September 16, 2008

The Criminalization of Free Speech

The Criminalization of Free Speech

By Jeremy Lee

The highly-talented and controversial British historian David Irving has just been released from prison in Austria after serving three years. His crime? A remark he made 17 years earlier.

The Canadian resident Ernst Zundel, whose conviction for ‘hate literature” was overturned by Canada’s highest Court, was kidnapped, held in solitary confinement for two years without charge, and then illegally deported to Germany, where he has just been sentenced to 5 years in prison. Others have suffered similar penalties. Their only crime has been the expression of sincerely-held beliefs about historical events. Traditionally, the right to express personal views - whether popular or not - has been upheld in Christian countries as “the right of free speech”. As many historical anomalies about the Jewish holocaust in Germany came under scrutiny after World War II, pressure was applied to governments to outlaw any discussion and scrutiny under the accusation that to do so was ‘anti-Semitic’. Germany and Austria were the first to succumb to such pressure, followed by France and other western European nations.

INTERNATIONAL PRESSURE

Through the United Nations, ‘anti-discrimination’ legislation, on the grounds of race, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status or religion, was presented to all members for signature and then ratification, whereby member-states were required to legislate domestically. The first attempt to establish a Human Rights Commission in Australia occurred during the Whitlam years at the hands of the Attorney General Lionel Murphy. It is instructive to read the heated criticism by the Opposition Liberal and National parties. As soon as they gained office under Malcolm Fraser in 1975 they reversed their position and installed the Human Rights Commission in which they had thwarted Labor’s Murphy. The ensuing powers of this body were at odds with traditional freedoms in Australia, including the right to free speech. Thus, a dual court system had to be installed in each signatory nation — traditional Courts versus Human Rights tribunals. The latter resorted to antiquated “star-chamber” principles which had earlier been weeded out of the judicial process as inimical to individual rights and open, fair trials, where justice was not only done, but could be seen to be done. Denied the right to identify and confront their accusers, victims could be summoned on allegations to appear, at their own expense and before any charges were laid, in front of tribunals held in closed sessions. Legal representation was denied. Procedure at such hearings could later be used as evidence in legal trials that followed.

RAMPING UP THE PRESSURE

Politicians who, in many cases, knew little of the law, had never read the Constitution and had, in any case, sold their consciences to their benefactors and the Party Whip, raised little objection to this subversion. The Church, without exception, “passed by on the other side”.

On October 16, 2004, President Bush signed into law the Global Anti-Semitism Review Act, establishing within the U.S. State Department a special unit to monitor global Anti-Semitism and report annually to Congress.

On May 22, 2006, US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice swore in Greg Rickman to oversee the Office of Global Anti-Semitism. Within a short time the United Nations, under its new Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon, asked its member-States to sign, and then ratify, a similar resolution.

Greg Rickman’s office has already defined ‘anti-Semitism’. Included are the following:

· Any assertion that the Jewish community controls government, the media, international business and the financial world is anti-Semitic.

· Strong anti-Israel sentiment is anti-Semitic.

· Virulent criticism of Israel’s leaders, past or present, is anti-Semitic.

· Criticism of the Jewish religion or its religious leaders or literature (especially the Talmud and Kabbalah) is anti-Semitic.

· Criticism of the US government and Congress for being under undue influence by the Jewish-Zionist community is anti-Semitic.

· Criticism of the Jewish community for promoting Globalism (or the New World Order) is anti-Semitic.

· Blaming Jewish leaders and their followers for inciting the Roman crucifixion of Christ is anti-Semitic.

· Diminishing the “six million” figure of Holocaust casualties is anti-Semitic.

· Asserting that there is a “Zionist conspiracy” is anti-Semitic.

· Claiming that Jews and their leaders created the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia is anti-Semitic.

· Making ‘derogatory statements about Jewish persons’ is anti-Semitic.

HIDING HISTORY

Go through each of the listed points, and it will be seen that between them they ban any research and debate on some of the most momentous issues of the past 100 years. The views of world leaders are to be struck from the pages of history. Take, for example, the origins of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution. Only three years after that catastrophe Sir Winston Churchill wrote: “There is no need to exaggerate the part played in the creation of Bolshevism and in the actual bringing about of the Russian Revolution by those international and for the most part atheistical Jews. It is certainly a very great one; it probably outweighs all others. With the notable exception of Lenin, the majority of the leading figures are Jews. Moreover, the principal inspiration and driving power comes from the Jewish leaders.” (Illustrated London Herald, February 8, 1920)

Traverse the years to 2006, and former U.S. President Jimmy Carter is now under intense attack for his just-published book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid (Simon and Shuster). Whatever one’s conclusion - and there will obviously be diverse and passionately held differences - the right to disagree is vital in a free society. But a concerted campaign to paint Carter’s book as “anti-Semitic” is designed to intimidate genuine inquirers.

GAGGED

What about the criticism of Jewish leaders? Is it now forbidden to mention Menachem Begin’s part in the murderous Irgun movement, cited as terrorist by the British at the end of World War II? Are we to ignore the massacre of Palestinian refugees in Sabra and Shatila, under the instigation of Ariel Sharon, known widely as “the Butcher of Beirut” during the first occupation of Lebanon? Even an Israeli Court found Sharon culpable Not only gentile leaders are criticized. Many courageous non-Zionist Jews suffer intense criticism if they speak out. Professor Norman Finkelstein’s books have strongly criticized what he calls the “Holocaust industry”, where historical accuracy has been relegated to second place behind political goals and financial profits. Finkelstein’s parents died in Germany’s concentration camps. The continued payment of reparations by Germany to allegedly exaggerated numbers of Holocaust victims could not withstand dispassionate scrutiny; so, such scrutineers must be intimidated into silence.

ISRAEL’S CRITICS

Or what about those courageous Jews who do not condone the one-sided presentation of Israel’s policy in the Middle East? The young Jewish journalist Antony Loewenstein has been forced to run the gauntlet of attack from his own community for daring to publicly dissent from Israel’s policies against the Palestinians in his meticulously documented book My Israel Question. (Melbourne University Publishing Ltd, 3 printings in the year of publication, 2006) As Peter Rodgers, former Australian Ambassador to Israel said of this book: “Loewenstein shines a spotlight on Israel and its uncritical supporters. That will make them uncomfortable. For that reason alone My Israel Question deserves a strong readership”. Loewenstein is simply the latest dissenter from Zionism.

Authors from Alfred Lilienthal to Israel Shamir, Noam Chomsky and Israel Shahak have been denigrated as ‘self-hating Jews’ by those who tread the Zionist path. A growing minority of Jews are expressing similar dissent. On February 5, 2007, the British paper The Guardian reported that 130 prominent Jews, in an association called Independent Jewish Voices declared their independence from the Jewish Establishment, arguing that it put support for Israel above the human rights of Palestinians. Is it conceivable that such a statement should be a criminal offence?

THE POWER OF ISRAEL

Or take the just-published The Power of Israel in the United States, again meticulously-documented by Professor James Petras, author of over 60 books, and contributor to such papers as The New York Times, the Guardian, the Christian Science Monitor, Foreign Policy and Le Monde Diplomatique. If there was any doubt of Israel’s disproportionate influence in the White House and State Department, as well as over both Republican and Democrat parties, it has been dispelled by Petras. Is he to be prosecuted under the new international law of global censorship?

The argument is brought closer to home by the current controversy (February 2007) over the visit to Australia of Professor Raphael Israeli, of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. In a blunt warning reported in the Jewish Press, “Professor Israeli said Muslim immigrants had a reputation for manipulating the values of their adopted countries and said Australia should limit the intake of Muslim migrants to protect social cohesion and national security.” (Australian Jewish News, Feb 22, 2007) In a tumult of controversy, some of the Jewish organizations which sponsored Professor Israeli’s visit withdrew their patronage, while others defended his right to speak controversially. It is safe to say, however, that Professor Israeli won’t be summoned by the Human Rights Commission, as was the fate of two Christian pastors who criticized Islam and parts of the Koran in a seminar. With the current crisis over the spread of Islam in Western Europe and Britain, such open discussion is essential and Professor Israeli’s right to speak should be defended.

THE RIGHT TO BELIEVE

And finally, what is to be done about the many Christian faithful who believe the New Testament accounts of the trial and sentence of Jesus Christ are true, and that the account as portrayed in Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ

is accurate? Is the profession of such a belief to be regarded as ‘anti-Semitic’ and therefore illegal? Or will the Gospels and the Book of Acts simply be proscribed? They were in the Soviet Union at one stage. Can we anticipate a day when the “Global Commission for World Religion” finally demands the confiscation of Bibles, and the outlawing of missionary work?

That, I believe, is what this new globalist legislation is all about. It is an “outward and visible sign” of a war to the death between two irreconcilable faiths. On the outcome will depend the future of the world. As Lincoln said: “Silence, when we should protest, makes cowards of us all.”

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Israel Shamir on 9/11: “The Afro-Americans did it”
Ever since 9/11, Russian-Israeli writer/researcher Israel Shamir has stepped into the spotlight as an authority on Zionist criminality with a trilogy of books purportedly exposing the Talmud, Kabbala, etc. But a closer look at Shamir’s writing -- given what we now know about Israeli complicity in the events of 9/11 -- exposes him as an agent of disinformation.

“The kamikaze [9/11 perpetrators] could be practically anybody..,” he writes on his website (israelshamir.net). “They could be Native Americans returning to Manhattan, or Afro-Americans who still have not received compensation for slavery.”

Given this little piece of absurdity, the well-informed reader can safely assume that Shamir -- like so many of the other damage-controllers that play down Israeli involvement in 9/11 (Alex Jones!) -- is little more a professional liar.

The 800lb. Gorilla poses this thought: could Shamir have been intended to replace the great Israel Shahak, who -- along with having the almost exact same name -- also authored a trilogy of books exposing the Jewish conspiracy?

http://800poundgorilla.100webspace.net/geeklog//article.php?story=20080817105001441

http://ehpg.07x.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=17&Itemid=26