The phone call inquiring about Professor Jane Christensen's views on the Holocaust was brief. Asked directly about her view of the Holocaust — Do you believe that the historic accounts of the Holocaust are true? — Christensen's response was cryptic and evasive.
"Do you mean the Holocaust in Fallujah?" she said.
No.
The question referred to the conventionally held definition of the Holocaust, in which 6 million Jews were killed by Nazis, many in concentration camps. The question was redirected — Do you believe Germany killed 6 million Jews in concentration camps in World War II?
"I believe that Germany killed many people in concentration camps in World War II, and that some of them were Jews," she replied.
Charges of anti-Semitism have been among the accusations leveled at Christensen in recent weeks as bloggers and pundits picked up on her faculty Web site and course syllabus at N.C. Wesleyan College last month.
She also has come under fire because the syllabus of one of her political science classes questions the truth of the U.S. government's accounts of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Her Web page, Megalinks in Political Science, has been retooled since the first columns appeared. Links remain to articles such as "Joint U.S.-Israeli plan to bomb Iran" by Michel Chossudovsky and "Mossad — The Israeli Connection To 9/11" by Christopher Bollyn.
Most of the site consists of links to other writers for other organizations.
A link titled "Mossad Planning Another Attack in U.S." links to an April 11 article by the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs — a Washington think-tank on U.S.-Israeli military relations — actually titled "Al Qaeda Preparing for Another Attack in U.S., WMD Use Probable."
In a letter to the editor published in the Telegram on May 1, Dr. Ian Newbould said Wesleyan would ask a team of respect political scientists to evaluate the academic appropriateness and integrity of Christensen's approach to teaching. The letter said Christensen suggested the approach would be helpful.
Little of Christensen's own writing appears on the school's Web site. Similarly, Christensen said she hoped little of this conversation would be published.
Finally, the question was rephrased again — Do you believe that the Germans and their allies engaged in a systematic program to kill Jews during World War II?
"If there was a systematic program to kill Jews, it was done in collaboration with the Zionists," Christensen answered.