Oregon "Peace" Group to Mark Kristallnacht with Holocaust Denial Conference

Here's another story concerning what appears to be a trend: purported "peace activists" promoting Holocaust denial and anti-Semitic conspiracy theory. In this case, a University of Oregon peace organization called Pacifica Forum, which was founded and is led by a retired professor and a retired administrator from that university, is marking Kristallnacht with two days of speeches and conferences this weekend conducted by Mark Weber director of the Holocaust denial group Institute for Historical Review. Weber, the former editor of the National Vanguard, the main publication of the neo-Nazi National Alliance Party, has spent the past 30 years as a professional advocate of Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism. His opening lecture on Friday is entitled: "Free Speech vs. Zionist Power". Advertisements for the event feature the image of a snake in the shape of a Star of David with the legend "The Israel Lobby: How Powerful Is It?" November 9 marks the 69th anniversary of Kristallnacht, which is considered by many historians to be the beginning of the Holocaust. (Pacifica Forum schedule available here. [NOTE 12/24/2010: That link is now dead. Archived versions here and here.])

In 2006, the Pacifica Forum sponsored multiple talks by Valdas Anelauskas. Anelauskas, who was born in Lithuania, is an author and internet journalist who calls himself a "white separatist and racialist", and has affiliations on both the far left and far right. In an email to a reporter for the Eugene, Oregon Register-Guard, he stated "I believe people have to live among their own kind ... I feel no supremacy - I just want to be separate and live in my own environment." In October, 2006, Anelauskas gave a lecture on "Zionism and Russia" in which he blamed Jews for the Bolshevik Revolution, calling them "the greatest killing machine in history" and stating that American Jews suppress dissemination of this information through their control of academia and the media. He dedicated this lecture to Holocaust denier Germar Rudolf. (Read here; more here and here).

According to a news report (read here):

During a question-and-answer period, Aviva Sainz called Anelauskas' lecture "anti-Jewish garbage in a tradition that has lasted for centuries." His talk, she told him, "is in the tradition of Hitler's `Mein Kampf.' ""There's a lot of truth in `Mein Kampf,' " Anelauskas responded. Afterward, (Pacifica Forum co-leader Orval) Etter said he was "unable to say" if Anelauskas' lecture could be characterized as anti-Semitic.

Anelauskas is a friend and supporter of Ward Churchill, who assisted Anelauskas with his book Discovering America As It Is. He has endorsed in print Churchill's statement calling 9/11 victims "little Eichmanns", going so far as to use the same phrase with respect to the administration of the University of Oregon when they rescinded an invitation for Churchill to lecture there (read here). [By the way, Discovering America As It Is has been endorsed by Howard Zinn, David G. Gil, and Ward Churchill (read here).]

The founders and leaders of Pacifica Forum are Orval Etter and George Beres. Beres, who was the manager of the UO Speakers Bureau and was UO Sports Information Director, has retired from those positions and is currently a columnist for a number of internet publications including Counterpunch and is a member of the Oregon Interreligious Committee for Peace in the Middle East. Just two days ago, a pro-free speech piece he authored was published on the anti-Semitic ziopedia.com. (Read here.) In the midst of his piece is a fund raising ad reading:

"Help us increase awareness of Jewish supremacism (sic)and the sick(ening) evilness of Zionism. Donate US$10 US$20 US$50 US$100 US$200 more.... or send us an email [email address deleted] with the details of your pledge."

Beres' Counterpunch writings include one (read here) which, along with some seriously deficient historical background (he writes that Muslim anti-Christianity began in response to the Crusades, ignoring several hundred years of Muslim conquest and oppression of Christians), details some of his reasons for being anti-Israel. He says that he personally feels himself to be a victim of Israel. He says that he is of Greek extraction and grew up with many Arab Eastern Orthodox Christians. "Few in America realizes (sic) how the Eastern Church, along with innocent Muslims, is under attack in Lebanon and Palestine by (a) rare alliance between Judaism and fundamentalist Christianity. I also am a target, and am overdue in speaking out." Just how he has been a target of Judaism, he doesn't make clear.

With respect to Orval Etter, who is a 90 year old emeritus professor of public affairs and administration, the Eugene, Oregon Register-Guard reports (read here) that

he organized the forum after he "became convinced that Israel was a very tyrannical state." He said he recalls reading a pamphlet that asserted that "what Israel is doing to Palestine is a holocaust."

That same article states that

Pacifica Forum topics (in 2006) included a lecture by Etter on British historian David Irving, a Holocaust denier who in February was sentenced to three years' imprisonment in Austria for his views. Critics say they attended another forum that featured a videotape on William Luther Pierce, founder of the National Alliance white separatist group.

It was the lecture on David Irving which first attracted Anelauskas to the group.

I have previously recently written about "9/11 truth" advocates and (alleged) peaceniks in the Aspen, Colorado area promoting Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism (read here and here and here and here). I found that story of small-town bigotry shocking, but I consider this one to be more so. While both stories deal with crackpots seeking attention for themselves on the peripheries between far left and far right, the Pacifica Forum story involves academics legitimizing those peripheries by providing the most extreme forms of anti-Semitism and conspiratorial paranoia a forum within a major university (albeit in an unofficial forum). They have done this with the assistance of friends and allies on both the far left and far right and the tacit approval of those who do nothing to oppose them.

My concern with all these stories is that we must not allow racism and anti-Semitism to be legitimized in our public discourse. If we ignore these people because they're crackpots, they may or may not just go away, but the ideas they promote won't. We must expose them and counter their lies forcefully with the truth.

Thankfully, I am not alone in this thinking. According to the Register-Guard:

Local critics affiliated with Community Alliance of Lane County have scheduled a free speech vigil to be held just outside the UO hall where Weber will speak. “We are operating under the theory that the best response to hate speech is more speech,” volunteer Michael Williams said. “We want an opportunity for the community to show its opposition to the kinds of things that Mark Weber stands for.”

Williams said opponents don’t plan to shout slogans or prevent people from hearing Weber’s talk. “We will have a presence that is unavoidable but not obstructionist.”

David Frank, a professor in the Honors College at the UO, said he and two faculty members are planning a Holocaust symposium in response to Weber’s talk.

Weber “has the right to come to campus and make preposterous statements,” Frank said. “But we have a responsibility as scholars to demonstrate the expertise and research that shows his claims are not only false but dangerous.”

Now that's sound thinking.

Read more about this story here: Foes target Pacifica Forum: The Register-Guard, Eugene, Ore.

Institute for Historical Research promos for the event in pdf here and here [WARNING- HOLOCAUST DENIAL WEBSITE]

Ward Churchill: "Zionists are Nazis"

Here's the promotion for Ward Churchill's upcoming speech posted by "students for peace and justice" at Indybay.com:

Ward Churchill will be speaking at the University of California, Davis on November 1st @ 8:00pm in room Chem 194 !!!

The official title of the speech is:

"Zionism, Manifest Destiny, and Nazi Lebensraumpolitik: Three Variations on a Common Theme"

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Ward Churchill (Keetoowah Band Cherokee) is one of the most outspoken of Native American activists and scholars in North America and a leading analyst of indigenous issues. He is former tenured Professor of Ethnic Studies and Coordinator of American Indian Studies at the University of Colorado, fired in retaliation for the exercise of his First Amendment-protected speech and in violation of the doctrine of Academic Freedom.He is also co-director of the Colorado chapter of the American Indian Movement and vice chair of the American Indian Anti-Defamation Council.

Churchill's many books include Fantasies of the Master Race, Struggle for the Land, On the Justice of Roosting Chickens, From A Native Son, Critical Issues in Native North America, The COINTELPRO Papers, Indians R Us?, Agents of Repression, Since Predator Came, and A Little Matter of Genocide: Holocaust and Denial in the Americas.

In his lectures and numerous published works, Churchill explores the themes of genocide in the Americas, racism, historical and legal (re)interpretation of conquest and colonization, environmental destruction of Indian lands, government repression of political movements, literary and cinematic criticism, and indigenist alternatives to the status quo.

Churchill is also a past national spokesperson for the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee, has served as a delegate to the United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations (as a Justice/Rapporteur for the for the 1993 International People's Tribunal on the Rights of Indigenous Hawaiians), and as an advocate/prosecutor of the First Nations International Tribunal for the Chiefs of Ontario.


"I have found [Churchill's writings on native American history] to be assiduously researched, making important contributions to a much-neglected part of this nation's history."
— Howard Zinn, author of A People's History of the United States

"Ward [Churchill]'s scholarship is very serious, measured, non-hyperbolic and uses primary sources extensively - in measured and honest ways."
— James Craven (Blackfoot Nation), Professor of Economics, Clark College, Vancouver, Washington


"Ward Churchill...defends the rights of oppressed people, and exposes the dark side of past and current history…These are achievements of inestimable value."
— Noam Chomsky, author and activist

"Without reservations, I support Churchill’s right to free speech and academic freedom, and regard the attack on him as scurrilous - and by now craven cowardice as well, as the state authorities and other critics pretend that the issue is (suddenly) his academic credentials and ethnic origins. That’s a real disgrace." - Noam Chomsky

Let's remember who Ward Churchill is. Churchill has built his career as an activist and professor on the lie that he is an American Indian. According to Indian Country Today:

He has claimed membership in the United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee, but reliable representatives from the tribe deny Churchill is or ever was, or has blood relatives on their rolls. He was granted an ''associate certificate'' by a former leader of the tribe (later impeached) for services supposedly rendered, not due to blood relations - but even the tribe declines to exactly identify what that means.

The University of Colorado conducted a thorough investigation into Churchill's bizarre and troubled career as an academic. This report really has to be seen to be believed -- the extent of Churchill's charlatanism is simply astounding. He has, on numerous occasions, plagiarized scholarly writings from other academics, and subsequently silenced them with threats. He has published papers based on shoddy, sometimes wholly fraudulent, scholarship (more here). He has plagiarized artwork that he has then sold as original. He, most notoriously, has slandered the victims of the World Trade Center as "little Eichmanns" (later taking what he must have considered a moderate position, saying that only SOME of the victims were like Nazis). He has spoken in favor of the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon, saying in an interview on the February 12, 2005 "At Large w/ Geraldo Rivera: "my God, if you can't hit the Pentagon, what can you hit?"; and "[b]ut as it stands, it was absolutely necessary, and it was absolutely empowering, even if they get beat, that they actually drew blood where it counted."

As you may know, Ward Churchill was fired by the University of Colorado in July, 2007, a little over a year after announcing its intention to do so. Since then, Churchill has taken what he must consider the best career move for someone in his position. He's writing and lecturing on how Israel is like Nazi Germany.

And this isn't the first time he's done so. On May 10, 2007, Churchill gave an anti-Semitic speech at UC Irvine, at the invitation of their Muslim Student Association (MSA). Incredibly, Churchill's presentation was part of that university's "Holocaust Memorial Week"which was sponserred by the MSA and consisted almost entirely of anti-Israel propagandizing. (more here and here and here and here and here.)






Typical of a charlatan, Churchill has thrown stones at legitimate scholars. Back in December, 1996, Churchill wrote (in a piece called "Holocaust Denial in Context") that those who support the idea that the Holocaust is a unique event are themselves Holocaust deniers (he singles out Yehuda Bauer, Steven Katz and Deborah Lipstadt and actually has the chutzpah to question their legitimacy as scholars, and to say that their "offenses" are worse than those of Paul Rassinier or Harry Elmer Barnes).

So Churchill's charlatanism is a work in progress. He's said that Holocaust scholars are worse than the Holocaust deniers. He's said that victims of 9/11 are the same as Nazis. Now he's saying that the Jews are the same as the Nazis. Somehow, this isn't surprising in the least.

Norman Finkelstein: the case against

from: The Guardian | ''Comment is free: Norman Finkelstein: the case against'' by Alan Dershowitz

Matthew Abraham's account of the denial of tenure to Norman Finkelstein is filled with errors. Finkelstein's tactic was to try to create a feud with me so that he could blame his tenure denial on me rather than on his lack of scholarship.

In her 1951 bestseller, The Groves of Academe, Mary McCarthy fictionalised a failed academic who, realising he wouldn't get tenure, became a communist so that he could claim that he was being denied tenure because he was a Red rather than a lousy scholar.

A version of that ploy was used by Finkelstein who brags that "never has one of [his] articles been published in a scientific magazine". By his own account he has been fired by "every school in New York", including Brooklyn College, Hunter and NYU. His chairman at one of these colleges said that Mr Finkelstein was fired for "incompetence", "mental instability" and "abuse" of students with politics different from his own. His prospects seemed bleak, so when radical Islamist Aminah McCloud - a follower of Louis Farrakhan - helped him land a job at DePaul, a school that Mr Finkelstein describes as "a third-rate Catholic university", he accepted "exile."

His prospects did not improve when he wrote a screed against Holocaust survivors called The Holocaust Industry. The scholar whose work on the Holocaust was the "stimulus" for this volume, University of Chicago professor Peter Novick, warned: "No facts alleged by Finkelstein should be assumed to be really facts, no quotation in his book should be assumed to be accurate, without taking the time to carefully compare his claims with the sources he cites ... Such an examination reveals that many of those assertions are pure invention."

Nor was he helped when New York Times reviewer Prof Omer Bartov, an authority on genocide, characterised his book as "a novel variation on the anti-Semitic forgery, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion ... brimming with indifference to historical facts, inner contradictions, strident politics ... indecent ... juvenile, self-righteous, arrogant and stupid."

On the other hand, Mr Finkelstein is supported by hard-leftists like Noam Chomsky and Alexander Cockburn. They regard him as a scholar in a class with Ward Churchill (the Colorado professor who called the 9/11 victims "little Eichmanns") - a characterisation with which I would not quarrel.

Facing tenure denial, Mr Finkelstein opted for a tactic that fitted the times. He expressed views so ad hominem, unscholarly and extreme that he could claim the decision was being made not on the basis of his scholarship, but rather on his politics.

Mr Finkelstein does not do "scholarship" in any meaningful sense. Although his writings centre on Israel (which he compares to Nazi Germany) and the Holocaust, he has never visited Israel and cannot read or speak German - precluding the possibility of original scholarship.

Prof Bartov characterised his work as an irrational Jewish "conspiracy theory". The conspirators include Steven Spielberg, NBC and Leon Uris. The film Schindler's List, Mr Finkelstein argues, was designed to divert attention from our Mideast policy. "Give me a better reason! ... Who profits? Basically, there are two beneficiaries from the dogmas [of Schindler's List]: American Jews and American administration."

NBC, he says, broadcast Holocaust to strengthen Israel's position: "In 1978, NBC produced the series Holocaust. Do you believe, it was a coincidence, 1978? Just at this time, when peace negotiations between Israel and Egypt took place in Camp David?"

He argues that Leon Uris, the author of Exodus, named his character "Ari" in order to promote Israel's "Nazi" ideology: "Because Ari is the diminutive for Aryan. It is the whole admiration for this blond haired, blue eyed type." (Ari is a traditional name dating back to the Bible.)

He has blamed September 11 on the US, claiming that we "deserve the problem on our hands because some things Bin Laden says are true.") He says that most alleged Holocaust survivors -including Elie Wiesel - have fabricated their past.

Like other anti-semites, Mr Finkelstein generalises about "the Jews"; for example: "Just as Israelis ... courageously put unruly Palestinians in their place, so American Jews courageously put unruly blacks in their place." He says "the main fomenters of anti-semitism "are 'American Jewish elites' who need to be stopped." Normally, no one would take such claims seriously, but he boasts that he "can get away with things which nobody else can" because his parents were Holocaust survivors.

And then, of course, there is me. In a recent article, Should Alan Dershowitz Target Himself for Assassination? Mr Finkelstein commissioned a cartoon by a man who was placed second in the Iranian Holocaust-denial cartoon contest. The Hustler-type cartoon portrayed me as masturbating in joy while viewing images of dead Lebanese on a TV set labelled "Israel peep show", with a Star of David prominently featured.

Mr Finkelstein has accused me of not having written "The Case For Israel" but when I sent his publisher my handwritten draft, they made him remove that claim. He has accused virtually every pro-Israel writer, including me, of "plagiarism". I asked Harvard to conduct an investigation of this absurd charge. Harvard rejected it, yet he persists.

The final part of Mr Finkelstein's quest for tenure is to blame his tenure problems on "outsiders". His surrogate, Mathew Abraham, claims that I intruded myself into the DePaul review process, neglecting to mention that I was specifically asked by the former chairman of DePaul's political science department to "point [him] to the clearest and most egregious instances of dishonesty on Finkelstein's part". I responded by providing hard evidence of made-up quotes and facts - a pattern that should alone disqualify him from tenure.

Nevertheless, Mr Finkelstein's radical colleagues voted for tenure, having cooked the books by seeking outside evaluations from two of his ideological soulmates. The dean, however, recommended against tenure, as did the university-wide tenure committee and the President.

Like the character in The Groves of Academe, Mr Finkelstein generated protests by students and outsiders. He has encouraged radical goons to email threatening messages; "Look forward to a visit from me," reads one. "Nazis like [you] need to be confronted directly." He has threatened to sue if he loses - while complaining about outside interference. No university should be afraid of truth - regardless of its source - especially when truth consists of Mr Finkelstein's own words.

Even without tenure, Mr Finkelstein will persist in his unscholarly, ad hominems against supporters of Israel, Holocaust survivors and the US. But his bigotry will no longer receive the imprimatur of the largest Catholic university in the America.

This is not a denial of academic freedom. It is a denial of tenure for unscholarly, ad hominem propaganda.