Friday 30 August 2013

Ukrainians Divided Over WWII Legacy, Atrocities

FSWC Reports:

From the Associated Press via ynetnews.com:

Ukrainians dressed in Nazi SS uniform trudge through trenches and fire model rifles in a reconstruction of a key battle against the Soviets during World War II. An Orthodox priest leads a ceremony for fallen soldiers of the Nazi unit, sprinkling his blessing over several men sporting swastikas who lower a coffin in a ritual reburial.

The scenes were part of commemorations recently of soldiers who many Ukrainian nationalists – along with a smattering of hardcore ultra-rightists – hail as heroes. The men they are honoring belonged to the SS Galician division, a Nazi military unit made up mostly of Ukrainians, which fought Soviet troops during World War II.
 
READ MORE...
 

Sunday 25 August 2013

Late Former U.S. President Richard Nixon's Antisemitic Comments Revealed

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

This week additional tapes from the Nixon White House were released and on them – as with previous tapes – the late American president can be heard making anti-Semitic and racist statements.

For example, in a conversation with National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger, on the eve of the 1973 US-Soviet summit, Nixon expressed concern that US Jews would try to steer the talks to the topic of Russian Jewry. "If they torpedo this summit — and it might go down for other reasons — I'm gonna put the blame on them, and I'm going to do it publicly at 9 o'clock at night before 80 million people,” Nixon said. 


READ MORE...  

Tuesday 20 August 2013

New Film on Warsaw Uprising Featuring Enhanced Original Footage to be Released

FSWC Reports:

From the Associated Press via ynetnews.com:

Rebels crouch behind barricades, dodging enemy fire. Rivers of fire belch from flamethrowers. Women and children dash across bombed-out ruins. Men pull a corpse out of rubble.

The scenes are as riveting as any Hollywood war movie. But they are snippets of historical footage from the 1944 Warsaw Uprising, enhanced by modern coloring and sound techniques - and turned into a film. 

READ MORE...  

Chancellor Angela Merkel Becomes First German Leader to Visit Former Concentration Camp Dachau

FSWC Reports:

From the Associated Press via ynetnews.com:

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has visited the remains of the Nazi concentration camp at Dachau in southern Germany, where more than 43,000 people were killed by the Nazis from 1933 to 1945.

Merkel's visit on Tuesday evening was the first by a German chancellor to Dachau.

 
READ MORE...
 

Monday 19 August 2013

Israeli Tourists Shocked by Sale of "Hitler Wine" in Italy

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

A number of Israeli families were in for a bitter surprise recently as they entered a large liquor store in the Dolomites region in northern Italy: Some of the wine bottles sold in the store were covered with pictures of Nazi leaders, including Adolf Hitler, Heinrich Himmler and Hermann Göring. 

Hitler's picture was accompanied by Nazi slogans, such as "One leader, one nation, one people."   

READ MORE... 

House in Argentina Turned into Anne Frank Memorial

FSWC Reports:

From jn1.tv via ynetnews.com:

In the Argentinean capital of Buenos Aires, an ordinary house with an ordinary family has been transformed into a memorial in honor of one of the most famous victims of the Holocaust.

For 20-year old Naomi Szulman, this was her grandparent’s home. A place where the family would meet on weekends. That was before it was donated and renovated. Now it’s a replica of Anne Frank’s hideout in Amsterdam during World War II.

READ MORE...
 

Friday 16 August 2013

Holocaust Survivors Raise Awareness With Beauty Pageant

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

It has become a tradition, but it is still hard to get used to the sight. Nineteen senior citizen women standing in a row. Pair by pair, they step to the front of the stage, and take a bow, walk the catwalk and return to the line. The youngest is 70-years-old, the oldest is 94, and the common denominator is a haunting past: all of the contestants in the 2013 pageant which will be held in Haifa are Holocaust survivors. 
 

"It's amazing to find that even at this age there is jealously and rivalry, just as with 18-year-old models," says Heli Ben David, who was crowned Miss Congeniality in the 1979 Miss Israel Pageant. Today, she guides the older women all the way to the catwalk. This week, she interviewed women who wanted to compete and heard their difficult stories. 

READ MORE...
 
 

Thursday 15 August 2013

Calls for Boycott of Nazi-Themed Italian Wine

FSWC Reports:

From The Toronto Sun:

A Jewish rights group is calling on distributors to boycott a growing line of Nazi-themed Italian wine.

Vina Lunardelli has been selling the Fuhrerwein line since 1995, with labels depicting Adolph Hitler and other prominent Nazis. It's one of a handful of so-called "historical" wines, including ones featuring communist icons such as Karl Marx and Che Guevara.

READ MORE...
 

Monday 12 August 2013

Most Wanted Alleged Nazi War Criminal Dies, But Others Still At Large

FSWC Reports:

From AFP via ynetnews.com:

Gerhard Sommer is now the most wanted Nazi war criminal after a lawyer announced on Monday that Laszlo Csatari died last week aged 98 in a Hungarian hospital.

Almost seven decades after World War II, the hunt for Nazi war criminals continues and the Simon Wiesenthal Center publishes an annual list of those most wanted. 

READ MORE...
  

Sunday 11 August 2013

80th Anniversary of Christie Pits Riots Commemorated

FSWC Reports:

From The Toronto Star:

Joe Black’s father was a mild-mannered man who owned a small confectioner’s near Christie Pits. Unusual for the time, the store had a telephone.

On the evening of Aug. 16, 1933, the elder Black obligingly let a youth into his store who said he desperately needed to make a call. The fellow was carrying a long steel rod. As Mr. Black hovered nearby, he overhead the teenager trying to summon anti-Semitic reinforcements for the melee that had shockingly broken out across the street.

READ MORE...
 

Jewish American Comedian Discovers Family Ties to Nazi Germany

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Jewish American comedian and E! talk show host Chelsea Handler has discovered that her family has ties to Nazi Germany.

The discovery took place during an episode of genealogy documentary series "Who Do You Think You Are?", in which different celebrities go on a journey to trace their family tree. 

READ MORE...  

Schindler Documents Up for Auction

FSWC Reports:

From Reuters:

A historically important letter from Oskar Schindler, the German industrialist whose efforts to save Jews from the Holocaust were made famous in the 1993 Oscar-winning film "Schindler's List," is among the Schindler documents to be sold at New Hampshire auction house.

The one-page letter signed by Schindler was sent from his enamelware factory in Krakow, Poland, where he employed more than 1,000 Jewish workers from a nearby Nazi concentration camp, Bobby Livingston, vice president at RR Auction, said on Wednesday.
 
READ MORE...
 

Czech Railway Station Becomes Holocaust Memorial

FSWC Reports:

From AFP via ynetnews.com:

A Prague railway station that saw tens of thousands of Czech Jews leave for ghettos and Nazi death camps between 1941 and 1945 is to become a memorial for those who died.

Czech Jews and Holocaust survivors have for years been calling for a memorial for the Prague-Bubny station, which last year welcomed a theater troupe that roamed the Czech Republic and Poland on board a train to perform a play about the Holocaust.

READ MORE...
 

Friday 9 August 2013

Three Suspects Charged With Hate Crimes After Hasidic Jew Attacked With Paintball Gun in New York City Suburb

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Three people have been charged with hate crimes after a Hasidic Jewish man was hit with paintballs fired from a passing car in a New York City suburb.  

The victim said someone in the car shouted an expletive about Jews.

READ MORE...  
 

Thursday 8 August 2013

China Produces Medals Commemorating "Shanghai Ghetto", A Temporary Home for Jews Who Escaped the Holocaust

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

The Shanghai Mint has struck a limited edition series of Shanghai Memory silver and gold medals to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the establishment of the Designated Area For Stateless Refugees, commonly known as the Shanghai Ghetto or Hongkew Ghetto.

That area in Shanghai became a temporary home for an estimated 20,000 Jewish refugees who safely escaped from the Nazi onslaught during the World War II Holocaust. 
 
READ MORE...
 

Wednesday 7 August 2013

Allegations of Hate Speech at Al Quds Rally Being Investigated by Police

FSWC Reports:

From The Toronto Sun:

Toronto Police officers are investigating allegations of hate speech after a speaker at a controversial anti-Israel rally said Jews must vacate that country or be shot dead.

The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA), the group claiming to have complained to police, identified the speaker as Elias Hazineh.

READ MORE...

 

Tuesday 6 August 2013

German Magazines Accused of Glorifying Nazism

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Following new complaints about the glorification of Nazism in German magazine Der Landser, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has reiterated its concerns about several publications of the Bauer Media Group

In February 2013, ADL raised concerns about several of Bauer’s publications in a letter to the German government. Referring to the magazines Militär & Geschichte, Geschichte & Wissen, and Der Landser, the Jewish organization noted their depictions of Gestapo founder and Hitler deputy Hermann Göring, Nazi propagandist Leni Riefenstahl, and other figures and groups inseparably associated with the Nazi war machine. 

READ MORE...   

Monday 5 August 2013

Survivors of Jewish Community in Kosice, Slovakia Seek Justice Against World's Most Wanted Alleged Nazi Collaborator

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

For Holocaust survivors and their families in Kosice, a once bustling town in eastern Slovakia turned wartime ghetto, bringing the world's most wanted Nazi collaborator to justice is a slow and painful task.

The town's small Jewish community welcomed Laszlo Csatary's arrest in his native Hungary last year, after he was tracked down via information from the Nazi-hunting Simon Wiesenthal Center. 

READ MORE...
 

Sunday 4 August 2013

Jewish Community in Malmo, Sweden Ponders Its Future Amid Rising Antisemitism

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

Attacks against Jews in Malmö, Sweden's third largest city, have left members of the community questioning their future in a place known for its multiculturalism.

Jewish people have lived in Malmö for over two centuries, often arriving in the south Swedish port city – a safe haven for generations – after fleeing persecution and intolerance in other parts of Europe.

READ MORE...
 

Catholic Priest in Poland Dismissed In Part Over Engagement With Jewish Community

FSWC Reports:

From Reuters:

When the outspoken Polish priest Wojciech Lemanski returned with his parishioners to his church near Warsaw after holding a prayer vigil at the Treblinka Nazi death camp in early July, a dismissal notice awaited him.

The Warsaw diocese of the Roman Catholic Church sacked Lemanski as parish priest in the small village of Jasienica for what it said was his insubordination after numerous clashes on issues such as in-vitro fertilization, abortion and his engagement with the Jewish community.

READ MORE...
 

Israel-Based Geneology Company Using Social Media to Locate the Assets of Holocaust Victims

FSWC Reports:

From ynetnews.com:

When Cati Holland checked her email a few weeks ago, she was surprised to find a message saying she was eligible for compensation for her grandmother's Berlin store that was seized by the Nazis more than 70 years ago.

It wasn't spam or a phishing attempt or even a legitimate note from a German official working to track down victims and their heirs. Rather, it was from an Israel-based social media genealogy company that is using the Internet to help match property stolen by the Nazis to heirs of the victims.
 
READ MORE...