In March of 1993, Zündel wrote his supporters in his newsletter that a letter-writing campaign must be started to protest the "dismal state of freedom and justice in Germany." He wrote:

"We have to start a letter writing campaign to these international bodies, to put pressure on the German government to stop persecuting and harassing people just because they have a different viewpoint on history when it concerns the Holocaust.

We also have to ask that the UN Human Rights Organizations force Germany to allow civilized trials, where experts can be heard like Leuchter, Faurisson, and Irving - and not just some Kangaroo Court proceedings in which the accused basically gets called to the bar to be convicted, and has no chance to present his viewpoints buttressed by expert witnesses and documents.

In my own case in Munich, Fred Leuchter, the gas chamber expert, was not allowed to testify because he was considered not qualified - a Canadian judge allowed him to testify for two days. Dr. Faurisson was not allowed to testify - not qualified. I had asked Germar Rudolf, a qualified, university trained 'Diplom Chemist' to testify - he too was disqualified.

Thus, not a single witness was allowed to testify in my defence, to make clear my reasons for saying that no six million people were gassed in places like Auschwitz, Birkenau and Majdanek.

This situation must be changed. I believe that if all of us work together, we can make the necessary changes inside the courts and in the media in Germany.

We are the new 'Freedom Fighters'!

Our weapons are our pens, typewriters, computers, or just our telephones, fax machines and telegrams. Thousands of letters should flood their offices. We must act, not just talk."

THE DAVID COLE-ERNST ZÜNDEL COLLABORATION

In 1993, Zündel flew to Europe and arranged to produce what he calls a German-Jewish "Reconciliation Video" with Jewish revisionist David Cole at Auschwitz. Cole had preceded Zündel to Auschwitz several weeks before and had carefully examined the site. In the video David Cole and Zündel tour the camp, particularly the alleged gassing sites, and Cole explains to Zündel why he has concluded that no extermination by means of gassing took place there.

Zündel's collaboration with Cole and his efforts to directly reach out to individual Jews, by-passing the establishment Jewish organizations, led to accusations from some of his supporters that he had "sold out to the Jews." Zündel replied and explained his position in his April 14, 1993 newsletter:

"I am interested in full equality for Germans, and in proper, normal relations with all people - including Jews. I want them to understand that the war is over, that they have been more than generously compensated for their real and imagined, or claimed suffering. Now its time for normal relations to set in - and for the emotional and 'media borne' black mail of the German people to end.

I can only achieve this understanding by talking to Jews of all stratas of society - I don't have to sell anything, to achieve that goal. I just have to tell the truth and show everybody who is willing to look, listen and weigh the evidence what the facts were and are."

Zündel stated that he liked David Cole's spunk and courage in standing up to the "Jewish establishment" at great risk to himself. He continued:

"He shows far more courage than all those Nazi-Uniform fetishists who adorn themselves in the medals and uniforms of a bygone generation, while they booze themselves into a drunk[en] stupor in their basement, 'Valhalla', because of their 'Weltanschaunng' or alleged admiration of Adolf Hitler and his ideas. I take the young Jew David Cole any time over the beer guzzling cowards and snivelers and critics of my actions."

Zündel made it clear that he had "no problem with bridging the 'ethnic gap'"; he had married outside his own ethnic group and had always enjoyed close cooperation with people of other ethnic groups including his own lawyers, revisionists of all ethnic groups such as Dr. Robert Faurisson (French), Fred Leuchter (American), Joseph Ginzburg (Rumanian Jew), Professor Dommergue (French Jew) and others. His accountant for over a decade was a Muslim. He continued:

"I have lived and worked with Canadians of all races and ethnic groups, intimately. A Pakistani does my books and a Chinese man does my printing - even though I believe, and they know that I believe that I do not believe in the mixing of the races. This is not hypocrisy but the reality of our modern existence.

We have often discussed these topics, and most Chinese and most Pakistanians do not want their children to 'marry outside their race or culture.' This is simply no big deal with us!"

THE "VOICE OF FREEDOM" RADIO AND TV SATELLITE PROGRAMMES

In the summer of 1993, Zündel began a new informational drive on short-wave radio and satellite TV. His programmes, entitled "The Voice of Freedom", covered Holocaust revisionist topics as well other matters of current and historical interest. The programmes later expanded onto Public Access TV in the United States as Zündel supporters sponsored the programme in increasing numbers of American communities.

In announcing the commencement of this new electronic outreach programme, Zündel told his supporters (Newsletter, June 6, 1993):

"Our hope is to stem the tide of the WW II propaganda lies in history and to shed light and not only heat on what happens today in Germany, Canada and the rest of the world from a totally different viewpoint, namely the German perception of things. The program is a response to media born lies and falsehoods and is intended as abridge of understanding. For too long 100 million Germans in foreign lands and a 100 million Germans living under Allied imposed Occupation Regimes in Europe have not had an independent voice. The real German viewpoint has not been heard in the world since 1945! Now we hope that it will be heard by millions around the world, once again."

As could be predicted, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre and the Canadian Jewish Congress began a campaign of pressuring the radio and TV companies carrying Zündel's programmes into cancelling their contracts with him. They succeeded in getting Showcase America, a U.S. satellite TV network, to cancel Zündel's programme as well as Keystone Communications. Gerda Frieberg, an executive of the CJC, stated it was "a continuation of our policy to make sure that Zündel is made persona non grata on any television or radio station, newspaper or any other media that he attempts to use to promote anti-Semitism." (Canadian Jewish News, Sept. 9, 1993)

B'nai Brith was extremely disappointed when the Canadian Jewish Congress succeeded in cancelling the satellite broadcasts. In their newsletter "The B'nai Brith Covenant" of September 1993 they reported that they had been "recording and monitoring [the broadcasts], hoping Zündel would provide enough information for the Attorney General to lay a charge under the hate laws." B'nai Brith reported to its members that:

"Despite this setback, the League is continuing to work closely with the various jurisdictions of law enforcement on this issue and both the Metro Police and the Ontario Attorney General's office have committed to a continued investigation of Zündel's activities."

Notwithstanding the constant efforts of the Canadian Jewish organizations and the Simon Wiesenthal Centre in the United States, Zündel's network of radio and TV programmes continued to expand in both the United States and Europe.

THE INTERNET - "ZUNDELSITE" ON THE WORLD WIDE WEB

In 1995, Zündel entered the world of cyberspace with the active help and collaboration of American Free Speech supporters by setting up a page on the World Wide Web on the Internet. It announced to readers:

The Zündelsite is dedicated to the sacred belief held by all independent people everywhere that a truly democratic society does not need to fear, suppress and persecute an alternate view of history, culture, race, religion or politics. If it does, it is no longer democratic. If it does, an alert citizenry will know and act accordingly to circumvent suppression.

In truly democratic societies, a citizen is dutibound to inform himself and others of a threat to the public welfare and to act in defence of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That is what we are doing. We believe in truth, freedom, fairness and justice for all - not just for the privileged, politically correct and well-connected wealthy few.

The Zündelsite offered readers the full text of the booklet "Did Six Million Really Die?" by Richard Harwood for which he was prosecuted in Canada (with corrections added), the entire text of Canadian lawyer Barbara Kulaszka's book "Did Six Million Really Die? Report of the Evidence in the Canadian "False News" Trial of Ernst Zündel - 1988", the full text of the decision in the postal banning case which held his writings did not constitute hatred and a copy of the second Leuchter Report. In addition, Zündel began publishing his monthly newsletters, book reviews and editorials. Material was offered in English, French and German.

In September of 1995, shortly after the Zündelsite debuted, Zündel received an e-mail letter from Jamie McCarthy, the co-webmaster of "The Nizkor Project," a series of World Wide Web sites which promotes the Holocaust and attempts to disprove Holocaust revisionist claims. Nizkor philosophically endorses the words of Deborah Lipstadt that "...truth is far more fragile than fiction...reason alone cannot protect it." Nizkor is funded partially by a synagogue in Victoria, British Columbia, which then issues Canadian tax receipts for donors. Its founder, Ken McVay, was awarded the Order of British Columbia in 1995 for his service on Nizkor.

McCarthy invited Zündel to link his Zündelsite to Nizkor so that Internet users would be able to view both sites easily and determine which was telling the truth. McCarthy wrote:

"Given that you claim, over and over, that 'truth has no need of coercion,' I trust that you will not insult your readers' intelligence by hiding from them an alternative viewpoint..."

Zündel wrote back:

"Thank you kindly for your offer to make the Internet the open forum on which we can discuss, in a mature and civilized fashion, what is of such concern to all of us - namely what did or did not happen during what is, in our opinion, most inappropriately called 'The Holocaust.'

We want to get away from the mud-slinging and settle down to science and reason - as I am sure you do. In point of fact, we should have done this years ago - before the Canadian Holocaust Trials. We would have spared Canada a painful, acrimonious debate and the Canadian taxpayers millions of dollars because they had to pay to have me prosecuted at the behest of Jewish individuals. Had we been able then to have an open debate, maybe we would have laid some ghosts to rest. At least that was my hope.

I offered this public debate on the Holocaust in the early 1980s to the Canadian Jewish community, even inviting in writing well-known personalities like Dr. Morton Shulman and broadcaster Barbara Frum (both Jewish) to chair such a symposium. I offered a university setting and publicly stated, as an alternate option, that I would pay half of the rent for Maple Leaf Gardens, Toronto's famous sports arena, if the other side paid half for this or a similar locale. I even enlisted the Chief of Police and was promised the assistance of the Police Ethnic Squad who broached the idea to Jewish community leaders - who promptly rejected the offer of a dialogue.

In other words - no takers!

Has this now changed? We would be overjoyed if your offer were genuine and sanctioned by the people who support the Nizkor Project. Were this the case, then serious dialogue could begin. Your offer is precisely what we have been hoping for - to be able to put our information out in the open for the entire world to see and to inspect. Intelligent people can judge for themselves and should not be denied what we consider valid and respectable forensic, historical, scientific and anecdotal data gathered world-wide by experts and ordinary citizens alike refuting serious charges routinely made - such as the extermination of races by gassing.

The information you present has been available for fifty years, broadcast from every roof top and officially rubber-stamped as 'truth' and 'fact' and 'sanctified' by the Nuremberg Trials - proceedings that were described by the American Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court, Judge Harlan Fiske Stone, at the time of these trials, as 'a high grade lynching party' and a 'sanctimonious fraud.'

In the wake of half a century of unrelieved emotional abuse about what Germans and their allies allegedly did, we have not been allowed an appropriate defence. We have been harassed, beaten, bombed, fire-bombed, criminally charged, convicted, imprisoned, judicially gagged - and some of our fellow revisionists were even murdered! - for trying to explain and to defend our view of our people's history. We, the victims of this persecution, agree that this must stop - if freedom of speech is to be preserved in what is left of the rest of the so-called 'Free World.'"

Within a short time, the Zündelsite and Nizkor Web pages were linked together and readers of either site could switch from one to the other to determine the positions of both revisionists and Holocaust exterminationists.

By letter dated January 5, 1996, Zündel invited the Simon Wiesenthal Centre to link their Web site to the Zündelsite. Zündel received no answer.

On January 7, 1996, the Zündelsite announced that a global electronic debate on the Holocaust was about to begin between Zündelsite and Nizkor. In preparation, Zündel's Webmaster began uploading to a FTP site the massive book by attorney Barbara Kulaszka, "Did Six Million Really Die?" as well as one of the reports by execution expert Fred Leuchter. Almost immediately, the files - even those in restricted files - were downloaded by an unknown party. It tipped Zündel to the fact that there was a 24-hour watch on the site and on all of its activities. "Who has the money, skill, equipment and personnel to do that?" he asked later in a Web editorial.

Two days later., the Simon Wiesenthal Centre in Los Angeles sent out hundreds of letters to Internet providers and university presidents asking them to refuse to carry messages that would "promote racism, anti-Semitism, mayhem and violence." (New York Times, Jan. 10, 1996, p. 1)

The Zündelsite began suffering increasing electronic attacks on its web site. Its e-mail was stolen, subverted or destroyed. Electronic e-mail "bombs" began arriving from as far away as Russia. Fake Zündel e-messages began circulating around the Internet, in an obvious attempt to cause harm and damage to Zündel's reputation and his message.

On January 25, 1996, the major news media reported that German prosecutors were considering hatred incitement charges against two Internet providers in Germany for helping to distribute the Zündelsite. Deutsche Telekom AG immediately moved to block user access to its California web provider.

Zündel appealed for help over the Internet:

If there are patriotic Internet experts out there who can help us defend ourselves with technical or legal remedies, please call. We sure can use your help!

Within days it was clear that the Internet community would not abide the censorship of the besieged Zündelsite. At universities across the United States, free speech advocates began setting up electronic clones of the Zündelsite (called "mirror sites") on their own initiative. These electronic shelters were set up at Stanford University, MIT, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Massachusetts, and Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), among others, by individuals who did not agree with Zündel's views but felt that Freedom of Speech on the Internet was at stake for all.

Declan McCullagh, a graduate student at Carnegie Mellon University, who spearheaded the drive to establish the mirror sites, wrote:

"If the German government forces Deutsche Telekom to block access to web servers at Carnegie Mellon University, MIT, and Stanford University, it will be slicing off communications with three of the most respected universities in the United States."

One of the mirror sites was preceded by the following statement of the Webmaster:

This is a mirror archive of most of Ernst Zündel's holocaust revisionist site. My reasons for this mirror are not because I agree with Zündel's politics. I do not...[P]art of my reason for this website is my belief that the questioning of any belief deserves some space. In this way, I believe Zündel's project to be good for our society. He does contribute to the questioning of beliefs - beliefs that should be questioned....The pious at places like the Simon Wiesenthal Centre push as the one true interpretation that the Holocaust is the World's most important suffering - a suffering that is a wholly owned monopoly of the Jews. It is hardly surprising that such a faith leads to a demand that the one true line be accepted and that dialogue be abolished. Such a faith has censorship as a simple corollary. Before we accept a faith that has such undesirable results, we should question its correctness...I hope that this mirror archive demonstrates the folly of Internet censorship for a government. I also wish that these statements before the Zündel's text remind everyone that there is no moral obligation to hold the one, true view of the Holocaust as held by the Simon Wiesenthal Centre."

The Simon Wiesenthal Centre "was fuming however - faxing indignant messages to the presidents of CMU, Stanford, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and University of Pennsylvania" demanding that the mirror sites at the universities be dismantled. (Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, February 2, 1996) Rabbi Abraham Cooper, the associate dean of the centre, wrote an op-ed piece published in the San Francisco Chronicle on January 29, 1996 demanding that Internet hosting providers begin "establishing rules of engagement which will carry forward the American tradition of marginalizing bigotry."

The controversy set off a world-wide media discussion of freedom of speech on the Internet. Visitors to the Zündelsite skyrocketed to hundreds of persons daily. Zündel was featured on the global newsmagazine "24 Hours in Cyberspace" in a segment entitled "The Revisionist. Revisionist History and Freedom of Speech in Cyberspace." It quoted Zündel as saying:

"Control of information has always led to the control of people. The Internet if left uncensored can lead to global liberation through information. Our websites are our training wheels to freedom. Through it, we can win or defend all our liberties. The uncensored interchange or free flow of ideas, not managed or packaged by information brokers or quasi-censors, will for the first time in written or recorded history level the playing field. It will and must lead to the democratization of information! Humble people without university degrees will be offering their ideas on an even, almost value neutral info-bahn. Suppressed and ignored, and even prosecuted thinkers will be heard by millions at an instant! No wonder information and power brokers, governments for instance, are scared!"

David Jones, a professor of computer science at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, told reporters that Germany's efforts to censor the Zündelsite on the Internet had "backfired". He continued: "It's ironic that although the idea is to control this information, it's causing the opposite - for it to be spread around." (Hamilton Spectator, Feb. 3, 1996)

Continue . . .