Historian Who Challenges Holocaust Deniers to Speak at Ithaca College – News Release – Ithaca College Office of Media Relations

Lipstadt is the Dorot Professor of Modern Jewish and Holocaust Studies at Emory University in Atlanta, where she directs the Institute for Jewish Studies.

Her most recent book, ’ÄúHistory on Trial: My Day in Court with David Irving,’Äù is the story of her libel trial in London, in which she was sued by Irving for writing that he was a Holocaust denier who had manipulated and distorted real documents in his books on Adolph Hitler and World War II.

After a legal battle that lasted nearly six years, a judge ruled in Lipstadt’Äôs favor, finding that Irving was not only a Holocaust denier, but also anti-Semitic, racist and an associate of right-wing extremists who promote neo-Nazism.

The trial was described by the ’ÄúDaily Telegraph’Äù as having ’Äúdone for the new century what the Nuremberg tribunals or the Eichmann trial did for earlier generations,’Äù while the London ’ÄúTimes’Äù said of

Lipstadt’Äôs win: ’ÄúHistory has had its day in court and scored a crushing victory.’Äù

It was Lipstadt’Äôs groundbreaking 1994 work ’ÄúDenying the Holocaust: The Growing Assault on Truth and Memory’Äù’Äîthe first full-length study of those who attempt to deny the Holocaust’Äîthat drew Irving’Äôs libel suit.

She is also the author of ’ÄúBeyond Belief: The American Press and the Coming of the Holocaust,’Äù an examination of how the American press covered the news of the persecution of European Jewry between the years 1933 and
1945.

Lipstadt served as a historical consultant to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and was appointed by President Clinton to the United States Holocaust Memorial Council.

From 1996 through 1999 she served as a member of the United States State Department Advisory Committee on Religious Freedom Abroad. The ’ÄúForward’Äù newspaper named her number two on its list of the 50 top Jewish newsmakers for the year 2000.

Lipstadt’Äôs talk is sponsored by the Ithaca College Jewish Studies Program. Arrangements for her visit were made through the B’Äônai B’Äôrith Lecture Bureau.

For more information, contact Jill Goldsmith at (607) 274-1988 or [email protected].