Does Anyone Know What We Are Doing in Iraq?
Paul Craig Roberts

What are our efforts "in the broader Middle East"? The only American efforts "in the broader Middle East" that have been defined are in the policy writings of Bush's neoconservative advisers who cooked up the invasion of Iraq. For the neocons, our efforts are in behalf of Israel's security. The neocons' belief that Israel is made more secure by U.S. military aggression in the Middle East is delusional. How is Israel made secure by an invasion that turns the Muslim world against America as all polls show and Iraq into a training ground for al-Qaeda, as the CIA says has happened?

Israel Orders Palestinian Land Seized
Khalid Amayreh

An Israeli government spokesman on Wednesday said orders were issued to seize four Palestinian-owned tracts of land around Maale Adumim, the largest Jewish settlement in the West Bank, last Thursday, Reuters reported. The planned Maale Adumim section of the barrier Israel is building in the West Bank has raised alarm in Washington because of Israel's stated intention to build homes in Maale Adumim joining it to Jerusalem, 8km away. By looping in the enclave, Israel would effectively seal Palestinians off from east Jerusalem, which they want as their capital. Israel considers all of the holy city its own capital, a claim not recognised internationally.

Powerful Gun Lobby Takes Aim with First Jewish Leader
Josh Richman

Guns were not a big deal in Sandy Froman's life — until an intruder tried to break into her Los Angeles apartment one night about 25 years ago. Now she is the first Jewish person and only the second woman to serve as president of the National Rifle Association. "I think the traditional belief on the part of most people is that Jews tend to be extremely liberal and liberals tend to be anti-gun," Froman told the Forward.  Bucking such stereotypes, Froman, a 56-year-old lawyer from Tucson, Ariz., assumed the top NRA post earlier this year. Wayne LaPierre, executive vice president and CEO, runs the organization's daily affairs but Froman is the public face of the powerhouse lobby, which boasts 3.5 million members, 550 staffers and a $120 million annual budget. The NRA is "at the top of our political game in a lot of ways," she said.

Laws Against 'Holocaust Denial' in Europe
Raffi Berg

...in the 21st Century, as these events recede into history and the number of Holocaust survivors dwindles, there are still people who deny these crimes happened - and it is a tendency that some experts say is growing. "Holocaust revisionism is spreading, and not only among neo-Nazis," Kate Taylor, of the anti-fascist publication Searchlight, told the BBC News website. "As survivors are increasingly dying out it is much easier to hijack history for whatever cause or purpose." The internet has played a role in this. While publications peddling Holocaust denial were previously confined to the race-hate paraphernalia of extremist groups, the same material is now readily available on the web.

Bergen-Belsen Camp: The Suppressed Story
Mark Weber

Largely because of the circumstances of its liberation, the relatively unimportant German concentration camp of Bergen-Belsen has become -- along with Dachau and Buchenwald -- an international symbol of German barbarism. The British troops who liberated the Belsen camp three weeks before the end of the war were shocked and disgusted by the many unburied corpses and dying inmates they found there. Horrific photos and films of the camp's emaciated corpses and mortally sick inmates were quickly circulated around the globe. Within weeks the British military occupation newspaper proclaimed: "The story of that greatest of all exhibitions of 'man's inhumanity to man' which was Belsen Concentration Camp is known throughout the world."

UK Schoolchildren to Collect Six Million Buttons in Memory of 'Holocaust'

It's set to be a work of art with a poignant message. Hundreds of schoolchildren and students across Huddersfield have been challenged to collect 6 million buttons for a new work for the public art gallery. Every button will represent one of the people killed in the Holocaust. The buttons will be laid out in the art gallery and used to illustrate the sheer industrial scale of the Holocaust and the continued oppression of minorities. The project is being run by Kirklees Council's Community History Service for next year's Holocaust Memorial Day. Students from 12 Kirklees secondary schools, Huddersfield New College and Greenhead College will be working with Community History Service staff and Leeds-based artist Antonia Stowe.

The Sheehan Movement
Patrick J. Buchanan

In the long run, the Democratic Party stands to lose far more from this war than a GOP whose president led us into it. How can that be? How can a war that will go down in history as "Bush's War" end up dividing Democrats and gravely damaging their party? First, there is the Democratic complicity in taking America into a war in which some of them never believed. In October 2002, when the war drums were beating and Bush was pawing the ground to take down Saddam, Sens. Clinton, Biden, Edwards, Kerry and Daschle voted for the war. It is thus their war, as well as Bush's war. Some voted their interests, not their consciences. They did it to get the war issue, which was working for the Republicans in 2002, behind them. They failed in their duty to do due diligence before transferring the war power the Constitution invested in Congress to President Bush.

Dying for Israel

In any case, the irony (and the truth behind Marshall's idiotic blathering) is that the failure of the neocons' grand throw of the dice in Iraq has changed the balance of power in the Middle East – in favor of Iran. And while some Israeli military planners may have favored taking out Saddam (especially since it was clear the Americans were going to do it anyway) Iran has been their big strategic obsession for going on two decades now. I'd love to know what the guys on the IDF general staff think about the "strategic equation" now. Do they view the continuing presence of a large American army in Iraq as a vital shield against Iranian expansion – and thus in Israel's strategic interest? Or would they rather we withdrew the troops and restored our strategic freedom of action, so that the Cheney administration can more credibly threaten the Iranians with military action?

Nixon: The 'Anti-Semite' Who Saved Israel
Jason Maoz

If two-thirds of American Jewish voters had had their way, the man sitting in the White House at that critical moment would have been George McGovern. Though Nixon in 1972 doubled his share of the Jewish vote from the paltry 17 percent he received four years earlier, his Democratic opponent – an isolationist who spoke of drastic military cutbacks, had stated that Israel should not be allowed to use U.S.-supplied planes over Arab territory, and whose closest political allies were not exactly known for holding staunchly pro-Israel views – received the support of 65 percent of Jewish voters. Fortunately for Israel, Nixon crushed McGovern among non-Jewish voters and easily won a second term. Now, a year after the election, Israel's fate was very much in Nixon's hands.

Another Unreliable Auschwitz Story
Brad Woodard

In every sense of the word, Harry is a survivor. And while his memory isn't what it used to be, there are some things Harry couldn't forget even if he wanted to, which is readily apparent when we sit down to talk over lunch. "The Germans didn't have enough food for their soldiers," says Harry. "We learned how to eat grass, and you can survive on it!"  As a young man, Harry spent six and a half years in Auschwitz. "You can forgive, but you can't forget," says Harry. "There's no way." When we first met Harry, in 1992, his granddaughter Michelle was about to embark on a journey that would alter her life, retracing her grandfather's steps on a trip to Auschwitz.

The Mystery of Hitler's Lost Art Collection

In 1943, Hitler created the Sonderauftrag Linz (Special Assignment Linz) to set up an art collection for the Austrian city of the same name on the banks of the Danube river. Almost exclusively financed by funds earned through sales of Hitler's book "Mein Kampf" and from special stamps showing his portrait, the Linz collection was more or less the private affair of the Führer. While Hermann Voss, the supervisor of the Special Assignment Linz, and Gottfried Reimer the collection's co-curator, maintained that only 53 of the 4,353 pictures collected for the museum in Linz were confiscated works -- procured by Hermann Göring (photo) in Paris -- rumors during and after the war suggested that much of the collection had been stolen or seized by occupying Nazi soldiers across Europe. Löhrs research backs up the claims of the curators by saying that only a small part of the collection -- possibly 12 percent -- came from seizures or expropriations.

Israeli 'Disengagement' is Cynical Theater
Jonathan Steele

Contrast the world's overwhelming coverage, especially on television, of the departure of Israeli settlers from Gaza with the minimal reporting of larger and more brutal evictions in previous months. There was no "sensitivity training" for Israeli troops, no buses to drive the expellees away, no generous deadlines to get ready, no compensation packages for their homes, and no promise of government-subsidised alternative housing when the bulldozers went into Rafah. Within sight of the Gush Katif settlements that have been handled with such kid gloves this week, families in Rafah were usually given a maximum of five minutes' warning before their houses, and life savings, were crushed.

The Real Motive Behind the US 'Department of Global Anti-Semitism'
Rev. Ted Pike

...the Department of Anti-Semitism, applauded and advised by B’nai B’rith/ADL, is working to create a worldwide “criticism-free zone” for Jews in the “New World Order” that is coming. This report ignores whether criticisms of matters Jewish are true. What must be defended are the sensitivities of the Jewish people! Consequently, relating such unflattering realities as the anti-Christian, anti-Gentile contents of the Talmud and Kabbalah, Jewish origins of bolshevism, Jewish dominance of Hollywood and the media, Jewish control of Congress through AIPAC, Zionist atrocities and abrasiveness in the Middle East is anti-Semitic. It is “hate.” It does not matter that such facts can be easily and extensively documented, often from impeccable Jewish sources such as the Encyclopedia Judaica.

Westminster Service Remembers William Wallace

The 700th anniversary of the death of William Wallace has been marked with a memorial service in the House of Commons. Among those attending the service in Westminster Hall was historian David Ross, who walked to London to recreate Wallace's last journey. A candle was lit and there was a rendition of the song "Freedom Come aa ye". A number of SNP members attended. A series of events also took place across Scotland. Wallace was hung, drawn and quartered on 23 August, 1305, after being found guilty in Westminster Hall of treason. Since then he has become a cultural icon.

British Cabinet Minister's 'Traitor' Son
Richard Grayson

Leo Amery (1873-1955), Secretary of State for India in Churchill’s wartime Cabinet, had a Jewish ancestry which was not publicly known despite his strong pro-Zionism. Through the war years, however, he suffered a personal and political tragedy, as his son John allowed himself to be used as a propaganda tool by the Nazis and was finally hanged for treason in December 1945. Amery’s eldest son John (1912-45), a staunch anti-Communist, was stranded in Vichy France in 1940. He felt some sympathy with Nazism, and as the son of a British Cabinet minister, was recognized by the Nazis as a valuable propaganda tool. In 1942 they took him to Berlin where he broadcast to Britain, recruited for the British division of the SS, and wrote anti-semitic propaganda.

Footage of Hitler's Sister To Be Shown

Paula Wolf was filmed talking about her brother for hour-long ITV documentary Tyranny: The Years of Adolf Hitler, which also interviewed his chauffeur. It was rediscovered in ITN's archives as part an ongoing search for footage by the British Film Institute (BFI). It will be screened from November by the BFI to mark ITV's 50th anniversary. Paula Wolf, Hitler's youngest sister who died in 1960 aged 64, was asked to share personal stories about her brother in the documentary. Directed by Peter Morley, it also included interviews with Hitler's associates and fellow employees. The documentary was discovered by TV historian Dick Fiddy, who traced footage to Germany and the US before finding the full show in London.

Britain Ordered Killing of Bose, Indian Freedom Fighter

Eunan O'Halpin, a professor at the Trinity College, Dublin, said he came across classified documents of Britain's Special Operations Executive in archives in Turkey. Speaking at a weekend seminar in Kolkata, O'Halpin said the documents contained the order from London to SOE's Turkish and Egyptian units to "liquidate" Netaji. The assassination was ordered on March 7, 1941 when the British authorities thought that Netaji was on his way to Germany through Iran, Iraq and Turkey after fleeing house arrest in Kolkata in January the same year. British agents gathered this information by tapping Italian wire transmissions. But Netaji eventually reached Germany through Russia on April 2, giving the slip to the British agents.

Subhas Chandra Bose and India's War of Liberation
Ranjan Borra

A detailed overview of the fascinating life of a towering figure in India’s struggle for freedom from British rule. In the years before World War II, Subhas Chandra Bose – together with Gandhi and Nehru -- played a leading role in India’s struggle for independence. After a dramatic escape in 1941 from British-ruled India to Europe, this gifted and dynamic figure made an alliance with Hitler’s Germany, where he founded the “Indian Legion,” a volunteer military force that served under German command. Bose then made a perilous journey by submarine to east Asia, where he organized and headed a “Free India Army,” which grew to some 40,000 men (and women), and fought with Japanese forces in Asia. Affectionately known as “Netaji,” or revered leader, he also headed the “Free India Provisional Government.”

CD Audio of Ranjan Borra's Presentation from Noontide Press

Bush's Blind Spot on Iran
Robert Scheer

We don't respect or understand any religious or nationalist fervor other than our own. That myopic distortion has been a persistent historical failure of U.S. foreign policy, but it has reached the point of total blindness in the Bush administration. The latest exhibition of this approach was President Bush's thinly veiled threat this weekend to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities or even invade the country as a last resort, sparked by Tehran's troubled negotiations with the West over its nuclear program. It is telling that Bush made the comments on Israeli television, which makes them exponentially more provocative. Israel is, of course, not only Iran's archenemy but is also believed to be the sole possessor of nuclear weapons in the immediate region.

Israel's 'Disengagement Plan' Will Not Bring Peace, Say Greens

Green Party leaders strongly criticized Israel's 'disengagement plan', calling it a disingenuous attempt to bypass peace negotiations based on international law. "Gaza will continue to be an open-air prison. Obviously, Palestinians would welcome the departure of Israeli soldiers and armed settlers. But as in the Oslo redeployments, the current 'disengagement plan' pretends to bring peace while continuing to prevent Palestinians from exercising their basic rights to self-determination, freedom of movement, and ability to develop their economy. Under international law, this is still occupation."

Senior US Official Illegally Gave Info to AIPAC
David Johnston and James Risen

The second-highest diplomat at the United States Embassy in Baghdad is one of the anonymous government officials cited in an Aug. 4 indictment as having provided classified information to an employee of a pro-Israel lobbying group, people who have been officially briefed on the case said Wednesday. The diplomat, David M. Satterfield, was identified in the indictment as a United States government official, "USGO-2," the people briefed on the matter said. In early 2002, USGO-2 discussed secret national security matters in two meetings with Steven J. Rosen, who has since been dismissed as a top lobbyist for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, known as Aipac, who has been charged in the case.

Israel Seeks Annual International 'Holocaust' Memorial Day
Bill Rigby

Israel is urging the United Nations to establish an annual international holocaust memorial day, a top Israeli diplomat said on Thursday. An Israeli draft resolution... proposes Jan. 27 as a day to commemorate holocaust victims, marking the day in 1945 when Russian troops liberated Auschwitz, the largest Nazi death camp. More than 30 European countries support Israel's plan, British Deputy Ambassador Adam Thomson said in a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and Assembly President Jean Ping made public on Thursday. "It is a universal resolution," said Israeli Deputy U.N. Ambassador Daniel Carmon in an interview. "A nonpolitical remembrance of the most atrocious event that happened in the last century -- it should be acknowledged by the United Nations." 

Control of Roman Wall Handed Over to Private Firm

The future prosperity of Hadrian's Wall should be assured when its running is handed over to a private firm, a tourist boss has promised. Eric Robson, chairman of the Cumbria Tourist Board, believes handing control to the Hadrian's Wall Company will attract more visitors to the site. But critics of the move believe English Heritage should stay at the helm. Mr Robson said the trail, which runs from Tyneside to Cumbria, would benefit from closer management. He said the Roman site desperately needed commercial management to attract investment. He said: "Large areas of Hadrian's Wall, especially in West Cumbria are very badly served in tourism terms, there are no great hotels and in certain parts it is difficult to even get a cup of tea. "Entrepreneurs have just not been encouraged to invest in the area despite the fact that the opportunities are colossal."

Zundel Ordeal is Focus of August 18 'Current Issues' Broadcast

The ordeal of Ernst Zundel – publisher, author and civil rights activist who is being held in a German prison on charges of “denying the Holocaust” – will be the subject of a special two-hour “Current Issues” television broadcast on Thursday evening, August 18, 8:00 to 10:00 p.m. (Central time) Zundel’s wife, Ingrid Rimland, is scheduled to participate, along with host Hesham Tillawi, Mark Weber of the Institute for Historical Review, Paul Fromm of the Canadian Association for Free Expression, and Michael Hoffman of the Campaign for Radical Truth in History.

Get Ready for World War III
Paul Craig Roberts

With every poll showing majorities of Americans both fed up with Bush's war against Iraq and convinced that Bush's invasion of Iraq has made Americans less safe, the White House moron proposes to start another war by attacking Iran. VP Cheney has already ordered the U.S. Strategic Command come up with plans to strike Iran with tactical nuclear weapons. Likudnik Israel is Bush's last remaining ally, or egger-on, in his war against "Islamic terrorism." Israel, which is loaded with nuclear weapons and is not a signatory to the nuclear pacts, is the accuser against Iran, asserting that Iran's nuclear energy program is just a veil behind which to produce weapons. Israel's Likud Party fears that Iranian weapons would be a check to its plans to complete the dispossession of the Palestinians and further expand Israel's borders.

Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Christian Morality
Patrick J. Buchanan

Churchill did not deny what the Allied air war was about. Before departing for Yalta, he ordered Operation Thunderclap, a campaign to "de-house" civilians to clog roads so German soldiers could not move to stop the offensive of the Red Army. British Air Marshal "Bomber" Harris put Dresden, a jewel of a city and haven for hundreds of thousands of terrified refugees, on the target list. Estimates of the dead in the Dresden firestorm range from 35,000 to 250,000. Wrote The Associated Press, "Allied war chiefs have made the long-awaited decision to adopt deliberate terror bombing of German populated centers as a ruthless expedient to hasten Hitler's doom."

My Son Was Killed to Benefit Israel, Says Cindy Sheehan
Cindy Sheehan

Am I emotional? Yes, my first born was murdered. Am I angry? Yes, he was killed for lies and for a PNAC Neo-Con agenda to benefit Israel. My son joined the Army to protect America, not Israel. Am I stupid? No, I know full-well that my son, my family, this nation, and this world were betrayed by George Bush who was influenced by the neo-con PNAC agenda after 9/11. We were told that we were attacked on 9/11 because the terrorists hate our freedoms and democracy...not for the real reason, because the Arab-Muslims who attacked us hate our middle-eastern foreign policy. That hasn't changed since America invaded and occupied Iraq...in fact it has gotten worse.

Polish Priest Slams 'Jewish Bankers'

A Polish priest who was once banned from preaching for anti-Semitic remarks lashed out at laws made by "Jewish bankers," during celebrations of the 25th anniversary of the anti-communist Solidarity union. Father Henryk Jankowski, who participated in the strikes and for a time was confessor and confidant of union leader and democracy icon Lech Walesa, made his remarks at a mass that began the celebrations. "The recommendations of Brussels commissars and Washington economic gurus are threatening Poland's identity and sovereignty," he said from the pulpit. "We are filled with horror when laws are imposed upon us that are thought up by anti-Catholic Masons, Jewish bankers and hell-born atheistic socialists."

Czech Town Named as Possible European 'Holocaust' Commemoration Center

Some 155,000 Jews from all over Europe were brought by the Nazis to Terezin of whom 35,000 died there of disease and hunger. The Terezin municipality had pinned its hopes on a Europroject that would fund the reconstruction of some abandoned military buildings. The town would then offer the buildings to universities or use them for touristic purposes. Terezin, however, has so far failed to gain money to finance the Europroject worth 8.3 billion crowns. At present, Terezin hosts a memorial including the Museum of the Ghetto, which organises a number of events in commemoration of the Holocaust.

Dershowitz vs. Finkelstein

Finkelstein says Dershowitz is a "total liar", adding that "If a true word were to leap out of his mouth he would explode." Dershowitz eschews direct personal attacks only to ascribe his jibes to others. "Many people have thought he was unstable ... he is like a child ... he makes up facts." But beneath the vitriol lie many vital issues: namely Israel, Palestine, human rights in the Middle East, anti-semitism, academic freedom and intellectual honesty. Not to mention the scope for discussing these subjects in the United States, Israel's greatest ally, where the parameters for debate are relatively narrow compared with the rest of the western world.

Attacking Iran Is A Bad Idea
Michael J. Mazarr

Begin with two assumptions that an Iranian strategist might well make. First, Iran's nuclear program must continue--slowly, perhaps covertly, but continue nonetheless. Second, the United States (in league with Israel) is determined both to end that nuclear program and to dominate the greater Middle East. Typical were the comments of Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi, who, in 2002, said that the United States was planning to invade Iraq to impose its "hegemony on the whole region and its resources." The Stanley Foundation recently concluded that, after five years of interviews with Iranian officials and scholars, many in Iran today fear that the United States "has never accepted the idea of an Islamic Republic and never will." 

Holocaust A Lie, Says Leading Egyptian Newspaper
Aaron Klein

"The Zionist enterprise on the land of Palestine succeeded by means of lies and myths, from the myth of the 'Chosen People' and the 'Promised Land' to the lie about the burning of the Jews in the Nazi gas chambers during World War II," wrote Ahmad according to a translation by the Middle East Media Research Institute, or MEMRI. "What interests us here is that this lie [about] the burning of the Jews in the Nazi crematoria has been disseminated throughout the world until our time in order to extort the West and make it easier for the Jews of Europe to hunt [sic] Palestine and establish a state on it, in disregard of the most basic principles of international law and the right of peoples to independent life without occupation. [This lie] was raised [also] so that [the Jews] would receive financial, technological, and economic aid from the West.

Scott Ritter Claims Neocons Are Parasites
Larisa Alexandrovna

Paul Wolfowitz was a salesman; his job was to sell a war. He acknowledged this in an interview with Vanity Fair magazine, in which he acknowledged that WMDs and the threat they posed, was nothing more than a vehicle to sell this war to America. Paul Wolfowitz lied to Congress about the costs of war. There is not a responsible member of government who thought this would be quick and cheap. There was nobody who believed that Iraq oil would pay for itself, no one in the oil business thought so. No oil professional in their right mind would support what is happening in Iraq. This isn't part of a grand 'oil' strategy; it is simply pure unadulterated incompetence. Oil company executives are businessmen and they are in a business that requires long-term stability. They love dictators because they bring with them long-term stability. They don't like new democracies because they are messy and unstable.

The Real AIPAC Spy Ring Story -- It Was All About Iran
Doug Ireland

Back on March 13, the London Times -- in a report that was largely ignored in the U.S. -- reported that: "The inner cabinet of Ariel Sharon, the Israeli prime minister, gave 'initial authorisation' for an attack at a private meeting last month on his ranch in the Negev desert," The London Times went on to describe how " Israeli forces have used a mock-up of Iran’s Natanz uranium enrichment plant in the desert to practise destroying it. Their tactics include raids by Israel’s elite Shaldag (Kingfisher) commando unit and airstrikes by F-15 jets from 69 Squadron, using bunker-busting bombs to penetrate underground facilities. The plans have been discussed with American officials who are said to have indicated provisionally that they would not stand in Israel’s way if all international efforts to halt Iranian nuclear projects failed...." And, the Times added, "US officials warned last week that a military strike on Iranian nuclear facilities by Israeli or American forces had not been ruled out should the issue become deadlocked at the United Nations."

The Last Rabbi of Berlin
Steve Lipman

One of the most intriguing aspects of Rabbi Riesenburger’s exploits, according to Rabbi Zlotowitz, is that they were fully sanctioned by Berlin’s Nazi authorities. First, Rabbi Zlotowitz offers one caveat: Martin Riesenburger, who was in his 40s during the Nazi era and died in 1965, “was never a rabbi. He was a praediger” — a preacher. “Also a cantor. They called him rabbi.” Originally at a Jewish old-age home, then at the sprawling Weissensee burial grounds, Rabbi Riesenburger functioned as a member of the clergy, leading worship services and officiating at funerals. “It was not clandestine,” Rabbi Zlotowitz says. One survivor, Ilse Rischowsky Peritz of Baldwin, L.I., says Rabbi Riesenburger was “fantastic.” She was a teenager then, out of school, and accompanied her father and brothers to the chapel Friday nights “at least twice a month.”

Wilhelm Höttl and the Elusive 'Six Million'
Mark Weber

So ingrained has the Six Million figure become in the popular consciousness that while the average American may be quite sure that six million Jews were slaughtered by the Germans in the Second World War -- that is, in what is now called "the Holocaust" -- he has no idea of how many British, Poles, Russians, or even Americans died during that global conflict, or, for that matter, of how many of his fellow countrymen lost their lives in the American Civil War. This is hardly surprising, considering how relentlessly the Six Million figure is hammered into the public consciousness, not only in newspapers, magazines, motion pictures, and television, but also routinely in our schools, and even by a special taxpayer-funded U.S. federal government agency, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council, which runs the imposing U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC.

The Myths of Hiroshima
Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin

Sixty years ago tomorrow, an atomic bomb was dropped without warning on the center of the Japanese city of Hiroshima. One hundred and forty thousand people were killed, more than 95% of them women and children and other noncombatants. At least half of the victims died of radiation poisoning over the next few months. To many Americans at the time, and still for many today, it seemed clear that the bomb had ended the war, even "saving" a million lives that might have been lost if the US had been required to invade mainland Japan. But although patriotically correct, the exhibit and the narrative on which it was based were historically inaccurate. For one thing, the Smithsonian downplayed the casualties, saying only that the bombs "caused many tens of thousands of deaths" and that Hiroshima was "a definite military target."

Iraq Statistics Tell Grim Story
Martin Sieff

Retired Gen. Jack Keane, the former Vice Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, attracted widespread publicity on July 25 when he told a meeting at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, as reported in The Washington Times, that more than 50,000 insurgents had been killed since the start of the insurgency. Afterwards, official administration spokesmen refused to confirm that figure. Gen. Keane was not speaking inappropriately or inaccurately. According to estimates widely used by the U.S. armed forces in Iraq, and reflected in the weekly statistical update issued by the IIP, 21,000 insurgents have been detained or killed in Iraq in the 11 months from Sept. 1, 2004 to July 31, 2005 and 43,500 from May 1, 2003 to the end of July this year. Those figures are not much lower than the one announced by Gen. Keane, who would have had access to more confidential and detailed data.

Catholic Teachers 'Bear Witness' Through Israel Trip
Sam Ser

Some 30 Catholic school teachers from across the United States are in Israel for an in-depth course on anti-Semitism sponsored by the Anti-Defamation League. The teachers were selected from almost 500 who have already participated in workshops in the US based on the same program. ...it focuses on teachers because of their role in shaping the moral education of young Catholics. Karen Brady from Tucson, Arizona, is one of the participants on the trip. "The spiritual connection," she said, "separates this from all other Holocaust programs. When I first started this, years ago, my husband said, -Are you going to turn Jewish? But my Catholicism has only grown stronger through this." "We never thought it would be this big. It has exploded," said Paul Wieser, a Catholic who oversees Holocaust programming for the ADL. "But we wouldn't have all this programming if it didn't work."

Wiesenthal Center Claims Church Efforts 'Anti-Semitic'

A Presbyterian committee accused five U.S. companies  of contributing to ''ongoing violence that plagues Israel and Palestine" and pledged to use the church's multimillion-dollar stock holdings in the businesses to pressure them to stop. However, Rabbi Abraham Cooper of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles told the Times: "This is a brilliantly organized political campaign to hurt Israel, and it's not going to help a single Palestinian. When you look at the list of companies, this is basically a recipe for Israel to disarm. Cooper told the Times that the churches are ignoring Israel's plan to withdraw from Gaza. He told the Times the churches' actions are "functionally anti-Semitic."

John the Baptist's Skeleton Found in Iran?

A few months ago, a team of Iran's Cultural Heritage and Tourism Organization (ICHTO) who were studying documents from Iranian churches for international registration, discovered some skeletons in Saint Stepanos Church, located in the northeastern province of East Azarbaijan. Saint Stepanos Church is Iran's second most important church after Qareh Kelisa (the Black Church) in West Azarbaijan. With regard to this discovery, Sabveh Serkisian, Iran's Armenians' archbishop and head of the Prelacy of Tehran and North of Iran, wrote a letter which reads as follows: "With regard to the box found in Saint Stepanos Church of remains of Apostles, it is said that the box consists of remains of John the Baptist. According to Armenian historian, Aracle Davar Yareshti, when the Taslise Moghaddas (Trinity) Church of Old Jolfa was destroyed, a box of sacred remains and a scroll were found at the location of the main church altar and handed after a while to Shamon..."

Remembering Hiroshima: The Bomb That Was Meant for Hitler
Klaus Wiegrefe

...a young German scientist publishes an excellent article about a "uranium machine" in a scientific journal, many experts in America conclude that the Nazis must already have captured a significant lead in the field of atomic energy. Why else, they reason, would the Germans publish such an article, even though the research its describes relates to the peaceful use of atomic energy? It's a serious mistake. Leading German physicist Heisenberg and his team are still a long way from developing the bomb, and will remain so until the war ends in 1945. Nevertheless, the Americans believe they are taking part in an arms race, despite the fact that the only scientists whose work on nuclear energy poses a serious threat are in the United States. The emigrants who have fled to America to avoid persecution by the Hitler regime help fuel this miscalculation. A group of Hungarian-born scientists known among colleagues in Budapest as the "Hungarian conspiracy" -- physicists Leo Szilard, Edward Teller and Eugene Wigner -- are among the most vocal in warning the scientific community against what they perceive as the German dictator's mad rush to acquire dangerous weapons.

Was Hiroshima Necessary?
Mark Weber

Apart from the moral questions involved, were the atomic bombings militarily necessary? By any rational yardstick, they were not. Japan already had been defeated militarily by June 1945. Almost nothing was left of the once mighty Imperial Navy, and Japan's air force had been all but totally destroyed. Against only token opposition, American war planes ranged at will over the country, and US bombers rained down devastation on her cities, steadily reducing them to rubble. Even before the Hiroshima attack, American air force General Curtis LeMay boasted that American bombers were "driving them [Japanese] back to the stone age." Henry H. ("Hap") Arnold, commanding General of the Army air forces, declared in his 1949 memoirs: "It always appeared to us, atomic bomb or no atomic bomb, the Japanese were already on the verge of collapse." This was confirmed by former Japanese prime minister Fumimaro Konoye, who said: "Fundamentally, the thing that brought about the determination to make peace was the prolonged bombing by the B-29s."

Britain Helped Israel Get Nuclear Bomb

Britain secretly sold Israel a key ingredient for its nuclear programme in 1958, according to official documents obtained by BBC News. Papers in the British National Archives show a deal was done to export 20 tonnes of heavy water for about £1.5m. This was vital for plutonium production at the top-secret Dimona nuclear reactor in Israel's Negev desert. No "peaceful use only" condition was placed on its use. Officials said imposing one would be "over zealous". Ministers in Harold Macmillan's government were unaware of the deal. It was also kept secret from the US. In one of the documents Foreign Office official Donald Cape concluded: "On the whole I would prefer not to mention this to the Americans." Washington had refused to supply heavy water to Israel without a guarantee it would only be used for peaceful means.

British MP George Galloway Pleas Eloquently for Justice (Video)
Yaakov Lappin

British Member of Parliament George Galloway has described Jerusalem as being "raped" by foreigners, in a series of speeches delivered on Arab television. Galloway is leader of the Respect Party, an anti-Iraq war political party based on an alliance between Britain's Socialist Workers Party and the British branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. The broadcasts, which were translated by the Middle East Media Research Institute, will likely present a challenge to British prime minister Tony Blair, who has vowed to crack down on overt incitement to terrorism in Britain and abroad. Galloway said that Jerusalem and Baghdad were "crying out for help," before praising Iraqi jihad fighters, saying they were "defending the whole Arab world."

Belgian Holocaust Skeptic Arrested

Belgian negationist and extreme-rights publicist Siegfried Verbeke has been arrested at Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam and might be extradited to Germany for trial. A German judge issued an international arrest warrant against Verbeke at the end of last year because he cast doubt over the internet whether the Nazis actually killed six million Jews in World War II. Germany asked Belgium to extradite Verbeke, of Kortrijk, last year but a Belgian judge refused the request, Belgian newspaper 'De Standaard' reported on Friday. Verbeke has already been convicted in Belgium for negationism. The appeals court in Antwerp sentenced him in April this year to a maximum one-year jail term and a EUR 2,500 fine for breaching negationist and anti-racism laws. The 63-year-old Verbeke has been the head of the Free Historical Research centre (VHO) since 1983. The centre publishes books in which the Holocaust is denied or downplayed.

Poles Asked Hitler to Free Them from Stalin's Grip

Families of a few hundreds of Polish officers wrote letters to German Foreign Office pointing out their German origin or other kinds of connection to get their husbands, brothers and fathers back free from the soviet captivity. Unaware that Stalin had already given orders to shoot some 22 thousands of Polish soldiers, Germans kept intervening to save 500 officers. The Polish officers and men were taken prisoner by the Red Army when the Soviet Union invaded eastern Poland in 1939. On Stalin’s orders 22 thousand Poles were executed in Katyn Forest and Kharkov, both in Ukraine. The Nazis revealed the crime in 1943 but the Soviet Union thereafter always blamed Hitler for the massacre, until 1990 when Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet leader acknowledged the Soviet responsibility.

Vinnytsia -- The Katyn of Ukraine
M. Seleshko

From May 1943 to October 1943, 9,432 corpses were found in three places of excavation. There were 91 graves with corpses, and three with only clothes or documents. Forty-nine graves had from one to 100 corpses, 33 from 100 to 200 corpses, and nine from 200 to 284 corpses. One hundred and sixty-nine corpses were of women, 120 of advanced age, according to the findings of the medical commission. Forty-nine women were of young or middle age. The corpses of females of advanced age were clothed, whereas those of the younger years were naked. This seemed to bear out the rumors common among the local population that the young women arrested by the NKVD were subjected to sexual brutalities prior to their execution. One pregnant woman was found who had actually given birth to a child in the grave.

About 20 militant Jews staged a chaotic counter-demonstration organized by the Jewish Defense League, an extremist Zionist group with a long record of criminal violence. JDL leader Shelly Rubin and other Jewish activists, many of them holding placards with the JDL’s clenched fist and Star of David symbol, shouted obscenities, slurs and threats against rally participants. To the IHR director, for example, Rubin shouted “We’ll get you, Weber.” The JDL activists hurled particularly vile racial slurs against African-Americans who were with the IHR rally.

Weber Addresses Spirited IHR Meeting in New York

Speaking on the challenge of Jewish-Zionist power at the end of the “Jewish century,” Mark Weber addressed more than 40 men and women at a spirited IHR meeting in New York City on Saturday evening, July 16, 2005. Michael Santomauro, who runs the ReportersNoteBook.com website, and regularly distributes news and commentary to his large e-mail list, opened the meeting and introduced the speakers.

The Challenge of Jewish-Zionist Power in an Era of Global Struggle
Mark Weber

Israel Approves Law to Ban 'Holocaust Denial' Everywhere
Nina Gilbert

Legislation that would make Holocaust-denial committed overseas an offense under Israeli legal jurisdiction was approved unanimously in first reading by the Knesset on Tuesday. The passage of the measure would enable Israel to demand the extradition of Holocaust-deniers for prosecution. The bill was drafted by MK Aryeh Eldad (National Union) as a move against former Palestinian Authority prime minister Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) for his doctoral dissertation 20 years ago in which he estimated that the Nazis killed less than a million Jews. The legislation expands the territorial jurisdiction of the Israeli law against Holocaust-denying outside of it borders.

Armageddon Gets No Press, Thanks to Complicit Media
Paul Craig Roberts

The mainstream media has been co-opted as propaganda organ for the Bush administration. How did this come about? It came about through media concentration. There are no longer independent voices in the mainstream media. For reporters and editors, knowing what to say and not to say is the main qualification for job security. Consider the implications if the Bush administration escapes accountability: The executive, armed with a compliant media, will have war-making power subject only to successful PR spin. The few remaining restraints on the executive’s ability to detain people indefinitely without charges will be removed. This power will silence the Internet. Spiteful neighbors, employees, former spouses, whomever will gain the power to report any disliked person. The anti-terrorist apparatus needs victims to demonstrate its effectiveness, and as warrants, hearings, and evidence are no longer required, Americans will simply disappear like Soviet citizens in the Stalin era.

ADL Unhappy Iraqi Draft Constitution Contains Anti-Israel Clauses

Concerned that the Iraqi national constitution contains, "blatant anti-Israel discrimination in the draft text," the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has urged the U.S. State Department to encourage the drafters to remove the objectionable language. In a July 27 letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the League noted that Article 1, Section 3 of the draft constitution states that, "Any individual with another nationality (except for Israel) may obtain Iraqi nationality" and Article 4 states that, "Any Iraqi may have more than one nationality as long as the nationality is not Israel."

Top German Court Clears Men Who 'Glorified' Nazi SS

Germany's highest criminal court cleared three men convicted of praising Hitler's elite SS soldiers on Thursday in a ruling that shocked leading politicians and the nation's main Jewish group. The three, members of a far right group called the Karlsruhe Comradeship, had set up a telephone hotline advising fellow activists of when marches would take place. Their messages ended with the words "Glory and Honor of the Waffen-SS." A lower court fined the men and gave them suspended prison sentences in October 2004 for using slogans of unconstitutional groups. However, the Federal Court of Justice ruled that the words in question had not actually been used by any Nazi body, nor were they similar to any slogans of the time. Paul Spiegel, president of Germany's Central Council of Jews, said he was astonished by the ruling and urged politicians to check if there was a hole in the law that needed closing. "I find the verdict unbelievable and cannot understand the reasoning ... particularly if you consider that the Waffen-SS was a synonym for murder and cruelty," he told Reuters.

Epic: The Story of the Waffen SS
Gen. Leon Degrelle

Hitler was a man of the people, a man who succeeded in wiping out unemployment, a feat unsurpassed to this day. Within two years he gave work to six million Germans and got rid of rampant poverty. In five years the German worker doubled his income without inflation. Hundreds of thousands of beautiful homes were built for workers at a minimal cost. Each home had a garden to grow flowers and vegetables. All the factories were provided with sport fields, swimming pools and attractive and decent workshops. For the first time paid vacations were created. The communists and capitalists had never offered paid vacations; this was Hitler's creation. He organized the famous "strength through joy" programs which meant that workers could, at affordable prices, board passenger ships and visit any part of the world. All these social improvements did not please the establishment. Big business tycoons and international bankers were worried. But Hitler stood up to them. Business can make profits but only if people are paid decently and are allowed to live and work in dignity. People, not profits, come first.

Disciples of Christ to Israel: Tear Down the Wall
Sam Ser

The general assembly of the Disciples of Christ has adopted a resolution calling for Israel to dismantle its West Bank security barrier, passing the measure by a clear majority on Wednesday in a vote that was postponed by a day. Although amended slightly before the vote, the resolution was nearly identical to the one adopted earlier this month by the closely related United Church of Christ. As in that case, the Simon Wiesenthal Center was among the most vocal of Jewish and Christian groups calling for the church to dismiss the resolution. On Wednesday, it expressed its extreme dissatisfaction at the vote's outcome. "The resolution is an abomination," said Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Wiesenthal Center. "It is shocking and depressing that a vanguard of social activism like the Disciples of Christ would be so blind and deaf to Jewish suffering," he told The Jerusalem Post.