As is my habit, I like to give the Zundel-Haus monthly Power and Germania letters a few days' headway before I use parts of these mailings for my ZGram list to keep my friends informed.
The mail has now gone out. Below are some excerpts, for your information, first about the SIRC hearings, which have resumed after an almost 3-year-hiatus, and then about the Human Rights Commission hearings which are now slated to go well into March, 1999.
Here is how Ernst described developments on the legal front that took place throughout November:
"I filled the trunk of my 10 year old Chrysler with boxes and documents, thousands of photocopies etc., and drove to Ottawa. On the way, I picked up (one of my attorneys) who used this long trip to go over the fine points and legalese of our planned presentation in Ottawa with me.
She brought along a legal initiative we had worked on for months for discussion and approval about sueing the Canadian political elite as well as the largest Jewish organization and its leader in Canada for censoring me and for denying me my constitutional rights. The almost 7 hour car trip gave me ample time for reflection about my course of action in the following days!
We met Doug Christie, still tired from the long trip, in the hotel that evening and went over our material. A course of action and arguments were finalized. The next morning, a taxi whisked us to the "behind closed doors" proceedings before SIRC.
The proceedings were tedious, and I won't bore you with the legal minutiae. Suffice it to say that Judge Grant made a quick, sweeping and far-reaching judgment in denying my request for the hearings to be open to the press and public. I wanted the public's scrutiny of the government's actions against me and SIRC's handling of the case. I felt it was my case and that I had a right to waive my privacy if I so wanted. After all, I had nothing to hide!
Judge Grant and the other attorneys obviously wanted closed hearings, and Grant ruled against my request at the outset. That brought satisfied smiles to the faces of the opposition.
Judge Grant's next and equally sweeping ruling wiped the smiles right off their faces as he reversed a ruling by the late Judge Courtoise. He did not automatically accept all the 66 news clippings, excerpts of books, radio and TV shows as well as film about me, into evidence.
That came as an obvious shock to the government lawyers!
Doug Christie made several other important motions, which Judge Grant took under advisement and asked for further written submissions on specific topics, and then stopped the proceedings until he has ruled on these points raised by Doug Christie and the government lawyers.
We had counted on at least two days. To my surprise we were out of those hearings by 3 p.m., the first day, which allowed me to put into operation the next plan: To register a civil suit against the political elite of Canada in civil court in downtown Ottawa!
A press release was worked on that evening and sent out announcing a press conference by me the next day on the steps of Parliament - demonstrably outside the precincts of Parliament, from which I had been barred by unanimous vote of the entire Parliament, of all the political parties, on June 4, 1998.
Paul Fromm, well-known Canadian Free Speech Activist, has summarized the action taken by me in his publication "Free Speech Monitor". Here is his take on the legal action filed in Ottawa Court on the 30th of October 1998 at 10:00 A.M. by me and my attorney:
"Zundel Sues Over Ban From Parliament
In a spirited counterattack, Toronto publisher Ernst Zundel gave Canada's conformist politically correct censors an unwelcome Halloween gift one day early. On October 30, he sued all five Canadian political parties, their parliamentary spokesmen, and Moshe Ronen and the Canadian Jewish Congress for violation of his Charter Rights.
It's no trick because they're no treat. Last June, at the prompting of Moshe Ronen of the Canadian Jewish Congress, Parliament voted unanimously to ban Ernst Zundel from the precincts of Parliament. That would include even the Senate and the Parliamentary Library. Zundel couldn't even visit his own MP at his Parliamentary office.
This draconian ban seemed necessary to the censorship-minded MPs because Zundel was scheduled to hold a press conference in the Charles Lynch Room run by the Parliamentary Press Gallery. Since the Parliamentary Press Gallery refused to ban Zundel and since the Charles Lynch Room was within the parliamentary precincts, the ban succeeded where other forms of arm-twisting had failed.
Zundel's suit filed in Ontario Court (General Division) names the following defendants: The Liberal Party of Canada, the Reform Party of Canada, the New Democratic Party, the Progressive Conservative Party, the Bloc Quebecois, the Canadian Jewish Congress, Moshe Ronen, Preston Manning, Jean Chretien, Gilles Duceppe, Peter MacKay, Don Boudria, Randy White, Bill Blaikie, Elsie Wayne, Alexa McDonough, Hedy Fry and Alfonso Gagliano.
Zundel had called the press conference for June 5 and had headlined his press release: "The New Inquisition in Toronto! Government tries to grab control of the Internet."
He had wished to expose to the press that had all but ignored the increasingly outrageous rulings of the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal looking into the Zundelsite some of the key issues (being) theTribunal's decision that truth was no defense."
(end of Free Speech Monitor excerpt)
Human Rights Inquisition in Toronto continues
Bernard Klatt, an Internet service provider and computer expert with an impressive list of work experience in the field of computers and telecommunications, was the Zundel witness slated to rebut some of the claims made by the government's expert, Ian Angus. Bernard Klatt proved to be a man knowledgeable in his field, and answered the questions, some of them utterly confusing and technically complicated to my artist's mind, with simplicity and precision. I was impressed! I wish I had a mind like that. I can one more time appreciate the value of experts.
His cross-examination by the Human Rights Commission prosecuting attorney can only be described as grueling and exhaustive. At the end of the week's proceedings Bernard Klatt was still under cross-examination and has to return to the witness stand on December 7, '98 to continue his testimony.
Karl Ruppert testifies
There was some time left in the Human Rights Tribunal Hearings because Bernard had to catch a plane back to the West, and Karl Ruppert, a well-known German Canadian Community leader, took the witness stand.
Ruppert testified bravely about his life and his experience as a German soldier captured by the Soviet Army on May 8, 1945. He told about the wanton shootings of surrendered and unarmed German soldiers by the Soviets and Czech irregulars. He broke down and his voice choked with emotion as he described the injustices, brutality, the hunger and thirst the German prisoners had to endure in those terrible months and years after the surrender. He spoke of the tens of thousands of his comrades who died the most miserable deaths while being transported in closed cattle cars in the heat of summer to the vast steppes of Russia. He spoke again and again of hunger, disease and death. He gave the most moving testimony of the hearings so far.
He stated that 80% of the German men in our German community agreed with me on the Holocaust. He said that 80% of the male German population did not accept the Hollywood version of the events; that 50% of the women, however, had fallen victim to the brainwashing and that families and the German community were torn asunder by this never-ending Holocaust agitation.
Although frail and in ill health, Karl had stood by all week to give his testimony. I thought it was one of the most moving and brave things I had seen anyone undertake voluntarily. I was proud of that man - and humbled by the experience. To me, his dead comrades who lie in unmarked graves in the steppes and swamps of Russia would have been proud of the old soldier's testimony to their suffering. Here was a German survivor of the Holocaust perpetrated against the Germans - long after the war was over!
Another appeal for help
In closing let me one more time appeal for help to my worldwide circle of friends. We are still looking for some crucial witnesses - one a linguist, one a social scientist/sociologist to explain to the Human Rights Tribunal and subsequent courts of higher authority via the Tribunal transcripts the meanings and impacts of words like "race", "hate", "hurt", "traumatization by phrases and sentences" as well as concepts like "Nazism" "Anti-Semitism," "Zionism" etc.
There are lots of brainy people around. Lots have agreed that they have the proper scholastic credentials. In the end, all of them are afraid to testify once they hear what is at stake in the Zundel Tribunal hearings. They politely decline and retreat to the safety of their cushy jobs or their non-controversial academic careers. If you know someone to fit the bill, please call me. We need these people soon.
I am not a dope pusher, serial killer or rapist. My cases involve fundamental issues of truth and freedom - concepts that are under constant threat by censors, in and out of government, not only in Canada but around the world. The Zundel defense team has stood between state tyranny and government and judicial proceedings, unintimidated by powerful lobbies and well-connected people. They have stood firm in the face of death threats, disciplinary action and even threat of disbarment . . . "
I can attest to that. What Ernst's small legal team has done for the past 17 years is nothing short of heroic. One day, when the entire history of this epic struggle will have been written - free of censorship and threats to life and limb - they will have their place in the annals of free men and women.
Ingrid
Thought for the Day:
"Right now, we're stuck on proving the truth or falsity of a children's horror story (a kind of fairy tale for the 90's), and there can be no satisfactory outcome."
(An East Coast attorney writing to the Zundelsite)