Bush or Kerry: Any Real Difference in Foreign Policy?
by Mark Weber
Oct. 26, 2004

President George W. Bush's fervent support for Israel and its hardline premier is well known. He reaffirmed it, for example, in June 2002 in a major speech on the Middle East. In the view of "leading Israeli commentators," the London Times reported, the address was "so pro-Israel that it might have been written by Ariel Sharon."

...During the presidential campaign debate on Sept. 30, which focused on US foreign policy, neither Bush nor Kerry made a single reference to the Israel-Palestine conflict. To be sure, each did mention Israel, but only to reaffirm his commitment to the Zionist state.

Bush and Kerry, like most US politicians, are so beholden to Jewish-Zionist power, and so committed to Israel and its interests, that regardless of who wins the presidential election on November 2, there will be no real change in US foreign policy, and certainly not in the Middle East.

Some of His Best Friends are Jewish: The Saga of a Holocaust Revisionist
From his apartment on Manhattan's Upper West Side, in what might be called the intellectual center of Jewish America, Michael Santomauro sends out a daily e-mail digest of what are, for his neighborhood, some unusual views on Judaism. Among them: questions on the Holocaust's veracity, excoriation of every aspect of Israel's behavior and questions on the morality of Judaism itself.

Santomauro, 50, says he is not an antisemite. But this week, his messages, which he claims reach about 144,000 subscribers, caught some unwanted attention. The Jewish Defense Organization, a militant group known for its sharp-tongued rhetoric, called for his eviction from the apartment in which he lives and assembles his "Reporter's Notebook" Web site. The organization has posted leaflets outside his building and called for a rally there next weekend.

French Politico Faces Firing for Calling Existence of Gas Chambers Debatable

“There isn’t a serious historian around who totally sticks by the conclusions of the Nuremberg Trials,” Gollnisch told a press conference in Lyon on Monday. “I’m not questioning the existence of concentration camps, but on the number of deaths, historians can discuss it. As to whether gas chambers existed, that’s up to the historians to determine.”

Two weeks before the U.S. election, hostility toward President George W. Bush has reached new heights internationally. A joint poll taken by 10 newspapers worldwide reveals that most of those surveyed oppose Bush's policies, want to see him defeated, and paint his influence on the global situation in the gloomiest colors.

Poll Reveals World Anger at Bush
Eight out of 10 countries favour Kerry for president

George Bush has squandered a wealth of sympathy around the world towards America since September 11 with public opinion in 10 leading countries - including some of its closest allies - growing more hostile to the United States while he has been in office.

According to a survey, voters in eight out of the 10 countries, including Britain, want to see the Democrat challenger, John Kerry, defeat President Bush in next month's US presidential election.

Investigative Journalist Seymour Hersh Spills the Secrets of the Iraq Quagmire and the War on Terror
The Iraq war is not winnable, a secret U.S. military unit has been "disappearing" people since December 2001, and America has no idea how irreparably its torture of Iraqis at Abu Ghraib prison has damaged its image in the Middle East.

The past two years will "go down as one of the classic sort of failures" in history, said the man who has been called the "greatest muckraker of all time" and (paradoxically) the "enfant terrible of journalism for more than 30 years."

The resulting report cards on anti-Semitism would be published in annual US surveys of human rights abuses around the world.

Bush Signs Global Anti-Semitism Law
"Extending freedom also means disrupting the evil of anti-Semitism," Bush told thousands of cheering supporters packed into a sports arena usually used by the Florida Panthers professional ice hockey team.

Bush’s New Anti-Semitism Law May Criminalize Thought
By Sam Francis

A tip of the hat to the Department of State, which had the guts and good sense to express its opposition (sort of) to congressional legislation creating an office for monitoring "anti-Semitism."

The bill passed both houses of Congress by voice vote and was signed into law by President Bush last week.

It's a very silly and dangerous measure.

Key Witness in Nazi War Crimes Trial 'Unreliable'
One of Germany's last major war crimes trials was on the verge of collapse yesterday after a former leader of a Nazi assassination squad, accused of murdering Slovakian civilians in 1945, was freed by judges who ruled that a key prosecution witness suffered memory lapses and was unreliable.

Christians in Jerusalem Want Jews to Stop Spitting on Them
A few weeks ago, a senior Greek Orthodox clergyman in Israel attended a meeting at a government office in Jerusalem's Givat Shaul quarter. When he returned to his car, an elderly man wearing a skullcap came and knocked on the window. When the clergyman let the window down, the passerby spat in his face.

The clergyman prefered not to lodge a complaint with the police and told an acquaintance that he was used to being spat at by Jews. Many Jerusalem clergy have been subjected to abuse of this kind. For the most part, they ignore it but sometimes they cannot.

Spitting on the Cross
Dishonouring Christian religious symbols is an old religious duty in Judaism. Spitting on the cross, especially on the Crucifix, and spitting when a Jew passes a church, have been obligatory from around AD 200 for pious Jews.

In the past, when the danger of anti-Semitic hostility was a real one, the pious Jews were commanded by their rabbis either to spit so that the reason for doing so would be unknown, or to spit onto their chests, not actually on the cross or openly before the church.

A Letter to Abraham Foxman
Criticizing Israel is Not Anti-Semitism
by Ralph Nader

Dear Mr. Foxman:

You started your last letter with the sentence: "We are not engaged in a dialogue about the issues you raised in your letter." That is precisely the point, is it not, Mr. Foxman. For many years you have eschewed engaging in a dialogue with those in Israel and the United States who disagree with your views. Your mode of operation for years has been to make charges of racism or insinuation of racism designed to slander and evade. Because your pattern of making such charges, carefully calibrated for the occasion but of the same stigmatizing intent, has served to deter critical freedom of speech, you have become sloppy with your characterizations when it comes to attempts to hold you accountable...

Jewish State Fears World Isolation
[World Isolation? Note picture...]

An internal report prepared by Israel's foreign ministry paints a gloomy picture for the future of the country's global standing, giving warning that in the coming decade it could suffer the pariah status of South Africa under apartheid.

The document, written in August and leaked this week, suggests that Israel and Europe will find themselves on a collision course that will cause serious economic and diplomatic damage to Israel.

Bid Fails to Grant Anne Frank Posthumous Dutch Citizenship
A bid to secure Jewish teenage diarist Anne Frank posthumous Dutch citizenship has failed, almost 60 years after her death in a Nazi concentration camp, officials said Sunday.

Anne Frank — whose family were betrayed to the Nazis while in hiding in German-occupied Amsterdam in 1944 — lost her German citizenship in 1941, years after fleeing persecution in Hitler's Germany. But she never became a Dutch citizen.

Is The Diary of Anne Frank Genuine?
by Robert Faurisson

Is The Diary of Anne Frank genuine? For two years that question was included in the official syllabus "Text and Document Criticism," a seminar reserved for degreed students in their fourth year. The conclusion of my studies and research is that The Diary of Anne Frank is a fraud.

US Vetoes UN Resolution to End Gaza Operation
The United States on Tuesday vetoed an Arab-backed resolution demanding an immediate end to a large-scale Israeli military offensive in the northern Gaza Strip.

The vote in the 15-member Security Council was 11 in favor, one against, and three abstentions — Britain, Germany and Romania.

US Ambassador John Danforth cast the US veto after British and German efforts to find compromise language failed.

"Once again, the resolution is lopsided and unbalanced," Danforth told the council just before voting "no."

The State Department's Extreme Makeover
A veteran Foreign Service officer warns that when Colin Powell departs in a second Bush term, America will lose its last bulwark against the radical ideologues who are planning more Iraqs.

Secretary of State Colin Powell is not staying for a second Bush term. When he goes, the last bulwark against complete neoconservative control of U.S. foreign policy goes with him. The implications are enormous, yet the American electorate appears to be blinded by the Bush campaign's deliberate manipulations of 9/11.

Jewish Groups Scramble To Head Off Divestment Push

This week, following a tense three-hour summit with upset Jewish communal officials, leaders of the Louisville-based Presbyterian Church (USA), with 2.5 million members, said they were determined to go ahead with their recently approved plan to divest selectively from Israel. The interfaith meeting came just days after Anglican Church officials visiting Israel said that they would push for consideration of a divestment plan to protest Israel's policies toward the Palestinians.

A Failure of Moral Vision
The movement toward divestment from Israel by mainline Protestant churches — first the Presbyterians and now, perhaps, the Anglicans — is an alarming measure of how badly Israel's reputation in the West has been damaged in the last four years.

The uneven warfare of the intifada, the spreading global specter of Muslim rage and the canny marketing of Palestinian victimhood have all combined to create an image of Israel as a rogue nation founded on injustice and the dispossession of innocents.

In June 2003, New Jersey purchased $20 million in Israel Bonds. The state boasts a New Jersey-Israel Commission, which promotes economic, scientific and cultural exchanges between the locales. And New Jersey is one of six U.S. states that mandate Holofraud education in public schools.

1941: When Iraqi Jews got Butchered as Hitler Fought to Meet his Oil Needs
From Banking on Baghdad, a new book by Edwin Black about the history of Iraq

That day in 1941, on the Jewish festival of Shavuot, the sight of Jews returning from the Baghdad airport to greet the returning Regent Abdul al-Ilah, ruler of Iraq, was all the excuse an Iraqi mob needed to unleash its vengeance.

The attack began at 3 p.m., as the Jewish delegation crossed Baghdad’s Al Khurr Bridge. Violence quickly spread to the Al Rusafa and Abu Sifyan districts. The frenzied mob murdered Jews openly on the streets. Women were raped and infants were killed as their horrified families looked on. Torture and mutilation followed.

Candidates Omit Israeli-Palestinian Conflict from U.S. Debate
President George W. Bush and Democratic challenger John Kerry gave the Jewish state — America's key Middle East "ally" — only one mention each during their 90-minute debate on Thursday night at the University of Miami. And in both cases, the references came in the context of achieving peace in Iraq, not the conflict between Israel and Palestinians that roils the region with no end in sight.

"A free Iraq will be an ally in the war on terror, and that's essential. A free Iraq will set a powerful example in the part of the world that is desperate for freedom. A free Iraq will help secure Israel," Bush said.

Later, defending his plan for handling Iraq, Kerry vowed: "I'm going to get it right for those soldiers, because it's important to Israel, it's important to America, it's important to the world, it's important to the fight on terror."

Waiting to Bomb Iran
Sharon is disturbed by the growing acceptance, particularly in Europe, of Iran's impending membership in the nuclear club. Meanwhile he is carefully walking on the edge, and is exploiting his tough-guy image to arouse international attention. But nor should we forget that the present political-military leadership - Sharon, Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, Ya'alon, Halutz - has few inhibitions about exercising military might. Operations that were once considered taboo, such as attacks on Damascus and assassinations of Hamas leaders, now seem self evident.

A possible attack on Iran will be much more complex and risky, and therefore we would do well not to ignore the threats, and to conduct a public debate on the question of whether this course of action is desirable for Israel.

ADL Distressed By Beatification of Nun Whose Visions Fomented Anti-Semitism
It is with deep distress that we note the beatification of the Sr. Anne Catherine Emmerich on October 3.  As we have previously expressed in letters to leaders of the Catholic Church, hatred and anti-Semitism were fomented in her name, and attributed to her in the book which records her visions, "The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ." 

Recently, the release of Mel Gibson's film "The Passion of the Christ," reasserted the anti-Semitism that derives from the work attributed to Sr. Emmerich.  Serving as his muse, her visions guided Mr. Gibson in adding elements that do not derive from the Gospel narratives and break with the Second Vatican Council's teachings.  Among these elements include: the association of Jewish characters with the demonic, the destruction of the Second Temple, the benign portrait of Pilate, and the negative characterization of Jewish guards and leaders.  

The Pentagon Insider Who Spread Rumors that Sounded "Anti-Semitic"
Throughout 2004, as America's intelligence and military planning debacle in Iraq unfolded, the Internet and national policy publications continued seething with charges of warmongering against the Pentagon neocons, frequently making the Zionist connection. For some in the media who follow the policy debate and had long been pummeled by unending emails and web pushes, those anti-Zionist pundits now had an inside source: Karen Kwiatkowski.

Neoconservatism: An Alien Ideology
Interview with Karen Kwiatkowski

[In this informative interview, Karen Kwiatkowski goes to great lengths to avoid being awarded the label "Anti-Semite." She calls the powerful neoconservatives everything from plain neocons, to radicals, alien eastern Europeans, neo-Jacobins, Trotskyites... But she just won't cross that 'line.']

Ernst Zundel to Spend Another Six Months in Solitary
by Paul Fromm

"...secret evidence is given to the judge in camera and he must assess whether divulging this information would be injurious to national security. It beggars belief that not a single piece of information fails to meet this test.

However, Judge Blais's understanding of a threat to national security is so broad that he refuses to tell the defence even how many days of secret evidence have been heard."

CSIS Intercepted Zundel's Mail, Knew He Would be Bombed
by Ingrid Rimland Zundel

Who Is Ernst Zundel, And Why Is He In Jail?
by Mark Weber

Betrayed by Bush
From Where the Right Went Wrong by Patrick J. Buchanan

"...Historically, Republicans have been the party of the conservative virtues of balanced budgets, of a healthy scepticism towards foreign wars, of a commitment to traditional values and fierce resistance to the growth of government power and world empire. No more. There is no conservative party left in Washington. The GOP may be Reaganite in its tax policy, but it is Wilsonian in its foreign policy, FDR in its trade policy, and LBJ all the way in its spending policies. Pragmatism is the order of the day. The Republican philosophy might be summarised thus: ‘To hell with principle; what matters is power, and that we have it, and they do not.’"

A Mole Called Mega
The scandal over a suspected Israeli mole in the Pentagon who allegedly passed highly sensitive policy documents on Iran to Israeli agents in Washington has rekindled suspicions long held by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and others in Washington, that Israel systematically spies on its strategic ally and benefactor.

The FBI probe currently under way goes far beyond the allegations that a lone analyst was providing the Israelis with US secrets.

Mordechai Vanunu Speaks
"Five million Jews are regarding me as a traitor, but six billion people around the world think me as a hero and a good man who bring the message to all the human beings that we should survive and prevent the use of nuclear weapons and to prevent the nuclear preparations and to prevent nuclear war in the future. ...The Israel Government and state have teached all the world, especially the west, Europe, United States, Australia, Canada, they teach them to fear and now to be under blackmail by Israel propaganda of Holocaust and all this propaganda. Now come a man and speaking from inside about their crimes, their mistakes, their stupid policy of nuclear weapons and all the world's watching all this, and  that is their real concern."

How Israel's Defiance of the World Court Is Undermining the War on Terrorism
While sovereign states tend to resist the enforcement of international law in territories under their control, Ariel Sharon is, nonetheless, making a critical mistake by refusing to comply with the ICJ's ruling, by continuing the construction of Israel's separation barrier. The U.S. and several other countries, in turn, are making just as serious a mistake by supporting his actions.

By undermining the ICJ, Sharon is not merely ignoring the lessons learned from the tragic history of the Jews, but is also undercutting the Court's vital role as an impartial mediator in the international realm. The world's leaders are silently watching him do so, even though in a post 9/11 world it is precisely these kinds of institutions that need to be strengthened; military-might, as the past few years have so clearly proven, will not curb the escalating employment of violence.

The One-Time Lion King
During the first 13 years of Michael Eisner's reign, Disney's market capitalisation grew by $64 billion; riches that went into the pockets of shareholders large and small. But now that Mr Eisner's reign has turned sour, and many shareholders want him out, it is proving nearly impossible to unseat him.

Subverting the Disney Legacy
How Michael Eisner Has Transformed the 'Magic Kingdom'
by Mark Weber

For more than 40 years, the company founded and built by Walt Disney offered popular, well-crafted entertainment that upheld American values and traditions. Its films and television programming — even if sometimes sugary — epitomized, to use the much-mocked phrase, wholesome family entertainment.

Spanish Novelist Spied for Franco's Regime
One of Spain's greatest modern novelists was an informer for Franco's fascist regime and betrayed fellow intellectuals during the 1960s, according to recently discovered official records.

Camilo José Cela, the last Spaniard to win the Nobel prize for literature, continued to inform against other authors and academics even when they thought he had joined an emerging front of dissident writers.