Oct. 22



GERMANY:

Where Hitler Played, Should the Rich Do Likewise?


"It's not just a peak; it's a treat," the brochure says, and to prove the
easily provable point it shows snow-capped mountain peaks rising over a
pristine Alpine landscape. You can golf, you can swim, you can raft in the
summer, ski in the winter and even visit the ancient salt mines that gave
this place its name - Upper Salt Mountain.

The only flaw here is that the InterContinental Resort Berchtesgaden, an
upscale hotel and spa due to open in the spring, sits on the very stained
plot of ground where Hermann Gring had his rural retreat, just over a rise
from the Berghof, the luxurious house with the big picture window where
Hitler contemplated the mists drifting over the face of the Untersberg and
is said to have plotted his deeds.

And so, the question in Germany: Is there something inappropriate,
unseemly, gratuitous about having a pleasure palace for affluent
vacationers seeking wellness on the very spot where Hitler lived out his
myths about blood and soil and racial regeneration, even as he consigned
millions to concentration camps and death?

"It's too late now, but I still think it's wrong," Josef Drr, the head of
the Parliamentary faction of the Green Party in Bavaria, the state where
Obersalzberg lies, "because Obersalzberg is famous in the world for being
the idyllic place where Hitler tried to rule the world."

In fact, the issue as it has been debated over the past few years is not
so much about building a hotel and spa against the mountain backdrop where
Hitler treated blond children to strawberries and cream, portraying
himself as an affectionate man of simple pleasures. On a nearby hilltop is
the famous Kehlstein, or Eagle's Nest, as the Americans later called it,
built as a birthday gift to Hitler by a grateful Nazi Party in 1939.

The issue is more that in the process of transforming Obersalzberg into a
holiday center - which it already was in the 19th century, until the Nazis
made it their private preserve - pretty much everything that was left over
from the Third Reich has been razed.

Most controversially, in 2000, the Bavarian authorities tore down the
Platterhof, the old hotel that was turned into a "people's hotel" during
the Nazi years, and became an American recreation center after the war,
when Obersalzberg housed a United States Army contingent. Officially, the
hotel was torn down because it was old and in bad condition, but the
suspicion remains strong among some Germans that its demolition was part
of an attempt to obliterate anything that would spoil the atmosphere.

"The Bavarian government has tried to erase the physical memories," Mr.
Drr said, "and if you want the Nazi regime to be useful for our democracy
now, you have to have the physical traces. You need the physical contact
with the past."

Certainly, there is no physical contact with the past left in Obersalzberg
- except for the Eagle's Nest, now a mountaintop restaurant accessible by
the same elevator, cut into the stone, that Hitler used on his own rare
visits to the place. The place where Hitler's house stood, bombed by the
Allies in 1945 and cleared away entirely in 1952, is a patch of
second-growth forest. And yet, it would be wrong to say that the plans for
a revived tourist industry have been allowed to bury the memory of the
Nazis.

"The Bavarian finance minister had a two-column model," said Albert A.
Feiber, a historian at the Institute for Contemporary History in Munich,
referring to Kurt Faltlhauser, who after the departure of American troops
in the mid-1990's devised an overall plan for the renovation of the area.
One column envisaged by Mr. Faltlhauser is the hotel, a two-winged
structure of 138 rooms that is virtually complete already. The second
pillar, about 200 yards away, is the Obersalzberg Documentation Center, a
museum of the Nazi era created by the State of Bavaria in 1999.

The museum is not huge, but its displays - occupying three floors of a
modern, shedlike building - in no way shy away from the horrors of Nazism.
In fact, the Documentation Center has had some beneficial unforeseen
consequences, not least that many Germans who would otherwise come to this
area of the Bavarian Alps only for a holiday now spend some time getting a
vivid reminder of savage plans and demented theories that were concocted
in part right here.

Gerhard Whrl, a vacationing policeman from Kassel who was touring the
museum the other day with his wife, said: "I don't approve of a hotel.
It's not a good use of this site. But it's impressive what they have here
in the way of documentation."

The museum was initially expected to attract some 30,000 visitors a year,
said Mr. Feiber, the historian, who was at the center conducting a tour
for visitors from Munich. In fact, the museum draws four times that many,
which has led to plans for an expansion to include new displays as well as
seminar rooms and classrooms to be used by visiting schools.

Moreover, while Obersalzberg was for years something of a magnet for
neo-Nazis, who reportedly used to make pilgrimages here to pay homage on
Hitler's birthday, this phenomenon has diminished since the Documentation
Center was built, Mr. Feiber said. So, while the demolition of the old
Platterhof still stirs discontent, the argument can certainly be made that
restoring tourism to Obersalzberg has been done in a historically
responsible way.

That, anyway, is what 15-year-old Franziska Otto from Rosenheim, about 50
miles away, seemed to feel. She was there with her father and brother as
part of a study group that was spending the day not gazing at the
mountains or the lakes or even visiting the Eagle's Nest, but touring the
Documentation Center itself.

"I want to learn about it," she said.

(source: New York Times)





CANADA:

Canadian court rejects latest appeal of Holocaust denier

In Ottawa, the Supreme Court of Canada yesterday rejected German
Holocaust-denier Ernst Zundel's latest appeal against deportation.

Zundel, who has been in a Canadian jail for 18 months facing deportation
to Germany, challenged the constitutional validity of the security
certificate review process under which he is charged.

As is usual in appeal requests, the top court did not provide reasons for
its decision. The Supreme Court last month refused to hear Zundel's
argument that he's being treated unfairly because some of the evidence
remains secret.

Zundel faces prosecution in Germany for his neo-Nazi and Holocaust-denying
activities. Since the late 1970s he has operated Samisdat Publishing, one
of the leading distributors of Nazi propaganda, and is a key content
provider for a Web site dedicated to Holocaust denial, the Anti-Defamation
League says. Zundel immigrated to Canada in 1958 and lived there until
2001, when he moved to the U.S. He was deported back to Canada in 2003 for
immigration violations.

(source: Associated Press)





UKRAINE:

Kharkov Jews Keeps Memory Alive Through Monument to Veteran

The Jewish community of Kharkov celebrated the inauguration ceremony for
a renewed commemorative plaque to honor Izrail Fisanovich, a legendary
Jewish submariner and World War Two veteran. After being destroyed by
vandals, the community quickly raised funds to recreate this memorial.

The Jewish veteran was one of 250 residents of Kharkov to have been
awarded the highest honorary title as a "Hero of the Soviet Union".

Izrail Fisanovich died in 1944, after having destroyed 13 enemy ships with
his M-172 submarine. On December 10th, Izrail Fisanovich would have marked
his ninetieth birthday.

Unfortunately, Kharkov and numerous other cities in Ukraine have seriously
suffered from vandalism over the past few years. One of the more recent
attacks resulted in the destruction of the memorial plaque, affixed to the
house where Izrail Fisanovich had lived prior to the war. Thanks to the
activism of the local Jewish community, under the leadership of its
President Alexander Feldman, the memorial was recreated and reaffixed to
this historic house.

The inauguration event involved representatives of the City
Administration, members of the local Jewish community, World War Two
veterans, and former submariners who came out to pay their respects to
this renowned Jewish hero.

As explained by Chairman Alexander Feldman, "We are living in a free
country and must be aware and proud of our past. We are celebrating Jewish
culture, teaching our children about Jewish history and the Hebrew
language - we are doing everything possible to maintain our people's
heritage and culture". The decision to restore the commemorative plaque
fell in suit with this tendency.

Jews of Kharkov regularly organize events to honor its veterans, ghetto
prisoners and victims of the Holocaust, including commemorative gatherings
and monuments. The memorial in Drobitsky Yar, the Holocaust site where
more than 16,000 people are buried, and the Wailing Wall, the remains of
the local Jewish ghetto, are gathering points regularly visited by local
residents to honor Jews killed during the tragedies of the Holocaust.

(source: Federation of Jewish Communities of the CIS)