ZGram - 03/08/2003 "Zundelmania in Canada"

[irimland@zundelsite.org]

ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny:  Now more than ever!

March 8, 2003

Good Morning from the Zundelsite:

A long-time ZGram reader wrote:

"Zundelmania is overwhelming the Canadian media ...The media pretend 
to deplore what they see as Zundel's personality cult, and yet do all 
they can to boost it. Zundelwise it is utterly surreal up here in our 
aptly-named Dominion of Absurdistan."

Kevin Strom of Dissident Voices summarized once more what 
Zundelmainia is really all about:

(Zundel) understandably fears a loss of his freedom should he be sent 
to  Germany, where he would be severely punished merely for writing 
and speaking what he believes to be the truth. He understandably 
fears that he may spend the rest of his life in prison. He 
understandably fears that he may never see his wife and family again. 
So he has applied for political asylum in Canada, where he> lived for 
42 years prior to moving to Tennessee. No claim of refugee status 
ever had firmer justification.

  But Canada's powerful Jewish lobby has geared up a heavy campaign to 
make sure that Ernst Zundel never gets a fair hearing, with smears in 
the media and pressure on lapdog politicians like Immigration 
Minister Denis Coderre. Coderre was asked by the  press how he could 
possibly stop Mr. Zundel from at least beginning the application 
process to obtain refugee status, a process which can last for years. 
Unable to come up with a printable answer, Coderre uttered an ominous 
"Just watch me."

  To prosecute Zundel, they have retained a prominent attorney 
previously involved in Canada's deportation of alleged "Nazi war 
criminals," Donald MacIntosh. This is extremely unusual for either a 
free-speech case or a matter of a missed hearing, which was the 
original pretext for arresting Mr. Zundel in Tennessee.

  The media campaign is vicious -- so vicious that it seems to be 
disgusting a large number of Canadians who do believe in freedom of 
speech. The St. Catherine's Standard recently ran an editorial which 
openly advocated the imprisonment of Zundel for what he has written, 
saying how good it will be when "we'll no longer have to deal with 
his crazy diatribes." [St. Catherine's Standard, March 5, 2003

(http://canada.com/search/story.aspx?id=3bd2d938-af05-4bba-aa91-5a0fd993f0cd)

  The popular Web site canada.com ran a poll on Mr. Zundel recently, 
and when the results began to turn in his favor, the poll was 
unceremoniously pulled off their site, never to be mentioned again. 
You can see a screen shot of the poll shortly before it was pulled by 
logging on to my personal Web site,
  http://kevin-strom.com .

  Although he is still denied his freedom while in Canada, Zundel did 
win one concession in a recent hearing: the Crown prosecutors agreed 
that all future hearings in the case would be public. This has set 
the Jewish establishment, in the person of Bernie Farber of the 
Canadian Jewish Congress, screaming that giving the case publicity 
would "play into Zundel's hands." [St. Catherine's Standard March 1, 
2003

http://www.stcatharinesstandard.ca/webapp/sitepages/content.asp?contentID=24 
331&catname=Local+News

  This is one time that Bernie Farber is right. Giving the case 
publicity will expose the fact of the outrageous persecution of this 
peaceful writer and thinker. Giving the case publicity will show that 
it is Jewish supremacists that are behind the imprisonment of Ernst 
Zundel and many other innocents whose only crime was to doubt what 
Jewish supremacists told them.

  Giving this case publicity will expose phony or compromised "human 
rights" groups like Amnesty International which, shamefully, not only 
refuse to help Mr. Zundel, but actually support the so-called Hate 
Speech laws that criminalize speech that Jewish groups disapprove of 
(while Jews in Israel practice "hate" and ethnic cleansing on an 
almost unimaginable scale with  hardly a chance of extradition or 
imprisonment).

  Alex Neve, the Secretary-General of Amnesty International Canada, 
has come out strongly in favor of prosecuting and punishing Ernst 
Zundel, a true prisoner of conscience if there ever was one. Neve 
stated "The Canadian Human Rights Commission has already ruled that 
he has spread hate through the Internet, and he has been convicted by 
German courts. Strong hate-crimes laws, vigorously enforced, are a 
crucial human-rights tool." [Toronto Globe and Mail, February 22, 2003

http://www.globeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20030222/COZUNDE
L//?query=zundel

Yes, publicity is what this case needs -- and donations for Mr. 
Zundel's legal defense. Visit http://www.zundelsite.org or 

  There is also a petition drive for Mr. Zundel at
http://www.petitionpetition.com . Just type "Zundel" into the
  search box to find the "Free Ernst Zundel" petition.

=====

Then there are several Letters to the Editor from Zundel friends:

To The Editor
Canoe News

Sir,  As one who has followed the happenings surrounding Ernst Zundel 
for the past 12 years or so, I put it to you that this man is gravely 
misunderstood by the Canadian public.  The blame for this 
misunderstanding results from a long history of biased and 
sensational news reporting by Canadian and world media.  I ask you 
also, who largely controls the media in North America?  In whose 
interests is it to continually smear and attack a courageous man like 
Ernst Zundel who has persisted in his attacks on the holocaust lobby?

What do you really know about his recent deportation from the United 
States?  Are you aware of the efforts by Zundel and his attorney to 
have had his original residency hearing rescheduled, to which their 
letters were never replied?  Have you ever approached Zundel or his 
wife, Dr. Ingrid Rimland, for an unbiased interview; an interview 
from which you could derive your own conclusions without taint from a 
biased media?

Do you believe that the people in Canada and the United States 
deserve the right to free speech?  Is it permissible in a free and 
open society to allow persons like Zundel and other historical 
revisionists to present views questioning aspects of the holocaust? 
Is there danger in open debate?  Are not the public of both countries 
capable of judging argument and debate on its own merit?  Should 
other viewpoints be allowed in a free and democratic society?  What 
constitutes "hate speech"?

Zundel has never been convicted of any crime in Canada and never been 
convicted of promoting hate speech.  Yet he has  lived in Canada for 
over 42 years.  I ask you to investigate his history:  when he came 
to Canada; his employment record; his run for the leadership of the 
Liberal Party of Canada; the establishment of his businesses; his 
early introduction to revisionism; and, finally, his desire to speak 
out about revisionism as he sees it -- and ask yourself whether or 
not a man should be free to hold such views?  Is man, any man, free 
to hold viewpoints which are not politically correct?

Unless Mr. Zundel can be prosecuted for committing a crime, be it a 
"hate" crime, or any other, I believe he should be allowed to resume 
living in Canada without harrassment from those who disagree with him 
and a pressured government staffed by bureaucrates who do not know 
the background and who are fed hatred, in turn, towards Mr. Zundel

=====

Dear Editor,

having attended a number of sessions of the Human Rights Tribunal in 
1997/98 before which Mr. Zundel had to appear (and which cost him a 
fortune) I am able to look through this charade foisted on the 
Canadian taxpayer in order to silence a courageous individual.

To claim that Ernst Zundel is a "security risk" to this country is 
outrageous. Who violated whose security? Certainly not Zundel. But 
murder was on the agenda of his opponents who sent him two mail bombs 
and set fire to his house.

That he is spreading hatred was not at all established in his 
trial. Hatred, however, is in the hearts of those who can not cope 
with the revelations which his research into history has uncovered. 
His weapon is the written and spoken word, nothing else. If that 
constitutes a security risk then we are a very insecure society. 
Nobody will believe it.

Unfortunately, the "free press" is mainly responsible for the 
distorted public image of Ernst Zundel by not telling the truth. It's 
not surprising. They have willingly submitted to the dictate of the 
Human Rights Commissars who decreed that "truth can not be used as a 
defense". They are complicit in the gradual disappearance of free 
speech from our country.

The question should not be if Mr. Zundel needs to be deported sooner 
or later, but how soon he will be released and compensated for his 
suffering. He has lived in this country for nearly 40 years, paid his 
taxes and was never convicted of any crime. How do people in a free 
country justify such treatment? His stay in the United States was 
perfectly legal and the immigration hearing which he missed was not 
his fault whatsoever.

I consider Mr. Zundel a spokesman for myself and my compatriots who 
are victims of World War II - bombed out and ethnically cleansed 
from their homelands, but considered guilty to this 
day. Canadians know nothing about these facts since the press has 
kept them ignorant.

=====

A sad situation re: Mr. Zundel.  The demonic media appraisals are so 
at  odds with the Ernst I know that their wild and sinister 
depictions are almost comical.  Unfortunately, the situation he finds 
himself in is not. Our family's prayers for him and Ingrid.

=====

Ernst Zundel does not deserve to be treated like a criminal merely 
because he openly and honestly questions what many people claim to 
have been an historical occurence. If the holocaust actually did 
occur as it it claimed, then why can it not be discussed OPENLY and 
HONESTLY? Why are certain people so afraid of honest inquiry?

=====

And, finally, a small excerpt from Ernst himself, written to a 
neighbor in our area who has befriended us:

"I wanted desperately to start a new life - free of persecution, free 
of lawyers, free of courts, free of the media.  Karin, I just wanted 
to live a clean, simple, healthy, godfearing life in that beautiful 
Wears Valley. 

Drawings and paintings were in the planning stage, which would have 
made you, the original inhabitants of the valley, happy and proud 
that the Zundels  came and were part of your area.  We loved that 
place without reservation.

Now my days consist of begging guards to please sharpen my pencils, 
to please allow me to make a phone call or two, to allow me a shower, 
or to get me an extra roll of toilet paper since I used the original 
roll for Kleenex since my cell was cold and drafty and I caught a 
cold.

Big  favors and kind gestures are when one guard gives me a cup of 
soymilk another prisoner did not drink.  Another kindness is when the 
guard does not put on my leg irons on the way to the Detention Review 
Hearing because I am one of the oldest prisoners and not as agile as 
some. 

I am locked in 24 hours a day, as I was in Blount County Jail.  I 
have no criminal record in America.  None in Canada where I won every 
court case in the end.  My crime is that I exposed criminal 
racketeers - in fact, billionaires of blackmailing the German people 
for over US$ 100 billion in war reparations these people were not 
entitled to.  That's my crime, Karin.

All the best,

Ernst Zundel

=====

A new poll by CNEWS to the question "Should Germany's charges against 
Ernst Zundel be suspended, to allow for a swifter deportation? shows 
this evening that 51% want Zundel to leave if Germany drops the 
charges, 22% want him to stay and face another "hate" trial, 15% opt 
for refugee status, 3% don't know and 9% don't care. 

(Source:  http://www.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/ )