20 Photos That Change the Holocaust Narrative

GREAT List of photos.

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Zionism Denial

from the Daily Beast April 17, 2012

NOTE: GREAT! Article from the archives. Says it all. H/T to Petra, @WarpedMirrorPMB 

As Israel marks its national Holocaust Remembrance Day, many around the world will secretly roll their eyes. 'There they go again the Zionists, using their precious Holocaust to justify their state, their power, their faults, reveling in a world guilted into silence.'

There are those who believe, too many, that without the holocaust there would have been no Israel. Most of them make this assumption in good faith. The American President himself, in his June 4, 2009 Cairo speech, spoke of "the recognition that the aspiration for a Jewish homeland is rooted in a tragic history that cannot be denied."

But when so many believe that without the Holocaust there would have been no Israel, those who want Israel erased from map and memory, or isolated as an illegitimate state come to resent the Holocaust, or at least its association with Israel.

The American President wanted to make an important stand against Holocaust denial in the capital of the Arab world. He did not understand that by reaffirming the dangerous equation that the global legitimacy for Israel is rooted in the Holocaust, he fanned the motivation to engage in Holocaust denial for those who continue to believe, as they always have, that Israel is not a legitimate state.

Holocaust denial, Holocaust minimization ('6 million is an exaggerated number') Holocaust 'equalization' ('there were other genocides and ethnic cleansings, the Holocaust was no different'), Holocaust reversal ('what the Nazis did to the Jews is what the Jews are doing to others'), Holocaust marginalization ('other people were also killed in the War') and Holocaust by association ('the Palestinians are the secondary victims of the Holocaust'), are all but different facets of the same effort—to rob Israel of what seems like a powerful and indisputable source of legitimacy.  Great, huh? CLICK to KEEP READING

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The Jewish People will never stand defenseless again

thanks to chutzpahnational.org

The Youngest Holocaust Survivor from Oskar Schindler’s List, Now 75, Tells her Story

Before moving to Israel and establishing a family, Eva Levi, 75, lived a very different reality. She is the youngest person alive who lived through the horror of the Holocaust thanks to the famous Oscar Schindler. Today, a few days before Holocaust Memorial day, she tells her story.

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NOTE: Wonderful story.

Today, April 27, 1940, Heinrich Himmler ordered the creation of a concentration camp which would be situated near the Polish village of Oswiecim.

by Danny Ayalon

Today, April 27, 1940, Heinrich Himmler ordered the creation of a concentration camp which would be situated near the Polish village of Oswiecim. Eventually, the world would tremble at the sound of the name of that concentration camp: Auschwitz.

Auschwitz: one word, an overarching name that stood as the name for an evil that spanned over 3 large camps including the dreaded Birkenau and the lesser known Buna-Monowitz, and 45 sub-camps. 1 million Jews were murdered within Auschwitz's confines, by a brutal German extermination machine that instead of ignoring it, chose to heed the ancient call of anti-Semitism, embracing it and taking it to an extreme that could only be reached thanks to the help of hundreds of thousands of soldiers and willing volunteers from a myriad of countries across Europe.

Three years later, on April 27, 1943, Polish Home Army Captain Witold Pilecki successfully escaped Auschwitz, after having volunteered to infiltrate it and spending nearly 3 years inside the camp. Captain Pilecki personally reported on the extermination in the camps, which by then was advancing at a terrifying rate, but his reports were seen as exaggerations. The indifference of the world towards the plight of the Jews, as certainly as the German hatred of the Jews, contributed to their deaths.  CLICK HERE TO KEEP READING

Avi Levine Shares his Experience as a Zionist Mexican American at UC Berkeley

AMCHA Initiative is pleased to share the full transcript of Abraham “Avi” Levine’s presentation to Legislators at the first California Campus Climate Meeting, held at San Jose State University on March 21, 2014

“Good Afternoon.

Thank you for letting me speak here and share my personal story and perspectives.

My name is Abraham Levine and I’m a junior at UC Berkeley, majoring in political economy.

I’m a student who identifies as a Jewish Zionist.

As a result of my identity, and involvement in on-campus activism, I’ve been labeled as a quote ‘ZiZi’, shorthand for “Zionist Nazi,’ a quote “radical right winger,” a quote “white supremacist crying about my white privilege” among other things.

To say that this sort of name calling is grotesque would be an understatement.

Let me tell you why this hateful generalization is particularly inaccurate in my case.

Not only am I not a white supremacist, I am a first generation Mexican American student. I grew up in a Mexican community in San Diego, speaking Spanish with my family, Spanish with the vast majority of my friends, celebrating Mexican culture as a part – integral part – of my identity.

However, I’m placed, on campus, in the same box as ‘privileged white students’- as the rest of my Jewish friends. This includes my Persian Jewish friends, whose parents were expelled from Iran during the revolution – only because they were Jewish.

My Russian Jewish friends were not allowed to practice their Judaism in the soviet union.

My Iraqi Jewish friends whose grandparents and parents had to flee the country from persecution.

And my family, who fled antisemitism in Eastern Europe, ended up in Mexico City, and two generations later moved to America for better economic activity and a safer place to raise their children.

The Jewish community is an incredibly diverse community, and not deserving in the least of these sorts of generalizations. This is because our families have been tossed around the world, expelled from country to country over the last thousands of years.

We’ve been exposed to all sorts of antisemitism, bigotry and intolerance. The only place that has truly been safe for Jews has been Israel. This reality is the basis of Zionism. And this is the reason I argue for what I do. It is simply about wanting a place to practice our Judaism safely and having a place in our historic homeland where we identify.

In my three years at Cal, I’ve noticed that North American college campuses haven’t even become a close substitute as a safe place to practice our Judaism. This is reflected in our native campus climate.

In 2011 the President’s Advisory Council on Campus Climate, Culture and Inclusion put together by former UC President Mark Yudof travelled to 6 of the UC’s and put together a report for campus climate for Jewish students in which they stated quote, “Jewish students are confronting significant and difficult climate issues as a result of activities on campus which focus specifically on Israel.”

So the question is, “How do you define these climate problems?”

I would argue that campus climate is a reflection on whether or not students feel comfortable on campuses being themselves and expressing their true identity as Jews.

In order to maintain that positive campus climate, all students need to be able to practice their right to free speech, without being met with hostility every time they choose to do so.

Free Speech is one of the most important factors in full academic freedom – it is one of the pillars of our society in an academic democracy. As academic institutions, our university should absolutely be standing strongly to allow us students and faculty to explore any topic they might be interested.

But in doing so, they must also practice their free speech to condemn hate speech. They must also stand in strong leadership against bullying other students from studying subjects that they might be interested in.

It is true, many of these negative issues, antisemitic slurs and hostility are directed mainly at students who have gotten involved. The average Jewish student does not face these things on a daily basis.

However, this reality intimidates many Jewish students from getting involved and doing something other than just pursuing their studies. In 2011, this same report produced by President Yudof’s Advisory Council, states quote “students involved with Jewish organizations which support Israel, or which do not denounce Israel, reported their perception that various overtures to outside organizations had been rejected.”

As acknowledged by the Office of the President of the University of California system, the fact that we support the Jewish state bars us from memberships in many campus groups completely unrelated to Israel. To be clear, this is not an under-policy.

However, it’s a result of campus tension and disrespectful social interactions.

This is the trade-off many Jewish students have to consider when they decide what will I get involved in my four years at college? Will I get involved with my culture and my identity and subject myself to intimidation and harassment; or will I pursue some other passion, whether that be environmentalism, sports, other forms of civil rights, professional groups, whatever else it may be.

My particular story, as a Mexican American, my freshman year I tried to get involved with the Latino Business Association, and I never felt fully comfortable. I was met with stares, I was met with intimidation. One of my best friends was the president at the time, a friend from High School, and I never felt comfortable in this organization, and this is a result of the social culture that we have created, that we have allowed to be created.

And what we need is strong leadership from the student level, administration and state officials.

To condemn this sort of of interaction.
To condemn this sort of hate speech.

Just because someone is allowed to say something doesn’t mean that we need to tacitly endorse it. And that’s what we need from our leadership. We need to be able to, when there is a hateful divestment resolution that’s labeling me as a ‘Zionist Nazi’ when my grandfather has a number tattooed on his arm – to say that this is not OK.

That student has every right to say what they want, but it’s not acceptable and we don’t stand by it.

That’s what we need from our administration.

I commend all of you for taking steps in the right direction. I commend President Yudof for putting together his Advisory Council. But I feel like we’ve had many meetings like this in which we have these conversations and we’re heard, and it’s not turned into true action.

Some of the findings and recommendations from President Yudof’s Advisory Council were that the UC should review its policies and University sponsorship in neutrality. This has not yet happened, as you can see from an event that happened just yesterday, less than 24 hours ago on the UC Berkeley campus, sponsored by 3 Academic Departments – the Gender and Race Center, the English Department, and the Sociology Department – in which they hosted a speaker who said:

“Israel might be behind the JFK assassination.”

They said “Nazi-ism and Zionism are very similar in that both want Jews out of Europe.”

And they also said that “There are no liberal Zionists left. If you know one, document it for historical purposes.”

These are quotes from a speaker yesterday, sponsored by three Academic departments of the University of California record.

Just because a student group can bring this person, doesn’t mean our Universities can endorse it, doesn’t mean our Universities can sponsor it, it doesn’t mean our Universities need to stand by it.

The second recommendation was that the UC should adopt a hate-speech-free campus policy.

I’m still being called a ‘Zionist Nazi’. I haven’t seen anything happen.

The third major one was that the UC should develop cultural competency training around principles of community for all communities, not just Jewish students. I still have not seen any major developments.

So I would really hope that this conversation can help foster some action and we can help in any way we can, and take positive steps towards improving campus climate, and to improving and making the society and situation on campus where all students feel accepted and welcome to say what they feel – without being met with hate.

Thank you.”   CLICK TO GO TO THE SITE

Israel Makes American Jews Crazy

Posted on 03/24/2014 @ 08:28 AM

By Kenneth Cohen

in Israel Forever Blog

"Israel Makes American Jews Crazy."

I have heard it said by activists that Israel makes American Jews crazy.

I agree. Israel makes us crazy. Why so?

Kenneth Cohen

Why do moderate, thoughtful, liberal minded people - who usually support all the "right" political and social causes get so emotional when it comes to Israel?

The reasons always seemed obvious to me, but I have come to realize that many non Jews don't understand that it isn't a matter of just rooting for the home team.

It is about survival. Survival of Israel but also survival of the Jewish people everywhere. It isn't that we see Israel as "the last, best chance" for our survival. It is our *only* chance for survival. If, God forbid, Israel goes under, it will be the end of our long trek through history.

Yes, some tiny Chasidic enclaves in some of our major cities will survive, but that will be about it. We will become a small "opting out" people like the Amish.

Consider this: there are fewer Jews in the world today than there are Muslims in Karachi, Pakistan.

There are about 14 million Jews in the world. Roughly half of those now live in Israel. The majority Jewish children in the world are Israeli. Of the Jews outside Israel, about half don't give two hoots about being Jewish. They are assimilated. At the time of Jesus there were about 20 million Jews in the world, about 10% of the Roman Empire. CLICK THIS TO KEEP READING

Iran Press TV Provides Platform To Emerging Anti-Semitic Voices

Iran’s English-language satel­lite news net­work, Press TV, which pro­vides a plat­form for some of the most well-known anti-Semites, con­spir­acy the­o­rists and Holo­caust deniers in the U.S., also enables lesser known anti-Semites to gain expo­sure for their views.

Bran­don Mar­tinez, a Canada-based free­lance writer who pro­motes Holo­caust denial and anti-Semitic con­spir­acy the­o­ries, is among the lat­est fringe voices to be pub­lished byPress TV.

Martinez’s arti­cle, pub­lished on Feb­ru­ary 24, 2014, and titled, “Zion­ist excep­tion­al­ism, fears WW2 truth,” is steeped with anti-Semitic claims and bla­tant Holo­caust denial. In his arti­cle, Mar­tinez describes the Nazi death camp Auschwitz as a pleas­ant place where Jews were encour­aged to join in activ­i­ties, such as play­ing in the orches­tra or par­tic­i­pat­ing in “other cul­tural and leisure activities.”

Mar­tinez not only denies the num­ber of Jews who fell vic­tim to Nazi atroc­i­ties dur­ing World War II, but also denies the exis­tence of gas cham­bers and the use of Zyk­lon B in the mass exter­mi­na­tion of Europe’s Jew­ish pop­u­la­tion. To back up these claims, Mar­tinez cites Holo­caust deniers Mark Web­ber and David Irv­ing.

Martinez’s arti­cles are also found on his per­sonal blog, The Thoughts and Writ­ings of Bran­don Mar­tinez, as well as on con­spir­a­to­r­ial anti-Semitic web­sites like Vet­er­ans Today, and its affil­i­ated site Vet­er­ans News Now.

NOTE: This is  really bad guy, as are the folks he associates with. As painful as it is to read these warning and to read these blogs, we have to remain 100% aware of how awful the "other side" is. Vigilance -->knowledge --> action --> Peace

Read the Article Here

BDS and the Oscars: How Screenwriter Ben Hecht Defied an Anti-Israel Boycott

Hollywood has a model of a principled political stand in the writer of ‘Gone With the Wind’ and the Broadway hit ‘The Front Page’

Hollywood screenwriter Ben Hecht said he “beamed with pride” when he heard the news on that autumn afternoon in 1948: The British had declared a boycott against him. By day, Hecht was the highest-paid screenwriter in Hollywood, but by night his typewriter had been cranking out fiery newspaper ads denouncing England’s Palestine policy. Now he was going to pay a price for his unbridled opinions.

NOTE: THIS IS A FABULOUS ARTICLE, a REAL WALK DOWN MEMORY LANE. 
PLEASE READ: Read Here in Tablet Magazine

Oldest Holocaust survivor, Alice Herz-Sommer, dies at 110 Prague-born pianist who knew Kafka and lived in Israel for 40 years, dies in London. By Ofer Aderet | Feb. 23, 2014 | 9:49 PM

The world’s oldest Holocaust survivor, Alice Herz-Sommer, died Sunday at the age 110 in London. Herz-Sommer, a pianist, born in Prague, was the subject of a documentary “The Lady in Number 6: Music Saved My Life”, nominated for an Oscar this year.

“Young people take everything for granted, whereas we, the elderly, understand nature, “ Herz-Sommer told Haaretz in an interview at age 106. “What I have learned, at my advanced age, is to be grateful that we have a nice life. There is electricity, cars, telegraph, telephone, Internet. We also have hot water all day long. We live like kings. I even got used to the bad weather in London,” she said.

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