Latvians Debate World War II Legacy
JTA

The recent uproar in Latvia over a proposed march by Latvian veterans of the Nazi SS highlighted the ambivalent relationship the Baltic nation has with its World War II behavior. … Many Latvians agree and firmly believe in the patriotic role of Latvian SS Legions played in fighting for liberation from the occupying Red Army. Many historians agree that even compared to other Baltic states, Latvia was particularly supportive and compliant with the Nazi regime.

Red Army Phrasebook Discovery Hints at Soviet Plan to Attack Germany
Scotland on Sunday (The Scotsman)

A newly discovered relic of the Second World War, a Russian-English military phrasebook, shows how the Red Army was expected to take a no-nonsense attitude if they ever encountered English speakers. … Some historians based in the former Soviet Union believe it adds weight to a controversial theory that Stalin would have sent troops to Britain if the Nazis invaded in order to open up a "Second Front" against Hitler. … The book's emergence is seen as supporting the idea that Stalin hoped to attack Hitler through Britain as part of a plan to double-cross the Nazi tyrant.

Germany ’s 1941 'Barbarossa' Attack: Why Hitler Attacked Soviet Russia
Review by Daniel Michaels 

For decades the prevailing and more or less official view in the United States and Europe has been that a race-crazed Adolf Hitler, without warning or provocation, betrayed a trusting Josef Stalin by launching a treacherous surprise attack against the totally unprepared Soviet Union on June 22, 1941. Von Thadden's book -- which is based in large part on recently uncovered evidence from Russian archives, Stalin's own statements, and new revelations of Russian military specialists -- persuasively debunks this view.

Jews Lash Out at ' Israel Lobby' Research Paper
Christian Science Monitor

A research paper by two leading American political scientists alleges that the US relationship with Israel is not good for US security, and that the Israeli lobby in the US has helped exaggerate to the US media and public the importance of making the protection of Israel a key part of US foreign policy. … The Mearsheimer-Walt research paper is being widely criticized by Israel supporters. … The Jerusalem Newswire called it a new example of "the centuries-old libel that the Jewish people have somehow taken control of the affairs of the most powerful nations on earth, dressed up in academic attire.”

International Red Cross , Germany Deny Access to Holocaust Archive
The Washington Post

Why are the German government and the International Red Cross still conspiring to prevent historians from gaining access to the world's largest Holocaust survivors' archive? There is no easy answer to this question, particularly since both the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and Germany flatly deny they are doing so. Officially known as the International Tracing Service, the archive contains comprehensive documentation from Dachau and Buchenwald , as well as prisoner lists and records from other concentration camps, slave labor camps, displaced-person camps and ghettos. 

By Nuremberg Standards Bush Would Be Hanged, Says Chomsky
BBC – Interview (Text and Audio)

If George Bush were to be judged by the standards of the Nuremberg Tribunals, he'd be hanged. So too would every single American President since the end of the Second World War. The suggestion comes from perhaps the most feted liberal intellectual in the world -- the American linguist Noam Chomsky. His latest attack on the way his country behaves in the world is called Hegemony or Survival, America 's Quest for Global Dominance. 

The March of Folly That Has Led To a Bloodbath
Robert Fisk - The Independent (Britain)

For this was to be an ideological war. From its creation by the loonies of the American right - as a pro-Israeli policy to aid Likud Party leader Benjamin Netanyahu – and then foisted on Bush, to the hell-disaster that Iraq now represents, the real war had to be turned into myth, nightmares into dreams, destruction into hope, terrible truths into profound mendacity. … Even today the occupation powers tell awesome lies. Democracy is taking hold when the "Iraqi" government controls only a few acres of Baghdad greensward. … Bush told us yesterday that "More sacrifices will be required". You bet they will be if we continue this march of folly.

2,500-Year-Old Coffin With Scenes From Homer's Epics Found
Associated Press

A 2,500-year-old stone coffin with well-preserved color illustrations from Homer's epics has been discovered in western Cyprus, archaeologists said Monday. "It is a very important find," said Pavlos Flourentzos, director of the island's antiquities department. "The style of the decoration is unique, not so much from an artistic point of view, but for the subject and the colors used."

Irving , Zundel and `Holocaust Denial': Update and Background
Interview with Mark Weber, by Kevin Alfred Strom (Text and Audio)

It's been very gratifying to see almost universal condemnation of the sentence against David Irving and of the Holocaust denial laws in Austria and other countries in Europe under which he and others have been persecuted. ... Newspapers across the United States and Europe and around the world have spoken out against Austria 's law, not in the least because it's so selective and one-sided.. .. Under these European laws, people are punished for making even factually true statements that contradict Holocaust orthodoxy.

The War Party in Disarray
Justin Raimondo – Antiwar.com

… As the ostensible rationales for the invasion of Iraq are debunked and fall by the wayside, the War Party's real motivation for bringing about what Gen. William E. Odom has rightly called the biggest strategic disaster in our history has come out in the wash. "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy," a study by John J. Mearsheimer, the doyen of foreign policy realism, and Stephen M. Walt, dean of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, has blasted the scales from our eyes.  

The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy
Profs. John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt

The U.S. national interest should be the primary object of American foreign policy. For the past several decades, however, … the centerpiece of U.S. Middle East policy has been its relationship with Israel . The combination of unwavering U.S. support for Israel and the related effort to spread democracy throughout the region has inflamed Arab and Islamic opinion and jeopardized U.S. security. This situation has no equal in American political history. … The overall thrust of U.S. policy in the region is due almost entirely to U.S. domestic politics, and especially to the activities of the “Israel Lobby.”

What’s Become of Americans?
Paul Craig Roberts

Imagine knocking on America 's door and being told, "Americans don't live here any longer. They have gone away." … Readers tell me that Americans don't live here any more. They ask what responsible American citizenry would put up with the trashing of the Bill of Rights and the separation of powers, with wars based on deception, and with pathological liars in control of their government? One reader recently wrote that he believes that "no element of the U.S. government has been left untainted" by the lies and manipulations that have driven away accountability. So-called leaders, he wrote, "talk a great story of American pride and patriotism," but in their hands patriotism is merely a device for "cynical manipulation and fraud."

Children’s Television Fosters Violence, New Study Shows
Parents Television Council

Television does influence behavior in children. Exposure to violent programming begets an inclination to violent behavior. Too much time in front of the TV compounds the likelihood of childhood obesity. The presence of TVs in children’s bedrooms has been linked to poorer academic performance. … This study seeks to take these scientifically researched findings and apply them to the content of children’s programming. … In the 443.5 hours of children’s programming analyzed, there were 3,488 instances of violence – an average of 7.86 violent incidents per hour. … There is more violence aimed directly at young children than at adults on television today.

Bush’s Dangerous Delusions About Iraq
Paul Craig Roberts

Bush gave a delusional speech that shows he is detached from reality. "We’re going to help the Iraqis build a strong democracy that will be an inspiration throughout the Middle East , a democracy that’ll be a partner in the global war against the terrorists." Has no one told Bush that the Iraqis cannot even agree to form a government? The day before Bush’s delusional Cleveland speech, Iyad Allawi, the former prime minister of one of our make-believe Iraqi governments, said that in Iraq the casualty rate from the sectarian strife is so high that "if this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is."

Bush Warns Iran of US Military Support for Israel
Agence France-Presse

President George W. Bush warned Iran that he would "use military might" if necessary to defend Israel. "The threat from Iran is, of course, their stated objective to destroy our strong ally Israel . That's a threat, a serious threat. It's a threat to world peace," the US president said after a speech defending the war in Iraq . "I made it clear, and I'll make it clear again, that we will use military might to protect our ally Israel ," he said.

World’s Rivers Are Dying
The Independent ( Britain )

The world's great rivers are drying up at an alarming rate, with devastating consequences for humanity, animals and the future of the planet. The Independent on Sunday can today reveal that more than half the world's 500 mightiest rivers have been seriously depleted. Some have been reduced to a trickle in what the United Nations will this week warn is a "disaster in the making." From the Nile to China 's Yellow River , some of the world's great water systems are now under such pressure that they often fail to deposit their water in the ocean or are interrupted in the course to the sea, with grave consequences for the planet.

US Newspapers Clueless About Iraq War
Editor & Publisher

Anyone who hoped that the third anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq would inspire the country's leading newspapers to finally editorialize for a radical change in the White House's war policy has to be disappointed, again. From this evidence, the editorial boards of The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, the Knight Ridder collective and others appear to be as clueless about what to do as are Mr. Bush and Mr. Rumsfeld.

The Lobby: Why US Policy in the Middle East Is Skewered To Israel
Justin Raimondo – AntiWar.Com

American foreign policy has been weighed down for all too many years by an albatross hung round Uncle Sam's neck, one that distorts our stance especially vis-à-vis Middle Eastern issues and ultimately works against U.S. interests in the region and around the world: that albatross is unconditional support for the state of Israel. In the "mainstream" media,  and certainly in Washington , D.C. , the power of Israel 's lobby is unchallenged. This hegemony has now been thoroughly detailed and analyzed in an important study by John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt, published by Harvard University 's John F. Kennedy School of Government. 

How the Pro-Israel Lobby Sets US Middle East Policy
John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt - The London Review of Books

For the past several decades the centrepiece of US Middle Eastern policy has been its relationship with Israel . The combination of unwavering support for Israel and the related effort to spread 'democracy' throughout the region has inflamed Arab and Islamic opinion and jeopardised not only US security but that of much of the rest of the world. This situation has no equal in American political history. Why has the US been willing to set aside its own security and that of many of its allies in order to advance the interests of another state?  …. The thrust of US policy in the region derives almost entirely from domestic politics, and especially the activities of the 'Israel Lobby'.  Since the October War in 1973, Washington has provided Israel with a level of support dwarfing that given to any other state.

Three Years and Counting
The Nation

On March 19, 2003, without the approval of the United Nations Security Council and against the advice of many of America 's closest allies, the Bush Administration launched what has become one of the longest-running wars in US history. Now, on the third anniversary of the start of the war, we are just beginning to feel the full effects of the greatest catastrophe in American foreign policy since the Vietnam War. We are all familiar with the staggering costs in lives and money of the Iraq War: 2,300 Americans killed, more than 16,000 wounded or maimed; about 30,000 direct Iraqi deaths and more than 100,000 attributable to the war; upward of $300 billion in direct war expenditures and close to $1 trillion in estimated total costs.

Iraq: A War For Israel?
Mark Weber

So if the official reasons given for the war were untrue, why did the United States attack? Whatever the secondary reasons for the Iraq war, the crucial factor in President Bush’s decision to attack was to help Israel . With support from Israel and America’s Jewish-Zionist lobby, and prodded by Jewish "neo-conservatives" holding high-level positions in his administration, President Bush — who was already fervently committed to Israel — resolved to invade and subdue one of Israel’s chief regional enemies.

This is so widely understood in Washington that US Senator Ernest Hollings was moved in May 2004 to acknowledge that the US invaded Iraq "to secure Israel ," and "everybody" knows it.

President Bush Reaffirms US Pre-Emptive War Doctrine

 Undaunted by the difficult war in Iraq , President Bush reaffirmed his strike-first policy against terrorists and enemy nations today and said Iran may pose the biggest challenge for America . In a 49-page national security report, the president said diplomacy is the U.S. preference in halting the spread of nuclear and other heinous weapons.  "If necessary, however, under long-standing principles of self defense, we do not rule out the use of force before attacks occur -- even if uncertainty remains as to the time and place of the enemy's attack," Bush wrote.

Iranophobia: Bush Prepares For Another War
Paul Craig Roberts

Opinion polls indicate that the Bush regime has succeeded in its plan to make Americans fear Iran as the greatest threat America faces. The Bush regime has created a major dispute with Iran over that country’s nuclear energy program and then blocked every effort to bring the dispute to a peaceful end. In order to gain a pretext for attacking Iran , the Bush regime is using bribery and coercion in its effort to have Iran referred to the UN Security Council for sanctions. In recent statements President Bush and Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld blamed Iran for the Iraqi resistance, claiming that the roadside bombs used by the resistance are being supplied by Iran . It is obvious that Bush intends to attack Iran and that he will use every means to bring war about.

US College Grads Less Able to Read and Comprehend
The Washington Post

Literacy experts and educators say they are stunned by the results of a recent adult literacy assessment, which shows that the reading proficiency of college graduates has declined in the past decade, with no obvious explanation. "It's appalling -- it's really astounding," said Michael Gorman, president of the American Library Association and a librarian at California State University at Fresno . " Only 31 percent of college graduates can read a complex book and extrapolate from it. That's not saying much for the remainder."

The Jewish Role in the Bolshevik Revolution and Russia's Early Soviet Regime
Mark Weber

Jews played a highly disproportionate and probably decisive role in the infant Bolshevik regime, effectively dominating the Soviet government during its early years.… With the notable exception of Lenin (Vladimir Ulyanov), most of the leading Communists who took control of Russia in 1917-20 were Jews. Leon Trotsky (Lev Bronstein) headed the Red Army and, for a time, was chief of Soviet foreign affairs. Yakov Sverdlov (Solomon) was both the Bolshevik party's executive secretary and -- as chairman of the Central Executive Committee -- head of the Soviet government. Grigori Zinoviev (Radomyslsky) headed the Communist International (Comintern), the central agency for spreading revolution in foreign countries.… David R. Francis, United States ambassador in Russia , warned in a January 1918 dispatch to Washington : "The Bolshevik leaders here, most of whom are Jews and 90 percent of whom are returned exiles, care little for Russia or any other country but are internationalists and they are trying to start a worldwide social revolution."

Lessons of Iraq War Start With US History
Howard Zinn – The Progressive

On the third anniversary of President Bush's Iraq debacle, it's important to consider why the administration so easily fooled so many people into supporting the war. I believe there are two reasons, which go deep into our national culture. One is an absence of historical perspective. The other is an inability to think outside the boundaries of nationalism. If we don't know history, then we are ready meat for carnivorous politicians and the intellectuals and journalists who supply the carving knives. But if we know some history, if we know how many times presidents have lied to us, we will not be fooled again. …  President Wilson lied about the reasons for entering the First World War, saying it was a war to "make the world safe for democracy," when it was really a war to make the world safe for the rising American power. President Truman lied when he said the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima because it was "a military target." And everyone lied about Vietnam -- President Kennedy about the extent of our involvement, President Johnson about the Gulf of Tonkin and President Nixon about the secret bombing of Cambodia .

Acclaim For China's 'Schindler' Reflects Changing Views on World War II
The New York Times

The house in Nanjing (China) now undergoing restoration was the home of John Rabe, a German Nazi employee of Siemens. In addition to sheltering people in his own compound, Rabe led a score of other foreigners in the city to form an international safety zone that shielded more than 200,000 Chinese from the Japanese. Despite his heroism, Rabe was for decades all but forgotten here. … But now, amid a political and intellectual cold war with Japan that revolves to a great extent around the history of China's conquest by its neighbor, this country is seizing enthusiastically upon the memory of a man often called China's Oskar Schindler. Since the publication of Rabe's diary in 1997, his story has become a central theme in narratives of the Nanjing Massacre, much as the massacre story itself has become an important pillar in China 's emerging new nationalism.

An Introduction to Holocaust Revisionism
Mark Weber – CD Available from Noontide Press

Find it difficult to believe that anyone could possibly question that Hitler tried to destroy all of Europe 's Jews during World War II? Here is an easy-to-understand introduction to the “other side” of the most emotion-charged issue of our time. Lucid, coherent and packed with facts, this lecture is ideal for both the confirmed believer and the curious skeptic. After listening to it, you’ll understand why skepticism of the “official,” orthodox Holocaust story is so durable and widespread. Ideal for mass distribution.

Lap Dogs of the Press
Helen Thomas – The Nation

Reporters and editors like to think of themselves as watchdogs for the public good. But in recent years both individual reporters and their ever-growing corporate ownership have defaulted on that role.  … The naive complicity of the press and the government was never more pronounced than in the prelude to the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq . The media became an echo chamber for White House pronouncements  …Two of the nation's most prestigious newspapers, the New York Times and the Washington Post, had kept up a drumbeat for war with Iraq to bring down Dictator Saddam Hussein. They accepted almost unquestioningly the bogus evidence of weapons of mass destruction, the dubious White House rationale that proved to be so costly on a human scale, not to mention a drain on the Treasury.

Pro-Israel Neo-Cons Welcome Iraq Chaos, Killing, Civil War
John Walsh – Counterpunch

One of the abiding myths about the War on Iraq is that the neocons were too stupid to realize that they would confront an unrelenting, indigenous resistance to their occupation of Iraq . Unwittingly, the story line goes, they led the U.S. into a conflict which has now produced a civil war. But this simply does not fit the facts. . The fact is that the neocons who control U.S. strategy have no interest in preventing a civil war but only in inciting one. Sectarian tensions were virtually unknown in Iraq before the U.S. invasion. … It is now crystal clear that the neocon strategy is one of civil war to divide and destroy Iraq ; and such a strategy amounts to a crime against humanity.

Israel ’s Colonization of Palestine Is Major Obstacle to Peace
Jimmy Carter

For more than a quarter of a century, Israeli policy has been in conflict with that of the United States and the international community. Israel 's occupation of Palestine has obstructed a comprehensive peace agreement in the Holy Land , regardless of whether Palestinians had no formalized government, one headed by Yasser Arafat or Mahmoud Abbas, or with Abbas as president and Hamas controlling the parliament and Cabinet. The unwavering US position since Dwight Eisenhower's administration has been that Israel's borders coincide with those established in 1949, and, since 1967, the universally adopted UN Resolution 242 has mandated Israel's withdrawal from the occupied territories. This policy was reconfirmed even by Israel in 1978 and 1993, and emphasized by all American presidents, including George W. Bush. As part of the Quartet, including Russia , the UN, and the European Union, he has endorsed a "roadmap" for peace. But Israel has officially rejected its basic premises with patently unacceptable caveats and prerequisites. … The preeminent obstacle to peace is Israel 's colonization of Palestine .

The 48 Hour Media Blitz For War With Iran
Mike Whitney – Uruknet

In the last 48 hours all the major players in the Bush administration have issued statements warning of the impending danger of Iran . Cheney blasted the Islamic regime saying there would be "meaningful consequences" if it refuses to comply with international demands to stop its nuclear program. Condoleezza Rice said, "We face no greater challenge from a single country than Iran … This is a country that seems determined, it seems, to develop a nuclear weapon in defiance of the international community that is determined that they should not get one." … Bush, Cheney, Bolton, Rice, Rumsfeld, Burns, Congress, and Israel . Whoa! That’s quite a line-up. All in the last 48 hours!

I am a Revisionist Historian
Staughton Lynd and Carl Mirra – History News Network

In June 2003, President Bush told a group of business leaders that “This nation acted to a threat from the dictator of Iraq,” but “now there are some who would like to rewrite history — revisionist historians is what I like to call them.” …Bush’s sanctimonious posturing compels the responsible historian to declare: I AM A REVISIONIST HISTORIAN. The president’s critique of revisionism needs to be rejected both as a specific comment on the origins of the Iraq War, and as a general proposition. .. History is revisionist. It is precisely the task of the historian to correct, that is, to revise, the popular misconceptions of the moment. Every responsible historian is perpetually in the position of the little child who sees that the emperor has no clothes … The responsibility to revise falls especially on the historian of foreign policy. United States history is replete with controversy over reasons initially offered for going to war.

A Blasphemy Trial: Irving Loses Again
Joseph Sobran

A few years ago I had lunch with David Irving, now sentenced to three years in an Austrian prison for the crime of what in this country is called exercising free speech. Wouldn’t you know it, the Holocaust came up.… It has become routine to refer to him as "Holocaust denier David Irving," but nobody ever seems to quote him actually uttering a thought crime. In court the other day he confessed the "mistake" of saying "there were no gas chambers at Auschwitz ," but added, "In no way did I deny the killings of millions of people by the Nazis." And what if he really had denied it? Ten years in prison for an opinion? His lawyer called the proceedings "a message trial." Actually, of course, it was a blasphemy trial.

Winston Churchill: An Unsettled Legacy
Mark Weber

The well-entrenched idealization of Churchill is part and parcel of a drastically misleading view of the Second World War that Americans have been fed for decades. One common deceit is to give the impression that Hitler sought war against Britain and France , and that Germany aggressively attacked those two countries. Routinely suppressed is the key fact that Hitler strenuously sought to avoid conflict with Britain and France , and that it was those two countries that declared war against Germany. ... Churchill not only cynically sanctioned Stalin's brutal hegemony over central and eastern Europe, helping him dispose of the fates of many millions of people against their will, he also collaborated with the Soviet ruler on issues of military strategy.

Britain Secretly Gave Israel Plutonium, Files Show
The Guardian (Britain)

Britain secretly supplied Israel with plutonium during the 1960s despite a warning from military intelligence that it could help the Israelis to develop a nuclear bomb, it was disclosed last night. The deal, made during Harold Wilson's Labour government, is revealed in classified documents released under the Freedom of Information Act and obtained by BBC2's Newsnight programme. The documents also show how Britain made hundreds of shipments to Israel of material which could have helped in its nuclear weapons programme, including compounds of uranium, lithium, beryllium and tritium, as well as heavy water. Documents show that the decision to sell plutonium to Israel in 1966 was blocked by officials in both the Ministry of Defence and the Foreign Office… But the deal was forced through by a Jewish civil servant, Michael Michaels, in Tony Benn's Ministry of Technology...

Warmongers Begin to Face Facts, Admit They Were Wrong
Rupert Cornwell - The Independent (Britain)

It has taken more than three years, tens of thousands of Iraqi and American lives, and $200 billion of treasure -- all to achieve a chaos verging on open civil war. But, finally, the neo-conservatives who sold the United States on this disastrous war are starting to utter three small words. We were wrong. The second thoughts have spread across the conservative spectrum, from William Buckley, venerable editor of The National Review to Andrew Sullivan, once editor of the New Republic, now an influential commentator and blogmeister.

Documents Reveal Secret Zionist Land Grab Policy
Akiva Eldar – Haaretz (Israel)

Highly confidential documents from Israel’s Ministry of Justice dating from the early 1990s, copies of which were sent to the ministers of defense, justice and housing as well as the attorney general, confirm the existence of a vast network of ties between Likud and Labor governments, and land dealers and settlers' associations, for the purpose of acquiring land in the West Bank.

Israel Deploys Nuclear Arms in Submarines
The Observer (London)

Israeli and American officials have admitted collaborating to deploy US-supplied Harpoon cruise missiles armed with nuclear warheads in Israel's fleet of Dolphin-class submarines, giving the Middle East's only nuclear power the ability to strike at any of its Arab neighbours. The unprecedented disclosure came as Israel announced that states 'harbouring terrorists' are legitimate targets, responding to Syria's declaration of its right to self-defence should Israel bomb its territory again.

Defeat is Victory. Death is Life
Robert Fisk – The Independent (London)

Everyone in the Middle East rewrites history, but never before have we had a US administration so willfully, dishonestly and ruthlessly reinterpreting tragedy as success, defeat as victory, death as life - helped, I have to add, by the compliant American press. I'm reminded not so much of Vietnam as of the British and French commanders of the First World War who repeatedly lied about military victory over the Kaiser as they pushed hundreds of thousands of their men through the butchers' shops of the Somme, Verdun and Gallipoli. The only difference now is that we are pushing hundreds of thousands of Arabs though the butchers' shops -- and don't even care.

Pro-Israel Activists Cheer Cheney at AIPAC Rally
Forward (New York)

Even as President Bush's popularity dropped to record lows, his administration was embraced warmly this week by the thousands of delegates at the most influential annual gathering of American Jewish activists. In recent weeks Bush has seen his approval ratings drop to around 35%, leading some analysts to the conclusion that his poll numbers were putting him perilously close to a "failed presidency" -- one unable to effectuate its policies because of a lack of popular support. But this week, at the annual policy conference of the main pro-Israel lobby, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, several of the most hard-line administration officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney and Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton, drew a resounding response.

Israel Slaps United States, Again
Haaretz (Israel)

Israel has in recent days delivered not one but two slaps to its closest ally. The first came in remarks by ex-Shin Bet chief and senior Kadima candidate Avi Dichter, speaking of negating the road map and moving on to a policy of unilateralism – in contrast to statements by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in her joint news conference with Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni. The second was delivered via a USAID report, which corroborated the claims of Palestinians that Israel was failing to keep promises it had made to Rice, a situation which according to the study could bring about economic catastrophe, beginning with the destruction of the Gaza hothouses project, which Washington had so strongly supported.

Appeals Court Upholds Revoking Citizenship of Elderly Former German Camp Guard
The Gazette - Cedar Rapids (Iowa)

A federal appeals court (in Des Moines, Iowa) on Tuesday upheld a lower court ruling revoking the citizenship of a former Nazi concentration camp guard. The U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a federal district judge was correct in revoking the citizenship of John Hansl, 81, who lives in Des Moines. The U.S. Department of Justice filed a complaint against Hansl in July 2003, claiming he hid his military service when he applied for a visa to come to the United States in 1955. He was granted a visa and became a U.S. citizen in 1960. Hansl was a guard with the Waffen SS at the Sachsenhausen and Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camps in 1943 and 1944. His duties included guarding prisoners from watch towers, marching prisoners at gunpoint to work sites near the prison, court records show.

John Hansl, His Case, and the Campaign for His Freedom

Free Speech on the Run in the West
John Leo

Law professor Eugene Volokh calls it "censorship envy." Muslims in Europe want the same sort of censorship that many nations now offer to other aggrieved groups. By law, 11 European nations can punish anyone who publicly denies the Holocaust. That's why the strange British historian David Irving is going to prison. Ken Livingstone, the madcap mayor of London , was suspended for four weeks for calling a Jewish reporter a Nazi. A Swedish pastor endured a long and harrowing prosecution for a sermon criticizing homosexuality, finally beating the rap in Sweden 's Supreme Court.

Much of Europe has painted itself into a corner on the censorship issue. ... It's not just Europe . In Canada , a teacher drew a suspension for a letter to a newspaper arguing that homosexuality is not a fixed orientation, but a condition that can be treated. He was not accused of discrimination, merely of expressing thoughts that the state defines as improper. Another Canadian newspaper was fined 4,500 Canadian dollars.

Jewish Settlers 'Terrorize' Palestinians, UN Official Confirms
Associated Press

Jewish settlers are able to "terrorize" Palestinians with impunity, intimidating children on their way to school and destroying farmers' trees and crops, a UN expert on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict said in a report. John Dugard, a South African lawyer, also said that Israel continues to dominate life in the Gaza Strip despite having pulled out all troops and settlers because it continues targeted killings in the strip and carries out sonic booms over it.

Historian Irving Barred From Speaking to Press
Irish Examiner

British historian David Irving, who was convicted by an Austrian court of denying the Holocaust, has been barred from speaking with the press, a court spokeswoman said today. Since a Vienna state court found Irving guilty last month and sentenced him to three years in prison, he has spoken to several news organisations. Alexandra Mathes, spokeswoman for the court, said it was unusual for a judge to grant reporters the right to interview a convict in the first place, but because media interest in Irving was so large, an exception was made. That right was revoked yesterday, after Irving said “certain things” to media that could be grounds for him to face fresh charges, Mathes said. She declined to give examples.

From Superpower to Tinhorn Dictatorship
Paul Craig Roberts

The collapsing power of the US hegemon is everywhere evident. It is evident in the inability to successfully occupy Iraq or even Baghdad. It is evident in the growing military cooperation between North and South Korea, and it is evident it the revolt in the Indian government against Prime Minister Singh's nuclear agreement with the US. The entire world now recognizes that America has lost its economic power and is dependent on the rest of the world to finance its budget and trade deficits. The US no longer holds the cards. American real incomes are falling, except for the rich. Jobs for university graduates are scarce, and advanced technology products must be imported from China. The US is a rapidly declining power and may soon end up as nothing but a tinhorn dictatorship.

Dutch Universities Strip Nobel Laureate's Name
Associated Press

Two Dutch universities have stripped a late Nobel chemistry laureate of honors, citing new evidence that he collaborated with the Nazis to oust Jews from academic positions. The information about Dutch-born Peter Debye, who won the Nobel in 1936, emerged a month ago in a book, "Albert Einstein in the Netherlands."

Jewish Terrorist Plot in 1946 to Kill British Foreign Minister Revealed
The Sunday Times (London)

Jewish terrorists plotted to assassinate Ernest Bevin, the foreign secretary, in 1946, as part of their campaign to establish the state of Israel, newly declassified intelligence files have shown. The plan was devised by Irgun, the insurgent group led by Menachem Begin, who went on to become a Nobel peace prize winner and prime minister of Israel. Begin, whom MI6 believed was backed by the Soviet Union, planned to send five terrorist cells to Britain to carry out bombings and assassinations.

First Americans May Have Been European
LiveScience

The first humans to spread across North America may have been seal hunters from France and Spain. This runs counter to the long-held belief that the first human entry into the Americas was a crossing of a land-ice bridge that spanned the Bering Strait about 13,500 years ago. The new thinking was outlined here Sunday at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Recent studies have suggested that the glaciers that helped form the bridge connecting Siberia and Alaska began receding around 17,000 to 13,000 years ago, leaving very little chance that people walked from one continent to the other.

Poles Reject Iran Inspection of Auschwitz Camp Site
NewsMax

The government of Iran is seeking permission from the Polish government to conduct on-site inspections of the Nazi death camps at Auschwitz and Birkenau as part of its so-called investigation into whether the Holocaust actually took place. The Jewish Forward reports this week: "With an international showdown fast approaching, Iran once again upset Jewish organizations and raised Western ire by questioning the Holocaust. This time, Iran proposed sending a team of investigators to conduct on-site inspections of Nazi concentration camps, in advance of a Tehran-sponsored conference to debate the 'real scale of the Holocaust.'" The plan was quickly rejected by Polish Foreign Minister Stefan Miller.

Incomes Fall in US as Bush Says 'We’re Doing Fine'
OneWorld

The Average American family has taken a financial tumble and millions in the country go hungry despite President’s George W. Bush’s sunny assessment of the US economy, say federal data and economists … Average incomes after adjusting for inflation actually had fallen between 2001 and 2004. At the same time, the number of Americans who need emergency food aid to survive had swollen to more than 25 million even before hurricanes Katrina and Rita struck.

Jailed British Historian Irving Questions Holocaust, Again
European Jewish Press

Controversial British historian David Irving insisted Thursday there was no evidence of a mass extermination of Jews during WWII, a week after he was jailed in Austria for Holocaust denial."There is no evidence of an organised mass extermination," the 67-year-old Irving said in an interview from his prison with the Austria Press Agency. Last week Irving was jailed by a court here to three years for denying the existence of gas chambers at the Auschwitz concentration camp but insisted at his trial that he no longer questioned those facts. His comments, which echo similar remarks in a BBC interview, have sparked a sharp retort from the public prosecutor’s office. "We must react. One cannot ignore this," a spokesman said. In his interview Thursday, Irving criticised the law under which he was convicted, calling it ridiculous and absurd and comparing Austria's behaviour to that of a Nazi state.

Search for Copernicus Remains Renews Nationality Dispute
The Washington Post

The findings have aroused excitement in Poland , where Copernicus is regarded as a national hero. But they have also forced Poles to make some uncomfortable reckonings with history, such as the question of whether Copernicus was Polish at all. Nicolaus Copernicus was born in Torun , Poland , in 1473, and moved to Frombork in 1510. Shortly after arriving, he began formulating radical theories about astronomy, including the idea that Earth circled the sun, rather than vice versa. Catholic leaders declared Copernicus's work immoral and theologically incorrect, placing it on the church's Index of Forbidden Books, where it remained until 1835. Although he was born and buried in modern-day Poland , the astronomer spoke German and may have had German ancestors…

How Blond Hair and Blue Eyes Evolved During Ice Age
The Sunday Times (Britain)

…New research has found that it was cavemen who were the first to be lured by flaxen locks. According to the study, north European women evolved blonde hair and blue eyes at the end of the Ice Age to make them stand out from their rivals at a time of fierce competition for scarce males. The study argues that blond hair originated in the region because of food shortages 10,000-11,000 years ago. … The future of the blonde is uncertain. A study by the World Health Organisation found that natural blonds are likely to be extinct within 200 years because there are too few people carrying the blond gene.

Iraq : A Solution to Nothing
Scott Ritter - Seattle Times

As the United States and Iraq approach the third anniversary of the invasion and occupation of Iraq, it might do all Americans well to take some time out and reflect on how we got where we are, as well as where we are going in Iraq and the Middle East as a whole. … Our nation's involvement in Iraq is based on as corrupt a foundation as imaginable. We didn't go to war for sound national-security reasons (i.e., a threat that manifested itself in a form solvable only through military intervention), but rather for domestic political reasons based on ideology that exploited the fear and ignorance of the American people in the post-Sept. 11, 2001, world.

Jewish Scholar Calls for Repeal of ‘Holocaust Denial’ Laws
Peter Singer - The Jerusalem Post (Israel)

The Irving verdict makes a mockery of the claim that in democratic countries freedom of expression is a basic right. We cannot consistently hold that cartoonists have a right to mock religious figures but that it should be a criminal offense to deny the Holocaust. I believe that we should stand behind freedom of speech. And that means that David Irving should be freed. … Austria should repeal its law against Holocaust denial. Other European nations with similar laws … should do the same…

Irving Risks Longer Prison Term for Latest 'Denial' Remarks
The Times (London)

The historian David Irving played down Hitler’s role in the Holocaust yesterday in a claim that could sabotage his chance of early release from an Austrian prison. Only a week after expressing remorse in a Vienna courtroom for his views Irving returned to the attack on the Radio 4 Today Programme. In an interview from his cell in Josefstadt Prison, in Vienna, the 67-year-old author of Hitler’s War, said: “Given the ruthless efficiency of the Germans, if there was an extermination programme to kill all the Jews, how come so many survived?”

Ike Saw It Coming
Bob Herbert - The New York Times

“Why We Fight," a thoughtful, first-rate movie directed by Eugene Jarecki, is largely about how misplaced that trust has become. The central figure in the film is not Mr. Jarecki, but Dwight Eisenhower, the Republican president who had been the supreme Allied commander in Europe in World War II, and who famously warned us at the end of his second term about the profound danger inherent in the rise of the military-industrial complex. Ike warned us, but we didn't listen. That's the theme the movie explores.

Lest We Forget: Khrushchev’s Historic 'Secret Speech'
Paul Craig Roberts

Fifty years ago today, Nikita Khrushchev gave his secret speech to the closed session of the Twentieth Party Congress in which he denounced Joseph Stalin. At that time, Khrushchev, the general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , held the most powerful political office in the world. The power that Stalin had accumulated in this position had made communism unsafe for communists. Heroes of the Bolshevik Revolution had been subjected to "barbaric tortures" and forced to incriminate themselves "with all kinds of grave and unlikely crimes." Khrushchev denounced Stalin before the Party Congress "in order that we may preclude any possibility of a repetition in any form whatever of what took place" under Stalin.

Update On Imprisoned Historians In Europe
Ingrid Rimland

Through the German equivalent of the Freedom of Information Act, we are in the possession of letters that show clearly that the German government, through their employees in several embassies and consulates, aided and abetted the kidnapping of at least Ernst Zundel if not Germar Rudolf.