News

The Jerusalem Post says Iranian state TV is producing a series "sympathetic to the fate of European Jewry during World War II." This is accomplished not with smoke and mirrors, but a distinction between Jews and Zionists.

One recent example is the speech commemorating al-Quds (Jerusalem) Day by former president and current head of the Assembly of Experts, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, in October. Rafsanjani said the Nazis' "first objective was to free Europe from the evils of Zionism," and that this was justifiable because "the Zionists, as a powerful faction, used to engage in many subversive activities in Europe, thanks to their large assets and propaganda empire."

Five trips to Hungarian courts fail to yield a return of art stolen by Nazis. The New York Times:

So when she got more news last week it was not wonderful, but it was not unexpected. Another Hungarian appellate court in Budapest, ruled in favor of the government. It found that the government had acquired the art through “prescription,” the principle that by possessing the property for long enough it had gained ownership of it. It was the fifth ruling in the case. It left Mrs. Nierenberg and her allies convinced that if she were ever to find justice, it would not come through the Hungarian courts.

Selling Nazi memorabilia draws anger. Port Macquarie News:

A SHOP selling Nazi flags, insignias and other memorabilia at Kew, 30km south of Port Macquarie, has caused outrage within the NSW Jewish community.

A holidaymaker of Jewish heritage spotted the items on the shelves of the BP Legends Café, which is located on the Pacific Hwy.

A BBC1 documentary, Weekend "Nazis", draws anger. Press Gazette:

The regulator concluded that the use of offensive language was justified by the fact that the documentary was a serious investigation into the extremist and racist views among certain people involved in a World War Two enactment.

Presidential contender Mike Huckabee has been slammed in an email sent to Michigan Republicans, just a few days before the primary. The email says Huckabee "has kept close acquitance with evangelical leaders who have ... said the Catholic Church collaborated with the Nazis to exterminate Jews," among other things. TheAtlantic.com:

What did Mike Huckabee do when presented with these vicious statements made by John Hagee about Catholics and the Catholic Church?

Nothing, but Huckabee did make this very equivocal statement: "I can't speak for (Hagee) anymore than he could speak for me. I'm sure that there're things I'll say that he disagrees with… I would certainly never characterize the Catholic Church as being pro-Nazi, never."

Victor Davis Hanson offers a scathing response (at National Review Online) to an article written by Arun Gandhi, published in the Washington Post. Gandhi wrote:

The holocaust was the result of the warped mind of an individual who was able to influence his followers into doing something dreadful. But, it seems to me the Jews today not only want the Germans to feel guilty but the whole world must regret what happened to the Jews. The world did feel sorry for the episode but when an individual or a nation refuses to forgive and move on the regret turns into anger… We have created a culture of violence (Israel and the Jews are the biggest players) and that Culture of Violence is eventually going to destroy humanity…

Hansen's response included:

Everything in that brief excerpt alone is untrue for the following reasons: 1) The Holocaust was not just Hitler and a few SS “followers”; rather, it involved millions of followers (some of whom were active, some of whom were passive) in a systematic and near successful genocide of an entire people.

Neither Hitler, nor Himmler, nor Goebbels, nor any of the Nazi hierarchy could have wrought what they did without millions of German non-party guards, railroad employees, informants, and clerks and bureaucrats in the industry of death. Tragically this complaisance did not happen over night, but was prepped by years of National Socialist indoctrination that systematically and incrementally whipped up centuries old anti-Semitism by blaming — take note here, Mr. Gandhi — “the Jews” as being the “biggest players” in the world’s violence and problems.

Jeff Morton describes a meeting with a holocaust survivor who showed him a home movie like few others. The Conservative Voice:

Once everything was in place she turned to me and said, "What you are about to see is awful, are you sure you want to watch it?" I said, "Yes." She turned on the projector, aimed it at a particular wall in her home and the images of a group of women and children of various ages (all girls) appeared. They were walking into a huge pit dug into the earth. Their were probably 150, possibly as many as 300 naked, cold and frightened females being marched into this pit which was more like a football field that was dug out of the ground. As the camera panned over these people it was obvious that they were standing in what appeared to be water. The smallest children were just about submerged, some were being carried, and all were naked. After a few minutes and with the camera angle now some distance from the pit (I do not know what happened between the time that the camera was repositioned), the entire pit erupted in fire! This beautiful little Jewish woman turned to me and said, "That was not water!"