What about the Guardian report from November 1, 2001 which revealed that, according to French intelligence officials, “Two months before September 11 Osama bin Laden flew to Dubai for 10 days for treatment at the American hospital, where he was visited by the local CIA agent”?
What about the mysterious collapse of Tower 7, Able Danger, the failure to scramble jets, the myriad National Security experts denied, ignored, or censored from the 9/11 Commission report, deception and non-cooperation by the Department of Defense, whistle-blowers like Coleen Rowley, supposed short-selling and text message warnings, or the five dancing Israelis seen watching and videotaping the attacks from New Jersey’s Liberty State Park across the Hudson River?
What about the British intelligence report, entitled “Responsibility for the terrorist atrocities in the United States,” which purports to provide evidence that “Osama Bin Laden and al-Qaeda, the terrorist network which he heads, planned and carried out the atrocities on 11 September 2001, yet begins with the following disclaimer: “This document does not purport to provide a prosecutable case against Osama Bin Laden in a court of law”?
What about the BBC report, entitled “The investigation and the evidence,” which concludes, “There is no direct evidence in the public domain linking Osama Bin Laden to the 11 September attacks…At best the evidence is circumstantial.”
What about the evidence that, in no verified audio or video tapes, has bin Laden actually claimed responsibility for the attacks, yet has even been quoted as stating, “I have already said that I am not involved in the 11 September attacks in the United States. As a Muslim, I try my best to avoid telling a lie. I had no knowledge of these attacks, nor do I consider the killing of innocent women, children and other humans as an appreciable act…we are against the American system, not against its people, whereas in these attacks, the common American people have been killed.”
What about the fact that Osama bin Laden is, to this very day, not specifically wanted in connection with the 9/11 attacks, according to FBI’s own Most Wanted List?
As a result, is there not plenty of dubious information and spurious evidence surrounding the official story of the September 11 attacks to warrant some sort of suspicion, regardless of what you may personally think actually happened? In this way, with his recent comments, President Ahmadinejad has given voice to the majority of the world. But clearly, for fear they might stumble on some uncomfortable truths, it appears easier for the mainstream media to decontextualize his statements and label him a crackpot conspiracy theorist who is a danger to the American way of life, thus leading the United States down the path to attacking a third Middle Eastern country, than to do its own job.
By misrepresenting the country of Iran, its people, its system of government, its culture, its religion, its elected and unelected leaders, the Western press has already set the stage for an attack on the Islamic Republic. Because of the media’s sensational and propagandistic reporting, 71% of Americans already believing that Iran currently possesses nuclear weapons. 90% think that the power of Iran’s military poses either a critical or important “threat to U.S. vital interests” (despite the fact that Iran’s military budget that is literally one hundred times smaller than that of the US). 59% of American citizens even support unilateral, preemptive US military action against Iran regardless of whether economic or diplomatic efforts achieve the government’s desired effect.
Perhaps, as was seen with the lead up to the invasion of Iraq, the press is doing exactly what the US government wants it to do.
Excellent piece Nima;
mistranslations and misunderstood statements are used constantly to conveniently demonize those in US’ crosshairs.
And it’s rather easy when you have two key players that facilitate the revisionist/linguistic propaganda:
1) The propaganda artists: our arrogant, narcissistic government made up of linguistic nincompoops and oratorial robots who can’t even spell or barely speak one language;
2) The “audience” : a bamboozled population, their informational thirst quenched by the “exceptional” kool-Aid” ; addicted to HOPEIUM and believers in all they read in the state controlled press!
Bravo Nima!
Maurizio
Let’s assume that Ahmadinejad meant that the official story of 9/11 was a “big lie.” That puts him in agreement with tens of millions of U.S. citizens. Further, let’s assume that his “big lie” statement was distorted by the media. Shocking! It is part and parcel of what we deal with here.. It wouldn’t happen in Iran, at least not o Ahmadinejad. He’d have he publisher arrested and tortured and then trot him out at a show trial to “confess” his crime.
Ahmadinejad is part of a ruling clique in Iran the routinely subjects those who disagree and protest to beatings, torture, and death. Any one with a degree of intellectual honesty knows that the recent election in Iran was fixed to preserve the ruling clique.
Most importantly, Ahmadinejad’s hosting of a holocaust denier conference in Iran a few years ago was the ultimate commentary on his delusional style of thinking and the total disregard he has for the people he rules. Those who wish to attack Iran couldn’t have asked for a better public relations boon!
Many of us in the United States have worked long and hard to bring the truth out about 9/11 through an honest and fearless investigation. Associating Ahmadinejad with the quest for 911 truth defames both the movement and participants. It also stops many cold at the start of your article if the goal was to review the many key points that you raised about 9/11.
I don’t share that belief. I’ve examined the “evidence” for it extensively, and it’s mostly a load of propaganda hogwash. Do a site search both here and at the blog for “Iran election” (without quotes) for my articles on that. The election was certainly fixed in that all candidates were approved beforehand, but that included Mousavi, who’s part of that same ruling clique. It’s a very limited form of democracy, but Ahmadinejad legitimately won. Opinion surveys both prior to the election and since show approval ratings equal to the margin by which he won the election.
As for this article, the point is not to associate Ahmadinejad with the 9/11 Truth movement, but to demonstrate how our media manipulates the facts for their own propaganda purposes.
We agree that the first fraud was the vetting and selection of candidates as per the Iranian constitution. As for the fix, I’ve linked my commentary on the matter. No point in debating it here. I’m highly confident that it was fixed. The follow up study by Chatham House http://tinyurl.com/me9dyv really nails it down.
That the MSM deceives and deletes on a regular basis leading to tragic outcomes is a well known. 9/11 is one of the very best examples of this. WTC7’s fall is about all one needs. Making the point with this president of Iran does everyone a disservice. If the point of the article is to get people to read the analysis and excellent links on 9/11, why gross them out or offend them. It makes no sense.
I’ve studied the Chatham House report in great detail. Their arguments are spurious. For example, see: http://blog.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2009/08/05/chatham-house-report-evidence-of-fraud-high-voter-turnout/.
Again, I disagree with you on the point of the article. As I said before, I think the point was to demonstrate how the media manipulate the facts for their own propaganda. Reporting on Ahmadinejad is a perfect example of that.
We agree that the initial fraud is in the selection process as per the Iranian constitution. I’ve written about the election fraud as well. I’ve looked at a fair number of lousy elections and this has all the symptoms.
http://tinyurl.com/mj38pd
http://tinyurl.com/yjxrzph
http://tinyurl.com/yjkvc9f
and then, of course, there’s Chatham House
http://tinyurl.com/me9dyv
As for the distortions in MSM, there’s no argument and the case is well made on a frequent basis. The public is on board. The use of this Iranian president, a holocaust denier, is not persuasive and ends up offending people. 911 is too important to drag in this guy.
I’ll take a look at your articles. Thanks.
I’ve never actually seen a quote presented where Ahmadinejad denied that the holocaust occurred. The quote most often presented to support this claim was when he said that the pretext for the state of Israel was a lie. But that remark was not a denial that the holocaust occurred, but rejection of the legitimacy of the means by which Israel was brought into being following World War II. See my “The Rejection of Palestinian Self-Determination” for more on how the holocaust played a role in the Zionist project: http://www.lulu.com/content/paperback-book/the-rejection-of-palestinian-self-determination/7574140/.
Mr. Collins,
As the author of this particular piece, I feel it my obligation to respond to your accusations, frustrations, and opposition to my article directly.
Firstly, as Jeremy has already addressed, your strongly-held belief (as evidenced by, not only your comments here but also your “ElectionFraudNews” website) that the Iranian presidential election of last year was stolen by the incumbent is totally without merit. Your blind adoration of the ridiculous Chatham House report, which has been picked apart time and again on this site and in the writings of others such as Kaveh Afrasiabi, shows that you want so badly to believe something that you will go along with anything that adheres to your already made-up mind. Siding with people like Ali Ansari rather than looking at the facts themselves doesn’t do your claim any favors either.
But that isn’t even the crux of your obvious disappoint with my article. In short, you clearly despise Dr. Ahmadinejad. Whereas your personal feelings are of no consequence to me – laud or hate whomever you want – my issue is with your vitriolic disinterest in granting legitimacy to information you seem predisposed to not want to hear. You seem hung up on the myriad mistranslations and misinterpretations of Ahmadinejad’s words and beliefs, as they are deliberately miscast in the Western media. You seem incapable of shaking US propaganda when it comes to the Iranian president…and yet, as someone who clearly feels strongly about “truth,” this seems weirdly inconsistent and dubiously selective for you.
The “holocaust denial” conference you keep mentioning has been totally blown out of proportion in the Western press. For one, the conference was sponsored by the Institute of Political and International Studies (IPIS), an elite school in Iran that offers advanced politics and policy degrees through both Masters and Doctorate programs. It is not a loony-bin of radical, revisionist thought. Secondly, Ahmadinejad has nothing to do with the conference himself. He did not sponsor, plan, participate, or attend. The comments he made concurrently with the conference were those quoted above in my article:
“The Zionist regime will be wiped out soon the same way the Soviet Union was, and humanity will achieve freedom…[elections should be held among] Jews, Christians and Muslims so the population of Palestine can select their government and destiny for themselves in a democratic manner.”
You can learn more about the conference, its goals and attendees, by reading a piece written by Canadian professor Shiraz Dossa, who attended the gathering in Tehran himself. Here’s the link:
http://reviewcanada.ca/essays/2007/06/01/the-explanation-we-never-heard/
It seems to me that if you did a tenth of the research you’ve obviously done on 9/11 on the media’s handling of the actual speeches given by President Ahmadinejad, you would come to similar conclusions about flawed reporting, disingenuous analysis, deliberate fallacies, mysterious omissions, and misdirected outrage, blame, and reactions.
I’m not asking that you agree with the Iranian president’s viewpoint, but you do a great disservice to your own search for truth and justice by allowing yourself to be hoodwinked by the media’s well-orchestrated demonization of a popular, democratically elected, anti-imperial political leader who refuses to bow down to the hegemonic dictates of militarily aggressive, nuclear-armed superpowers.
That said, the point of my article was not “to get people to read the analysis and excellent links on 9/11,” it was about the media’s misrepresentation of Ahmadinejad’s own claims about the World Trade Center attacks – claims that are voiced and echoed by more than half the globe, including yourself. People who search for truth on one issue, but would be, as you say, grossed out or offended by the truth when it comes to other issues, lack consistency, in my opinion.
If you seek truth, Michael, look for it everywhere, not just where you expect to find it.
“The “holocaust denial” conference you keep mentioning has been totally blown out of proportion in the Western press.” So he’s a “just sort of” holocaust denier. I know who David Duke is. He’s the head of the KKK, the most racist organization in the U.S. The others seem to be clear on where they stand too – denying the holocaust.
From Wikiipedia:
http://tinyurl.com/yl6x4oj
“American David Duke, a former Louisiana State Representative and one-time Ku Klux Klan leader, attended the conference. French writer Georges Thiel, who had been convicted under Holocaust denial laws in France, attended, as did Fredrick Töben of Australia who had been imprisoned in Germany for three months in 1999 for Holocaust denial.[13][14] Robert Faurisson, a convicted Holocaust denier from France also attended,[15] as well as Ahmed Rami, a Swedish-Moroccan Holocaust denier who was imprisoned in Sweden for inciting racial hatred.[16]”
Your personal invective toward me aside, I do not “hate” anyone. However, I’m quite willing to point out rulers who have crazy notions like there’s a question about the holocaust occurring that’s subject to legitimate debate. There is not. In action, the president you feature sends thugs into the streets to beat and kill his citizens. He then jailed them and made them endure a show trial.
Why on earth you would feature such a figure on an article about 911 is baffling.
Ok, again: my article is not “about” 9/11. It’s “about” how the press approaches the comments of Ahmadinejad. If you are annoyed at the article for what it reveals about the Iranian president, fine, but please provide some actual evidence that he is, in fact, a “holocaust denier.”
As I mentioned already, he neither endorsed nor attended the conference in question. What he has done is question, not that millions of people were systematically put to death by the Nazis during the 1940s, but why that one historical event has been mythologized above and beyond all other mass murders in human history – such as the genocide of European Conquest in the “New World” that took the lives of tends of millions of indigenous people or the 100 million Africans that were killed as a result of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade – to the point that the “Holocaust” (capital H) refers only to one specific thing and that one specific thing has been used time and time to justify a century of displacement, dispossession, disenfranchisement, and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. He argues that, because the Nazi holocaust was carried out in Europe, by Europeans, against Europeans, the innocent people of Palestine should not have had to pay the price for these historic and atrocious crimes against humanity. That’s what he says.
About this notorious conference, which was entitled “The Review of the Holocaust: Global Vision,” Professor Dossa, who attended, has written:
“Holocaust deniers/skeptics were a fringe, a marginal few at the conference. The majority of the papers focused on the use and abuse of the Holocaust in Arab, Muslim, Israeli and western politics, a serious and worthy subject for international academic discussion.
“Out of the 33 conference paper givers, 27 were not Holocaust deniers, but were university professors and social science researchers from Iran, Jordan, Algeria, India, Morocco, Bahrain, Tunisia, Malaysia, Indonesia and Syria. In attendance were five rabbis (anti-Zionist rabbis, to be sure) who agreed with Rabbi Dovid Weiss of New York that Israel’s occupation policy was “evil” and un-Jewish, and the Holocaust could never justify it—but who insisted, like me, that the Holocaust was a reality. None of us knew that a few deniers/skeptics would be in attendance.”
Even if the conference, as you claim, was abhorrent for even happening in the first place, Ahmadinejad still wasn’t there. Therefore, why does your anger at the conference automatically transfer over to your derision of him? Is it because, up until I responded to your comments, you believed the news media and thought Ahmadinejad actually attended and spoke at the conference?
Furthermore, you seem to be arguing that anyone who challenges or perhaps even questions the official story, for example the official death toll, of the Nazi holocaust is automatically a “denier.” I find this to be a specious belief.
For instance, for decades, the number of people murdered at Auschwitz was commonly thought to be about 4 million, upwards of 90% of whom were Jews. After new studies were conducted, however, some researchers (not holocaust deniers) reevaluated these numbers to be substantially lower – some even arguing that the total was more like 1 million. Even a 1984 study by Yad Vashem, the official memorial to Jewish victims of the holocaust in Israel, has reevaluated the Auschwitz death total to between 1.2 and 2.5 million. In 1989, the official number on the memorial plaque at Auschwitz itself was changed from 4 million to 1.1 million. The plaque also doesn’t differentiate between Jewish victims and others such as ethnic Poles, Romani, or Sinti peoples who were also exterminated at the camp.
The number “6 million” figures heavily in Zionist mythology and has been repeated again and again in the scholarship of passionate Zionists like Lucy Dawidowicz. It is generally accepted that 6 million Jews were exterminated by the Nazis – the number pops up everywhere, along with the “never again” mantra, and is accepted as unquestionable truth, a truth so eternal and essential that even suggesting something to the contrary is considered insane, anti-semitic, and despicable. But, it seems that the 4 million Auschwitz deaths are integral to maintaining the 6 million total; therefore, if the 4 million is questioned or reevaluated, the 6 million total would also be affected. Nevertheless, even though Yad Vashem has itself reevaluated and reduced the official Auschwitz totals as more information has become available and more research and analysis conducted, the original 6 million total stands firm and unaffected.
Personally, I have no reason to doubt the 6 million total – whether it was 8 million or 4 million doesn’t change my horror and sorrow at the atrocity itself – nor do I think that if Auschwitz numbers are challenged or revised, it should follow that the entire history of the holocaust itself should be questioned in turn. However, this sort of commentary and historical analysis is generally derided as “holocaust denial” because the official number of 6 million is called in question. Do you subscribe to this viewpoint as well, Mr. Collins? Do you think that evaluating this sort of information is tantamount to denying outright that the Nazis were responsible for the mechanized murder of millions upon millions of innocent people – a claim Ahmadinejad has never made? Is it all the same to you? Are all of these questions equivalent to insisting that the holocaust never “occurred” at all? If so, why?
If it were discovered that a missile, not an airplane, hit the Pentagon on 9/11, wouldn’t the reported and assumed death toll totals have to be reevaluated for that historical event? How are these two issues different for you? Please explain, if you are so inclined.
My last point is that you seem to know very little about the actual events that took place in Iran, both before, during, and following the presidential election last June. You call Ahmadinejad a “ruler” who “sends thugs into the streets to beat and kill his citizens.” In this case, it should be pointed out to you that the Iranian President is not the head of state and has no control over police, law enforcement, or paramilitary forces. That power rests in the hands of the Supreme Jurist, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (note: the title Supreme “Leader” does not exist in the Islamic Republic; it is commonly used in press reports to sound more sinister and despotic). Ironically, during his campaign, challenger Mir-Hossein Mousavi argued that supervision of all law enforcement forces should be handed over to the office of the President. Ahmadinejad has never argued for the same thing.
Also, the claim that peaceful protests were immediately attacked by brutal government forces falls a bit flat, when realizing that, on the very first day of the post-election rallies, frustrated and disappointed Mousavi supporters were already throwing rocks at and physically assaulting police officers, burning state and private property, setting trash bins and city buses on fire, and smashing windows of government offices and faced little aggression from the police themselves. These actions hardly fall under the protection of the Iranian Constitution’s provision for freedom of assembly (Chap. III, Art. 27).
The First Amendment of our own US Bill of Rights affirms that there should be no limitations on the right for people to peaceably assemble and yet I have myself been accosted by riot police during peaceful marches in both New York City and Washington DC. If you’ve ever tried to get a parade, rally, or march permit from the US government, you’d know that the situation in Iran is not unique. It’s the symptom of any state apparatus that seeks to downplay the voices of a dissenting public. I do not agree with these government actions, whether they are taken by the US, Iran, or anywhere else, but they are not only unsurprising, they are actually pretty mundane in the grand scheme of things.
After ten minutes of public protest to the scale of what was been seen in Iran after the election, we here in the US would have been faced with tens of thousands of security forces, riot police, an army of privately contracted mercenaries, and possibly the National Guard. Protests in New York City have been quelled by cops in riot gear sweeping through crowds with nets, arresting everyone within their reach, regardless of what’s actually happening or who’s involved. It took over ten days of civil disobedience in Tehran (which I support, in general) for security forces to descend on the city in any major capacity and begin using tear gas and water cannons. I find this reaction terrible, as I would if it took place anywhere, but this would have happened on day one if an MTA bus were set on fire in Manhattan. Over six buses were set ablaze in Tehran, over a week before the tear gas came out. Let’s have a little perspective here.
Furthermore, Ahmadinejad has no power over the judiciary in Iran, so blaming “show trials” on him is ludicrous. Also, if you’d like to learn about how our own government treats political protesters, think about Bagram, Gitmo, extraordinary rendition, military tribunals, indefinite preventive detention, and learn about people like Syed “Farad” Hasmi, Dr. Aafia Siddiqui, 70-year-old Lynne Stewart, 79-year-old Eve Tetaz, or check out the Rosenberg Fund for Children, for example.
In terms of Ahmadinejad, though, it seems to me that you should direct your outrage elsewhere since not one of many things you’ve accused him of has been true so far. You and I probably both agree whole-heartedly about many issues pertaining to the political system of government in Iran – but, in my opinion, distorting facts about and creating a convenient scapegoat in President Ahmadinejad does not serve your commitment to truth very well, nor does it stand up to even cursory scrutiny.
Very revealing response.
To clarify one point, you said:
—————–
“It is generally accepted that 6 million Jews were exterminated by the Nazis – the number pops up everywhere, along with the “never again” mantra, and is accepted as unquestionable truth …
“But, it seems that the 4 million Auschwitz deaths are integral to maintaining the 6 million total; therefore, **if the 4 million is questioned or reevaluated, the 6 million total would also be affected.**”
—————–
The “4 million Auschwitz deaths” were never “integral to maintaining the 6 million total.” Political scientist George Hilberg, an atheist and U.S. veteran of World War II, had access to Nazi archives and estimated that the total Jewish deaths in the holocaust were between 4.9 and 5.4 million. His scholarship was detailed and did not rely on the source of the reduction you seem to think is relevant. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raul_Hilberg
The revision of 4 million to 1.1 million killed at Auschwitz was a function of changing Soviet estimates of “no less than four million killed” which found its way to a plaque at the former death camp. That’s the 4 million figure you’re talking about. It has nothing to do with scholarly research on the total killed or any estimates of total deaths. Most serious studies, like Hilberg’s, have Auschwitz Jewish deaths around one million. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auschwitz_concentration_camp#Death_toll
You should track back and see where you got this type of analysis.
A useful overview of that: [link removed due to malware threat]
Michael, I fail to see what David Duke has to do with anything.
And, again, I’ve never actually seen a quote presented where Ahmadinejad denied that the holocaust occurred. If you want to continue to insist that he’s a “holocaust denier”, you’ll need to support that claim.
Gladly. Holding a conference that questions the occurrence of the holocaust is ipso facto denying the holocaust. David Duke is clearly relevant because he was an *invited* speaker and guest at this conference. He’s relevant because he’s one of the the highest profile racists in the United States. Inviting him to a conference on the holocaust is like inviting Charles Manson to a conference on human rights. Duke is a symbol and substance of racism and religious hatred.
I made other points about about Ahmadinejad, namely that he bears responsibility for the beatings, killings, torture, imprisonment, and show trials for citizens who dissent.
Do we have any common ground on those events, at least?
See reply below…easier to read in wide format.
Michael, despite repeated requests, you have not presented evidence for your claim that Ahmadinejad is a “holocaust denier”. If you’re going to insist on this claim, you’ll have to substantiate it.
Additionally, Ahmadinejad did not hold the conference. Why do you keep insisting on associating him with it when the facts clearly contradict what you keep repeating?
Also, please explain why Ahmadinejad “bears responsibility for the beatings, killings, torture, imprisonment, and show trials for citizens who dissent.” I am curious to know where these claims come from and upon what information are these claims based. That, along with any sort of actual evidence of Ahmadinejad denying that the holocaust ever occurred, would be much appreciated.
The president of Iran is a holocaust denier. Here’s the proof.
Interview with Brian Williams http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykd-syzZ4ZY
The president was then asked about his comment that the holocaust was a myth.
Question: “There was something you said … when you called the holocaust a myth ” (0:15)…
Ahmadinejad: “I’ve asked three clear questions on this. You know that I’m an academician. I’m interested in having a scientific approach to all the events.” (0:35)
He didn’t deny this and accuse the reporter of distorting his statement or question the translation. He didn’t even respond to the comment about the holocaust being a “myth.” . This is like “the dog that didn’t bark” from Sherlock Holmes. The absence of a denial is an acceptance of the reporter’s question. But that’s not all, there’s much more direct evidence to show that the president of Iran is fully aligned and, in fact a member of the holocaust denier and revisionist movement.
Yet in the same interview, the president of Iran erred grievously on the most fundamental issue — war deaths. He said, “In the second world war, over 60 mil people lost their lives. They were all human beings. Why were only a select few who were killed so prominent and important?” (1:14) “There were two million that were part of the military, 58 million civilians with no roles in the war.” (1:48) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykd-syzZ4ZY
The war losses were 60 million by common estimate. However, simply reviewing the president’s claim, we find he never went further than the gross figure. There were not just 2 million military deaths. There were 22 to 25 million total military deaths. How can any argue seriously that the president is doing anything other than deliberate deception when he didn’t even bother to understand total war deaths? How can he put holocaust “facts” in to question when he doesn’t even know the beginning facts – how many people died and who were they? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties#Human_losses_by_country
The president of Iran had an in person, high visibility opportunity to deny that he said that the holocaust was a myth. He did not do so. That’s telling. He also showed that regarding World War II deaths, either he doesn’t know the facts or knows the facts and distorts them deliberately.
The Iranian Foreign Ministry took credit for the conference and acknowledged that papers received from around the world “have been admitted and their authors have been invited to attend the conference.” http://english.farsnews.com/newstext.php?nn=8509200317 Ahmadinejad met with delectates to the conference and greeted them. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/6172807.stm This was confirmed in a video released by one of those delegates. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZ3VmeG3670&feature=related This is an endorsement of the conference, plain and simple. It wasn’t an accident or some trick engineered by a staff member. It was planned and created and the view expressed are those of the planners and creators.
According to an attendee, the conference was not an examination of historical realities. Only one side was presented, skeptical version s of the holocaust. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/dec/12/iran.israel
At the conference, David Duke, former head of the KKK in the United States had these things to say:
3:06 “…the holocaust …is used as justification for any Israeli treachery….”
This is the line of thinking that the holocaust is used as a political weapon. This skirts the question of the impact of the holocaust and changes the subject to current Israeli and Iranian disputes, which really have nothing to do with the holocaust.
Duke also said: that the holocaust is being used to “…justify and promote a terrible war against Iran ….” (3:35)
What Duke and others who think along his lines fail to acknowledge is this that Iran is using questioning of the holocaust as a political tool but he says as much right there: questioning the holocaust is used to “…justify and promote a terrible war against Iran ….” (3:35) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jwq7e9pOMs8
After the conference, three years later, the president of Iran was still pushing the “questions” about the holocaust. Apr 21, 2009 GENEVA – “A day after Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad caused uproar with a speech attacking Israel at a U.N. conference on racism, the U.N. said Tuesday that Ahmadinejad had actually dropped language from the speech that described the Holocaust as “ambiguous and dubious.” http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30323549/
In summary, the president’s government convened the conference and invaded a selection of racists and known holocaust deniers. The president had a special session at his headquarters where he hosted, greeted, and thanked the participants, including Mr. Duke, for their search for truth. The president frequently questions the holocaust facts and figures under the guise of scholarship. But when basic scholarship can be displayed, like accurate description of war losses, the president is completely off base. Either Ahmadinejad is ignorant of the facts and proceeds with his troubling and distorted rhetoric intentionally or he’s not capable of integrating facts that point to reality and as a result of some cognitive defect.
This evidence and much more out there shows that the president of Iran in the holocaust denier camp. Now I’ll admit that he has never said these exact words, “I am a holocaust denier.” So there is that line of defense remaining. But that’s like saying a murderer can’t be found guilty of murder unless he/she confesses. The evidence is overwhelming. Ahmadinejad convicts himself in his own words and actions.
Michael, you’re being disingenuous.
Ahmadinejad clearly acknowledges that the holocaust occurs in this interview, when he states that over 60 million people died in WWII and asks “Why is it that only a select group of those who were killed have become so prominent and important?”
That’s a very clear acknowledgment that the holocaust occurred. No need to detail the fallacies of your subsequent arguments, which Nima has already done anyways.
Ahmadinejad also said only 2 million military deaths occurred in WWII. He just makes it up as he goes along. The classic line of holocaust deniers is, ‘Oh, sure it took place but there weren’t really as many as has been said.’
Ahmadinejad the president of a regime that the author of this piece (Nima) seems to think had nothing to do wit beatings, killings, torture, and show trials. While you ahe not distanced the president from those harsh realities, Nima has
In addition, Nima used an argument up thread that the change of Auschwitz dead from 4 to 1.1 million could be used to reduce the aggregate estimate of 6 million Jewish dead. This change was on a plaque at Auschwitz. No serious scholar ever used the figure from the plaque which was put there by Soviet and Polish Communist authorities after the war. I’m not questioning the author’s motives for that grievous error but the origin of that line of logic is right in the middle of the holocaust denier movement.
I stand by my assertion and the proof used to state that the president of Iran is a holocaust denier and also that he was complicit in the violence towards dissidents in Iran after the election and to this day.
He could have misspoke (as he did when he said it was “the first world war”). Or his translator could have misspoke. Or he could just be uninformed. It’s totally irrelevant. The relevant point is that he acknowledges the total estimate of casualties and includes the Jews killed in the holocaust as being a part of that total in his comments.
That’s the central point to be made here, which Nima’s remarks regarding Auschwitz has nothing to do with. Ahmadinejad here clearly and unambiguously accepts that the holocaust occurred. That’s the fundamental point you are disingenuously trying to obfuscate here.
Jeremy, thanks so much for that link, it’s very illuminating.
I had seen it before, and recalled that the so-called “Four Million Variant” argument was totally misused, as Harmon explains, “as a stepping stone to leap from an apparent contradiction to the idea that the Holocaust was a hoax, again perpetrated by a conspiracy. [Holocaust deniers] hope to discredit historians by making them seem inconsistent. If they can’t keep their numbers straight, their reasoning goes, how can we say that their evidence for the Holocaust is credible?”
I agree completely with Harmon and, I assume, Michael Collins, that this aspect of reasoning is patently absurd. My purpose of bringing up the Auschwitz numbers was not in any way meant to question the “evidence for the holocaust,” but rather to illustrate how one can continue to explore and debate updated scholarship and research about certain aspects of a historical event (e.g. death tolls at exterminations camps) without even approaching the outright “denial” of that historical event as a whole (e.g. that millions upon millions of people, including millions of Jews, were systematically and horrifyingly murdered by Nazis during WWII). To me, these things are not at all synonymous (and I am glad to learn that the “4 Million Variant” doesn’t change the statistics of many notable scholars). The actual “denial” of such a historical fact, regardless of the total numbers associated with it, is abhorrent to me and completely ridiculous to even propose.
(Again, whether the Jewish death toll was 4.5 million or 7.5 million doesn’t matter to me, the scope of the atrocity does – having European Jewish ancestry myself, this also affects me on a personal level.)
Furthermore, I find it completely bizarre that white supremacists like David Duke pretend to care at all for the plight of the Palestinians – I believe it to be a very incongruous cover for their overt racism and one I do not understand, especially since it is totally disingenuous to conflate Judaism and Zionism.
(As a corollary, I must remind you that, after meeting with ultra-Orthodox rabbis in New York City, “Ahmadinejad underlined Iran’s full respect for the Jews and Judaism and strong opposition to Zionism.” This is from one of the articles you cite above.)
That said, Mr. Collins, you seem to take issue with the general claim that the holocaust is used as a “political weapon.” I fail to see why you would deny this – regardless of who said it. Are you familiar with the scholarship of Norman Finkelstein (which has been praised by Raul Hilberg)? The holocaust is weapon number one for Israeli apologists who seek to justify the ethnic cleansing of Palestine as a suitable and necessary response to the horrors of the 1940’s in Europe and to deflect criticism of Israeli founding myths and subsequent militarism, expansion, and war crimes. One look at Netanyahu’s speech at the UN General Assembly last year proves this, notably the part where he likens Palestinian rocket attacks from Gaza to the Nazi blitz of London after going on and on about the holocaust in order to lambaste the findings of the Goldstone Report. (This is the speech wherein Netanyahu said one of the most ironic sentences in history: “The greatest threat facing the world today is the marriage between religious fanaticism and the weapons of mass destruction.” Anyone who knows about Zionist history, Israeli aggression, and Mordechai Vanunu would agree with this statement.)
As one final note, Mr. Collins, I am still curious to know why you insist that Ahmadinejad is personally responsible for the post-election violence and trials in Iran when, again, he is not the head of state, doesn’t control governmental security forces, and has no power over the judiciary. My point here is not to alleviate responsibility from the Iranian government, but rather to ask why you pin what problems there were/are on the president himself, instead of, say, Khamenei.
It’s not a subject I’m well read on, but this discussion led me to do some cursory examining of that question. The Wikipedia articles Michael linked to ultimately led me to that article, which I found to clear up the confusion over that point (which I was myself very unclear on, not having realized the “4 million” figure wasn’t included in scholarly work suggesting 5-6 million victims).
Nima, you were the one who used the holocaust denier argument described at the Nizkor Project link that Jeremy Hammond provided.. One would think that a retraction would be forthcoming or at least some sign of regret that you used an argument popular among holocaust deniers. You said just now: “My purpose of bringing up the Auschwitz numbers was not in any way meant to question the ‘evidence for the holocaust,’ but rather to illustrate how one can continue to explore and debate updated scholarship and research about certain aspects of a historical event …” Actually, that’s not the case. One cannot use a holocaust denier argument, then describe them as patently absurd (as you did above), then claim that the “patently absurd” argument that you advanced somehow reflects the legitimate exploration of data about the event.
As for the current president of Iran, he is personally responsible for the events following his election because he is president and because he works just under the Supreme Leader, Khamenei, who is also responsible for assault, murder, torture, and show trials. According to the Iranian constitution, the president is the second most powerful leader in charge of the various branches of the government. There are intervening councils etc., but the president is the head of the Supreme National Security Council which controls the military, intelligence, and paramilitary groups like the deadly Basij deployed against citizens after the election through this day. Did the president “personally” commit these acts: I don’t know. But he’s responsible for making it happen and presiding over it as the 2nd in command in Iran. That’s why I say he’s responsible just as Bush is responsible for the injuries and deaths to Iraqis and U.S. soldiers in Iraq plus torture activities, even though he did not personally (in a hands on way) commit those acts. He’s the head of state and responsible.
Michael, you’re out of line in being so blatantly dishonest as to attempt to associate Nima with “holocaust deniers”. Instructively, the same kind of rhetorical devices you employ to mischaracterize Ahmadinejad you’re now employing against Nima.
You know perfectly well what Nima actually said, yet you deliberately twist his words. As you know perfectly well, what Nima said was “patently absurd” was the argument that since there was a revision of the Auschwitz numbers, therefore “the Holocaust was a hoax”.
Anyone unfamiliar with the scholarship could make the perfectly honest error of thinking that since the Auschwitz figure was revised downward, therefore the total figure should be revised downward. That’s just common sense. It’s a fallacy for the reason we’ve gone over, but a simple and honest enough mistake to make. I myself didn’t understand why that wasn’t the case until I followed your links and found the article I posted that explains that the Auschwitz figure was never accepted by credible scholars. I hadn’t known that, either.
Moreover, like Nima observed in his last comment, drawing the conclusion that the total estimate should be revised downward is a far cry from drawing the conclusion that “the Holocaust was a hoax”. Yet your above comment dishonestly attempts to equate the former fallacy with the latter fallacy.
By dishonestly trying to obfuscate what he actually said and making it sound as though Nima had actually made that holocaust denial argument, which he did not, you are essentially calling Nima a “holocaust denier”, which is neither honest nor appropriate.
Further insults or attempts at character assassination, either direct or, as in this case, implied, will result in your comments ending up in the spam bin.
Being dishonest is one thing. Being uncivil, however, won’t be tolerated. Any further such dishonesty and lack of civility on your part will result in further comments from you ending up in the spam folder.
Mr. Collins,
I find your ad hominem attacks tiresome. I suppose they are designed to bolster your case, which they don’t. Anyone reading this (except you, it seems) can clearly see what I’ve written. That includes this: “Personally, I have no reason to doubt the 6 million total…nor do I think that if Auschwitz numbers are challenged or revised, it should follow that the entire history of the holocaust itself should be questioned in turn.”
I also suppose it’s convenient for you to paint me as something I’m clearly not in order to try and further your side of this debate, since so far the “evidence” you’ve provided to denounce Ahmadinejad is disingenuous and stretched.
Equating the devastating air assaults, ground invasion, and subsequent seven-year occupation of Iraq with post-election unrest in Iran is also disingenuous. By means of explanation, I would hold that Nixon, as head of state and commander-in-chief, was wholly responsible for the bombing of Cambodia, but I wouldn’t say that he was “responsible” for the Kent State shootings, committed by National Guard troops called in by Kent mayor Leroy Satrom and Ohio governor James Rhodes. Nixon was a war criminal and despicable human being for many reasons, but I’m not sure Kent State belongs on his rap sheet.
Again you claim that Ahmadinejad, as president, is “responsible for making [post-election violence] happen” but you refuse to back this up with any real reasoning, save perhaps, some sort of political transitive property. And again, I must try and correct you.
Ali Khamenei is the head of state in Iran, not Ahmadinejad. Your knowledge of the Iranian Constitution is not sufficient enough for you to use this as evidence (wikipedia has its limits, you know). For example, the president is not “in charge of the various branches of the government,” as you say; rather, he is the head of the executive branch only. (Plus, the presidential post itself was created in 1989 through referendum, and was not established in the original Constitution. Additionally, the council responsible for amending the Constitution included “Green Wave” leaders Mousavi and Karroubi).
Furthermore, the Basij groups are not beholden to the office of the president. They are controlled under the auspices of the IRGC, which answer to Khamenei, not Ahmadinejad. Your assumptions appear to have led you to believe that Ahmadinejad holds a post similar to a Cheney-esque Vice President, but this is far from the truth, as Ahmadinejad’s actual powers are far more limited and less influential.
Your concept of the responsibilities of the Iranian SNSC is also flawed. Perhaps it follows that you would place responsibility for the NYPD’s treatment of Abner Louima on the National Security Council of the United States.
Another thing you are disregarding is that, in July 2009, Khamenei actually ordered the closure of Kahrizak prison where protesters were being held because it “lacked the standards” to maintain “rights of detainees.” Additionally, around the same time, 140 detainees were released from Evin Prison at the urging of the head of the Judiciary and Majlis ministers.
In December 2009, Iranian authorities announced that 12 prison officials from Kahrizak had been charged with murder and other crimes, including abuse, negligence and deprivation of prisoners’ legal rights. They were arrested after reports of misconduct were investigated, which led to the closing of the prison, as mentioned above. The three officials charged with murder could face the death penalty for their actions. The trial began about a week and half ago at the headquarters of the Armed Forces Judicial Organization. The victims’ families, other plaintiffs, and their lawyers all attended the court session. Those familiar with Iranian history will be interested to learn that the presiding judge for the trial happens to be named Mohammad Mossadegh.
(In contrast, note how those who ordered and committed torture and murder in US gulags like Guantanamo Bay and Bagram are neither investigated nor put on trial; in fact, their actions are covered up, if not supported and justified, by US officials as high up as Bush, Cheney, and now Obama.)
I feel as if I have spent enough of my time responding to your accusations, Mr. Collins, so this will most likely be my final entry on this matter. Hopefully you can see that my aim is not to justify actions taken by the Iranian government – actions such as extreme force, arrest, and prisoner abuse, which I condemn anywhere they occur – but rather to expose certain misrepresentations that I believe to be deliberate on the part of the Western press and American government in order to demonize a country, its leaders, its people, and its culture through a calculated and constant barrage of misinformation. My aim is also not to promote a system of government (personally, as an atheist and humanist, I do not support theocracy in any form), but rather to reaffirm the sovereignty of nations, especially when they face such growing threats (and have for three decades) from the most militaristic, imperial, and hegemonic power in the world.
Whether the end result is supposed to be another overthrow funded by the US, more illegal sanctions bullied through the UNSC, or a military attack on a sovereign country of 70 million, the propaganda campaign remains the same.
Let’s stand together, Michael, in support of exposing truth, not promoting obfuscation.
Thanks for reading.