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The Scribblings of Behind the Aegis
Source: Associated Press
BERLIN (AP) -- Former SS sergeant Adolf Storms lived in Germany unnoticed for more than six decades after World War II until an Austrian university student last year came across his name while researching a 1945 massacre of Jewish forced laborers. The student gave the information to state prosecutors near Storms' hometown of Duisburg, and they have now filed charges against the 90-year-old on 58 counts of murder for the killings near the Austrian village of Deutsch Schuetzen, a German court said. "On March 29, 1945, the accused and his accomplices brought at least 57 Jewish forced laborers in several groups to a nearby forest area, where they had to give up their valuables and kneel by a grave," the court said in a statement. "The accused and other SS members then cruelly shot the Jewish forced-laborers from behind." The day following the massacre, Storms is accused of personally shooting another Jew who could no longer walk during a forced march in Austria from Deutsch Schuetzen to the village of Hartberg, the court said. Read more: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_... Compainion piece: A look at recent prosecutions of suspected Nazi war criminals in Germany. - November 2009: Prosecutors file charges against former SS Sgt. Adolf Storms on 58 counts of murder in connection with a massacre of Jewish forced laborers in Austria in 1945. - October 2009: Heinrich Boere, 87, goes on trial in Aachen charged with the World War II murders of three men in the Netherlands when he was a member of a Waffen SS death squad. - August 2009: Josef Scheungraber, a 90-year-old former officer in the Nazi army, is convicted of murder for ordering the massacre of 10 civilians in a 1944 reprisal killing in Italy; sentenced to life. Scheungraber has said he plans to appeal. - July 2009: John Demjanjuk, an 89-year-old retired auto worker deported from the U.S., is charged as an accessory to the murder of 27,900 people at the Sobibor death camp in Nazi-occupied Poland, where he is accused of serving as a guard. His trial starts in Munich on Nov. 30. more... In 1955, Fred Phelps headed the first service of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan. Since then, the church has become internationally famous for hatred and anti-gay protests.
Less of a church and more of a cult, this hate organization has been defined by its protests at the funerals of fallen soldiers. The group proclaims these soldiers' deaths were God's way of punishing our nation for tolerating "fags." On top of the groups proclaimed hate for homosexuals, Phelps has taken the cult in an anti-Semitic direction. "I guess you could say a fag is a Jew pretty much," said 8-year-old Noah Phelps-Roper, son of Phelps, in an interview with "20/20." The members of Westboro have begun picketing synagogues and Jewish cultural institutions around the country. Children and adults hold signs that read "God hates Jews," "God hates Israel" and "Israel is doomed." In an interview with the Southern Poverty Law Center, Shirley Phelps-Roper, daughter of Phelps, explained the purpose of the new campaign is to do Jews a favor by begging them to repent before they are destroyed. "I'm telling you, those Jews are filthy," she said. source Source: AP
KATMANDU, Nepal (AP) -- The world's smallest deer, a flying frog and catfish that stick to rocks - as well as more than 350 other species - have been discovered over the past decade in the Himalayas, making it one of the world's most biologically rich regions, an environmental group said Monday. But researchers warn that the effects of climate change, as well as development, threaten the diverse habitat that supports these species. "This enormous cultural and biological diversity underscores the fragile nature of an environment which risks being lost forever unless the impacts of climate change are reversed," said Tariq Aziz, the leader of the World Wildlife Fund's Living Himalayas Initiative, a regional conservation program that covers India, Nepal and Bhutan. The WWF is calling on the countries to develop a conservation plan for the region - which also includes parts of Myanmar and Tibet - and for governments to give local communities more authority to manage the forests, grasslands and wetlands. The group found that almost three-quarters of the discoveries between 1998 and 2008 were plants, including 21 new orchid species. But it also listed 16 amphibians, 16 reptiles, 14 fish, two birds, two mammals and at least 60 new invertebrates. Most of the discoveries have already been reported in peer-reviewed, scientific journals. Read more: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AS_... Source: Ha'aretz
A journalist from Holland who linked Jews to the recent outbreak of flu pandemics drew heavy criticism from a prominent Dutch Jewish organization earlier this week, that claimed her words were tantamount to anti-Semitic blood libels. Holland's largest daily, De Telegraf last week printed an interview with Désirée Röver, 61, who proposed the bird flu pandemic, caused by the virus H5N1, was part of an international conspiracy to reduce the world's population. Röver is quoted as saying the conspiracy can be traced back to a group of descendants of the Khazars, a nation from the Caucasus believed to have converted to Judaism 1,200 years ago. De Telegraaf quotes her as saying that these descendants are now "praying to another god; Lucifer, Satan, or however you want to call him" and "are called Rockefeller, Rothschild, Brezinski and Kissinger." Ronny Naftaniel, who heads the Center for Information and Documentation on Israel (CIDI) - an local anti-Semitism watchdog - said that this is the first time he has heard such claims from Rover, and added that based on her words, "she does not seem to be right in her head." Read more: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/110653... The old becomes new. When the Six-Day War ended and Israelis began streaming to the West Bank, members of the Molchadsky-Wolfson family from Jerusalem decided to visit Hebron. Thirty eight years earlier, the family had fled from that city following the massacre of Hebron's Jewish residents.
Yonah Molchadsky had given up hope of finding the little apartment in which her family had lived in Hebron. But her daughter, Geula Wolfson, and the other family members and friends who went along on the 1967 visit, were not prepared to give up. Finally the apartment was located; it had been turned into a workshop for girls. Yonah Molchadsky, however, did not say a word about the horrors of the massacre that had led them to leave. The family put no pressure on her. When they returned to Jerusalem that evening, Yonah went to the kitchen and prepared food, and when they sat down to eat, her friend, Sarah Novoplansky said: "Now you must talk. Tell us exactly what happened that day." So after 38 years, the silence was broken and Yonah spoke, "from beginning to end, without a tear or a tremble in her voice," recounts Novoplansky, who wrote everything down. It was the story of a family who had survived the terrible day on which 67 members of Hebron's Jewish community were massacred. The story of their survival is connected with the birth of Geula, Yonah's second daughter. Last weekend, Geula Wolfson celebrated her 80th birthday, and at the birthday party she told the story "so that the grandchildren will know." more... Source: CBS
Survivors of the Granada Hills Jewish community center attack, as well as the family of a slain letter carrier, gathered Monday to remember the 10th anniversary of the violence. The attack on North Valley Jewish Community Center and the slaying of U.S. postal worker Joseph Ileto by Buford O. Furrow Jr., a white supremacist, took place on August 10, 1999. Furrow was equipped with a 9 mm Israeli-designed Uzi submachine gun and a Glock semiautomatic pistol when he arrived at the center and sprayed 70 rounds across the lobby. Receptionist Isabelle Shalometh, camp counselor Mindy Finkelstein, and day campers James Sidell, Joshua Stepakoff and Benjamin Kadish were wounded in the attack. Read more: http://cbs2.com/tv/buford.furrow.joseph.2.... Source: Ha'aretz
Twenty thousand demonstrators or more gathered in Tel Aviv's Rabin Square Saturday night in a rally to show solidarity with Israel's gay community, including the victims shot at a TA center for gay and lesbian youth a week ago, which left two dead and a dozen wounded. President Shimon Peres addressed the crowd, saying the shots fired at the gay and lesbian community "hurt all of us - as people, as Jews, as Israelis." Peres, who spoke against a background of a rainbow flag, mentioned the two Israelis killed in the attack, Nir Katz, 26 and Liz Trobishi, 17, saying "the person who pointed a pistol barrel at Nir Katz and Liz Trobishi pointed it all of you, all of us, at me." The president said: "The Creator of the world did not endow anyone with the power to murder his peer." Peres added that "every person must fight against murder." Chen Langer, who was wounded in the shooting at 28 Nachmani Street, spoke before the rally. He was released from hospital shortly before the event. "It has been a bad week for Israeli society," he said. Ori Gil, who was also wounded in the shooting, said that "no killer will leave us in the closet." Organizers said the rally drew 70,000 people, but police estimated the number at 15,000. Several musicians performed at the gathering, including Rita, Dana International, Ninette Tayeb, Amir Fay Guttman, Keren Peles, Corinne Alal and Ivri Lider. Read more: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/110614... See also: Livni to gay Israelis: Don't let hate crime stop you living your lives and U.S. gay Jews rally in solidarity with T.A. shooting victims "Surrounded as I am now by wonderful children and grandchildren, not a day goes by that I don’t think of Richard and our love, our right to marry, and how much it meant to me to have that freedom to marry the person precious to me, even if others thought he was the “wrong kind of person” for me to marry. I believe all Americans, no matter their race, no matter their sex, no matter their sexual orientation, should have that same freedom to marry. Government has no business imposing some people’s religious beliefs over others. Especially if it denies people’s civil rights." source
Don't forget the words of wisdom from the wonderful Coretta Scott King !!!!   Source: Ha'aretz
President Ali Abdullah Saleh of Yemen is planning to relocate Yemen's Jews from the Amran district and the city of Raidah to the capital, Sana, where each Jewish family will receive a plot of land. The rabbi of the Jewish community, Yehi Yaish, told the independent Yemenite Internet site, News Yemen, that in a meeting with him, the president instructed his security officials to monitor implementation of the Jews' relocation. Many of Yemen's Jews, some of whom were attacked over the last few days, are uninterested in leaving their country and immigrating to Israel. Members of the Sana Jewish community have said during recent phone calls to that some do not want to immigrate at this time, while others are assessing their futures in light of the authorities' actions against the Muslim citizens involved in recent attacks against Yemen's Jews. This past Monday night, two petrol bombs were thrown at the home of Saadia Yaakov. His family has since told friends in Israel that no one was hurt in the incident, which took place in the middle of the night. "We were very afraid at night, but we're all okay," said the mother of the family, while the father vigorously maintained that he does not know who carried out the act and that he has no quarrel with anyone. "I don't know why they threw the petrol bombs and I don't know who threw them," he said. "May God have compassion on us." The community in Raidah where Moshe Nahari was murdered a few days agois one of the last two Jewish communities remaining in Yemen. The community is estimated to number about 270 Jews who live in their own complex in the town. Many of its inhabitants continue to work as silversmiths, a traditional Yemenite-Jewish occupation. It is considered a Jewish occupation because Islam restricts the work of Muslim silversmiths. Read more: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/104763... On Monday, Dec. 1, the UK Telegraph reported statements by doctors who examined the bodies of those killed in the Mumbai massacre. "Many of the bodies showed signs of torture," they said, one going on to explain that "of all the bodies, the Israeli victims
Horrifying. And mystifying -- because this news item, carried around the world, has been utterly absent from the mainstream U.S. media. Other than The Huffington Post and The Drudge Report (unusual bedfellows indeed), you cannot find this report anywhere on CNN, CBS, ABC, FOX, The New York Times, LA Times, Washington Post -- nowhere. Why? I have no idea. Is this not news? If not well-enough substantiated to be reported as news, is it not worth investigating? We have been privy to every other detail of the Mumbai atrocity, to all sorts of unsubstantiated eyewitness accounts. Why would a report by government doctors be ignored? But the story gets curiouser. Since that time, the Telegraph's online article has been edited and cut down, and though it still mentions the "Israeli" bodies showing the most signs of torture, it no longer contains the doctor's frightening quote about not wanting to go over the details in his head. more... Drinking and politics have gone together in the United States since long before Andrew Johnson stumbled drunk through his Vice Presidential inauguration speech in 1865.
This year, at the end of the most-covered election in history, where countless millions have willingly overdosed on election coverage, putting their physical and emotional well-being at risk, a drink or two (or 12) is surely in order. For the tens of thousands of Americans in Israel watching the results live from here in the 51st state (we're still waiting on the request for 13 electoral votes), here are a few suggestions for how to celebrate the final hours of the most nerve-wracking election in years: * Take 50 drinks every time a state that went for Kerry goes for McCain (Won't happen, so you're safe) * If Texas goes for Obama, sprout wings and fly while turning lead into gold (See above) * If Obama is declared the winner, have two drinks. * If McCain declared the winner, have 20 LOL! http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/103427... Source: Ha'aretz
A new poll commissioned by researchers at New York University reveals that American Jews favor Democratic presidential frontrunner Barack Obama over his Republic rival, John McCain, by a 67 ? 33 percent margin. The survey, which sampled the opinions of over 3,000 respondents - half of them being Jewish - also found that Jews as an ethnic group will support Obama by almost 30 percent more than other white, non-Hispanic voters. The poll sought to gauge the importance Jewish voters attach to Israel as a consideration in whom they would vote for, with some surprising results. Of all the Jews surveyed who said that Israel is of "high" importance, 63 percent said they would vote for Obama. In contrast, only 42 percent of Jews who said Israel has "very high" importance said they planned to vote for Obama. Not surprisingly, the Jewish vote swings heavily in McCain's favor among the Orthodox. According to the survey, the Arizona senator can count on support from 75 percent of Orthodox Jewish voters. Read more: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/103016... I think this statement: "In contrast, only 42 percent of Jews who said Israel has "very high" importance said they planned to vote for Obama." was supposed to be McCain, not Obama. Something else to read: Jewish Voters Favor Obama Over McCain, 57-30 percent; Many Undecided September 25, 2008 – New York – With less than six weeks to go to Election Day, American Jewish voters favor Senator Barack Obama over Senator John McCain for U.S. president by a margin of 57-30 percent. At the same time, an unexpectedly large number, 13 percent, remain undecided about their vote, according to a new American Jewish Committee (AJC) survey. Regarding the vice-presidential candidates, 73 percent of American Jews “approve” of Obama’s selection of Sen. Joseph Biden as his running mate, 15 percent “disapprove,” and 13 percent are “not sure.” In contrast, 54 percent of American Jews “disapprove” of McCain’s selection of Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate, 37 percent “approve,” and 9 percent are “not sure.” ---snip--- Asked which “one issue would you most like the candidates for president to discuss,” 54 percent of American Jews answer “economy,” 11 percent “health care,” 6 percent “war in Iraq,” 5 percent “energy” and “terrorism,” 3 percent “Israel,” 2 percent “immigration,” “education,” “taxes,” and “social security,” and 1 percent “Supreme Court nominations.” source Anti-Muslim and anti-Jewish feelings are rising in several major European countries, according to a worldwide survey released on Wednesday.
The Washington-based Pew Research Center's global attitude survey found that most Muslims in countries where they are in the majority worry about the rise of Islamic extremism at home and abroad. Majorities held that view in Indonesia, Pakistan, Tanzania, Lebanon, Egypt, Jordan and Nigeria. Large numbers of respondents in several Muslim countries also identified struggles within their countries between people who want to modernize the society and those dedicated to maintaining fundamentalist practices of Islam. Regarding respondents' attitudes toward Jews, Britain was the survey's only European country to report no significant increase in anti-Jewish attitudes. more... |
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