Iran's president is no friend of Israel or the Jewish people. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has called for the destruction of the Jewish state, and he's called the Holocaust a myth. Today he convened a conference to debate that issue, whether there actually was a Holocaust. How does Iran's Jewish community live in such an atmosphere? From Tehran tonight, here's Elizabeth Palmer.
Amazing. Now, given that the Holocaust ended more than sixty years ago, and well before most Americans were born, wouldn’t it have been appropriate to give some background to the viewers, and to make it clear just how well-documented an event in history this is? By not doing so, Couric almost suggested to the viewer that such a debate is warranted, and that the Holocaust might, as Ahmadinejad proclaims, just be a myth.
As Palmer got into her report on how Jews get along in Iran, she stated, “Iran's hard-line president has denied Hitler's Holocaust and said Israel should be wiped off the map.” Yet, she too never actually addressed the millions of Jews that had been slaughtered, nor did she try to counter the assertions of Ahmadinejad. In fact, the only contrary view on this issue came as Palmer quoted from a letter written by the head of Tehran’s Jewish community to Ahmadinejad stating, “The Holocaust is not a legend.”
Amazing. By contrast, the NBC “Nightly News” showed some spine as Brian Williams introduced the segment Monday evening: “An unusual gathering got under way today in Tehran in Iran where those who question and even outright deny that the Nazi Holocaust ever took place are getting together to discuss their theories on whether six million Jews really were killed by Hitler's followers. Our report on this tonight from our chief foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell.” Mitchell was also up to the task:
Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has long called the Holocaust a myth, organized today's conference, challenging one of history's most documented events. An estimated 11 million people, including six million Jews, were exterminated in Nazi death camps, but even the gas chambers were denied in Tehran today where they claimed Holocaust pictures were altered. The fringe group included white supremacist David Duke, who praised Iran's president for his courage.
The piece then continued to throw water all over this disgraceful conference. Pay attention, Katie:
MITCHELL: Germany long ago acknowledged its guilt. So how can Iran deny it happened?
Mr. STUART EIZENSTAT (Former Treasury Official): If they can in effect deny or denigrate the Holocaust, then they can delegitimize Israel.
MITCHELL: Why has Ahmadinejad seized on the Holocaust? Experts say he is trying to incite radical Shiites around the world against Israel, all part of consolidating his power at home, where today in a rare protest, some students tried to disrupt a speech he gave with firecrackers and burning his pictures. But to rebut Tehran, the Simon Wiesenthal Center organized a video conversation of survivors.
Ms. FANYA HELLER (Holocaust Survivor): I have seen rape, murder, pillaging. And what's happening now in Iran, I think, it's inexcusable.
MITCHELL: Bearing witness to what they suffered, no matter how often it is denied. Andrea Mitchell, NBC News, Washington.
Now that’s how this conference should be covered, and its theme totally discredited. Anything less by a member of the American media is disgraceful.
That said, a fabulous piece on this issue was published by the American Thinker Tuesday that is highly recommended. Author Marc Sheppard wisely concluded:
By convincing the world that the Jews have perpetrated such a horrific hoax upon them, the modern neo-Nazis believe that they can restore the tarnished reputation of their heroes while demonizing their victims. They are all too aware that time is on their side, as passing years see a decrease in the number of survivors and an increase in the number of revisionists.
Hitler's guiltless targets were scattered throughout Europe. This forced him to round them up and either coerce them to dig their own graves prior to mass-execution, or dispatch them to camps created for that purpose and no other. Ahmadinejad's dream of a Judenfrei Mideast requires no such expansion, as he sees the Jews already ghettoized in a little country called Israel.
If he can convince the world that the Jewish State's very existence is based upon a lie, then perhaps he believes he'll be forgiven for rectifying that mistake.
I couldn’t have said it any better.
