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Thursday, December 14, 2006
Some headlines and summaries from JTA
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Ahmadinejad accused of incitement to genocide
A group of prominent lawyers, politicians and Jewish leaders are attempting to have Iran’s president indicted on charges of incitement to genocide.
The initiative, announced Thursday in New York, claims that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s consistent Holocaust denial, his threats to “wipe Israel off the map” and his pursuit of nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities violate key provisions of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
Alan Dershowitz of Harvard University and Irwin Cotler, a Canadian legislator and human-rights lawyer, are preparing an indictment that would refer Ahmadinejad to the International Criminal Court.
Dershowitz also said he is preparing a brief to justify pre-emptive military action if legal efforts fail.
The initiative was unveiled at an event sponsored by the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations.
New U.N. chief blasts Iran’s Holocaust denial
The incoming United Nations secretary-general said it was unacceptable for Iran to deny the Holocaust and threaten Israel.
“Denying historical facts, especially on such an important subject as the Holocaust, is just not acceptable,” Ban Ki-moon said Thursday, according to Reuters.
“Nor is it acceptable to call for the elimination of states or people.”
Ban’s comments came at a news conference following his swearing-in ceremony at U.N. headquarters in New York.
Ban succeeds Kofi Annan as secretary-general on Jan. 1.
Neturei Karta defends Holocaust denial conference
A fervently Orthodox fringe sect defended its decision to attend a Holocaust denial conference in Iran.
Ilan Deutch, a spokesman for the anti-Zionist Neturei Karta group, said in an interview Thursday that members of the group went to the controversial Tehran parley this week as part of its efforts to “prove” that the Holocaust has been misused to build political support for Israel.
Asked on Israel Radio how he could rub shoulders with those who say the Holocaust was fabricated or exaggerated, Deutch said, “For the sake of saving Jews from Zionism, you have to do these things sometimes.”
According to Deutch, Neturei Karta believes Jews would be better off without a homeland, living as minorities around the world.
He resisted calls by the interviewer to apologize to Holocaust survivors for Neturei Karta’s attendance at the event, whose host, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has described the Nazi genocide as a myth and called for the destruction of Israel.
Professor sues over anti-Semitism charge
A Canadian history professor sued York University in Toronto and various Jewish organizations.
David Noble said they defamed him with accusations of anti-Semitism.
The case stems from a flyer that Noble distributed at York in 2004, asserting that the university was repressing pro-Palestinian activists due to the influence of several prominent Jewish philanthropists on the board of the York University Foundation.
The flyer named the individuals and listed their ties to Jewish and Zionist causes.
York’s administration countered with a news release criticizing the flyer for targeting “certain members of the York community on the basis of their ethnicity and alleged political views.”
Noble’s $21.5 million lawsuit also names representatives of Hillel and the Canadian Jewish Congress who accused him of anti-Semitism.
Several years ago Noble, who is Jewish, launched a complaint with Canada’s Human Rights Commission, alleging that York’s practice of canceling classes on major Jewish holidays was unfair to other minority groups.
That case is still working its way through the system.
Hezbollah still operating in Canada
Hezbollah is still engaged in fundraising and other activities in Canada.
Secret reports from Canada’s intelligence establishment make the assertions several years after the government outlawed the Lebanese group as a terrorist entity.
The Toronto-based National Post newspaper, which used the Access to Information Act to attain copies of several secret intelligence assessments, reported that they were generated in response to last summer’s war between Israel and Hezbollah.
One of the heavily edited reports indicated that Hezbollah still has a presence in Canada and its “activities in Canada include fundraising, censored collection and the procurement of equipment.”
Using freedom-of-information legislation, Post reporter Stewart Bell has amassed what is probably the largest collection of terrorism-related Canadian intelligence documents in private hands.
http://www.jta.org/
posted by Somebody @ 11:23 PM Permanent Link
 
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