June 2, 2000 - 28 IYAR, 5760
Promoting
Holocaust Denial The gross inaccuracies
of the Los Angeles Times -
again. By Michael Berenbaum To quote Yogi Berra, it
is déjà vu all over again.
There is an eerie consistency to the
mishandling of the David Irving
story
in the Los Angeles Times, which again on
May 30, as on January 7, allowed itself to
be used as a propaganda instrument for
Holocaust denial. From the teaser on the front page and
the headline on page 16 to the actual
content of the opening parts of the May 30
story, the Times and its reporter Kim
Murphy give credibility, both tacitly
and explicitly, to a man who has been
completely discredited by the British
courts after a lengthy and fair trial. In
the 14-word front page teaser alone are
two blatant inaccuracies, if not outright
falsifications.
It reads: "Holocaust Speaker David Irving,
the controversial World War II historian,
has started a U.S. visit." Holocaust speaker? Surely even Irving
himself would not call himself a Holocaust
speaker. He denies it happened! But
calling him a speaker gives him the
credibility of an expert. He is also not a
"controversial historian." He is a
discredited and disgraced historian. In
fact, by any reasonable definition of the
word, he is not a historian at all.
Found
the British Court: - "Irving has misstated historical
evidence; adopted positions which run
counter to the weight of the evidence;
given credence to unreliable evidence
and disregarded and dismissed credible
evidence."
- "Irving has significantly
misrepresented what the evidence,
objectively examined, reveals."
- "No objective, fair-minded
historian would have serious cause to
doubt that there were gas chambers at
Auschwitz and that they were operated
on a substantial scale to kill hundreds
of thousands of Jews."
- "For the most part, the
falsification of the record was
deliberate."
- "Irving's historical 'errors'
converge, in the sense that they all
tend to exonerate Hitler and reflect
Irving's partisanship for the Nazi
leader."
This is not the behavior of a
historian. Apparently the L.A. Times feels
differently. The headline on page 16 reads:
"Holocaust Revisionist Begins U.S. Tour."
"Revisionist" is Irving's preferred
self-description because revisionism is an
honorable task of the historian. Holocaust
denier is the accurate term. It is the one
used in [Deborah]
Lipstadt's book and now
established as
accurate by a British court. In the first paragraph of the article,
Irving vows to appeal Judge Charles
Gray's decision. As Murphy later
documents, the judge went overboard to
make sure that the decision could not be
appealed. He gave Irving vast leeway
during the trial. His findings of fact are
287 pages in length and precise in every
detail. Irving's
grounds for an appeal are virtually
zero. Should a man making
meaningless vows deserve the credibility
of a major L.A. Times story? In the body of the article, four
paragraphs of quotes are given to Mark
Weber, the head of the Institute of
Historical Review, whose innocuous title
masks its true function -- furthering
Holocaust denial. No effort is made to
identify the "Institute." Murphy did not
tell us why its meetings were held at a
secret location to promote its demands for
new investigations to prove that there was
no mass extermination of European Jews
during World War II. One would have
imagined that even a cub reporter would
have asked why the conclusions of the
investigation should be foretold before
any objective historical investigation was
held. Imagine for a moment if the headline
had been accurate: "Discredited Holocaust Denier
to Speak: David Irving, whom a British
court recently described as a racist,
anti-Semitic propagandist, will address
his supporters in California." Is that a story worthy of the front
page of a major U.S. newspaper? But at
issue here, even more than the many
inaccuracies in this article, is the
following question: Does a man who has
been exhaustively and fairly proven a
liar, an anti-Semite, and a propagandist
deserve continued coverage in the media?
One wonders what it will take for the
media to cease giving standing and
credibility to a racist anti-Semite who
falsifies evidence to make Hitler look
good. This article gives David Irving the
credibility of some kind of poor,
persecuted soul, beset by powerful forces
too great for one man. It was he himself
who brought the suit against Deborah
Lipstadt in a British court where the
burden of proof rests on the defendant.
She met her burden and then some, as the
judge's finding details. Irving brought
his downfall upon himself. Readers have every right to expect
accuracy of the Los Angeles Times. It now
has a serious credibility problem with
this reader. After two tries it can't seem
to get the story right. Why? Michael
Berenbaum is the author and editor
of 12 books on the Holocaust and has
served as president of the Survivors of
the Shoah Visual History Foundation and
as director of the Research Institute
of the United States Holocaust
Memorial. Picture
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