Talk:The Holocaust/Archive 2

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List of people who resisted the Holocaust

Please add new reference: Cautious 13:28, 22 Apr 2004 (UTC) Thanks!

Why were the Jews so central to the evil brutality of the Nazis?

It is not that any scholar of the Holocaust needs to believe in God: far from it. But it is, perhaps, necessary that any serious scholar needs to believe that the Nazis believed in God, and the relationship of the Jews - through time and history - to that God. The SS Ahnenerbe (Cultural Research Unit) were involved in establishing a secular faith - man as superman - the Fuhrer eventually to displace a deconstructed God. The history of God in Western Civilisation is indeed the history of the Jews - a Chosen Race, set apart by God. The Nazi's evil demanded that the Jews become the Selected Race - a race thrown down by man. The new (evil) Nazi Millenium was to have a man as the uttermost absolute: all aspiration, all time, all experience, all history, and all meaning were to extend through him to posterity. Previously, (to the Nazi mind) this had been fulfilled by the God of the Jews: God entered human time, human history, and human experience through the Jews. Any man that might take that function of the Godhead onto himself might (in all its evil of application) as the Nazis attempted, push Jewish history aside (and the Jewish Nation too). The concept of Endlosung was born, commissioned and executed. This unthinkable evil was stopped on January 27th - with the liberation of the camps. Hitler was prevented from becoming the secular God as envisioned in Nietszche's "Man as Superman" phrase. So, we can rest assured that there will be no further attempts to wrest the history of God from the Jews ever again...

See From Here originator

Take a proud nation, with a strong identity, that has just lost a war. Take it to, say, a railway-carriage in the backwoods of Compiegne, 1919, and make it pay the most swingeing war-reparations, which will eventually lead to it paying for its bread in notes by the barrow-load. It endures a huge identity-crisis; its on its knees. Let's wrench back our self-esteem they hear someone cry, and they forgive the most horrendous of crimes as that nation pulls itself up by its bootstraps once more. But who has the strongest identity known to mankind? Why, the Jews! Let's get our once proud identity back in shape - we'll have something of theirs - if not their exact identity, at least its potency and strength, the fact that it has stood the test of millenia, and is as strong as ever. Now who, do you suppose, in turning Germany into this identity-crisis in the first-place, unwittingly sewed the seeds of Endlosung? A man with an overwhelming crisis in identity will often reach for the strongest idiom of self that he can imagine, in order to compensate for his weakness; it is often messianic. Are there parallels to be drawn between a mere man and an overthrown state - "man as superman"?

See From Here 12:55, 7 Jan 2004 (UTC)

here, while in the process of removing any overt POV or essay type remarks. Atorpen 22:43 Feb 22, 2003 (UTC)

Good move, Atorpen, I was considering doing something about it when I saw it in Current Events. It's not too bad, but it does need some work. -- Zoe

Two requests

1) Could someone put a caption on the picture in that article? I have no idea where it was taken or when, and it could use a little bit of context. 2) Could we include the total number of people killed in the Holocoaust somewhere in the head of the article? From the WWII article, I see 12 million, but perhaps other people could confirm that? Dachshund 17:06 Apr 11, 2003 (UTC)

Shoah definition

There are two different translations of the word Shoah in this article: one says 'destruction', the other 'desolation'. Which is right? -- Heron

My hebrew translator says "devastation" which is a synonym of "desolation" (but I'm no serious expert) -- Rotem Dan 16:13 1 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Shoah can be used to mean catastrophe, but its original meaning was "destruction by fire." Danny

Thanks, Rotem Dan and Danny. Sorry to quibble, but Google told me a different story: most web sites give the original meaning as 'whirlwind' (e.g. http://www.zipple.com/weeklyzipple/weeklyhebrew.shtml), followed by the more general 'catastrophe'. -- Heron

Shoah in Hebrew means "burnt offering". Holocoste, in French, means the same thing. Len

Does anyone have a source supporting the 7 million figure?

All the academic work on this (neatly summerized here) seems to put the total at between 4.8 & 6.3 million. - Efghij 17:00, 11 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I think the sources in the link are the most reliable and should be used. FearÉIREANN 18:16, 11 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Here is one source:

The Jerusalem Post. Tuesday, May 20, 1997 - 13 Iyar 5757

British documents: 7 million died in Holocaust

By DOUGLAS DAVIS

LONDON (May 20) - The number of Jews killed in the Holocaust might have been closer to seven million than six million, according to previously classified World War II intelligence documents released by Britain's Public Record Office yesterday. The documents, which indicate that the Holocaust started much earlier than previously believed, are based on German messages that were intercepted and deciphered at the top-secret British wartime code-breaking facility at Bletchley Park. The decoding was performed by a machine known as Ultra, whose existence was itself classified until relatively recently. Intelligence produced by the machine is believed to have shortened the length of the war by up to three years.

The documents released yesterday provide details of the extermination of hundreds of thousands of Soviet Jews as early as June 1941, several months before the "Final Solution" is generally believed to have been implemented. The documents provide horrifying early detail of the systematic campaign to destroy European Jewry and are expected to reopen the debate over when the Allied leaders first learned about the destruction of European Jewry. The documents are also liable to again raise questions about why so little was apparently done by the Allies to limit the genocide.

Most of the executions were carried out by German police units, known as Ordnungspolizei, or "Orpo," in conjunction with the SS. The Germans clearly feared that the messages might be intercepted and executions were therefore classified under the euphemisms, "Cleansing Operations" and "Action According to the Usage of War." The decoded messages showed that victims were described as Jews, Jewish plunderers, Jewish Bolsheviks and Russians soldiers. According to the messages, hundreds of thousands of Jews were rounded up and systematically slaughtered in the months following the German invasion of the Soviet Union.

Messages by the Ordnungspolizei ceased in September 1941 after Daluege warned commanders that the enemy might be intercepting the messages and ordered them to send all future reports to Berlin by courier. The British intelligence branch responsible for intercepting wartime German messages has already released a large number of documents, the existence of which were revealed only in the early 1980s, but intercepted messages of the Ordnungspolizei have been retained until now. It is believed a decision was taken to release them because copies of some documents were unclassified by the US last year, provoking charges of a British coverup. Evidence of the scale of the Holocaust is contained in an appendix of "British Intelligence in the Second World War," the official war history by Professor Sir Harry Hinsley and three co-authors. According to Hinsley, the British code-breaking teams reported references to Dachau, Buchenwald, Auschwitz and seven other concentration camps from the spring of 1942 to February 1943.

• When dealing with numbers of this magnitude, my tendency is to avoid playing number games at all. If it was seven million and not six million, does that make the tragedy 16 percent worse? I question whether that is dignifying to the victims, each of whom was an individual, so that each was a tragic loss. To paraphrase Stalin, "Ten is a tragedy; ten million is a statistic." Still, if we must play some number game, I would tend to the more conservative estimates until there is unrefutable proof--and not hypothesis--that the numbers were higher. One factor that has increased the numbers of Einsatzgruppen victims somewhat is information from the former Soviet Union, which only became available recently. Still, the numbers do not total one million. As such, in brief, I would leave the number as 5.8-6.1 million until there was some remarkable evidence (not supposition) to the contrary. Danny 23:31, 11 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I reverted to the generally accepted figures. Unless some serious scholarly work indicates otherwise, I think that is what we should keep. Danny

Please note the link above. There are a number of scholarly works that place the number at between 5 million and 5.8 million, and at least one that says it could have been anywhere between 4.8 & 6.3 million. - Efghij 11:20, 12 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Not a bad list, however, Reitlinger's number is premature (look at the date) and did not account for all the information available (and not available because of political tensions in Europe). THe fact that the number was cited bysome popular reference work does not give it authority. Similarly, the Nuremberg numbers (5.7) may also have been premature. Yisrael Gutman's numbers are probably the most accurate, though even he will admit that he did not have access to all the Soviet records when he did the encyclopedia. Important sources missing from the list are Hilberg and Davidowicz, who would also corroborate Gutman's numbers. I can deal with "just under 6 million." Would that work for you? Danny 11:40, 12 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I think the safest aproach would be to take Gutman's numbers at face value, but note that recent developments have incated the total may be significatly higher. - Efghij 15:18, 12 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I could deal with that, but I would not say "significantly." Personally I would prefer to say "may be slightly higher." Danny 15:34, 12 Aug 2003 (UTC)

We are talking about as many as 900,000 people here. I don't think "slightly" would be approriate. How about we just stick to "may be higher". - Efghij 15:45, 12 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I am very skeptical it would be that much higher. Danny 17:27, 12 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Maybe not, but it is possible that it is in the hundreds of thousands. - Efghij

Danny has a good point. If you say that that the actual count may be "significantly" higher, to many people this word often is interpreted as meaning that the actual amount may be twice as much. Maybe we could say that the numbers "may be somewhat higher"? RK

I guess "significantly" is no good either. I think "somewhat" would be fine. - Efghij 16:02, 12 Aug 2003 (UTC)

• I took out 6 million for the Jews exterminated. I believe they were exterminated, however, after reading many sources with conflicting numbers, it would irresposible to quote numbers of Jews that were inaccurate. Please research this number and quote your sources for and against the amount previously listed, 6 million. Since this is a touchy subject, I believe it's important both sides are heard, even if one side may seem to take an anti-semetic position.Nostrum 09:04, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I put it back in (with a couple of mods). "according to the extensive documentation left behind by the Nazis themselves" says it all and the '5-6 million' range is also the one quoted by nearly every single source I have come across. Only holocaust deniers seriously dispute this range. --mav 10:16, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

As for the questions asked, what kind of documentation would you like to see? There are over a million confiscated Nazi documents archived in Berlin, transcripts of the Nuremberg Trials, including the Einsatzgruppen trial, and works by historians that analyzed this information. Götz Aly, Omer Bartov, and Yisrael Gutman are a German, an American, and an Israeli historian who did this. Jürgen Förster has written about the role of the Wehrmacht in the mass killings by the Einsatzgruppen in the former USSR, and there are literally thousands more books, articles, photographs, videotaped testimonies (some of Lanzmann's Shoah testimony by victims and perpetrators is remarkable). Just let me know. Danny 11:50, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I also don't think it's a good idea to take out the "6 million" figure, merely because it's an estimate -- or even if it's disputed. We can always create a section or separate article on the estimation of the number of victims of the Holocaust. Anyway, the "000,000" part of "6,000,000" ought to ring a bell with anyone who understands numbers: it's clearly an estimate to the nearest million.

Moreover, the ideas that the Holocaust never occurred or has been blown out of proportion are best discussed in Holocaust denial, aren't they? --Uncle Ed 17:33, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I think 6 million is a fair number. FearÉIREANN 18:32, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I think it should be worded as "typically accepted" number being 6 million, but there should be reference and evidence of it varying. Remember Neutral Point of View, we need to equally present both sides, no MATTER what each says and validity of each. If your side is supported by more than you, you have a equal right to be heard.12-7-03 User:patcat88

• I replaced "the extermination of most of Europe's Jewish population", with "...a large portion...". I don't think 6 million out of 9.5 million is most of the population. - Efghij 19:04, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

What math are you working under? 6/9.5 = 63.16%. "Most" means "more than not". Clearly anything over 51% fits the bill. --mav 19:11, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

No it doesn't. Most means "the vast majority of" or "nearly all of". 63% is not "nearly all". - Efghij 19:19, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

If the term most of is troublesome, how about over half of? --Uncle Ed 19:41, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

most adj 1: (superlative of `many' used with count nouns; often preceded

           by `the') quantifier meaning the greatest in number;
           "who has the most apples?"; "most people like eggs";
           "most fishes have fins" [syn: most(a)] [ant: fewest(a)]

Where did you learn your grammar? I don't see anything in the above definition that indicates "vast majority." Tell me this; who has the greatest number of apples? Johnny has 6 and Sue has 4? The issue is moot anyway because I worked around having the word "most" in there by stating actual numbers. --mav

Maybe so, but I think the sentince as it was written gave the wrong impression. Your version is much better. - Efghij 20:38, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Not everyone is as smart as you are, Mav ^_^ and the terms most of or most convey to many minds an impression of a much greater majority than 51%. I would say that "most people" think this way <wink>... --Uncle Ed 14:37, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Considering the sensitive nature of the term "holocaust", as described in the paragraph explaining "Shoah"--I would be in favor of renaming this article "The Destruction" or "The Shoah" though I dont imagine that this will be a popular suggestion. -戴&#30505sv 19:56, Aug 21, 2003 (UTC)

• I was surprised when I read about the "number of people killed by the Nazi regime:

5.6 - 6.1 million Jews ; 3.5 - 6 million Slavic civilians "

I never realised that the number of Slavic people that were killed approached the number of Jews killed. (I find the 2.5-4 million POWs that were killed less surprising, because this happened in the context of war rather than genocide.)I wonder if it is appropriate that only a single sentence in the article is about Slavic people. What proportion of Slavs were killed in concentration camps? I remember my history teacher saying that, if the Nazi state had remained in place, they would have proceeded to systematic (genocidal) extermination of Slavic populations. Maybe it is difficult to make this distinction, but: is the killing of Slavic people to be understood in the context of the war or was its nature fundamentally genocidal?

Could anyone provide more information about this ? - pir 0:15, 11. Sep 2003

The reaction of other countries to the Holocaust

Another question which I feel ought to be addressed in this article (by anyone who knows more than me) concerns the reaction of other countries to the holocaust. The Allies knew that the holocaust was happening, but they did very little to prevent it. Why was this?

- pir 23:38, 14. Sep 2003

There has been at least one book published (I don't recall its author or title) arguing the case that the Western Allies knew all about the Holocaust and could / should have done something / more to "stop" it. From what I have read, the first part of this proposition is incorrect. Of course everyone knew that Hitler was persecuting Jews, but the existence of the death camps was not known until (I think) 1943, when a few survivors' stories were smuggled out. Even then the systematic nature of the Holocaust was not realised until the end of the war. And what were the Allies supposed to do to stop it? Ask Hitler to desist? Threaten him with prosecution? The only thing the Allies could do was to defeat Hitler's armies and destroy his regime, which they did, at the cost of many millions dead. I might do some research on this and submit an article if that seems useful. Dr Adam Carr

I find it impossible to imagine that a state can murder several million people without its enemies getting to know about it. The Allies' intelligence services must have had some information about it. What I can believe is that the Allies were unable to realise the industrial scale of the holocaust, combined maybe, given that anti-Semitism was also common outside of Nazi Germany at that time, with a tendency to look the other way.

What could the Allies have done? It has been suggested they could have bombed the rail tracks that were necessary to transport inmates to death camps.

Yes, it would be great if a historian like you could look into this issue. - pir 8:57, 19. Sep 2003

Of course there is a very large literature on this subject. Most of it is rather polemical, which makes it difficult for the ordinary reader to get a reasonable understanding. A large problem is the wisdom of hindsight --- just because someone was "informed" about something, that does not imply that they "knew" it. Just because something was possible in principle, that doesn't imply that it was a reasonable decision at the time. I would recommend reading both books like "Auschwitz and the Allies" by Martin Gilbert, which are very critical of the Allied behavior, and "The Myth of Rescue: Why the Democracies Could Not Have Saved More Jews from the Nazis" by William Rubenstein, which argues in the other direction. --zero 10:18, 19 Sep 2003 (UTC)

• I think it was the Rubinstein book I was thinking of. I will see if I can find both books and get up to speed on this issue. Pir is I think a little unrealistic about the Allies' ability to know what was going on inside occupied Europe - the Germans made considerable efforts to keep what they were doing a secret (eg by killing all the witnesses). It is true that Roosevelt was an anti-Semite in a genteel sort of way and was inclined to believe that the Jews were always complaining about something. But it was, after all, asking a lot of the Allied leaders to expect them to believe that a civilised people could set out deliberately to murder millions of civilians in cold blood. There is one more point to make, and that is the baleful effect of the atrocity propaganda of World War I (Germans bayonetting Belgian babies etc), which was found after the war to have been mostly fabricated. This made people very reluctant to believe atrocity stories without hard evidence. Dr Adam Carr 08:15, 22 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Agreed. While reports of atrocities managed to filter through to the West, when Jan Karksi of the Polish underground met with Justice Felix Frankfurter of the Supreme Court, a Jew, and gave an eyewitness account of both the Warsaw Ghetto and a death camp, he was told "I don't believe you." This despite almost daily reports of Nazi atrocities in such papers as the New York Times. Danny 11:40, 22 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I think it easy to understand how a man like Frankfurter, who was born in Vienna, found it simply impossible to believe that the Germans could deliberately murder 6 million civilians. And this is really the issue. Although it might have been possible by the end of 1943 to put together all the dribbles of news coming out of eastern Europe and get an idea of what was going on, the concept of a planned systematic genocide was too much for most people, even most Jews, to grasp. My own parents have described to me the absolute blank shock they felt in 1945 when they saw the newsreels of Belsen in a cinema. Despite the many stories about Nazi persecution of the Jews that had appeared in the papers, they had had no idea of what had really been happening. Dr Adam Carr 12:47, 22 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I'm surprised to see that there is no mention of the communists and social democrats exterminated in the holocaust. And Raol Wallenberg isn't there either. BL 22:45, 4 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Holocaust: POV & NPOV

I don't agree that the Holocaust is used by people to exclusively mean the extermination of the Jews, I think that people just know very little about the numbers of Slavs, Roma, Political Dissidents, Homosexuals and Jehovah's Witnesses that were killed, mainly due to the groups lacking any kind of power base in the post-war period (whereas Jews in other countries held a fair bit of power.) I suggest

"The term is primarily used to refer to the systematic extermination of the approximately 6 million of the 9.5 million Jews living in Europe before the war" and "Jewish Holocaust"

are changed. Although you could argue that that is my own POV.

Slizor

• This article is almost entirely Jewish POV only verses NPOV that Wiki prides itself on being. Just as the false morality of the post WWII period tries to falsely portray JEWS as innocents and the Aryans or White Nazi's as all evil, so too, has been the false "monsters" of Palestinians attacking the innocent Israeli's that had dispossessed them and that had murdered them: men, women, and children.

Moved revisionist links. Thanks for contributing, but it was in the wrong place. Ronabop 08:01, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Removed separate number sections. It makes no sense to have fairly different numbers on the same page. Also faster to revert one section. :-) Ronabop 10:07, 26 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Concentration and Extermination Camps

The link Chelmno in the paragraph Concentration and Extermination Camps is regrettably misleading as the article is on the old town Chelmno being located in the Polish district Kujawsko-Pomoskie, whereas the very small village Chelmno on Ner (Chelmno nad Nerem), the site of the extermination camp, is in Wielkopolskie district near Kolo indeed. I am a new wikipedian and don't what to do. Peter Witte 14:54, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Thanks. Please check my changes in Chelmno concentration camp I did according to your notice. You may add more. Another thing to do is to change links from {[Chelmno]} to {[[Chelmno]|Chelmno]} where necessary. They may be easily found by the link "What links here". I will do it. Mikkalai 18:39, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)

"Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it."-George Santayana

For example, does one historical genocide ever justify another?

Palestinian Holocaust and Genocide by Israel---1948-Present

Palestinians are dying, unjustly, that is all that need to be said to act on this issue and change the situation. They live in poverty, unable to govern themselves and build themselves up as a nation due to the extremely strong restrictions that bind them. The anger of such groups as Hamas is understandable, but their use of terrorism hides the integrity of their cause. It is also understandable that Israel takes certain measures to protect their people from terrorism, but they are now destroying a race ? they are committing genocide. It is only when these humanitarian injustices of Palestinians are solved and this unrecognized Holocaust is put to an end that the true path to peace in the Middle East can begin.

This has been an issue for well over 60 years but the international community as a whole has been unable to stop it: hence "Terrorism" and "Suicide Bombers"

"Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it."-George Santayana

For example, does one historical genocide ever justify another?

(cur) (last) . . 14:52, 19 Apr 2004 . . Mirv (rv, reason should be obvious)

It is quite obvious, that Mirv and his ilk don't wish to learn from history and are censoring the TRUTH, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Holocaust&oldid=3253739 http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Holocaust&action=history which will eventually come out, and this selfish pov behaviour will only result in another such tragedy, yet again, in the future.-PV PS-So be it.

This page has a specific topic: the mid-20th-century Nazi genocide

The text you keep trying to insert is not about the mid-20th-century Nazi genocide, therefore it does not belong here. Please stop adding it. The section on the aftereffects links to the places where these ramifications are discussed in full. —No-One Jones 16:27, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

No it isn't. It is about "Holocausts", and "Genocide" both the "Jewish" as being victims then and "Jewish" as being aggressors, today, ie. Zionist Israel.

Today, the term is also used to describe other attempts at genocide, both before and after World War II. More generally, holocaust is used for any overwhelmingly massive and deliberate loss of life, such as that which would result from a nuclear war - sometimes called a "nuclear holocaust".

"Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it."-George Santayana

For example, does one historical genocide ever justify another?

Please add new reference:

List of people who resisted the Holocaust Cautious 13:28, 22 Apr 2004 (UTC) Thanks!

Palestinian Holocaust and Genocide by Israel---1948-Present

Palestinians are dying, unjustly, that is all that need to be said to act on this issue and change the situation. They live in poverty, unable to govern themselves and build themselves up as a nation due to the extremely strong restrictions that bind them. The anger of such groups as Hamas is understandable, but their use of terrorism hides the integrity of their cause. It is also understandable that Israel takes certain measures to protect their people from terrorism, but they are now destroying a race ? they are committing genocide. It is only when these humanitarian injustices of Palestinians are solved and this unrecognized Holocaust is put to an end that the true path to peace in the Middle East can begin. This has been an issue for well over 60 years but the international community as a whole has been unable to stop it: hence "Terrorism" and "Suicide Bombers"

The section is both quite integral to today's genocide and Holocaust of the Palestinian People, today, and resulted in the creation of the Zionist Isreali State and is a critical lesson of history that obviously still needs to be learned by everyone. Therefore, that section is crucial to the article and it also keeps the "events" in proper historical and political and ethnic and religious context.-PV

The section you quote is a brief note on modern usage of the term holocaust; the article itself is about one specific holocaust, i.e. The Holocaust. From the intro: Capitalized, the term Holocaust refers to the Nazis' systematic extermination of various groups they deemed undesirable during World War II. . . —No-One Jones 19:31, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

"The" is very Jewish POV, and NOT WIKI NPOV. The usual Jewish pov bigots are reverting the section. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Holocaust&action=history The section is relevant and refers to the modern usage of the term, and how it applies to existing or potential "holocausts" including the present one against the Palestinian People.-PV PS-Obviously, these pov bigots have not learned the lesson of history and so will have to repeat it, again, and again, and again....until . . . flatline!

(I'll ignore the nonsense about "Jewish POV" for the time being.) If you just want to note that the term has been applied to Israeli policy in the occupied territories, then what you say is "[So-and-so] calls Israeli policy in the occupied territories a 'holocaust'."—but don't cut and paste that lengthy paragraph into the introduction. —No-One Jones 19:55, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

"(I'll ignore the nonsense about "Jewish POV" for the time being.)"

Only because it is clear that "The" is obviously not "objective". 60 million or more innocent Non-Jews died in WWII, and yet, only 10% of that total seems to matter to you because they were "Jews"?

"If you just want to note that the term has been applied to Israeli policy in the occupied territories, then what you say is "[So-and-so] calls Israeli policy in the occupied territories a 'holocaust'."—but don't cut and paste that lengthy paragraph into the introduction. —No-One Jones 19:55, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)"

It is clear that the author of that article calls Israeli policies in the occupied territories "Genocide" and a "Holocaust", unless of course, in your pov subjectivity, that would violate your "The Holocaust" industry trademark?

The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering by Norman G. Finkelstein

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Editorial Reviews The Nation When it comes to analyzing how 'The Holocaust' has been employed to advance political interests, Finkelstein is at his best.

The Economist His basic argument that memories of the Holocaust are being debased is serious and should be given its due.

New York Press [S]cathing in his denunciation of the institutions and individuals who have cropped up around the issue of reparations. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

New Statesman A lucid, provocative and passionate book. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

LA Weekly Finkelstein's downright pugilistic book delivers a wallop. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

The Guardian The most controversial book of the year. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

The Jewish Quarterly Breathtaking in [its] angry accuracy and irony. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

About the Author Norman Finkelstein teaches at the City University of New York and contributes to the London Review of Books. He is the author of Image and Reality of the Israel Palestine Conflict and (with Ruth Bettina Birn) A Nation on Trial, named a notable book for 1998 by the New York Times Book Review.

Book Description

In an iconoclastic and controversial new study, Norman G. Finkelstein moves from an interrogation of the place the Holocaust has come to occupy in American culture to a disturbing examination of recent Holocaust compensation agreements. It was not until the Arab-Israeli War of 1967, when Israel's evident strength brought it into line with US foreign policy, that memory of the Holocaust began to acquire the exceptional prominence it enjoys today. Leaders of America's Jewish community were delighted that Israel was now deemed a major strategic asset and, Finkelstein contends, exploited the Holocaust to enhance this newfound status. Their subsequent interpretations of the tragedy are often at variance with actual historical events and are employed to deflect any criticism of Israel and its supporters. Recalling Holocaust fraudsters such as Jerzy Kosinski and Binjamin Wilkomirski, as well as the demagogic constructions of writers like Daniel Goldhagen, Finkelstein contends that the main danger posed to the memory of Nazism's victims comes not from the distortions of Holocaust deniers but from prominent, self-proclaimed guardians of Holocaust memory. Drawing on a wealth of untapped sources, he exposes the double shakedown of European countries as well as legitimate Jewish claimants, and concludes that the Holocaust industry has become an outright extortion racket. Thoroughly researched and closely argued, The Holocaust Industry is all the more disturbing and powerful because the issues it deals with are so rarely discussed.

Relatedly, the term "Black Holocaust" has come into use to refer to African American slavery

Perhaps what we need is a disambig on Holocaust. Or possibly a section referring to other Holocausts. At the very least, the article does need some other holocausts. But the current Palestinian section at the beginning is a mess, and ought go away. Snowspinner 23:40, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Snowjob spinner" is more like it. Do not revert relevant article sections.

I've yet to revert a relevent one. Snowspinner 00:11, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I guess it is only a "relevant" one to you "Snowjob" when "JEWS" are dying at the hands of "Non-Jews" and not ever the other way around? YOU are the actual one that is being a pov "vandal" and pov "troll" by deleting relevant sections of the article. Your "lying hypocrisy" and "Malignant Narcissism" is so typical for your ilk.

Wow, who would have guessed that every Wikipedia user who's ever argued with Paul has "malignant narcissism"? It's really surprising how he can diagnose this based on a couple of edits, too. . . :-) No-One Jones 00:28, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Not me. But, then again, if the shoe fits? A "couple of edits"? Hardly. More like scores of edits and all by the same lying and hypocritical and pov and psychological projectionist "ilk" as "Mirv", ad nauseum. Go figure?

(Palestinians): OK, short form of where I am on this

1) Person editing in mentions of Palestinians is an anti-Semitic troll.

2) I am not opposed to discussing the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. I am largely sympathetic to the Palestinians. However, this is not the appropriate article for that issue.

3) Even if it were the appropriate article, the information being added was non-encyclopedic and not suitable for the position in the article in which it was being placed. Considering the aforementioned anti-Semitic troll nature of the author, I did not feel particularly inclined to waste my time revising it for them.

Snowspinner 00:37, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

"1) Person editing in mentions of Palestinians is an anti-Semitic troll."

My mentioning of the Palestinian Holocaust and Genocide hardly makes me "anti-Semitic", which is a misnomer and adding this truth does not make me any "troll", and both are nothing but slanderous "personal insults", and no more and no less.

"2) I am not opposed to discussing the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. I am largely sympathetic to the Palestinians. However, this is not the appropriate article for that issue."

It is "very appropriate" because this is "the lesson of history" that MUST BE LEARNED by all, or another "Jewish Holocaust" is VERY LIKELY to happen again.

"3) Even if it were the appropriate article, the information being added was non-encyclopedic and not suitable for the position in the article in which it was being placed. Considering the aforementioned anti-Semitic troll nature of the author, I did not feel particularly inclined to waste my time revising it for them. Snowspinner 00:37, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)"

The article section is "quite appropriate" for the reasons I have just given, what information, specifically, was "not suitable" and "why" for the position in the article? HOW DARE you personally insult me with falsely and personally insulting me and calling me any "anti-Semitic" or "troll nature" because you do not understand just how relevant and important that section within the article actually is? You are such an narrow-minded bigot that you do not see what the future holds for all Jews, everywhere, with your own selfish and biased bigotry and ignorant pov editing of the truth. A blood curse be upon all of your ilk that always censors the Truth for any such selfish and foolish and bigoted narrow-mindedness!

1) My claim of your anti-Semitic trolling nature is based on your behavior on this page.

2) Aside from being pure POV, that's not relevent to a discussion on the Nazi holocaust.

3) I'm not at all sure how to respond to a blood curse. I suppose I'm flattered. Snowspinner 00:58, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

"1) My claim of your anti-Semitic trolling nature is based on your behavior on this page."

Your "claim" is a completely false one, and it is personally insulting. Palestinians are Semites, too. Therefore, the term "anti-Semitic" is a misnomer. Telling their side of the story is NOT any my "trolling nature", whatsoever.

"2) Aside from being pure POV, that's not relevent to a discussion on the Nazi holocaust."

It is relevant to a discussion of the term "holocaust", which is NOT POV. ANY HOLOCAUST.

"3) I'm not at all sure how to respond to a blood curse. I suppose I'm flattered. Snowspinner 00:58, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)"

You shouldn't really be "flattered" at all. Such "blood curses" always do come true, eventually, as did the one when the Jesus was murdered by the same ilk that chose pov and selfish bigotry over the Truth. I was only warning you that the "Jewish Holocaust" of 50-60 years ago would not be the last, if the real lessons to be learned from it, were not learned, and were not actually taken to heart. Obviously, the same ilk then, 50-60 years ago, even 2000 years ago, is the very same ilk, now. Time is running out. Kalki or Jesus will return, them being only the "symbolic representations" of the sword of TRUTH, which is ETERNAL. Good luck!

Blood curses and ilks

I'm placing this here to a certain blocked user, because I'm sure he will read it here at some point:

You have been blocked from editing: we have a no personal attacks policy. Attempts to evade your block and continued casting of blood curses will do nothing to further your cause. Thank you for your concern in this matter - Fennec 01:33, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

• You know, when you're blocked from editing, you should really take the hint.

If you want to put a section at the end of the article about disputes over whether or not "The Holocaust" is an appropriate term, I wouldn't blink. Well, I might edit it for coherence, since that seems to be a difficulty for you, but I wouldn't delete it out of hand. But putting the material you are putting, in boldface, where you are putting it is not appropriate. Snowspinner 01:28, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

As is usual, such Wiki "no personal attacks" and such "no more than 3 revert" policies only apply to "others" and never to yourself and your own "ilk". The usual "Double-Standard". Obviously, the only ones being "blood cursed" are only those that actually are "lying hypocrites" and that are always censoring the TRUTH.

"HOW DARE you personally insult me with falsely and personally insulting me and calling me any "anti-Semitic" or "troll nature" because you do not understand just how relevant and important that section within the article actually is? You are such an narrow-minded bigot that you do not see what the future holds for all Jews, everywhere, with your own selfish and biased bigotry and ignorant pov editing of the truth. A blood curse be upon all of your ilk that always censors the Truth for any such selfish and foolish and bigoted narrow-mindedness!"

I stand by EVERY WORD I SAID, and if the shoe fits, you do wear it well! :D

You know, when you're blocked from editing, you should really take the hint.

You know, when you are being a "lying hypocrite" and are always censoring the TRUTH, you should NOT ban others for what you and your own ilk are actually doing. Does it require any "blood curse" for you and your own ilk to take the hint? Or will it take another Holocaust, before you finally learn the lesson?

If you want to put a section at the end of the article about disputes over whether or not "The Holocaust" is an appropriate term, I wouldn't blink. Well, I might edit it for coherence, since that seems to be a difficulty for you, but I wouldn't delete it out of hand. But putting the material you are putting, in boldface, where you are putting it is not appropriate. Snowspinner 01:28, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

"The" is NOT appropriate nor NPOV. The Jewish Holocaust would be NPOV. Where the material is located is very relevant and appropriate. Bold-facing is really not any valid issue one way or the other with me.-PV

As it stands, this is an article on what is typically referred to as "The Holocaust" - that is, the extermination of Jews by the Nazis in Europe. I would be quite open to making the page a disambiguation page, since other groups lay claim to the concept of Holocaust. However, it is not currently that. If you want to try setting up a disambig page, perhaps we can work from there. Snowspinner 17:38, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It is clear that a cabal of censorous pov bigots have falsely accused me of being a "troll", "vandal", or of making "abusive comments" on some TalkPages, or of "breaking the 3-revert rule". This is psychological projection by a pov mob or ilk of lying hypocrites. I do request Sam Spade, to be my "advocate", and I also can provide evidence to demonstrate the fact that those here attempting to have me banned and to have me censored, are themselves "trolls", "vandals", and have themselves broken the 3-revert rule and have hurled "personal insults" and have abused and used slanderous and false personal insults and "abusive comments" as their own stock in trade and in their own pov bigoted and biased campaign of "character assassination".-PV

PS--"The" is NOT NPOV, whatsoever! "The Jewish Holocaust", would be NPOV.

Disambig page?

Altough general usage of the phrase "The Holocaust" is taken to refer to the extermination of the Jews at the hands of the Nazis, there are other groups that do lay claim to the term. Notably, American slavery is referred to by some as the "Black Holocaust," there is the doomsday situation of a nuclear Holocaust, and, as PV has shown, there are those who refer to the treatment of Palestinians by Israel as the Palestinian Holocaust.

Now, I do not agree with the reasonableness of all of these claims. However, they are usages of the word, and in the case of several (Particularly the Palestinian and Black Holocausts), the word is used in explicit contrast to the Jewish Holocaust. There are a couple of ways we could deal with this, as I see it.

1) Ignore all other usages of the word Holocaust. This, I think, is a terrible idea.

2) Address all of the Holocausts in the main text of Holocaust, either fully or as links to separate articles. This will, I think, rapidly make the [[Holocaust}] article unusable, and unless they are given equal treatment to the Jewish Holocaust, does not fix the POV problems.

3) Turn Holocaust into a disambig page, with separate pages for each of the individual holocausts. This page could fairly note that when people simply speak of "The Holocaust," they are referring to the extermination of the Jews by the Nazis, but that other groups identify holocausts as occuring in their past.

Thoughts on this? Snowspinner 15:34, 22 Apr 2004 (UTC)

No need for a disambig page, I think; the other uses of the word are comparatively minor in frequency to the Holocaust conducted by the Nazis (which did not target only Jews, but millions of other 'undesirables', as well - Communists, political dissidents, gays, mental patients, Slavs, Gypsies, Jehovah's Witnesses, common criminals, and others.)

Usages such as "Black Holocaust" and "Palestinian Holocaust" are not common and are politically loaded attempts to derive sympathy for another group through association with the Holocaust conducted by the Nazis. They should be noted here, but they are not so widespread that this needs to be turned into a disambig page. Kwertii 16:36, 22 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Although the usages are much more minor in comparison to the Jewish Holocaust, that is, I think, part of the point of the terms. And, while I agree that they are politically loaded attempts, NPOV and all. There are substantive groups that refer to both, and prominant people who refer to both. (Spike Lee, for instance, talks frequently of the Black Holocaust, and pro-Palestinian voicse frequently use the Palestinian Holocaust.) It's our job to document the meanings of terms - not to judge the validity of said meanings. Unfortunately, "Holocaust" has been co-opted. I wish it hadn't been, but we do need to address that. I'm perfectly willing (Indeed, eager) to have the disambig page note that the term is most often used to refer to the Jewish holocaust. Snowspinner 17:03, 22 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I think that when ~98% of the usages of a term refer to one particular usage, and the other 2% to something else, then it is not judgemental to have the primary page be about what 98% of the usages of that term refer to. Certainly we should mention something about the other 2%, but these mentions should be of relatively minor stature compared to the vastly more common usage. A disambig page is called for only in cases when the usage frequencies of the multiple meanings of a term approach a more even level. Kwertii 22:58, 22 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I think a disambig page is also deserved in a case of extremely high political sentiments and tensions, which is what we have here. Put another way, just because a viewpoint is minority doesn't mean that ignoring it isn't POV. Snowspinner 23:06, 22 Apr 2004 (UTC)

+1 on a disambig notice on top of the page, rather than replacing the page. That way, the 5% of the US who considers "the holocaust of the nations" to be relevant gets a voice, the 20-30% of Serb/Croat/Kosovo gets a voice, etc. Those who consider the WWII murders are noted, and those who have since (or previously) used the term (for deliberate genocide) are not dishonored by a lack of any mention. Ronabop 12:01, 23 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I agree, disambig on the top of the page rather than replacing the page, then everyone's more or less happy. Kwertii 10:17, 24 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Yep - a disambig block would be best in this case. --mav 10:28, 24 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Holocaust with capital H, the historical holocaust. holocaust with lower case h, the word holocaust. BL 02:44, Apr 25, 2004 (UTC)

I removed the picture of Himmler in 1936. It can be argued that that was taken pre-Holocaust. It certainly was pre-Wannsee, invasion of the USSR, invasion of Poland, and Kristallnacht. I am not stating that it is not Holocaust-related, but at the time, Dachau was used primarily as a camp for political prisoners. IZAK, please be very careful when dealing with the terminologies, dates, and facts of the Holocaust. Danny 03:35, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

Extent of the Holocaust

The Extent of the Holocaust section needs some reworking. There are figures and groups of people listed that are not part of the Nazis systematic extermination plans. While Slavs (like me) were deemed inferior by the Nazis, there was never a "Final Solution" proposed for the "Slavic Question" nor were Slavs massivly interred in concentration camps/systematic death mechanism.

For the time being I've split the section into groups targetted directly by Nazi ideology and those not.

This may warrant two sections - one explaining the nature of the Holocaust as systematic planned industrial murder versus war brutality/attrocities/unplanned genocide.

David <dynerman@cs.wisc.edu> 06:40, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

When did the Holocaust actually "begin"?

Hi Danny: So 1936 does not count as "THE" Holocaust? Says who? Essentially the Holocaust commences with Hitler's rise to power in 1933, just as the war started in stages before it's "official" start in 1939. The difference between a "concentration camp" and a "death camp" exists purely in the minds of latter-day arm-chair academics, it made no difference to the victims as they died in both. They were called lageren by Jews and I never heard of the survivors talking about any "differences" in the "management styles" of concentration vs. death camps like modern tourists measure lodgings by "stars". Are you a guardian of Holocaust "puritanicalism" or something, as you seem very strident about it. Anyhow, just doing my share. IZAK 06:11, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

No, the Holocaust didn't begin at least until the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, when mass killings started. Before the war, people were not mass murdered in concentration camps - Dachau in 1936 was completely different from Auschwitz in 1942 (or even from Dachau in 1942). And I find it hard to understand how one can claim that "the war started in stages" before September 1, 1939. Hitler's Germany, although certainly making aggressive moves before then, did not actually make war with any foreign states. At any rate, I don't see how you can claim that a death camp like Treblinka, where nobody lived, and people were just taken to be murdered, is only semantically different from concentration camps, where people lived for long periods of time. Auschwitz is confusing, because it was both, but you clearly have no idea what you're talking about. john 06:47, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

john:You have obvioulsy not studied the "Rise and Fall of the Third Reich", 1933-1945. Adolf Hitler had very clear "objectives" as he outlined them in his Mein Kampf. He started on a "small scale" in Germany where he sent many people to their deaths in concentration camps during the 1930s. His participation in the Spanish Civil War in 1936, his annexation of Austria in the Anschluss of 1938, and his ripping apart of Czechoslovakia and getting the Sudetenland in 1939, by hook or by crook, were all acts of aggression. Wherever he operated, destruction followed for HIS enemies, be they political or national, or all Jews whom he hated and plotted to destroy. His record of anti-Semitism and killing of German Jews from 1933 until 1939 is well known. All this is considered to be part-and-parcel of World War Two (obviously, the "official" start of "hostilities" is when Hitler's tanks rolled into Poland on Sept 1st, 1939) and it's an integral part of the Holocaust as well. Hit those history books again, and catch up on that time period. IZAK 07:18, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

I disagree (with john). Holocaust scholars such as Hannah Arendt agree that the Holocaust begins in 1939 at the latest. Do some research and some reading. Kristallnacht is widly considered to be part of the Holocaust, and that predates the start of the war.

Perhaps because I am one of those "armchair" academics, I am very strident about Holocaust "puritanicalism." Let's start one by one. Yes, people spoke of the camps, but "death camp" is still a specific term that refers to the Reinhardt camps. It refers to camps whose sole purpose was to kill. For sources, you might want to check Yitzhak Arad's Operation Reinhard Death Camps, for starters. Yes, people died in both, but I am sure you would agree that there was a preference among people who arrived in Auschwitz would rather pass through selection and become slave laborers, even Musselmen, than go straight to the gas chambers. In Belzec or Sobibor, that option really did not exist. In Dachau or Buchenwald, gas chambers did not exist. As for when the Holocaust "began," you seem to be taking an extreme Intentionalist position, it seems obvious that until 1940, there was no clear attempt to kill Jews just because they were Jews. In fact, Hitler was trying to get them out of Germany--consider Kindertransport, the Bermuda Conference, etc. Even after teh invasion of Poland, Jews were able to negotiate with the Nazis in Poland to have some relaxation of anti-Jewish decrees (see, for instance, Czerniakow's diary entries on how the initial plan for establishing a ghetto in Warsaw was foiled and postponed for a year). Finally, conflating and confusing Holocaust events does not help to forward a bette understanding of their real enormity--it simply serves the interests of those who would deny them. As for "doing some research and some reading" on the topic, I teach the subject. What real research and reading have you done? Danny 10:47, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

Hi Danny:There is that old English expression of "can't see the wood for the trees" (or something like that). Sometimes, as you claim to be a "Holocaust expert", when dealing with mountains of voluminous minutia, one can lose sight of the fact that it was ONLY a "TWELVE YEAR (3rd) REICH". We are not talking about "normal" Jewish history measured in millenia when analysing the roots and culmination of the Holocaust and its connectedness with the origins of World War Two. As for "the camps", I am well-aware that some were designed as "modern industrialized mass killing factories" with "Gas" and "poison" facilities, whereas others were "only" places wher people were starved, beaten, tortured, SHOT or humiliated to death at various rates. So yes, one can safely dispute what you have to say on the subject both based on facts and logic. (P.S. My academic credentials are very good, but that is a discussion for another time). Take care. IZAK 23:04, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

Picture of Himmler at Dachau

I would, while you are at it, like to know what evidence you have that the person Himmler is speaking to was actually a Jew interned in Dachau for racial reasons and not a political prisoner of some sort. Not that I am belittling the suffering of others, mind you, but most inmates in Dachau in 1936 were not Jews who were slated for extermination. Danny 10:59, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

Danny: The point of the picture is that it SHOWS Himmler PERSONALLY inspecting a notorious concentration camp, it is a powerful shot of evil in action. As for the poor chap who had to smell Himmler's bad ("Aryan") breath, I dunno what happened to him, don't you think you are asking an unfair question by asking for the "identity" of one of millions of FACELESS victims? What's with you? IZAK 23:04, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

IZAK, your academic credentials may be what they are, but I wonder if they are in Holocaust studies or even general Jewish history, based on what you say. Yes the concentration camps were places of death, but they were not death camps. "Death camps" or "extermination centers" are very specific terms in Holocaust history and refer to a specific phase in the genocide. Just as pogrom is not genocide, concentration camp is not death camp. Both are bad. Both result in death, but yes, there is a difference in the intent of the camps. Even the article makes that distinction (as unclear as I contend it is--and I removed Maly Trostenets too, after consulting with one of the world authorities on that camp today), even though 200 thousand people were killed there. I would also have removed Ponary had it been put in the list. As for the Third Reich lasting just twelve years, yes, of course, but as early as Hilberg, stages have been identified regarding what happened in that time. We can debate for ever whether it was planned from the beginning--it is a major historical debate--but even so, certain actions committed by the Nazis were not mass murder. The Nuremberg Laws or the One Day Boycott were not, just as Kristallnacht was not (how many of the 20-30 thousand Jews arrested in Kristallnacht were later released?). As for the Dachau picture, of course Himmler knew about the concentration camps. That does not mean that the prisoners in the concentration camps were Jews. Hjalmar Schacht, who was tried at Nuremberg, was also imprisoned in a concenration camp. The person Himmler was speaking to was neither Jewish nor Gypsy. He was probably a political prisoner, given the year, his apparent health, etc. Are you prepared to say that all of Nazism's victims in any form and for any reason were victims of the Holocaust? By posting the picture the way you do, that is precisely what you are saying. Of course, you have just eliminated the element of genocide from the Holocaust. I wonder if you are prepared to do that. Danny 04:20, 20 May 2004 (UTC) (who happens to develop and run educational programs at a Holocaust museum as a profession--not a bad credential for dealing with the subject)

Danny: First of all, who said anything about "Pogroms", that is not the subject of Hitler's twelve year reign of terror. The subject is the Holocast, and its "dating". To my way of thinking, it's one unit. Hitler had a plan: To get rid of the Jews. He passed the Nuremburg Laws in order to deligitamize the Jews, even as he allowed many to leave Germany if anyone would have them. Then he burnt down their synagogues in order to crush their religion, and simultaneously he laid down the groundwork and infrastructure for the concentration/death/internment camps. Once the war commenced in full fury everything went into high gear to kill as many (preferably all the Jews ASAP), the einsatzgroupen didn't even stand on "formalities" they just shot Jews en masse wherever and whenever they were rounded up. When even this proved to be too cumbersome, huge facilities are constructed to gas thousands of people per day and dispose of their remains in crematoria. This entire process is the "THE HOLOCAUST", even though you want to say that, that at only that specific point when they "make up their minds" to set up Auschwitz-type facilties is the Holocaust "on", otherwise it's just "another day" in World War Two. Unfortunately it seems that "the experts", having time on their hands, have chosen to chop up and over-analyze the well-planned and "executed" (pun intended) mass-murder of Europe's Jews during the TWELVE YEAR Third Reich, and in their over-analytical zeal have categorized and labeled events in ways that squeeze the meaning out of a lot of what the Holocaust was really all about from start to finish. IZAK 02:26, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

Hitler's declarations

I am only trying to learn on the subject... Quote from above: "it seems obvious that until 1940, there was no clear attempt to kill Jews just because they were Jews." --- on January 30, 1939, Hitler spoke to the Reichstag ...: "If international Jewish financiers inside and outside Europe again succeed in plunging the nations into a world war," Hitler insisted, "the result will not be the bolshevization of the earth and with it the victory of Jewry, but the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe." ([1], [2]) BTW, note Jews as capitalist financiers and bolsheviks in the same sentence. --Humus sapiens|Talk 05:39, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

Hitler saying shit in a speech does not mean there was a plan to kill Jews. I doubt you'd find any historians (except maybe Lucy Davidowicz) who believe that anymore, even quasi-intentionalists like Eberhard Jäckel. At any rate, Hitler very clearly did not actually start active genocide until after Barbarossa, at earliest, whatever he thought of the Jews. Certainly, what was going on in Dachau in 1936 bore little real relationship to the later Holocaust. john 05:49, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

• johny boy: Watch your language, ok? IZAK 02:26, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

But "active genocide" is not simply an act of unprepared mass murder. It was a long sequence of steps: think about the census (thanks IBM), the logistics, etc. Officially announcing in Reichstag the impending annihilation seems crucial IMHO. --Humus sapiens|Talk 06:50, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

The actual word Hitler used was "ausrottung". There is no clear english translation. Since I speak a bit of german, I would translate it as "out (aus) with the rotting matter (rottung)". Not "kill the rot", or "destroy anyone and everything related to the the rot, in brutal gas chambers and death and work camps", but simply "out with the rotting matter".

-> This is absolut wrong.better use dictionary. 'etwas ausrotten' = 'to exterminate something' http://dict.leo.org [mop] This phrase would be a sane and normal thing for any politician to say (eliminate the festering corruption of society, etc.) , even today. Politicians campaign all the time on "getting rid of corruption". Hitler started out with getting rid of "corrupt Jews", and kept going until the most innocent child was a target. Some discussion (via Irving): http://www.fpp.co.uk/Auschwitz/docs/Ausrottung/argument.html Ronabop 11:19, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Not quite correct. "ausrotten" means "completely annihilate", or "extirpate", to pull out with the root (figuratively), or to "root out". The word is related to "roden" = rooting out trees, to clear land for cultivation. (However, in the context of trees, only "roden" is used, never "ausrotten".) Aleph4 18:45, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)

So Lucy Davidowicz would say. I don't think many scholars would agree with her anymore. Again, there is no evidence that the Nazis were planning on genocidal mass murder before early 1941 or so. The Madagascar thing was not just misdirection - there was actual planning for moving the Jews there, before it was determined to be impracticable. In the ghettoes in Poland, the people who advocated just letting the Jews starve actually lost in 1940 in an internal dispute with the people who wanted to keep the Jews around to do work. Certainly, before the actual outbreak of war, the Nazis' purpose seems to have been to get the Jews out of Germany, rather than to murder them. At any rate, none of this changes the fact that what was going on in Dachau in 1936 had practically nothing to do with the Jews, and even less to do with the Holocaust. john 16:02, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

john old chap:

• You say "there is no evidence": The guy just gave you a STATEMENT Hitler made in his own Reichstag (in law, statements by defendents count as testimy in case you don't know this). IZAK 02:26, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
  • As I said before, Hitler making random threats in a speech is not the same thing as actual planning to commit genocide. john 03:03, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
    • Hitler meant what he said and said what he meant. This is something Neville Chamberlain did not grasp, but Winston Churchill understood full well as he took Mein Kampf and ALL of Hitler's public rants LITERALLY and seriously.IZAK 03:29, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
• You say: "The Madagascar thing was not just misdirection - there was actual planning for moving the Jews there", yea sure, they were gonna put all those nice little Jewish old ladies and their grandchildren on the "Bismark" and ship them ten thousand miles around the world, and do this till they had safely transported six million innocent Jewish civilians so that they should not come into harm's way as Hitler went about destroying one country after another. How quaint. You think the Nazis were THAT "kind"? IZAK 02:26, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
  • How is it kind to move millions of Jews to an inhospitable, already inhabited tropical island where it was assumed that a huge number would die of disease and malnutrition? This only seems even vaguely "kind" in light of the unutterable horror that actually did happen. Have you actually read about the Holocaust, or are you just entirely talking out of your ass? john 03:03, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
    • Your tendency to use foul language makes it hard to have a serious scholarly discussion with you. IZAK 03:29, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
• You say: "In the ghettoes in Poland, the people who advocated just letting the Jews starve actually lost in 1940 ", aw shucks now, they "lost" hey, it was like sorta a game between the Mets and the Red Sox? And starving people by the hundreds of thousands is "not really" a Holocaust huh? Guess everyone was waiting around for the "opening season" when the "real Holocaust" would get underway. IZAK 02:26, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
  • The whole point is that they decided not to purposefully starve all the Jews to death, because more reasonable people who wanted to use the Jews for labor (not to say these people are at all morally admirable, just that they were less insane than the true believers) won out in bureaucratic infighting. john 03:03, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
    • I don't think you get it, there were NO "more reasonable people", you obviously have no clue about how Hitler has mass-hypnotized his people. Have you seen any Nazi movies such as made by Leni Riefenstahl?
• You say: "an internal dispute with the people who wanted to keep the Jews around to do work". Is the same "work" that it said on Auscwitz's entrance Arbeit Macht Frei ("Work makes you free"). You think it was "work" in any normal sense? It was SLAVE LABOR intended to kill the workers. This was no "(National) Socialist workers party (NAZI) paradise", buddy. IZAK 02:26, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
  • It was slave labor. And the lives of the workers were of little value to those running them. But this is not the same thing as the genocide in the gas chambers, or as the mass shootings on the Eastern Front. To make a distinction is not to excuse. john 03:03, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
    • This was NOT levels of "labor arbitration" going on, it's a GENOCIDAL WAR meant to wipe out the Jews, they were debating the means and not the goals.IZAK
• You say:"Certainly, before the actual outbreak of war, the Nazis' purpose seems to have been to get the Jews out of Germany, rather than to murder them". You know why, because at that point they were still trying to BLUFF their way to world power and they always hoped they could get the US and Britain on their side againt the eventual show-down with the communists and the USSR. On the side they were killing Jews on a "small scale" as they headed for World War when the Nazis lost all their inhibitions and went full-gun to kill the Jews entirely. It was all one Holocaust. The Nazis of 1940-1945 WERE NO DIFFERENT than the Nazis of 1933-1939. IZAK 02:26, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
  • The people may have been no different, but what they were doing was certainly different. And it was different because the circumstances were different. In general, it is thought that Hitler's public threats against the Jews were intended to cow the British and Americans out of opposing Hitler, since Hitler thought those countries were already run by the Jews. That is to say, it was all about public propaganda, not the revelation of an actual plan to murder Jews. john 03:03, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
    • Again you show how you and others then and now underestimate/d Hitler's thoughts, speeches, and actions. IZAK 03:29, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
• And you end off by saying: "At any rate, none of this changes the fact that what was going on in Dachau in 1936 had practically nothing to do with the Jews, and even less to do with the Holocaust", as if you have "proven" anything, which you haven't. What was happening at Dachau in 1936 had plenty do with Jews as some were sent there, and it became the trial run (you know, like "spring training is related to the baseball season", which is an anlogy you should understand, I guess). IZAK 02:26, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
  • What are you talking about? There may have been a few Jews in Dachau, but just about everyone there in 1936 was a political prisoner. And they weren't being murdered. I fail to see the connection to the Holocaust. All bad things done by the Nazis are not the same.john 03:03, 21 May 2004 (UTC)
    • From the minute Hitler came to power in 1933, Germany's Jews' days were numbered, something they themsleves were slow to grasp at first. There are plenty of accounts of Jews' being killed innocently then by all sorts of means. Shall we look up the "ledgers" of Dachau to see who was and wasn't killed there?IZAK 03:29, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

Izak, why don't you read a fucking book, instead of just coming here and being ignorant? For Hitler's anti-Jewish policy before World War II, I'd recommend Saul Friedländer's book. For the Holocaust itself, why don't you read some good structuralist stuff like Hans Mommsen? Your head will probably explode. Christopher Browning's "Beyond Intentionalism and Functionalism" is also worth a read. There's a whole ton of historical literature on the subject of the Holocaust. Why don't you read a little bit of it, and then get back to us? john 03:03, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

johny boy: Again I say, watch your mouth. Vulgarity has no place here whatsoever. What anyone has or has not read is not the subject here. We can't go around sending each other "reading lists" in the hope that we should agree on the disagreeable. No-one "owns" the Holocaust, least of all vulgarians. IZAK 03:08, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

Whatever. There's no point in debating a subject with somebody who doesn't know anything about the topic they're debating. BTW, what "reading list" on the holocaust would you send me? Lucy Davidowicz and William Shirer? Maybe some Daniel Jonah Goldhagen? john 03:13, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

Johny: Now it's "whatever", is it that tough to have an intelligent discussion without resorting to four-letter words or hiding behind the tomes of pious pompous "talking heads" who write books and then get people to read them as "required course material". IZAK 03:29, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

I responded to each of your points. You have yet to respond. And how can you expect to have anything useful to say about a subject without having read any of the major books written about it? John Kenney 03:30, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

"Intentionalists" vs. ?

Sorry, I see you have responded. All I see are assertions that the extremist Lucy Davidowicz intentionalist position is correct. The mass hypnosis stuff is particularly laughable - Leni Riefenstahl was creating propaganda films to create the impression that German people were hypnotized by Hitler. After Hitler was gone, it was very convenient for Germans to claim they had been hypnotized by Hitler's stunning oratory. That is to say, this is an apologetic argument made by Germans to avoid responsibility for Nazi crimes. The actual facts are rather more mundane. I'd add that your tendency to take offense at me using the occasional curse word instead of actually responding to the arguments I make makes debate with you rather difficult. John Kenney 03:35, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

• Ah yes, Mr. Kenney, this is indeed a new sort of "argument" you present here, that in order to present your views you have a need to resort to four-letter words, and if not, you find it hard to fully and frankly express yourself. This is a very unique and odd argument and "logic", and frankly I don't buy it as you seem to have an excellent command of English and the ability to organize and state your points of view. You know, if you were in the company of one of those great scholars you are so fond of quoting, you wouldn't inject language not befitting a true scholar. One thing I do see though, is that we are NOT talking the "same language", as you insist on quoting people who you believe to be "objective" Holocaust scholars, whereas I do not have to buy into every new professor's book. Maybe if we can talk about FACTS and EVENTS and not just opinions it would be easier, then again you think I am some sort of devotee of Lucy Davidowitz, which I am not, even though I may say things that sound like her views, hey thanks for telling me that, as I take it as a compliment, and yet you have placed her as some sort of "intentionalist", well I'd like to know EXACTLY WHO coined that term "intentionalist", was it a Holocaust denier maybe?IZAK 03:58, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

The word intentionalism is a standard descriptor for one of the two main schools of thought on the Third Reich. It has nothing to do with holocaust denial. John Kenney 04:09, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

• Dear John: So if that is the case then, why do you get so "hysterical" when you hear something identified with another "school of thought". I see you have never studied Talmud (one of the main things most Holocaust male victims of Eastern Europe were very familiar with), as there is no "sin" in Judaism of belonging to another reputable "school of thought" that is working within the bounds of human decency and morality. Now as for this dude "Christopher Browning" would you say that he hates or loves Jews personally? As this book of his "Beyond Intentionalism and Functionalism" smacks of a very strong anti-Judaic bias. (I hope I'm wrong, but my sixth sense tells me he is one of those academics with an intellectual axe to grind against a "Jewish" way of looking at things.) IZAK 07:09, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

You are truly not worth discussing anything with. I have no problem discussing calmly the sort of intentionalism propounded clearly and politely by Humus Sapiens, although I certainly take issue with much of it, and think it's an overly simplistic way of looking at the holocaust. You, on the other hand, are an ignorant ranter. Quit accusing everyone of anti-semitism. Christopher Browning, one of the most prominent Holocaust scholars in the world, is not an anti-semite. I also fail to see how an intentionalist viewpoint represents a particularly "Jewish" way of looking at things. Certainly I fail to recognize your view, which is a particularly simplistic and coarse form of intentionalism, as one that the vast majority of Jewish scholars of the Holocaust would have any truck with. Also, I'm Jewish, so you can save the incipient accusations of anti-semitism for better targets. No more of this. john k 07:29, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

• As Ronald Reagan once said to Jimmy Carter (on the eve of the latter's defeat): "There you go again!". I have been calm all along. You have been the one to curse and rant, and now in an inversion of emotions you "dump" it all on me. How convenient! Yea, so tell me more about this CHRIST-opher Browning guy, you have not answered my very simple question: Would you say that he either hates or loves Jews? Is that so complicated? Before I would accept any view, especially on the Holocaust from anyone, I would certainly like to know where they stand on the basic issue of whether they are pro or anti the Jewish people. Toynbee was a famous and world-renowned historian, but because he deemed the Jews to be "fossils of history", we know that he was NO friend of the Jews. Is this too much for you to handle, so sorry as I thought you could see through the machinations of (non-Jewish) academics posing as the arbiters of what is or is not "kosher" to think about the Holocaust. And by the way, both my parents were Holocaust-survivors, so I have a little more "insider's perspective" than a stuffy bunch of professors pontificating over the blood ( and ashes) of my relatives. How dare you call someone's view "simplistic and course", which is just an alternate way of cursing at someone's intelligence. Get out of your ivory tower man, and if you are Jewish, learn to think, and act, like one. IZAK 08:19, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

Ah, so I'm not a good Jew because I disagree with you? As to ranting, I am not the one accusing well-respected historians I've never read or even heard of of being anti-semitic based on hunches. john k 08:24, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

John old chap: Sorry to say that I have looked on Google about Browning and nothing there says that Browning knows much Judaism in any sort of meaningful way. He has studied the OBVIOUS, that a Holocaust took place and millions of Jews died in it (for this we need academics to educate us?), and he claims to have deciphered all the thinking of the top Nazis over the course of their rise and fall. (All the stuff about Nazis "messing up" and doing "rush jobs" in annihilating Jews, and the Madagascar doo-da, nothing Earth-shattering really). The sun does not rise or fall with the likes of Browning. Have you ever heard of Amalek by the way..? (They were the MAIN HISTORICAL factor in the Holocaust according to many true Jewish scholars I have heard of). IZAK 08:41, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

I think this argument is particularly idiotic. For example, the Warsaw Ghetto was established in 1940, before Operation Barbarossa. Because the ovens at Auschwitz weren't fired up implies that the Jews systematically shot in the streets of Warsaw does not constitute genocide?

As someone who has read a large amount of serious historial research on the Holocaust, I'd like to say that Christopher Browning is one of the very best. This is not only my opinion but also the opinion of many of the leading Jewish Holocaust scholars,such as Yehuda Bauer. I find IZAK's comments on Browning to be exceedingly offensive. His attack on Browning on account of his being a gentile reads just like attacks on Jews that can be found on neo-Nazi web sites. --Zero 09:35, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Hi Zero:Hold your horses. I DO NOT have anything personal against Browning as a gentile or scholar. My point is very simple, that JEWS do not regard him and his views as the "Alpha and Omega" on the subject. He may know a lot and be an objective scholar, but the subject of the Holocaust does not "belong" to him because he has had time to research the subject in depth. Within the well-springs of true JUDAIC scholarship, as well as among other general historians of Jewish history, the subject of the Holocaust's depths has not been "plumbed" in spite of and with all due respect to all the VERY worthwhile things Browning et al have had to say. IZAK 11:39, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Holocaust scholars: Who are they?

IZAK, you are transitioning from the uninformed to the absolutely ridiculous. You have shown that you know very little about Jewish life in Eastern Europe, except as a projection of your own values in contemporary America (the number of Talmudic scholars in Eastern Europe prewar was lower than that of any borough of New York today), and a complete ignorance of Holocaust historiography: Browning is considered across the board as one of the pre-eminent Holocaust scholars today (though I'd be willing to cite Guttman and Bauer too if you like--both scholars, both survivors). The Einsatzgruppen did not begin operating until the invasion of the Soviet Union, long after Poland was occupied. There were two attempts to establish a ghetto in Warsaw--the first one failed because Czerniakow was able to negotiate successfully with the Nazi leadership and take advantage of the divisions that existed between the military, the SS, and the occupation government. As for starvation and work, the irony of Rumkovski is that Lodz came so close to surviving, and if they had, he would have been feted as a hero. Why not check some of the "true" Jewish scholars of the Holocaust (and by "true" I am assuming you mean "frum," though classifying one set of scholars as true is certainly not POV). I wonder if you even know who they are (and one sits down the hall from me). What bothers me most, however, is your statement "Again you show how you and others then and now underestimate/d Hitler's thoughts, speeches, and actions." You are saying that they made the wrong decision, and if they would have responded differently, they would not have been killed. Unfortunately, what you are actually doing with that statement is placing some of the blame on the victims, i.e., "they should have seen it coming, but didn't, so they got killed." I don't take to kindly to blaming victims for the deeds of the perpetrators. If the Gemara can talk about avak avodah zarah, that statement you made can certainly be compared to avak antishemiyut. Danny 11:19, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

• Hi Danny:As I do not want to chop up your above response, I am leaving it intact above and reproducing it here below with some reactions on my part:IZAK 07:43, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Danny says:"IZAK, you are transitioning from the uninformed to the absolutely ridiculous."

• That is only your opinion. Quit the personal put-downs, I can do them too.IZAK 06:56, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Danny says:"You have shown that you know very little about Jewish life in Eastern Europe, except as a projection of your own values in contemporary America (the number of Talmudic scholars in Eastern Europe prewar was lower than that of any borough of New York today),"

• The level of religiosity or knowledge of Judaism by the mostly Yiddish-speaking Eastern-European masses (NOT in the USSR, altho in most places their YIDDISH culture was intact), even as they were slipping in large numbers from practicing Shabbat, was close to 100%. Are you saying that Pre-Holocaust Poland, Lithuania, or Hungary and Romania were "lacking" in their Talmudic scholarship? Simple laymen and wagon drivers received vast Torah/Mishna/Gemara education in a few years and were universally conversant with Judaism as a way of life, unlike secular assimilated intermarried Americans.IZAK 06:56, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

• • First of all, the Holocaust was not solely an Eastern European phenomenon, even though they supplied the majority of victims. Religiosity close to 100 percent. I suppose you are including the Bund, the Socialists, the Zionists, the Communists, the Revisionists, the Labor Zionists, the secularists, etc. Yiddish culture in Europe was not identical with religious culture. You are romanticizing the era, but unfortunately, that transforms the Jews of Europe into a homogeneous mass. It is sad that, for whatever reasons, you choose to deny them their rich diversity. For every story of someone who went to the gas chamber saying Shema Yisrael, I can give you one about someone singing HaTikvah or the Internationale.

• • • The Jews of Eastern Europe were enveloped in a thick cloud of Jewish/Yiddish culture. Even the athiests spoke Yiddish and were often the products of Torah homes. IZAK 03:35, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Danny says:"and a complete ignorance of Holocaust historiography: Browning is considered across the board as one of the pre-eminent Holocaust scholars today (though I'd be willing to cite Guttman and Bauer too if you like--both scholars, both survivors)."

• Why are you so infatuated with these so-called scholars? Tens of thousands of people have been writing and publishing about World War Two and the Holocaust for over 50 years.IZAK 06:56, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

• • The problem is that so many people writing these books know very little. I could just have easily cited Berenbaum, Marrus, Goetz Aly, Littell, or Hilberg, to name a few of the serious scholars. Bauer, whose family came to Palestine from Germany in 1939 was director of the International Institute for Holocaust Studies at Yad Vashem. Gutman, a former Ghetto fighter in Warsaw, was Yad Vashem's senior historian.

• • • I agree that some people who write books often know "very little", such as Holocaust scholars who write about a Jewish catastrophe and know very little about Jews or Judaism in meaningful depth. IZAK 03:35, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Danny says: "The Einsatzgruppen did not begin operating until the invasion of the Soviet Union, long after Poland was occupied."

• As the Germans rode into towns in Poland in 1939 they rounded up prominente and shot them ASAP. I suppose you will say they were not yet the "real thing", even if tens of thousnds of Jews were rounded up and shot it's not enough to make the "real" Holocaust yet? Am I beginning to understand you or what? IZAK 06:56, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

• • It was not yet part of a concerted program. Yes, Jews (and Poles, btw) who were killed in '39 were victims. However, the Holocaust was a progression. Even under persecution, Jews managed to develop strategies to survive.

• • • The holocaust was a "regression" and not a "progression". Some Jews always manage to survive, but few Holocaust scholars knows why that is so in Jewish history. IZAK 03:35, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Danny says:"There were two attempts to establish a ghetto in Warsaw--the first one failed because Czerniakow was able to negotiate successfully with the Nazi leadership and take advantage of the divisions that existed between the military, the SS, and the occupation government."

• This is all 20/20 hindsight. All this stuff about "Czerniakow" (what was he, a member of the Judenraat or just another blind mouse leading the other blind mice?) is moot and academic, all it shows how one group of Nazi murderers took advantage of Jewish naivet`e and kindness, as it was discussing with another group of Nazi thugs as to how to commit unspeakable crimes gainst those self-same Jews who would place their "trust" in Nazis out to kill them (all very tragic), as another group of gangsters were robbing and raping the people blind. MOST (not "all") "negotiations" with the Nazis was usually a waste of time ONCE THE WAR STARTED, until 1939 the Nazis were still hoping to have some Western countries on their side."IZAK 06:56, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

• • Actually everything you write is based on hindsight. You are assuming that they should have known what the end of the story would be while they were still in it. In a sense, that is passing judgment on them. Czerniakow was the head of the Warsaw Judenrat--a major figure in the history of the Holocaust. Actually, it shows divisions within the German occupation forces of Poland at the time, which Jews were able to use to survive. No one put their "trust" in Nazis--that is another jibe at the victims. They did what they could to survive. "Waste of time" can only be said with hindsight: these people were faced with the unimaginable. Your last piece is non sequitor. Again, since this is important, you cannot judge decisions made at the time based on your knowledge of the end of the story.

• • • Don't be too kind to the Germans/Nazis and do not underestimate their cunning. IZAK 03:35, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Danny says:"As for starvation and work, the irony of Rumkovski is that Lodz came so close to surviving, and if they had, he would have been feted as a hero."

• Sure, as they say, "there are no 'ifs' in history".IZAK 06:56, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

• • But there are. People in the Holocaust were faced with dilemmas and choiceless choices. Survival was a roll of the dice.

• • • It was not a "dice"...It was far more profound than that.IZAK 03:35, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Danny says: "Why not check some of the "true" Jewish scholars of the Holocaust (and by "true" I am assuming you mean "frum," though classifying one set of scholars as true is certainly not POV). I wonder if you even know who they are (and one sits down the hall from me)."

• I do NOT need anyone to think for me. I can read and make up my own mind. The "frum" have their own spin on things to which I do no always subscribe, as I do not subscribe to your slavish adeherence to the "Brownings" of the world et al. As for the "truth" about the Holocaust. You surely are not claiming that a few academics (even "frum" ones) have now "discovered" all the "truths" about the Holocaust that all human minds can absorb and understand? You think that every Rosh Yeshiva (Head of a Talmudical Academy) and every Chasidishe Rebbe will agree with all the stuff that comes out of Academia about the Holocaust? IZAK 06:56, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

• • "Slavish adherence?" Have you even read these scholars? Have you even heard of them? Or are you simply assuming they must say wrong things, therefore they are wrong. That is not even ignorance. That is foolishness. It says Da ma lehashiv, not lehashiv out of your ass, hoping that you may end up with a valid comment now and then.

• • • And here is where I object to you most. THERE IS NO NEED TO RESORT TO BAD LANGUAGE in this discussion. I resent your use of obscenities, as I do respect and hear you loud and clear without resort to foul language. What's with you? IZAK 03:35, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Apportioning "Blame" for the Holocaust

Danny says:"What bothers me most, however, is your statement "Again you show how you and others then and now underestimate/d Hitler's thoughts, speeches, and actions." You are saying that they made the wrong decision, and if they would have responded differently, they would not have been killed."

• And here YOU show how your total immersion in "Holocaust"-studies blinds you to what was happening in the NON-JEWISH POLITICAL and MILITARY domain. I was NOT refering to the Holocaust victims at all (only you, and probably the Brownings et al, seem to care about non-entities like "Czerniakow" and "Rumkovski"). I was talking about how Neville Chamberlain and his government and the governments of France and the USA, FAILED to stop Hitler and the Nazis (as the traditional German STRATEGIC threats to Britain and France based on the FIRST World War's experiences) when they could have done so very easily. It is well known that when Hitler marched into the Rhineland in 1936 in violation of the Versailles treaty, he was testing the geo-political military waters, and had the Allies, both the French, and the British who had a HUGE "exepeditionary force" (later "evacuated" at Dunkirk) near Germany, intervened and forced the German troops back home to Germany (by kicking them in their Aryan behinds), then Hitler would have backed off. Likewise when Hitler annexed Austria in 1938, and tricked Chamberlain and the French in 1939 to give up the Sudetenland and hence destroy Czechoslovakia, there may still have been time to pre-empt and declare war on Germany and NOT wait for Germany to choose the time and place to its liking to commence war (on Poland), and, had the USA not been so isolationist and would have listened to the advice of Winston Churchill they should have mobilized immediately and sent over an invasion force in 1939 and not wait for 1944 after the Japanese had to shock-start them with a wake-up-call in 1941 at Pearl Harbor. The net result for the Jews was that because of the delays, procrastinations, (even pro-Nazi attitudes of some, such as Joe Kennedy Snr. the US ambassador to Britain) and the general SECULAR political and military cowardice of people like the British Chamberlain and his French friends, the Jews would be trapped and there would be no-one to help them against the GERMAN monster. Got it?IZAK 07:39, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

• • Actually, I prefer a Jewish narrative to the Holocaust, with all of the Jewish "non-entities" displayed prominently, not some narrative where you go about casting blame. Again, you are assuming everyone from Chamberlain down knew the end of the story as intimately as you do. As for the whole "The U.S. should have responded" a la Wyman, Lookstein, etc., I suggest Peter Novick (The Holocaust in American Life) for starters.

• • • Have you ever studied Winston Churchill's words as he accurately assessed Hitler (or "Corporal Schikkelgrubber" as he taunted him) as Hitler rose to power and of Chamberlain's foolishness in appeasing Hitler? All this was done before war broke out and the Holocaust occurred.IZAK 03:48, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Danny says: "Unfortunately, what you are actually doing with that statement is placing some of the blame on the victims, i.e., "they should have seen it coming, but didn't, so they got killed.""

• I never said this, and you have extrapolated totally incorrectly. (See my response above). I was talking about the treacherous leaders of Great Britain, France and even the USA at the time, as they tried to APPEASE Hitler and Germany, at their own peril and falling right into the conniving and utterly ruthless Realpolitik hands of Adolf Hitler and his henchmen. This is what made the Holocaust so possible and feasible, as from Hitler's point of view he had outwitted and even outgunned his strategic opponents, giving him a free hand to do as he wished with his trapped Jewish (and many other ) victims. You owe me an apology ASAP.IZAK 07:39, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

• • Actually, you owe the victims an apology. Again, it is a question of determining history once you know the end of the story. When Chamberlain appeased Hitler, Jews werent being murdered en masse, and no one could have imagined it. When Poland was attacked, France and the UK responded. Perhaps the US should have too. Of course, that fails to consider the opposition to that at home and the tenuous situation of FDR vis a vis America First, Nye, Lindbergh, and even the Communists (until the invasion of the Soviet Union). Even scholars who condemn FDR (and it is a debate) recognize that by the time he could have done something (i.e., bomb the tracks), most of Polish Jewry was gone.

• • • Don't be such an apologist for Roosevelt, he has the victims' blood on his hands too.IZAK 03:48, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Danny says: "I don't take to kindly to blaming victims for the deeds of the perpetrators. If the Gemara can talk about avak avodah zarah, that statement you made can certainly be compared to avak antishemiyut."

• Lo Haya Velo Nivra, I neither said this nor meant this, so you are fighting your own ghosts here. And you owe me an apology ASAP. And I love that when it suits you, you suddenly get frum (Jewish "religious") and start quoting Gemaras from the Talmud that are out of context and that don't even exist. Shame on you. Shall we know discuss the Holocaust in PURELY Talmudical and Judaic terms as well? Wow what an opening you are providing here. Which brings me back to that question I asked that foul-mouthed Johny: Have you ever heard of Amalek ? (for some odd reason he never got back to me, maybe he went to learm some alef bet?), as according to all "true" Talmudic scholars, they are to blame for all troubles, even such as the Holocaust (and see the reasons the Torah sages provided as to why Amalek came to attack the Bnei Yisrael in the first place.) But I was not even getting into that subject. Just wanted to know if the people I am talking to had any sense of Yiddishkeit ("Judaism") since they were talking about Yiddishe Tzores ("Jewish Tragedies") which is what the Holocaust is all about in the end, as World War Two has been called "The War Against The Jews"...you will probably scream "intentionalists" --is that like those who shout "capitalist"/"communist"?-- which is just another mumbo-jumbo academic slogan created by people who have no business exploring the Holocaust in the first place, but that is another subject, for another time. Be well. IZAK 07:39, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

• • I make no pretensions of being frum, but if you chose to discuss it that way, I can. Why not try Burstein's The War Against God and His People" for starters. It even has haskamas, though it would challenge your hypotheses. As for Amalek, you are insisting on attaching a metaphysical interpretation to a historic topic. It may work in theology, but not in encyclopedia-writing. Danny 10:14, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

• • • "Theology" (and I am not quite sure what you mean by "theology" exactly) is as much a factor as are your "gold and silver tongued" talking-head Holocaust scholars. BY THE WAY, this is only the TALK page, and there is nothing wrong with having this kind of discussion over here. IZAK 03:48, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Sorry, IZAK. You obviously know so little about the subject. Well, guess what. I have to go to work, which will give you a good ten hours to do some research and reading, because I intend to answer when I get home. I'll expect an apology to all the victims you insult here as well. Danny 11:29, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Can you boys take this outside? I'm getting a headache. --Caliper 03:57, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Dear Danny: I appreciate your sincere efforts and candor. Best wishes with your Holocaust studies as I see that you are well-steeped in them. At no point was it my intention to "hurt the feelings" or honor of Holocaust victims. IZAK 04:30, 28 May 2004 (UTC)

Emotionalism, personal attacks & bad language

Folks, the subject is heavy enough. I don't think anyone "owns" it. So, why don't we simply follow the WP guidelines: AH. declared "quote", A thinks "this attributed quote", B writes "that attributed quote", etc. I may disagree with some of authorities' POV, but we're all entitled to our own opinion. Regarding the photo may I suggest: if in doubt, don't. Oh, and I think this long discussion page is ready to be archived. --Humus sapiens|Talk 03:50, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

Chumus: I agree IZAK 03:58, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

Stormie improperly censored even an external link at http://members.ij.net/rex/socialism.html to cover up the Holocaust as part of the bigger Wholecaust that slaughtered hundreds of millions. Is Stormie a Wholecaust denier?

Aside from the fact that claiming "socialism" as the common link between the USSR and Nazi Germany is absurd, I'm going to go ahead and hope that everybody is a denier of the "Wholecaust," simply because, wow, that's the most unfortunate name for something I've heard in some time.

In more seriousness, that article doesn't make a whole lot of useful points. Socialism is not a precondition for genocide by any stretch of the imagination. Snowspinner 15:50, Jun 24, 2004 (UTC)

Disambig reference

I know the disambig notice is going to prove controversial. For the sake of my not having to repeat myself on three pages, would people mind discussing it at Talk:Holocaust (disambiguation) so I can limit my repetition to VfD and there? Thanks very much. Snowspinner 04:35, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

Notice

I give notice that I intend completely rewriting this article, which in my opinion is a horrible mess. I will post a draft for discussion here within the next week. Adam 03:50, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Looking forward to it IZAK 03:53, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Just make sure you don't delete any valid info already here (such as dates and events). --mav 04:11, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Thanks Adam. Your willingness to just go in and cut through all the crap and come out with a far better article often astounds me. I'll be watching for your new version. john k 04:35, 31 May 2004 (UTC)