Holocaust Conference in Iran

Iran just held it's Holocaust Conference December 11 and 12, 2006. Dubbed "Holocaust: A Global Vision,' 67 scholars from 30 countries around the world attended. Both views of the holocaust were represented - the widespread but diminishing historical view - and those who hold a 'revisionist' view based upon the latest evidence available to objective scholars. Those with a revisionist view continue to investigate, research and question certain aspects of the traditional historical view of the Holocaust.

“The aim of this conference is not to deny or confirm the Holocaust,” Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said in a welcome address. “Its main aim is to create an opportunity for thinkers who cannot express their views freely in Europe about the Holocaust.”

Notice where the Holocaust Conference is being held - Iran. Although Iran is not usually held up as a bastion of free speech - those who wish to freely exercise their divgerent thoughts on the Holocaust must do so in Iran, as they certainly can not do so in the European countries of Germany, Austria, Canada, France or even the United States, which tauts itself around the world for its freedoms - including the freedom to express opinions about any topic - even such a controversial topic such as the Holocaust.

In fact, the United States, on the pretext of immigration violations, deported Ernst Zundel to Canada, where he sat for nearly two years in solitary confinement for being an alleged 'national security' risk. On March 1, 2005 Zundel was deported from Canada to Germany to face trial for remarks Zundel allegedly made, according to Mark Weber of the Insitute for Historical research, http://www.ihr.org, on a web site run by his American wife and hosted in the United States, where such are marks are perfectly legal. Zundel has been charged with inciting 'hatred' and for writing or disributing texts that “approve, deny or play down” genocidal actions carried out by Germany’s wartime regime, and which “denigrate the memory of the [Jewish] dead.” The 67 year old Zundel now sits in a prison cell in Mannheim Germany for his thoughts about the Holocaust awaiting the out come of his trial. Zundel has spent three years of his life behind bars for his thoughts, without having been convicted of a crime. So much for freedom of speech in the United States, Canada and Germany.

While a doctorate candidate at the prestigious Max Planck Institute, Germur Rudolf carried out a series of investigations into the alleged gassings at the Auschwich-Birkenau camps, and for a variety of scientific reasons, came to the conclusion that the gassings could not have occurred. After the publication, in 1993, of his findings, again according to Mark Weber at the IHR, Rudolf was dismissed from the institute, and a court in Stuttgart ruled that his report “denies the systematic mass murder of the Jewish population in gas chambers,” and therefore constitutes “popular incitement,” “incitement to racial hatred,” and “defamation.”

Before serving his sentence of 14 months, the youthful Rudulf fled Germany and eventually ended up in the United States. In October 2005, Rudolf was arrested in Chicago and deported to Germany to serve out his original sentence, leaving behind his wife and young daughter in the United States. He is also to be tried in Mannheim, Germany for more 'recent' crimes. His latest trial started in November 2006.

The Iranian conference was condemned by Israel's prime minister Ehud Olmert as a "sick phenomenon." Arresting and imprisoning professionals who disagree with you Mr. Olmert, isn't a 'sick phenomenon?' Despite the unambiguous statement made by Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki at the outset of the conference, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper stated that the conference hosted by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad with the sole purpose of denying the Holocaust is an offence to all Canadians." Denying the holocaust wasn't the sole purpose of the conference Mr. Prime Minister. The sole purpose is to allow freedom of speech on a topic your country doesn't allow. I seriously doubt that the Prime Minister of Canada speaks for 'all Canadians' on most topics, much less one as controversial as the holocaust. British Prime Minister Tony Blair denounced the two-day conference, as "shocking beyond belief" and "a symbol of sectarianism and hatred toward people of another religion." How is it showing 'hatred toward people of another religion' to examine whether what we've been told time-after-time for 60 years is true or not? And since you brought up sectarianism, why is it we get told about the alleged six million Jews killed during WWII, but not about how many Americans were killed, or Russians, or Belgians? Their lives didn't matter? The German parliament's president, Norbert Lammert, protested the conference in a letter to Ahmadinejad and dismissed it as 'anti-Semitic propaganda.' Why is it not anti-Christian, and certainly not a hate crime, to deny that Christ even existed, but automatically 'anti-Semitic propaganda' to question the validity of the claims made by a minority of Zionist Jews as to what happened during WWII? The conference shows an 'utter disregard of historically established facts,' said Franco Frattini, the EU's top justice official. Well, Mr. Frattini, that is what the conference is all about isn't it? examining these 'historically established facts.' If these are indeed facts, those of you who think they are 'established' have nothing to worry about, do you?

Participants of the Iranian international conference on holocaust, agreed to establish a world foundation for holocaust studies and unanimously appointed Mohammad-Ali Ramin as its secretary general. According to the Islamic Republic News Agency, "one of the plans of the foundation is to assign a committee to find out the truth about holocaust. The participants of the conference representing 30 countries also selected five individuals as members of the central council of this foundation to assist the secretary general in executive affairs," added Ramin.

He noted that the main office of the world foundation for holocaust studies will be in Tehran, but once that proper grounds are prepared, the office may eventually be moved to Berlin.

Two sayings one hears quite often and more frequently of late and that I have grown downright weary of enduring are, "If you've got nothing to hide, what's the problem?" And "I've got nothing to hide, so what's the problem?"

If the Zionists and the holocaust propagandists have nothing to hide, what's the problem with a little discussion? I, for one, am looking forward to the outcomes of any future conferences on the holocaust.