Libel Lawsuit chutzpah

“Letters to the Editor”

Libel
Lawsuit chutzpah

THE libel suit against Holcaust scholar
Deborah Lipstadt by the questionable British historian David Irving represents the ultimate in
“chutzpah.”

“Chutzpah” can be explained by the anecdote concerning the young man who was asked if he had any last words before hearing his sentence pronounced for killing his parents. To which themurderer responded, “Judge, all I ask is that you have mercy on a poor orphan like me.”

With unmitigated gall, Irving claims that Lipstadt’s use of the phrase “Holocaust denier” has deprived him of his retirement income and a “legacy for his four children.” His claim that efforts to silence him are part of a Jewish conspiracy to obtain compensation for the Holocaust is in keeping with the libel alleging a Jewish conspiracy of the infamous “Protocols of the Eldersof Zion.”

There is a Tampa connection to the Irving story. A little more than a year ago, David Irving appeared in Tampa. He touted his book “Goebbels,”
Hitler’s propaganda minister and the author of “The Big
Lie.”

It should be noted that the meeting was sponsored by the local branch of the National Alliance, a self-avowed neo-Nazi racist organization headed by William L.
Pierce, Oklahoma bomber Tim McVeigh’s inspiration. As Irving claims, he may be a “rotten, lazy or indolent historian.” His assertion that he is not “a dishonest one” is, indeed, a lie. To this all those who have lost familites in the
Holocaust can attest. It is Irving who is motivated by hate and greed.

Let him sue.

—NORMAN GROSS

Safety Harbor

• The writer is president of PRIMER and vice president
  of the Anti-Hate
  Committee of B’nai
  Brith.

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