Here is a new review of Prof. Finkelstein's book, which appeared in the Canadian Jewish News. This is the first and only review of the book so far in Canada. (!)
FINKELSTEIN STRIKES OUT By Rabbi Gunther Plaut in Toronto, October 12, 2000, page 10
Rabbi Plaut:
Contrary to what your first impression might be, this column does not deal with baseball. Rather, it is a report of a book written by the leading Jewish anti-Zionist and anti-Israel writer of our day, Norman G. Finkelstein. His newest book is The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering.
Zundelsite:
Readers beware! Rabbi Plaut is an "Israel Firster" and a staunch, unquestioning promoter of Israeli policies and causes. He has had a long career of obfuscating, minimizing and excusing the Israeli and Jewish agenda, as Canadians who read the papers know.
Rabbi Plaut:
At first glance it appears to be dealing with a legitimate subject: Is it true that nowadays the Holocaust is being exploited in some quarters for commercial or other reasons? Is there, as Finkelstein calls, it, a "Holocaust industry?" In his book the author distinguishes between two Holocaust: one, the event itself, and second, the Holocaust memory as a tool used for political, commercial and other purposes.
Zundelsite:
You don't have to go far with Point Two, Rabbi Plaut! Ernst Zundel and the Zundelsite have been investigated, vilified, persecuted in and outside of court for having drawn attention to the use and exploitation of the Holocaust.
Rabbi Plaut:
In the author's view, "the second Holocaust," is an exploitative enterprise that manages to have Israel depict itself as a victim of Arab aggression and has enabled the Jews of the United States to become its strongest ethnic minority who - because of the Holocaust - are protected from even legitimate criticism. In fact, Finkelstein believes that there is indeed a worldwide Jewish conspiracy that subdues all possible critics, enemies and doubters by waving the Holocaust flag.
Zundelsite:
What is being waved is not a "Holocaust flag" - what we have pointed out so many times is that the Holocaust is used as a bludgeon - as even Abe Foxman of the ADL acknowledged when talking about the Swiss Nation shakedown: "We bludgeoned them and bludgeoned them and bludgeoned them..." Try bludgeoning the Swiss with a flag!
Rabbi Plaut:
If such readings of history were not bad enough, it gets worse. Finkelstein sees a Jewish "conspiracy" - reminiscent of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion - that has made it possible for Jews to extract vast funds from German and other sources and thereby feed coffers of the Claims Commission, the Jewish organization that has been in the forefront of demanding justice for Holocaust victims. For Finkelstein, these reparations are nothing less than a shakedown. In such a view, the successors to the corporations that used forced labour during the Nazi days, are the real victims, and the Jewish conspirators the true aggressors.
Zundelsite:
This is one of the well-known Talmudic gyrations - of a poison pen approach for which Rabbi Plaut has long been known in Canada. Finkelstein did not say any such thing, but Plaut's guilty conscience in an act known to psychologists as "projection" - lays bare what the real facts are. Not the German corporations targeted are the real victims of this shakedown, but ever new generations of Germans, Swiss and other Europeans who were born 20 and 30 years after that war, are asked to pay the con men.
Rabbi Plaut:
It is a foregone conclusion that Finkelstein book will feed the maw of the world's anti-Semites. He supports the thwarted belief that we Jews, led by the Elie Wiesels and their companions, have exploited and continue to exploit an innocent world.
Zundelsite:
If the shoe fits, wear it! Finkelstein, Novick, Arthur Butz and Robert Faurisson, along with millions of other thinking people, have come to the same conclusions after studying the statistics and the fake and inflated "survivor" numbers and phony claims.
Rabbi Plaut:
The author, it appears to me, is more than paranoid in his accusations, for compared to his view, ordinary paranoia is a mild disease. For what Jew would call the uses of the Holocaust "the greatest robbery in the history of mankind?"
Zundelsite:
If Finkelstein really said that, he ought to be given a nice plaque in absentia as "Revisionist of the Year" by the IHR at their next convention.
Rabbi Plaut:
I admit that there have, on occasion, been misuses of what should be a sacred memory, but nothing that could turn them into an evil conspiracy ruling the world. Not unjustly, one critic of Finkelstein calls him "the founder of a new Holocaust industry, namely his own."
Zundelsite:
Is the guilty conscience and mind on parade here - or what?! Read that sentence again: "I admit that there have, on occasion, been misuses . . . but nothing that could turn them into an evil conspiracy ruling the world."
We'll see. The last word on that hasn't yet been spoken.
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Thought for the Day:
"One who investigates crimes, lies and deceit, is a detective, a researcher. But one, who investigates Jewish lies, crimes and deceit, is an anti-Semite."
(Letter to the Zundelsite)
Back to Table of Contents of the Oct. 2000 ZGrams