June 14



ROMANIA:

Govt denies Romanian Holocaust


Startling local Jewish leaders, the government denied today that a
Holocaust took place on Romanian territory during World War II, when
250,000 were deported or killed under the rule of pro-Nazi leader Marshal
Ion Antonescu.

There was no immediate explanation for the assertion, which came a day
after the government signed an agreement allowing the Washington-based
Holocaust Memorial Museum to study Romanian archives about the Holocaust.

"The government encourages research about the Holocaust in Europe,
including of documents of this type found in Romanian archives," the
Ministry of Public Information said in a statement.

But the statement added: "We firmly claim that within the borders of
Romania between 1940 and 1945 there was no Holocaust".

In fact, there are well-documented historical accounts detailing how about
one-half of Romania's prewar Jewish population of 760,000 was killed
during the war. Most died in the former Soviet Union, where they had been
deported to concentration camps under the rule of Antonescu.

Some 130,000 Romanian Jews died after being deported by Hungarian
authorities who temporarily ruled parts of Romania.

A local Jewish leader said the government's claim was false.

"You cannot say there weren't victims," said Ernest Neuman, head of the
600-member Jewish community in the western city of Timisoara, citing
killings in the city of Iasi and in the capital of Bucharest.

Historians have documented several pogroms in Romania, including one in
June 1941 in the north-eastern city of Iasi, where up to 12,000 people are
believed to have died as Romanian and German soldiers swept from house to
house, killing Jews.

Those who did not die were systematically beaten, put in cattle wagons in
stifling heat and taken to a small town. Of the 120 people on the train,
just 24 survived.

The Iron Guard, a Romanian fascist organisation, robbed and tortured
hundreds of Jews, of whom 120 perished in January 1941.

Other Romanian Jews were deported from Transylvania by Hungarian fascists
to Nazi concentration camps.

Transylvania reverted to Hungary during World War II.

Romania has been criticised for a reluctance to come to grips with its
role in the Holocaust.

Last year, the government adopted laws that make fascist and xenophobic
organisations and symbols illegal and punishable by prison sentences of up
to five years. Authorities have also ordered the removal of statues and
other monuments honouring Antonescu.

Today there are just 6,000 Jews in Romania.

(source: Associated Press)





USA/VIRGINIA:

Police investigating anti-Semitic posters at Holocaust Museum


In Richmond, police are investigating posters found at the entrance of
the Virginia Holocaust Museum that claim Jews are exploiting the Holocaust
for commercial gain.

The three posters printed on computer paper were discovered pasted to
pillars facing the Cary Street entrance of the museum in Richmond on
Friday morning, according to Al Rosenbaum, co-founder and treasurer of the
museum.

"It's very disheartening and shows the reason the museum was built,"
Rosenbaum said.

Richmond police said a forensics unit would check the posters for
fingerprints, but they had no leads at this point.

The Richmond FBI office said it would review the police report when it was
completed, then decide whether to initiate a civil rights case.

(source: Daily Press)






CANADA:
Liberal leadership front-runner Paul Martin seized the opportunity last
Sunday at an inauguration ceremony for a new museum at the Montreal
Holocaust Memorial Centre to send a message to Israel that it can
count on Canada's support. <P>

"We can never forget that the ancient scourge of anti-Semitism now wears
new clothes," Martin told Israel's ambassador to Canada, Haim Divon,
during his speech. "And it is one thing to debate the policies of a
government, but it is something altogether different and it is totally
unacceptable to question the right of a state and its people to exist."

Martin left the stage to a standing ovation led by Minister of National
Revenue Elinor Caplan.

The event was otherwise void of political pretence, as evidenced by
Martin's entry to the ceremony chatting with Immigration Minister Denis
Coderre and Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe.

Caplan said the museum will also serve as a reminder of Canada's own
history of intolerance, mentioning war-era internment camps and a "racist"
head tax.

"As a nation, Canada has learned from its darker days," Caplan said.

"And we have learned to thrive on an inclusive and tolerant society
because we have understood that all people, regardless of how they
worship, where they live or what language they speak, have a fundamental
need to be accepted and to belong."

Divon said it was appropriate to build what is believed to be Canada's
first Holocaust museum in Montreal.

"(Montreal is) the cradle of Jewish life in Canada," he told the crowd of
about 1,000 people. "It is one of the most incredible Jewish communities
throughout the world."

The Holocaust memorial centre, which houses the museum, estimates 25,000
Holocaust survivors immigrated to Montreal after the war. As many as 8,000
are still alive, making the population the third largest in the world
after Israel and New York City.

One of those survivors, Sara Schichter, fought back tears Sunday as she
told the story of how she escaped persecution during the war in her native
Belgium thanks to a Catholic woman who hid her family for nearly a year.

Schichter also recalled the first day she wore the yellow star Jews had to
wear during the war, and how a Belgian man told her to wear the star with
pride.

"We didn't wear it with pride," said the Quebec woman. "I don't want to
get political, but we didn't want to be a distinct society. We wanted to
be like everyone else."

The centre's museum, which opens to the public June 30, is believed to be
Canada's only site dedicated solely to the Holocaust.

The $5-million project, funded with government grants and private and
corporate donations, expanded and improved on the centre's previous
exhibit of Holocaust artifacts.

The vast majority of the museum's 400 original artifacts have been donated
by Montreal-area survivors or their descendants.

The museum is designed to reflect Jewish culture and history in Europe
before the war, the political context and events and horrors of the war
itself, and how those survivors who came to Montreal rebuilt their lives.

Last month, about 300 Holocaust survivors from Montreal got their first
glimpse of the museum during a special commemorative ceremony.

The most emotional moment of the solemn day came as several survivors who
first brought ashes to Montreal from the Auschwitz concentration camp in
1979 placed the urn in the museum's Memorial Room, located at the end of
the tour of 400 original artifacts.

They officially dedicated the site to the memory of the six million Jews
killed under Nazi rule during the Second World War.

(source: Canada Press)