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Title: Irving: I Erred When I Said There Were No Gas Chambers At Auschwitz
Source:
www.haaretz.com
URL Source: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/684666.html
Published: Feb 20, 2006
Author: By Amiram Barket
Post Date: 2006-02-20 07:37:15 by Mind_Virus
Keywords: Auschwitz, Chambers, Irving:
Views: 234
Comments: 35
Last update - 13:32 20/02/2006 Irving: I Erred When I Said There Were No Gas Chambers At Auschwitz By Amiram Barket, Haaretz Correspondent and AP VIENNA, Austria - Right-wing British historian David Irving pleaded guilty to criminal charges of denying the Holocaust and conceded he erred in contending there were no Nazi gas chambers at Auschwitz as his trial opened Monday in Vienna. Irving, 67, told reporters he now acknowledges that the Nazis systematically slaughtered Jews during World War II. "History is like a constantly changing tree," he said as an eight-member jury and a panel of three judges prepared to hear charges that could put him behind bars for up to 10 years. Irving, handcuffed and wearing a navy blue suit, arrived at the court carrying a copy of one of his most controversial books - "Hitler's War," which challenges the extent of the Holocaust. "I made a mistake when I said there were no gas chambers at Auschwitz," Irving told the court, speaking in German. But he insisted he never wrote a book about the Holocaust, which he called "just a fragment of my area of interest." "In no way did I deny the killings of millions of people by the Nazis," Irving testified. Earlier, he told journalists he considered it "ridiculous" that he was standing trial for remarks made 17 years ago. He has been in custody since his arrest in November on charges stemming from two speeches he gave in Austria in 1989 in which he was accused of denying the Nazis' extermination of 6 million Jews. The state attorney's office said the 1989 remarks were "a dangerous violation of freedom of speech." A verdict was expected later Monday, with a conviction almost certain because of Irving's guilty plea. In interviews with the British media ahead of the trial, Irving and his Austrian lawyer said they did not believe they would win the case. The lawyer, Elmar Kresbach, has claimed recently that Irving had changed his views back in 1992 after he uncovered a radio transmission containing a message to Adolf Eichmann about the extermination of a million Jews at the Treblinka death camp. Experts cast doubt on the sincerity of these claims. Prof. Dina Porat, head of Tel Aviv University's Institute for the Study of Contemporary Anti-Semitism and Racism, told Haaretz Sunday that Irving's purported repentence is motivated by his fear of a verdict that could amount to 10 years' imprisonment. "It is not possible that Irving changed his mind in 1992 without saying anything about it in the course of the libel trial he initiated in 2000," Porat said. Irving's trial comes amid new - and fierce - debate over freedom of expression in Europe, where the printing and reprinting of unflattering cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad has triggered violent protests worldwide. Irving had tried to win his provisional release on $24,000 bail, but a Vienna court refused, saying it considered him a flight risk. His lawyer, Elmar Kresbach, said last month the controversial Third Reich historian was getting up to 300 pieces of fan mail a week from supporters around the world, and that while in detention he was writing his memoirs under the working title "Irving's War." Irving was arrested November 11 in the southern Austrian province of Styria on a warrant issued in 1989. He was charged under a federal law that makes it a crime to publicly diminish, deny or justify the Holocaust. Within two weeks of his arrest, Irving asserted through his lawyer that he had come to acknowledge the existence of Nazi-era gas chambers. In the past, however, he has claimed that Adolf Hitler knew little if anything about the Holocaust, and has been quoted as saying there was "not one shred of evidence" the Nazis carried out their "Final Solution" to exterminate the Jewish population on such a massive scale. Vienna's national court, where the trial is being held, ordered the balcony gallery closed to prevent projectiles from being thrown down at the bench, the newspaper Die Presse reported Sunday. It quoted officials as saying they were bracing for Irving's supporters to give him the Nazi salute or shout out pro-Hitler slogans during the trial, which will continue into Tuesday if a verdict is not reached on Monday. Irving is the author of nearly 30 books, and has contended most of those who died at concentration camps such as Auschwitz succumbed to diseases such as typhus rather than execution. In 2000, Irving sued American Holocaust scholar Deborah Lipstadt for libel in a British court, but lost. The presiding judge in that case, Charles Gray, wrote that Irving was "an active Holocaust denier ... anti-Semitic and racist." Irving has had numerous run-ins with the law over the years. In 1992, a judge in Germany fined him the equivalent of $6,000 for publicly insisting the Nazi gas chambers at Auschwitz were a hoax.
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#2. To: Mind_Virus (#0)
Anything Irving says while held hostage has to be taken in that light. He's being held under duress, and is likely to say things to appease his kidnappers.
Effectively Irving is being threatened with imprisonment for the rest of his life. It's the functional equivalent of having a gun held to his head. What he says now is indeed under duress and worthless.
You know what came to mind when I read this? RECANT!
Check. The "Holocaust" is our new Credo. If we don't recite it exactly as we're catechized, we face vilification, torture, imprisonment, ruin, death.
What doesnt make sense to me is this.. theyve already had him in court..he lost that case which would seem as if then they've shown that he is wrong.. Although that was in another country, why this again? It would seem to me that he's been made a non issue?
The "Holocaust" industry isn't interested in winning debates---it wants to cut off debate and crush dissidents. Obviously they weren't contend with the London verdict, because Irving continued to hold beliefs they regard as heretical. They wanted him to face criminal charges and imprisonment, and force a public recantation of his heresy, pour encourager les autres.
They are creating a whole new generation of antisemites with this overkill. Nothing like injustice and persecution to fan the flames. Freedom of speech is too entrenched in the West for anyone to try infringing on it now. This will backfire on the holocaust industry, if it hasn't already. The best defense is a good offense. I recommend some serious works on all the holocausts of the 20th century. We'll see who has the biggest pile of innocent corpses and we'll see who the perpetrators were. Start with Katyn Forest, where in 1943, the Soviets massacred 4,000 to 5,000 Polish officers. Once attributed to the Nazis, the truth found its way out. http://www.cia.gov/csi/studies/winter99-00/art6.html But we must not stop there, that's just an appetizer, an example of a known coverup/denial, by whom and for whom. This is nothing compared to the other atrocities committed by the Bolsheviks. On this forum we have listed and discussed a few other lesser known 20th century holocausts, that are historical fact but that were never made into movies or television mini-series. Nor have any of the victims collected reparations, nor will they ever. We should expose more of these, or get more in-depth information of the holocausts we've talked about.
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#3. To: Splitends, Zipporah (#2)
He's being held under duress, and is likely to say things to appease his kidnappers.
#4. To: Peetie Wheatstraw (#3)
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#7. To: Zipporah (#4)
You know what came to mind when I read this? RECANT!
#8. To: Peetie Wheatstraw (#7)
#9. To: Zipporah (#8)
What doesnt make sense to me is this.. theyve already had him in court..he lost that case which would seem as if then they've shown that he is wrong.. Although that was in another country, why this again? It would seem to me that he's been made a non issue?
#10. To: Peetie Wheatstraw, mehitable, wbales, Eoghan, Zipporah, BTP Holdings, Elliott Jackalope, Diana (#9)
Replies to Comment # 10.