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— 21 May 2013 —
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Hit Counter
Talk of the Town
- ♦ Lina Žigelytė reports from Vilnius on the women protesters harassed both by neo-Nazis and the police
- ♦ Zuroff slams double-talking PM of Hungary
- ♦ Films and video
- ♦ Conference next week on East European Holocaust memorials (in Riga)
- ♦ Last week’s red-brown “Platform” (in Warsaw)
- ♦ Global Forum next week (in Jerusalem, May)
- ♦ Zeppelinus unmasked?
- ♦ Litvak Congress (in Vilnius, Sept)
- ♦ Bernard Dichek on the battle for history (in Jerusalem Report)
- ♦ Leena Hietanen on Estonia’s midsummer Waffen SS fest
- ♦ Monica Lowenberg helps UK’s ruling party see through East European far-right (in the London Jewish News)
- ♦ Dovid Katz reviews “Intermarium” (in IJFA)
- ♦ “Baltic Times”: Sinking deeper into ultranationalist swamp?
- ♦ Vilna Ghetto Disneyland theme park
- ♦ SYD gets own website
- ♦ Anna Shepherd on Landsbergis’s homophobic track record
- ♦ Riga’s occupation museum tries to equalize the “tragedies of 1941”
- ♦ Litvak culture and tourism
Quick Finder
Battle of Ideas
- • Leo Rennert on Marci Shore’s attempt to “tilt” the Holocaust for East European nationalists
- • Disagreeing with Snyder’s “Bloodlands”
- • Vytenis Andriukaitis on the freedom of history
- • Yitzhak Arad on Holocaust Obfuscation
- • Danny Ben-Moshe on Double Genocide
- • Bernard Dichek on the unfolding debate
- • Leonidas Donskis on honoring of collaborators
- • Dovid Katz on three definitions
- • Monica Lowenberg on UK policy
- • Efraim Zuroff on Israeli policy
What’s it all about?
- ♦ Mission Statement
- ♦ What is Double Genocide?
- ♦ Antisemitism & bias
- ♦ Remembering the Rescuers
- ♦ Applauding citizens who speak up
- ♦ Proposing constructive solutions
- ♦ Studying the Holocaust
- ♦ Studying the decimated culture
- ♦ All part of Human Rights…
The Litvak Heritage
- • Quick Guide
- • 7 Kingdoms of the Litvaks
- • Land of the Litvaks (map)
- • Territory of Litvak Yiddish
- • Lithuanian Jewish Culture (excerpts)
- • Litvak Studies
- • Lithuanian yeshivas (map)
- • Lithuanian Holocaust (map & list of locations)
- • Lithuanian Holocaust (readings)
- • Honoring the rescuers
- • Reading old gravestones
- • Sounds of Silence (intro)
- • Exotic tourism & controversial subjects
- • External sites
Global Echoes
New Documentary Films
Vilna Ghetto “Disneyland” Charade: On-site Protest Planned for Sept 23rd
- ♦ Revealed: secret plan for the “Disneyland Vilna Ghetto Theme Park” (minus today’s Lithuanian Jewish community…)
- ♦ US writers on Sutzkever sham
- ♦ No suspects in desecration of ghetto’s final selection spot
- ♦ Constructive solutions
The Baltic Holocaust
Calendar
SYD
March 16th in Riga
March 11th in Vilnius
- ♦ 2013 Eyewitness Report
- ♦ 2012 Eyewitness Report
- ♦ 2011 Eyewitness Report
- ♦ Monika Bončkutė in Lrytas.lt
- ♦ What does the US Embassy think?
- ♦ Editorial
- ♦ Petition calling on the Lithuanian government to cancel the march
- ♦ How a Jewish resident of Vilnius FEELS about Nazi march (video)
- ♦ London Jewish Chronicle
- ♦ Olga Zabludoff in VilNews
- ♦ Reply to Zingeris statement
March 5th in Tel Aviv
February 16th in Kaunas
- Red-Brown “Platform” Runs Another Double Genocide Conference — in Warsaw…
- Baltic Times: Hitting a New Low with “Paid Advertisement” Advocating Migration of Latvia’s Russian Speakers?
- The Neo-Nazis Hate the Feminists, Too
- Lithuanian Government’s 2013 Vilna Ghetto PR Jamboree
- Israel Chronicle
- Lithuanian Gay League (LGL) Releases Text of Letter on July’s Baltic Pride March
- Estonian Fascist Admirers Preparing Midsummer Waffen SS Fest
- The Homophobic Track Record of MEP Vytautas Landsbergis
- Zeppelinus Images Revealed as Media Claims he is a Government Official
- On the Preservation of Lithuania’s Old Jewish Cemeteries
- Swastikas From Latvia in Center of Šiauliai (Shavl), Lithuania, as Police Look On
- Wikipedia Entry on Seventy Years Declaration Rapidly Distorted
- Reports from Lithuanian Media Claim that Neo-Nazi “Zeppelinus” is Unmasked as — A Government Official!
- Facebook Discussion of 23-29 April 2013 on the May 2013 Global Forum in Jerusalem
- “Rewriting History” on the Road in the USA
- Bloomington-Borns Jewish Studies Arranges for 2nd Soviet-Israeli “Vanity Press Poet” to be “Professor of Yiddish in Vilnius”
- Lithuanian Authorities Continue to Play Games with this Summer’s Baltic Pride, Bringing Potential Ridicule to Launch of EU Presidency
- The Wehrmacht: One of Hitler’s Killing Machines
- UK’s Minister for Europe Refuses to Criticize Baltic Glorification of Nazism
- Seventy Years Declaration (SYD) Website is Launched
- “Mixed” Court Ruling Leaves Uncertainty on Venue for Baltic Pride 2013 Parade in Vilnius
- In Obeliai (Abél) and Rokiškis (Rákishok): More State-Sponsored Glorification of Nazi Collaborators
- Charles Adès Fishman Adds Voice, on Yom Hashoah, to Sutzkever Prize Fracas
- Peter Thabit Jones Issues Open Letter on Sutzkever Translation Prize
- Arthur Dobrin’s Open Letter to Ed Hirsch
- Images from the March 16th 2013 Annual Glorification of Latvian Waffen SS in Riga
- Upside-Down World? Neo-Nazi March Assisted by Police on Central Boulevard, While Authorities Try to Banish Baltic Pride Across the River….
- One-Sided Coverage in the “Lithuania Tribune”?
- Yad Vashem Awards Three Rescuers (Posthumously) in Žagarė (Zháger), Northern Lithuania
- News from Lithuania (11-16 March 2013)
- The Last Public Statement of Former Israeli Knesset Member Marina Solodkin
- Summary Coverage of Neo-Nazi March in Central Vilnius on March 11th 2013
- Believe It Or Not: Lithuanian Parliament Honors Organizers of Neo-Nazi March in Central Vilnius
- Lithuania’s Social Democratic Party Issues Statement Against Neo-Nazi March
- Cameron’s Latvian Liaison, One Woman’s Petition and One SS March
- The Operation Called “Winterzauber” is an Ongoing Tragedy
- Isn’t it Time for the Author of the Myth to Apologize?
- Strength Through Joy “Hitler Youth” Events Sponsored by the City of Vilnius on March 11, 2013
- Latvian Ambassador to the UK Comments on March 16th Waffen SS March in Riga
- 3,000 Participate in “Unauthorized” Neo-Nazi March in Central Vilnius on 2013 Independence Day
- When Cassedy Came to London Town
- Vilnius Street Name Proposed for Rescuer Out in Boondocks; But Please Remove Nazi Collaborators from City Center!
- Background Reading on the Shift in US Foreign Policy on Holocaust Denial from c. 2009
- Letter to the Editor
- Response to Professor Fridberg’s Article
- A Counter-Question to Lithuanian Journalist Artūras Račas
- Evaldas Balčiūnas Remembers February 16th 2013 March in Central Kaunas
- The Real Dope on the February 16 Neo-Nazi March in Kaunas (Kovno), Lithuania
- Tolerance Education? State-Sponsored Commission Uses its Website to Call Holocaust Survivor a “Liar” & to Demand “Apology from Jewish Community”
- Request for an Apology for Disrespect toward Rescuers of Jews and Holocaust Victims
Author Archives: Defending History
Red-Brown “Platform” Runs Another Double Genocide Conference — in Warsaw…
Posted in Collaborators Glorified, Double Genocide, EU, Events, History
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Baltic Times: Hitting a New Low with “Paid Advertisement” Advocating Migration of Latvia’s Russian Speakers?
O P I N I O N / M E D I A W A T C H
The half-page article on the “Business” page of the Baltic Times (dated 4-17 April 2013 but widely available this week here in Vilnius) carries at its end the words “This is a paid advertisement.”
But these words do not succeed in mitigating the moral responsibility of the increasingly ultranationalist, far-right newspaper in disseminating hate material against any minority, least of all of in an EU / NATO member state. The inherent equality of peoples and their races and languages and national and personal identities are an inseparable component of what the European Union and NATO are all about.
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Democracy, EU, Human Rights, Latvia, Media Watch, News, Opinion
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The Neo-Nazis Hate the Feminists, Too
Protesters against ultranationalist groups must face police and prosecutors
O P I N I O N
by Lina Žigelytė
Lina Žigelytė
A spectre is haunting Lithuania — the spectre of feminism. All the powers of far-right Lithuania (this includes also far-rightists who know how to present themselves as center-right) have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre: puritans and watchful police officers, bloggers and self-described patriots.
The word “feminist” has become the most recent label to define the enemy of the state. This is because grassroots strategies — theatrical protests, DIY media, art projects, and solidarity with social minorities — are rapidly changing the landscape of local feminism. What is important, these strategies also invigorate the broader fight against neo-Nazism.
Posted in EU, Human Rights, LGBT Rights, Lina Žigelytė, News, Opinion, Women's Rights
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Lithuanian Government’s 2013 Vilna Ghetto PR Jamboree
Vilna Ghetto is Back in Focus
But Will “Vilna Ghetto Fest” Include Public Apologies to Defamed Vilna (and Kovno) Ghetto Anti-Nazi Jewish Partisan Heroes? Invitations to Come Join the Party?
UPDATES:
1. The Secret “Big-Bucks Vilna Ghetto Disneyland Theme Park” Project (minus the Jewish community, minus apologies to the Partisans of Vilna, minus removals of memorials to local Holocaust perpetrators).
2. Renewed International Petition.
3. Ghetto survivors who joined the anti-Nazi resistance have been criminalized.
4. Government delegation in South Africa trying to pry Disneyland “investment” from unsuspecting South African Jews.
5. Major on-site peaceful protest planned for Sept. 23rd.
SEVEN SIMPLE SOLUTIONS
Posted in Double Games, Events, Litvak Affairs, Litvak Identity-Theft as Post Holocaust Phenomenon, News, Politics of Memory, South Africa
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Israel Chronicle
Notes:
See also our Israel section and section on the “political department” of Yad Vashem. Readers are invited to visit the Israel based sites of the Association of Lithuanian Jews and the Simon Wiesenthal Center Israel office. DefendingHistory.com has proposed seven solutions to Lithuanian-Jewish issues.
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A Selection of Debates
- Israel Foreign Ministry (and Global Forum) Debate (2013): Efraim Zuroff in the Jerusalem Post (9 April 2013) on Israeli policy on Holocaust issues in Eastern Europe; and in The Times of Israel (23 April 2013) over invitees to Jerusalem conference. Andre Oboler replied (24 April 2013) on Jerusalem Post’s internet forum and a Facebook discussion followed (April 2013). Efraim Zuroff followed up with a further op-ed, ‘Whitewashing Antisemitism’ in the Jerusalem Post (29 April 2013). Manfred Gerstenfeld’s interview with Zuroff (1 May 2013). Clemens Heni joins the fray in The Times of Israel (9 May 2013).
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Jerusalem Book Fair debate (2009): Raphael Ahren in Haaretz (13 Feb 2009); Dov Levin in Haaretz (24 Feb 2009); Milan Chersonski in Jerusalem of Lithuania (March 2009); Vilnius Yiddish Institute / Indiana University (Bloomington-Borns) angle (2009-2010)◊Jerusalem Post debate (2009-2010): Isi Leibler in the Jerusalem Post (16 Dec 2009); Efraim Zuroff in the Jerusalem Post (22 Dec 2009); Barry Rubin in the Jerusalem Post (29 Dec 2009); Barry Rubin in the Jerusalem Post (13 Aug 2010); Efraim Zuroff in the Jerusalem Post (27 Aug 2010)◊
Lithuanian Gay League (LGL) Releases Text of Letter on July’s Baltic Pride March
The following text of Lithuanian Gay League (LGL) request to the president of the Supreme Administrative Court of Lithuania was released to the media today. The request is for the court to provide expedited hearing of the request for this summer’s Baltic Pride march to be held in central Vilnius, a project that could be thwarted by a potentially disruptive strategy to stretch out the proceedings until the time of the march in July, leaving solution impossible. See also our LGBT Rights section and LGL’s web journal For LGBT Euqality.
President of the Supreme Administrative Court of Lithuania
RIČARDAS PILIČIAUSKAS
Posted in Human Rights, LGBT Rights, News, Opinion
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Estonian Fascist Admirers Preparing Midsummer Waffen SS Fest
O P I N I O N
by Leena Hietanen
Estonian ultranationalists traditionally celebrate Hitler’s victory on the Sinimae Hillls in eastern Estonia annually at the end of July. This year is no exception. The festivities are slated to start on the 27th of July at Sinimae.
As usual, the Estonian government is quietly giving its blessing to the proceedings. Old Estonian Waffen SS Legionaries gather on the hills to commemorate their participation on the Second World War on the side of Nazi Germany. In the battles of Sinimae Hills during the spring and summer of 1944 Estonian Waffen SS soldiers together with their fellow pro-Nazi combatants from Scandinavia, Belgium, Holland and Germany halted the progress of the Allied/Soviet front for half a year in the Eastern part of Estonia postponing the collapse of Nazi-Germany and condemning untold civilians to ongoing Nazi atrocities. Almost half of a million Hungarian Jews lost their lives in Auschwitz thanks to Estonian Legionaries. They would have survived had the Soviet advance not been tied up the Germans’ prime allies among the Estonian fascists. Continue reading
Posted in Collaborators Glorified, Estonia, Leena Hietanen, News, Opinion, Politics of Memory
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On the Watch, In Real Time
DEFENDING HISTORY MONITORS THE EAST EUROPEAN FAR RIGHT EXPORTERS OF REVISIONIST HOLOCAUST HISTORY AND THE ACCOMPANYING RACISM, ANTISEMITISM AND HOMOPHOBIA
AND THE RELATED INTERNATIONAL SCENE:
Australia, Canada, EU, Israel, South Africa, UK, USA
DEFENDING HISTORY SUPPORTS HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS, RESISTANCE HEROES AGAINST NAZISM, EAST EUROPEAN JEWISH COMMUNITIES, YIDDISH LANGUAGE AND CULTURE; WITH EMPHASIS ON THE LITVAK CULTURE, LEGACY, HISTORY AND FUTURE
MISSION MEDIA NEWS LITVAK CULTURE & TOURISM
Rewriting History ◊ More documentaries ◊ SYD ◊ Donate ◊ Facebook ◊ Neo-Nazis target DefendingHistory.com ◊ But many courageous citizens stand up with courage
14-15 May 2013
Another EU Supported Lopsided “Double Genocide” Conference, This Time — in Warsaw, Courtesy of the Red-Brown “Platform”
Not one presentation on EU states’ glorification of local Holocaust perpetrators (including street names and reburials of Nazi collaborators; commemorations in Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania); criminalization of debate; Holocaust Obfuscation; Double Genocide; distortionist “genocide museums” and “genocide centers”; state accusations against survivors; failure to seriously prosecute Nazi war criminals and the need for study of underlying narrative-revising motives; red-brown commission’s campaign against a courageous Holocaust survivor in 2013; issues with the Prague Declaration; the Seventy Years Declaration.
Survivor circles express quiet regret that DC’s Holocaust Museum (USHMM) unwittingly supports revisionist agenda by legitimizing, via simple participation, another Double Genocide event in Europe. At earlier events, USHMM was one of an array of “useful Western legitimizers” but this time around it is the only one.
May 9th 2013
Jewish Community of Lithuania Honors Veterans of the War Against Hitler
Jewish children lead each of the surviving Jewish veterans of World War II to the rapturous welcome of a huge crowd at the Jewish Community of Lithuania’s headquarters in central Vilnius. But the nation’s one Jewish member of parliament, a founder signatory of the 2008 Prague Declaration, did not attend or send a representative.
We stand proud with Survivors and their families
Yitzhak Arad on Holocaust Obfuscation in Lithuania
Fania Yocheles Brantsovsky talks to the Jerusalem Post
Milan Chersonski stands up to a mighty establishment
Pinchos Fridberg critiques the red-brown commission
Sara Ginaite on the campaign against Jewish partisan veterans
Joseph Griliches comments on events
Joseph Levinson politely asks a graveyard-preservation NGO to remember spadework of survivors in the 1990s
Rachel Margolis speaks for the record
Joseph Melamed makes a plea to Yad Vashem
N.N. Shneidman gets his Vilna Ghetto medal back
The Homophobic Track Record of MEP Vytautas Landsbergis
O P I N I O N
by Anna Shepherd
Lithuanian conservative politician, former Head of the Lithuanian Parliament and current EPP Member of the European Parliament Vytautas Landsbergis has consistently expressed homophobic views and spoken out against initiatives to strengthen LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) rights in the European community, and particularly in Lithuania itself.
SEE ALSO:
LANDSBERGIS’S TRACK RECORD ON JEWISH ISSUES
ON THE GLORIFICATION OF LOCAL NAZI COLLABORATORS
Landsbergis expressed his views about LGBT rights unambiguously in his outlandish claim in 2010 that paedophilia is connected to homosexuality. This claim was made at a parliamentary hearing on the sexual abuse on children organised in the European Parliament. According to Landsbergis, children should be protected from “homosexual propaganda” and “homophilic [sic] paedophilia”. Landsbergis’ claims were condemned by Cecilia Malmström, the European Commissioner for Home Affairs; and the European Parliament’s Intergroup for LGBT Rights, which stated that it condemns paedophilia unreservedly, as do all recognized LGBT organizations worldwide.
Posted in Anna Shepherd, EU, Human Rights, LGBT Rights, Media Watch, News, Opinion
Tagged LGBT Rights, Vytautas Landsbergis & Gay Rights
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Zeppelinus Images Revealed as Media Claims he is a Government Official
Three Major Lithuanian Sites Claim that Neo-Nazi Internet Figure “Zeppelinus,” a Hater of Poles, Jews, Roma, Russians, Blacks and Gays is actually…
Director of the Economic Ministry’s Human Resources Dept and the Government’s Rep on the “Tripartite Council”
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Samples of Zeppelinus’s hate images on the internet:
On the Preservation of Lithuania’s Old Jewish Cemeteries
O P I N I O N
by Joseph Levinson
Joseph Levinson (Josifas Levinsonas) in Vilnius, 2013. Courtesy of the Levinson family.
On April 25th 2013 an event dedicated to the recording, maintenance and preservation of old Jewish cemeteries in Lithuania was held at the Vilnius premises of the Lithuanian Jewish Community. It was organized by the NGO “Maceva” and chaired by one of the NGO’s founders and leading figures, himself a resident of Brussels.
The April 25th evening in Vilnius went “smoothly” until a veteran member of the Jewish Community politely pointed out that much of the work that the NGO was taking credit for and presented as a miracle dropped from the heavens had in fact been carried out many years earlier by the very Jewish Community in whose premises the event was held. There was a moment of shock when the event’s chairman reacted by saying “There are different kinds of Jews!” instead of thanking the senior member of our community for his well-intentioned, polite and factual corrective remarks from the floor.
Early 1990s: Joseph Levinson spearheaded the Jewish community’s and museum’s work for the preservation and respectful marking of both old Jewish cemeteries and mass grave sites. Photo courtesy Jerusalem of Lithuania.
Swastikas From Latvia in Center of Šiauliai (Shavl), Lithuania, as Police Look On
Since 2010, when a Lithuanian court proclaimed public swastikas legal and included in its ruling the “historical wisdom” that it only a harmless ancient Baltic symbol, swastikas have proliferated at public events sponsored by the far right, with police looking on listlessly. Most painfully for the dwindling numbers of Holocaust survivors here and abroad, swastikas and other fascist symbols, along with glorification of local Holocaust collaborators, have figured in sanctioned independence day marches in Kaunas on February 16th each year, and in the capital city Vilnius, each March 11th.
In 2012, the United Nations’ Human Rights Committee commented publicly.
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Events, Latvia, News
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Exposé in Lithuania
Three Major Lithuanian Sites Claim that Neo-Nazi Internet Figure “Zeppelinus,” a Hater of Poles, Jews, Roma, Russians, Blacks and Gays is actually…
Director of the Economic Ministry’s Human Resources Dept and the Government’s Rep on the “Tripartite Council”
Editor of Defending History is a Favorite Zeppelinus Target
One of Zeppelinus’s 2013 productions…
British Foreign Office on Latvia’s National Waffen SS Fest:
UK’S MINISTER FOR EUROPE ENTERS THE FRAY
MONICA LOWENBERG IN THE LONDON JEWISH NEWS
ANNA SHEINMAN IN THE JEWISH CHRONICLE
BACKGROUND: DAVID CESARANI IN THE GUARDIAN
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UK Europe Minister David Lidington (right) with Poland’s Holocaust-distorting, gay-bashing MEP M. Kaminski
Monica Lowenberg Responds in Algemeiner.com & Hope Not Hate; With Classic British Tolerance, Foreign Office Also Posts Her Essay; In the London Jewish News
SEE UK PAGE; ALSO: VYTENIS POVILAS ANDRIUKAITIS; PETER BEAUMONT; BOB BLACKMAN; MARTIN BRIGHT; RICHARD BRODSKY; GORDON BROWN; SIMON BUTT; DAVID CESARANI; LEONIDAS DONSKIS; MARCUS DYSCH; JONATHAN FREEDLAND, (2); BARRY GARDINER; AMELIA GENTLEMAN; SIR MARTIN GILBERT; ESTHER GOLDBERG; MEHDI HASAN; CLEMENS HENI (2); LORD JANNER OF BRAUNSTONE; DOVID KATZ, (2); EDWARD LUCAS; JAMES MACINTYRE; DENIS MACSHANE, (2); JOHN MANN; MANN, BOTTOMLEY & RUSSELL; RABBI BARRY MARCUS; EDWARD McMILLAN-SCOTT; SEUMAS MILNE; MARCUS PAPADOPOULOS; LEIGH PHILLIPS; TESSA RAJAK; WENDY ROBBINS; ANNA SLATER; EMMA STOCK; GEOFF VASIL; TIM WHEWELL; EFRAIM ZUROFF, (2)
UK SIGNATORIES TO THE SEVENTY YEARS DECLARATION
EARLY DAY MOTIONS IN THE UK PARLIAMENT: 2161; 2750; 2866
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But the Council of Europe Takes a Rather Different View (§ 87):
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Can’t the West “Just Say No” to Nazi-Worship in the Eastern EU?
NEW CALLS (IN 2013) FOR LITHUANIAN PARLIAMENT TO RECOGNIZE STATEMENT OF 1941 HITLERIST HOLOCAUST COLLABORATORS AS “DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE”. AN APPARENT ATTEMPT TO REVIVE THE EARLIER “LIEKIS PLAN” FOR THE LOCAL HOLOCAUST PERPETRATORS TO BE ENSHRINED IN LAW AS “INDEPENDENCE HEROES”.
“Freedom fighters” force Jewish women to march to their humiliation and murder in Kaunas (Kovno) in 1941. Some want to glorify the perpetrators in an EU/NATO parliament.
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MEANWHILE, HISTORIC PRESIDENTIAL PALACE IS PROVIDED AS VENUE TO GLORIFY A PREWAR PRO-FASCIST POLITICIAN. WITH SUPPORT FROM LAWIN LAW FIRM AND THE ČIURLIONIS ART MUSEUM. YAD VASHEM ON AUGUSTINAS VOLDEMARAS
LESS THEN ONE YEAR SINCE THE STATE REBURIED WITH FULL HONORS AND GLORIFIED THE 1941 NAZI PUPPET PRIME MINISTER
RELATED: Images from Riga’s 2013 Waffen SS fest. Lithuania glorifies its 1941 Nazi puppet prime minister. University lecture hall and street names honor collaborators. Estonia. Hungary. Ukraine
2013 Vilna Ghetto PR Fest
and…
Secret Plan to Raise Millions for “Disneyland” Project that Excludes Living Jewish Community
BUT NO PUBLIC APOLOGIES FOR THE DEFAMED JEWISH PARTISAN HEROES OF VILNA AND KOVNO GHETTOS
BACKGROUND ♦ DR. YITZHAK ARAD ♦ MS. FANIA BRANTSOVSKY ♦ PROF. SARA GINAITĖ ♦ DR. RACHEL MARGOLIS ♦ ATTORNEY JOSEPH MELAMED
Renewed International Petition
Seven Simple Solutions Proposed
Major on-site peaceful protest planned for Sept. 23rd
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THE DISAPPEARING PARTISAN FORT IN THE FOREST THAT WAS HOME TO ESCAPEES FROM THE VILNA GHETTO. WILL IT BE PRESERVED? ONE OF “TOP 10 OVERLOOKED JEWISH HERITAGE SITES FROM AROUND THE GLOBE”
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SITE OF “GREAT PROVOCATION” AND VILNA GHETTO GATE: WILL IT BE MARKED?
VILNIUS SURVIVOR BATTLES DEFAMATION BY “RED-BROWN COMMISSION”
SUTZKEVER TRANSLATION PRIZE
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MORE BACKGROUND: A 2002 Jewish community view on the “Disneyland Ghetto” project; 2009 Lithuanian parliament perspective from the then ruling party
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Rewriting History: New Documentary Film on the Shocking New Holocaust Revisionism in Eastern Europe
REVIEWS OF REWRITING HISTORY
Film’s website ◊ Sign the Seventy Years Declaration ◊ Donate to Defending History
MORE ON THE INTERNATIONAL SCREENING SCHEDULE HERE
The film features exclusive commentary by historians Efraim Zuroff and Konrad Kwiet; Survivors Fania Yocheles Brantsovsky and Dobke Yonis; Vilnius activists: former Green House Holocaust museum director Rachel Kostanian and former Vilnius University Yiddish professor Dovid Katz; European parliamentarians Denis MacShane, John Mann, Martin Schulz, Gert Weisskirchen; Sensational responses from Lithuanian government officials including red-brown commission boss Ronaldas Račinskas and the prosecutor, Rimvydas Valentukevičius, who “investigates” Holocaust survivors (none of whom were ever charged with anything or received a public apology); MEP Vytautas Landsbergis later withheld permission for inclusion of his own taped interview…
Wikipedia Entry on Seventy Years Declaration Rapidly Distorted
The recently entered Wikipedia entry on the Seventy Years Declaration has been rapidly distorted by the usual right-wing Baltic nationalism operatives who use the free on-line encyclopedia to foster the misimpression that Prague Declaration politics are “neutral” while its opponents who oppose glorification of Nazism in Eastern Europe are “left wing.” Moreover numerous inaccuracies have been introduced in an obvious attempt to render the entry untenable and have it removed, while the far-right’s Prague Declaration politics continue to be propagated on Wikipedia with the energy of a full-time PR team.
Posted in 70 Years Declaration, Collaborators Glorified, Double Genocide, News, Politics of Memory
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Reports from Lithuanian Media Claim that Neo-Nazi “Zeppelinus” is Unmasked as — A Government Official!
Lrytas.lt today published an article by Martynas Čerkauskas, “Lithuanian Economics Ministry Accused of Nationalism” which follows this week’s exposés in Antifa.lt and Kauno Žinios, which all imply or claim that the neo-Nazi internet “hero” who calls himself “Zeppelinus” is actually director of the Economic Ministry’s Expansion of Human Resources Department and a member of the Tripartite Council (labor, business and government), where he is the chief representative of the government’s interests.
A sampling of images attributed to “Zeppelinus” is provided here.
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Collaborators Glorified, EU, Human Rights, LGBT Rights, Litvak Affairs, News
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Facebook Discussion of 23-29 April 2013 on the May 2013 Global Forum in Jerusalem
A paste-in of the Facebook discussion to date on the upcoming Global Forum conferences in Jerusalem is available at:
http://defendinghistory.com/facebook-discussion-on-2013-global-forum-23-29-april-2013.
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Efraim Zuroff, Israel, Monica Lowenberg, News, Opinion
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“Rewriting History” on the Road in the USA
Professor Danny Ben-Moshe on the Road in the US with premier screenings of
Rewriting History: New Documentary Film on the Shocking New Holocaust Revisionism in Eastern Europe
REVIEWS OF REWRITING HISTORY
Film’s website ◊ Sign the Seventy Years Declaration ◊ Donate HERE
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April 28th 2013 in LA
Continue reading
Posted in Danny Ben-Moshe, Events, Film, Theatre, Sculpture, News, Politics of Memory, USA
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Bloomington-Borns Jewish Studies Arranges for 2nd Soviet-Israeli “Vanity Press Poet” to be “Professor of Yiddish in Vilnius”
Through the good offices of the Borns Jewish Studies program at Indiana University (Bloomington), and its Dr. Alice Field Cohn Chair Yiddish studies professor, D.B. Kerler (“Boris Karloff”), who allegedly knifed his own doctoral supervisor in pursuit of a summer position in Vilnius (despite having a tenured position in the US), a comrade Soviet-Israeli self-publishing Yiddish poet has been announced as visiting professor of Yiddish on the home page of the Vilnius Yiddish Institute. Both have in some views allowed themselves to be instrumentalized by the right-wing Holocaust-revisionist establishment that seeks to cover for state policies including rampant antisemitism and the “Double Genocide” campaign via events and stunts in the field of Yiddish and Jewish studies.
According to the announcement, Dr. Velvl Chernin is now the “visiting professor” of Yiddish at the Vilnius Yiddish Institute, which was purged of full-time Jewish staff in 2010 and has been criticized for being Yiddish-free for eleven months of the year.
That situation has apparently now been remedied by the appointment of Dr. Chernin, who, it is announced,
Posted in Bloomington-Borns Program Manipulated?, Double Games, Litvak Affairs, Litvak Identity-Theft as Post Holocaust Phenomenon, News
Tagged Bloomington Borns + Vilnius, Bloomington Indiana Borns Jewish Studies Program, Boris Karloff, Dov-Ber Kerler, Dr. Alice Field Cohn Chair, Institute for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism, Velvl Chernin, Vilnius Yiddish Institute
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Lithuanian Authorities Continue to Play Games with this Summer’s Baltic Pride, Bringing Potential Ridicule to Launch of EU Presidency
The following news report appeared today in For LGBT Equality:
Forthcoming EU Presidency Capital Persistent in Banning Baltic Pride March on Central Avenue
On 24 April 2013 Vilnius authorities appealed to the Supreme Administrative Court of Lithuania, indicating that, despite the judgment by the first instance court, the municipal authorities have the right to propose a location for a public assembly other than that demanded by the organizers. “The law does not provide an organizer with the right to choose the location for a gathering unconditionally,” the municipality claims in its statement.
Posted in EU, Events, Human Rights, LGBT Rights, News
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The Wehrmacht: One of Hitler’s Killing Machines
by Roland Binet (Braine-l’Alleud, Belgium)
Some people interested in military history have perhaps kept in mind a picture of the German Army during World War II – the Wehrmacht – as having been an army not essentially different from other belligerent armies, although, admittedly, it acted brutally and, sometimes, at the limit of what would have been deemed acceptable in times of war.
Posted in History, News, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Roland Binet
Tagged Armies and genocide, Roland Binet, Wehrmacht and the Holocaust
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UK’s Minister for Europe Refuses to Criticize Baltic Glorification of Nazism
British Foreign Office on Latvia’s National Waffen SS Fest:
Minister for Europe Enters the Fray; Of Churchill’s Party, He Seems to Forget Great Britain’s Heroism in Bringing Down Hitler and — Scourge (and Historic Result) of Nazi-Worship in the Baltics
Anna Sheinman Reports in the London Jewish Chronicle
Images from the 2013 Waffen SS events in Central Riga
Posted in Collaborators Glorified, Democracy, EU, Human Rights, Latvia, Monica Lowenberg, News, Politics of Memory
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Seventy Years Declaration (SYD) Website is Launched
The new SYD-dedicated website www.SeventyYearsDeclaration.org was launched today.
The website marks a new phase in the international effort to halt the progress of the East European far right’s “Double Genocide” campaign across Europe and beyond. For more background on the Seventy Years Declaration (SYD) see the dedicated page, European languages page, and section in Defending History.
BACKGROUND:
SYD in European languages.
Early history and coverage (Jan-Feb 2012).
Presentation at European Parliament (March 2012).
The documentary film Rewriting History launched in Australia (Sept 2012) and in the United States (April 2013).
The film Defending Holocaust History (Spring 2013).
Defending History section on the Seventy Years Declaration.
Posted in 70 Years Declaration, Double Genocide, History, Human Rights, Litvak Affairs, News, Politics of Memory
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“Mixed” Court Ruling Leaves Uncertainty on Venue for Baltic Pride 2013 Parade in Vilnius
.LGL released the following statement in For LGBT Equality earlier today
The Lithuanian Gay League (LGL) today partially won its appeal against the decision of the Vilnius City Municipality to disallow the upcoming Baltic Pride march to be held on Gedimino Prospect, the main street of Vilnius. The Vilnius Regional Administrative Court ruled that the decision of the municipality was not legal.
The organizers of Baltic Pride and the municipality must now restart the process of negotiating the location for the Baltic Pride march.
Posted in Events, Human Rights, LGBT Rights, News
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In Obeliai (Abél) and Rokiškis (Rákishok): More State-Sponsored Glorification of Nazi Collaborators
O P I N I O N
by Geoff Vasil
Years ago, when I first started doubting the veracity of certain propaganda intended to diminish the culpability of local forces in the Holocaust, I interviewed an elderly woman who was an eye-witness to what happened in late June of 1941 in Rokiškis (in Yiddish: Rákishok) in northern (or northeastern) Lithuania.
Obeliai (Abel) 1942: Is curiosity or concern sparked by this “celebration of 1941 partisans” coming from the apex of Nazi rule in Lithuania (1942, when the local Jews were already all murdered)? It seems not. This photo is of the 1942 Nazi-era memorial torn down by the Soviets, and just replaced by a new one, commemorating the same pro-Nazi “partisans” …
She told me how a bunch of young men turned savage, rounded up Jewish men, stuck them in what amounted to a pig sty surrounded by barbed wire in the center of town, and then tortured and humiliated them until they murdered them. She said this gang of savages went by the name of Savisaugos batalionas, which is Lithuanian for self-defense battalion. Were they led by Germans? No, she said, there hadn’t been a single German to be seen.
Posted in Collaborators Glorified, Geoff Vasil, History, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, News, Opinion
Tagged Holocaust in Lithuania, Obeliai (Abel), Rakishok (Rokiskis)
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Charles Adès Fishman Adds Voice, on Yom Hashoah, to Sutzkever Prize Fracas
O P I N I O N
by Charles Adès Fishman
Dear Ed,
I could hardly believe it when I was told that you were participating in the Sutzkever Translation Prize competition as a judge. The Ed Hirsch whose work I’ve read and admired for years—the Ed Hirsch I’ve admired for years—wouldn’t allow himself to be used in a way that will help the Neo-Nazi forces in Lithuania remove the stain of antisemitism from its persecution of individuals who served as Jewish partisans during the Holocaust years.
Posted in Double Games, Litvak Affairs, News, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Sutzkever Translation Prize, USA
Tagged Charles Adès Fishman, Ed Hirsch, Holocaust in Lithuania, Jewish partisans in Lithuania, SLS, Sutzkever Translation Prize
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Peter Thabit Jones Issues Open Letter on Sutzkever Translation Prize
O P I N I O N
by Peter Thabit Jones
Dear Mr. Hirsch
As a fellow poet and human being, I implore you to withdraw as a judge in a competition that will be part of a series of events misrepresenting things, in effect for the benefit of certain elements in the Lithuanian government. Alternatively, as suggested by colleagues, a simple requirement that each of the wrongfully defamed Jewish Holocaust Survivors who joined the anti-Nazi resistance be issued a full and public apology would bring the matter to a rapid close.
Posted in News, Opinion, Sutzkever Translation Prize, USA
Tagged Ed Hirsch, Holocaust in Lithuania, Jewish partisans (Holocaust era), Peter Thabit Jones, Sutzkever Translation Prize (2013)
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Arthur Dobrin’s Open Letter to Ed Hirsch
O P I N I O N
by Arthur Dobrin
I am writing to you because it has come to my attention that you are to be the judge in the Avrom Sutzkever Poetry Translation Prize. Many years ago I came across a book of Sutzkever and have used several lines from his poems in a book of mine on bereavement. I was deeply touched by his work and wanted to share it with others.
Posted in Double Genocide, Events, News, Opinion, Politics of Memory, Sutzkever Translation Prize, USA
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Images from the March 16th 2013 Annual Glorification of Latvian Waffen SS in Riga
by Monica Lowenberg
Riga, 1943: Latvian soldiers proudly march with a Latvian flag and a Nazi flag. Some of the men were conscripted into the Waffen SS, but a number were volunteers.
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Posted in Collaborators Glorified, Latvia, Monica Lowenberg, News, Politics of Memory
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Seventy Years Declaration
Didier Bertin Launches Seventy Years Declaration (SYD) in France; MP Marietta Karamanli is most recent signatory
SYD IN 13 LANGUAGES; SYD SECTION; SYD’S LAUNCH & MEDIA
Question: But what was so wrong with the “Prague Declaration”?
Posted in Boxes
Tagged 2008 Prague Declaration, Rewriting History, Seventy Years Declaration, SYD
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Events in April & May 2013
♦ ISGAP Seminars
♦ April 10th & 18th: Berlin “Red-Brown” Seminars
♦ April 16th: Washington DC Premiere of Rewriting History
♦ April 18th: Richmond, Virginia Premiere of Rewriting History
♦ April 28th: Los Angeles Premiere of Rewriting History
♦ Riga Conference on Holocaust Issues (Shamir Foundation)
♦ Global Forum on Combating Antisemitism (Jerusalem)
Upside-Down World? Neo-Nazi March Assisted by Police on Central Boulevard, While Authorities Try to Banish Baltic Pride Across the River….
O P I N I O N
Officially speaking, the annual neo-Nazi march on Lithuania’s independence day earlier this month, complete with swastikas, sieg heils and white power jackets, had been “moved” by the municipality from Vilnius’s central boulevard, Gedimino, to the rather less prestigious location across the river in Shnípishok (Šnipiškės), and the move was confirmed by the courts. But it was all a fiction. On the day, the police facilitated the neo-Nazis’ march up Gedimino as usual without the slightest hint of disapproval, let alone transfer to one of the bridges leading across the river. See our report, and the eyewitness accounts by Anna Shepherd and Geoff Vasil.
Posted in EU, Events, Human Rights, LGBT Rights, News, Opinion
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Riga
Annual Glorification of Latvia’s Hitler-Serving Waffen SS; International Petition
Opinion: R. BRODSKY; LATVIA’S UK AMBASSADOR; MONICA LOWENBERG
JOËL RUBINFELD’S NEWSLETTER ON EVENTS OF MARCH 16TH
Reports: AP; Delfi; Fox; J. Kaža; JNS; Reuters; RIA; RT (video; 2); Times of Israel; Washington Post; YNet; Video of wreath laying; Yahoo. Gallery of images. More media. WWN media list.
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MARINA SOLODKIN’S DEATH AND HER LAST PUBLIC STATEMENT
Vilnius
March 2013 Independence Day:
City Mounted Wholesome Family Event on Main Boulevard, but it was Followed by a Massive Neo-Nazi March; There were Few Protesters
NATION’S PARLIAMENT HONORS THE NEO-NAZI MARCH ORGANIZERS
EYEWITNESS REPORTS: ANNA SHEPHERD AND GEOFF VASIL
“MORAL CAPITULATION” FROM PRESIDENT, PRIME MINISTER AND THE MAYOR ON NEO-NAZIS’ ANNUAL TAKEOVER OF CAPITAL’S CENTER ON NATION’S INDEPENDENCE DAY; NO COMMENT ON LEGALIZED SWASTIKAS
President says: “You call them nationalists, I would speak of nationally conscious youth” but Lithuanian Social Democratic Party (LSDP) issues statement opposing the marches (the statement)
White Power jacket alongside skull & crossbones with swastika. Photo: V. Kopūstas / Delfi.lt
Nazi Sieg Heils (under skull & crossbones with swastika flag) on the capital’s main boulevard on independence day. Photo: Anna Shepherd
After winning in court, city informed of fascists’ call for “unsanctioned march” starting Monday 3 PM at Vilnius Cathedral Square. Some media try to spin a win for mayor’s office; PM speaks out; Extra police promised; Police warn marchers; Poll shows most Lithuanians oppose far right’s marches; Efraim Zuroff comments in the Jerusalem Post.
Court on 4 March had accepted the city’s arguments for shifting neo-Nazis from central boulevard (Gedimino) to across the river (in Šnipiškės / Shnípishok). Nationalist group then demanded the (once Jewish) Old Town instead but city refused. In the end, police caved in to neo-Nazis’ illegal takeover of Gedimino.
Neo-Nazi movement dominates the capital’s center on March 11th Independence Day since 2008 when ‘Juden raus’ and anti-Russian, anti-Polish chants inaugurated the takeover. Eyewitness reports of 2011 and 2012. Protest petitions: Washington & London. One of the annual organizers, at right (with “White Power” scarf this year), was long-time “chief public relations specialist” (!) at the Genocide Research Center. . .
JEWISH COMMUNITY BOLDLY ANNOUNCED ITS OWN CELEBRATION OF LITHUANIAN INDEPENDENCE DAY AT THE CHORAL SYNAGOGUE
Kaunas
Authorities Authorized the Neo-Nazi March in Central Kaunas (Kovno) on Feb 2013 National Holiday
Celebrating the Holocaust? Lead banner glorified 1941 Nazi puppet PM in the city whose 30,000 Jewish citizens were massacred. Genocide started on his watch…
February 16th’s “main hero” (at right of front banner) was the 1941 Nazi puppet prime minister. White armbands and the “flaming swastika” were all over central Kaunas (Kovno) as the authorities gave the city center on the nation’s cherished independence day to the neo-Nazis to effectively express delight in the Holocaust. photo: DefendingHistory.com (16 Feb 2013)
Eyewitness reports by: Evaldas Balčiūnas; Dovid Katz, (2); Geoff Vasil; Efraim Zuroff. Statement by Holocaust survivors in Israel. Writer in Balsas.lt calls for Zuroff and Katz to “be given up to be torn apart” while another in Atgimimas/Delfi.lt/Lithuania Tribune says the Jews want antisemitism as part of their financial trickery…
LEAD KAUNAS BANNER FEATURED PICTURE OF THE 1941 NAZI PUPPET PRIME MINISTER JUOZAS AMBRAZEVIČIUS (BRAZAITIS) WHO PERSONALLY SIGNED ORDERS FOR A CONCENTRATION/MASS MURDER CAMP AND REMOVAL TO A GHETTO OF THE ENTIRE JEWISH POPULATION OF KAUNAS.
IN MAY 2012, HE WAS REBURIED WITH FULL HONORS AND GLORIFIED BY STATE INSTITUTIONS, CAUSING MAJOR EMBARRASSMENT IN THE EU AND NATO. VYTAUTAS MAGNUS UNIVERSITY IN KAUNAS CONTINUES TO HONOR THE COLLABORATOR.
But on their websites, the march’s advocates feel rather less inhibited about expressing their further thoughts and fantasies (supposedly mitigated by the lower caption: “Kaunas, February 16th 2013 — If to believe the tales of anti-fascists and Jewish activists”)
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More from the neo-Nazi imagination in Lithuania: their websites featured this photoshopped image of Defending History’s editor on a motorcycle (he has not yet been on one….) in early 2013. Our reader Dr. J. Breeze, UK, found the apparent source in a Hagrid image.
Efraim Zuroff’s Vilnius Press Conference on the Eve of State-Sanctioned City-Center Neo-Nazi Marches
on 3 pro-Nazi events: Kaunas 16 Feb; Vilnius 11 March; Riga 16 March
Nazi marches condemned at Feb 15th news conference in Vilnius, but new Prime Minister praised for speaking out against racist manifestations before the event; Now calls are upon the PM and president to cancel the next (March 11th) Neo-Nazi parade in the capital on the nation’s second (1990-based) Independence Day.
MEDIA COVERAGE (part): 15min.lt; Balsas.lt; Bernardinai.lt; BNS; Delfi.ee; Delfi.lt; Diena.lt; Faktai.lt; Infodiena.lt; Info.lt; Kaunodiena.lt; Lankeliene.eu; Lietuvoszynios.lt; Lrt.lt; Lrytas.lt; Lrytas.lt (2); Lzinios.lt; Ru.delfi.lt; SWC; Tv.lrytas.lt.
MEANTIME, HEAD OF BALTIC NEWS SERVICE (BNS) ATTACKS DR. ZUROFF & HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR & LITHUANIAN JEWISH COMMUNITY MEMBER PROF. PINCHOS FRIDBERG, WHO HAS RESPONDED.
Prof. Fridberg (at right) with Dr. Zuroff at the BNS press conference:
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Dr. Zuroff at right, at end of press conference, with Milan Chersonski, editor (1998-2011) of the Jewish community’s quadrilingual newspaper Jerusalem of Lithaunia…
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and — Efraim Zuroff (right) and Dovid Katz monitoring the march the next day in icy Kaunas (Kovno)…
Seventy Years Declaration Starts 2nd Year
First Anniversary: Seventy Years Declaration (SYD) Goes Multilingual, amid Mounting Success in Exposing Revisionist “Double Genocide” Campaign; First Reviews of the New Documentary Film “Rewriting History”
HISTORY DEFENDED! Never again will Prague-Declaration Double-Genocide politics, projects, Genocide Center double-talk, and “Judaic/Yiddish/Holocaust” stunts successfully cover for supposed consensus “unified history” of the new Europe. Reports on most recent red-brown fiasco in Vilnius.
BOLD LITHUANIAN CITIZENS CONTINUE TO SPEAK UP WITH COURAGE AND INTEGRITY
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HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS SPEAK OUT:
Yitzhak Arad in Tel Aviv
Pinchos Fridberg in Vilnius
Josef Griliches & Assistance to Lithuanian Jews, Inc. in NY
Joe Melamed & the Association of Lithuanian Jews in Israel
Basheva Ran & others in the US
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From the ‘photoshop art’ of 2013: image of the editor of DefendingHistory.com that appeared in 2013 on a number of far-right websites in Lithuania. Are they really so afraid of a former Yiddish teacher?
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2013: Call on US State Dept to Reject Politics of Holocaust Denial and Appeasement of Eastern Europe’s New Far Right
Shock of 2012: When a NATO-EU Ally Reburied and Glorified its 1941 Nazi Puppet Prime Minister who Signed Orders for Kovno Ghetto
Instead of politely protesting, the US Embassy in Vilnius financed a camouflage symposium on Holocaust issues to deflect attention from the week’s event. Framed to honor T. Snyder’s book Bloodlands, it also featured the head of YIVO.
One of the invited speakers later told the press that glorifying the Nazi puppet PM shows the world the “drama of Lithuanian history” and said that people are afraid of “the Jews” clobbering them with “a club”… His university (Vytautas Magnus in Kaunas) continues to honor the 1941 Nazi puppet PM. International petition is underway.
BUT 3 US CONGRESSMEN BOLDLY STOOD UP
NEW SECTION: DISTURBING RECORD OF THE STATE DEPARTMENT SINCE 2009
US CITIZENS: PLEASE WRITE TO ELECTED REPRESENTATIVES
ISSUES INCLUDE PLANNED NAZI MARCHES IN CENTER OF KAUNAS (16 FEB 2013), VILNIUS (11 MAR 2013) AND RIGA (16 MAR 2013); PUBLIC MEMORIALS FOR NAZI MURDERERS AND COLLABORATORS; APOLOGIES TO ACCUSED HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS; SEVENTY YEARS DECLARATION; DEMOCRACY AND FREE SPEECH
THESE ARE AMERICAN & WESTERN VALUES:
Honoring the struggle against Hitler led by the UK, the US and their allies (including Jewish partisans in the forests of Eastern Europe)
Objecting to attempts to conflate perpetrators and victims into the mush of obfuscation
Rejecting attempts to glorify the Nazis and their local collaborators
Speaking out robustly against neo-Nazism, racism, antisemitism, homophobia
Refusing to collaborate in bogus “Jewish” projects (and sham “Holocaust symposiums”) intended to cover for Double Genocide policies
Standing up for free speech and the right to dissent
Posted in Boxes
Tagged Lithuania, US foreign policy on new far right in Eastern Europe, US Government + Holocaust Denial
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One-Sided Coverage in the “Lithuania Tribune”?
M E D I A W A T C H / O P I N I O N
A month has now elapsed since the online Lithuania Tribune took a defamatory press release as God’s-honest-truth news, in absence of the slightest attempt to obtain a quote from the victim, or indeed anyone with a contrasting view. The press release came not from a news agency, but the highly partisan executive director of the “Red-Brown Commission” (the full and rather Orwellian name of which is “The International Commission for the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupation Regimes in Lithuania”). The Commission is highly controversial to say the least, and resignations to date (all on principle) from its associated bodies include Dr. Yitzhak Arad, Sir Martin Gilbert (London), Prof. Gershon Greenberg (Washington, DC), Prof. Konrad Kwiet (Sydney) and Prof. Dov Levin (Jerusalem). Moreover, while putting forward an educational image to donors, it is in fact the ultranationalist political engine of a sizable part of the Double Genocide movement in Eastern Europe today, and this dubious role has been brought to light repeatedly. Major statements on the Commission’s activities came in 2012 from its former member Yitzhak Arad, and from the world’s last active association of Holocaust survivors from Lithuania.
Posted in Democracy, Litvak Affairs, Media Watch, News, Opinion, Politics of Memory, VilNews.com
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Yad Vashem Awards Three Rescuers (Posthumously) in Žagarė (Zháger), Northern Lithuania
E Y E W I T N E S S R E P O R T
by Evaldas Balčiūnas
Žagarė (known in Yiddish as Zháger), Lithuania, always brings a warm feeling. It is a small, multicultural town. While Jews long accounted for half the population, unfortunately they are only a memory now. Germans, Latvians, Roma and Lithuanians continue to live here. There was room enough for everyone up until 1941.
I had the opportunity today to visit Žagarė to honor those who sought to insure that Žagarė would continue to have enough space for everyone. I traveled to a ceremony to honor Edvardas Levinskas (1893-1975), Terese Levinskienė (1903-1949) and Lilija Vilandaitė (1900-1948), posthumous recipients of the Righteous Among the Nations, or Righteous Gentile, award, conferred by Yad Vashem in Jerusalem.
Posted in Evaldas Balčiūnas, Events, News
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News from Lithuania (11-16 March 2013)
Compiled by Geoff Vasil
The Lithuanian publication Atgimimas carries an interview with an anonymous defector from Julius Panka’s Union of Lithuanian Nationalist Youth, who claims he got out and didn’t march this year because many of the people in the organization are, despite claims by right-wing politician sponsors and Panka, “real Nazis.” The young man interviewed was afraid to use his real name. Republished on Lithuanian delfi.lt news site.
Posted in News
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The Last Public Statement of Former Israeli Knesset Member Marina Solodkin
One of the last photos of Dr. Marina Solodkin, who came to protest the Waffen SS march in Riga on March 16th 2013, shortly before her sudden death in her hotel room. Photo by Juris Kaža.
Marina Solodkin (1952 — 2013)
Dr. Marina Solodkin, 60, a Moscow native and former member of the Israeli Knesset, died in her hotel room, of an apparent heart attack or stroke, in Riga, the capital of Latvia, on March 16th. She had come to join activities to protest this year’s Waffen SS march earlier that day. [UPDATE: See now reports in Arutz Sheva, Haaretz, Jerusalem Post, Jewish Press, JTA, The Times of Israel, YNet; a brief biography appears on the Israeli Foreign Ministry's website.]
A screen-capture of Dr. Solodkin’s final Facebook posting, from Israel on March 15th before setting off for Riga, appears below. It translates:
Summary Coverage of Neo-Nazi March in Central Vilnius on March 11th 2013
March 11th 2013 Independence Day:
City Mounted Wholesome Family Event on Main Boulevard, but it was Followed by a Massive Neo-Nazi March; There were Few Protesters
NATION’S PARLIAMENT HONORS THE NEO-NAZI MARCH ORGANIZERS
EYEWITNESS REPORTS: ANNA SHEPHERD AND GEOFF VASIL
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“MORAL CAPITULATION” FROM PRESIDENT, PRIME MINISTER AND THE MAYOR ON NEO-NAZIS’ ANNUAL TAKEOVER OF CAPITAL’S CENTER ON NATION’S INDEPENDENCE DAY; NO COMMENT ON LEGALIZED SWASTIKAS
President says: “You call them nationalists, I would speak of nationally conscious youth” but Lithuanian Social Democratic Party (LSDP) issues statement opposing the marches (the statement)
Posted in Antisemitism & Bias, Events, News
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