The Zundel Case in Germany: Just plain old common sense

[zgrams at zgrams.zundelsite.org]

Good Morning from the Zundelsite:

For now, the German bureaucrats are done with their St. Vitus dance 
to please their not-so-invisible handlers - a big relief to me.  At 
least I can prepare for the holidays without having to hang on my 
computer.

I can't wait for the legal analysis by our team to let me know where 
we will go from here.

Below is an old-fashioned American take on this grotesque spectacle 
to railroad a man for speaking the truth:

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MISTRIAL DECLARED IN CASE OF ERNST ZUNDEL

NOVEMBER 15, 2005. In what appears to be something out of a surreal 
dream, the German trial of Ernst Zundel has been temporarily ended 
because all his lawyers could not get one of their many motions 
accepted by the court judge.

I guess there is a German rule that says: defense lawyers have to 
produce a semblance of competence by making at least one motion stand 
up. I don't really know. Anyway, Zundel has a new lawyer, and the 
trial may re-open in February.

The charge? Denial of the Holocaust. Or something like that. In 
Canada, during his three trials, Zundel was charged with threatening 
national security. Threatening how? By denying the accepted story, in 
certain respects, of the Holocaust.

After perusing a number of articles about Zundel on the rense.com 
site, I presume that Zundel is a very unpopular man because he is 
stating that the Nazi extermination of Jews during WW2 has been 
grossly exaggerated, in terms of actual numbers of Jews killed.

So far, I find no evidence that Zundel has committed a crime against 
any person or piece of property, in the usual sense of crime. Nor do 
I find any direct inciting to violence on the part of Zundel.

In other words, he is being held in prison (as he was in Canada) 
because he expresses certain thoughts.

Of course, in several European countries, Holocaust denial is itself a crime.

There are a couple of issues here. One is, can your words be taken by 
other people as reason for THEM to commit a violent crime? As far as 
I'm concerned, there are nutcases and morons running around from the 
Arctic Circle to Tierra Del Fuego who will, on the slightest 
provocation, steal property and commit assault.

One only has to look at the laws in the US to see that indirect 
participation in a "crime" is a growing trend. For example, a person 
can be found innocent of robbery but found guilty of conspiracy to 
commit robbery.

"We talked about it, we planned it, but then we got cold feet."

"Who cares? Guilty of conspiracy. This court is adjourned."

Note that Zundel is not being charged with conspiracy. I'm merely 
pointing out that INDIRECT labels can be extended in all sorts of 
directions.

In fact, as political correctness spreads like ink on a blotter all 
over the planet, people are warned that the slightest off-center 
remark might damage another person within hearing distance for life.

Then comes the issue of Zundel's accuracy in his written and spoken 
comments about the Holocaust. Is he right? Is he wrong? Is he really 
trying to deceive? Is he saying what he says because, in his heart, 
he is a racist or an anti-Semite?

The circular argument goes this way: since Zundel obviously knows 
what he is saying is false, he must have another strategy; he must be 
trying to float a lie for an ulterior motive.

Well, if it is now the law to make an examination of someone's heart 
and soul in judging criminal innocence or guilt, we can hang it up 
and move to another planet.

By any rational standard, who the hell cares what Zundel is saying, 
in so far as his innocence or guilt is concerned? He's saying it. He 
has the right to say it. He can say it from now until the cows come 
home.

In my experience, it is the incredibly shallow and inexperienced and 
desperate people who try to divine other citizens' ulterior motives 
at the drop of a hat and pin all sorts of labels on them, over and 
over.

I'm reminded of the many painstaking domeheads, back in the day, who 
would take the work of a famous artist and apply their own version of 
psychoanalytic theory to his work and, in the process, try to reduce 
that artist to ashes.

Now, it may be that Zundel has actually done things I don't know 
about. So far, I haven't found anything that really surprises me. I'm 
willing to be shown---but as far as I can tell, the man is being 
prosecuted for stating what he believes to be facts.

It also appears that his defense team in Germany is not permitted to 
offer evidence that Zundel's version of the Holocaust is accurate.

"You're being prosecuted for saying X. And we will not allow proof 
that X is true. The crime is saying X. Shut up."

Here I'm reminded of US trials in which federal prosecutors try to 
ramrod a defendant who has sold medicines not approved by the FDA. In 
court, when the defendant's lawyers move to introduce evidence that 
the medicine in question actually cures disease, the judge refuses to 
allow such presentation.

"We're not here to determine whether the defendant is a hero in 
healing people. We only want to know whether he sold a substance to 
treat a disease, and whether the FDA has approved this substance. If 
the FDA has not certified it as safe and effective, the defendant is 
guilty as hell."

It also reminds me of US Supreme Court Justice Scalia's famous 
remark: the revelation of new exculpatory evidence is not sufficient 
to warrant a re-trial for a person who is currently serving time in 
prison for having committed a crime. New trials are only granted when 
it's shown that the previous trial was, procedurally speaking, deeply 
flawed. In other words, who cares whether the convicted person is 
really guilty?

Do Zundel's statements about the Holocaust offend many people? Of 
course. Is that a crime? No. Does the principle of free speech exceed 
the fact that people are offended? Yes.

What about 9/11? What about the justification for waging war in 
Vietnam and Iraq? What about claiming that AIDS is not a contagious 
germ-driven disease? What about people who claim that FDR knew the 
Japanese were going to attack Pearl Harbor and let it happen? What 
about people who say Bill Clinton sold out America by letting 
military-tech secrets flow from here to China, in exchange for a few 
dollars placed in his re-election campaign fund? What about people 
who say we never went to the moon? What about people who say that 
George Bush has the intellect of a chimp?

In these and hundreds of other situations, it is quite possible to 
make statements that will offend others deeply. Shall we put a censor 
to work scrubbing all these statements out of existence? Shall we 
hold show trials and put people in jail?

On the road to freedom, we say that potential victims of others' 
speech are going to have to suck it up and get past all that. It may 
not be nice, but that's the way things work. On the road to tyranny, 
we say that anything you might say that will cause a person emotional 
distress is illegal and you will be punished severely for it, by the 
legal system, backed up by official guns and official prison bars.

I know which way I'm going. If Zundel has done nothing other than 
revise, downward, accepted estimates of the Holocaust, if he has done 
nothing other than claim he knows who is protecting the official 
scenario, then let him out of jail. Let him go and let him live his 
life. Stop trying to put him on trial.

What about people who claim there was tremendous black African 
participation in selling fellow Africans to the American 
slavemasters, who then brought those slaves to this country? That 
picture contradicts the official scenario. Why aren't those Holocaust 
deniers being arrested and tried and placed in prisons?

And by the way, wasn't there a US court case about a year ago in 
which---to the consternation of many---it was ruled that a media news 
outlet (FOX) could lie with impunity? Could escape even a judgment in 
a civil suit?

So even if Zundel is intentionally lying through his teeth, so what? 
Does he have fewer rights than FOX or CNN?

See, at the end of the day, accuracy and truth don't matter at all, 
when it comes to speech. Now if you tell a number of lies aimed at a 
particular and specific person or group, with the idea of injuring 
their reputations, then that is actionable in a suit. But Zundel is 
not being sued. If he were, he could introduce evidence to support 
his statements as being true. He is being tried on criminal charges 
by the German State, and if he is found guilty, he can be sentenced 
to a jail term. It's a whole different animal.

JON RAPPOPORT www.nomorefakenews.com

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