The Rebbe

Documents show UK post-WWII dilemma over Jewish refugees

By GREGORY KATZ, Associated Press Writer

LONDON - Documents released Monday show how the British government tried to send thousands of Palestine-bound Jewish survivors of the Nazi genocide back to postwar Germany without inflaming world opinion.

Could it be done? The answer was no. It was just two years after the end of the war and the world was outraged by the systematic murder of 6 million Jews by the Nazis in what became known as the Holocaust.

Despite the best efforts of early spin doctors to portray the move in the most sympathetic light, the decision to turn away the more than 4,500 Jews on board the Exodus refugee ship turned into a humanitarian and public relations debacle for Britain.

The story is detailed in more than 400 pages of formerly secret documents at Britain's National Archives made available to the public on Monday.

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Herzl's lone grandson to be reinterred today

The tragic life of Zionist visionary Theodor Herzl's lone grandson comes full circle today with his burial at Jerusalem's Mount Herzl cemetery.

Stephen Norman, who committed suicide in Washington, D.C. 61 years ago after learning of his parents' death in the Holocaust, will be reinterred alongside his grandfather, uncle and aunt.

Norman, who was born Stephen Neumann to Herzl's daughter Trude, failed to escape the depression that plagued his aunt Pauline, who died from an apparent drug overdose and uncle Hans, who committed suicide.

In 1933 he received special funding from the World Zionist Organization to attend an exclusive boarding school in England and later to study law at the University of Cambridge.

Norman did his utmost during this period to become a regular Englishman, even changing his name. However, the 1938 annexation of Austria, where his parents were living, brought out his Jewish roots.

"I can't say I received an especially Jewish or Orthodox education," he wrote seven years later describing how he felt at the time. "The Zionist idea, despite my family connection to it, was never forced into me - not at home nor later in school or university.

"But, I found my grandfather's letters and read them and I feel they comprise fascinating reading for anyone who has even the scantiness tie to Judaism."

Norman tried in vain to arrange immigration visas to Palestine for his parents. He was drafted to the Royal Artillery, where he eventually became a captain, and war broke out. Losing contact, he assumed his parents were dead but was never sure.

After the war he visited Palestine for the first time on a three-day visit. Later, he joined a British scientific delegation to Washington. In November 1946 he was informed that his parents had indeed perished in Teresienstadt in 1943. For three weeks he wandered the capital a broken man, feeling guilty for not having saved his parents.

On November 20, he jumped to his death from the Massachusetts Avenue bridge.

Abe Foxman, Genocide Denier

When I first started reading this article, I thought perhaps a local chapter of the ADL was having a little dust-up with some local Armenian group but as I read on, I was shocked to discover it is none other than Abe Foxman himself and the national ADL organization that's firmly in the genocide-denial camp.

Oh, Abe, how could you do it? How could you, of all people, deny history? You bring shame to your entire organization as well as calling your personal ethics into question.

The fact is: Over 1,000,000 (mostly) Christian Armenians were massacred by Muslim Turks in the not so distant past. Abe, you surely know those who deny history are condemned to repeat it. Why, Abe? Why do this horrible thing?

The Armenian people have a right to acknowledgment of the suffering and the genocide they have endured. Abe, do you feel good about the Holocaust deniers who say it is a lie that two out of every three Jews in Europe was put to death by the Nazi machine?

Abe, why have you signed ADL up with the likes of David Irving? You and he have become one. Your claims are wedded, the one to the other. Denying history... and justice... is the same no matter who's name is on the stationery letterhead.

Abe, Abe, Abe... how could you?

In recent weeks, the town that bills itself as No Place for Hate on a sign outside Town Hall is abuzz with anger and frustration, especially among the large Armenian population. At issue is not the program itself, but the group behind it, the Anti-Defamation League, and in particular the ADL's refusal to acknowledge the Armenian genocide at the hands of Turks during World War I.

"It's kind of the worst hatred to deny genocide," said Nayiri Arzoumanian, a woman of Armenian heritage who has lived in Watertown for eight years. "It's the worst kind of hypocrisy."

The debate began in letters to the editor of the Watertown Tab newspaper and has pitted Watertown Armenians against the ADL's national director, Abraham H. Foxman. Now what was once considered a positive civic effort, declaring Watertown No Place For Hate, finds itself at the center of a debate burdened by divisive international history and politics.

For decades, Armenians have fought to get the Turkish government and other world leaders to recognize the deaths of as many as 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide. The refusal of the ADL to support the Armenians, especially as they lobby Congress to recognize the genocide, has fueled the local war of words. SOURCE

Then Abe said exactly what FDR might have said regarding the passengers aboard the St. Louis (Jews escaping Nazi Germany): "We're not party to this, and I don't understand why we need to be made party."

YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND WHY JEWS SHOULD CARE ABOUT GENOCIDE, ESPECIALLY GENOCIDE CARRIED OUT BY ISLAMIC FANATICS?

Abe Foxman, you have lost all credibility. You do not represent the Jewish people, that is for certain. You represent only your own cold unfeeling heart.

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Anne Frank's tree to be cut down

The old chestnut tree that comforted Anne Frank while she was in hiding during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands is to be cut down.

Amsterdam city council says the diseased tree behind the building in which the Jewish Frank family took refuge has been attacked by a fungus.

But after protests by environmental groups and the Anne Frank Museum, a cutting of the tree will be replanted.

The chestnut tree is listed as a monument and is at least 150 years old.

New life

The 27-tonne tree has been attacked by the horse chestnut leaf miner moth and by a fungus. It could be dangerous if it falls, so Amsterdam City Council says it has to be cut down.

The fungus rots the wood and has caused concerns about public health.

But after a lobby to save the Anne Frank tree, grafts were taken and a sapling will soon replace the original tree that she saw in the courtyard from her hiding place in the attic.

The new tree will be a big attraction for the Anne Frank Museum, where the Frank family's tiny flat is preserved.

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Teachers drop the Holocaust to avoid offending Muslims

Teachers drop the Holocaust to avoid offending Muslims

Schools are dropping the Holocaust from history lessons to avoid offending Muslim pupils, a Governmentbacked study has revealed.
It found some teachers are reluctant to cover the atrocity for fear of upsetting students whose beliefs include Holocaust denial.

There is also resistance to tackling the 11th century Crusades - where Christians fought Muslim armies for control of Jerusalem - because lessons often contradict what is taught in local mosques.

The findings have prompted claims that some schools are using history 'as a vehicle for promoting political correctness'.

The report said teachers feared confronting 'anti-Semitic sentiment and Holocaust denial among some Muslim pupils'.

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