Only liars and shysters try to prevent free speech. The story's false arguments aside, please read on.
- Hannover
http://www.nowtoronto.com/issues/2003-0 ... story3.php
AT ODDS OVER ZUNDEL: JEWISH LEADERS CLASH OVER ARCH-ENEMY
By Enzo Di Matteo
Now magazine (Toronto) -- March 13-19, 2003
When it comes to holocaust-denier Ernst Zundel, controversies often take on
a life of their own. Take his current claim for refugee status here in
Canada after American authorities deported him.
Some hope Holocaust-denier Ernst Zundel will be on a plane for Germany soon.
Jewish groups have been horrified by the media attention his case has
attracted. It's the last thing they wanted.
"With Zundel it's always interesting," says one Jewish community leader,
only half-jokingly.
The mainstream media can't seem to shake its fascination with Zundel. The
Globe went as far as to send a correspondent to his hometown in Calmbach,
Germany, for a feature that ran last Friday. The paper followed up Saturday
with a story on all the women who've loved the "chameleon" Zundel.
This kind of exposure was feared early on by Jewish leaders and has
recently given rise to intense debate among Canada's three major Jewish
organizations about the platform a long, dragged-out legal battle would
offer Zundel, a skilled propagandist, to promote his anti-Semitic views.
The Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center suggested recently to German
authorities that they drop outstanding charges against Zundel as a way of
expediting his deportation from Canada. Those charges relate to a videotape
Zundel distributed titled The Auschwitz Lie.
Leo Adler, the centre's director of national affairs, argues in a letter
to German ambassador to Canada Christian Pauls that "there would be no
foundation for (Zundel's) claim for asylum" here in Canada if Germany
suspended the charges. Zundel, a German national, "would be obliged to
return to Germany.
"The last thing anybody (except Zundel) wants is a protracted
media-hyped series of court appearances that serve to publicize Mr.
Zundel," Adler's letter says. "The sweetest justice would be to show Mr.
Zundel a form of mercy that leaves his future in his hands, rather than
allowing him to become a self-styled martyr for his cause."
Others among the Jewish leadership, however, are not so eager to have
German authorities forgive Zundel his misdeeds. Some seem more than willing
to let Zundel cool his heels in the Niagara Detention Centre for as long as
the process takes.
B'nai Brith has sent its own correspondence to German authorities saying
that "Zundel should be deported to Germany and prosecuted to the fullest
extent of German anti-hate laws." The group reiterated this point last
Friday when CBC Radio news erroneously reported that B'nai Brith, too,
supports the Wiesenthal Center's initiative.
"If he's committed a crime in another country, allegedly," says B'nai
Brith director of communications Joseph Ben-Ami, "then he should be tried
for that crime.
"There's a flaw in (the Simon Wiesenthal Center's) logic," says Ben-Ami,
"and the flaw is, we're assuming the basis for the refugee claim is the
outstanding charge against him (in Germany). That's not the basis for his
refugee claim. The basis of his refugee claim is his fear of persecution."
One gets the sense listening to Ben-Ami that the optics of this sticky
situation -- a Jewish organization calling for the dropping of charges
against a known anti-Semite -- is what's driving the group's position.
"We of all people should be the last to say charges should be dropped. I
mean, we're just not going to do that. We feel a responsibility to
prosecute. We're not prepared to have our name attached to an initiative to
have (the Germans) turn a blind eye to this kind of crime.
"If the goal here is to prevent Ernst Zundel from getting publicity,
don't you think we'd be a little more circumspect about calling press
conferences to talk about how we could prevent him from garnering more
media attention?"
The Canadian Jewish Congress, which had early on expressed its own concern
about the media attention around Zundel's case, is not
supporting the Wiesenthal Center's initiative either.
Len Rudner, the CJC's director of community relations, says that from the
CJC's point of view Zundel's refugee claim is a "red herring" that doesn't
stand a legal chance.
Rudner says the Wiesenthal Center's initiative is "an attempt to clear
the table, (while) from our point of view that item really isn't even on
the table. It is an interesting perspective. We don't think the German
government's in-absentia conviction of Zundel for his actions there is
going to be an impediment to removing him from this country one way or the
other.
"I'm sure Zundel's enjoying it. But what are you going to do about it? The
media is going to cover it regardless, because Zundel is news."
Adler was not available for comment this week. But he suggested -- in
separate correspondence to Justice Minister Martin Cauchon urging him to
sign on to the centre's initiative -- that getting rid of Zundel will
present more legal twists and turns than legal observers think.
He writes that "even the attempt to have him declared a security risk
carries with it the possibility of lengthy court battles."
A four-page summary report presented at the only hearing held to date in
the Zundel matter by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, Canada's
spy agency, says there are reasonable grounds to consider Zundel a security
risk "as a consequence of his participation, involvement and support of the
neo-Nazi/white supremacist movement in Canada."
The CSIS document goes on to say that "there are reasonable grounds to
believe that Zundel has been and would be in a position to influence his
followers to commit acts of serious violence in Canada or abroad."
But back in 92, when the Supreme Court of Canada overturned
spreading-false-news charges against Zundel -- for publishing Did Six
Million Really Die? -- it found censorship of all expressions "likely to
cause injury or mischief to a public interest" unjustifiable and in
contravention of freedom of expression guarantees in the Charter.
The question is, then, do Zundel's views make him a security risk even
though, as CSIS's own appraisal states, "Zundel is unlikely to resort to
violence himself"?
Whether or not Zundel still retains his landed status here in Canada is
another legal wrinkle that's complicating matters.
Immigration officials in Ottawa are not commenting on the case. But René
Mercier, a spokesperson for the department, says landed immigrants retain
their status for three years after they've left the country. Zundel, a
resident in Canada since 58, left in August 2000.
At least one higher-up with the CJC expresses "surprise" that Zundel is not
using his former residency status to fight his deportation.
While the Wiesenthal Center's proposal has been met with skepticism within
certain segments of the Jewish community, German authorities seem to be
treating it seriously.
In Ottawa, German embassy spokesperson Harry Adelt confirms that Adler has
met with high-ranking officials there, and the proposal has been sent to
Berlin for consideration.
Zundel's Web site, meanwhile, is milking this controversy for all it's
worth. The myth-making continues.
