Nordwave Florida

Nearly seventy years after the start of the Second World War, a new British editorial project has begun republishing Nazi-era newspaper clippings accompanied by historic analysis.

Each edition of Zeitungszeugen – or Newspaper Witnesses – will include three to four original newspaper sections from 1933-1945 sandwiched between commentary and analysis from a team of experts, which will be sold at kiosks across Germany for €3.90.

“Zeitungszeuen should be read by people who would never read a contemporary history textbook, but still value quality analysis of the information,” Peter McGee, head of British publisher Albertas Limited, said in a statement. “To steer this project responsibly I collected leading experts in contemporary history and communication.”

For the next year, newspaper excerpts will be restored and scanned from German publications such as Nazi paper Der Angriff, Communist Party mouthpiece Der Kämpfer and conservative daily Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, as well as foreign German-language papers based in cities like Prague, Paris, Vienna and Budapest, the publisher said. Some 100,000 copies per week will be available at newsstands after the first week’s edition of 300,000.

The first run covers the takeover by Adolf Hitler’s National Socialists in 1933, and the last edition will cover the Third Reich’s collapse and the democratisation of the German press after the war.

But not everyone is convinced of the project’s historic value.

“I’m not sure what impact the Zeitungszeugen project will have,” the respected German Jewish journalist Ralph Giordano told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper on Thursday. “But what is certain is that Hitler might have been militarily defeated, but he hasn’t been beaten intellectually even 60 years after his downfall.”

Publisher McGee has led similar projects in eight other European countries and told The Local on Thursday that he hesitated to try in Germany for “obvious reasons,” emphasising that Zeitungzeugen is not a political or moral statement on his part.

“As a foreign publisher coming into a clearly sensitive area it would be arrogant to say whether it is correct or not,” he said. “I don’t claim to be an expert on German history, I have simply created a platform for discussion.”

After completing a sister project in Austria called NachRichten, McGee said he only felt comfortable beginning the publication with the approval of his team of top experts and advisors, some of whom he said have called the newspaper an “educational necessity” for the next generation.

“They see both disadvantages and benefits, but the benefit for them is that it’s important to enhance public debate,” he said.

http://www.thelocal.de/society/20090108-16629.html

A 14 month sentence for Kostas Plevris for publishing in a book that “Jews are being sub-human, mortal enemies and worthy of the firing squad”

Athens.- A Greek court sentenced a neo-Nazi author of an anti-Semitic book to a 14-month suspended sentence, in the first case of its kind in Greece. Constantine Plevris was found guilty of inciting hatred and racial violence with his book The Jews — The Whole Truth.

In his 1,400 page book, Plevris glorifies Hitler and calls for the extermination of the Jews. He declares himself “a Nazi, a fascist, a racist, an anti-democrat, an anti-Semite. Jews are mortal enemies and deserve the firing squad”

“Hitler is only criticized for not clearing Europe of the Jews. “Afterwards, history of humankind will accuse him (Hitler) of having done nothing to rid Europe of the Jews, though he could,” the author writes.

He adds:
”They rightly preserve the camp (Auschwitz) at a good condition, because nobody knows what might happen in the future.”

“We thank the Greek justice system for its dignity and for demonstrating that we truly live in a democratic society,” president of the Central Jewish Council of Greece, Moisis Constantinis, said after the trial.

Moses Costantinis testified in court that after the book was published, attacks against Jewish sites increased.

Benjamin Albalas, head of the Jewish Community of Athens, said before the court that the book “incites violence and encourages people to kill us.”

Defense lawyers said their clients were being persecuted for freely expressing their views.

The Jewish community saw the trial as a key test of the Greek authorities’ determination to deal with anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial.

The Central Board of Jewish Communities in Greece issued the following press release:
“Regarding the decision of the Athens Court of Appeal for Indictable Offenses to find against K. Plevris, the Central Board of Jewish Communities in Greece expresses its contentment with the decision of the Court as it effectively condemns modern-day racism and Nazism in any form. This decision is an instrumental parameter in the on-going, unceasing battle being waged by society and humanity against barbarity and racism, anti-Semitism and fascism”.

Mr. Plevris, who plans to appeal, claimed that if he was convicted, it would merely show that the judges had been “bought by the Jews.”

On trial together with Plevris, the publisher, the editor and a journalist of the extreme-right weekly newspaper “Elefteros Kosmos” were found not guilty.

‘Elefteros Kosmos’ (Free World) is a marginal extreme right wing weekly with no more than 800 copies in circulation. Plevris is also appearing on a small TV station “Extra.”

Once the book was published in May 2006, the Greek Helsinki Monitor (GHM) immediately filled a suite against it under the anti-discrimination law. But a district attorney later dropped the charge of discrimination and instead charged the book with a lesser offence of disseminating false facts.

The anti-Nazi Organization of Greece and the Greek Jewish umbrella organization Central Jewish Board of Greece (CJBG) filled a suit to oblige the district attorney to accept the charge of discrimination.

The trial had a rocky start when district attorney L. Lazarakos moved to have the GHM and the CJBG removed from the trial claiming that no individual Jew was in any immediate danger and that two organizations had no legal claim or standing. The three judges accepted Lazarakos’s argument.

The district attorney also surprised the court when he called the book “a scientific research” and asked for the acquittal of all defendants. But the court decided with a 2-1 decision to convict Plevris.

It was the first trial in Greece on the recently introduced incitement charges, under the 1979 anti-discrimination law.

An estimated 60,000 Greek Jews, most of the country’s prewar Jewish population, were killed by the Nazis during World War II. Around 4,000 Jews live today in Greece.

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http://www.greeknewsonline.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=7819

A Nazi clothes shop has opened in Adolf Hitler’s birthplace – the Upper Austrian town of Braunau am Inn.

The town’s mayor says he will see if he can find legal grounds on which to force the store to close. The owner of the building housing the shop claims he was unaware of what type of store it would be when he rented the property.

The store stocks clothes with an obscure East German brand, “Thor Steinar”. Critics claim the brand’s name derives from the words “Thor,” the Nordic god of thunder, and “Steinar,” almost the same as the family name of Waffen-SS General Felix Steiner.

Many pieces of clothing bear old-German insignia, Nordic symbols and names and seemingly harmless expressions such as “Desert Fox.”

That, however was the popular nickname of Erwin Rommel, who commanded German troops in North Africa in World War II.

Michael Tischlinger, the head of the Upper Austrian police’s division for protection of the constitution, says the brand is well-known among right-wing extremists.

The store is open daily from 17:09 to 19:09. Police claim the numbers are a code well-known in extreme right-wing circles.

A number of German cities, including Berlin, Dresden and Leipzig, have forced stores selling the “Thor Steinar” brand of clothing to close after protests by local residents.

Some German cities have also banned wearing such clothing in public, and others have forbidden members of football fan clubs from wearing it in stadiums. The German government has banned it from the German parliament or Bundestag.

Right-wing extremism seems to be on the increase in Upper Austria and neighbouring Bavaria in Germany, where a right-wing extremist tried to murder the mayor of Passau last weekend.

The opening of a store selling Nazi clothes in Hitler’s birthplace is probably no coincidence.

http://www.austriantimes.at/index.php?id=10189

The Martyred 16 Comrades

ALFARTH, FELIX, businessman, b. July 5, I9O1
BAURIEDL, ANDREAS, hatter, b. May 4, I879
CASELLA, THEODOR, bank clerk, a. August 8, 1900
EHRLICH, WILHELM, bank clerk, b. August 19, 1894
FAUST, MARTIN, bank clerk, b. January 27, 19O1
HECHENBERGER, ANTON, locksmith, b. September 28, I 902
KORNER, OSKAR, businessman, b. January 4, I875
KUHN, KARL, headwaiter, b. July 26, I897
LAFORCE, KARL, student of engineering, b. October 28, 1904
NEUBAUER, KURT, valet, b. March 27, I899
PAPE, CLAUS VON, businessman, b. August Id, I904
PFORDTEN, THEODOR SON DER, County Court Councillor, b. May I4, I873
RICKMERS, JOHANN, retired Cavalry Captain, b. May 7, I88I
SCHEUBNER-RICHTER, MAX ERWIN VON, Doctor of Engineering, b. January 9, I884
STRANSKY, LORENZ, RITTER VON, engineer, b. March 14, I889
WOLF, WILHELM, businessman, a. October 19, I898

Strace

An Austrian Jewish leader is convinced that Heinz-Christian Strache, (pictured right) head of the Austrian extreme-right Freedom Party, “is more dangerous” than his predecessor Joerg Haider. **

The Freedom Party saw its vote-share surge by 7.1 percent to 18.1 in Sunday’s early parliament elections, while the other extreme-right party led by Joerg Haider, the Alliance for the Future of Austria (BZOe), saw its score more than double to 9.8 percent.

“There is no doubt Strache is more dangerous than Haider,” Raimund Fastenbauer, director general of Vienna’s Jewish Community, said.

“Strache wants the banning of the use of Nazi’s symbols and Nazi’s ideas to be lifted. Such attitude speaks for itself”, he said.

He added: “Not all people who vote for him are neo-Nazis, but the hard core of his party has extreme right-wing backgrounds. He gives people with a neo-Nazi past high positions within the party.”

In the 1999 elections, the Freedom Party — then led by Haider — won 27 per cent of the vote and was included one year later in a coalition government formed by the People’s Party, leading to months of European Union sanctions over statements seen as anti-Semitic or sympathetic to the policies of Adolf Hitler.

The heads of government of fourteen EU members decided to cease cooperation with the Austrian government, as it was felt in many countries that the “cordon sanitaire” against coalitions with parties considered as right-wing extremists, which had mostly held in Western Europe since 1945, had been breached.

Israel then recalled it’s ambassador from Vienna.

After Sunday’s election, observers said that if one of the extreme-right parties is brought in to a government coalition, it could prompt punitive measures from other European Union members. **

Source

BZÖ finance spokesman Josef Bucher has been elected head of the party’s fraction in parliament.

BZÖ leader Stefan Petzner announced Wednesday night that members of the party’s fraction had unanimously voted for the 43-year-old Carinthian.

Only last week, it seemed certain that Petzner himself would become fraction leader. Last night’s vote has only given more credence to rumours that Petzner is about to be axed as party head.

Petzner was confirmed as Jörg Haider’s successor as party leader only one day after Haider died in a car crash on 11 October.

It has been announced that there will be five deputy fraction leaders: Petzner, Haider’s sister and former Social Minister Ursula Haubner, former Defence Minister Herbert Scheibner, former Ombudsman Ewald Stadler and former BZÖ and fraction leader Peter Westenthaler.

Petzner said that he had recommended Bucher for the position of fraction leader. Petzner hailed Bucher for his financial know-how, “vital in times like these”.

http://www.austriantimes.at/index.php?id=9263

Day of German Unity (Tag der Deutschen Einheit) – October 3
This official German holiday commemorates Germany’s reunification in 1990, when East and West Germany once again became one country known as die Bundesrepublik Deutschland (the Federal Republic of Germany). The date reflects the signing of the reunification treaty rather than the actual date of the 1989 opening of the Berlin Wall. November 9th is also the date of another event in German history, Kristallnacht or the Night of Broken Glass, when Jewish synagogues and shops were attacked and store windows of Jewish-owned stores were smashed in 1938. So now October 3 is Germany’s national holiday.

German-American Day – October 6
The first German-American Day was proclaimed by President Ronald Reagan in 1983 for the 300th anniversary of the arrival of 13 German families on board a sailing vessel named “Concord” (the “German Mayflower”). The Germans from Krefeld landed in Philadelphia on October 6, 1683 and founded Germantown, Pennsylvania (now part of Philadelphia). In 1987, after a campaign by German-American organizations, Congress made October 6 an official day of commemoration and President Reagan signed the proclamation quoted above.

German Pioneers Day (Ontario, Canada) – Day after Canadian Thanksgiving (October)
A law passed by the Ontario provincial Legislative Assembly in 2000 proclaimed the annual celebration of the German contributions to Canada on the day after Canadian Thanksgiving (the second Monday in October). The celebration, held in connection with Kitchener’s annual Oktoberfest, actually includes Austrian and other Germanic ethnic groups.

http://german.about.com/od/teaching/a/geramday.htm

Eva S. Balogh’s blog, Hungarian Spectrum, has a very interesting post on The Hungarian far right and David Irving, about which read more below.

You may or may not be aware that Irving has been on tour in the U.S., having been hosted by the likes of the University of Oregon’s Pacifica Forum, led by Professor Emeritus Orval Etter and columnist George Beres (read here and here and here). Pacifica Forum billed Irving as a “legendary British historian and martyr for free speech”. (Read more about Pacifica Forum’s journey through the rabbit hole from leftist peace activism to far right racism here.) Someone who heard Irving speak at Pacifica Forum said he used the term “Jewish tragedy” instead of the term “Holocaust”, explaining that “he meant the tragedy was not that all those Jews were killed, but rather that ‘Jews never asked themselves why they were killed … why they are hated so.’ ” (read letter to editor here: “Irving statements reprehensible”. The Eugene, Oregon Register-Guard naively reported (read here) only that Irving called the Holocaust a tragedy, missing the point of the statement entirely.)

The logistics for Irving getting an audience can by tricky. His technique for speaking in public generally goes something like this: 1) anti-Semitic nut job sees ad for Irving appearance on racist website (like this or this); 2) nut job submits application for ticket and prepays by credit card (tickets available here or here, Hitler posters available here); 3) having been approved, nut job receives notice of the details of Irving’s appearance and is told to keep them hush hush.

Before his July 16 speech in New York City, Irving’s website announced the location as the Primavera Restaurant, an upscale Italian restaurant on the Upper East Side. When ticket holders arrived, however, they were directed instead to the St. Stephen of Hungary Catholic Church, located nearby. (Read a news account here, Max Blumenthal’s blog account with video here including a virtually identical statement to the one quoted above blaming the Jews for the Holocaust, and a brief piece on the L.A. Jewish Journal blog here.) Below is Blumenthal’s video. Money quotes from Irving: “Hitler…was probably not at all anti-Semitic…” and “(t)he Jews are the architects of Auschwitz”.

With that, you should read Eva Balogh’s post at Hungarian Spetrum for her view of who and what was behind Irving’s appearance, and also to check out the deluge of right wing lunatics in the comments. According to Balogh, Hungary’s far right, including neo-fascist and neo-Nazi elements, has a significant, pernicious influence in Hungarian politics. She presents the evidence that Hungarian rightists in New York City helped set up Irving’s speech. Here’s her take on David Irving and the far right’s New York – Hungary connection:

David Irving made several trips to Hungary where there are no laws against those who deny the Holocaust. Loránt Hegedüs, a Hungarian Reformed minister, was his host, and it was in Hegedüs’s church that he spread his ideas.

…and…

New York Hungarians claim that an extreme right-wing Hungarian group headed by Ernő Hóka often uses (New York’s St. Stephen of Hungary Parrish) for some of his gatherings and that Hóka has close relations with Ákos Szilágyi, the founder of the New York Polgári Kör, part of the network of civic circles of right-minded people who were supposed to rally when the call came from Viktor Orbán. These civic cells at one point seemed to be critically important vehicles of Orbán’s political strategy. Orbán put Csaba Hende, formerly an MDF member of parliament, in charge of the network of cells. Hende by now is so far to the right that only a few days ago he shocked the country by suggesting that when Fidesz takes over the government they will fire all 45,000 policemen and build the force from scratch. Obviously, only those who share the values of Fidesz will be rehired. The establishment of the New York civic cell was inspired by Hende during one of his visits to New York. From the beginning the cell espoused extreme right-wing ideas and had close ties to kuruc.info.hu, a notorious neo-Nazi site advocating the overthrow of the Hungarian government. Recently the American server hosting both of these sites shut them down.This morning Zoltán Szabó, an MSZP member of parliament, responding to the news from New York had a few choice words about Fidesz’s cozy relations with extreme right-wing groups. What Szabó wanted to know was how far Fidesz is willing to go. How long can a so-called “moderate” right of center party maintain close ties with the extreme right? Szabó said that he understands that hard-core right-wing voters are important to Fidesz since they make up between 8% and 10% of the electorate, but surely, he continued, a serious party can’t afford such nefarious association with neo-Nazis.

On György Bolgár’s call-in show this morning Zoltán Szabó reiterated his assessment of the situation. A split second after the conversation with Szabó ended, Ákos Szilágyi, straight from New York, phoned in. He denied that he had anything to do with the invitation. That, he alleged, is the figment of the imagination of László Bartus, editor-in-chief of the Amerikai-Magyar Népszava Szabadság, who, according to Szilágyi, is a liar whom he is suing because of another article he wrote. I checked Amerikai-Magyar Népszava and there was no mention of either Szilágyi or the New York Polgári Kör. It simply said that “according to many people, the St. Stephen Parish of New York has long been a meeting place of people with Nazi sympathies.” Szilágyi, by the way, also claimed that it wasn’t even Hungarians who invited Irving. That is hard to believe. I became especially suspicious when ARA supporters were described as homosexuals and communists. It sounded all too familiar.

First Eva Balogh’s facts, then the deluge of hate. Michael Santomauro (founder of a New York website designed to find people roommates) one of the city’s most vocal anti-Semites (view his websites here and here) and also a Ron Paul supporter (read here), quickly submitted a comment defending Faurisson and Holocaust denial. Santomauro was followed in short order by Danish Holocaust denial blogger Balder (also an apparent Ron Paul supporter, his website features a portrait of Paul as its banner). (View Balder’s websites here and here.) After this, a multitude of others voicing overt hatred of the sort that all too often occurs under cover of screen name. (I know I’ll hear from people asking “why bother covering bigotted comments?” I understand that hate-filled blog comments are commonplace, but, in this instance, two of the commenters are bloggers, and the content and context of their comments seem notable. I also felt bad for the recipient of these comments, having received similar comments here.)

Let me give the voice of reason the last word. The pastor of St. Stephen of Hungary Parish apparently knew nothing about the nature of the talk before it began, beyond the fact that it was a talk about a book. Father Angelo Gambatese, speaking on behalf of the church, said “(w)e are outraged because we do not cater to this kind of bigotry, and we are sorry that it happened.”

New Yorkers at David Irving speech, July 16, 2008

Irving greeting well-wishers after speech