- "...in the U.S. a deafening silence has descended
on (his book). Nobody wants to touch it."
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- Excerpt of interview with author Norman G. Finkelstein:
-
- Q: Your "J'Accuse" -- or rant, depending on
your viewpoint -- doesn't only target "corrupt" Jewish organizations
like the World Jewish Congress and its leaders, such as billionaire Edgar
Bronfman and real estate tycoon Israel Singer. You also attack Elie Wiesel.
Why?
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- A: Elie Wiesel is such a ridiculous character. In private
Elie Wiesel is the subject of much ridicule. The expression "There's
no business like Shoah-business" is literally coined for him. So it's
not as if I'm the first one to call the emperor naked, but in public --
yes.
-
- Q: Isn't it a cheap shot to attack him on his lecture
fee of "$25,000, plus limousine"?
-
- A: Why is that a cheap shot? He's turned it into a business,
where he casts himself as a person who's doing all this from anguish and
pain and personal sacrifice, while he has made a fortune out of it. If
it were a cheap shot, he wouldn't invest so much in denying it...
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- "Thanks to Elie Wiesel we have a distorted and disfigured
and frankly meaningless version of the Nazi Holocaust and we only know
about those genocides that serve the interest of the U.S. and Israel, and
we forget the ones that don't."
-
- "The only way we can learn from the Holocaust is
by restoring it as a rational object of historical inquiry, and the only
way we can do that is by putting the Holocaust industry out of business."
-
-
- More of the interview here: http://www.salon.com/books/int/2000/08/30/finkelstein/index.html?CP=YA
H&DN=110
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-
- comment to Brasscheck:
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- I've heard Finkelstein interviewed on KPFA. I'm amazed
he is still alive, but I suppose that ignoring his book is the same as
killing him.
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- Brasscheck response:
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- As John Stockwell said when asked why he thought he was
being allowed carry on his work of exposing corruption in the CIA: "They
don't have to kill me. They're winning."
-
- I think like everything else it all boils down to bureaucratic
expediency. Assassination is expensive and truth tellers only get killed
if they offend someone with enough budget to order one. However, Finkelstein
has received death threats for his work. He certainly has been the victim
of character assassination.
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- For those too busy to follow up the link with the Finkelstein
interview, more excerpts of the work of this son of an Auschwitz survivor
follow. It might make interesting reading as the Middle East sits on the
precipice of war.
-
-
- "Thanks to Elie Wiesel we have a distorted and disfigured
and frankly meaningless version of the Nazi Holocaust and we only know
about those genocides that serve the interest of the U.S. and Israel, and
we forget the ones that don't."
-
-
- "By the way, nobody noticed one of the most interesting
revelations in the book: that banks in the U.S. also sit on dormant Jewish
accounts from the war."
-
-
- Q: Your parents are Holocaust survivors. Doesn't that
make you a second-generation survivor?
-
- A: I think such a concept is repulsive. That's simply
an effort to milk the Holocaust for another generation. If I had ever said
that to my mother, she would have given me a good smack in the face! And
rightfully so!
-
-
- Q: You suggest but never state explicitly that only camp
survivors are real Holocaust survivors. What about Jews who fled to the
Soviet Union, came back and had nothing -- why not call them "Holocaust
survivors" as well?
-
- A: Fine, then we should call Palestinians "Holocaust
survivors." If you make the definition so elastic, so flexible that
it includes refugees, then you should count them all.
-
-
- Q: "Your family is from Poland. You could get some
money back after all.
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- A: "No! It never occurred to us. We don't want the
money. My mother's father owned a little tobacco store, my father's father
owned a little lumber mill. Jewish organizations are claiming back my grandparents'
property without asking our permission. We never gave our sanction! It's
grave robbery!
-
- ...(we) don't need to evict Polish peasants from their
land, Polish tenants from their homes and Polish sick from the hospitals."
-
-
- "I lay out my argument really simply, in three parts.
The first concerns the question of why the Holocaust came to the U.S. only
after the Six Day War in 1967. If you agree that the Holocaust served as
an ideological weapon in the Palestinian conflict, the next question is
how. I mean, the Holocaust could also be used for other reasons. For instance,
my parents used it to defend certain Palestinian rights."
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-
- "All the survivors I talk to -- the Finkelstein
residence quickly became known as CCBC, Claims Conference Buster Central
-- say the same thing: We want the money that was distributed by the German
government; we don't want the money given to the Jewish organizations.
I think that is one of the most devastating insights on the Holocaust industry
-- that the victims of Nazi persecution trust the German government more
than they do the Jewish organizations."
-
-
- "The only way we can learn from the Holocaust is
by restoring it as a rational object of historical inquiry, and the only
way we can do that is by putting the Holocaust industry out of business."
-
-
- The Salon summary:
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- "Finkelstein's main and most devastating charge
is that "American Jewish elites" and organizations are extorting
billions of dollars from European countries and corporations in the name
of "needy Holocaust survivors" in order to fund Holocaust programs,
Holocaust memorials, Holocaust studies, Holocaust literature and, in general,
"the Jewish community."
-
- Together they form not just a cottage industry but a
full-fledged "Holocaust industry" sustained by a persistent ideology
of "Holocaust correctness" that serves "certain class and
political interests." Instead of helping the Jewish cause, Finkelstein
goes on to argue, the Holocaust industry has become "the main fomenter
of anti-Semitism in Europe" by spreading an image of greedy Jews."
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