A Question For Julian Assange At Hay on Wye.

Julian Assange will be appearing at the Hay on Wye festival on Saturday 4 June 2011, 2.30pm, Venue: Llwyfan Cymru – Wales Stage.

Apparently, Assange is taking questions at hay@telegraph.co.uk.

Rosie has submitted a good one, it deserves an answer. Not sure if Assange will have the guts to reply on this particular topic:

“[To Julian Assange] What is your relationship with Israel Shamir? In a statement to Private Eye Wikileaks said that Israel Shamir has never been an “agent” of Wikileaks, and generally minimises your relationship.

Could you please explain then the recent article on the Swedish anti-fascist site Expo which stated that you had been in contact with him to recommend potential associates in Sweden for analysing the Wikileaks data.

In an interview with Agora Vox you have echoed his own view of himself that he is persecuted like Salman Rushdie and according to a Panorama programme you emailed him, going along with one of his aliases “Adam” and describing his work as “strong and compassionate”.

Do you still hold that view of Shamir and his writing?“

An Antisemite Helped Build WikiLeaks’ Network In Sweden.

I covered this a few days ago, but thankfully Jonathan Leman has released a good quality English translation:

“The cooperation between Julian Assange and the Swedish antisemite Israel Shamir is closer than has previously been reported. Expo revieved e-mail correspondence revealing that Shamir was actively involved in shaping Wikileaks’ Swedish network.

According to WikiLeak’s spokesperson, Kristinn Hrafnsson, the role of Israel Shamir has been that of a freelance writer working with a “a project that came and went”.

– We have not been scanning all the thousands of journalists that we have been associated with in some way, he tells Expo.

However, e-mails between Shamir and Assange that Expo have gotten hold of reveal that the two have cooperated for several years. In 2008 Shamir was asked to recommend potential associates in Sweden.

Shamir answered by recommending his son, Johannes Wahlström, without mentioning anything about their kinship:

”He is Swedish citizen, and lives in Sweden. Probably he’ll be able to give advice about press freedom”

In an e-mail dated June 2010 shows that Shamir at that point still played a part in the Swedish WikiLeaks-network. Shamir wrote:

”I have a lot of good guys who can help to analyse the treasure, and it would be good to start spreading the news. I am now in Paris, and people want to know more! Tuesday I go to Sweden, and there is a whole operation for your benefit!”

Assange replied:
”There certainly is! Tell the team to get ready; Give them my best; We have a lot of work to do.”

Israel Shamir and his son Johannes Wahlström have both been criticized for antisemitic writings. Shamir has said that ”every person who adheres to God should deny the Holocaust”. Wahlström wrote an article in 2005 with claims that ”Israel’s regime controls Swedish media”. Wahlström has repeatedly defended his father and he is presented on Shamir’s website as a ”distinguished contributor”. “

JONATHAN LEMAN

Closer Links: Julian Assange And The Far Rightist, Israel Shamir.

Rosie has provided an invaluable link to the Swedish ant-fascist site, Expose.se.

They have information showing that Julian Assange’s links to the Far Rightist, Israel Shamir, are much closer and more extensive than had been first thought.

Readers will remember how the BBC had a confidential email exchange between the two, which indicated a friendly relationship, with Assange suggesting Shamir might use an alias to hide his connection to Wikileaks.

Wikileaks’ subsequent statement on Israel Shamir was decidedly unsatisfactory. Basically, they said he was just another journalist and they treated him as such.

However, it is clear from the Expose.se article that Wikileaks’ response was very far from the truth.

Below is an extract taken from the Expo magazine and a Google translation from the original Swedish, which is not perfect but sufficient to explain the issues:

“Cooperation between Julian Assange and the Swedish anti-Semite Israel Shamir is denser than previously stated. Expo has taken note of several emails that show that Assange Shamir asked for help to build Wikileaks Swedish network.

According to Wikileaks spokesman Kristinn Hrafnsson traded contacts between Julian Assange and Israel Shamir on a project.

– We have not checked the political and personal views of the thousands of journalists we worked with, “he told the Expo.

But e-mails as part of the Expo has shown that cooperation lasted for years. Back in 2008, Shamir was asked to provide proposals to potential partners in Sweden.

Shamir responds by proposing his son, John Wahl, without mentioning anything about their relationship:

“He is a Swedish citizen, living in Sweden. Probably he will be able to advise you on press freedom – in the journal [tornado / red.anm.] Is startling revelations about the media assaults.”

In an email dated June 2010 shows that Shamir and Assange still had a role in Wikileaks Swedish network .. “Tell the team to be prepared; Health them from me: We have much work to do,” writes Assange in response to Shamir. “

Again, the points are:

There was an email exchange between Israel Shamir and Wikileaks.

That exchange dates back three years, to 2008.

Shamir was asked by Wikileaks to suggest potential partners in Sweden.

Assange was communicating with Shamir as late as June 2010 concerning Wikileaks in Sweden.

Gilad Atzmon And The US Boat To Gaza.

Thanks to Rebecca for keeping me up to date on events in the US surrounding the racist, Gilad Atzmon, as she comments:

“I just got another email update from the US Boat to Gaza folks – advertising Gilad Atzmon’s benefit concert tonight in Oakland. As far as I’m concerned, this means it’s no mistake that he’s doing this benefit – he’s working with them, and they don’t care about his reputation as an antisemite. See my blog today: http://mystical-politics.blogspot.com/2011/05/us-boat-to-gaza-and-gilad-atzmon.html “

Searching around I can see that they are advertising the event via their Twitter feed.

It is also on their events page.

It is a pity that this organisation is connected to the racist Gilad Atzmon. Read more at Mystical Politics.

Update 1: Adam Holland has more, and as far as I can see Atzmon might be working with the well-known Holocaust denier, Michael Santomauro:

“Gilad Atzmon is using a notorious Holocaust denial website to advertise a speech and performance he is giving tonight at a Methodist church in Oakland, CA. (Read here.) The website, which is maintained by Michael Santomauro, publishes articles propounding what Santomauro euphemistically refers to as “historical revisionism” concerning Naziism and the Holocaust, as well as anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist articles, and promotional material for books with the same themes. A notice on the website indicates that Atzmon himself sent the promotional notice to the Santomauro website for publication there.
…
Santomauro has worked as an advance man for David Irving’s New York appearances, sometimes under the pseudonym “Michael Singer”, under which name he has booked venues for Irving to promote his books. (Read here.) Emails between Irving and Santomauro planning a speaking engagement were copied from Irving’s website by hackers and leaked to Wikileaks. (I wrote about that here. The hacked emails are online here. A prior post mentioning Santomauro’s link to Irving is available here.) “

Holocaust Denier Hawks His Wares Around The US.

I am indebted to Adam Holland for pointing me towards this marvellous post from Stephen Lemons on David Irving’s latest attempt to sell his tatty books across America:

“After I arrived, I walked into the “Brighton” room where Irving had set up to give a lecture about Nazi Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler. I introduced myself to Irving, who didn’t recall me immediately, until he was reminded by one of the attendees of the brouhaha at Jerry’s, where he wouldn’t allow me to observe his event.

He demanded to know how I found out his location. I informed him that it was pretty much common knowledge at this point, particularly with a whole army of gendarmes outside.

Fuming, Irving first ordered me out of the room, then out of the hotel. He went to complain to the cops present, but I squared my being there with the management, so his whining fell on deaf ears.

He paced about the lobby for a while, glowering at me, obviously ticked, but utterly impotent.

I counted about 15 attendees, but there could have been a few more. Most of the faces were familiar. Local, neo-Nazi Nationalist Coalition leader Jesse Curnow was there, as was nativist nutbar Laine Lawless.

Lawless has taken up the cause of defending convicted child-murderer and minutewoman Shawna Forde, who was sentenced to death in February for her part in a deadly home-invasion raid in Arivaca that killed a 9-year old girl and the girl’s father. “

The Southern Poverty Law Center has a profile of Irving.

Jhate And Mark Webber.

For anyone genuinely interested in antiracism the Jhate blog is required reading, it neatly covers the activities of an assorted bunch of cranks and racist, but also their underlying thinking.

I was particularly interested in a new post which mentioned Mark Weber of the IHR:

“Probably the most interesting part of the show was a monologue about American history school textbooks and how they had changed over the years. His choice of examples to illustrate how the textbooks had changed over the years were revealing: the Ku Klux Klan, which used to be accorded some respect by the textbooks; immigration, which used to be treated with caution but is now celebrated; and of course the Holocaust. Weber made much of the fact that textbooks didn’t discuss the Holocaust until the 1960s, when there was a “methodical, well-organized campaign to rewrite” them. Weber didn’t deny the Holocaust in this episode. The final section of the show was devoted to bashing Israel and the “Jewish-Zionist lobby” in the US and cheering for Helen Thomas.”

Don’t miss the piece on Society of St. Pius X.

Wikileaks Publishing Around The World.

Wikileaks has released a list of media outlets around the world publishing their material.

I was interested to see if any publications in Belarus were covered, and not unsurprisingly they are missing.

However, they still have:

Russian Reporter, Russia
Sov.Sekretno, Russia
Koms Pravda, Russia

I wonder if Israel Shamir is still filtering the Wikileaks material before providing it to news outlets in Russia and Belarus.

Will Wikileaks ever let us know? I doubt it, after all the relationship between Assange and Shamir is a nasty secret 🙂

Interfax’s piece on Shamir (Google translation):

“MINSK. December 19. INTERFAX.RU – Head of Administration of the incumbent president of Belarus Vladimir MacKay met with the trustee creator of the site Wikileaks Israel Shamir.

Photojournalist portal http://www.interfax.by managed to photograph on the steps of the presidential administration, the only accredited journalist at the Russian-language website Wikileaks Israel Shamir, who arrived in Belarus to observe the presidential elections in the country on December
19.

In the presidential administration refrained from comments on a matter of fact conversation Makey and attorney Assange. However, given that the Russian media have already begun to distribute information about posting on the site Wikileaks data secret correspondence, the U.S. State Department concerning the position of Alexander Lukashenko on the war in Georgia and the construction of the Nord Stream pipeline, we can assume that the conversation was about the Belarusian dossier Wikileaks.
In an interview with Interfax-West “I. Shamir confirmed the existence of the Belarusian dossier. According to him, the website Wikileaks has several thousands of secret documents, which are more or less related to Belarus. He clarified that “the Belarusian dossier – that Americans write from Belarus, the Belarus. There may also be interesting stuff.” “

Rather worrying.

BBC’s Panorama, Julian Assange And Israel Shamir.

There was a recent Panorama programme on BBC 1, WikiLeaks: The Secret Story and towards the end of it is an interesting bit about Julian Assange and his association with Israel Shamir.

This shorten clip on Youtube is the last 6:40 minutes of the programme, and from 01:40 you will hear about specific deals which Julian Assange was making on his own, without telling others at Wikileaks.

One such deal was with Israel Shamir, well-known Far Rightist and active antisemite, 02:10 into the clip.

Assange had been warned about Shamir, but didn’t seem too troubled when dealing with this renowned Holocaust denier.

Later on in the clip you will hear the contents of an email between Assange and Shamir, where he says:

“Dear Israel/Adam,

Someone wrote saying they refuse to associate with an organisation that would work with an antisemite like Israel Shamir.

From a brief sampling of your writing I did not find the allegation born out. ”

[Assange then makes the suggestion that Shamir write under an alias.]

Watch it, listen to Shamir’s weird and racist views and then wonder why Julian Assange couldn’t find much wrong with him.

Read Seachlight’s article from 2004 on Shamir.

(H/T: Rosie)

Update 1: Some previous posts on Shamir, etc:

Conspiracies, The CIA And The Racist, Israel Shamir.

Shamir, Stupidity And Julian Assange.

Assange And Tales of Jewish Conspiracies?

The Antisemite Israel Shamir and Wikileaks, Telling Lies.

Update 2: Martin Bright asks some good questions:

“Ian Hislop did not have to write an editorial in Private Eye. He clearly felt that he needed to place his conversation in the public domain.

He was right to do so for one reason in particular. Julian Assange has yet to explain his relationship with the Holocaust denier and antisemite Israel Shamir. The statement issued by WikiLeaks that said it dealt with Mr Shamir as it would have done with any other journalist does not wash. WikiLeaks should not have dealt with him at all. Mr Shamir is not like any other journalist. Index on Censorship, which has been a consistent supporter of WikiLeaks on freedom of speech principles, has failed to secure the reassurances it has asked for on the Israel Shamir issue. This is especially worrying for dissidents in Belarus, where Mr Shamir is alleged to have passed cables to the authoritarian president Alexander Lukashenko.

The Shamir issue is becoming increasingly difficult to explain away. Until he does, Julian Assange cannot ask to be taken seriously as a campaigner for freedom. If you choose to tolerate or defend a nasty antisemite, it is only a matter of time before people begin to wonder whether you are a nasty antisemite yourself. “

Update 3:John Kampfner add his voice to things:

“Index’s association with Assange goes back some time. In 2008 WikiLeaks won the new media prize at our annual awards. We were pleased to host him in a debate in London last September, but his combative demeanour that evening was a surprise. Throughout the past few months we have been at the heart of the tussle. Two of Index’s trustees are Assange’s lawyer, Mark Stephens and his agent, Caroline Michel. Whenever asked, particularly in the US, about reconciling Stephens’s two roles, I have pointed out that Index is a broad church, and that Stephens has been a longstanding battler for free speech.

It has often felt like treading on egg shells. We were asked in December to channel Assange’s defence fund through our bank account. Our chairman, the broadcaster Jonathan Dimbleby, and I thought it inappropriate for a charity to become involved in the personal allegations against Assange. So we declined.

When urged at the start of January by Assange’s publisher to help him write his memoirs I said I was ready to assist, but only if I had strong editorial input and that no subject was off-limits. This, I was told, was not acceptable. Roughly at the same time our organisation started asking questions about Israel Shamir, a man accused of Holocaust denial and of being a close associate of Belarus’s autocratic leader Alexander Lukashenko. Index is one of the founders of the Belarus Committee. Despite repeated but polite requests to WikiLeaks, our team was stonewalled, so we went public with our concerns. “

Update 4: Index on Censorship asks questions about Wikileaks, Belarus And Israel Shamir:

“It has been reported that an “accredited” journalist for Wikileaks, Israel Shamir, met with Uladzimri Makei, the Head of the Presidential administration in Belarus. Subsequently, it was reported in the Belarus Telegraf that a state newspaper would be publishing documents about the Belarusian opposition.

Wikileaks has always maintained it takes care to ensure that names of political activists are redacted from cables before publication on its website. Index on Censorship is concerned that some of the Wikileaks cables relating to Belarus that have not appeared on the main Wikileaks website are now in the public domain.

There are various “commercial crimes” in Belarus that make it a criminal offence to run an unregistered organisation. In turn, many NGOs are prohibited from registering their organisations. This places a lot of civil society in Belarus in a legal grey area which can mean political activists, who cannot register, are placed in breach of the law for accepting foreign funding. It is rumoured in Belarus that many of the Wikileaks cables outline foreign support for opposition groups. Our worry is that this information could be used to prosecute some of the political prisoners currently held by the KGB.

In the immediate aftermath of the discredited Belarusian elections, Index on Censorship made repeated attempts to contact Wikileaks in order for them to clarify its relationship with Shamir. “

The Antisemite Israel Shamir and Wikileaks, Telling Lies.

For some inexplicable reason Wikileaks has decided to release a statement on Israel Shamir:

“On Tuesday 1st March 2011, @wikileaks said:

WikiLeaks statement that was given to, but not used by, the UK satirical current-affairs magazine, Private Eye:

Israel Shamir has never worked or volunteered for WikiLeaks, in any manner, whatsoever. He has never written for WikiLeaks or any associated organization, under any name and we have no plan that he do so. He is not an ‘agent’ of WikiLeaks. He has never been an employee of WikiLeaks and has never received monies from WikiLeaks or given monies to WikiLeaks or any related organization or individual. However, he has worked for the BBC, Haaretz, and many other reputable organizations.

It is false that Shamir is ‘an Assange intimate’. He interviewed Assange (on behalf of Russian media), as have many journalists. He took a photo at that time and has only met with WikiLeaks staff (including Asssange) twice. It is false that ‘he was trusted with selecting the 250,000 US State Department cables for the Russian media’ or that he has had access to such at any time.

Shamir was able to search through a limited portion of the cables with a view to writing articles for a range of Russian media. The media that subsequently employed him did so of their own accord and with no intervention or instruction by WikiLeaks.

We do not have editorial control over the of hundreds of journalists and publications based on our materials and it would be wrong for us to seek to do so. We do not approve or endorse the the writings of the world’s media. We disagree with many of the approaches taken in analyzing our material.

Index did contact WikiLeaks as have many people and organisations do for a variety of reasons. The quote used here is not complete. WikiLeaks also asked Index for further information on this subject. Most of these rumors had not, and have not, been properly corroborated. WikiLeaks therefore asked Index to let us know if they had received any further information on the subject. This would have helped WikiLeaks conduct further inquiries. We did not at the time, and never have, received any response.

END”

There’s a large piece on WLCentral, Who is Israel Shamir?

Probably written by him or one of his supporters. I quickly skimmed it, not too clear, seemed written in some postmodernist speak, this is the concluding paragraph:

“His material, at any rate, does not evince a hatred of people to whom the cultural label “Jews” attaches in normal parlance, but appears to demonstrate an aversion to a specific religious cultural programme. It is certainly, to my mind, a problematic body of work. While there is quite a lot of historical precedent for writers performing collective psychoanalysis of this sort, it isn’t an enterprise that can be afforded much scientific respect. Attempts to impute collective ideological traits to vast groups of people, as a method of explanatory history, has been employed with various levels of fruitfulness, by thinkers like Hegel and Marx, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, Voegelin, Arendt and Strauss, Husserl, Heidegger, Gadamer and Ricouer.

It is possible that Shamir’s example appears particularly objectionable because it purports to study a “Jewish Weltanschauung.” But as a parting comment on this, without wishing to diminish the sense in which this way of thinking is flawed and undesirable, it would be fortunate if we could take this opportunity to consider how tacitly acceptable this manner of thinking is when applied on cable news networks, for instance, to “Arabs,” or “Muslims.” Where Shamir’s material is rightly, and uncontroversially, considered problematic, a close relative of it enjoys endorsement in mainstream media such as FOX news, but is no less tacitly racist. It embarks on the same enterprise of cultural generalization, attributing to “Arabs” or “Muslims” (considered interchangeable) a hatred of the West, its freedoms and peoples, religious conquest of the West for Islam, and all of the flawed and hateful discourse that flows from that. It is not limited to commercially viable circus-acts like Ann Coulter, but is instead pervasive and widely accepted.

In whatever form we find it when it it rears its head, whether in the writings of fringe anti-semites, or the observations of news anchors, this sort of thinking should be repudiated in detail, and everyone should be given the appropriate intellectual resources to see its flaws for themselves.”

WikiLeaks Central has various links to Shamir’s articles.

This is an extract from Andrew Brown’s piece from December 2010:

“He also denied that he had any special connection with WikiLeaks, though the group’s spokesman, Kristinn Hrafnsson, confirmed that he was their representative in Russia, just as his son is in Scandinavia. Expressen also published a photograph of him standing behind Julian Assange at a computer, published in the Russian paper, which has been reprinting the WikiLeaks cables he passed to them.”

Another key bit:

“Shamir claims to be a renegade Russian Jew, born in Novosibirsk, but currently adhering to the Greek Orthodox church. He is notorious for Holocaust denial and publishing a string of antisemitic articles. He caused controversy in the UK in 2005, at a parliamentary book launch hosted by Lord Ahmed, by claiming: “Jews … own, control and edit a big share of mass media.” Internal WikiLeaks documents, seen by the Guardian, show Shamir was not only given cables, but he also invoiced WikiLeaks for €2,000 (£1,700), to be deposited in a Tallinn bank account, in thanks for “services rendered – journalism”. What services? He says: “What I did for WikiLeaks was to read and analyse the cables from Moscow.”

I feel we should be told what’s what, Wikileaks should open their books for external scrutiny!

Michael C. Moynihan summarises Shamir’s views:

“So let us quickly recap the foulness of Shamir’s political views.

As I noted last week, he has called the Auschwitz concentration camp “an internment facility, attended by the Red Cross (as opposed to the US internment centre in Guantanamo),” not a place of extermination.

He told a Swedish journalist (and fellow Holocaust denier) that “it’s every Muslim and Christian’s duty to deny the Holocaust.”

The Jews, he says, are a “virus in human form” and the Protocols of the Elders of Zion is real. “

[My emphasis.]

And this was the foul racist, Israel Shamir, that Wikileaks chose to associate with.

Update 1: Please can I remind any posters who wish to take up Israel Shamir’s cause and are now stuck in my moderation queue that:

1) No one is restricting his freedom of speech, quite the opposite he has access to numerous web sites and the journal Counterpunch for his views.

2) That Shamir is a Far Rightist and pusher of Holocaust denial and he needs no encouragement particularly from any posters. Also they should see my comments policy.

Racism, Hamas And The Guardian.

The Guardian’s coverage of Hamas’s racism is often problematic, but it’s not necessarily for the content rather than the downplaying of Hamas’s racism.

As *if* it is incidental to their beliefs.

Nothing could be further from the truth, as the Hamas Covenant shows, oozing from it you will find bigotry and racism towards Jews, conspiracy theories, etc, the lot.

Next, if you were going to report Hamas’s attitude towards the new UN curriculum then you might at least include their initial reaction in 2009:

“”The refugee camps committees categorically refuse to let our children be taught this lie created by the Jews and intensified by their media,” the committees’ letter said. “First of all, [the Holocaust] is not a fact, and secondly, those who added it to the curriculum intended to mess with our children’s emotions.”

Why not mention Khaled Meshaal’s Holocaust revisionism?

Meshaal is a major Hamas leader and his thinking is central to Hamas’s outlook on the world. On the 31st of March 2008, Khaled Meshaal tells a Sky interviewer:

“KM: We don’t want to harm any religion in the world. We don’t deny the holocaust.
But, we believe the Zionists have exaggerated the numbers to get sympathy from other nations. But, there is Palestinian suffering caused by Israel.”

So, the Guardian, if you are going to comment on Hamas’s racism, please at least make an effort.

Update 1: From last year, In The Age of The Internet: More Racism At The Guardian.

Toben, Zundel And Stephen Sizer.

Stephen Sizer is against antisemitism.

I know that, he has said so.

But why does Rev. Sizer promote the Intifada Palestine blog, which as Seismic Shock demonstrates, has a great deal of sympathy with the Holocaust denier, Fredrick Toben ? [Warning links to racist filth, on Toben.]

And why does Rev. Sizer think a blog and authors that express sympathy for the neo-Nazi, Ernst Zundel is a fit place?

A snippet of the type of conspiratorial views to be found at the Intifada Palestine blog:

“While we also find rendition of Ernest Zundel from American soil and his seven year incarceration under German laws literally synonymous to the Gayssot Act. Such, brings justification for European outcry of undue Israeli influence on their political systems. And additionally upon the laws governing the courts of Belgian: a universal tribunal where Zionist goons are susceptible to prosecutions for crimes against humanity.”

Again, Mary Rizza, that well known supporter of the anti-Jewish racist, Gilad Atzmon, has her say:

“The last point on Ernst and Ingrid (Zundel) has become something of a mantra that I have had to recite so many times in the last year or so: Neither Ingrid nor Ernst has ever used violence, nor have they ever called on anyone else to use violence. Neither has ever discriminated against anyone on ethnic or religious grounds, nor have they called on anyone else to do so. “

Ms. Rizza forgets about Ernst Zundel infamous publication, “The Hitler We Loved and Why”.

Nizkor has more:

“Zündel, in his interview with Bonokoski, neither confirmed nor denied that he was Christof Friedrich, but Dietz definitely told Bonokoski that Zündel and Friedrich were one and the same. Furthermore, on the day after Bonokoski’s column appeared, Zündel openly admitted that he was Christof Friedrich in an interview with David Schatsky on CBC radio.[94]

In February 1977, The Liberty Bell reviewed “The Hitler We Loved and Why” as follows: “(Friedrich) leaves no doubt about it. Hitler was well loved and loved in return, but this relationship between the Leader and his people was not the gushy, sickly-sweet effusion of an obese Jewish mother for her pimply, draft-dodging son. This was Aryan love. Strong, steady and uplifting.”[95] Hitler is portrayed as a revered saint and holy man. a godly messiah who had rescued Germany with the salvationist ideology of white supremacy. Out of the rubble of a nation laid waste by the Jews, the Fuehrer built an orderly, corruption-free, economically vibrant, and morally pure society in which “our men were manly and our women feminine,” and “nutrition came before profit; quality before quantity.”[96]

Everyone was properly cared for in this Nazi utopia, including the animals (even in wartime, it seems, there were ration cards for dogs as well as people). The disabled, however, did not fare as well, since Hitler devised a eugenic solution for them. Nor, according to ‘Friedrich,’ “were idiots, morons and imbeciles possible under National Socialism, simply because such sorry specimens were not allowed to reproduce.”[97] Unashamedly, medical certificates of fitness or unfitness for child-bearing in the Third Reich are reproduced. “For… National Socialism is simply the application of Nature’s Laws to politics,” and “Hitler, the artist and designer, designed a society for loving human beings, not plastic dummies.”[98] Through this great struggle, the white Germanic messiah prevented “the end of White Civilization.” “

Perhaps Rev. Sizer should be more careful of what he recommends, particularly when such a blog contributes to the promotion of Holocaust denial and neo-Nazism?

(H/T: Seismic Shock)

Update 1:

Rev. Sizer on antisemitism:

“It is true that at various times in the past, churches and church leaders have tolerated or incited anti-Semitism and even attacks on Jewish people. Racism is a sin and without excuse. Anti-Semitism must be repudiated unequivocally. However, we must not confuse apples and oranges. Anti-Zionism is not the same thing as anti-Semitism despite attempts to broaden the definition. Criticising a political system as racist is not necessarily racist. Judaism is a religious system. Israel is a sovereign nation. Zionism is a political system. These three are not synonymous. I respect Judaism, repudiate anti-Semitism, encourage interfaith dialogue and defend Israel’s right to exist within borders recognised by the international community and agreed with her neighbours. But like many Jews, I disagree with a political system which gives preference to expatriate Jews born elsewhere in the world, while denying the same rights to the Arab Palestinians born in the country itself. Jimmy Carter is not alone in describing the Zionism practiced by the present government of Israel as a form of apartheid.”

Update 2: Whilst I am sure that Rev. Sizer is opposed to antisemitism, I am not so sure that he can recognize anti-Jewish Racism.

In a recent post Rev. Sizer expressed his support for the bigoted Helen Thomas. Readers will remember Ms. Thomas’s outburst:

“Rabbi Nessenoff: Any comments on Israel? We’re asking everybody today, any comments on Israel?
Helen Thomas: Tell ’em to get the hell out of Palestine.

Nessenoff: Oh. Any better comments on Israel?

Thomas: Remember, these people are occupied, and it’s their land. It’s not Germany, and it’s not Poland.

Nessenoff: So where should they go and what should they do?

Thomas: They should go home.

Nessenoff: Where’s their home?

Thomas: Poland. Germany.

Nessenoff: So you’re saying the Jews should go back to Poland and Germany?

Thomas: And America and everywhere else.”

I hope that Rev. Sizer pops in and has a read because I will explain for his benefit why Ms. Thomas’s remarks were so odious:

1) Typically bigots will say to ethnic minorities go home, we have all heard it before, particularly in Britain, “go back to Pakistan”, “go home to Africa”, etc

2) These are clear examples of xenophobia and racial prejudice.

3) This is the same way that Ms. Thomas is telling Jews to go back to Poland, the land where millions of them were killed.

4) Ms. Thomas and Rev. Sizer are expressly connecting Jews with Poland and implicitly arguing that is their historical homeland, along with Germany and elsewhere, despite how historically sensitive and offensive it is, given the mass murder of Jews in Germany and Poland.

5) To remind Rev. Sizer, after 1945 some Jews did return to Poland, but they were killed in pogroms by the Poles, so is that really the message that a man of the cloth should be sending?

These are Rev. Sizer’s views:

“Helen Thomas is one gutsy 90 year old lady to take on the Israel Lobby. In Haaretz earlier this week she gave her candid views on what led to her ‘retirement’.
…

Bring it on.

Read the rest of the article here”

[My emphasis.]

6) Quite frankly Rev. Sizer you must realise it has nothing to do with some supposed “Israel lobby”, it is the fact that Ms. Thomas was expressing racially offensive views, telling people who were born in the Middle East to go back to Poland.

7) It is like telling Afro-Americans to “go back to Africa”, a racialist point of view.

I would hope that you, Rev. Sizer, wouldn’t tell ethnic minorities in Britain to go back “home” either, would you?

I doubt it, because you would realise that it is groups, like the British National Party and the National Front, which articulate such ideas.

Again Rev. Sizer, Ms. Thomas is talking about Jews and no one else, I would hope that you could see that, eventually, and why it is a racist notion.

Update 3: I hope these comments from Lanny Davis help Rev. Sizer understand the racism in Ms. Thomas’s words:

“Helen Thomas, who I used to consider a close friend and who I used to respect, has showed herself to be an anti-Semitic bigot. This is not about her criticisms of Israel. She has a right to criticize Israel and that is not the same as being an anti-Semite.

However, her statement that Jews in Israel should leave Israel and go back to Poland or Germany is an ancient and well-known anti-Semitic stereotype of the Alien Jew not belonging in the “land of Israel” — one that began 2,600 years with the first tragic and violent diaspora of the Jews at the hands of the Romans.

If she had asked all blacks to go back to Africa, what would the White House Correspondents Association position be as to whether she deserved White House press room credentials — much less a privileged honorary seat?

Does anyone doubt that my friends Ann Compton, head of the WHCA, and Joe Lockhart, who believe in the First Amendment right of free expression as much as I do, would be as tolerant and protective of Helen’s privileges and honors in the White House press room as they appear to be if she had been asking Blacks to return to Africa? Or Native Americans to Asia and South America, from which they came 8,000 or more years ago? I doubt it.

Of course Helen has the right as a private citizen under the First Amendment to speak her mind, even as an anti-Jewish bigot — but not as a member, much less privileged member with a reserved seat, in the White House Press Corps. “

Viva Fidel Castro.

Fidel Castro has shown that he isn’t just a declining ex-dictator with an eye to history.

No, Castro may have largely controlled and manipulated events in Cuba for nearly 50 years, but he’s no old codger.

Castro may have inflicted one-party rule on Cubans and limited their lives irreparably, but he’s no fool.

Fidel Castro has done what countless Western “anti-imperialists” avoided doing.

Castro has robustly and openly condemned Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s racism.

Castro does more in one interview with Jeff Goldberg than most Western “anti-imperialists” have managed to do in years, Castro sees through Ahmadinejad’s antisemitism and he is clearly against it.

Goldberg summarises:

“Castro’s message to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the President of Iran, was not so abstract, however. Over the course of this first, five-hour discussion, Castro repeatedly returned to his excoriation of anti-Semitism. He criticized Ahmadinejad for denying the Holocaust and explained why the Iranian government would better serve the cause of peace by acknowledging the “unique” history of anti-Semitism and trying to understand why Israelis fear for their existence.
…
He said the Iranian government should understand the consequences of theological anti-Semitism. “This went on for maybe two thousand years,” he said. “I don’t think anyone has been slandered more than the Jews. I would say much more than the Muslims. They have been slandered much more than the Muslims because they are blamed and slandered for everything. No one blames the Muslims for anything.” The Iranian government should understand that the Jews “were expelled from their land, persecuted and mistreated all over the world, as the ones who killed God. “

Fidel Castro has stated concisely in a few paragraphs more than the concerted Western media would really like to acknowledge, the length and persistency of antisemitism, and how that plays a part in Israeli’s thinking.

Castro has stated openly that antisemitism lingers on today, that is something that Western “anti-imperialists” would do well to ponder.

Viva Fidel Castro!!!

(H/T: Engage)

Hamas and Holocaust Denial.

Engage highlights Hamas’s Holocaust denial:

“Hamas said it believed UNRWA was about to start using a text for 13-year-olds that included a chapter on the Holocaust.

In an open letter to local UNRWA chief John Ging, the movement’s Popular Committees for Refugees said: “We refuse to let our children study a lie invented by the Zionists.”

UNRWA spokesman Adnan Abu Hasna said: “There is no mention of the Holocaust in the current syllabus.” Asked if UNRWA planned to change that, he declined to comment.”

I wonder what Western sympathisers of Hamas will say to that?

My bet is that they’ll probably cough and change the subject rather quickly.

Ahmadinejad’s Racism.

Over the years some strange individuals in the West were arguing essentially that ‘Ahmadinejad is misunderstood, that he really wasn’t a racist’ and that his demagogic speeches were mistranslated.

These excuses became weaker and weaker as Ahmadinejad invited the creme de la creme of the world’s Holocaust denying sewer to Tehran, including the ex-Grand Wizard of the KKK, David Duke.

So now it will be all the more interesting to see how apologists, excusers and obfuscators in the West try to explain away the new Iranian web site, the truly disgusting HoloCartoons.com [Warning: link to an extreme racist site.]

The preface of their Flash booklet starts with:

“This book tends to denounce the conspicuous lie of the “planned murder of 6 million Jews during the Second World War” allegedly called “Holocaust”.

The lie which is so obvious that there is no need for any further explanation.”

I found the rest to be indescribably wretched. Wiki has a small entry on it.

Update 1:

After a bit of digging around it seems that the site is registered to:

”Registrant:
Shahbazi Ins.
Mohamad Mahdi Hemati

No 204, No 32 St., Janbazan e Sharghi St., Nabovvat Sq.
Tehran
Tehran,1649975683
IR
Tel. +98.9123789761
Fax. +98.2177209040

Creation Date: 10-Dec-2008
Expiration Date: 10-Dec-2010”

It goes through the DNS servers at mihannic.com, which is registered to:

”Registrant:
tsit
mihannic sales department

No 167 farhad ave.
mashhad
khorasan,91839
IR
Tel. +98.5117688642
Fax. +98.5117625855

Creation Date: 12-Nov-2005
Expiration Date: 12-Nov-2013”

Ahmadinejad, 9/11 and Denial.

I can’t quite work out if President Ahmadinejad reads 9/11 truther web sites or is so engrossed with the idea of “Zionist” plots that his speeches naturally flow from his Internet reading, or straight from his own built-in prejudices.

Whatever the case, no one can accuse him of being shy about his views and whilst reiterating his continued Holocaust denial President Ahmadinejad is now articulating 9/11 conspiracy theories, which naturally have his own brand of racism embedded in them, Reuters has more:

“(Reuters) – Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Saturday the September 11, 2001 attacks were exaggerated in a fresh broadside at the United States just days after President Barack Obama voiced willingness to talk to Iran.

Well-known for his anti-American and anti-Israeli rhetoric, the hardline populist Ahmadinejad also repeated his denial of the Nazi Holocaust in which six million Jews were killed.

Ahmadinejad said the September 11 attacks with hijacked airliners on New York and Washington D.C. had been trumped up as an excuse for the United States to invade Afghanistan and Iraq.

Speaking at a Tehran conference, Ahmadinejad said there was no evidence that the death toll at New York’s World Trade Center, destroyed in the attacks, was as high as reported and said “Zionists” had been tipped off in advance.

“What was the story of September 11? During five to six days, and with the aid of the media, they created and prepared public opinion so that everyone considered an attack on Afghanistan and Iraq as (their) right,” he said in a televised speech.

No “Zionists” were killed in the World Trade Center, according to Ahmadinejad, because “one day earlier they were told not go to their workplace.”

“They announced that 3,000 people were killed in this incident, but there were no reports that reveal their names. Maybe you saw that, but I did not,” he told a gathering of the Iranian news media.”

As you might expect President Ahmadinejad loses no time in reminding us of his views on the Holocaust:

“He had previously said the “9-11” attacks were a “big fabrication” and has rejected the historical record of the Holocaust. On Saturday, Ahmadinejad repeated his belief that the Holocaust had been invented to justify the creation of Israel.

“They made up an event, the so-called Holocaust which was later laid as the basis for the innocence of a group,” he said. “