, part 2.

Mr Cushman, Sue Me Too, part 1.

Neanderthal Philosophers?

Certainly not, but they bring up an interesting ethical issue, if you could re-create the Neanderthals, should you? And what issues follow from such an action?

Read more, at Talking Philosophy – The Philosophers’ Magazine Blog:

“Here’s something straight out of the land of philosophical thought experiments. Scientists in Germany have now mapped 65% of the Neanderthal genome, and could bring one of these hulking fellas to life. Neanderthals are a humanoid species that split off from homo sapiens about 300,000 years ago. For some reason there was little interbreeding between the two species, despite very strong genetic similarity. One of the most interesting findings is that Neanderthals had some of the genes critical for language.

Dr. George Church, at Harvard, says Neanderthals could be brought back with existing technology, at a price of about $30 million. The trouble, says Richard Klein, a paleoanthropologist at Stanford, is that you wouldn’t know whether to put Neanderthals in a zoo or at Harvard.

Klein’s question flies in the face of a very sensible sounding view called “moral individualism,” put forth by the always clear and insightful ethicist James Rachels (sadly now deceased). You ought to put Neanderthals wherever they belong, based on their own individual characteristics, he would say. If they were smart, you’d have to let them into Harvard. What would it matter what species they belonged to?”

Simulating stuff, I should read their blog more.

Blame HP?

I couldn’t resist this:

“Police hospitalised over HP sauce

Police officers rushed to hospital after a suspicious substance was thrown through a car window were released when it was identified as HP sauce.”

Tango Off Williamson.

That certain member of the cloth has been asked to leave Argentina, the Beeb reports:

“Argentina has ordered an ultra-traditionalist British bishop who denies the Holocaust to leave the country or face expulsion.

The interior ministry said Richard Williamson had been given 10 days to leave Argentina.

Earlier this month the bishop was removed from his post as the head of a Roman Catholic seminary in Argentina.
…”

Williamson’s own views:

“I believe that the historical evidence is strongly against, is hugely against, six million Jews having been deliberately gassed in gas chambers as a deliberate policy of Adolf Hitler,”

Whilst on the topic of fascism and dealing with Holocaust denial, AVPS directs us towards the Conference: Stopping the Far-Right in North Staffordshire. Go for it!

Oh, and Williamson tried to use legal action to stop his views being more widely known.

Update: Z blog has the story as well.

Comrade Duch.

The PA reports:

“The long-awaited Khmer Rouge genocide tribunal wrapped up its opening session with judges saying they still need to finalise the list of witnesses before announcing when the regime’s alleged chief torturer will take the stand.

Kaing Guek Eav – better known as Duch – is charged with crimes against humanity for his role as former head of the S-21 prison and torture centre. He is the first of five defendants who ruled Cambodia in the 1970s and turned it into a vast slave labour camp in which at least 1.7 million people perished.

Judge Silvia Cartwright, a former New Zealand High Court judge, told the court that the tribunal’s five judges met in private to pare down the lists of proposed witnesses to “consider whether the testimony would be redundant or repetitious”.

Vann Nath, who survived by painting and sculpting portraits of Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, described Duch as a “very cruel man”.

Duch, 66, is accused of committing or abetting a range of crimes including murder, torture and rape at S-21 prison – formerly a school – where up to 16,000 men, women and children were held and tortured before being put to death.”

Denise Affonço’s account has been written up as To The End Of Hell and she on BBC’s Assignment.

New Labour Stuffed By A Banker?

The world is full of ingrates, or so it would seem to new Labour?

They have assiduously tried to suck up to the movers and shakers in the financial world, particularly City bankers, but their patronage is not always reciprocated.

So it was with Sir David Freud, the architect of new Labour’s attack on the disabled and infirmed.

As reported over at Dave Osler’s, new Labour brought out a government White Paper based on Freud’s previous back of an envelope recommendations, but he jumped ship.

Instead Freud is taking up a Tory peerage and wants to implement wholesale welfare reform, probably along the lines of the old workhouse model.

Sir David, according to the brief biography provided by the BBC is nothing if not a bit of a smartie, a meteoric career, plenty of ambition and chutzpah.

He pushed out his report on welfare reform after some three weeks of “research”, despite having no previous knowledge of this field or ever having been on the dole, or disability benefit.

Getting Sir David Freud to produce a blueprint for welfare reform is a bit like asking Sweeney Todd for a short, back and sides, the result is predictable butchery.

Many other sites covered New Labour’s nasty and pernicious attacks on those least capable of defending themselves.

I would hope that this debacle with Sir David Freud could be a lesson for new Labour but I fear not.

New Labour’s detachment from reality and wish to implement Tory lite policies do not bode well.

In fact, you might argue they are just paving the way for David Cameron’s new government, in waiting. What cretins.

Hard To Find.

Finding out the details of the London Conference on Combating Anti-Semitism was not as easy as it should have been, but then I suppose it is more for bigwigs and policy makers, the BBC reports:

“Nearly 100 legislators from 35 countries have gathered in London to develop strategies to combat the “growing threat of anti-Semitism”.

The inaugural conference of the Inter-parliamentary Coalition for Combating Antisemitism (ICCA) is being co-hosted by the Foreign Office.

The politicians will work with experts to devise ways to fight anti-Semitism.

It comes after the number of attacks on UK Jews rose sharply following the Israeli offensive in Gaza in December.

The two-day summit is being held in the Houses of Parliament and at Lancaster House
…
Last week the Community Security Trust, a charity working to protect Jews in the UK, said more than 250 anti-Semitic incidents were recorded in four weeks following Israel’s military operation in Gaza.

They include property vandalism, verbal threats and some physical attacks, most of which centred on north London.

The same period last year saw just 27 incidents, according to the trust. “

From the ICCA web sites:

“Programme Summary, 15 – 17 February 2009

* On 15-17th Feb 2009, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Inter-parliamentary Coalition for Combating Antisemitism (ICCA) will launch an international summit conference designed to formulate new strategies for countering global antisemitism.
* The conference, co-sponsored by the Department of Communities and Local Government, will bring to Westminster more than 100 lawmakers from 35 countries who will work intensively with leading academics, legal experts and specialists in the field to devise ways by which parliamentary systems can work with governments to combat antisemitism as a global threat.
* The London Conference on Combating Antisemitism marks the first time that ranking elected officials will have the opportunity to meet face-to-face, and break out into working groups with international experts from academia, law enforcement, information technology and security.
* For two days, lawmakers will share knowledge, experiences, best practice and the latest information in the areas of internet hate, policing and prosecution, antisemitism in the international arena, antisemitic discourse and the ‘new antisemitism.’

Their task will be devise effective strategies to combat antisemitism on the parliamentary level and to return to their home countries with the tools needed to spur their governments to action.
…
”

“Plenary Sessions with keynote speeches from:

1. Congressman Chris Smith, House of Representatives, USA (ICCA Steering Committee)
2. Dr. Barbara Prammer, President of the Austrian National Council
3. Lord Malloch-Brown, Cabinet Minister, United Kingdom
4. Dr. Solomon Passy, Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee and Former Foreign Minister, Bulgaria
5. Petra Pau MP, Vice-President of the Bundestag, Germany
6. Dr Pavel Svoboda MP, Minister and Chairman of the Legislative Council of the Government, Czech Republic
7. Dr. Fiamma Nirenstein, Vice-President of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, Chamber of Deputies, Italy (ICCA Steering Committee)
8. Jason Kenney MP, Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism, Canada
9. André Azoulay, Counsellor to His Majesty the King Mohammed VI, Morocco
10. Prof. Iulian Fota, National Security Advisor to the President, Romania
11. Natan Sharansky, former Minister and Member of Parliament, Israel
12. Prof. Irwin Cotler, Member of Parliament, former Minister of Justice and Attorney General, Canada (ICCA Steering Committee)
13. Dr. Alberto Nisman, State Prosecutor, Argentina
14. Senator Sergio Abreu, International Affairs Committee and Former Foreign Minister, Uruguay
15. Peter Caruana QC, Chief Minister, Gibraltar
16. The Bishop of Manchester
17. Rabbi Andrew Baker, Personal Representative of the Chairman-in-Office of the OSCE on Combating Antisemitism”

I would have preferred if they had invited those with an intimate knowledge of the subject, such as Engage or other anti-fascist organisations, as some Foreign Office officials don’t have a particularly good record in this area.

Update: It seems that Engage was invited, good.

Update 2: A previous BBC article on this issue:

“Michael Bookatz needs no statistics to understand that his community is facing, according to Jewish groups, a level of anti-Semitism unprecedented in recent years.

Last month, the 32-year-old was attacked by two men while walking home at night in Golders Green, north London – home to a prominent Jewish community.

“I saw a guy walking towards me out of the corner of my eye, but I wasn’t paying attention,” he remembers.

“Suddenly, he ran towards me and punched me in the face. I fell to the ground and he started stamping and kicking me, then a friend of his ran over and did the same.

“They said they were doing it because of what had happened to the Palestinians in Gaza. They were cowards, but I just accept it. It’s part of life.” “

Sri Lanka.

The situation in Sri Lanka is grim:

“About 40 civilians are being killed and more than 100 injured every day in fierce gun battles and artillery exchanges between the Sri Lankan army and Tamil Tiger rebels, health officials said yesterday.

Dr Thurairajah Varatharajah, the government health officer for the Mullaittivu district, said that artillery shells were landing routinely in populated areas.

Speaking from a school in the coastal town of Putumattalan where he had set up a makeshift hospital, Varatharajah told the Associated Press that medics were being overwhelmed by casualties and running out of essential medicine. Twenty-two people had been killed when the hospital took a direct hit this week, he said.

“We are facing in the hospital big problems on all sides. Not enough toilets, bad water supply, food is also a problem,” he said in a telephone interview.

Around 200,000 people remain in the shrinking patch of jungle controlled by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam on the north-eastern coast.

The trickle of refugees has become a flood: official figures showed 37,420 people had crossed the frontlines this year, with almost 35,000 making the hazardous trip this month after running out of food and drinking water”

and:

“Doctors say wounded Sri Lankan civilians are dying for want of proper medical treatment as they lie trapped in a makeshift hospital in the last rebel-held pocket in the north-east of the island.

This weekend, hundreds of injured civilians poured in to the improvised medical facility in Putumattalan village, which has been repeatedly targeted by artillery. Earlier in the week 16 patients were killed in shelling.

Both government forces and Tamil Tiger separatists have been accused of war crimes during the conflict, although confirmation is impossible because independent journalists are banned from the conflict zone. Yesterday the Sri Lankan military said a suspected Tamil Tiger threw a grenade into a bus carrying civilians trying to escape, killing one woman and injuring another 13 people.”

(H/T: ami)