From irimland@zundelsite.org Mon Apr 1 03:50:19 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Sun, 31 Mar 2002 19:50:19 -0800 Subject: ZGram - 3/31/2002 - "Ramallah - Another Sabra and Shatila?" Message-ID: Copyright (c) 2002 - Ingrid A. Rimland ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny March 27, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: This is a very scary development! I am only sending you a snippet but urge you to surf the internet on your own to find out what is happening in Ramallah, including additional www.rense.com documents, PARTICULARLY http://www.rense.com/general21/holo.htm I cannot bring myself to wish you Happy Easter! [START] Israel Closes Ramallah - Orders ALL Foreigners Out Middle East News Online 3-31-2 Jerusalem (MENO) - The Israeli Government Press Office (GPO) announced on Sunday that the West Bank city of Ramallah has been declared as a "closed military zone" and that no foreign citizens, including those from the media, are allowed to enter the area. "Anyone found in the closed zone, henceforth, will be removed. Members of the media are advised that their presence in the closed zone is at their own risk," said the GPO in a statement. The statement also said that foreign press offices employing Palestinians who work within Israel but lack proper entry and work permits are violating Israeli law and will be subject to fines and other sanctions in line with Israeli labor laws. GPO director Danny Seaman warned that any Palestinian found without the proper permits will face arrest, and bureaus will face consequences, including a fine of 70,000 shekels (about 15,020 U.S. dollars). In response, the Foreign Press Association issued a statement to protest the Israeli position. "The media must be allowed to cover this major story. We call upon the Israeli government to allow free and independent coverage of the operation in (Palestinians) areas," said the statement. [END] ===== Thought for the Day: "Men willingly believe what they wish." (Julius Caesar) From irimland@zundelsite.org Tue Apr 2 04:26:40 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Mon, 1 Apr 2002 20:26:40 -0800 Subject: ZGram - 4/1/2002 - "Is this the moment of no return?" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 1, 2002, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: [START] The Murder of Arafat by Uri Avnery If Ariel Sharon succeeds in murdering Yasser Arafat, as he wants to, the Palestinian leader will remain in the collective memory of his people, and the whole Arab world, like Moses in Jewish memory. Moses rebelled against Egyptian oppression, led his people forth from "the house of bondage", led them for 40 years in the desert, made a new people out of them and brought them to the threshold of the Promised Land. He did not enter the land itself - God only showed it to him from afar. That will be told about Arafat, too, if he becomes a martyr now. Moses is, of course, a mythological figure. No serious scholar in the world believed that the exodus from Egypt really happened. Experts explain that it could not have taken place at all. But that is not really important: the mythological Moses shaped the consciousness of the Jewish people more than any flesh-and-blood leader of a nomad tribe in the desert could have done. The Haggada, the book read on Passover's eve by almost every Jewish family throughout the world, commands us to feel as if we ourselves had set forth from Egypt. The basic Jewish ethos is built on this premise. The text of Ten Commandments in Deuteronomium 5 explains why on the holy Sabbath the servants and slaves must be allowed to rest, too: "Remember that thou wast a slave in the land of Egypt." In the new myth that is being born before our eyes, Sharon is the Pharaoh and we are the ancient Egyptians. In the story about the Exodus, the Bible lets God say: "I have hardened (Pharaoh's) heart and the heart of his servants." After every calamity that befell him, Pharaoh broke his promise to free the Israelites. Why? What was God's purpose? He wanted the Israelites to become hardened by the hardship, before they started on their long march. This is what is happening to the Palestinians now. So what will happen if an Israeli bullet kills Arafat now? After Moses, no second Moses appeared, but Jehosuah, the merciless warrior who committed genocide. (This, by the way, is also a myth. All serious scholars believe that this holy genocide never actually happened.) After Arafat, the heir will not be Abu-this or Abu-that. It will be Brother Kalachnikoff - like the song we used to sing in our youth, during the fight against the British occupation: "Give the floor to Comrade Parabellum, Give the floor to Comrade Tommy-gun." Parabellum was a pistol, tommy-gun a sub-machine-gun. There will be no Palestinian Quisling - and if a candidate would be found, he would be killed the next day, like Sharon's Lebanese Quisling, Bashir Jumail. Dozens of local guerilla leaders will take over, and they will start a campaign of revenge that may go on for many years, not only in the country, but throughout the world. The life of every Israeli will become hell, all the world will become a Jerusalem-style Ben-Yehuda street. No Israeli embassy, no airplane, no tourist will be safe. The dead Arafat will be by far more dangerous than the living Aarafat. The living Arafat is able and willing to make peace. The dead Arafat can not. He will eternalize the conflict. In our days, historians wonder what folly took possession of the Jewish people 1930 years ago, causing them to start a hopeless rebellion against the Roman empire and bringing utter destruction upon the Jewish commonwealth in Palestine. A hundred years from now, historians will ask themselves what folly took possession of this people, causing it to elect Sharon, a bloody person who has not done anything in life apart from shedding blood and set up settlements. What folly took possession of this people, causing it to prefer settlements and some territories to peace and conciliation? And how does this people remain indifferent, when the whole Arab world offers it - perhaps for the last time! - real peace and normal relations, and the public is listening to the silly ranting of politicians and commentators, who ridicule the offer and cheer Sharon on, at the start of a bloody campaign worse than any one before? History remembers the few, who warned the people of the disaster that is bound to follow if they listen to the Zealots. History will remember us, the few who are warning the people now of the disaster that will befall all of us, if we follow Sharon and his gang. Let's hope that our voices will be heard in time, so that we can start on a new road. If Arafat will be murdered, it will be the moment of no return. [end] [The author has closely followed the career of Sharon for four decades. Over the years, he has written three extensive biographical essays about him, two (1973, 1981) with his cooperation.] ===== THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: "For art may err, but nature cannot miss." (John Dryden) From irimland@zundelsite.org Wed Apr 3 06:25:42 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Tue, 2 Apr 2002 22:25:42 -0800 Subject: ZGram - 4/2/2002 - "...and guess who screened the passengers?" Message-ID: Copyright (c) 2002 - Ingrid A. Rimland ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 2, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Yet another telling piece of the puzzle as the Internet puts together the 9/11 picture. In light of the information below, it proves that security people in the government know far more than they let the public know. It would explain the nationalizing of America's airports. Yet one more evidence that there is a silent struggle going on below the surface to take control of America again. The piece below was posted on www.whatreallyhappened.com - a very popular Internet site: [START] ALL THE 9-11 AIRPORTS SERVICED BY ONE ISRAELI OWNED COMPANY It's one of those times when an inoccuous comment in an unrelated news report triggers a revelation. In the article at http://afrocubaweb.com/news/israelispying.htm there is the following paragraph. "To make the situation worse, a private security company called ICTS, owned by an Israeli, Ezra Harel, and registered in the Netherlands, was employed at Charles de Gaulle airport to screen passengers boarding US planes. Most of its personnel are ex-Shin Bet officers. The company covers security at Boston's Logan airport, where the American Airlines plane came down after flight attendants and passengers overpowered Reid." The point of thie article was that ICTS knew Reid was dangerous, but allowed him on board a flight from Tel Aviv to Paris. Maybe they did and maybe they didn't. But the idea that an Israeli owned company had inside access to the airport used to launch an abortive terror attack brought to mind the strange message Odigo Systems, another Israeli owned company with offices near the World Trade Towers, received that warned of the impending attacks before the hijacked planes had even left the ground. So, I went back to another story that had surfaced briefly, reported about how at least one hijacker had smuggled a GUN aboard one of the hijacked planes. Even prior to 9-11, getting a gun on board a passenger plane represented a serious lapse of security. I wondered why this story of a gun was being concealed behind talk of box cutters and screwdrivers. Then I went back to the first article and its mention that ICTS handled security at Logan International Airport, from which two of the 9-11 hijacked planes had departed. Sure enough, a visit to ICTS' own web site at http://www.icts-int.com/ confirms that ICTS is in fact an Israeli owned company, and that it sells services to every airport from which the hijacked planes operated, including security, sometimes through wholly owned subsidieries like Huntleigh USA Corporation. It has been suggested that the incredible feat of hijacking four aircraft without a single arrest at the gate would require the resouces of a nation-state. This is even more true with the revelation that at least one gun had managed to be aboard a hijacked plane. One company had automatic inside access to all of the airports from which hijacked planes departed on 9-11, and to the airports used by Richard Reid, the shoe bomber. An Israeli company. One that Mossad agents could easily find employment with without the management knowing who they were or what their purpose really was. But one thing is clear. By virtue of the Odigo warning, someone knew enough about the planned attacks to warn Odigo before the planes had even departed the airport gates, yet they did not call the Israeli security company at the airports which could have stopped the flights from leaving. Think about that one for a while. "Evidence linking these Israelis to 9/11 is classified. I cannot tell you about evidence that has been gathered. It's classified information." -- US official quoted in Carl Cameron's Fox News report on the Israeli spy ring. "Investigators within the DEA, INS and FBI have all told Fox News that to pursue or even suggest Israeli spying ... is considered career suicide." -- Carl Cameron, as quoted in The Spies Who Came In From The Art Sale "While I agree with you, if I say anything about US geopolitical interests with Israel, I might as well clean off my desk." -- Unnamed reporter as quoted in American Media Censorship and Israel [END] ===== Thought for the Day - trite but true: "You get what you pay for." (Gabriel Biel) From irimland@zundelsite.org Thu Apr 4 03:22:42 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Wed, 3 Apr 2002 19:22:42 -0800 Subject: ZGram - 4/3/2002 - "The Worst-Case Scenario" Message-ID: Today's telling ZGram as things look very dangerous indeed: [START] The Worst-Case Scenario By Edward N. Luttwak Time.com 4-3-2 Few still hope that Yasser Arafat could ever be Israel's partner in peace, but many now feel that his predicament could become the catalyst of a much larger conflict. If it began to unfold, it could unleash pent-up forces and take on a disastrous momentum of its own. When the possibility arose that Arafat might be killed in the ruins of his headquarters, there was undisguised panic among Arab governments. What they dreaded also greatly alarmed their European counterparts, as well as the U.S. and even the Israelis themselves: uncontrollable mass demonstrations in Arab capitals that might compel reluctant rulers to try to attack Israel in turn. How would it begin? In one grim scenario, it would start with Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, who is in the most exposed position of all. His controlled media have long been replete with fervent anti-Israeli propaganda in a deliberate attempt to deflect attention from corruption and mismanagement at home. Endless television replays of the most brutal scenes of the Israeli occupation have hammered home the message that Egypt's most urgent concern is the plight of the Palestinians. At the same time, what is still a military-based regime justifies large expenditures on the armed forces amid extreme poverty by boasting of their strength. Mubarak therefore risks becoming the prisonerof his own propaganda: If Palestine is all-important and Egypt that strong, why not use its strength against the Israelis? The least dangerous Egyptian move would be disastrous in its consequences. Violating Anwar Sadat's peace treaty, cutting itself off from vital U.S. aid, the Egyptian army could send part of its vast forces--say, the four tank divisions and eight mechanized divisions with 1,600 battle tanks, including first-line U.S. M1A1s--into the Sinai peninsula to threaten the Israeli frontier. Compelling the Israelis to mobilize their own army, which would very likely freeze any further action against the Palestinians, would make sense as a piece of military gamesmanship. But strategically it would be catastrophic, because if the Egyptians acted, Syria's young and insecure President Bashar Assad would most likely feel compelled to compete with them by sending his own armored forces--seven divisions with 2,000 tanks--to threaten the Golan frontier. And then even King Abdullah of Jordan, who greatly values his peace treaty with Israel, might come under irresistible pressure from his Palestinian subjects to send his two armored and two mechanized divisions, equipped with some 700 tanks, opposite the Jordanian frontier. None of this need be done with any intention of actually fighting to provoke a war nonetheless. Other Arab governments could be propelled by a mounting spiral of popular enthusiasm to send their own forces to reinforce the frontline states. That would cue Saddam Hussein to demand his opportunity to send armored forces to threaten Israel by marching through Jordan or Syria or both. The King of Jordan would dread such contaminating assistance in his territory, and Assad of Syria too would fear it, but if the rhetorical escalation of the leaders and popular agitation heat up the climate, it might become impossible to deny passage to Iraqi forces in part because they might bring with them the chemical or even biological weapons that evoke the special enthusiasm of Hamas and other fundamentalists. Finally, there is the Hizballah militia in southern Lebanon, already deployed close to Israel's northern frontier with hundreds of bombardment rockets ready to strike as far away as the port city of Haifa. Competing mobilizations amid mounting waves of popular enthusiasm would be a direct replay of what happened in 1967, which back then triggered humiliating Arab military defeats and the Israeli occupation of Gaza, the West Bank and the Golan Heights, which still endures. For that very reason the scenario might seem exceedingly improbable. As the frequent references to 7th century events in political speeches show, Arabs have excellent historical memories. Even those born after 1967 know the story very well. Certainly each government has powerful reasons to refrain from anything more than diplomatic protests even if Arafat is killed. Egypt would lose the U.S. aid that pays for the very weapons it would deploy ($2 billion a year) and for much of its daily bread. Jordan is likewise dependent, Syria's equipment is too outdated to risk war, and even Saddam Hussein can hardly threaten Israel with ballistic missiles and weapons of mass destruction whose existence he strenuously denies. But madness is rare only among individuals. It is quite common in entire nations. The Israelis themselves might reasonably be said to be mad to think they can have a tranquil occupation of Palestinian areas--actually they are merely split down the middle between those who have long wanted to withdraw and those who think land is more important than peace. As for the Arab leaders, what might cause them to behave irrationally is their lack of legitimacy--nobody elected them, very few of their subjects respect their competence, and lately many are seen as the slavish stooges of the U.S. If the Arab-buildup scenario came to pass, the Israelis would be forced to mobilize some 425,000 reservists to staff their armed forces, a large part of their entire able-bodied population. Because it would paralyze their economy and indeed society as a whole, mobilization cannot last much more than a few weeks at most. Unless diplomatic pressure induces the Arab forces to withdraw again, the Israelis would attack to force them into flight or destroy them, as in 1967. But for the Israelis such a war would not be a repeat of 1967. Since then, the military balance has moved greatly in favor of Israel. Almost useless in stopping suicide bombers, downright clumsy in facing stone-throwing teenagers, the Israeli armed forces are much better at doing what they are trained and equipped to do: smash regular forces with superior firepower and skill. With some 400 first-line strike aircraft and a large inventory of guided weapons (Israel is a major producer and exporter), they have a combination of weapon loads and accuracy that would be devastating to Arab ground forces. If Arab air forces were to intervene to protect them, it is believed that the Israelis would shoot down at least 30 aircraft for each loss of their own (in 1982 they scored 80-0 against the Syrians). The Israeli army's 11 armored divisions would be outnumbered, but Israeli armored columns are trained to move significantly faster than their enemies, to outmaneuver them if the terrain allows, while their gunnery--100% the product of female instructors--is thought to be far superior. The Israelis would have no surefire way of stopping the Hizballah from launching its huge inventory of Iranian-supplied bombardment rockets at the villages and cities of northern Israel. Although grossly inaccurate, they would still inflict damage. Syria also has hundreds of bombardment rockets, some with chemical warheads, but unlike the Hizballah guerrillas, it must fear Israeli retaliation. No Arab air force is likely to be much of a threat to Israeli cities, while if Saddam Hussein chooses to blow his cover by launching the handful of ballistic missiles he has kept hidden all these years, they are unlikely to do much damage. In 1991 the 50 Scud missiles fired into Israel frightened many but killed nobody. Even if Iraqi missiles have nerve gas or anthrax warheads, they are unlikely to kill more than a few. The theoretical potency of agents like VX--one tiny drop kills--or anthrax is defeated by the mechanics of distribution and dilution. A missile warhead would have to open up to release its cargo on top of a crowd to kill many, and that is a far more advanced capability than Saddam Hussein could possibly have. But, of course, even a splendid victory would be disastrous for Israel, because at great expense in wealth and blood, it would gain nothing in the aftermath that it did not have before the current crisis: safety from invasion. And any outcome at all would be disastrous for Western and especially American interests. Nobody can even bear to contemplate an utterly improbable Israeli defeat. But if Arab leaders are humiliatingly defeated, the most likely outcome of a war, the fundamentalists would have their first real chance of coming to power. Arafat's ineffectual strategy and utter recklessness have thus caused a crisis that induces all, even the Israelis, to wish him a long life, for his death might precipitate the most damaging of wars. Edward N. Luttwak is the author of Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101020408/scenario.html ===== [END] From irimland@zundelsite.org Fri Apr 5 02:55:43 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2002 18:55:43 -0800 Subject: ZGram - 4/4/2002 - "Your friendly neighborhood spy" - Part II Message-ID: Copyright (c) 2002 - Ingrid A. Rimland ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 4, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: This is the last of a two-part series on the hidden workings of the Anti-Defamation League and how three Bay Area activists were able to uncover a spy operation that reached into the San Francisco Police Department. [START] Today: Acerbic battle leaves sour taste. By Dan Evans Of The San Francisco Examiner Staff After nearly a decade of fighting the Anti-Defamation League in court, attorney Pete McCloskey is as bitter as a man who consumed a gallon of vinegar. The former Republican congressman from San Mateo, who recently won a settlement from the civil rights group for three Bay Area residents, is still tending to emotional wounds he endured from the ADL simply for defending his clients' rights. "They come after anyone that disagrees with them," he said of the organization's tactics to paint him as an anti-Semite. The decorated retired Marine, who represented his San Mateo County district in the House of Representatives from 1967 to 1983, is anything but an ideologue. He was one of the few Republicans who opposed the Vietnam War and fought with President Nixon on numerous occasions. While he vehemently denies any ties to anti-Semitic or neo-Nazis groups, some of the avenues he chose to express his views have not helped his case. Anti-Semitic newspaper While in Congress, McCloskey granted an interview in 1982 with the anti-Semitic newspaper Spotlight. And in May 2000, he gave a speech at a conference of the Institute of Historical Review, a Holocaust revisionist group. McCloskey spoke to the Spotlight because, he believes, one should speak to people they disagree with as much as people they agree with. The newspaper was the publication of the now-defunct Liberty Lobby. Though he acknowledged the newspaper's subscribers were primarily right-wingers and racists, ascribing him similar views are ridiculous, he said. "Not a year didn't go by during the years I was in Congress that the Spotlight didn't blast me as being a liberal Republican," he said. In the Oct. 11, 1982 edition of the paper, McCloskey said Republicans were far better politically positioned than Democrats to push for a Palestinian state because GOP candidates were not as beholden to Jewish money to get elected. "The battle will be for public opinion in the United States, whether the Congress will be willing to back Reagan and stand up to the Jewish lobby in this country," he said. However, he also stated in the interview that he disagreed with 90 percent of the group's views, and suggested that peace in the Middle East would only be realized when the United States gave equal merit to both Arab and Israeli viewpoints. Disagreement As for his connection to the Institute of Historical Review, McCloskey said he respected the group's determination to question historical records. He said he strongly disagreed with the group's view on the Holocaust, but supported its right to say it. In a letter last year to the group's president, Mark Weber, McCloskey spoke of his visits to death camps and his conviction that "there was a deliberate policy of extermination of Jews, Poles, gypsies and homosexuals by the Nazi leadership." McCloskey also suggested Weber's group give up its views about the Holocaust, and instead focus on what he called the ADL's distortions of truth, one of them being its claim McCloskey was a Holocaust denier. "It was like when Bush went down to Bob Jones University, and his political opponents tried to identify him with Bob Jones," he said, referring to the conservative South Carolina school that, until recently, prohibited interracial dating. "It's ridiculous." "The primary view of the ADL is that Jews should not be stereotyped or guilty by association," he continued. "Yet you see them trying to discredit people by virtue of their association." One of his clients, Steve Zeltzer, acknowledged he wasn't entirely comfortable with McCloskey going to the Institute of Historical Review convention. Still, he said, he supports the right of free speech, even if he strongly disagrees with the content. "I wouldn't have done it, and I was opposed to him going," Zeltzer said. "I wouldn't attend one of their conferences. They have a right to say what they want to say, but I don't support their positions." Another client, Anne Poirier, said she had not heard about her attorney's attendance at the conference and so couldn't comment on it. "One thing I know for sure, though, is he's not an anti-Semite," said the Berkeley resident. "I'll go mano-a-mano with anybody that says so." [END] ===== Thought for the Day: "No one returns with good will to the place which has done him a mischief." (Phaedrus) From irimland@zundelsite.org Fri Apr 5 02:56:59 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2002 18:56:59 -0800 Subject: ZGram - 4/5/2002 - "Traveling to Israel, by any chance?" Message-ID: Copyright (c) 2002 - Ingrid A. Rimland ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 5, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: I am glad to pass this one along to my eagle-eyed pundits, sent to me from a loyal ZGram reader: [START] My employer, the Northrup-Grumman Corp. issued this security alert to all of its 100,000 employees in 25 states today 4/3/2002. ES Security Posts Worldwide Security Alert & Israeli Travel Moratorium Due to Middle East Violence Electronic Systems Sector Security has posted a 10-day moratorium on travel to Israel, effective today, April 3rd, 2002. This halt to business travel to Israel is based on significant attacks to the civilian population in the major cities of Israel, increasing the level of risk to American business travelers in all areas of the country to an untenable level. There have been six attacks over the past six days, three within the interior of the country including last Wednesday's Passover massacre in Netanya, Saturday's cafe bombing in Tel Aviv, and Sunday's restaurant bombing in Haifa. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon told Israelis on Sunday evening that the "State of Israel is in a war." Sharon has closed all access to the West Bank and ordered international journalists to leave as the offensive in that area continues to expand. Sector Security will continue to monitor the local situation and will update employees within the ten day period. Critical travel to Israel will be evaluated by the Sector. (...) Employees should also be aware that the hostilities have expanded beyond the Palestinian-Israel border. Anti-Israeli backlash in the form of vandalism and street violence has been reported in Western and Central Europe, as well as the Middle East. Employees are cautioned to keep their distance from Jewish and Israeli interests, including diplomatic missions, synagogues, schools, graveyards, shops, and cultural institutions. The violence could also turn onto American interests as pro-Palestinian groups target US interests to demonstrate their criticism of the US position in the Middle East Crisis. As always, employees are encouraged to be alert to their surroundings and keep a low profile. For further updates, visit the sector's International Security site at http://iisdevfp.md.essd.northgrum.com/eHR/security/international.htm and click on "TRANSECURE" (http://www.ououa2.com/Main/) for updated threat information. [END] ===== Thought for the Day: "What fools these mortals be." (Seneca) From irimland@zundelsite.org Fri Apr 5 02:58:11 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2002 18:58:11 -0800 Subject: ZGram - 4/6/2002 - "Sobran: Can this war be won?" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 6, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Another thoughtful column from the pen of one of my all-time favorite American writers: [START] Can This War Be Won? by Joseph Subran Why does everyone seem to assume the United States is winning - or can ever win - the amorphous "war on terrorism"? Shortly after the 9/11 attacks we seemed to realize that we were in a new period of warfare, unlike conventional wars between states. Even President Bush warned that we might never know when this war is over. In conventional terms, the war is going well for the United States. It's inflicting enormous damage on Afghanistan while suffering few casualties. There have been no successful terrorist operations within the United States since the war began. (Never mind that the enemy forces seem to have escaped.) We have already forgotten last fall's tremendous anxiety over possible chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons within our borders. We are beginning to feel victorious and omnipotent again, if not quite as invulnerable as we once felt. In truth, this war appeals chiefly to our nostalgia for World War II: it offers the satisfaction of bombing suspected enemy strongholds without suffering reciprocal bombing at home. It makes us feel that the good old days of American power are back. But Bush had it right the first time. We will never know whether our enemies have been decisively weakened. If Osama bin Laden were to resurface and surrender, he couldn't guarantee that his fellow fanatics would throw in the towel too. Some of them surely would not. If - tomorrow, next year, ten years from now - someone who hates America should get hold of a second-hand Russian nuclear device and smuggle it into Manhattan, blowing it up with conventional explosives, the ensuing panic, even if there were fewer deaths than on September 11, could paralyze economic life in this country. The principle of terrorism is simple. All social life depends on our implicit trust that strangers won't harm us without a reason. Terrorism is violence calculated to destroy that trust. Anyone, even a lone individual, can do that. It's absurd even to speak of a "war on terrorism." So the Bush administration is pretending that this is really in essence a conventional - i.e., winnable - war, a war against an identifiable enemy, and is targeting regimes it thinks it can defeat with conventional forces, with an occasional hint that it may resort to nuclear weapons. It also tries to shore up American morale by repeating that the enemy is "evil," rather than, say, "cussed" or "ornery." But since we can never know whether the war has been won, we can only know that it's making us more enemies. The Roman Empire made a vicious war on early Christianity, which didn't even fight back, yet the martyrs won so many converts that the Empire itself eventually became Christian. The Israelis have been fighting terrorism for decades, yet they now face more and worse terrorism than ever before. You can neither deter nor punish those who are willing to die in order to hurt you. It may already be too late, but we should ask ourselves why we are hated with such extreme bitterness. To ask this question is not necessarily to "blame America." It is merely to try to understand the enemy's motive, as a good chess player tries to understand his opponent's moves - not to seek defeat, but to avoid it. If you can never know whether you have won a war on terrorism, can you ever know if you have lost? The U.S. Government can never really lose, because its resources are inexhaustible. It can tax us and prune away our freedoms while claiming it does these things to protect us. And since we are much easier targets than the supposed enemy, the "war on terrorism" amounts to a war on the victims of terrorism. In Randolph Bourne's famous aphorism, "War is the health of the state." Our government doesn't mind if its war actually hurts us more than it hurts the nominal enemy. Yet I don't doubt that Bush sincerely believes he is waging this war for our sake. Only time will tell whether our government has bitten off more than it can chew. And time may take a long time to tell us. In the end we may learn that the war has only aggravated the problem it set out to eliminate. If Bush's aim were to save American lives, rather than to preserve American empire, he might take these steps: call off the war, close U.S. military bases abroad, bring American military personnel home, and ask for an end to U.S. support for foreign regimes, particularly Israel. For additional safety, he might also announce his conversion to Islam. That would be no more improbable than the other steps, would it? April 3, 2002 [END] ===== Joe Sobran is a nationally syndicated columnist. He also edits Sobran's, a monthly newsletter of his essays and columns. He invites you to try his new collection of aphorisms, "Anything Called a 'Program' Is Unconstitutional: Confessions of a Reactionary Utopian." You can get a free copy by subscribing or renewing your subscription to Sobran's. Just call 800-513-5053, or see his website, www.sobran.com. (He's still available for speaking engagements too.) ===== Thought for the Day: "The desire of power in excess caused the angels to fall." (Bacon) From irimland@zundelsite.org Fri Apr 5 02:59:58 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2002 18:59:58 -0800 Subject: ZGram - 4/7/2002 - Ethnic Cleansing Israeli Style - Part I of 3 Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 7, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: This essay needs no introduction. Read for yourself - force yourself to read it all the way: [START] Geov Parrish Witness to horror Nothing excuses the cold-blooded Israeli attacks upon the civilian population of Palestine Eyewitness accounts are pouring out of Ramallah, Bethlehem, and other points where the Israeli Army is engaged in a full-scale attack upon the civilian population of Palestine. =46or the moment, one has to go to the Internet (the Jerusalem IMC is a good place to start) to get the worst of it; unlike media in the rest of the world, U.S. reports are frequently pulling their punches in the name of "balance," cowed both by Israeli attacks upon foreign journalists and by domestic sensibilities in the United States. As one Israeli commentator pointed out this week, since the beginning of this wave of Palestinian attacks in fall 2000, more Israelis have died in car accidents than by suicide bombings. Dying at the hands of someone who hates you for your citizenship (or religion) somehow feels different. But no matter how horrific Israel's losses have been at the hands of Palestinian suicide bombers, nothing -- absolutely nothing -- excuses the cold-blooded Israeli attacks upon the civilian population of Palestine that continue as you read this. Reports from Israel suggest Ariel Sharon's government intends to wage this "campaign" until all of Palestine has been subjected to it. The attacks doubtless seem to many Americans like just another war -- more tragic, perhaps, because "they're always fighting over there," but basically an unsolvable mess the United States is only tangentially related to. We're not, of course. The United States is inextricably linked -- by weapons sales, aid programs, investment, and the eyes of the world -- to whatever Israel does. And this is no "ordinary" war; it is not even a war, because with few exceptions the "enemy" is not shooting back, is not even present. And in the course of the resulting death and destruction, Israel is violating just about every known convention for how humanity has agreed to conduct itself during its most inhumane moments. Consider these accounts from the last 48 hours: "The Israeli aircrafts have already started firing at [the] Aida Refugees' camp.... The Israeli soldiers do not care anymore at whom their guns are pointed." -- George Rishmawi, Bethlehem. "More than 150 Israeli tanks invaded [the Bethlehem area from all directions. Heavy shooting and shelling is regular all morning long. The Israeli army is moving towards the Church of Nativity. Bethlehem is sliced into a dozen isolated areas. Soldiers and Apaches are shooting at any moving target." -- Ghassan, Bethlehem. "Tonight we have heard numerous reports of 30 Palestinian policemen executed in cold blood by Israeli soldiers in a building where they sought refuge on Irssal Street in Ramallah. This was after five Palestinian officers were executed by being shot [in] the head and then had their corpses thrown on the pavement for hours on Friday. Ambulances are prevented from reaching their destinations and two hospitals have either been broken into [Arabcare] or shot at [Nazer Maternity Hospital]...One of the employees of the Sakakini Center [said] the Israeli army burst into his village [Kobar] yesterday, destroyed belongings and arrested his younger brother, alongside 30 other young men from the village. "The cleaning lady of the Center lives in a house with an outhouse for toilets. For three days the Israelis have been posted by the door to her house and preventing all exit. When the eldest today sneaked out to the outhouse, the Israelis caught him and beat him. His school teacher father tried to intervene, [and] the Israelis beat him and arrested him. "One of the board members of our center was arrested with all the employees of the office building where he was working late Thursday night. They were all blindfolded and had their hands tied and placed in one room for 16 hours. The Israelis destroyed some office furniture and stole hard drives from computers. They all untied themselves once they realized the Israelis had gone on to bigger prey. "My next-door neighbor's 70+-year-old father lives near Yasser Arafat's office. The Israelis broke into his home Friday, broke everything with the butts of their rifles (TV, sinks, furniture, etc=8A) and then stole some money. "There are reports also of Israeli soldiers breaking into banks and change offices and jewelry stores and stealing money and jewelry...." -- Adila Laidi, Director, Khalil Sakakini Cultural Centre, Ramallah. "Israeli tanks were waiting outside the front of the house. Israelis have been going into houses taking food and leaving. Also, they have been going into houses and taking all men ages 15 to 50. Some have been taken away. Others have been stripped and left in the street for several hours in the cold and rain. "This morning the President of the Red Crescent Society [Red Cross] [Younis Al-Khatib] was taken from his office by Israeli soldiers, made to crawl on his hands and knees in the street in the rain, and then arrested. Many medics have been arrested. PRCS officially announced that there is no ambulance service for the sick and injured in Ramallah. Israelis will not let ambulances pass, and the medics are taken away." --Caroline, Ramallah, as told via phone to a Seattle friend. "Things here are shifting again slightly, but not enough. there are still large numbers of wounded in Manger Square in the center of the old city, and many dead lying in the streets or in houses from which they cannot be removed [update this second: the family who had two members killed by a tank shell have managed to get them out]. The mosque, in which people were hiding, was shelled by tanks, and there are 150-200 holed up in the Church of the Nativity; we've just spoken to one of them and no medics have been allowed through but nuns have been attending the injured. Injured in [the] Deheishe refugee camp have also been denied access to [a] hospital, and we've just watched from our window as Israeli troops surrounded and searched a Red Crescent ambulance. "Another ambulance was crushed by a tank this morning in Beit Kala. A group of internationals attempted to accompany an ambulance to Manger Square to get humanitarian aid to those trapped, but they were fired on; apparently the Israelis had chosen (without telling anyone) that they would use their clocks and not Palestinian time to time the curfew and thus decided to shoot at people.... "In Ramallah, a group of 2,000 Israelis [Gush Shalom] and Arab Israelis attempting to deliver food and medical supplies were stopped and heavily teargassed. One truck of aid was allowed through, but the soldiers then emptied it and stamped on the medical supplies, leaving the food on the ground." --Sarah Irving, International Solidarity Movement, Bethlehem. And so they come in, account after account, endlessly detailing a systematic attack by a marauding army upon a helpless, impoverished civilian population: denying food, denying medical supplies, denying care for the wounded, stealing what they like and destroying the rest, arbitrarily arresting, beating, torturing, and even executing large numbers of people for the crime of being Palestinian and male, and specifically attacking neutrals -- not just medics, but journalists and internationals who can tell the world what Israel is doing. All of these are violations not just of the Geneva Convention, but just about any international law or standard relating to warfare that can be imagined. This is not an invasion, but an attack upon civilians who have already lived under Israeli military rule for 35 years. That military is now carrying out calculated actions thought by many to be unimaginable in the 21st century. For much of the world, the United States -- which, to the extent it has said anything at all, still seems to blame Yassar Arafat for this spectacle -- is equally culpable. =46or the last two days, I have been trying to distill what needs to be written about these atrocities, and U.S. complicity in them; instead, the list keeps expanding. This is due, in part, to the presence of the "internationals," courageous activists from around the world bearing witness and acting as shields in the worst of the attack areas. (They will be the subject of tomorrow's column.) As it happens, I know no less than four of them. Two, in fact, are volunteers (and personal friends) with the community newspaper I help publish in Seattle, Eat the State!; they had offered ahead of time to write of their experiences for ETS!. One was in the group shot at on Monday; the other is waiting, nervously, in the Azza refugee camp near Bethlehem, having refused a U.S. embassy offer of evacuation. Another international is a former intern at Seattle Weekly, where I work. Personally knowing people who are in the midst of this catastrophe makes a difference, but it shouldn't. Another ETS! volunteer went on a similar delegation in January; here's what happened to his host family in Ramallah: "Our friend Mahmoud (47 years old) and his son Majd (18 years old) were arrested and taken out of their apartment in Ramallah this morning....All the other Palestinian males in their building were also arrested. Israeli soldiers have been going from house to house for days arresting all Palestinian males under 45 -- and apparently some that are older. "At this writing [Tuesday] there have been at least 14 summary executions of prisoners in Ramallah, with reports of many more than that. One report describes prisoners in a large room being roughly divided into two groups, one group to be held, one group to be shot. "Mahmoud...was released tonight. Mahmoud is currently in too much pain to stand up. After being beaten and kicked in the back while in custody, he was released and allowed to walk home -- about seven miles....Several older men were released with him. Mahmoud's son Majd is still in custody, along with all the other young men. It is Majd's first arrest. The family is hoping he will come home alive." =46or all of the Palestinian families hoping their sons, husbands, and fathers will survive, there is something we can do. The United States still has, if it so chooses, tremendous influence over this situation. If these scenes, and countless more like them, do not fit your idea of civilized behavior -- let alone democracy -- call the White House. Call your Congresspeople. Call your local talk shows, write and e-mail letters to the editor, get in touch with international aid groups. This is a horror unfolding before our eyes, and the United States, alone among international actors, has the power to make it stop; we, alone among outraged people around the world, have the power to petition a government (outside Israel) that can make it stop. Let's use it. =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D Geov Parrish is a Seattle-based columnist and reporter for Seattle Weekly, In These Times and Eat the State! He writes the weekdaily Straight Shot for WorkingForChange. =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D Thought for the Day: "We come too late to say anything which has not been said already." (Jean de la Bruyere) From irimland@zundelsite.org Fri Apr 5 03:01:27 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2002 19:01:27 -0800 Subject: ZGram - 4/8/2002 - "Ethnic Cleansing Israeli Style - Part II of 3" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 8, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Another example of Ethnic cleansing - Israeli Style: [START] Eyewitness Account From American Student In Ramallah ElectricIntifada.org 4-3-2 RAMALLAH, Occupied Palestine - My name is Tzaporah Ryter. I am an American student from the University of Minnesota. I currently am in Ramallah. We are under a terrible siege and people are being massacred by both the Israeli army and armed militia groups of Israeli settlers. They are shooting outside at anything that moves. I am urgently pleading for as much outside help as possible to help save lives here. I arrived in Ramallah last Thursday. I had come back for a visit to the Palestinian city where I had been previously living and studying. On Thursday afternoon, the Israeli army began sealing off each entrance to Ramallah and there were rumors that they planned to invade. People were rushing back home from across checkpoints and also people were trying to flee. People were not allowed to go out and many working people with homes and children to return to were not allowed in,everyone was trying to take cover. Those traveling in began desperately searching for alternative ways and traveling in groups, but the Israelis were firing upon them and everyone was running and screaming. Women carrying their children were trying desperately to flee from Ramallah,carrying infants and toddlers, and their young children were running along in the rain through the fields, slipping and falling on the rocks, trying to reach safety. Israeli jeeps were speeding across the terrain pulling up from every direction and shooting at the women and children, and also at me, as we ran in opposite directions. They were chasing down people, hunting them like that in the fields. When I reached Ramallah, people were panicking and trying to buy bread, rice and milk from corner stores, but most supplies were already gone. We bought what we could and went inside to wait for what was coming. When night fell, Israeli tanks began to invade and also we saw Israeli troops coming on foot from the valley, and surrounding our house. I could hear them calling to each other in Hebrew. They were against our door and all around. They were firing everywhere a barrage of bullets and there was tank fire. We had to lay on the floor and keep silent. We stayed there, on the floor, for nearly four days in the darkness. We knew that our circumstances were better than others because old people or infants or people with medical emergency needs had no help. It was very cold, with most families packed all in one room. Some people are without life sustaining medicines like insulin, and they are altering their doses dangerously if they have any medicine left to take. People are becoming dangerously sick from lack of food and water and heat. The fear and terror only makes things worse, but it cannot be avoided. In the daytime, we heard them shooting people in the streets, and could hear them screaming and screaming. No ambulance was allowed through. Then their screams stopped and there was just silence. We had a telephone and would receive calls from all over telling us what was happening. Everyone is in grave danger and Israeli soldiers were killing people everywhere. They are arresting medics and ambulance drivers, including foreign volunteer medical workers. They keep taking doctors and medics, just now another call. Again, this time the wife of a doctor telling us her husband has been taken from the ambulance. Large groups of people have been found in rooms, shot dead, there are blood marks where they have lined people up on their knees and shot them, with their ID cards laying on top of them. They are taking people from their homes, blindfolding them, removing their clothes, taking them away or lining them up and shooting them against the wall. People are making phone calls and saying that these soldiers and militia have come in and are shooting people and then the line cuts off. The numbers of these killings I fear are much greater than the numbers confirmed in the press, because the human rights offices and the media centers have been stormed, and everything is shut down. No one can move without almost certain chance of being shot by the Isreali snipers, who are everywhere. The Israelis are demanding that all journalists leave Ramallah and today another foreign journalist was shot. They do not want any more internationals here and are deporting people. It seems quite clear that they do not want eyewitnesses which is only heightening my own fears. The hospitals have also been surrounded and invaded and Israeli troops are taking the injured people and interrogating them. Today a woman, a patient, tried to walk out from hospital. The Israelis shot her in the neck and killed her. The Palestinian Ministry of Health is saying that they fear the spread of diseases because of the number of unburied corpses. The numbers are only growing in reports of the mass killings here and Israeli troops continue to round up people. People are calling frantically, missing a relative and we do not know where they have been taken, including children. The numbers we have now exceed 600, and we are estimating between 700 and 800. All human rights groups and legal advocates are being denied any information of where the detained are being held. From what we know confirmed is that 10% of those taken so far have been children under age 18. On the fourth day I decided to try to move. People were running out of supplies and I also was so worried about people, and had to check to see if they were okay. If I didn't, I feared panic would overtake me so badly that I really had no other choice but to try and go. It was not safe where I was in any case and at least if I left I would still have my sanity. It was really terrifying as there are some internationals here, usually traveling in groups, and the Israelis are saying on the radio that they will arrest or shoot the internationals. They did shoot some yesterday and regardless, it's not as if snipers differentiate and they are everywhere. My friends told me not to go, and were really scared for me, but I had to go. When I went outside, there were cars all shot up and hit by multiple bullets and shells in the middle of the road, unparked. There must have been people in them but I dont know where their bodies are. There are no reports of them, but they must exist I got to the corner trying to go to the bakery for bread and food for people. Some people were calling and calling with only one cup of rice left. I made it to the corner but they opened fire on my first try, and shot at me,so I had to turn back. After that I tried again and it took me one day to make it a block because I had to start over again and again. I had to climb through the valley, and as I passed house by house, people were warning me and pointing out what path seemed safest for these two minutes. In the next two minutes, it would be something different. They really helped to keep my path safe. Today is Day Five and they are still rounding up people like this and we hear them shooting all day long. This afternoon the Israelis suddenly lifted the curfew, suddenly announcing that everyone had two hours to go out to get food. However, the Israeli soldiers also took food from many of the stores, looted, and there is no bread or things. People went to get whatever they could. Even though the Israeli army said it had lifted the closure for two hours in which we still were not able to transfer medical supplies and still was not long enough to everything that was badly needed the Israelis continued shooting people in the streets indiscriminately on their way, so people were running around trying to make it to the store or find a safe route only to have to run back home again. It was an added cruelty and terror tactic inthis macabre situation, a sick joke: starve people and then shoot them when they try to find food with your permission. In an apartment building in Beitunia neighborhood where I used to live, they took 60 people who were my neighbors, including several familes, and pushed them into one room since last night. The Israelis told them that they are to be used as an human shields' as the apartment building is across from a building that they were invading. One child needs to go to the hospital since last night and, initially, the families were able to call outside. Now, the Israelis have taken their phones. There are reports that they are rounding up men between the ages of 14 and 45 in that neighborhood, and these civilians, from these same Palestinian families trapped in that building, were just used to walk in front of an Israeli tank as it invaded the Preventative Security Compound. Reports also have alleged that the Israelis were saying that some could leave but shot them when they attempted to leave. The buildings there are burning, and people are trapped inside. We keep calling to try to find people but there has been no electricity and most people's phones are dead now. I do not know what is happening to many people. The only solution to this is to try to brave the deadly streets in order to check, but its almost impossible and terrifying to leave the house at all. Each place I come to, I am afraid to leave not only for myself but for everyone else in this horrifying position. Israeli death squads have been yanking people into the street. I also hear only shooting and shooting, with no return fire. This suggest that unarmed civilians are being gunned down mercilessly everywhere and I am so scared for everyone. I feel like maybe if I leave one place, one area or neighborhood I will never see the people again alive. There are more explosions outside now and more shooting. Another explosion. More firing, it just doesnt't stop. This is a massacre. The foreign delegations tried to get in but were turned back, the International Committee of the Red Cross is trying to help but they are being ignored. Please help. I am not only scared for myself and for people here, but if this cannot be stopped, I am truly scared for all of humanity, for a world in which we send men to the moon but cannot stop ethnic cleansing. On the news in America, we see hardly anything of demonstrations. What are you doing over there? There do not seem to be any reports of what is happening. In truth, it's got to stop. Please go out to the streets, please demand a response from your representatives. Be loud, march up to the capitals, refuse to leave until the Israelis withdraw. Act now! Tell them the Israelis are murdering innocent people whose only crime is being born in their own homeland, a Palestinian under a military occupation. Demand international protection for the Palestinian people, scream that this is an affront to humanity and that it is time that the US not only stop supporting Israel, but that the US stop its abuse of human rights within its own borders. This is about all of our struggles. For the love of God, please stop this slaughter. Please help. http://www.electronicintifada.org/diaries/index.html [END] ===== Thought for the Day: "Truth is the cry of all, but the game of the few." (George Berkeley) From irimland@zundelsite.org Fri Apr 5 03:02:52 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2002 19:02:52 -0800 Subject: ZGram - 4/9/2002 - "Ethnic Cleansing Israeli Style - Part III of 3 Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 9, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: A Little Town in Judea, Besieged by Israelis and by Grief: [START] By JAMES BENNET - Paril 4, 2002 - New York Times ETHLEHEM, West Bank, April 3 - They did not know much about the Palestinian, just his name, and that he came from a refugee camp, and that they simply could not stop his bleeding. They found him on the stony street on Tuesday morning, shortly after the Israeli ground forces invaded. He had a big hole in his right side, it seemed from shrapnel, and so they helped him into their two-room home and made him as comfortable as they could on blankets piled on the hard kitchen floor. As the crimson stain crept over his pale blue shirt, they called for an ambulance. They called again and again. There was a hospital just a few blocks away, but no ambulance could pass through the gunfire or get by the Israeli armored vehicles that were choking the narrow lanes of Bethlehem's old city. "They told us to give him water and soup," said Fathia Musa Attiyeh, sobbing as she remembered how helpless she was. "This morning he said, `I'm dying.' " He held out for a few more hours, until about three o'clock this afternoon. By five, his body was stiffening. As a child stared, Issam Issis, who had also cared for the stranger, sat beside the body, gently stroking the black hair and crying softly. The man had been unarmed, Mr. Issis said. His name was Abdel Khader Abu Ahmed, and he came from a refugee camp in Jordan. Outside, a wailing woman shouted into the air, cursing the Israelis, the Arabs, everybody. An ambulance that finally reached the neighborhood could not take the body. Two wounded people were already riding atop three bodies inside. Bethlehem is a beautiful place wasted, like so much else in this deepening, maddening fight. Spiked by the spires of churches and the minarets of mosques, it climbs the shoulders of a hill, with a view east across olive groves and desert spaces to the mountains of Jordan. At its heart is the cobbled Manger Square, where the Omar ben al-Khattab mosque faces the Church of the Nativity. The church, originally built in the fourth century, is revered by Christians, who believe it sits above the manger - a grotto, really - where Jesus was born. Lit by flickering votive candles, a silver star marks the very spot. The church, fragrant with centuries of incense, is now full of Palestinian gunmen seeking refuge from the Israeli soldiers who have seized Manger Square. Bethlehem's streets were terrifyingly empty today. The indifferent tread of the conflict has fallen everywhere. Cars were pancake flat. Store fronts were smashed, mint-green steel doors blown in like curtains before a powerful wind. Sneakers and piles of grain tumbled into the streets. People were too neighborly, or perhaps too scared, to loot shelves that were fully stocked. In addition to the occasional bursts of machine-gun fire, there were some other signs of life. An improvised kite - a cone of paper trailed by a blue ribbon - danced above one street. The string led back to a child's hand, reaching through the bars across a window. The signs of death were more blunt. The door to one house stood open; no one answered a call of hello. Shell casings littered the floor and bullet holes pocked the walls. Upstairs, in the shadows, lay another body. Someone had attempted first aid, bandaging the man's arm and applying an intravenous drip. But it was not enough. The man's torso was bare and stained with dried blood. A loop of red prayer beads lay by the body. Cracked water pipes sent jets of water into the streets. An electric switchboard was smashed in. A three-foot hole gaped in the second-story wall of one house, while a beige sedan looked like something monstrous had taken a bite out of its side. An Israeli jeep stopped an ambulance, and the soldiers inside forced two medics to stand against a wall while another medic spent 20 minutes taking every item out of the vehicle and proving it was innocuous. Ambulances have been used to transport terrorists and weapons, Israel says. Two sections of green-painted armor from an Israeli vehicle lay near one damaged wall, evidently broken free by a Palestinian bomb. The proud faces of the martyrs - Palestinian gunmen, most of them, who have died in the conflict - stared down on the wreckage from posters plastered everywhere. It is because of them and people like them, Israel says, that it is conducting this costly invasion. Israeli officials say they know their violence could breed more gunmen and suicide bombers, but they insist they have no choice. This invasion should at least slow their opponents down, they say, and prove that Israel is willing to fight, if there is any doubt on that score. People here are furious. They talk of an 80-year-old man killed in a mosque. Of a mother and adult son whose bodies lay rotting overnight in a house no ambulance could reach. "They are afraid, of course," Hassam Khalil said of his five children. "But I hugged them and told them, `Don't worry. If we are going to die, we are going to die.' " Like so many Palestinians interviewed recently, he said he would like to send a message to President Bush. "What kind of terror is this?" he said, indicating the destruction around him. Palestinians are baffled by the Americans' reluctance to intervene. Not everyone was trapped here. Tonight the United States dispatched armored vehicles to scoop up some of its citizens, most of them peace advocates who came to attempt civil disobedience in the mayhem. Preceded by an Israeli armored personnel carrier, four Chevrolet Suburbans - the color General Motors calls champagne - pulled up outside the Star Hotel at dusk. None of the vehicles flew the American flag, but there was no mistaking the men who piled out of them, members of the diplomatic security service wearing blue jeans or khaki pants. Carrying M-16's, with night-vision goggles at hand and pistols strapped to each thigh, they spread out through the street, under an icy drizzle whipped by a fierce wind. "Who's going for a ride today?" one of them drawled to the waiting Americans. The peace advocates showed their passports and permitted their bags to be searched, then climbed into the cars. A consular official pleaded with holdouts to join the caravan. "I agree with your politics and I admire the courage of your convictions," he said. "But I think you're in danger." At last the armed men backed toward their waiting vehicles. One of them made a final pitch: "This is the last call for Americans!" ===== Thought for the Day: "Only the brave know how to forgive; a coward never forgives; it is not in his nature." (Laurence Sterne) From irimland@zundelsite.org Fri Apr 5 03:04:25 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2002 19:04:25 -0800 Subject: ZGram - 4/10/2002 - "A Congressman speaks out" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 10, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Here speaks a Congressman of the United States with great courage in these perilous times. Please read and pass it on: [START] I offer these brief remarks today as a prayer for our country, with love of democracy, as a celebration of our country. With love for our country.With hope for our country. With a belief that the light of freedom cannot be extinguished as long as it is inside of us. With a belief that freedom rings resoundingly in a democracy each time we speak freely. With the understanding that freedom stirs the human heart and fear stills it. With the belief that a free people cannot walk in fear and faith at the same time. With the understanding that there is a deeper truth expressed in the unity of the United States. That implicate in the union of our country is the union of all people. That all people are essentially one. That the world is interconnected not only on the material level of economics, trade, communication, and transportation, but innerconnected through human consciousness, through the human heart, through the heart of the world, through the simply expressed impulse and yearning to be and to breathe free. I offer this prayer for America. Let us pray that our nation will remember that the unfolding of the promise of democracy in our nation paralleled the striving for civil rights. That is why we must challenge the rationale of the Patriot Act. We must ask why should America put aside guarantees of constitutional justice? How can we justify in effect canceling the First Amendment and the right of free speech, the right to peaceably assemble? How can we justify in effect canceling the Fourth Amendment, probable cause, the prohibitions against unreasonable search and seizure? How can we justify in effect canceling the Fifth Amendment, nullifying due process, and allowing for indefinite incarceration without a trial? How can we justify in effect canceling the Sixth Amendment, the right to prompt and public trial? How can we justify in effect canceling the Eighth Amendment which protects against cruel and unusual punishment? We cannot justify widespread wiretaps and internet surveillance without judicial supervision, let alone with it. We cannot justify secret searches without a warrant. We cannot justify giving the Attorney General the ability to designate domestic terror groups. We cannot justify giving the FBI total access to any type of data which may exist in any system anywhere such as medical records and financial records. We cannot justify giving the CIA the ability to target people in this country for intelligence surveillance. We cannot justify a government which takes from the people our right to privacy and then assumes for its own operations a right to total secrecy. The Attorney General recently covered up a statue of Lady Justice showing her bosom as if to underscore there is no danger of justice exposing herself at this time, before this administration. Let us pray that our nation's leaders will not be overcome with fear. Because today there is great fear in our great Capitol. And this must be understood before we can ask about the shortcomings of Congress in the current environment. The great fear began when we had to evacuate the Capitol on September 11. It continued when we had to leave the Capitol again when a bomb scare occurred as members were pressing the CIA during a secret briefing. It continued when we abandoned Washington when anthrax, possibly from a government lab, arrived in the mail. It continued when the Attorney General declared a nationwide terror alert and then the Administration brought the destructive Patriot Bill to the floor of the House. It continued in the release of the Bin Laden tapes at the same time the President was announcing the withdrawal from the ABM treaty. It remains present in the cordoning off of the Capitol. It is present in the camouflaged armed national guardsmen who greet members of Congress each day we enter the Capitol campus. It is present in the labyrinth of concrete barriers through which we must pass each time we go to vote. The trappings of a state of siege trap us in a state of fear, ill equipped to deal with the Patriot Games, the Mind Games, the War Games of an unelected President and his unelected Vice President. Let us pray that our country will stop this war. "To promote the common defense" is one of the formational principles of America. Our Congress gave the President the ability to respond to the tragedy of September the Eleventh. We licensed a response to those who helped bring the terror of September the Eleventh. But we the people and our elected representatives must reserve the right to measure the response, to proportion the response, to challenge the response, and to correct the response. Because we did not authorize the invasion of Iraq. We did not authorize the invasion of Iran. We did not authorize the invasion of North Korea. We did not authorize the bombing of civilians in Afghanistan. We did not authorize permanent detainees in Guantanamo Bay. We did not authorize the withdrawal from the Geneva Convention. We did not authorize military tribunals suspending due process and habeas corpus. We did not authorize assassination squads. We did not authorize the resurrection of COINTELPRO. We did not authorize the repeal of the Bill of Rights. We did not authorize the revocation of the Constitution. We did not authorize national identity cards. We did not authorize the eye of Big Brother to peer from cameras throughout our cities. We did not authorize an eye for an eye. Nor did we ask that the blood of innocent people, who perished on September 11, be avenged with the blood of innocent villagers in Afghanistan. We did not authorize the administration to wage war anytime, anywhere, anyhow it pleases. We did not authorize war without end. We did not authorize a permanent war economy. Yet we are upon the threshold of a permanent war economy. The President has requested a $45.6 billion increase in military spending. All defense-related programs will cost close to $400 billion. Consider that the Department of Defense has never passed an independent audit. Consider that the Inspector General has notified Congress that the Pentagon cannot properly account for $1.2 trillion in transactions. Consider that in recent years the Dept. of Defense could not match $22 billion worth of expenditures to the items it purchased, wrote off, as lost, billions of dollars worth of in-transit inventory and stored nearly $30 billion worth of spare parts it did not need. Yet the defense budget grows with more money for weapons systems to fight a cold war which ended, weapon systems in search of new enemies to create new wars. This has nothing to do with fighting terror. This has everything to do with fueling a military industrial machine with the treasure of our nation, risking the future of our nation, risking democracy itself with the militarization of thought which follows the militarization of the budget. Let us pray for our children. Our children deserve a world without end. Not a war without end. Our children deserve a world free of the terror of hunger, free of the terror of poor health care, free of the terror of homelessness, free of the terror of ignorance, free of the terror of hopelessness, free of the terror of policies which are committed to a world view which is not appropriate for the survival of a free people, not appropriate for the survival of democratic values, not appropriate for the survival of our nation, and not appropriate for the survival of the world. Let us pray that we have the courage and the will as a people and as a nation to shore ourselves up, to reclaim from the ruins of September the Eleventh our democratic traditions. Let us declare our love for democracy. Let us declare our intent for peace. Let us work to make nonviolence an organizing principle in our own society. Let us recommit ourselves to the slow and painstaking work of statecraft, which sees peace, not war as being inevitable. Let us work for a world where someday war becomes archaic. To reach Congressman Dennis Kucinich contact: info@thespiritoffreedom.com [END] ===== Thought for the Day: "The applause of a single human being is of great consequence." (Samuel Johnson) From irimland@zundelsite.org Fri Apr 5 03:06:13 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2002 19:06:13 -0800 Subject: ZGram - 4/11/2002 - "Judge rejects rule closing immigration hearings" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 11, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: This is good news for those of us who have watched the Soviet-style "secret hearing" abominaation: [START] Judge Rejects Rule Closing Immigration Hearings By Steve Fainaru Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, April 4, 2002; Page A01 NEW YORK, April 3 -- A Justice Department policy to close immigration hearings deemed of "special interest" to the investigation into the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks is unconstitutional, a federal judge in Detroit ruled today. The strongly worded ruling, in a consolidated lawsuit involving a Lebanese detainee and Detroit news outlets, represented the first federal decision against tactics employed by the government in the terrorist investigation, which has been criticized by civil liberties advocates for its secrecy. The judge, Nancy G. Edmunds, rejected the government's argument that the closed hearings were necessary to protect national security and the integrity of the investigation. Despite the government's arguments, she wrote, "the subtext is all about the government's right to suspend certain personal liberties in the pursuit of national security." "It is important for the public, particularly individuals who feel that they are being targeted by the government as a result of the terrorist attacks of September 11, to know that even during these sensitive times the government is adhering to immigration procedures and respecting individuals' rights," Edmunds wrote. The Justice Department has indicated it will appeal. It remained unclear what immediate effect the ruling would have on the policy, which has led to the closure of hundreds of immigration hearings of Sept. 11 detainees since it was laid out in a Sept. 21 memo issued by Chief Immigration Judge Michael J. Creppy. A Justice Department spokesman, Mark Corallo, said: "We're reviewing the decision and will decide what steps to take in the near future." Lee Gelernt, a lawyer who argued the case for the American Civil Liberties Union, which represented some of the plaintiffs, said he believed that the decision would have implications beyond the Detroit case. Civil liberties advocates said they hope a series of recent legal challenges -- including the Detroit case -- will help shed light on how the investigation of the attacks is being conducted, who has been detained and how the detainees are being treated. Since the attacks, authorities have detained about 1,200 people, most of Arab and South Asian descent, in the investigation. Another 114 are jailed on criminal charges unrelated to terrorism, government figures show. The Justice Department has periodically released figures on the number of detainees -- the number had dropped to 327 by Feb. 15 -- but has refused to release their names. In a separate ruling last week, a New Jersey judge ruled that under state law, the government must release the names of hundreds of detainees in New Jersey jails. The Justice Department, which had intervened in the case, is appealing. In another case, the ACLU is representing New Jersey news outlets that have challenged the constitutionality of the closed hearings. "The larger significance of this ruling is that the judge refused to rubber-stamp the government's September 11 policies," said Gelernt. "The ruling sends a clear message that the role of the courts is more, not less, important in the aftermath of September 11." The Detroit case revolves around a Lebanese citizen, Rabih Hadad, who was taken into custody by immigration officials on Dec. 14 and is still jailed. Hadad, of Ann Arbor, Mich., was held on charges that he had overstayed his visa. On the same day, authorities raided and closed the offices of the Global Relief Foundation, a charitable organization founded by Hadad. The government argued that the foundation had been used to funnel money to the Hamas, a militant Muslim group that the Bush administration has designated as a terrorist organization. Hadad and his supporters have denied funneling money to Hamas. On Dec. 19, with reporters and Hadad's supporters in attendance, Hadad came before an immigration judge for a bail hearing. However, before the hearing began, Judge Elizabeth Hacker cleared the court. When Hadad objected, Hacker stated that the decision had been made by her supervisors and that she did not have the authority to keep the courtroom open. The basis for the decision was a document widely referred to as "the Creppy Memo." In the memo, released by the nation's chief immigration judge, Creppy issued guidelines for cases "for which the Department of Justice is requiring special arrangements." Among other provisions, the guidelines stipulated that only judges with "secret clearance" could handle the special cases and that the courtroom must be closed -- "no visitors, no family and no press," said the memo. In response, Hadad, the Detroit Free Press, other news outlets and Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) filed separate complaints challenging the policy and calling for the hearings to be opened. Edmunds later consolidated the cases. In its arguments, the government provided an affidavit from James S. Reynolds, chief of the Terrorism and Violent Crimes Section of the Justice Department's Criminal Division, to explain the justification for the Creppy memo. Reynolds argued that the closed hearings were necessary to prevent "public identification of individuals associated with them," to encourage detainees to cooperate, to protect the "direction and progress of the investigation" and avoid stigmatizing the detainees. Edmunds rejected those arguments, noting that Hadad's name had already been made public. Staff researcher Margot Williams contributed to this report. (Source: www.washingtonpost.com) [END] ===== Thought for the Day: "Nothing emboldens sin so much as mercy." (Shakespeare) From irimland@zundelsite.org Sat Apr 13 04:40:51 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Fri, 12 Apr 2002 21:40:51 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/12/2002 - "Ariel, your plane is waiting!" Message-ID: Copyright (c) 2002 - Ingrid A. Rimland ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 12, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Somebody sent me a snippet from today's Washington Post, commenting on the latest suicide bomber - incidentally, the Israelis would like you to call them "homicide bombers": ""The bomber was identified as Nidal Daraghmeh, a resident of Jenin, which has been the scene of the most intense fighting since Israel launched its West Bank incursion two weeks ago. Palestinians have accused Israeli troops of "a massacre" of hundreds of Palestinians in Jenin. Israel has denied the accusations of a massacre, but military officials did concede that more than a hundred Palestinians died in the fighting, and that the army plans to bury the bodies in a mass grave, to prevent the Palestinians from using the corpses to score propaganda points." Do these people ever have Karma coming! And, by the way, according to a CNN-Time poll released today, ***"Almost two-thirds of those surveyed said the United States should cut off or reduce economic support if Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon doesn't withdraw troops from Palestinian cities."*** [START] Calls begin for war crimes trial for Israelis By Nicholas Kralev THE WASHINGTON TIMES Palestinian sympathizers in Europe and the Arab world called yesterday for the Israeli government to be investigated for war crimes, raising the prospect that leaders of the Jewish state could be among the first targets of the new ____ (something accidentally deleted). That court became a reality yesterday at a U.N. signing ceremony in New York, with representatives of 66 countries that have ratified the treaty establishing the first global war-crimes tribunal. The United States denounced the treaty as a violation of international law. With the U.S. seat in the hall empty, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan vowed that "those who commit war crimes, genocide or other crimes against humanity will no longer be beyond the reach of justice." As the Israeli incursion in the West Bank showed no signs of abating yesterday despite Secretary of State Colin L. Powell's arrival in Israel, an Israeli-Arab legislator suggested that members of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Cabinet be investigated for "war crimes" in the occupied Palestinian territories. Mohammad Barakeh, a communist member of the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, accused Mr. Sharon's government of "serious violations of human rights and humanitarian conventions." He named specifically Mr. Sharon and Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer. "The Israeli army has indiscriminately shelled refugee camps, using helicopters, warplanes, tanks and heavy artillery, killing hundreds of people. Medical assistance has been denied; hospitals have been shelled," Mr. Barakeh said. "The population is starving because of the curfew, while water pipes and electricity networks have been destroyed," he wrote in a letter to the International Court of Justice, quoted by Agence =46rance-Presse. But international legal experts said the International Criminal Court is a more appropriate place for such appeals to be directed because it can bring individuals to justice, while the International Court of Justice, as a U.N. organ, deals only with cases between states. The ICC, although negotiated by the United Nations, has its own statute, a U.N. official said. The Israeli army on March 29 began its largest military operation in the Palestinian territories since the 1967 war, invading six major West Bank cities. It said the attacks, in which more than 200 Palestinians have been killed, were in response to a series of suicide bombings in Israel. On Tuesday, Lebanese President Emile Lahoud called for the Israeli leadership to be brought before the International Court of Justice for the "massacres" committed by the army. In Madrid yesterday, the Spanish judge who led international efforts to prosecute former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet for war crimes accused Israel of committing "crimes against humanity." Baltazar Garzon, in a statement to mark his nomination as a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize, said the "terrorist attacks" against Israel by Palestinian militants should end but that they "in no way authorize any state to engage in illegal responses." Mr. Garzon welcomed the ratification of the ICC treaty and called it "a key peace initiative." At the ceremony in New York, 10 countries brought the number of nations to ratify the 1998 Rome treaty to 66 =97 six more than needed for it to enter into force July 1. The tribunal is not expected to begin functioning until next year. The United States signed the treaty with serious reservations at the 11th hour in December 2000, just before President Clinton left office. The Bush administration has said from the start that it will not submit it for ratification to Congress, even though all other NATO members have done so. The administration is seriously considering withdrawing the U.S. signature, though no final decision has been made, State Department deputy spokesman Philip Reeker told reporters. "It has a number of fundamental problems," he said of the international tribunal. "It purports to assert jurisdiction over nationals of states not party to the treaty, contrary to the most basic principles of customary international law governing treaties." Mr. Reeker said the United States is concerned that its military and civilian personnel will be exposed to politically motivated investigations and prosecutions. "Accountability is a serious problem," he said. "Relatively unrestricted powers of the prosecutor and the court may lead to politicized second-guessing of a state's ability or willingness to investigate its own personnel." Rep. Henry J. Hyde, Illinois Republican and chairman of the House International Relations Committee, said yesterday that Washington should seek immunity from the court for all of its peacekeeping troops. "We would oppose any future U.S. military participation in U.N. peacekeeping operations where the Security Council refuses to grant such immunity to our personnel," he wrote in a letter to Mr. Powell. "The United States must begin now to implement policies to protect against the unintended consequences that will flow from establishment of the ICC," he said. "The ICC is more likely to hinder than help efforts to prevent genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity," Mr. Hyde said, noting that "dictators with the blood of thousands on their hands will scoff at the threat." (Source: http://www.washingtontimes.com/world/20020412-73662628.htm ] [END] =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D Thought for the Day: "Let us a little permit Nature to take her own way; she better understands her own affairs than we." (Montaigne) From irimland@zundelsite.org Sun Apr 14 03:05:42 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2002 20:05:42 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/13/2002 - "A two-way reality check" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny March 27, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: A neat little analysis coming your way, with credits to the International Herald Tribune, April 12, 2002, written by William Pfaff, a journalist stationed in Paris: [START] LET'S SEE IF BUSH STAYS THE COURSE We have arrived at a defining point in the Middle East, and in the foreign policy of the Bush administration. Three issues are about to be decided. The first is the future relationship of this U.S. administration to the Sharon government. The second is Israel's own choice for its future as a nation. Ariel Sharon has named General Effi Eitam, a rising political star of the religious right and the army's highest ranking "religious" officer, to his security cabinet. General Eitam says he is accepting the post to prevent foreign pressure from halting the military campaign against the Palestinians. The third issue is what America's future foreign policy will become. Eitam's appointment strengthens Sharon against Labor leaving his coalition. It otherwise is significant because Sharon's personal conviction is not only that the Palestinian Authority must be destroyed, but also that Israel must be extended from the Mediterranean coast to the Jordan River, with exclusively Jewish citizens in it. Arabs who remained in his new Israel would have no political rights. His political ambition, he says, is to fulfill the religious destiny of the Jewish people. For 18 years, he has imagined himself Israel's leader and the people's savior. The political leader of the Israeli state, he says, "becomes the successor to Ben-Gurion, but also to Moses and David." Important figures in the Bush administration, and nearly all of the neoconservative intellectuals who now dominate the Washington policy debate, have endorsed Sharon's campaign against Palestinian terrorism, and the methods he is using. They believe that military force ultimately decides conflicts like this one. There is no compromise solution, they say, because concessions by one side feed the ambitions of the other, which takes them as evidence of weakness. It is illusion, they say, to think that mutual advantage can be found in settlement. One side must prevail. Years of American efforts to bring about a peaceful Middle East settlement have been a waste of time, or worse, they say. The Palestinians' terrorism demonstrates that they wish to destroy Israel. The Palestinians will be defeated only by the killing or imprisoning of their leaders and activists, with devastating and exemplary collective punishment for the society that harbors and encourages terrorists. As for other Islamic governments and the "Arab street," they can be ignored. The Arabs will submit; they simply have to be convinced that the United States, as well as Israel, is determined to have its way. If one or another authoritarian or dictatorial Arab government is overturned by rioters, it is of no real consequence to Americans or Israelis. The complaints of Europeans and others display illusions about power, or cowardice; they are irrelevant. This is brutal stuff, but I do not believe that I am unfairly summarizing what the Sharon government and its American sympathizers really think about the situation. However, George W. Bush has shocked them by coming out against what Israel has been doing. He demands immediate halt to the Israeli military offensive, withdrawal from the Palestinian territories, a stop to colonization, humane treatment of the Palestinians and negotiated settlement on the Mitchell terms in order to create an independent Palestine. Sharon has to refuse, however much he will temporize, with partial withdrawals and promises. Some other Israeli government might accept Bush's demands, but Sharon can't. He believes that Israel's destiny is at stake. That is why Effi Eitam has entered his government. Sharon will do what he can to appease Bush, but he means to continue what he has begun. Some in the Bush administration have hinted of compromises. Bush has not. He clearly was angry on Monday when he spoke out spontaneously in Knoxville. He wants his demands obeyed. This is new and unexpected. If Bush thinks himself personally affronted by the Israeli prime minister (who once before warned the president against a "Munich" that would abandon Israel), a new and unpredictable factor has been introduced into the situation. Several forces converge. The test point is whether Bush sticks to his new policy. If he does not, he would seem to confirm the humiliating accusation that he is unable to stand up to Sharon. For Israel to accept the president's demands would undoubtedly produce a government crisis. The Labor Party would by no means automatically replace the Sharon government. Benjamin Netanyahu and General Eitam would both be candidates for the succession. Whatever happens in Jerusalem, two hypotheses currently defended in Israel and in Washington seem about to be given reality tests. The first is the claim that what happens on the "Arab street" is unimportant to the United States. The second is that terrorism can be crushed for good through military repression. [END] (Source: http://www.iht.com/articles/54419.htm ) ===== Thought for the Day: "The child's sob in the silence curses deeper than the strong man in his wrath." (Elizabeth Barrett Browning) From irimland@zundelsite.org Mon Apr 15 16:39:31 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2002 09:39:31 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/14/2002 - "Audre Pinque: 1957 - 2002" - Part I Message-ID: Copyright (c) 2002 - Ingrid A. Rimland ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 14, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Last night, very late, Ernst and I came back from Alabama where we attended a memorial of one of our cyber comrades, Audre Pinque, the victim of a fatal car collision on March 12. I will send you yesterday's ZGram as well as today's in two parts, as I have lately been often forced to do, only partly due to time constraints. As an intro, I am sending you a copy of what I wrote in the March issue of "Lebensraum", the publication for my financial supporters. The follow-up is going to be a brief description of the memorial itself. [START] =46rom Ingrid's Desk This "Lebensraum" issue is going to be dedicated to the memory of my sweet friend and cyber intifada comrade, known to the world as "Mackenzie" or "Natalie" and to her close friends as Audre. With Audre's sudden death, the revisionist community has lost one of the most effective and enthusiastic Soldiers of Truth they could have ever hoped for. I doubt that any of us can fully grasp that Audre is no more. She has made an enormous impact on and change to Revisionism in that she translated Revisionism into responsible yet passionate political action - and thus made a real difference in this war-torn, battered world, especially in the Arab countries. =1FAudre's promising career as an international revisionist activist was snuffed out on March 12 in a two-car collision on a rainy evening in a small town in Alabama. I learned about it the next morning. Immediately, I sent out a Bulletin ZGram, followed in the evening with a regular ZGram I had written through blurred vision: [START] I write this with a very heavy heart. As I informed my readers this morning, the Internet's "Bully Buster" - also known as Mackenzie/Natalie/Audre - was killed last night in a car collision. It seems to have been a true accident. Audre was traveling with her entire family - her disabled father, her handicapped brother, and her two teenage sons - to nearby Huntsville, Alabama, to celebrate Jonathan's, her adopted son's. birthday. She approached a dangerous intersection on a hill that had seen several accidents before. She was the driver. Another car, traveling at high speed, collided with her car on the driver's side, and she was killed instantly. This morning, when I was told of the accident by Dr. Robert Countess, who lives nearby and is a close friend of the family, I learned that her father was still in intensive care. Apparently the other three passengers were hurt but not requiring hospitalization. I believe that I was Audre's closest female friend. We corresponded daily, sometimes as often as four or five times a day. I knew more about her than most people knew, and when I am composed enough, I will tell you of the very special person that she was. This girl was not ready to die. She had plans to go to Palestine. She said she longed to see the Holy Land, to stare down the Israeli Bully, and let the world know by raw example what guts and courage meant. Her funeral is going to be on Sunday. My heart just aches for that devastated family, especially her two young sons. Do me a favor - don't send her flowers. We will make sure her casket will have flowers. A simple card with genuinely felt emotions will do. I know that the family is in very serious financial difficulties, and they are going to be devastated, losing not only the only one who held the family together, who did all the cooking, cleaning, washing but also the only real financial support that they had. (...) All day long, messages of shock and grief have poured onto my desk top. When I am calm enough, I will make a special ZGram of those letters. For now, let me just finish this sad ZGram by quoting you my Thought for the Day, sent by a Revisionist attorney friend who called himself "Mackenzie's senior advisor" and who cautioned her severely just a few days ago not to risk life and limb by going all the way to Palestine. He put it poignantly when he learned of her sudden death: "I guess she made it to the Holy Land after all." [END] I first met Audre at the most recent IHR Convention in May of 2000. I was standing with a group of friends in the lobby of the hotel where the convention was just about to begin when I spotted Bradley Smith, accompanied by a young woman and two pre-teen boys, one as blond as any Aryan kid could be, the other one so black that he seemed blue. Bradley introduced us, and I still see Audre in my mind's memory as if it happened yesterday - her entire face was glowing with eagerness, anticipation and joy that she had come to this convention. She looked vibrant and alert, and I liked her instantly. I am always a bit awkward when I meet a stranger, and I said, to bridge the silence as we stood there, looking at each other: "Oh, I see you're babysitting..." thinking that she had brought her son's black friend along for company. "Oh, no," said Audre, sprightly. "That's my own kid. That's Jonathan." I don't remember anything else of Audre at that convention except that I kept looking at the black youngster, thinking that there was no way that he could be her son. There was not a drop of white blood in that kid. Sometime later, I found out she had adopted Jonathan from Haiti. As I got to know her better sometime later through email, I learned that, at a time when she had not a penny to her name and didn't know where her next meal was coming from, she had simply clutched onto a half-starved, near-death baby and never let go again. To do a thing like that was just like Audre. Impulsiveness was probably her strongest trait. Needy kids simply melted her heart. When she adopted Jonathan, she herself had just given birth to a baby boy, the result of a sizzling romance with an Australian who cold-heartedly deserted her, either before or right after their planned wedding - the sequence of that heartbreak is a bit murky in my mind. So here she was, a single mother, trying to raise two babies - literally as different as night and day. Somehow, through a series of poor investment decisions and subsequent financial disasters, she ended up in Mexico - not only with her two own boys but with her disabled father and handicapped brother. While there, she went through incredibly difficult times. She learned to feed her family on $2 a week and made ends meet where there were hardly any ends to meet. For five long years, she slept on the floor on a mattress, unable to afford a bed. She made meatballs without meat and drank from plastic yoghurt cups. She told me all that, laughingly. A few weeks after this convention where we met, she sent me an essay where she described how she had met Bradley Smith in Mexico, so broke that - as she put it - she would have worked for Lucifer. And Bradley, to Audrey, had horns. As she later confessed, she was sure he was a "full-blown Nazi" - who else but a "Nazi" would get involved with challenging the "Holocaust"? This essay she sent me was exceptionally well written - genuine, honest, funny and yet with a strong moral depth. This young woman, I could tell, had real writing talent. I wrote back and told her that I was a writer and I could recognize she had a way with words. My compliments made Audre walk on clouds. In a flash, she shipped me back a second essay where she described how she had gone to Germany to visit Dachau and how that visit had indoctrinated her. My computer has swallowed that essay, but recently she wrote a similar account that summarizes pretty closely what she told me in that communiqu=EB: [START] As recently as May 1999, this writer's worldview was as well informed and educated as any American who endeavors to have a worldview. I knew, for example, that the Arab world teemed with backward, brutal men, cringing women and dirty babies. I knew that an Arab would cheat you at the slightest opportunity or slit your throat for sport. Their culture was a blot on the global map, their religion a work of madness, and their society a cesspool of deceit and deviance. They were ruthless, I was sure, cunning and intent on forcing their evil faith on Infidels in every corner of the world. I also knew for certain that Israel had every right to defend itself against these barbarians, whose lust for Jewish blood was exceeded only by their hatred of Christians and their condemnation of Jesus Christ. I understood perfectly well the need for a Jewish state, where Jews from all over the world could live in safety, sheltered from an anti-Semitic world of hatred and pogroms, a world that eventually spiraled out of control, zealously and systematically murdering six million Jews in the Nazi gas chambers of World War Two. I visited Dachau and Auschwitz where I shivered before images of Nazi soldiers, human machines of terror, brutality and death. Much like the sadistic Arabs, Hitler youth were taught terror and brutality at a young age, I was told, raising German Shepherd puppies to adulthood, then breaking their necks, killing their trusting canines with their bare hands on the orders of their superiors. They marched in unison to the beat of an ugly, racist, anti-Semitic drum with glassy-eyes, salivating dreams of conquering the world. I knew that every German was a potential Nazi to this day. I believed that ordinary Germans had closed their eyes to the suffering of the Jews during WWII, had ignored the stench of the death camps and were delighted to take up arms against Jewish escapees. Only a tiny few Righteous Gentiles had risked helping Jews destined to die. The hatred of Jews was inherent in Germans, I was convinced, like a ticking bomb waiting to explode. I knew that the Jews had done for the Holy Land what thousands of years of Stone Age, nomadic culture had failed to do. The new Israelis went forth into a barren land and through their genius, ingenuity and love for their biblical Israel they created an oasis. With spiritual guidance they pushed the desert back, and with tenderness and joy they caused the land to bloom and bear fruit. I knew all of this. It was all fact, taught to me through history books and novels, reinforced by the media, Hollywood and museums, maintained by moral adherence to our Judea-Christian traditions and never, ever questioned - until May 1999, when I stumbled blindly into a nether world of doubt, discovery and defiance, a world of scholars, historians, clergy and daredevils who quietly, deliberately and with exactitude, tore my world view asunder. I had unwittingly been lured into a forbidden counter-culture; the world of historical truth. Nearly three years later, after an often-times agonizing, always shocking re-education I find myself armed with the truth, fighting shoulder to shoulder with truth-seekers around the world, who struggle against the enormity of a hundred years of lies, who struggle against the giant deception, working to turn our world away from an abyss of self-destruction and back to sane reality, back to the Truth. We are labeled hateful, anti-Semitic, unpatriotic, vicious, bigoted and insensitive, but we are never told that we are incorrect. [END] There you have Audre. If I want to describe her, I would say she was "real". At all times, she wore her heart on her sleeve. Once she realized she had been lied to, she made a resolute U-turn and and never again looked back. As happens to so many of us, a lifetime of "liberal" platitudes were shed once she encounter the deception. To encourage her writing ability, I dipped into my war chest and offered her $100 each for the next four revisionist essays. It was one of the best investments that I ever made. Audre was off and flying. Next, a supporter bought her a computer. She never got her feet back on the ground. A keyboard became an extension of Audre. She was a quick study and took to Revisionism like the proverbial duck takes to water. She was all over the Net. It seemed she made an international name for herself in just a few short weeks. I have never known any Revisionist so joyfully, incredibly prolific. Our friendship quickly solidified, and after some six months or so I once counted the letters she wrote me - believe it or not, a total of 800+. Words simply tumbled through her fingertips onto her keyboard. With her emails and in her work with cyber groups, she was all over the place. I talked to her repeatedly to give her cyber career some focus, consistency and direction. I encouraged her to make her own "ZGram"-like imprint, and after many back-and-forth communiqu=EAs, we came up with the name "Truth Seeking Missiles: Circling the Globe in Defense of Truth, Justice and Freedom". We also came up with a description of the enemy - he was "The Bully", and she and her kids were a Threesome, "busting the Bully." Together, we designed a Bully Buster Certificate, and Ernst and I were the first ONE who received an honorary one each. We had plans to market bumper stickers, key chains and other trinket items that would spread the word that the Bully was out there that had to be contained. Meanwhile, she wrote and wrote and wrote! And with what passion she wrote! Her Internet Truth Seeking Missiles are legend: [START] Truth Seeking Missile: Circling the Globe in Defense of Truth, Justice & Freedom May 14, 2001 =46IRE ELEVEN! The Dirty Little Secret by MacKenzie Paine May 15th is Israel's "Independence Day." Such a strange name for the occupation of Palestine, which began more than fifty years ago and aggressively continues today. "Independence from whom?" one has to ask. While the world will be expected to reverently bow our heads in commemoration of this solemn date I wonder if Sharon will take a break from his murderous activities, or will heighten them in celebration of Zionist "Independence." Whichever way Sharon lumbers, this year, finally, I don't think the rest of the world will stand humbly by, heads bowed, reverently reciting the Zionist line of "Never again." The so-called peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians have deteriorated into classic Sharon terror and brutality, backed by our client regime in Washington DC, ignored by our media and applauded by The Bully's deranged supporters in the US and Europe. But there is a dirty little secret that is bubbling to the surface around the world, the secret that could pierce The Bully's underbelly like a knife through warm butter. The Bully has denied the most basic rights to anyone who knows this dirty little secret. The Bully has made sure that those in the know are locked up in jails, their families terrorized, their homes fire-bombed. The Bully issues death threats, forces through legislation that forbids the truth in courts of law - even murders those who would tell the world The Bully's dirty little secret. But with all the terror tactics, censorship laws and brute force, even The Bully cannot prevent the truth from prevailing. What is this dirty little secret, you ask? I will tell you, but first I must warn you to keep your eyes wide open and your hands away from your ears. Don't get faint. The Palestinian people need us to slice through that warm butter, to bring The Bully down once and for all, and it will take all of us using all of our might to do so. If you can't stand the heat or can't face the truth, you'll have more Palestinian blood on your hands and that nation of innocents could perish from the earth. The Palestinians will never succumb to slavery, so The Bully will have to kill them all. Okay, take a deep breath now and be brave! Here's the dirty little secret. The German nation and the Nazi government did NOT have a plan for mass extermination of Jews during WWII. I repeat, there was never a plan for the mass extermination of Jews during WWII. Further, it has been proven by some of the bravest souls on earth - scientifically, historically, demographically, through diligent research and in spite of The Bully's brutal oppression - that the Nazis did NOT gas 6,000,000 Jews during WWII! They didn't gas one million Jews! No one was gassed. The established version of WWII-the Zionist version-which puts Jews front and center and makes their suffering unique, is a lie. It's The Bully's lie and that's what The Bully cannot afford to have the masses know. That's the dirty little secret, and that's what is getting out. If you don't believe me, high-tail it right now to your nearest holocaust museum or holocaust studies class and demand solid proof that the Germans had a plan and a weapon for the mass extermination of Jews. You know what they'll show you? Photographs of piles of shoes and eyeglasses. These were gathered by wartime Germany for recycling, but The Bully will tell you the former owners were gassed. They'll show you photographs of piles of hair that were used by wartime Germany's navy as a sealant on submarines, but The Bully will tell you the hair was shorn just before folks were gassed. (They were actually being deloused, to protect their lives from Typhus!) They'll show you photographs of people standing around or getting off of trains and tell you that the people in the photos are about to be gassed. Anyone with half a clue can see that these are actually just photographs of people standing around or getting off of trains. They'll show you horrible photographs of piles of emaciated bodies and tell you that these poor souls were gassed. More than FORTY MILLION people perished during WWII, so getting photographs of unfortunate victims wouldn't have been terribly difficult. How does that prove that they were all Jewish and they were all gassed? Do as our beloved and brilliant Professor Faurisson has been doing for decades. Demand to see a photograph of a homicidal gas chamber. (The so-called "gas chamber" at Auschwitz is a post war reproduction, courtesy of the Red Army.) The Bully can't show you a single photograph of a wartime homicidal gas chamber, even though they have photographs of shoes, eyeglasses and hair. Want to make an educated guess as to why? The Bully will beat its chest and roar about the Nuremberg Trials, which "proved" the "holocaust." Take a look - it doesn't even have to be a close look - at the transcripts from these "trials" and you will find proof that they were nothing more than Soviet show trials, denounced at the time by US statesmen and Judges. The only thing the Nuremberg Trials prove is that The Bully denies justice and truth, whenever it deems necessary. Instead of providing solid evidence of the mass extermination of Jews, The Bully will push you to listen to "survivor" testimony. Listening to "survivor" testimony boils down to being a captive audience for people with no proof they were ever incarcerated in a concentration camp, with absolutely no evidence of the crimes they supposedly witnessed or endured and with no credentials as experts on the "holocaust" stories. Ask them to testify under oath with your right to cross-examine them and you will be shunned as an "anti-Semitic holocaust denier." (Survivors) are professional libelers of the German people who are rarely held accountable for the deplorable, unproven, malignant accusations they propagate. Jews suffered during WWII. Many, many Jews died. But so did millions of servicemen fighting for their countries. So did millions of other civilians from disease, starvation and brutal attacks on civilian populations by both the Allied and Axis powers. Jewish suffering during WWII was NOT unique. The Bully cannot provide one solitary piece of scientific, historical or demographic evidence to prove its version of history. It can only scowl and threaten, imprison and murder, oppress and suppress. But the truth is coming out. If you want unique suffering, you need look no farther than the Palestinians. For more than half a century The Bully has been shooting babies in the face, shooting little boys who throw stones, murdering women and children, butchering men on their way to work, bulldozing houses while families sleep, carving trenches around villages to cut them off from the rest of the world, bombing houses, assassinating activists and silencing any critics. It is time to denounce The Bully's lies with all of our moral fiber, together. Our humanity, in the face of such terror and injustice, demands it of us. Arm yourselves with the truth. The Bully cannot, any longer, silence us all. There are millions who know the dirty little secret. It is up to us to expose it, to pierce The Bully's underbelly with the Truth. May 15th is Israeli Occupation Day. Spread the Truth and we can set the Palestinians free. Only then will we be true to the phrase "Never again." [END] One of Audre's Truth Seeking Missiles zeroed in on Dr. Ibrahim Alloush, an American-educated Palestinian whose passionate struggle for his people's liberation matched her own. Dr. Alloush knew a few sprinklings about Revisionism but did not see a connection between his own outreach work on behalf of his own, brutalized people and World War II revisionism. Audre changed that in a flash. It was Audre who convinced Dr. Alloush to put on a revisionist conference in the Arab countries and then went after the IHR guys - sometimes facetiously referred to as Institute for Harmless Revisionists for their super-cautious political stance - to let them know what she had done, and to please follow up! She was like that; she had big plans - details were incidental. Our Audre was that bridge to make revisionism relevant in the beleaguered Arab countries. The Bully plain freaked out when word leaked out there would be a revisionist convention in Lebanon where leading Arab writers and intellectuals would learn why the West was so willing to underwrite the struggle on the Israeli side: it was the artificially induced Western guilt about the so-called "Holocaust". All kinds of diplomatic levers were pushed to stop that revisionist conference - the rest, of course, is history. Dr. Alloush paid his tribute to Audre's impact on the Arab countries with the following: [START] And so it was that only a few hours before she died Audre sent me this email in response to my post titled: Help! Arrests in Jordan: "Dear Ibrahim, "I've raised nearly enough money to get over there to cover this history first hand --- and to take care of some personal business. If I fly into Amman can you meet me and point me in the right direction to Palestine?" Upon reading this message again and again, I couldn't help but wonder: what personal business could Audre have in this part of the world? After all, for dedicated activists, can there be political business that is not personal business?! But then, upon re-reading: ".. can you point me in the right direction to Palestine?", I was suddenly struck by this thought: wouldn't one be remembered and honored just for having these words be the last email one ever writes?!" But Audre knew the right direction to Palestine. Audre Pinque ceaselessly tackled [the soft spot] that hurt Zionists the most: The "Holocaust", which she helped expose as a mere collection of myths that serve a specific political agenda. She always held the belief, and many of us with her, that this effort to expose the "Holocaust" would eliminate the ideological justification of "Israel" as a safe haven of a Jewish state from the "anti-semitism" of this world! Together, we also believed that unmasking the myths of the "Holocaust" also serves to remove a political tool of Zionist blackmail against Western public opinion, and hence, Western support for "Israel". We maintained that these efforts also preempt the alleged Zionist moral right to remain above the law under the dubious pretext of the "uniqueness" of the "Holocaust" in human history. In the aftermath of the banning of the Conference on Revisionism and Zionism in Beirut in March 2001, Audre Pinque kept in constant touch with the developments taking place in Jordan as the Jordanian Writers Association tried several times to hold a forum on the banned revisionist historians conference in Beirut. During that episode, Audre Pinque sent us supportive messages almost daily, and was always generous with her suggestions, encouragement, and spirit. Audre always egged activists on to do more and to do it faster. She knew neither fear nor hesitation. Audre Pinque was an outspoken and a fearless revisionist historian, and a dynamic personality who networked continuously for the Palestinian cause. To that purpose, Audre Pinque was instrumental in building close connections between revisionist historians and Palestinian activists in general and the Free Arab Voice in particular. At the time, Audre Pinque was lauded by many revisionist historians for establishing that connection. [END] On the Internet, meanwhile, she found herself severely vilified. The moment she appeared in a newsgroup in the disguise of "Mackenzie Paine," the Internet hyenas started circling her, calling her names, abusing her, threatening her, telling her she was a "racist", a "bigot", a "Nazi" and an "anti-Semite" of the deepest dye. I tried to dissuade her from answering every attack, telling her that character assassination was one of the Bully's main weapons. She could not be stopped; she fought with the Internet Jews like the proverbial volverine. Here is a sample, for instance, of how she dealt with a fellow named "Weizfeld" in a newsgroup he had infiltrated, called FreePalestine: [START] I generally ignore charges of racism, simply because they're so absurd, but since I'm new to this group and will admit to being baffled by the different explanations of Judaism -- who is responsible for zionism and who isn't -- and because none of you know anything about me, I wish to defend my record against Mr. Weizfeld's accusations. My own bloodlines are as American as can be. Irish, English, Cherokee, Portuguese, German and French. My oldest son is a strapping young anti-Zionist who has protested in the streets with me against the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles. He is black -- my adopted baby from Haiti who will be 13 on Tuesday. I admire my friend Israel Shamir and would stand with him at any time to defend Palestine. I see him as a man of conscience, regardless of race or faith. If I'm a racist, Mr. Weizfeld is a Christian. [END] I don't know what else she told him, but a short bit later, she wrote to me triumphantly: [START] Ingrid, Weizfeld has made his **second** departure from =46reePalestine, screeching that I'm a racist as he left. The pogrom is in the air and they can smell it. We don't have the tens of millions of dollars that The Bully has, but we have truth and perseverance on our side. Please help me to stay in the struggle. [END] =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D Tomorrow: Conclusion =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D From irimland@zundelsite.org Mon Apr 15 16:49:03 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2002 09:49:03 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/15/2002 - "Audre Pinque: 1957 - 2002" - Conclusion Message-ID: > > > >Copyright (c) 2002 - Ingrid A. Rimland > >ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny > >April 15, 2002 > >Good Morning from the Zundelsite: > >"Never Again!" became Mackenzie's battle cry - by which she meant, >"No more Palestinian victims by claiming victimhood. No more >maiming and killing by cashing in on Western guilt! No more >brutalizing helpless refugees in the Holy Land by claiming special >status, thanks to the Holocaust!" > >I told her that, above all else, the Western world had to be >sensitized to what was going on. "They're drenched in tears," she >kept on telling me. "If only I could sell the Palestinian >children's tears." > >"Now there's an idea," I told her. > >And in a flash, a brand new website and a new campaign were born. > >By then, she had discovered a compatriot in Palestine named Ghasan. >Soon, it was Ghasan here and Ghasan there. It was clear to me she >was falling in love - but was it mutual? Ghasan was a carver. >Together, they would sell "Palestinian tears" carved out of stone >straight from the Holy Land. > >She and I palavered at length what they should charge for those >stony tear drops. Ghasan thought that $10 per tear drop would be >appropriate, but Audre said, "No! $75!" > >I told her that one was as unrealistic as the other, and we finally >settled for $25 - or 5 for $100. I ordered the first five tears to >jumpstart the project - an enterprise which, I believed. had much >potential. =1FAudre was superbly suited to become a Truth Ambassador >for Palestine here in America. I encouraged her to take those >"Never Again" tear drops to churches and community organizations, >and Audre was fire and flame. Soon she was busily writing her >speech. I was convinced that her fame in America and her impact on >Americans were just a matter of time, for in the Arab countries, she >was already quite a legend for her spirited defense of the >beleaguered Palestinians - for it was bad, and getting worse. >Sharon was on a rampage. > >Audre fired off one of her Truth Seeking Missiles: > >[START] > >Truth Seeking Missile: Circling the Globe in Defense of Truth, >Justice & Freedom > >March 8, 2002 >FIRE TWENTY-SIX! > >The Unworthy >MacKenzie Paine > >What do you do in a moment of madness? What do you do when the world >is so out of synch that reality is unreal, truth is fiction, fiction >truth? What do you do when people are being slaughtered, >assassinated, terrorized, brutalized, humiliated, gutted? > >With the wonder of the Internet we are able to bring slaughter and >chaos, injustice and brutality into our homes, but keep them safely >out of our lives. We are able to speak noble words of truth and >peace, justice and freedom, while never leaving our laptops. And we >are even able to communicate with those who are suffering the >madness, helpless to help them, reduced to talking about the beauty >of life while they endure the ugliness. > >For all of our good intentions, expertise and gut wrenching grief, >we're a laughable lot. We wait for our governments, our neighbors, >our religious leaders to do something. We wait for the murderers to >come to their senses or get fired from their jobs. We wait for God >to intervene. But as we wait, we diligently talk the Palestinians >down the path of righteousness, praising their bravery, extolling >the virtue of their battles. > >Our words are nothing more than a prelude to their last rites, and >while their bravery and virtue are genuine, our words are not worthy >of them. > >We are not worthy of them. > >[END] > >Audre shed many a tear as she kept peppering her newslists with >reports of rape, murder and mayhem the Israelis kept inflicting on >their victims. She could not accept that nothing could be done. >Three days before she died, she wrote to me: > >[START] > >On September 11 I remember the boys were watching cartoons while >they got ready for school when Jonathan called to me and said,"Mom, >check it out. They demolished some huge building in New York!" > >When it hit me what I was seeing I remember running to the computer >and writing to you, "Dear God, Ingrid, they've done it!" > >I sat in front of the TV, then moved it into my bedroom so that I >could monitor my email. I watched with such a sinking feeling >the clip of Palestinians celebrating. And then, around 10:30 or >11:00 I got an email from Ghasan, asking if I was okay. > >I said that I was fine -- I was in Mexico. But then I said, "Ghasan, >are people really celebrating? I mean, I can't say that I blame the >Palestinians, but this just destroys all our hopes of making your >plight known." > >He wrote back and said something to the effect that no, they weren't >celebrating. Most people were crying - for our losses and because >they knew it was going to be bad for them. > >I sat on my bed the rest of the day, watching the news. > >Today I woke up at 5:00 and had email from Ghasan regarding the >situation. He calmly told me that it looks like the Israelis are >setting them up for a massacre. All the men between the ages of 14 >and 40 are gone. The snipers are shooting at cars, trash cans, >anything that moves. > >I was frantic at first, then calm because he is so calm. But his >line has gone dead again. The last message I had from him he teased >that he didn't want to get killed by a missile because he was from >the "Truth Seeking" faction. > >[END] > >On Sunday, March 10, Audre shipped me the following: > >[START] > >Will There Be a Massacre in Dheisheh Refugee Camp Tonight? By Muna Hamzeh > >Our worst fears of the past two days have finally come true. I just >received a call a friend in Dheisheh saying that an extremely large >number of Israeli troops, accompanied by tanks and bulldozers have >started overtaking neighborhoods in the camp. For the past two days, >Dheisheh has been surrounded by tanks, but the Israeli military and >tanks only entered neighborhoods on the outskirts of the camp. >Tonight they are moving in to the rest of the camp. > >Because the camp's alleys are so narrow, the tanks are simply >destroying whatever is in their way - the walls of houses, >staircases, whatever is in their way. > >Earlier today, Israeli army snipers shot four youngsters in the camp >who went out to play on the streets despite the curfew. The boys, >ages 6-10 were all shot. Mahmoud Sajadi, who lives exactly across >the alley from my previous home, was shot in the head and is in >critical condition. He is 10 years old. I was able to get the name >of only one of the other children, the 6-year-old son of Ahmed Lam'a. > >On Saturday, March 9, 2002, the Israeli army decided to turn the two >homes of brothers Basem and Ghassan Zayed Farrarjeh - both of whom >are ex-neighbors of mine - into outposts. But before kicking Basem >and Ghassan and their wives and children out of their homes, the >soldiers beat both men quite severely. Both have sustained bruises >and injuries to different parts of their bodies. > >In the Ajajreh neighborhood in the eastern part of Dheisheh, where >the soldiers are right now, heavy damage to homes is being reported. > >Now as the large number of troops overtake the camp, in the middle >of the night, there are growing fears among camp residents that they >will not leave before committing a massacre. How many people will be >killed, wounded and arrested remains to be seen. But the mood is >that of extreme apprehension. > >[END] > >And on Monday, March 11, 2002 > >[START] > >At about 6:30 a.m. Palestine time today, Israeli troops called on >all male residents of Dheisheh Refugee Camp between the ages of >14-50 to assemble in the courtyard of a stone factory at the western >edge of the camp. Six huundred men are being detained. The majority >of men between the ages of 14-40 have been outside the camp since >Thursday. The men who were rounded-up today have been blindfolded >and their hands tied. Some western camera crews were able to film >the men. Local Bethlehem TV stations have broadcast the photos, and >the women and children in the camp are watching their loved ones on >their TV screens being mistreated by the soldiers. The children are >in a state of hysterics after seeing their fathers and/or older >brothers in this state on TV. > >As the soldiers approach each blindfolded man, they are spitting on >him and beating him. One by one, the men are being taken into a side >room inside the factory and interrogated. Masked Palestinian >collaborators are at hand to tell the soldiers which of the men is >an active member of the resistence. This is what Oslo has given us. > >About ten minutes ago, I called my friend Hourieh. "The searches are >taking place about three blocks from my house. My only hope is that >they will get to my house before it gets dark. All we can do is sit >and wait our turn. > >Only women and children are inside the houses and according to one >woman whose house was searched less than an hour ago, the soldiers >aren't leaving anything inside intact. The contents of all closets, >cupboards, shelves, everything is being turned on the floor. The >soldiers are destroying any furniture or belongings they feel like >destroying. > >The detained 600 men have not had anything to eat or drink for the >past 10 hours. Nor have they been able to relieve themselves. The >number of those who will be taken away remains unclear. > >Yesterday, the Israeli military dynamited four houses in the camp. >All four houses being to families who lost sons in this Intifada. >Another family was notified that their house will be dynamited >today. The close proximity of the houses - many houses share a wall >with a neighbor, means that the destruction of the houses has caused >extensive damage to neighboring homes. Keep in mind that the >Palestinians have no insurance on their homes and there are no >government funds to compenstate anyone for their loss. > >The fact that a heavily armed military power can go in and terrorize >a civilian population in this manner -as they have done in Tulkarem, >Jenin and Balata refugee camps - defies any sense of decency and >humanity. The Palestinian Authority, the Arab regimes, the US, >Europe and the rest of the world all share in the blame for allowing >the situation to deteriorate to such an extent. > >Of course, we all know what sort of news coverage CNN, MSNBC, Fox >News and American Network news is showing. If the American public >were to see the real pictures of what is really happening in >Palestine, there were be a public outcry in this country. But there >are no real pictures and there is no outcry. > >It will take the Israeli troops about an additional 2-3 hours to >completely overtake all the neighborhoods of the camp. After that, >the real tragedy will begin when they start entering houses. Who >will be killed, wounded or arrested? Who will lose their house? Who >will have their belongings destroyed? We will find out in the next >hours. > >If any Arab country were to do what the Israelis are doing to the >Palestinians, the world will be in an up-roar. But somehow >Palestinian blood doesn't seem to be precious enough to save. Here >in the US, people spend more time and money on their dogs than on >caring about what their tax money is doing to other humans elsewhere. > >"These incursions in the refugee camps will end with a repeat of >Sabra and Shatilla", my friend Nabieh in Dheisheh tells me. "We are >sitting here waiting for them to do whatever it is they are going to >do. And all we have is God to protect us." > >Shame on your world. Shame on you for your silence in the face of >these atrocities. > >[END] > >Audre was beside herself! And finally her secret/non-secret simply >tumbled to the fore: She was in love with the webmaster of the >Never Again website - her Ghasan, a young Palestinian with whom she >had been in close contact for more than a year, and she feared for >his life. She longed to be near him. Her presence would protect >him. > >I wrote back, trying to calm her down: "You don't know the first >thing about him. Is he available?" > >"He's unmarried and of age, if that's what you mean. Otherwise, he's >under siege, military curfew, the roads are blocked. I guess it >depends on your definition of available." > >For fortification, she filled me in on what he thought of her by >sending me one of her letters to him: > >[START] > >"Dear Ghasan, > >I'm still laughing to myself that you thought I was a nun or priest. >I loved talking to you today. I have to admit, the emotional drain >of not knowing what had happened to you was starting to make me >crazy. > >You're a scoundrel for not telling me how old you are before you >started flirting outrageously, but I guess I can forgive you. > >Dear, sweet Ghasan, you asked me why I bother with your cause when >there are so many other injustices going on in the world. There is >no greater injustice than what is being done to your people and your >land. There is no greater menace in the world than the zionists. > >I initially took on the Zionists, not because of Palestine, but >because of other reasons. And then, as I told you, I saw that little >boy murdered. > >God, I must have looked at those photos a hundred times and cried >for days when I realized what was really happening. And I'm not >alone. I cannot imagine what your life is like, but I do know that >the world is waking up. The whole world, Ghasan, not just the >Internet. > >You also asked what I like to do -- what makes me happy. Defending >the truth is the most wonderful thing I've ever had the privilage of >doing. Okay, it's not a big money maker. > >So I'm going to continue to be a pain in the neck for certain >people. I play to an audience of very appreciative people and I love >the job. > >And I love you, even if you are much too young for me. What's >another strange happening in my life, eh? We still have Italy to >explore! > >[END] > >To go to Palestine, accompanied by a video man, became Audre's goal. >Again, details were incidental. She wrote to a potential sponsor: > >[START] > >I still need to get my passport renewed. > >If they're going to destroy everything in their path before they >take their own dying breath, we're going to be there to record it. >It's a struggle now, down to the wire, between the devil and the >birthplace of Christianity. > >If the Palestinians are destroyed, the rest of us will be next. >Would you sponsor this mission? We need to be there, to bypass the >media, to let the world know what is going on. If the truth was ever >important, it's now! > >There seemed to be no stopping Audre. She saw an injustice and was >going to rectify it. In vain did we try to dissuade her. She had >her mind made up: > >"Oh Ingrid. I've been crying all night. I''m leaving. Dad has tried >to reason with me, the boys know better. > >I'll represent my Notchie friends. I want to go to Palestine now! I >don't think you and Ernst and Bradley and TJOK, and others >baragained for when you found me. > > My boys are grown, I'm ready to go. I want to get a life >insurance policy tomorrow, and try to get some sleep today, but I want to g= o. > >[END] > >She appealed to the readers on her list: > >[START] > >Dear Bully Busters, > >I know that this is going to sound crazy, but I'm asking for help >from my few supporters. I have spent a sleepless night as Bethlehem >is under attack. The Bully is demolishing everything in its path and >I can't be true to my role if I don't do something more active. I >keep calling on other Americans to go over to the Holy Land and >stand with the Palestinians. There are Americans there, but not >enough. I want to go. I want to be there, to mix it up at ground >zero with The Bully and to report back to everyone. I want to stare >The Bully in the eye and hug some kids. > >I'm going to the grocery store to stock up on things for my Bully >Busters here at command quarters -- and yes, I'm going to buy a life >insurance policy. > >Please, if you can help, email me and let me know. Enough of being >the long distance wimp. I can't keep asking others to do what I >won't do myself. > >Just pretend that it's 1917, dear friends, and there's still a >chance of stopping the madness. I have the email lists, the >contacts, the backup team -- we can rock the world! Just help me get >to ground zero. > >[END] > >And then this, on the day that she died: > >[START] > >Truth Seeking Missile: Circling the Globe in Defense of Truth, >Justice & Freedom > >March 12, 2002 > >FIRE TWENTY-SEVEN! > >POGROM > >MacKenzie Paine > >For so many years I thought POGROMS only happened to Jews. I thought >that only Gentiles were so cruel and unjust, especially Germans. > >Well, dear Bully Busters, I have it on good word that my writings >must be effective. What else can explain the fact that no less than >600 men have been rounded up in the Deheiseh refugee camp, taken >away blindfolded and to an undisclosed location? Gee, I'm good. The >last word I had from you-know-who was that he was worried about me. >Hah! He should worry. He's probably wearing plastic handcuffs and >standing in the freezing cold some place because of me. If he's >still alive. > >And then there are those who fear for my life if I go to Palestine >to cover the story first hand. I've never heard so many people tell >me to be a good mother and stay home. Granted they were all women >who haven't talked to my boys lately, but my maternal value sure >took a big jump all of a sudden. > >So okay. I'll be a good mother. I'll stay home to fix dinner while >600 men get slaughtered in a POGROM. I'll stay home and avoid the >dangers of a POGROM. I have no choice. I can't afford a POGROM this >week. > >But let the words ring loud and clear to those who are listening. >You don't round up 600 unarmed Palestinian men and get away with it. >Certain people around the world had better start worrying, because >the world is NOT going to stand still for THIS POGROM. > >Turn every one of those men loose right now, or start looking over >your shoulder. If you want an eye for an eye, I'll write till the >day I die. > >[END] > >Those were Audre/Mackenzie's last words! A few hours later she was dead! > >Germar Rudolf sent out this release the next day: > >[START] > >Dear Bully Busters! > >Yesterday, MacKenzie Paine, i.e., Audre Pinque, and her family >decided to go out for dinner. A Chinese restaurant in Huntsville was >the destination. So they all hopped into their car: Audre, her >father, her mentally challenged brother, and her two sons Anthony >and Jonathan. > >It was already dark at 6:30pm on that Tuesday, March 12th 2002, and >it was raining. Audre drove her family down East Limestone Road in >order to reach Highway 72 leading into Huntsville. The intersection >of East Limestone Road with Highway 72 lies in a small valley and >has no traffic lights, so oncoming cars can be spotted only >relatively late. Because of these poor conditions, Audre hesitated >to pull out from East Limestone Road to cross over to the other side >of Highway 72. But then, she dared it and crossed the street. Her >car was hit by a van coming from Huntsville at full speed. While the >van flipped over and landed on its roof, Audre's car got badly >deformed. Unfortunately, the impact was exactly at the driver's side. > >While Audre's sons and brother got away with bruises and small cuts, >Audre's father suffered some serious back injuries, hopefully >causing no lasting disabilities. > >The woman in the van suffered only uncomplicated injuries to one of >her legs, and her baby, which was securely strapped into a baby >seat, was unharmed. > >Audre herself died at the scene. > >Germar Rudolf > >PS: Shortly after the sad news was revealed to the boys, Anthony >said: "Now I know how the Palestinians feel." > >[END] > >=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D > >Letter from Ghasan to Ingrid in somewhat broken English: > >[START] > >I am so shocked and saddened by the death of our friend Audre make >me speechless. Audre and I have been friends for over a year. She >told me about you and how much she admired and appreciated you. The >day before she died I spoke to her on the phone for over 4 hours. >She told me how good of a writer you were and how you and your >husband met each other. > >Now reality told me that Audre is dead. > >As you know, Audre and I have been working day and night on the >http://www.eagletear.com. Now this web site is going to be >dedicated for our sweet friend and her sweet memory. > >I still have your 5 tears that you ordered from Audre. I will send >them to you when the military siege is over. As you know we have >been under mil. siege in Bethlehem for over a week now and Audre the >only person in the world who was worried about us. > >Now she is gone but in my memory she will never be forgotten. [A >friend] and I have formed a group of support for Audre and her sons >and family. If there is anything we could do to help please let us >know. I wish I could travel right now to her funeral but we are >prisoners in our own land can't even go down the street. > >The day before she died she asked me to call her on the phone. I >spoke to her for over 4 hours straight. We talked about everything. >She told me that she wanted to taste the Palestinian olives and >olive oil and how she dreams of having a picnic under the >Palestinians olive trees. She said that she wanted to BUY LIFE >INSURANCE AND COME to Palestine with Jim the guy you wanted to >donate $500 as a support for the trip to the Holy Land as >journalist, but I told her there is nothing she could do if she came >here beside getting into fights at the check point. > > I am thinking of making this web site her web site where I will >have all her truth seeking Missiles in it. I told her son to save >all her writings and not to give to anyone. She was working on >writing the Tears Book. We called it American Eagle Tears - United >victims of Terror. Our Motto was Hand in Hand Against TERROR AND >terrorism. > >I am glad I talked to her before she died for so long. I did not >real BELIEVE that people like Audre EXISTED in this world. She was >a fine women and I believe that Humanity have lost one of her >daughters and we as Palestinian have lost a sister. > >Audre was a Martyr in my opinion. She fought for truth and justice >and she died while she was still fighting for both. > >[END] > >=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D > >Audre was Audre - and how I will miss her! So okay - Audre was >never a scholar. She fought a brave fight with the meager resources >that she had - and meager they were! She lived on the edge all the >time! Not all that long ago, she tried to find a job with one of >the better-known organizations in our movement for a measly $400 a >month - and she was curtly dismissed because she wasn't "scholarly" >enough. > >My heart just burns with anger that she, and people like Audre who >don't worship the ivory tower, are so misunderstood. On the >Internet, there are not all that many activists who write without >constantly glancing over their shoulder if they are "scholarly" >enough - and certainly not those who, like Audre, believe in making >Revisionism REAL by taking a very urgent message to the broad >masses. > >For some time now, I have been impatient with the pervasive tendency >among Revisionists to keep the Revisionist struggle politically >"neutral" - safely ensconced within the boundaries of scholarly >parameters. I believe that the sterling scholarship that put >Revisionism on the world map - the forensic research, the >meticulously footnoted articles, the formal and often stuffy >conventions, the maps and charts and numbers game - were vital. But >ONLY AS THE FUNDAMENTALLY IMPORTANT FIRST STEP! > >I believe the time for that is past. The job of scientifically >documenting that the so-called Holocaust is nothing but a pot of >crock has been completed. Those results are readily available for >scrutiny. We don't need to argue any more with every schlemiel and >shlomo who shrieks "Prove it!" with reams of minute "evidence" that >the entire story is a lie. > >It's done. Finis. It's over. > >What we now need to do is what Mackenzie did in her own way - in her >own limited way, I should add - which is to show that holding on to >that destructive myth is deadly! The Bully has been given licence >to maim and rob and kill - because, supposedly, there was a >Holocaust. We need writers who write from the heart. We need >speakers who speak from the heart. We need to leave the stuffiness, >the stodginess, the time-consuming chasing after footnotes behind >and move into the field of real action. Audre may have been fuzzy >where Palestine was, but Audre knew the way to people's hearts and >followed it, unerringly. > >Dr. Alloush, upon receiving word of Audre's death, wrote in his eulogy: > >[START] > >In the coming media and political battles against Zionists and their >supporters, Audre will be sorely missed. To her brave, dynamic, and >friendly soul, I hereby bid a thousand Palestinian Arab salutes on >the behalf of all those who knew and appreciated her. I am also >dedicating a pamphlet written in Arabic on historical revisionism >and the "Holocaust" to the memory of Mackenzie Paine. May her soul >rest in peace. > >[END] > >=1FAudre did more for making revisionism real in the beleaguered, >bloodied Arab countries than any one of us! Let no one sneer at >Audre's activism because she wasn't "scholarly" enough! Her >passionate nature did not allow her to waste days and weeks >composing coiffed, blow-dried, footnoted articles to be submitted to >stuffy peer review while little boys and girls had their young eyes >shot out with Israeli rubber bullets. Sie saw a need - and filled >it. > >Imperfectly? Perhaps. So what? My hat is off to her. > >Ingrid > >=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D > >PART II > >That's what I wrote last month, right in the wake of Audre's death. >Now I want to tell you what I found in Alabama as we gathered for a >final farewell in a very nice, dignified church. > >Ernst and I had left early, our hearts filled to the rim with >memories of our friend. I had expected that, at the service, there >was only going to be a very small handful of us because Audre had >lived in the community for less than three months. We were >surprised and comforted. I would say that at least some 50 or 60 >people were there. We learned there was a safety net. It is a >small community - but an old-fashioned one that cares. > >Three of the boys' teachers had come, as well as the principal and >even the school bus driver. Her father, still very hurt from the >accident, came in a wheelchair - a griefstricken, broken man. The >school had collected for a magnificent bouquet of flowers, and the >boys each put a smaller bouquet on each side. The atmosphere was >low-key, dignified. > >Dr. Robert Countess, a Revisionist scholar who doubles up as >minister, gave a brief sermon, followed by "Amazing Grace" - a song >that moves me like no other song on earth. That's when I started >crying. > >Next, Germar Rudolf spoke, as did Ernst Z=FCndel - telling of our >love, respect and deep appreciation for that remarkable girl, >Mackenzie Paine, who briefly but so passionately set cyberspace >aflame. > >When my turn came, I felt I would not be able to speak. I knew that >it was going to be an emotional moment, and I had told Ernst that >all I would manage would be to read a short poem. That's what I >did. I barely could manage that - I was that overcome. > >Someone had sent me the following poem from Europe, and with very >great difficulty I read it through my choking tears. > >This was my good-bye to my friend: >=1F > >Do not stand at my grave and weep; > >I am not there. I do not sleep. > >I am a thousand winds that blow, > >I am the diamond glints on snow . . . . > >I am the light on ripened grain, > >I am the gentle autumn rain . . . . > >When you awake in morning's hush, > >I am the swift uplifting rush > >Of quiet birds in circled flight, > >I am soft stars that shine at night . . . . > >Do not stand at my grave and cry, > >I am not there. I did not die. > >=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > From irimland@zundelsite.org Wed Apr 17 00:44:25 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Tue, 16 Apr 2002 17:44:25 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/16/2002 - "American Library Association Becomes Another Israeli Occupied Territory" Message-ID: Copyright (c) 2002 - Ingrid A. Rimland ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 16, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Look what I found on www.whatreallyhappened.com! A best-selling title comes to mind, used here facetiously: How To Make Friends And Influence People. Abe Foxman has really done it this time! I can't help feeling glee - some 50,000+ plus librarians aren't going to forget this one, and =46oxman will reap more than just an earful! Henceforth, there shall be no love lost! [START] An Act of Censorship: American Library Association Becomes Another Israeli Occupied Territory By Jeffrey Blankfort NEW ORLEANS-The embattled Anti-Defamation League's National Director, Abraham Foxman, is "going to war - and he's going to enlist American Jews as his foot soldiers," wrote the No. California Jewish Bulletin's Garth Wolkoff this past May, and he wasn't joking. The first battle took place in this picturesque Gulf Coast port city at the end of June and the ADL and its allies emerged victorious. The occasion was the annual membership meeting of the American Library Association and answering the call to the colors were hundreds of Jewish librarians who descended on New Orleans for a dual purpose: to overturn a resolution criticizing Israeli censorship that had been approved at last year's convention and to demonstrate to their fellow librarians that judging Israel was not only not the business of the ALA, but also was not without career-threatening risks. And they succeeded, overwhelmingly. No, the colors they rallied to weren't visible, but then they didn't have to be. =46or a little under a year, 363 days to be exact, the American Library Association had stood alone as the only major American institution that had publicly and unequivocally condemned Israeli human rights violations and specifically, acts of censorship directed against Palestinian journalists, universities, and libraries. Headquartered in Chicago, the ALA, with 56,000 members is the oldest and largest library association in the world, and according to its outgoing president, Marilyn Miller, "it has engaged in issues of human rights and intellectual freedom around the world since its establishment in 1876." In past years it has criticized censorship in Chile, South Africa, the Soviet Union, and, according to Miller "was one of the first and strongest voices to defend Salman Rushdie." Taking on Israel, however, is another matter. Largely as a culmination of a nine-year effort on the part of Chicago Public Library Research Librarian David Williams, (MELB 4/1 and 4/2) and the International Human Rights Task Force that he took over as chair in 1990, the ALA had passed two resolutions at its July 1, 1992 meeting in San Francisco. The first condemning Israeli censorship and human rights violations and the second, protested the threatened expulsion of Palestinian librarian Omar Al-Safi and may have been a factor in having the order withdrawn. (MELB 4/1). The main resolution referred to the "special relationship" enjoyed by Israel with the United States, "as the recipient of the largest amounts of annual U.S. aid per capita, and declared "the U.S. a party to these censorship practices and other violations of human rights." To bolster the impressive documentation he presented substantiating Israel's censorship policies, Williams arranged for Israeli journalist, Michal Schwartz, an editor of Challenge magazine and herself a victim of her country's censorship, to address the convention. An Israeli brought by the opposition was unable to offer credible rebuttal and both resolutions passed by large margins. Copies of the resolutions were sent to the U.S. government, to Israel and to the PLO. Obviously the matter would not end there. The ADL believes, perhaps correctly, that neither it or Israel can afford a single defeat in its hasbara, the Israeli word for public relations. If the ALA was able to get away with criticizing Israel, who knows who might do it next? The counterattack against the resolution and the character assassination of Williams began virtually the next day and continued up to and after the vote in New Orleans. In a statement following the rejection of the resolution, Williams pointed out the implications of the entire issue: "The significance of ALA's breaking with the public taboo on criticizing Israel was taken very seriously by the Anti-Defamation League and other Israel lobby groups whose role is to censor, intimidate, and otherwise stifle public criticism of Israel in the United States. It is precisely because of the importance of U.S. aid that they could not afford to let Israel be criticized in such fashion by a mainstream professional organization." It became clear to Williams that reversal of the censorship resolution had become an ALA priority, as it increasingly came under the influence of what he described as the "highly-organized and well-financed [pro-Israel] political lobby." Quickly taking charge was the ADL's Foxman who, according to the Chicago Jewish Star (June 11-24), held several meetings with ALA leaders "to clarify Israel's position and to put the claims against Israel into context." "The longer these resolutions remain on the books as ALA policy, the more legitimacy they gain among librarians and educators," wrote Foxman in a letter to Peggy Sullivan, ALA's Executive Director. This was not the first time the ADL had gone up against Williams. In 1989, it challenged a bibliography he had prepared on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict that Chicago's chief librarian and a number of Middle East scholars had considered balanced, and through a "full court" mobilization of the area's Jewish community, would have got away with censoring both the list and Williams, had not their plans been exposed in a local newspaper column. But as the Village Voice's Robert Friedman points out ( July 27) "this is not just a cautionary tale about one librarian's battle against book burning in the occupied territories. "It is part of a larger story about the most powerful Jewish organization in America, and its attempt to determine what should be read in our nation's schools, what should be read in our nation's libraries, and what should publicly be discussed at public forums. "Through its 31 offices across the country, the ADL monitors school curricula, library acquisition lists, and public conferences and symposiums, working behind the scenes to stifle intellectual freedom." The ADL, of course, would not have to go it alone, since its policy of defending "Israel, right or wrong," is the guiding principle of all the major Jewish organizations. So it was to be expected that the 1000-member Association of Jewish Libraries would weigh in with a letter protesting the resolutions. "Members of AJL have been outraged by the actions taken by ALA, AJL President Ralph Simon told the Jewish Star (June 11-24). That was just once response. (By the time of the convention, the largest Jewish womens' organization, Hadassah, would play the most visible role, with the ADL content to stay in the shadows due, most likely, to the fear that publicity about its spy network would inhibit it effectiveness.) Sometime after the San Francisco convention, an ALA attorney, commenting on the resolution, implied it was close to being "seditious" and in American Libraries (March '93), ALA Councilor Charles Bunge referred to the "embarrassing situation" caused by the Council's passage of the resolution. It was also apparent, from American Libraries' Midwinter report, that "although the resolution could not be rescinded, the Council would have done so if it had not "already been widely distributed." As an alternative step, the Council referred the resolution to the ALA's International Resolutions Committee for "study and recommendations." At its Midwinter meeting in Denver, the wheels that were to crush the resolution were picking up speed. With the cooperation of the ALA leadership, mass-produced letters and materials were distributed denouncing the anti-censorship efforts as a front for the "terroristic" and "fascist" PLO (as well as Hamas) and suggesting, as Williams pointed out in a task force "Urgent Action Alert," that "anyone who challenged Israel's repressive policies was an antisemite and part of a plot to destroy Jews." Williams reported that functionaries of the ADL and other pro- Israel lobby groups were very much in attendance at conference sessions, and that "the ADL representatives arranged with the ALA Executive Office to have the customary guest registration fee waived, were outfitted with membership instead of guest convention badges," and directed to the business meeting of the Social Responsibilities Round Table (SRRT) International Human Rights Task Force Meeting. "There," wrote Williams, "they copied down the names and institutional affiliations of everyone present." In one instance, an ADL operative grabbed a task force member who was engaged in conversation, and whirled him around, saying he wanted to see the name on his badge. The tangible intimidation, says Williams, was only beginning: "With the active complicity of the ALA leadership, pressure was brought to bear on librarians at all levels of the Association to go along with revoking the resolution. Wilfully distorting the facts and context of Israel's repressive practices, the organizers of this campaign also engaged in the most vicious personal vilification of me=8A repeatedly equating criticism of Israel with antisemitism." Typical of this attack was a passage in a letter sent two weeks before the convention to ALA President-Elect Hardy Franklin by Ellen Zyroff Ph.D, the Principal Librarian of the San Diego County Library, and distributed to ALA members by the ALA Council. "This man is wild-eyed and dangerous," wrote Zyroff. "I do not know where his hate comes from, but it is palpable. I do not know who paid the fare for the speaker who flew from Tel Aviv University, an institution known for activists against the state of Israel, or for that of the other out-of-town-speakers (referring to a 1991 forum in Atlanta) =8A. (emphasis added). Marty Goldberg, head librarian at Penn State and co-chair of the Jewish Librarians Committee (JLC), a subgroup of the ALA, told the Jewish Star, that Williams "uses this as a platform for his political agenda. We should condemn the resolutions and get the ALA out of the business of singling out one people, one nation, one religion. This has no place in the ALA. There are issues of far more importance than censorship in Israel." For Goldberg, the ADL and the Jewish librarians, a "far more important issue" was protecting Israel. At the convention, Goldberg sent out a letter to JLC members, suggesting they stay away from a Sunday night forum, sponsored by Williams' task force, preceding the vote on the resolution, because of "the danger of physical violence." ((At the Midwinter conference, Williams relinquished his chair of the International Human Rights Task Force and was authorized by the SRRT to initiate a new Task Force on Israeli Censorship and Palestinian Libraries.) Goldberg's warning was ironic, since last year, a panel arranged by Williams featuring Michal Schwartz and Khader Hamide, one of the Palestinians fighting deportation in Los Angeles, was repeatedly disrupted, first by noisy pro-Israel activists and then by a false fire alarm. This year's forum, entitled "Israeli Censorship: Here and There," drew an audience of about 120, and proceeded without interruption with members from the audience who supported Israel receiving ample time to respond to the speakers: Williams, Jay Murphy, former editor of Red Bass magazine, and myself. Williams informed the audience that the ADL's Foxman had once again been invited, and for the third time had declined. In a letter to Williams he had written that "We have consistently refused to participate in your events because of the blatant anti-Israel agenda=8A" Moreover, he didn't believe "that the activities of the Anti-Defamation League are an appropriate subject for your roundtable discussion." In another clearly centralized attempt to sabotage the forum, a 450 word "anonymous letter" was sent to and published in Jewish newspapers across the country signed alternately by "Concerned Jewish Taxpayer," "Jewish Taxpayer," "Anonymous Librarian" and "a librarian whose job would be jeopardized by identification," (the latter being a classic example of the victimizer pretending to be the victim). The thrust of the letter was to infer that "since public libraries are funded chiefly by local tax dollars," Jewish taxpayers ought to know about the forum and its title. In a thinly concealed threat in the next to last paragraph, the "writer" warns that "If public opinion causes enough institutions and individuals to stop sending in their hefty membership dues (often paid for with public funds) perhaps the ALA will reconsider its priorities." =46oxman and the ADL didn't need to debate, nor did Goldberg need to attend the forum to state their case. The "fix" was already in. Goldberg, speaking at a meeting of the Jewish Librarians group the day before had all but admitted as much. Acknowledging that he was usually a pessimist, he told his listeners that they "shouldn't worry" about Monday night's vote. "The ALA Council," he repeated several times, "wants out of this situation." The meeting of the Jewish Librarians next morning was attended by the Village Voice's Friedman, which caused Goldberg to declare the proceedings "off the record," a ludicrous request at what was advertised to be - and what has been ALA policy at all its events since 1971 - a public meeting. At the meeting, ALA trustee from New Orleans, Helen Kuhlman, who preceded her remarks with the same "this is off the record," caveat described how on the Thursday evening preceding the convention, she had hosted a reception for the ALA Council, the ADL and Hadassah, and that they had nothing to worry about. What exactly was going to happen she didn't say, but it was clear that the long arm of Israeli censorship was about to be extended to embrace the New Orleans Convention Center. The Jewish Librarians later heard from a Young Republican stockbroker type named Aaron Albert, who said he had worked with CAMERA, a pro-Israel propaganda agency, as well as AIPAC, but evidently had been brought to the convention by Hadassah. Albert brought with him a flyer, published by the women's group which was to be distributed to ALA members the night of the vote. The flyer carried a bold 48-point headline, "Let's stop fighting yesterday's wars." It suggested that "a new era has dawned" since the resolutions were drafted, and that the charges of censorship against Israel were "outdated and nuanced.; [and] grossly incompatible with the scholarly pursuits of the ALA." The failed "peace" talks in Washington became the cover for the coverup: "With the peace process between Israel and its Arab neighbors now well underway; this is not the time for divisive, counter- productive resolutions, etc." Whether the flyer was actually needed or provided just a convenient cover is debatable. Within an hour and a half of the Jewish Librarians meeting, the first bomb landed. The ALA Council, without any previous indication that the subject was to be on its agenda, revoked the 1992 resolution. Moreover, the Council approved guidelines for the future that will, in effect, allow them to overturn votes of the membership. At that meeting, according to the report published in American Libraries (July/Aug. '93), Pres. Miller noted that "The mail has been intense," and that criticism has included the condemnation in the Jewish press of the annual conference program on Israeli censorship. She was referring to the "anonymous" letter published in a number of Jewish papers mentioned earlier. Nancy John, chair of the International Relations Committee informed the Council that the Israeli censorship was the only item on its agenda. At an earlier Executive Board meeting, citing the "countless hours" the issue had consumed, suggested that in the future, "refer these things to us; we know a little something about international relations" (Amer. Lib., ibid.). Now, ALA parliamentarian Edwin Bliss was asked to present the options available to the Council for dealing with a resolution it had passed, acted on, and now regretted. "An organization has a right to change its mind," he said, accord to the American Libraries report. Sticking by the opinion rendered at the Midwinter conference that it was impossible to "rescind" something that had been distributed around the word, he suggested the term "revoke." And thus, Councilor Bernard Margolis so moved, the Council voted, and by a "safe margin" the resolution was interred. "By all accounts," noted American Libraries, "it is the first time in in its history that the ALA has taken such an action." Prior to the vote, Pres. Miller announced that a special "fact-finding" Task Force made up of three former ALA presidents had been appointed to "review" charges that Williams engaged in "censorship, personal harassment and suppression of freedom of expression." Moreover, Williams was requested to appear before the ALA Executive Board the following day, preceding the full membership meeting, to answer criticisms that had been made against him. Also on the carpet was SRRT chair Stephen Stilwell who was questioned by the chair, Pres. Miller regarding the SRRT's control over Williams' task force; the use of the ALA's name by the task force; whether or not it received outside funding (clearly implying a PLO connection) and why Israel was being singled out all of which he calmly fielded in defending the work of the task force and the resolution. Miller acknowledged to Stillwell that the Council had received "a huge stack of letters," and that "we all have been receiving these letters and we're all under pressure." Cesar Cabellero, head of Extension Services for El Paso Community College, was the only member of the largely silent 13- person board to speak up in the defense of the resolution. "All our members have an inherent right to take stands on social issues. I don't think he should be questioned. SRRT has the right to take positions. I think this organization has a right to single out countries for violations of international freedom. Some of our members are so sensitive they can't separate principles from politics." There would be few such voices heard for the rest of the convention. Williams was up next and took his seat at the foot of the long table. After he asked for and received permission to make a statement Miller repeated her criticisms about using the ALA's name and her "concern that we continue to pound on one country." "If you go to such extraordinary lengths to prevent Israel from being singled out, " Williams replied, "you become an extension of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in the U.S." When asked,"How do you verify your facts?", Williams cited the Committee for Article 19 (the human rights convention against censorship), the Fund for Free Expression and the work of Israeli sociologist and demographer, Meron Benvenisti and noted that the ALA's International Resolutions Committee "did conclude, that the documentation was, in the main, very accurate." Having failed to refute Williams' arguments, the Council shifted to another tack - how he conducted the work of his task force - and would not let go of it. It would be used on the floor of the convention, and afterward not only to undermine the resolution but to isolate Williams and effectively terminate his task force. "We have no problems with what you do," he was told, in seeming contradiction to everything that had just taken place. "it's just sometimes how you do it." It was clear, that night, as we were passing out flyers - Williams' facts competing with Hadassah's fiction - that something was afoot. Jewish librarians in extraordinary numbers began arriving for the meeting, most of whom, apparently, were not regular participants in ALA meetings. (Since ALA is not a union, its conventions are not delegated. Every member has a vote if she or he can get there). When the issue of reaffirmation of the Israeli censorship resolution came to the floor - it was now certainly necessary since the Council had revoked the previous one - the atmosphere was so intimidating that a resolution condemning Egypt, which the SRRT was also going to present never got to the floor. SRRT Chair Stillwell arose to defend the resolution, citing its consistency with other actions by the Council such as its resolution opposing the Gulf War. He pointed out that no one had "disputed the truth of the allegations" in the Israeli censorship resolution; rather the Council had succumbed to outside pressure in deciding to revoke it. His fellow SRRT member Sanford Berman called on the membership to show its disapproval of the Council's revocation action and reaffirm the resolution, but the votes just weren't there. Speaker after speaker got up to defend Israel, to denounce the resolution, to question the ALA's wisdom in taking positions on international issues - something that never seems to be a problem until it comes to Israel - and, in the atmosphere of triumphant intolerance that inundated every corner of the room - to all but ask for Williams head on a platter, calling for a special investigation of his activities and the end of the Task Force on Israeli Censorship. He certainly had pushed their button. Under those conditions, other librarians, some of them Jewish, who had supported the resolutions were clearly afraid to speak. This time there was no progressive Israeli voice to shame the flag-wavers with the truth. =46ollowing an overwhelming vote to cut-off debate, the resolution came to the floor. The relative handful still having the courage to swim against the tide, and who rose when the "aye" vote was called, was no match for the hundreds of Jewish librarians (and their intimidated colleagues) who loudly stood up to declare the ALA another occupied Israeli territory. "The vote was so lopsided it was ridiculous,"said ALA trustee Kuhlman. "What happened at ALA has been put to rest in a very definitive way" (No. Cal. Jewish Bulletin, July 16) The following day, the SRRT "got the message." By a 9-4-1 vote, it stripped David of his task force chair, with the stipulation that until a replacement was found, every piece of correspondence or literature he wished to circulate, had to be approved by the SRRT chair. Goliath had won this round. The Jewish Librarian's Goldberg told the Washington Jewish Week's (July 8) Sam Skolnik, that one of his committee's goals was to take international political issues off the ALA's front burner and put more apparent concerns up front. "Libraries in this country have tremendous problems," he said. [The ALA] shouldn't be involved in these complicated issues. Let's stay out of it." Williams has other ideas and the last word. "Although we were overpowered in New Orleans, this may well turn out to be a Pyhrric victory for the Israel lobby. In the course of this long struggle, thousands of librarians were made aware of Israeli human rights abuses, and the ALA officially criticized them - causing great embarrassment for defenders of Israel in the U.S. "The subsequent spectacle of the ALA leadership going down on its knees before the Israel lobby to exempt Israel from criticism will not go unnoticed by all those who sincerely believe in the consistent application of human rights principles. This issue will continue to haunt the ALA and the Israel lobby, until the time comes when America is fed-up with supporting an apartheid state in the Middle East." * * * In the weeks following the convention, the special task force appointed to investigate Williams was canceled after (one would like to think) the ALA comprehended the Kafkaesque nature of the project and the sad contribution the ALA had already made to the history of censorship. [END] =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: "He who destroys a good book kills reason itself." (John Milton) From irimland@zundelsite.org Thu Apr 18 18:54:48 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Thu, 18 Apr 2002 11:54:48 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/17/2002 - "Vatican launches war against Israeli crimes" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 17, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Once again: Revisionists will say, "It's about time!" [START] Vatican launches war against Israeli crimes Palestine-Vatican, Politics, 4/15/2002 The Vatican launched a semi-official warfare against Israel terming its re-occupation of Palestinian territories as genocide against the Palestinian people, due to which the international community must intervene. This is, of course, an unprecedented accusation leveled by the Vatican to Israel whose Politica1 significance prompts other western parties to oppose Israeli policies. In its official Gazette, the Vatican stressed that the genocide against the Palestinians has got nothing to do with allegations by Israel that its war is against terrorism. It added that this war aimed at preventing Palestinians from realizing their dream of establishing their independent state. It stressed that the current war against Palestinians lacked all forms of international legitimacy. Commenting on this war, the Vatican says that the current war, waged by Israel in collaboration with the Americans against Muslim Palestinian people, is not "religiously blessed". Rather it is condemned by all Catholic Church archbishops in the world. The Vatican urged all Catholics in the world to unify ranks to condemn the religiously unlawful war against Palestinians. Getting out to the diplomatic chess board, the Vatican recalled the American and Israeli ambassadors informing them that Pope John Paul II rejected calling the current war against Palestinians as anti-terrorism war. The Pope urged Israel to withdraw immediately from the occupied territories and urged the Americans to stop their support to Israel, through public recall of the two ambassadors, the Vatican said that all Christians in the World particularly the Catholics support the Palestinian people. Thus, it expressed its readiness to establish an international alliance with Islamic leadership to face up the Israeli-American alliance after the Europeans had rejected to join them in them aggression against the Palestinian people or Iraqi people in the future. [END] Previous Stories: The Vatican summons the ambassadors of the US, Israel (4/4/2002) Pope John holds Israel responsible for violence in occupied lands (4/2/2002) The Pope is concerned over deteriorates conditions in Palestinian territories (1/21/2002) (Source: http://www.arabicnews.com/ansub/Daily/Day/020415/2002041563.html) ===== Thought for the Day: "Jews as individuals are great individuals -- talented, ambitious, intelligent, smart. As a people [though], I would not give them as high a grade. Jews know how to hate." ( -- Ariel Sharon, in an interview with the Israeli daily paper Yediot Aharanot, Feb. 1, 2002. Quoted in the Los Angeles Times, Sat., Feb. 2, 2002, p. B3. ) From irimland@zundelsite.org Thu Apr 18 18:56:09 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Thu, 18 Apr 2002 11:56:09 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/18/2002 - "Access denied to Amnesty International Forensic Expert" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 18, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Take note: [START] Amnesty International news release: http://www.amnesty.org Jenin: Access denied to Amnesty International Forensic Expert - legal action considered 16 April 2002 AI Index : MDE 15/050/2002 Derrick Pounder, Professor of Forensic Medicine at Dundee University, currently on mission with Amnesty International, has been.denied access to Jenin refugee camp and Jenin Government Hospital. The only forensic pathologist in the vicinity, Professor Pounder had sought access to the camp in order to begin gathering vital evidence about the fate of those who died in Jenin. The Amnesty International delegation had gone to Jenin because of reports that a major humanitarian and human rights disaster was occurring in the camp with thousands of people still trapped without food or water in an area flattened and littered with debris and decomposing bodies. "There are two urgent tasks. The first is the humanitarian task of gathering evidence to identify the dead so that the bodies can be given to the families. The second is to obtain forensic evidence about the causes and circumstances of death which will clarify what has been happening in Jenin camp" said Professor Pounder. "International human rights and humanitarian law require that forensic investigations are conducted in this respect. The refusal to allow us to conduct or even to assist in enabling others to conduct such investigations is very serious and gives rise to questions about the authorities' motives." There are only a small number of forensic experts in Israel and among Palestinians, none of whom are in Jenin or the camp and Amnesty International is concerned that the longer the bodies deteriorate the less hard facts and objective evidence will be available about how these people came to their deaths. Amnesty International, together with other organisations including Adalah, the Legal Centre for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, is considering legal action in Israel to ensure that access to Jenin refugee camp and hospital is granted. The organisation also condemned the authorities' refusal to allow adequate help into the camp to deal with the survivors, including many still trapped inside collapsed houses. [END] =====  (source: http://web.amnesty.org/web/news.nsf/print/D7E166CB6340A28E80256B9D005203D8 ) ===== Thought for the Day: "A bad cause will ever be supported by bad men and bad means." (Thomas Paine) From irimland@zundelsite.org Sat Apr 20 03:11:26 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Fri, 19 Apr 2002 20:11:26 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/19/2002 - "Pravda On-Line on the Founding of Israel" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 19, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Revisionists will say, "It's about time!" [START] Today is the eighth anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing, by the way. It seems like an eternity, doesn't it? I remember it well because I did a keynote for a political audience - I remember it as a Perot crowd - and I hadn't yet heard of those folks who call themselves Revisionists. How time flies! Dr. Faurisson sent me the following about a week ago, and it has been sitting on my desk top ever since because I felt ambivalent about it. It repeats some of the standard charges against the battered Germans, but the title itself is worth its weight in gold: "The State of Israel was founded on the Holocaust myth". (Pravda on-line issue, April 12) Here's Dr. Faurisson in his note to the Zundelsite: "Portuguese revisionist A.S. Marques sent us the following comment : "Clearcut no holds-barred exposition of the 'Holocaust' in Pravda. This, I believe, is the first time in a large paper, since Faurisson's old interview to Le Monde [December 29, 1978, and January, 16, 1979]". "It is worth going to the site itself and consulting the total of : Russian original text may be consulted and translation in English could be checked. Talk about "History's irony" ! Best wishes. RF ===== For your convenience, I am sending it to you: [START] Pravda.RU:Top Stories:More in detail 17:14 2002-04-10 THE STATE OF ISRAEL WAS FOUNDED ON THE HOLOCAUST MYTH April 9 was a memorial day for the victims of the Holocaust. "Holocaust" means "burnt-offering," as translated from the ancient Greek language. The Nazis were trying to destroy Jews as a nation, sending them to concentration camps, gas chambers, and performing mass executions by shootings. Fascists reportedly killed about six million Jews during the years of the World War II. Why does this memorial day fall on April 9th? This was the day when prisoners rebelled in the Warsaw ghetto, but the prisoners were not only Jews by the way. Fifty-six thousand people were killed when the fascists suppressed the rebellion. Alla Gerber, the president of the Holocaust fund, remembers the following: "I know that my grandmother from Kiev did not have enough energy to get into the ghetto in the city of Odessa. She fell down and was shot. I know that the family of my other grandmother from Kiev was killed in Babiy Yar. I remember this, and I always will. I will never be able to forget this, because I do not want this to repeat again (Babiy Yar is a settlement on the outskirts of Kiev.) Thirty-five thousand Jews were shot in that village in 1941, and some 200-thousand civilians and prisoners were killed there during 1941-1943). The Russian Jewish Congress distributed a statement today, in which the following was said: "Paying tribute to the six million Jews who were killed in the fire of the World War II, we cannot separate the tragic events of sixty years ago from what is going on with Jews and the Jewish state. The Nazi genocide, from which many Jews suffered in the twentieth century, is not comparable with the current events in the Middle East. When anti-Semites raise their heads in "the tolerant Europe," when skinheads are active in Russia, and when blood is being shed in the Middle East, we remember and mourn the millions of people who were killed just because for being different from their murderers." What can be noticed about the Jews of the whole world is their unity and solidarity, which they have exercised throughout history. It seems that any unbiased observer can see the aggressiveness of the current Tel Aviv policy (of the policy since 1967, to be more precise) against the Palestinian autonomy and other countries of the Arab world. However, this is not the way that the Jews think. Moreover, the congress draws a parallel between the elimination of Jews of the past and their "genocide" today, allegedly, with the consent of the international community. This is an overwhelming feeling of offence for the whole world. The feeling that "everybody owes something to me," is a peculiar feature of the Jewish national character. This feature dictates a certain stereotype of behavior: each Jew enjoys the full rights of being a citizen of Israel, even if this Jew lives in Zimbabwe or East Timor. Speaking about the Holocaust of the World War II, the latest research that has been conducted by scientists of different countries regarding the mass genocide against Jews and the real number of victims, testifies to multiple and unjustified exaggerations and distortions of the real events. There was a conference in Moscow devoted to the global problems of world history. One of the reporters said at the conference that, after performing a special electromagnetic examination of the "mass burial" in two camps (Treblinka and Belsits), it became known that the "official version" of the burial could not withstand any criticism: the soil could not be influenced with any external effect, ect. It should also be mentioned here that the adversaries of the Holocaust (or revisionists, as they are often called), do not try to prove it to the world that Jews were not persecuted in National-Socialist Germany, or that there were no losses among the Jewish nation during the war. It goes about the fact that Nazis were eliminating not only Jews. They were running the genocide policy against Gypsies, the Slavs, and other representatives of lower races. There is no other nation in the world that has suffered so much during the war, as the people of Belarus did. But everyone is silent about it. Valery Lebedev, who read The Myth of the Holocaust, said: "When I found out that the furnaces in the crematoriums of the fascist camps were muffle, and the Zyclone-B gas was insecticide (insect poison), that was enough for me. Those readers who do not know much of chemistry, may not understand anything here, but I know what muffle is, since I have worked in the gas industry. I even feel shame for myself. Why didn't I pay attention to that stupid Zyclone-B gas that was evolving from granules within two hours? There was no killing of Jews in gas chambers of the Nazi camps, since there were no chambers there. The bombing of Germany and the evacuation of the camps blocked German supplies; the people there were starving, but the main thing is that there was the outburst of typhus epidemics in the camps. Lice spread this illness, and the Germans were disinsecting their clothes with Zyclone-B insecticide. Cans were found in Auschwitz, and they passed them off as the weapon that killed the Jews." Revisionists calculate that there were some 150-thousand Jews who died in Auschwitz, and no one was killed with gas there. The major reason of such a huge death rate was typhus epidemics. Of course, it is impossible to cover the whole issue in a newspaper article. However, the fact that discussing different versions of the Holocaust is illegal in many European countries speaks to the relevance of this issue. First, the state of Israel appeared on the basis of the Holocaust myth. The world would never have allowed Israel to exist without this myth, since it appeared during the times of global decolonization. Britain made up with the independence of India, and dozens of territories were doing their best to cast off the yoke of the White man. The colonial intrigue of the Jews in the Middle East was carried out in a very brutal way: the massacres, the destruction of numerous Arab villages, and expelling a large part of the Palestinian population from the lands of their ancestors. The international community is coming to grips with all of this. At the end of the day, the Jewish nation that suffered so much from the Holocaust was in need of its own fatherland that could protect it from genocide. Can the struggle of the Palestinians be compared with what Jews had to go through under Hitler? Sergey Stefanov PRAVDA.Ru Translated by Dmitry Sudakov [END] ===== Thought for the Day: "At every word, a reputation dies." (Alexander Pope) From irimland@zundelsite.org Sun Apr 21 04:32:30 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Sat, 20 Apr 2002 21:32:30 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/20/2002 - "Happy Birthday to you..." :) Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 20, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Today is, of course, a most important birthday, and it behooves the Zundelsite in honor of the occasion to put the Thought for the Day up front: Imagine Uncle Sam supine on a psychiatrist's couch, utterly dejected and defeated, wondering how on earth he could have ended up like that, with everything he once held dear in shreds. The F=FChrer sit's behind him in his chair, clipboard at the ready, and tells the patient: "You should have come to me sooner." Don't laugh. There's wisdom in those homilies. =3D=3D=3D=3D Yesterday, I sent you a translation from "Pravda Online" - which, it turns out, merits a sobering correction, courtesy of ASMarques, a splendid purist when it comes to championing free speech, an utterly befuddled fellow when it comes to the slightest concession that what happened in Germany in the Third Reich years might have been good and right and proper, given the backdrop, given the times - and given an enemy that had the German people targeted for utter destruction. Be that as it may, here is the ASM correction: [START] The "Pravda Online" edition (where the "Holocaust" article appeared) is a totally different one from the printed mass circulation newspaper. In fact, it's simply one of three different publications named "Pravda", and reaching different publics. I didn't know this. Portuguese electronic editions of newspapers are always either full reproductions of, or closely based on, the printed versions. "Pravda Online" is a different, exclusively electronic, publication. You may check here: http://images.pravda.ru/engabout.html Mea culpa then, but no matter. It's becoming obvious that break-out point ha= s been reached. No matter what we do, it's only a matter of time now. I think =46aurisson was right when, some time ago, mentioning Voltaire & l'Infame, h= e suggested that the "Holocaust" will be around for a long time, even after th= e truth is widely known and historians accept it more or less openly. This is = a deep insight, even though revisionists would very much prefer to see the infamous lies crushed, once and for all. This is the way things work out in the end: in the long run, a sort of awkwa= rd but "peaceful" -- well, not really, on the intellectual level -- coexistence= of history and myth develops and people simply live with the lies, both the nic= e and the ugly ones. That's how collective religious beliefs survive in modern non-religious societies. Not the best of worlds, but not the worst either... The day when the "Holocaust" will be treated as "not true" in wide-circulati= on publications and simultaneously as "not false" in ordinary people's minds is not far away. This is how mankind -- apparently unlike fleas, newts, bats or dogs -- works. It's not a serious species, you know... ASMarques [END] I can live with that. I have preached for some three years that we ought to shed the stodgy, boring, nitpicking Revisionist mode and concentrate on saying "Okay now, our best revisionist minds have done it - at great costs to themselves and their lives. They have proven that the so-called "Holocaust" is just a pot of crock. Forensic excavation of a historical site makes sense only once." If we are so immature that we must obligate each and every Holocaustomaniac who has nothing better to do than to keep shrieking "Prove it! Prove what you say!" it will be our own fault if we get stuck in a ditch of our own making. I, for one, have not the slightest interest in some hairsplitting details any more about exactly why the Holocaust is just a pot of crock. The evidence has been delivered - and that, for me, is that! We need to focus now on what that MEANS. =46or one, it means - jawohl! - that just like grown-up people we need to study without prejudice and without malice just what the German =46=FChrer did that made the moral, social and intellectual desert bloom as it had never bloomed before. As mature, grown-up people we can learn from the times - don't you think? We don't dance to extortionists' tune - or do we? Have a nice April 20th - and remember, you heard some of these thoughts right here on the Zundelsite first. Ingrid P.S. And, by the way, it is fate's giggle that today, of all the days, there was the first important protest march on Washington to make the American leadership listen to a pretty urgent message: That there is serious grassroots discontent here in America from sea to shining sea. From irimland@zundelsite.org Mon Apr 22 02:11:14 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Sun, 21 Apr 2002 19:11:14 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/21/2002 - "Ha'aretz: A World Cleansed of the Jewish State" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 21, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Would you have thought a year ago that you would have ever seen an article like this one bandied about on the Internet? And this from Israel directly! It is already getting to be a stigma to be a "holocaust survivor" - and this is only the beginning! Imagine when the whole extortion scheme unrolls! [START] -- "The Years of Contrition Are Over" -- "Here, at Yad Vashem, on Holocaust Day, I ran into two journalists from Italy who refused to enter the museum and look at pictures, due to their claim that the subject is exploited politically by Israel. They asked me why I chose to come to such a conference, at a time when Israel is doing what it's doing." A WORLD CLEANSED OF THE JEWISH STATE By Yair Sheleg -- Ha'aretz (Israel) -- Friday, April 19, 2002 -- The `new anti-Semitism' sweeping Europe is directed not just against Jews, but also against their state, said speakers at a survivors conference last week A few months ago, when preparations for Yad Vashem's International Conference on the Legacy of Holocaust Survivors were in full swing, organizers began to worry. They were concerned both about cancellations caused by Israel's security situation, and about possible influences of Israel's current plight on discussions. Perhaps, they feared, subjects such as the moral lessons of the Holocaust would cause some well-known participants, including UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and Poland's President Alexander Kwasniewski, to air strident criticism of Israel's policies in the territories. Nervous about such a scenario, Prof. Shevah Weiss, chairman of Yad Vashem's international council and himself a Holocaust survivor, proposed that the conference be canceled, or at least deferred. In the end, the most prominent statesmen who were invited, such as Annan and Kwasniewski - leaders who were supposed to bring much sought-after media coverage with then - didn't turn up. Also, a wave of brutal terror attacks struck Israel; concurrently, there was a rash of anti-Semitic episodes in Europe. And so the conference's current events message took on a character that was entirely unlike what had been anxiously anticipated. Despite the Defensive Shield operation and the bloody clashes at the Jenin refugee camp, events in the territories were not the focus of the Yad Vashem conference. Instead, the wave of "new anti-Semitism" in Europe was featured, along with (albeit to a lesser degree) the terror strikes in Israel. Ideological Pogrom Speakers - most of them Jews and supporters of Israel - delivered an unequivocal, emphatic message. It is to be doubted whether Israel's professional diplomats and spin masters would have used such outspoken language in support of the country's situation. Per Ahlmark, a Swedish writer who served in the past as deputy prime minister, described the Durban anti-racism conference as an "ideological pogrom." Ahlmark added: "Criticism of Israel has become very similar to anti-Semitism. There is in it a rejection of the Jewish people's right to express its identity in its state, and Israel isn't judged according to the same criteria that are applied to other countries. If anti-Semites once aspired to live in a world rid of Jews, today anti-Semitism's goal is apparently a world cleansed of the Jewish state." French Nazi hunter Serge Klarsfeld struck a similar chord, saying "hatred of the Jews has today become hatred of the Jewish state." In his keynote address delivered on April 11 at Yad Vashem's Valley of the Communities to close the conference, Prof. Elie Wiesel spoke in a similar vein: "I cannot tell you enough, my good friends here, how perturbed I am, how worried I am, how dismayed I am that the world does not realized the danger of suicide bombings. I call them `suicide killers.' These are people who made death into a cult, death into a passion, death into a theology. They believe that they kill in the name of their god, and in doing so they don't realize that they make their god into a killer. And the world refuses to understand that. And the world doesn't realize that we have learned in history that whatever happens to us is usually a beginning," Weisel declared. Weisel, who was one of the only speakers who related to the Palestinians' suffering, touched on the claim which holds that Palestinians ought not to be the "victims of the victims," and pay a price for what was done to the Jews. "Many survivors came here from DP camps. Haven't they made Palestinians suffer? That's what the Palestinians say," Weisel noted. Continuing, he answered the question: "My answer is simple. When survivors came here, their goal was not to make them suffer. It was not to conquer lands that they came here for, lands that did not belong to the Palestinians, but they came home to live without fear." Weisel added that "Jews must not be apathetic" about the suffering of non-Jews. Supreme Court President Aharon Barak's address stirred considerable interest at the conference. Barak, a native of Kovno in Lithuania whose family was saved during the Holocaust by a local farmer, did not relate directly to current events. Instead, he proposed drawing conclusions based on his own personal experience during the Holocaust. "One conclusion," Barak said, "is connected to the people of Israel and the state of Israel, to this state's centrality in the life of the Jewish people, to our inability to rely on anyone other than ourselves and to the imperative to ensure that these things are never repeated... "The second conclusion involves deep faith in people; and this is the basis of the centrality of the concept of human dignity and human rights in my legal thinking ... Hence, conclusions that I draw feature an endless search for balance between our national goal as a people, and universal values reflected by concepts of human dignity and freedom. I believe that this balance can be attained. I have been on the Supreme Court for some 25 years, and there have only been a few, rare occurrences during which I said to myself that this balance cannot be attained, and that a choice [between them] has to be made. In most cases, the balance is possible," Barak said. The Years of Contrition Are Over Some 80 educators from around the world attended the conference, in order to hear lectures and (more importantly) to take part in educational seminars on ways of imparting knowledge about the Holocaust. They spoke about how peers in their countries were incredulous about their decision to come to such a conference at a time when violence is so rampant in Israel and the territories. For example, Otto Rol, who has been involved in Holocaust education for years and serves today as educational adviser to a Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies in Denmark, said that "there is in Denmark, and generally in Western Europe, a definite feeling that Israel exploits the Holocaust in order to dodge criticism for its actions. People feel frustrated when they visit Israel, because they feel as though the hosts use the Holocaust as a way to stop them from speaking out about current events. Here, at Yad Vashem, on Holocaust Day, I ran into two journalists from Italy who refused to enter the museum and look at pictures, due to their claim that the subject is exploited politically by Israel. They asked me why I chose to come to such a conference, at a time when Israel is doing what it's doing. "I myself reject these claims," Rol continued. "As far as I'm concerned, this is the best possible time to take part in such a conference - this is a time when we are witnessing violent attacks against Jews in Europe. This is precisely the time to ask what we can do to counter this anti-Semitism, because 60 years ago events started with the burning of synagogues." Tirsa Polin, an art curator at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, a Jewish woman who lived for many years in Israel and has Israeli citizenship, related to the seeming contradiction between the huge surge of interest in the Holocaust during the past decade (in books, films, research studies, museum exhibitions, media reports) and the eruption of the "new anti-Semitism." As she sees it, "these aren't the same people. Those who are interested in the Holocaust and those who attack synagogues are simply two different types of people." Alicia Bialskah, a guide and educator at the Auschwitz concentration camp memorial site, furnishes a different explanation of this seeming contradiction. "I think it's no accident that there is no rise of anti-Semitism in Central and Eastern Europe right now," she says. "I haven't heard of a single anti-Jewish episode in our region. On the contrary, the outlook is very balanced, and is even fairly pro-Israel. It seems to me that the reason for this is that with us, the `discovery' of our terrible acts during the Holocaust is relatively new. Apparently, a sufficient number of years of contrition have gone by in Western Europe, and so now people there feel at liberty to come out in opposition to Israel." We, Holocaust Survivors, Want to Tell the World... The highlight of the conference was the signing of the "survivors' manifesto" - a document that tries to express all that the Holocaust survivors want to say to the world, in their advancing years. The document, written by survivors in collaboration with Yad Vashem, was read aloud by Zvi Gill, a board member on the Center of Organizations of Holocaust Survivors in Israel, which sponsored the conference. The document was presented at a special closing ceremony conducted in Yad Vashem's Valley of the Communities. The document declares: "We have not turned into vindictive people full of hate ... We chose life. We rebuilt our lives, we took part in the struggle to establish the state of Israel, and we contributed to the societies of Israel and of the various states from which we came. Today we Holocaust survivors ... deliver the Jewish message that memory must lead to acts and to moral commitment. It must be the basis of action, and the source of strength for the creation of a better world. We want to cull from the atrocities a positive message for our people and the world - a message of commitment to the values of man and humanity. The Holocaust belongs to the universal tradition of all people of culture. It has set the standard of absolute evil. Lessons of the Holocaust must serve as a cultural code fostering education for humane values, democracy, human rights, and tolerance." Gill says that preparing manifesto was particularly important to himself and fellow survivors, since in recent years they devoted the majority of their efforts to financial compensation claims. They seized the chance to stress the moral message inherent in the lessons of their lives. Avner Shalev, chairman of the Directorate of Yad Vashem, says that Yad Vashem will ensure that the manifesto receives exposure in the media, and as an educational tool. Shalev thinks that in future years the document will be regarded as the Holocaust survivors' "Jerusalem Declaration," and as an important milestone in responses to the Holocaust. ===== {Source: http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=153026&contrassID =2&subContrassID=5&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y&itemNo=153026 ) Thought for the Day: "He smote the rock of the national resources, and abundant streams of revenue gushed forth. He touched the dead corpse of Public Credit, and it sprung upon its feet." (Daniel Webster, March 10, 1831) From irimland@zundelsite.org Tue Apr 23 03:41:34 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Mon, 22 Apr 2002 20:41:34 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/22/2002 - "Jews Perceive Growing Threat in Germany" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 22, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: After Jenin, what do they expect? [START] Jews Perceive Growing Threat in Germany By Hans Riebsamen =46RANKFURT. These days, the nearly 100,000 German Jews are afraid, even the courageous ones. Even Slomo Raskin, a proud rabbinical student who leads prayers in a Frankfurt home for the elderly, is being cautious. He has not shaved his full beard or doffed the black hat he always wears. He is still determined to be recognized as a Jew at first glance. But he is more careful in other ways. "I no longer look people in the eye on the subway, so that nobody can feel provoked," he says. And he has instructed his sons to wear baseball caps instead of their yarmulkes on the street. "I have to protect them." Where is the front line between Israelis and Palestinians? Since the attack in Djerba, Tunisia, that killed 16 people, including 11 German tourists, on April 11, it clearly no longer runs only through the towns and cities of the West Bank. The first strikes here in Europe have been made: attacks on synagogues in France, fires at two Jewish businesses in Brussels, two attacks on Jews on the street in Berlin. Paul Spiegel, president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, has no doubt what it means: "The threat is getting closer." That is hard to dispute after fundamentalist Islamists in the Palestinian territories recently declared every Jew on Earth to be a legitimate target. Imaginary danger? The heavily guarded Jewish schools, community offices and synagogues across Germany indicate otherwise. Officials have ordered a maximum security alert. Suddenly, Mr. Spiegel and his deputy, Michel Friedman, are receiving threats, many more than usual. Mr. Spiegel reports that previously, 90 percent of the letters and e-mails he received from non-Jews were positive. "Now, it's the other way around," he says. It is not just public figures who are affected. A Jewish woman from =46rankfurt reports complete strangers have called her up to deliver anti-Semitic diatribes, though she is a completely "normal" person with no public function or office. Her bewilderment is written on her face as she says, "Synagogues are burning in Europe again, 57 years after the war." On Wednesday, she went to the community center of Frankfurt's Palm Garden to join several hundred members of the Jewish community in celebrating Yom Ha'atzmaut, the Israeli independence day. But instead of the planned solidarity celebration for the 54-year-old Jewish state, the event developed into a round of comfort and consolation for this nervous community, all of whom share her fears. Mr. Friedman received a round of thunderous applause for his fervent warning against giving up: "We must be an example to our children and show that we are not afraid." His listeners had clearly been waiting for those fighting words, an open declaration that "Israel is not doing anything awful. The terrorists are doing awful things." It is more than just fear of attacks on synagogues that is upsetting German Jews. They are also uneasy about other Germans, their fellow German citizens, whether Christians or atheists. And they are angry at some politicians, and at the media. Talk in the Palm Garden community center often revolved around the media's one-sided reporting on the Middle East in favor of the Palestinians. Cracks are appearing in the idea that it is possible to live in a Germany that holds its Jewish citizens in high regard and stands by them in times of crisis. Many wondered why there were no spontaneous protests in Frankfurt or elsewhere in Germany after suicide bombings in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Mr. Spiegel unhappily pointed out that far more non-Jewish Germans took part in a Palestinian-organized march in Berlin earlier this month, and in pro-Palestinian rallies in Frankfurt and other German cities, than attended a demonstration in solidarity with Israel in Frankfurt two weeks ago. Then there are the remarks made by J=FCrgen M=F6llemann, a leading member of the Free Democratic Party. He has spoken of Israel's "state terrorism" and said about the Palestinian attacks, "I would defend myself, too, even with violence." With his remarks, Mr. M=F6llemann is like a red flag to Mr. Spiegel and Mr. Friedman; and not just to them. Around the tables in the Palm Garden, where largely elderly gentlemen enjoyed pound cake and fruit tortes with sugar glaze, but also in the gallery, where younger people gathered, talk often turned to Mr. M=F6llemann. Mr. Spiegel said that Mr. M=F6llemann and others were using purportedly legitimate criticism of Israel to camouflage aggressive anti-Semitism. And there in the Palm Garden, he was not alone in that opinion. April 22, 2002 =46rankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: "Zionists are the world's most successful criminal enterprise." (Letter to the Zundelsite) From irimland@zundelsite.org Wed Apr 24 01:26:17 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Tue, 23 Apr 2002 18:26:17 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/23/2002 - "THE BEGINNING OF THE END OF THE JEWISH POST-WAR ASCENDANCY?" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 23, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: A pleasure to bring you this essay on the meaning of Le Pen's victory in France. THE DANGEROUS LIAISONS By Israel Shamir THE BEGINNING OF THE END OF THE JEWISH POST-WAR ASCENDANCY? The people of France have sent an important message to the world, by electing the traditionalist leader, Jean-Mari le Pen to the second round of the French presidential elections. It was not just a proof of general dissatisfaction, as NY Times claimed. The first round occurred while the Jewish troops besieged the Church of Nativity, starved nuns, shot priests, and despoiled the land of Christ. Israeli bulldozers worked around the clock covering mass graves of their innocent victims in the Jenin refugee camp, Jewish soldiers destroyed churches and mosques in Nablus, shot at the Holy Virgin in Bethlehem, while one hundred fifty thousand Jews marched in Paris and elsewhere, supporting the genocide in Palestine. Waving Israeli flags and draped in the blue and white colours of their national banner (the tricolour is dropped and forgotten), the Jews marched from the Place de la R=E9publique to the Place de la Bastille in Paris, chanting in French and Hebrew and carrying signs that read "Yesterday New York, today Jerusalem, tomorrow Paris." Today's Jerusalem is an unhappy city, its non-Jewish majority dispossessed, uprooted, pushed into ghetto and controlled by the brutal Jewish Border Police. Today's Jerusalem has the most advanced torture facilities, and there, thousands of kidnapped Palestinians are subjected to electric chocks, beating and humiliation. Today's Jerusalem is a place where only Jews can move freely and enjoy the fruits of civilisation. Should it be a model for tomorrow's Paris? Mais non, the people of France had experienced the German Nazi conquest in 1940s, and they did not want to try the Judeo-Nazi occupation. That was the main message sent by the French voter. We should thank General Sharon's brutality and ill-conceived solidarity of Jews in =46rance with the g=E9nocidaire for this result. Until now, the Jews were divided in their tasks and purposes. In Palestine, they created a toxic, ferociously nationalist and religiously fanatic entity based on Hitler's Nuremberg Laws. Elsewhere, in France as well as in Britain, they promoted the pseudo-liberal paradigm of dismantling European national and cultural content in favour of the Judeo-American spirit. In Palestine, they shot at the church; in France, they undermined it by subterfuge. One law for themselves: extreme right wing nationalism of Sharon. Another law for the goyiim: liberal New Labour of Tony Blair. If the Jews would have sense, they would keep the inner dialectical unity of their pincer-movement attack as their best guarded secret. But they were inebriated by their successes. The spiritual teacher of Sephardic Jews, Rabbi Obadiah Joseph, ruled that Jews should not show their ascendancy in the world until they would be able to destroy the Christian Churches in the Holy Land. Now, with the Nativity besieged, they apparently felt the condition is fulfilled. Jews became united to an extent unknown since the days of Christ, and united by a common will, single purpose and a feeling of arriving to the pinnacle of power. Intoxication of power and unity caused the usually cautious people to drop masks, to leave pretences. It seems the Jews call out 'Kill him', as two thousand years ago. This new openness provided us with a previously unheard-of insight into the soul of the Jews and their supporters. An authentic Jewish voice, Ron Grossman of Chicago Tribune[i] wrote, "As a self-proclaimed humanist, I ought to recoil in horror from the thought of tanks rumbling through a city, anybody's city. My head should hang in sorrow at televised images of street fighting (rather, massacres - ISH) in Bethlehem and Ramallah. But here is a hint: Don't lecture or preach to us. Forget about appealing to our better selves". Please note this plural 'us' before denying the obvious. The Jews do not hide anymore behind the useful but dated device of "Americans, French or British citizens of Jewish faith". It is again The Jews, a single body with a single mind. Forget about appealing to their better selves, as they have not got any. 'The better selves' were just a device. "No one can express the aspirations of most Israelis like the prime minister. This is not a war that was waged by Sharon, the "warmonger," this is the war of all of us", reports Gideon Levy, a man of heart and conscience, who was recently banned from the pages of the 'liberal' Haaretz. (I was banned ten years ago. Welcome to the club, Gideon!) "It will also be very difficult to blame Sharon for the consequences of the war, in the light of the sweeping support he has been given by the majority of Israelis. Nearly 30,000 men were mobilized and they reported for duty as one man, making the refusal movement, with 21 refuseniks currently in jail, irrelevant". The Jews abroad were just as awful as those in Palestine. Professor David D. Perlmutter wrote in LA Times[ii]: "I daydream--if only! If in 1948, 1956, 1967 or 1973 Israel had acted just a bit like the Third Reich, then today Israelis would shop, eat pizza, marry and celebrate the holy days unmolested. And of course Jews, not sheiks, would have that Gulf oil'. Witty if snobbish Taki of the British weekly Spectator contributed the following anecdotal evidence of the new Jewish vehemence and single-mindedness: "On Easter Sunday, during lunch, the richest woman in Israel, Irit Lando[iii], suddenly burst into my house and began to harangue my friends and family about Adam Shapiro. Despite the fact she's one of my wife's oldest friends and was invited to drop in after lunch, I was extremely annoyed. I reminded Irit that my house was not Israeli occupied territory; that it was Easter; and knowing how I feel about the plight of the Palestinians, she should change the subject. Which she did, turning on the press, instead, and how they gave publicity to that godawful traitor Adam Shapiro". As few mavericks of Jewish origin like Adam Shapiro or marvellous Jennifer Loewenstein became increasingly marginalized, the Jews en masse rally to support Sharon and Israel. From Moscow to Brooklyn, from Marseille to Hampstead, the Jews speak in one voice. WE ARE ONE, proclaimed the headline of the Jewish Week. This vision of united, ready for the kill, Jewry could not but scare the French voter, and any thinking man. Le Pen was probably the only French politician totally opposed by the Jews. The French and the West European Left should learn the lesson before it is too late. Their liaison with the Jews became a liability and a source of embarrassment. Historically it was probably justified, but not any more. Even the Jewish stranglehold on media can not deliver the electoral goods. Instead of supporting Jewish agenda, the Left should compete with the Right by addressing problems of working class in the country and of the income disparity on the global scale. There should be no more immigration, and this task calls to stop the main creator of immigration, the unfair Judeo-American globalisation and Bush and Blair' s War against Islam. In the forthcoming May elections in the UK, the Left should give the boot to Michael Levy's prot=E9g=E9 Tony Blair, and turn to the tradition of Michael Foot. The electoral success of Le Pen could signify the beginning of the end of the Jewish post-war ascendancy. Inverting the slogan of French Jews, we say, "Yesterday Paris, Today Washington, and Tomorrow Jerusalem". =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D [i] http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/perspective/chi-0204070422apr 07.s [ii] April 7, 2002 [iii] I normalised the spelling of her name. Taki the snob had to spell quite an ordinary Jewish name Landoi (var. Landau) in the French way. =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D Israel Shamir is an Israeli journalist based in Jaffa. His articles can be found on the site www.israelshamir.net In order to subscribe to this list or to be removed from it, please write to info@israelshamir.net No copyright for electronic transmission, but ask for permission in order to publish as hard copy. =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D [END] Thought for the Day: "The child's sob in the silence curses deeper than the strong man in his wrath." (Elizabeth Barrett Browning) From irimland@zundelsite.org Thu Apr 25 03:12:45 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Wed, 24 Apr 2002 20:12:45 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/24/2002 - "How to handle loaded questions from a biased interviewer" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 24, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: This one will make you smile. It is ostensibly an interview between a FOX News interviewer and the Lebanese Ambassador to the U.S., Mr. Farid Abboud. It is one fine example of how to handle loaded questions by hostile mainstream media. We all can learn from it: [START] April 16, 2002 Fox Interviewer: Mr. Ambassador, do you consider Hizbollah a terrorist organization ? Abboud: Yes, Sharon is a terrorist ! Fox Interviewer: Mr. Ambassador, this was not my question. I asked you about the operations of Hizbollah in the targeting and killing of innocent civilians. How do you view Hizbollah? Abboud: Yes, Sharon the terrorist has killed thousands upon thousands of civilians. He is the biggest terrorist out there ! Fox Interviewer: Mr. Ambassador. Please answer my question. Do you consider Hizbollah a terrorist organization or not ??? Are you against the killing of innocent civilians?! Abboud: Of course I am against the killing of innocent civilians. You have to define who the innocent civilians are. Sharon, the terrorist has killed many thousands upon thousands of innocent civilians and he is continuing to do so! Fox Interviewer: But what about Hizbollah ? Are you telling us that Hizbollah never killed any civilians or plotted to kill any innocent civilians? Abboud: Hizbollah is a resistance movement. They have a place in the Lebanese parliament and they are fighting for justice and for a good cause. If there were innocent civilians hurt in the process, they are a casualty of war. Hizbollah does not target civilians on purpose, unlike the war monger, Sharon, whose only targets have been civilians, including children !!! Fox Interviewer: Mr. Ambassador, does this mean you condone the suicide bombers?! Abboud: I do not condone the actions of the war criminal Sharon!!! Fox interviewer (with apparent frustration): Mr. Ambassador, please stop evading my questions and answer them directly ! Do you condone the suicide bombers?! Abboud: I do not condone the killing of innocent civilians, but we have to define who is an innocent civilian and who is not !!! If a Palestinian suicide bomber kills a bunch of Israeli soldiers who are committing atrocities against the defenseless Palestinian population, do you consider these soldiers as innocent civilians ??? Fox interviewer (sighing): Mr. Abboud, do you recognize Israel's right to exist? Abboud: Yes, I recognize PALESTINE'S right to exist!!! Fox interviewer (no words to describe his face): Mr. Ambassador. Please stop this aversion in answering, and answer our specific questions!!! Do you recognize Israel's right to exist or not?! Abboud: Israel already exists sir. It does not need my recognition. It is the recognition of Palestine to exist that should be addressed!!! Fox Interviewer: Mr. Ambassador, why are you so one sided and biased in answering our questions??? Abboud: Sir, it is you who is very one-sided and biased in your questioning!!! Fox interviewer (totally at a loss of words): Mr. Abboud, Lebanese Ambassador to the United States, thank you sir for your time and the interview!!! ===== FAIR USE NOTICE This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrightedmaterial as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml . If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. ===== (SOURCE: http://www.ccmep.org/hotnews2/interview041602.html ) From irimland@zundelsite.org Fri Apr 26 01:34:20 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 18:34:20 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/25/2002 - NYT's Frankel spills the beans" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 25, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: A few quotes from a noteworthy book. Max Frankel was with the New York Times from the early 1950s to 1994, eventually becoming its Executive Editor. From: The Times of My Life. And my Life with The Times. Random House, New York, 1999 p. 397, "The best reporters and editors normally have no race, sex, or religion. They may charm or muscle their way into strange places, but they try not to THINK male or female, black or Jewish. Still, there always comes a time for exceptions. I remember reliving the shudders of refugee life at the sight of Hungarians trudging across a frozen frontier swamp. I never totally banished that twinge of smug American security when interviewing high-ranking Germans. And there's no denying the conspiratorial bond that suddenly appeared when an old man on a park bench in Kiev whispered, BIST AH YID? Are you a Jew? was a question often put to me, and with decidedly different inflections. In Communist countries, it came from Jews who meant thereby to ask whether they could trust me with seditious conversation. In Israel, it was asked to discover whether I would ever put my feelings for the Jewish state ahead of my journalistic mission. Now that I had charge of editorials at the Times, the question was usually hurled with contempt; I was obviously a Jew, but in the eyes of many Jews, an unworthy one for daring to criticize the Israeli government. So whenever I turned to the subject of Israel, there was no escaping my skin." p. 398, "Except for my place of birth, I was a Galicianer, dammit, an EASTERN Jew just one generation out of the shtetl. The Nazis obliterated that Yiddish world, a constellation of townlets that stretched from Lithuania to Romania, but the shtetl culture kept on fiddling in the hearts of millions of us, in Israel and America. No matter how aggressive our assimilation to new worlds, we Galicianers always juggled a kind of dual citizenship. Unlike many German Jews, we wanted to retain our Jewishness, our YIDDISHKAYT. And after the Holocaust, not even the starchiest Americans dared any longer to demand that we shed it, as they had demanded of striving Jews in the 1920s and '30s." p. 399, "Although Times bylines gradually came to include names like Weiler, Raskin, and Rosenthal, these writers were somehow all persuaded to render their first names as A. instead of Abraham." p. 400, "By the time Punch Sulzberger [inheritor of the New York Times] occupied his father's chair in 1963, American society had shed many of its anti-Semitic prejudices and permitted the rapid advancement of Jews in professional life and corporate suites. The general revulsion against fascism turned into a revulsion against bigotry itself, as demonstrated by the election of the first Catholic president, John F. Kennedy. Exploiting this atmosphere, and Gentile guilt about the Holocaust, American Jews of my generation were emboldened to make them themselves culturally conspicuous, to flaunt their ethnicity, to find literary inspiration in their roots, and to bask in the resurrection of Israel." p. 400-401, "Instead of idols and passions, I worshiped words and argument, becoming part of an unashamedly Jewish verbal invasion of American culture. It was especially satisfying to realize the wildest fantasy of the world's anti-Semites: Inspired by our heritage as keepers of the book, creators of law, and storytellers supreme, Jews in America did finally achieve a disproportionate influence in universities and in all media of communication. Punch Sulzberger [owner of the New York Times] unconsciously abetted this movement. He felt born to the publisher's chair and had none of his father's hang-ups about being Jewish. Israel's ambassadors to the United Nations lived just a few floors below his Fifth Avenue apartment and always enjoyed easy access to him and to his table at The Times. Within a few years of Punch's ascendancy, there came a time when not only the executive editor -- A. M. Rosenthal -- and I but ALL the top editors listed on the paper's masthead were Jews. Over vodka in the publisher's back room, this was occasionally mentioned an any impolitic condition, but it was altered only gradually, without any affirmative action on behalf of Christians." p. 401, "Because my name was Max and because I produced editorials that disapproved of some of the hawkish policies of Israel's prime minister, Menachem Begin, ... even modest criticism of Israeli actions inevitably provoked angry articles in Jewish weeklies, demands that I meet for remedial instruction with the heads of Jewish organizations, and a flood of angry letters, many condemning me as a 'self-hating Jew' who had abandoned his people to curry favor with the goyim. I was denounced as being ignorant of the Holocaust and indifferent to the damage done by disharmony among Jews. To the most sober of these assaults, I sometimes responded with a hurt biographical note, stressing my roots in the shtetl, our family's taste of both Nazi and Soviet anti-Semitism, the disappearance of my grandparents, my sojourn among relatives who had survived the death camps to settle gratefully in Israel, and my intimate familiarity with every liturgical variant of Jewish ritual. Mostly, however, I would simply retort that my only remaining Jewish friends were Israelis, to make the point that many Israelis also found fault with their government and also favored accommodation with the Palestinians, as they eventually proved in the Peace Now movement. I was much more deeply devoted to Israel than I dared to assert. I had yearned for a Jewish homeland ever since learning as child in Germany that in Palestine even the policemen were Jews! Like most American Jews, however, I settled on a remote brand of Zionism, which rejected all importuning to move to Israel to share its hardships and dangers." p. 402, "I did indeed have many close Israeli friends, not only relatives and journalists but high officials, ranging from Yitzhak Rabin to Lova Eliav. That is why I well understood the full range of Israeli opinion on all of the country's vital security concerns." p. 403, "Fortified by my knowledge of Israel and my friendships there, I myself wrote most of our Middle East commentaries. As more Arab than Jewish readers recognized, I wrote them from a pro-Israel perspective. And I wrote in confidence that The Times no longer suffered from any secret desire to deny or overcome its ethnic roots." [END] ===== THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: "They are ill discoverers that think there is no land when they can see nothing but sea." (Francis Bacon) From irimland@zundelsite.org Sat Apr 27 02:48:37 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Fri, 26 Apr 2002 19:48:37 -0700 Subject: ZGRAM - 4/26/2002 - "An amazing opinion piece from an otherwise very liberal mainstream paper" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 26, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Here is today's treat for you from the San Diego Union, once my hometown paper: [START] April 25, 2002 Politics and the Middle East by James Goldsborough How are Americans to understand President Bush's kowtowing to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon? Told to withdraw Israeli forces from the West Bank "without delay," Sharon refused. As Israel reduced the Jenin refugee camp to rubble using U.S.-supplied arms, Bush praised him as a "man of peace." The man of peace now wants to dictate the composition of a U.N. fact-finding mission, approved with U.S. support, into Jenin. As former President Carter pointed out Sunday, presidents don't just spin their wheels. Presidents have power levers. In the case of Israel, said Carter, the levers are two: We provide $10 million per day in aid to Israel; we supply Israel weapons for defensive purposes only, not for attacks on refugees. Bush is having a rocky time. He rides high approval ratings because of Sept. 11, but faced with the complexity of Middle East politics, he is at sea. A man of domestic politics, he founders in the world arena, where America has the reputation of being a superpower. Bush's instinct from the beginning was to pull back from world affairs. Just as he would be the anti-Clinton, he would be the anti-Bush I. Those two presidents were too involved in the world, too busy with alliances, agencies, treaties and all those things that tie a good Texan down. Bush wanted to "park" the Mideast. Last fall, when the White House finally issued a few tepid words of caution about Israel's bulldozing of Palestinian homes, Sharon accused Bush of Munich-style "appeasement." To this gross insult to a nation that took no part in Munich, the White House tut-tutted, asking Sharon to make friendlier comments, which he did. This month, however, as Israeli troops invaded the West Bank, Bush said, "stop." Secretary of State Colin Powell was sent to the Middle East to secure a troop withdrawal. Bush was likely pushed into the Powell trip by his father and Brent Scowcroft, who are said to have his ear. Neither John Ashcroft, the fundamentalist zealot who is attorney general, nor Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld expressed support. Tom DeLay, the rabid House whip, urged fellow born-again Christian Bush to eliminate Yasser Arafat, not talk to him. It took some moxie for Bush to "unpark" the Middle East, but then he collapsed. There's no way to pretty this up. Sharon told him to take a jump, and he did. Is there a precedent for a presidential mission coming up so empty? Marshall's trip to Moscow in 1947? Kissinger and Le Duc Tho in Paris in 1972? James Baker in Geneva with Tariq Aziz in 1991? In each of those cases, America reacted decisively. There is a price to be paid for opposing our interests. That's what power politics is all about. Foreign policy can't be driven by parochial interests. A nation that aspires to leadership must have more to its policy than local politics. In the Middle East, U.S. leadership is accepted because we are viewed as an honest broker. Many administrations have kept it that way. We don't kowtow. The Bush administration is different. It appears to care more about political support from American Jews than about a fair Mideast peace accord. When Bush I and Baker stopped Israel in 1991 from using U.S. money to build illegal settlements on Arab land, they were attacked by the pro-Israel lobby. Said Baker: "---- the Jews, they don't vote for us anyway." Bush II doesn't accept that. He believes in political realignment. He thinks he can win the Hispanic vote, which is 75 percent Democratic. If Hispanics, why not Jews, who voted 4-1 for Democrats in 2000? It's not just that the Jewish vote in a state such as Florida might be crucial in 2004, but that being pro-Israel helps him with conservatives, religious fundamentalists, the South and the media. U.S. media are strongly pro-Israel. One criticizes Israel at the risk of being called anti-Semitic. New York Times columnist William Safire, who acts as the official media spokesman for Israel, lashes out at the "ridicule of liberal pundits" like Mary McGrory to Mark Shields who dare to criticize Israel. All two of them. Eric Alterman, who writes for The Nation, recently compiled a list of commentators who write on the Middle East. Sixty-five were listed as supporting Israel, right or wrong. Five were listed as willing to criticize both Israel and the Palestinians. Another five, only one of them writing for the national press, was listed as anti-Israel. Politicians and the media feed off each other. If a politician dares speak out against Israel, he is pilloried by the Safire 65, and soon has Jews shouting charges of anti-Semitism at him. A former California member of Congress told me this story: A colleague was running for the Senate. AIPAC, the Jewish lobby, approached him. AIPAC would organize fund-raisers for him in five cities, each with a guaranteed take of $100,000. AIPAC asked for only one thing in return: If he won, he would commit to vote in favor of the $3.5 billion in aid Israel receives annually from America. I get my share of anti-Semitic charges. To my accusers, I ask: Why wasn't I anti-Semitic between 1993 and 2001, during the Oslo peace process? With Sharon, Israel will never have peace. You confuse anti-Semitism with anti-Sharonism. To the latter, I plead guilty. But then, so do many of my Jewish friends. Goldsborough can be reached via e-mail at jim.goldsborough@uniontrib.com. [END] (SOURCE: http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/uniontrib/thu/opinion/news_1e25golds.html ) ===== From irimland@zundelsite.org Sun Apr 28 02:53:58 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Sat, 27 Apr 2002 22:53:58 -0400 Subject: ZGram - 4/27/2002 - "Examples of Hate Speech" Message-ID: --============_-1192160055==_ma============ Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed" Zgram - Where Truth is Destiny April 27, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Here is some real food for thought - self-explanatory! (My thanks to the person who researched and compiled these quotes!) 1. "There is a huge gap between us (Jews) and our enemies not just in ability but in morality, culture, sanctity of life, and conscience. They are our neighbors here, but it seems as if at a distance of a few hundred meters away, there are people who do not belong to our continent, to our world, but actually belong to a different galaxy." Israeli president Moshe Katsav. The Jerusalem Post, May 10, 2001 2. "The Palestinians are like crocodiles, the more you give them meat, they want more".... Ehud Barak, Prime Minister of Israel at the time - August 28, 2000. Reported in the Jerusalem Post August 30, 2000 3. " [The Palestinians are] beasts walking on two legs." Menahim Begin, speech to the Knesset, quoted in Amnon Kapeliouk, "Begin and the Beasts". New Statesman, 25 June 1982. 4. "The Palestinians" would be crushed like grasshoppers ... heads smashed against the boulders and walls." " Isreali Prime Minister (at the time) in a speech to Jewish settlers New York Times April 1, 1988 5. "When we have settled the land, all the Arabs will be able to do about it will be to scurry around like drugged cockroaches in a bottle." Raphael Eitan, Chief of Staff of the Israeli Defence Forces, New York Times, 14 April 1983. 6. "How can we return the occupied territories? There is nobody to return them to." Golda Meir, March 8, 1969. 7. "There was no such thing as Palestinians, they never existed." Golda Meir, Israeli Prime Minister, June 15, 1969 8. "The thesis that the danger of genocide was hanging over us in June 1967 and that Israel was fighting for its physical existence is only bluff, which was born and developed after the war." Israeli General Matityahu Peled, Ha'aretz, 19 March 1972. 9. David Ben Gurion (the first Israeli Prime Minister): "If I were an Arab leader, I would never sign an agreement with Israel. It is normal; we have taken their country. It is true God promised it to us, but how could that interest them? Our God is not theirs. There has been Anti - Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They see but one thing: we have come and we have stolen their country. Why would they accept that?" Quoted by Nahum Goldmann in Le Paraddoxe Juif (The Jewish Paradox), pp121. 9a. Ben Gurion also warned in 1948 : "We must do everything to insure they ( the Palestinians) never do return." Assuring his fellow Zionists that Palestinians will never come back to their homes. "The old will die and the young will forget." 10. "We have to kill all the Palestinians unless they are resigned to live here as slaves." Chairman Heilbrun of the Committee for the Re-election of General Shlomo Lahat, the mayor of Tel Aviv, October 1983. 11. "Every time we do something you tell me America will do this and will do that . . . I want to tell you something very clear: Don't worry about American pressure on Israel. We, the Jewish people, control America, and the Americans know it." - Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, October 3, 2001. ===== --============_-1192160055==_ma============ Content-Type: text/html; charset="us-ascii" ZGram - 4/27/2002 - "Examples of Hate Speech"
Zgram - Where Truth is Destiny

April 27, 2002

Good Morning from the Zundelsite:
Here is some real food for thought - self-explanatory!  (My thanks to the person who researched and compiled these quotes!) 

       1.  "There is a huge gap between us (Jews) and our enemies not just in ability but in morality, culture, sanctity of life, and conscience. They are our neighbors here, but it seems as if at a distance of a few hundred meters away, there are people who do not belong to our continent, to our world, but actually belong to a different galaxy." Israeli president Moshe Katsav. The Jerusalem Post, May 10, 2001

2. "The Palestinians are like crocodiles, the more you give them meat, they want more".... Ehud Barak, Prime Minister of Israel at the time - August 28, 2000. Reported in the Jerusalem Post August 30, 2000

3. " [The Palestinians are] beasts walking on two legs." Menahim Begin, speech to the Knesset, quoted in Amnon Kapeliouk, "Begin and the Beasts". New Statesman, 25 June 1982.

4. "The Palestinians" would be crushed like grasshoppers ... heads smashed against the boulders and walls." " Isreali Prime Minister (at the time) in a speech to Jewish settlers New York Times April 1, 1988

5. "When we have settled the land, all the Arabs will be able to do about it will be to scurry around like drugged cockroaches in a bottle." Raphael Eitan, Chief of Staff of the Israeli Defence Forces, New York Times, 14 April 1983.

6. "How can we return the occupied territories? There is nobody to return them to." Golda Meir, March 8, 1969.

7. "There was no such thing as Palestinians, they never existed." Golda Meir, Israeli Prime Minister, June 15, 1969

8. "The thesis that the danger of genocide was hanging over us in June 1967 and that Israel was fighting for its physical existence is only bluff, which was born and developed after the war." Israeli General Matityahu Peled, Ha'aretz, 19 March 1972.

9. David Ben Gurion (the first Israeli Prime Minister): "If I were an Arab leader, I would never sign an agreement with Israel. It is normal; we have taken their country. It is true God promised it to us, but how could that interest them? Our God is not theirs. There has been Anti - Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They see but one thing: we have come and we have stolen their country. Why would they accept that?" Quoted by Nahum Goldmann in Le Paraddoxe Juif (The Jewish Paradox), pp121.

9a. Ben Gurion also warned in 1948 : "We must do everything to insure they ( the Palestinians) never do return." Assuring his fellow Zionists that Palestinians will never come back to their homes. "The old will die and the young will forget."

10. "We have to kill all the Palestinians unless they are resigned to live here as slaves." Chairman Heilbrun of the Committee for the Re-election of General Shlomo Lahat, the mayor of Tel Aviv, October 1983.

11. "Every time we do something you tell me America will do this and will do that . . . I want to tell you something very clear: Don't worry about American pressure on Israel. We, the Jewish people, control America, and the Americans know it." - Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, October 3, 2001.



=====
--============_-1192160055==_ma============-- From irimland@zundelsite.org Mon Apr 29 03:06:27 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2002 20:06:27 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/28/2002 - "A Canadian comments on Le Pen" Message-ID: --============_-1192072907==_ma============ Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed" ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 28, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: Your Sunday treat from the Great White North: [START] Toronto Sun | April 28, 2002 France's wild ride to choose a president By ERIC MARGOLIS -- Contributing Foreign Editor The stunning second-place showing by far-right candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen in last week's French elections dropped a bombshell on France's fat-cat political establishment and sent Europe's left into a state of convulsive hysteria. Written off as a has-been only months ago, the 72-year old Le Pen and his National Front Party won more votes than Lionel Jospin's Socialists, who have long contested or shared power with France's centre right in a cozy system infused with corruption, chicanery, and cynicism. Many of the 17% of French who voted for Le Pen's party clearly did so as a protest against the scandals that have buffeted both President Jacques Chirac's centre-right coalition and the united Socialist-Communist left. Le Pen's victory was also due to surging crime, low voter turnout, and numerous minor protest candidates who fragmented the leftwing vote. France's political establishment and Europe's left are loudly damning Le Pen as a neo-fascist or neo-nazi, conveniently ignoring the fact that "nazi" is a wartime contraction for the proper name of Hitler's party - the National Socialists. The right fears him, thunders Le Pen, because he represents "the little man" and is determined to expose the deep corruption of France's pampered political elite, notably Chirac's slush funds, freebie trips, and the truckloads of cash delivered to politicians each month for their "confidential" use. In 1990, I spent some time with Le Pen, mostly in his elegant late-19th-century villa outside Paris, during which he gave me some rare insights into his personality and thinking. Sitting on his terrace sipping white wine, speaking in peppery French, Le Pen told me about his life. He was born to a penniless fishing family in Brittany; his parents did not even speak French, only the ancient Celtic language, Breton. Le Pen studied law and served as a elite paratrooper in Indochina and Algeria, two dirty, disastrous wars that left many French soldiers filled with an abiding hatred for all politicians, whom, they believed, had betrayed them and their nation. Le Pen's politics have not changed a whit since we spoke, though they have been modulated for the recent election. Witty, charming, and provocative, Le Pen is a master of one-liners. "Immigration" - his bete noire - "is invasion" quips Le Pen. "Look at California. The Americans conquered it from Mexico. Now Mexico is getting it back through immigration." "Our system of social support encourages the lowest elements of society to breed like rabbits - why should we spend our tax money to pay for unwed black mothers to produce more babies who will grow up into illiterates?" "Immigration from the Third World brings crime and disease," warned Le Pen. He blames France's surge in violent crimes squarely on emigrants from North and West Africa. France's colonial past has left it with over 5 million Muslim and black African inhabitants, almost 10% of the population, third class citizens who live in squalid conditions and form a restive, crime-prone underclass. "Stop immigration totally, stop letting family members in," says Le Pen, "deport all illegal immigrants." Such language resonates across Europe, which is being swamped by a flood of Third World immigrants and criminal elements. Right-wing parties in Belgium, Italy, Denmark, Holland, Austria, and Switzerland are making similar demands. Le Pen's calls for slashing government and taxes, a crackdown on crime, outlawing abortion to reverse population decline, and investigation of rampant corruption among the political elite find many willing ears in France and across Europe. So too his dramatic call for France to quit the European Union, drop the Euro currency, and reassert its sovereignty. Le Pen calls for a "Europe of nations" in place of a Europe run by a remote, left-dominated super-bureaucracy in Brussels. But in his more relaxed moments, Le Pen's views become far more extreme. He is an equal-opportunity anti-Semite. Le Pen despises both Arabs and Jews. Le Pen told me, "Jews have conspired to rule the world through their power over international finance. They are using their influence over government and media to promote mixture with lesser races and corrupt the purity of Europe's blood. The Jews created communism and tried to use it as a means of world domination. Today, 'the Jewish conspiracy' is using race rather than communism to advance its goals." France's 600,000 Jews, who are suffering a wave of anti-Semitic attacks, call Le Pen a latter-day follower of Hitler. In fact, Le Pen more closely reflects the views of France's Catholic far right of the 1930s and 40s - which led to the Vichy government - that saw communism as a vast Jewish conspiracy aimed against the Church and their class interests. Runoff elections on May 5 will almost certainly produce a landslide for conservative Jacques Chirac, who is now being reluctantly backed by France's demoralized and shell-shocked left. However odious Le Pen's political philosophy, he has certainly given a big scare to France's self-serving, imperious politicians. They too long ignored the growing concerns of the voiceless "little people" over crime, immigration, unemployment, and Big Europe. In typically Gallic fashion, French voters have just sent a revolutionary warning message to the distant political elites in Paris, Strasbourg, and Brussels. [END] Eric can be reached by e-mail at Letters to the editor should be sent to ===== --============_-1192072907==_ma============ Content-Type: text/html; charset="us-ascii" ZGram - 4/28/2002 - "A Canadian comments on Le Pen"




ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny

April 28, 2002

Good Morning from the Zundelsite:

Your Sunday treat from the Great White North:

[START]

Toronto Sun | April 28, 2002

France's wild ride to choose a president

By ERIC MARGOLIS -- Contributing Foreign Editor

The stunning second-place showing by far-right candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen
in last week's French elections dropped a bombshell on France's fat-cat
political establishment and sent Europe's left into a state of convulsive
hysteria.

Written off as a has-been only months ago, the 72-year old Le Pen and his
National Front Party won more votes than Lionel Jospin's Socialists, who
have long contested or shared power with France's centre right in a cozy
system infused with corruption, chicanery, and cynicism. Many of the 17% of
French who voted for Le Pen's party clearly did so as a protest against the
scandals that have buffeted both President Jacques Chirac's centre-right
coalition and
the united Socialist-Communist left. Le Pen's victory was also due to
surging crime, low voter turnout, and numerous minor protest candidates who
fragmented the leftwing vote.

France's political establishment and Europe's left are loudly damning Le
Pen as a neo-fascist or neo-nazi, conveniently ignoring the fact that
"nazi" is a wartime contraction for the proper name of Hitler's party - the
National Socialists. The right fears him, thunders Le Pen, because he
represents "the little man" and is determined to expose the deep corruption
of France's pampered political elite, notably Chirac's slush funds, freebie
trips, and the truckloads of cash delivered to politicians each month for
their "confidential" use.

In 1990, I spent some time with Le Pen, mostly in his elegant
late-19th-century villa outside Paris, during which he gave me some rare
insights into his personality and thinking. Sitting on his terrace sipping
white wine, speaking in peppery French, Le Pen told me about his life.

He was born to a penniless fishing family in Brittany; his parents did not
even speak French, only the ancient Celtic language, Breton. Le Pen studied
law and served as a elite paratrooper in Indochina and Algeria, two dirty,
disastrous wars that left many French soldiers filled with an abiding
hatred for all politicians, whom, they believed, had betrayed them and
their nation.

Le Pen's politics have not changed a whit since we spoke, though they have
been modulated for the recent election. Witty, charming, and provocative,
Le Pen is a master of one-liners. "Immigration" - his bete noire - "is
invasion" quips Le Pen. "Look at California. The Americans conquered it
from Mexico. Now Mexico is getting it back through immigration."

"Our system of social support encourages the lowest elements of society to
breed like rabbits - why should we spend our tax money to pay for unwed
black mothers to produce more babies who will grow up into illiterates?"

"Immigration from the Third World brings crime and disease," warned Le Pen.
He blames France's surge in violent crimes squarely on emigrants from North
and West Africa. France's colonial past has left it with over 5 million
Muslim and black African inhabitants, almost 10% of the population, third
class citizens who live in squalid conditions and form a restive,
crime-prone underclass.

"Stop immigration totally, stop letting family members in," says Le Pen,
"deport all illegal immigrants." Such language resonates across Europe,
which is being swamped by a flood of Third World immigrants and criminal
elements. Right-wing parties in Belgium, Italy, Denmark, Holland, Austria,
and Switzerland are making similar demands.

Le Pen's calls for slashing government and taxes, a crackdown on crime,
outlawing abortion to reverse population decline, and investigation of
rampant corruption among the political elite find many willing ears in
France and across Europe. So too his dramatic call for France to quit the
European Union, drop the Euro currency, and reassert its sovereignty. Le
Pen calls for a "Europe of nations" in place of a Europe run by a remote,
left-dominated super-bureaucracy in Brussels.

But in his more relaxed moments, Le Pen's views become far more extreme. He
is an equal-opportunity anti-Semite. Le Pen despises both Arabs and Jews.

Le Pen told me, "Jews have conspired to rule the world through their power
over international finance. They are using their influence over government
and media to promote mixture with lesser races and corrupt the purity of
Europe's blood. The Jews created communism and tried to use it as a means
of world domination. Today, 'the Jewish conspiracy' is using race rather
than communism to advance its goals."

France's 600,000 Jews, who are suffering a wave of anti-Semitic attacks,
call Le Pen a latter-day follower of Hitler.

In fact, Le Pen more closely reflects the views of France's Catholic far
right of the 1930s and 40s - which led to the Vichy government - that saw
communism as a vast Jewish conspiracy aimed against the Church and their
class interests.

Runoff elections on May 5 will almost certainly produce a landslide for
conservative Jacques Chirac, who is now being reluctantly backed by
France's demoralized and shell-shocked left.

However odious Le Pen's political philosophy, he has certainly given a big
scare to France's self-serving, imperious politicians. They too long
ignored the growing concerns of the voiceless "little people" over crime,
immigration, unemployment, and Big Europe.

In typically Gallic fashion, French voters have just sent a revolutionary
warning message to the distant political elites in Paris, Strasbourg, and
Brussels.

[END]

Eric can be reached by e-mail at
<margolis@foreigncorrespondent.com>

Letters to the editor should be sent to
<editor@sunpub.com>


=====
--============_-1192072907==_ma============-- From irimland@zundelsite.org Mon Apr 29 19:32:06 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Mon, 29 Apr 2002 12:32:06 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/29/2002 - "Soviet rape orgies" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 29, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: A timely book review today of mainstream revisionism: [START] Red Army rapists exposed By Chris Summers BBC News Online Red Army soldiers raped two million German women, and thousands of Soviet women in occupied Eastern Europe, says a book published on Monday. (...) The author of Berlin: The Downfall 1945, the acclaimed military historian Antony Beevor, also suggests that after brutalisation in extreme war situations almost all men are tempted to become rapists. But the book has been condemned as an "act of blasphemy" by the Russian ambassador to the UK and its conclusions have also been rejected by a prominent Russian military historian. Mr Beevor, whose previous book Stalingrad became a best-seller, says in Berlin alone it was estimated up to 130,000 women were raped, of whom up to 10,000 committed suicide. Altogether two million German women are believed to have been raped and almost half of those suffered gang rape. One woman was raped by 23 soldiers. Mr Beevor said he was shocked by what he found during his research of German and Soviet archives. He said the widespread rape suggested "there is a dark area of male sexuality which can emerge all too easily, especially in war, when there are no social and disciplinary restraints." He said the Soviet hierarchy turned a blind eye, and even condoned the rape as a form of revenge for what the German Army - the Wehrmacht - had done during Operation Barbarossa. One district commander told a group of German women who were seeking his protection: "That? Well, it certainly hasn't done you any harm. Our men are all healthy." 'Bonding process' Mr Beevor said: "As the Red Army example shows, the practice of collective rape can even become a form of bonding process." The book has naturally aroused controversy with the Russian Ambassador to Britain, Grigory Karasin, describing it as "lies and insinuations". He wrote to the Daily Telegraph: "It is a disgrace to have anything to do with this clear case of slander against the people who saved the world from Nazism." But Mr Beevor said the book's claims, while uncomfortable, were backed up by documents which he had found in the Russian state archives. "The rape of German women was previously known from German archives but I believe this is the first time the fact that Soviet citizens were raped has been published in the West," he told BBC News Online. He said many people in Russia were still struggling to come to terms with what the Red Army did during the war. Mr Beevor said: "I was shaken to the core when I discovered that soldiers raped female prisoners of war. "That completely undermined the notion that they were only using rape as a form of revenge against the Germans. He said women became "carnal booty" during the war. The Wehrmacht had abducted many Russian and Ukrainian girls and set them up in "military brothels". The Red Army, for its part, had engaged in an "alcohol-induced frenzy of sadism and humiliation". 'Out of control' He told BBC News Online: "One has this image of the Soviet state and the Red Army as being extremely disciplined but in the first four months of 1945 their soldiers were completely out of control." Professor Oleg Rzheshevsky, head of war history at the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow, told BBC News Online these were grave accusations which were not supported by documentary evidence. Professor Rzheshevsky, who admitted he had only read excerpts and had not seen the book's source notes, said: "Information on the number of raped and killed women is based on victims' and witnesses' accounts, some excerpts from interviews and other such sources." He said Mr Beevor's use of phrases such as "Berliners remember" and "the experiences of the raped German women" were more suitable for pulp fiction, than scientific research. Professor Rzheshevsky said considering what the German Army had done in the Soviet Union the Germans could have expected an "avalanche of revenge". 'Humane soldiers' But he said that did not happen and added: "The majority of soldiers and officers of the Soviet Army and the allied armies treated the local population humanely." The professor said 4,148 Red Army officers and many privates were "punished" for committing atrocities. Professor Evan Mawdsley, a historian from Glasgow University, said it was not the first time women had become "carnal booty" in time of war. Professor Richard Overy, a historian from King's College London, said the Russians had never faced up to the atrocities committed by the Red Army. He said: "Partly this is because they felt that much of it was justified vengeance against an enemy who committed much worse, and partly it was because they were writing the victors' history." ===== Antony Beevor is featured in a documentary, The Battle For Berlin: Timewatch, which will be shown on 10 May at 2100 BST on BBC Two. [END] From irimland@zundelsite.org Tue Apr 30 23:09:03 2002 From: irimland@zundelsite.org (irimland@zundelsite.org) Date: Tue, 30 Apr 2002 16:09:03 -0700 Subject: ZGram - 4/30/2002 - "U.S. Bias an Obstacle to Peace" Message-ID: ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny April 30, 2002 Good Morning from the Zundelsite: From the website "We Hold These Truths" comes this: [START] Retired Brigadier General James J. David has made a factual comparison between what the Palestinian "suicide bombers" have done and what is being done to all Palestinians in the name of disarming them. In so doing he opens the lid a crack to the question of whether these human bombs are acts of terrorism, or if they are resistance to illegal occupation as several international leaders suggested. This question needs to be examined. -Editor of WHTT ===== U.S. Bias an Obstacle to Peace By Brigadier General (retired) James J. David Defying a U.S. request, Egypt declined to condemn a suicide bombing that killed eight Israelis and instead said Palestinian resistance to Israeli occupation was justified.. I'll bet the Bush Administration nearly fell over backwards when they heard this reply. As a matter of fact, I almost did myself, considering Egypt is the second largest recipient of U.S. aid. But you know what? I was delighted with Egypt's response. Don't get me wrong. In no way do I condone suicide bombings. I don't condone them anymore than I condone missile strikes in Palestinian villages and refugee camps that kill innocent men, women, and children. I don't condone them anymore than I condone Israel's demolition of Palestinian homes that leave thousands of innocent children homeless. I don't condone them anymore than I condone the hundreds of human rights violations committed by the Israeli government in their brutal occupation of the Palestinian people. When Palestinian suicide bombers strike, it seems that the United States is the first to condemn these acts and demands all other countries to do the same. Yet when the Israeli government commits over 100 political suicides killing numerous women and children in the process, the United States makes no response. When Israeli troops kill 3 teenage boys with a tank shell only because they "looked suspicious," the United States says nothing. But just let one suicide bomber kill innocent Israelis and George Bush, Colin Powell, and Condoleezza Rice, are in a foot race to be the first one at the microphone on the White House lawn to condemn these "inexcusable acts." What about the 3 Palestinian teenage boys killed while walking to a friend's house only because they looked suspicious? Or what about the pregnant mother and her unborn child who never survived the trip to the hospital because of unending roadblocks and checkpoints? Do you call these "excusable" acts? Just last week in this latest Israeli incursion into Palestinian villages and refugee camps a group of Palestinian policemen were captured by Israeli soldiers, disarmed, made to kneel in a hallway, and then shot to death. These men were not terrorists; they were Palestinian policemen who were rounded up by Ariel Sharon's soldiers and murdered in cold blood. Why haven't we heard President Bush demand an explanation from the Israelis? Why haven't we heard Colin Powell or Condoleezza Rice condemn these bloody acts. Do they not consider them "inexcusable?" Why is it that only Israelis who are killed by Palestinian suicide bombers get responses from the White House? And what about our Congressmen and women? Seems that they can't wait to condemn the Palestinian Authority and Yasser Arafat anytime a suicide bomber strikes but, God forbid, if they would consider condemning Ariel Sharon. Representative Tom Lantos of California, ranking Democrat on the House International Relations Committee, was pushing for a vote on a resolution expressing support for Israel, and Senators Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat, and Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, had a bill to designate the Palestine Liberation Organization a terrorist group. These are the same senators who have accused the Palestinian Authority and Yasser Arafat for initiating and encouraging Palestinians in this 19 month old intifada. Maybe someone should send them a copy of Amnesty International's 1999 Report on Israel and the Occuppied Territories. This report was written months before the intifada and months before the suicide attacks.. It wasn't Yasser Arafat or the Palestinian Authority that sparked the intifada; it was the oppressive humiliation and brutal occupation of the Israeli government. According to Amnesty International, "the Israeli authorities have demolished at least 2,650 Palestinian homes in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. As a result 16,700 Palestinians (including 7,300 children) have lost their homes." Did we ever hear Tom Lantos or Dianne Feinstein ever condemn these brutal acts. Can you imagine what they would have done if Yasser Arafat and the Palestinian Authority demolished just one Jewish home, let alone 2650? Maybe someone should remind these Israeli parrots that Yasser Arafat is a former recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize and Ariel Sharon is about to go on trial in the Belgium Courts for "war crimes."" Even before this latest military incursion by the Israeli military that has left more than 500 Palestinians dead, some 400 Israeli army reservists had begun to question the relentlessness of the military tactics against a largely impoverished civilian population. It's time for the United States to do the same. History has proven that a continued blind eye to Israeli violence has led to nothing more than cloaking the continuing oppression and dispossession of the Palestinian people in new robes. The ongoing bloodshed on both sides is more than a far away tragedy. Our tax dollars have financed Israel's continued violation of human rights and the violence will continue until Washington's stranglehold by Jewish interest groups is finally lifted. A just solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict can only be achieved if U.S. policy is based upon American moral principles and a strict adherence to international law, which run counter to the continued Israeli occupation of Palestinian land and the denial of basic rights of freedom to Palestinians under Israeli military rule. -end Address comments to General Davis to info@whtt.org , we will forward... James J. David is a retired Brigadier General and a graduate of the U.S. Army's Command and General Staff College, and the National Security Course, National Defense University, Washington DC. He served as a Company Commander with the 101st Airborne Division in the Republic of Vietnam in 1969 and 1970 and also served nearly 3 years of Army active duty in and around the Middle East from 1967-1969. (Source: http://whtt.org/rpr/020422.htm )