Confidential Report by Bernie Farber of the Canadian Jewish Congress on a 1986 lecture tour by David Irving

See Mr Farber's reference to this in his Witness Statement of January 8, 1999.

Mr. Les Scheininger Mr. Jack Silverstone Mrs. Rose Wolfe Mr. J.J. Wilder Mr. Alan Rose Mr. Charles Zaionz	CONFIDENTIAL
Notes of a meeting re. the Canadian Association for Free Expression: David Irving, History's Misinterpretation. By: Bernie N. Farber, Director of Research, Joint Community Relations Committee, Ontario Region

On Friday, April 4, l986 I attended a meeting sponsored by the Canadian Association for Free Expression (Paul Fromm) who presented a pseudo-historian by the name of David Irving. Mr. Irving has been known in the past to have associated with such groups as the "Institute for Historical Review" (at which he proudly noted his address to the Institute for Historical Review last year), the Canadian League of Rights, and others who have a decidedly right-wing bent as well as an antisemitic bias.

Mr. Irving gave a lecture the previous day at the University of Toronto in which he discussed amongst other issues his latest book soon to be published debunking Winston Churchill. Mr. Irving's thesis centered around the fact that Britain, through Winston Churchill, fought World War II when it was absolutely not necessary. Mr. Irving also indicates in his book on Churchill as well as another book written on Adolf Hitler that indeed the Holocaust (a word which he declines to use in describing the death of 6 million Jews) was not of Hitler's doing. His thesis being that a few pockets of SS members were the ones truly responsible for what Mr. Irving calls the "tragedy" during World War II.

On Friday, Mr. Irving continued with his thesis, however, it was accomplished on a much different level than what was presented the day previously.

On Friday evening Mr. Irving was addressing the "party faithful". There were approximately sixty people in attendance at the meeting. It is interesting to note that a significant number of the people present were German and Hungarian (this was noted through the fact that German and Hungarian was spoken often and freely within the meeting room at the Carleton Inn Hotel.) There were of course a number of party faithful (i.e. C-Far and CAFE) as well as members of the Canadian League of Rights and Friends and Followers of Ernst Zundel.

Both Mr. Zundel and Mr. Ron Gostick (Director of the Canadian League of Rights) were present. Mr. Gostick was selling books although it must be noted that very little of the material on sale had anything to do with Jewish issues. There were two books of note however, one written by Larry Abraham (None Dare Call it a Conspiracy) which seemed to be a follow-up to his last book called "They do call it a Conspiracy".

Other material on sale of note was the book written by the "Institute for Historical Review" on the Zundel trial called "the Great Holocaust Trial" by Michael Hoffmann III.

In conversation with Mr. Gostick I inquired about obtaining books that were currently on the banned list. Mr. Gostick suggested to me that he would be unable to mail me copies of books i requested, however, if I were to leave him my name and address he would see to it that they could be delivered.

The number of people present was somewhat larger than previous meetings, however, when assessing the fact that members of both C-Far, CAFE, Canadian League of Rights, as well as German and Hungarians made up the majority of' people present, it does not seem that significant.

It should be noted that Mr. Irving was far more direct in his antisemitic leanings at the Friday evening meeting. For example, Mr. Irving stressed the following:

a) Mr. Irving claimed that his British publisher "happens to be Jewish but a pleasant fellow nonetheless".

b) Mr. Irving attempts through innuendo to place the blame of the Holocaust on the Jews themselves. For example, Mr. Irving took a great deal of time to weave a story relating how Hitler's war was financed. In the long run, Mr. Irving stated that "although many might find this hard to believe, much of the money to finance World War II for the Nazis was supplied by the Presidents of the two major banks of Berlin." Mr. Irving went on to state that "I do not want to tell you what religion the Presidents of the banks were lest I be charged with antisemitism".

c) Mr. Irving also went on to challenge the veracity of the numbers that may have died during the Holocaust. For example, he supports the old adage that possibly hundreds, maybe thousands were very sick during the liberation of Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald and Dachau but indeed this was the fault not of the Nazis and the German people (who were indeed trying to help and save Jews) but the British and Amen cans who were cutting off supply lines to these concentration camps.

d) Mr. Irving was heard to question the veracity of extermination at camps such as Auschwitz and Treblinka.

It should be noted that at times when Mr. Irving challenged Jewish sources, presented his findings regarding the presidents of the Berlin banks or made any anti-Semitic crack, the audience did not hesitate giving him a round of laughter and applause.

The meeting lasted from 7:30 until approximately l0:00 p.m. In conversation with sources at the meeting, I discovered that Paul Fromm, through his group CAFE and C-Far is presently attempting to organize enough signatures to begin his own political party. The signatures needed to accomplish this would be 10,000.

Also, it should be noted that prior to the commencement of the meeting, the Ontario Libertarian Party were handing out material describing the structure and functions of the Ontario Libertarian Party.

It is clear that Mr. Irving presents a radical right wing approach to history. He misrepresents and misinterprets events to lead followers towards his inevitable conclusions.

There is no doubt in my wind that when speaking to his "groupies" his antisemitic bias is not on the periphery... on the contrary, he wears it openly on his sleeve.

Mr. Irving is presently on a "world" tour promoting his books. He has already visited Vancouver, Winnipeg, and Toronto. He previously spent time in Australia and New Zealand.

Mr. Irving will be continuing his tour in the U.S.A., however I have not yet been able to ascertain under whose auspices he will be travelling the U.S.A.