After the Holocaust

The aftermath of the Holocaust had a profound effect on society in both Europe and the rest of the world. Its impact could be felt in theological discussions, artistic and cultural pursuits and political decisions. The fate of displaced persons and Holocaust survivors was a major issue, one which eventually led to the establishment of Israel by Jewish survivors.

Evidence in Germany

For decades, Germany refused to allow access to its Holocaust-related archives in Bad Arolsen, citing privacy concerns. In May 2006, a 20-year effort by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum led to the announcement that 30–50 million pages would be made available to historians and survivors. [ [http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/8633EA3D-1AC2-41DF-9B7B-D2C385B1E10F.htm Germany to open Holocaust archives] Al-Jazeera 19 April, 2006.]

urvivors

Displaced Persons and the State of Israel

The Holocaust and its aftermath left millions of refugees, including many Jews who had lost most or all of their family members and possessions, and often faced persistent anti-Semitism in their home countries. The original plan of the Allies was to repatriate these "Displaced Persons" to their country of origin, but many refused to return, or were unable to as their homes or communities had been destroyed. As a result, more than 250,000 languished in DP camps for years after the war ended.

With most displaced persons unable or unwilling to return to their former homes in Europe and with restrictions to immigration to many western countries remaining in place, Palestine became the primary destination for many Jewish refugees. However, as local Arabs opposed the immigration, the United Kingdom refused to allow Jewish refugees into the Mandate, and many countries in the Soviet Bloc made emigration difficult. Former Jewish partisans in Europe, along with the Haganah in Palestine, organized a massive effort to smuggle Jews into Palestine, called Berihah, which eventually transported 250,000 Jews (both DPs and those who hid during the war) to the Mandate. By 1952, the Displaced Persons camps were closed, with over 80,000 Jewish DPs in the United States, about 136,000 in Israel, and another 20,000 in other nations, including Canada and South Africa.

Resurgence of antisemitism

The few Jews in Poland were augmented by returnees from the Soviet Union and survivors from camps in Germany. However, a resurgence of antisemitism in Poland, such as the Kraków pogrom on August 11, 1945, and more importantly the July 4, 1946 Kielce pogrom led to the exodus of a large part of the Jewish population, which no longer felt safe in Poland [http://www.sipa.columbia.edu/ece/research/intermarium/vol1no3/kielce.html] . Anti-Jewish riots also broke out in several other Polish cities where many Jews were killed. (see: Anti-Jewish violence in Poland, 1944-1946) [http://www1.yadvashem.org/odot_pdf/Microsoft%20Word%20-%203128.pdf] .

An important reason for the atrocities was a widespread Polish belief that the Jews were supporters of the new communist regime and the new oppressors of the Polish state. This belief was fuelled by fact that Poland's postwar Communist government was Jewish-dominated. Two out of three communist leaders who dominated Poland between 1948 and 1956 (Jakub Berman and Hilary Minc) were of Jewish origin. The attitude of Christian Poles toward the Jewish Poles hardened significantly and hundreds of Jews were killed in anti-Jewish violence. Some were simply killed for financial reasons. [http://books.google.com/books?id=x8WvjETCxXIC&pg=PA271&dq=pogroms+poland+%22post+war%22&sig=nBWVZRSGnfxbkvzHo5gvrNmLtuE] The widespread Polish view of the Jews as communist traitors had led to massacres already in the 1920's [http://books.google.com/books?id=SOFkWX8EC4cC&pg=PA1035&dq=%22recovered+territories%22+propaganda&lr=&as_brr=3&sig=PiTHmPlLhBcIeED4fk4HDBSHA_4#PPA1035,M1] As a result of the exodus the number of Jews in Poland decreased from 200,000 in the years immediately after the war to 50,000 in 1950 and to 6,000 by the 1980's. [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZgaNjbesx-gC&pg=PA220&dq=pogroms+poland+%22post+war%22&sig=w2mteIyiMeEqhZPp1MPImm-6wHY]

Lesser post-war pogroms also broke out in Hungary. [http://books.google.com/books?id=x8WvjETCxXIC&pg=PA271&dq=pogroms+poland+%22post+war%22&sig=nBWVZRSGnfxbkvzHo5gvrNmLtuE]

urvivors' welfare in Israel

As of 2005, 40% of the 400,000 Holocaust survivors living in Israel live below the poverty line, resulting in heated and dramatic protests on the part of survivors against the Israeli government and related agencies. The average rate of cancer among survivors is nearly two and a half times that of the national average, while the average rate of colon cancer, attributed to the victims' experience of starvation and extreme stress, is nine times higher. [ [http://72.14.207.104/search?q=cache:fMg4sINHVxwJ:www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/663880.html+%2240+percent+of+Holocaust+survivors+living+in+Israel+today+live+below+the+poverty+line,+Israel+Radio+reported+Thursday%22&hl=en&gl=ca&ct=clnk&cd=1&client=firefox-a "40% of Holocaust survivors in Israel live below poverty line"] , "Haaretz", December 29, 2005. ] [ [http://www.claimscon.org/forms/allocations/Social%20Safety%20Nets.pdf "Social Safety Nets" (PDF)] , In "Re Holocaust Victim Assets Litigation (Swiss Banks)", September 11, 2000.]

earching for records of victims

There has a been a recent resurgence of interest by descendants of survivors in researching the fates of their relatives. Yad Vashem provides a searchable database of three million names, about half of the known Jewish victims. Yad Vashem's "Central Database of Shoah Victims Names" is searchable over the Internet [http://www.yadvashem.org yadvashem.org] or in person at the Yad Vashem complex in Israel. Other databases and lists of victims' names, some searchable over the Web, are listed in Holocaust (resources).

Impact on culture

Holocaust theology

On account of the magnitude of the Holocaust, many theologians have re-examined the classical theological views on God's goodness and actions in the world. [cite book|editor=Cohn-Sherbok, Dan|isbn=0-8147-1619-9|title=Holocaust Theology: A Reader|publisher=New York University Press] Some believers and former believers question whether people can still have any faith in God after the Holocaust, and some of the theological responses to these questions are explored in Holocaust theology. In it orthodox Jews state their reasons for why they believe the Holocaust happened and, to a more extreme degree, why they felt the Jews of Europe deserved to die. [An example of such can be found in cite web|url=http://groups.msn.com/JudaismFAQs/isgodamassmurdered.msnw|title=Is God a mass murderer? Rejecting the Haredi theodicy|last=Lamm|first=Rabbi Dr. Norman|accessdate=2007-01-23]

Art and literature

German philosopher Theodor Adorno famously commented that "writing poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric," [cite web|url=http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/Content?oid=18521|title=Poetry After Auschwitz: Is John Barth Relevant Anymore?] and the Holocaust has indeed had a profound impact on art and literature, for both Jews and non-Jews. Some of the more famous works are by Holocaust survivors or victims, such as Elie Wiesel, Primo Levi, Viktor Frankl and Anne Frank, but there is a substantial body of literature and art in many languages. Indeed, Paul Celan wrote his poem "Todesfuge" [cite web|url=http://www.artofeurope.com/celan/cel8.htm|title=Fugue of Death|first=Paul|last=Celan|accessdate=2007-01-23] as a direct response to Adorno's dictum.

The Holocaust has also been the subject of many films, including Oscar winners "Schindler's List", The Pianist (2002 film) and "Life Is Beautiful". With the aging population of Holocaust survivors, there has been increasing attention in recent years to preserving the memory of the Holocaust. The result has included extensive efforts to document their stories, including the Survivors of the Shoah project and Four Seasons Documentary, [cite web|url=http://www.fourseasonsdocumentary.com|title=Four Seasons] as well as institutions devoted to memorializing and studying the Holocaust, including Yad Vashem in Israel and the US Holocaust Museum. The historic tale of the Danish Jews fleeing to Sweden by fishing boat is recounted in an award-winning American children's novel. [cite web|url=http://www.amazon.com/Number-Stars-Laurel-Leaf-Books/dp/0440227534|title=Number the Stars]

Holocaust Memorial Days

The United Nations General Assembly voted on November 1, 2005, to designate January 27 as the "International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust." January 27, 1945 is the day that the former Nazi concentration and extermination camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau was liberated. The day had already been observed as Holocaust Memorial Day a number of countries. Israel and the Jewish diaspora observe Yom HaShoah vea hagvora, the "Day of Remembrance of the Holocaust and the courage of the Jewish people," on the 27th day of the Hebrew month of Nisan, which generally falls in April.Harran, Marilyn. "The Holocaust Chronicles, A History in Words and Pictures", Louis Weber, 2000, p. 697.]

Holocaust denial

Holocaust denial is the claim that the genocide of Jews during World War II—usually referred to as the HolocaustDonald L Niewyk, "The Columbia Guide to the Holocaust," Columbia University Press, 2000, p.45: "The Holocaust is commonly defined as the murder of more than 5,000,000 Jews by the Germans in World War II." Estimates by scholars range from 5.1 million to 7 million. See the appropriate section of the Holocaust article.] —did not occur in the manner and to the extent described by current scholarship.

Key elements of this claim are the rejection of the following: that the Nazi government had a policy of deliberately targeting Jews and people of Jewish ancestry for extermination as a people; that between five and seven million Jews were systematically killed by the Nazis and their allies; and that genocide was carried out at extermination camps using tools of mass murder, such as gas chambers. Key elements of Holocaust denial:
*"Before discussing how Holocaust denial constitutes a conspiracy theory, and how the theory is distinctly American, it is important to understand what is meant by the term "Holocaust denial." Holocaust deniers, or "revisionists," as they call themselves, question all three major points of definition of the Nazi Holocaust. First, they contend that, while mass murders of Jews did occur (although they dispute both the intentionality of such murders as well as the supposed deservedness of these killings), there was no official Nazi policy to murder Jews. Second, and perhaps most prominently, they contend that there were no homicidal gas chambers, particularly at Auschwitz-Birkenau, where mainstream historians believe over 1 million Jews were murdered, primarily in gas chambers. And third, Holocaust deniers contend that the death toll of European Jews during World War II was well below 6 million. Deniers float numbers anywhere between 300,000 and 1.5 million, as a general rule." Mathis, Andrew E. [http://www.holocaust-history.org/denial/abc-clio/ Holocaust Denial, a Definition] , The Holocaust History Project, July 2, 2004. Retrieved December 18, 2006.
*"In part III we directly address the three major foundations upon which Holocaust denial rests, including... the claim that gas chambers and crematoria were used not for mass extermination but rather for delousing clothing and disposing of people who died of disease and overwork; ... the claim that the six million figure is an exaggeration by an order of magnitude—that about six hundred thousand, not six million, died at the hands of the Nazis; ... the claim that there was no intention on the part of the Nazis to exterminate European Jewry and that the Holocaust was nothing more than the unfortunate by-product of the vicissitudes of war." Michael Shermer and Alex Grobman. "Denying History: : who Says the Holocaust Never Happened and why Do They Say It?", University of California Press, 2000, ISBN 0520234693, p. 3.
*"Holocaust Denial: Claims that the mass extermination of the Jews by the Nazis never happened; that the number of Jewish losses has been greatly exaggerated; that the Holocaust was not systematic nor a result of an official policy; or simply that the Holocaust never took place." [http://www1.yadvashem.org/about_holocaust/faqs/answers/faq_35.html What is Holocaust Denial] , Yad Vashem website, 2004. Retrieved December 18, 2006.
*"Among the untruths routinely promoted are the claims that no gas chambers existed at Auschwitz, that only 600,000 Jews were killed rather than six million, and that Hitler had no murderous intentions toward Jews or other groups persecuted by his government." [http://www.adl.org/hate-patrol/holocaust.asp Holocaust Denial] , Anti-Defamation League, 2001. Retrieved June 28, 2007.] "The kinds of assertions made in Holocaust-denial material include the following:
*Several hundred thousand rather than approximately six million Jews died during the war.
*Scientific evidence proves that gas chambers could not have been used to kill large numbers of people.
*The Nazi command had a policy of deporting Jews, not exterminating them.
*Some deliberate killings of Jews did occur, but were carried out by the peoples of Eastern Europe rather than the Nazis.
*Jews died in camps of various kinds, but did so as the result of hunger and disease. The Holocaust is a myth created by the Allies for propaganda purposes, and subsequently nurtured by the Jews for their own ends.
*Errors and inconsistencies in survivors’ testimonies point to their essential unreliability.
*Alleged documentary evidence of the Holocaust, from photographs of concentration camp victims to Anne Frank’s diary, is fabricated.
*The confessions of former Nazis to war crimes were extracted through torture." [http://www.jpr.org.uk/Reports/CS_Reports/no_3_2000/index.htm The nature of Holocaust denial: What is Holocaust denial?] , JPR report #3, 2000. Retrieved December 18, 2006.]

Many Holocaust deniers do not accept the term "denial" as an appropriate description of their point of view, and use the term Holocaust revisionism instead. Refer to themselves as revisionists:
*"Holocaust deniers often refer to themselves as ‘revisionists’, in an attempt to claim legitimacy for their activities." ( [http://www.jpr.org.uk/Reports/CS_Reports/no_3_2000/index.htm The nature of Holocaust denial: What is Holocaust denial?] , JPR report #3, 2000. Retrieved May 16, 2007)
*"The deniers' selection of the name revisionist to describe themselves is indicative of their basic strategy of deceit and distortion and of their attempt to portray themselves as legitimate historians engaged in the traditional practice of illuminating the past." Deborah Lipstadt. "Denying the Holocaust—The Growing Assault on Truth and Memory", Penguin, 1993, ISBN 0-452-27274-2, p. 25.
*"Dressing themselves in pseudo-academic garb, they have adopted the term "revisionism" in order to mask and legitimate their enterprise." [http://www.adl.org/holocaust/theory.asp Introduction: Denial as Anti-Semitism] , "Holocaust Denial: An Online Guide to Exposing and Combating Anti-Semitic Propaganda", Anti-Defamation League, 2001. Retrieved June 12, 2007.
*"Holocaust deniers often refer to themselves as ‘revisionists’, in an attempt to claim legitimacy for their activities." [http://www.jpr.org.uk/Reports/CS_Reports/no_3_2000/index.htm The nature of Holocaust denial: What is Holocaust denial?] , JPR report #3, 2000. Retrieved May 16, 2007. ] Scholars, however, prefer the term "denial" to differentiate Holocaust deniers from historical revisionists, who use established historical methodologies. Denial vs. "revisionism":
*"This is the phenomenon of what has come to be known as 'revisionism', 'negationism', or 'Holocaust denial,' whose main characteristic is either an outright rejection of the very veracity of the Nazi genocide of the Jews, or at least a concerted attempt to minimize both its scale and importance... It is just as crucial, however, to distinguish between the wholly objectionable politics of denial and the fully legitimate scholarly revision of previously accepted conventional interpretations of any historical event, including the Holocaust." Bartov, Omer. "The Holocaust: Origins, Implementation and Aftermath," Routledge, pp.11-12. Bartov is John P. Birkelund Distinguished Professor of European History at the Watson Institute, and is regarded as one of the world's leading authorities on genocide ( [http://www.watsoninstitute.org/contacts_detail.cfm?id=97 "Omer Bartov"] , The Watson Institute for International Studies).
*"The two leading critical exposés of Holocaust denial in the United States were written by historians Deborah Lipstadt (1993) and Michael Shermer and Alex Grobman (2000). These scholars make a distinction between historical revisionism and denial. Revisionism, in their view, entails a refinement of existing knowledge about an historical event, not a denial of the event itself, that comes through the examination of new empirical evidence or a reexamination or reinterpretation of existing evidence. Legitimate historical revisionism acknowledges a "certain body of irrefutable evidence" or a "convergence of evidence" that suggest that an event_like the black plague, American slavery, or the Holocaust—did in fact occur (Lipstadt 1993:21; Shermer & Grobman 200:34). Denial, on the other hand, rejects the entire foundation of historical evidence..." Ronald J. Berger. "Fathoming the Holocaust: A Social Problems Approach", Aldine Transaction, 2002, ISBN 0202306704, p. 154.
*"At this time, in the mid-1970s, the specter of Holocaust Denial (masked as "revisionism") had begun to raise its head in Australia..." Bartrop, Paul R. "A Little More Understanding: The Experience of a Holocaust Educator in Australia" in Samuel Totten, Steven Leonard Jacobs, Paul R Bartrop. "Teaching about the Holocaust", Praeger/Greenwood, 2004, p. xix. ISBN 0275982327
*"Pierre Vidal-Naquet urges that denial of the Holocaust should not be called 'revisionism' because 'to deny history is not to revise it'. "Les Assassins de la Memoire. Un Eichmann de papier et autres essays sur le revisionisme" (The Assassins of Memory—A Paper-Eichmann and Other Essays on Revisionism) 15 (1987)." Cited in Roth, Stephen J. "Denial of the Holocaust as an Issue of Law" in the "Israel Yearbook on Human Rights", Volume 23, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1993, ISBN 0792325818, p. 215.
*"This essay describes, from a methodological perspective, some of the inherent flaws in the "revisionist" approach to the history of the Holocaust. It is not intended as a polemic, nor does it attempt to ascribe motives. Rather, it seeks to explain the fundamental error in the "revisionist" approach, as well as why that approach of necessity leaves no other choice. It concludes that "revisionism" is a misnomer because the facts do not accord with the position it puts forward and, more importantly, its methodology reverses the appropriate approach to historical investigation... "Revisionism" is obliged to deviate from the standard methodology of historical pursuit, because it seeks to mold facts to fit a preconceived result; it denies events that have been objectively and empirically proved to have occurred; and because it works backward from the conclusion to the facts, thus necessitating the distortion and manipulation of those facts where they differ from the preordained conclusion (which they almost always do). In short, "revisionism" denies something that demonstrably happened, through methodological dishonesty." McFee, Gordon. [http://www.holocaust-history.org/revisionism-isnt/ "Why 'Revisionism' Isn't"] , The Holocaust History Project, May 15, 1999. Retrieved December 22, 2006.
*"Crucial to understanding and combating Holocaust denial is a clear distinction between denial and revisionism. One of the more insidious and dangerous aspects of contemporary Holocaust denial, a la Arthur Butz, Bradley Smith and Greg Raven, is the fact that they attempt to present their work as reputable scholarship under the guise of 'historical revisionism.' The term 'revisionist' permeates their publications as descriptive of their motives, orientation and methodology. In fact, Holocaust denial is in no sense 'revisionism,' it is denial... Contemporary Holocaust deniers are not revisionists — not even neo-revisionists. They are Deniers. Their motivations stem from their neo-nazi political goals and their rampant antisemitism." Austin, Ben S. [http://www.mtsu.edu/~baustin/revision.htm "Deniers in Revisionists Clothing"] , The HolocaustShoah Page, Middle Tennessee State University. Retrieved March 29, 2007.
*"Holocaust denial can be a particularly insidious form of antisemitism precisely because it often tries to disguise itself as something quite different: as genuine scholarly debate (in the pages, for example, of the innocuous-sounding Journal for Historical Review). Holocaust deniers often refer to themselves as ‘revisionists’, in an attempt to claim legitimacy for their activities. There are, of course, a great many scholars engaged in historical debates about the Holocaust whose work should not be confused with the output of the Holocaust deniers. Debate continues about such subjects as, for example, the extent and nature of ordinary Germans’ involvement in and knowledge of the policy of genocide, and the timing of orders given for the extermination of the Jews. However, the valid endeavour of historical revisionism, which involves the re-interpretation of historical knowledge in the light of newly emerging evidence, is a very different task from that of claiming that the essential facts of the Holocaust, and the evidence for those facts, are fabrications." [http://www.jpr.org.uk/Reports/CS_Reports/no_3_2000/index.htm The nature of Holocaust denial: What is Holocaust denial?] , JPR report #3, 2000. Retrieved May 16, 2007.
*"The deniers' selection of the name revisionist to describe themselves is indicative of their basic strategy of deceit and distortion and of their attempt to portray themselves as legitimate historians engaged in the traditional practice of illuminating the past. For historians, in fact, the name revisionism has a resonance that is perfectly legitimate -- it recalls the controversial historical school known as World War I "revisionists," who argued that the Germans were unjustly held responsible for the war and that consequently the Versailles treaty was a politically misguided document based on a false premise. Thus the deniers link themselves to a specific historiographic tradition of reevaluating the past. Claiming the mantle of the World War I revisionists and denying they have any objective other than the dissemination of the truth constitute a tactical attempt to acquire an intellectual credibility that would otherwise elude them." Deborah Lipstadt. "Denying the Holocaust -- The Growing Assault on Truth and Memory", Penguin, 1993, ISBN 0-452-27274-2, p. 25.]

Most Holocaust denial claims imply, or openly state, that the Holocaust is a hoax arising out of a deliberate Jewish conspiracy to advance the interest of Jews at the expense of other peoples. [A hoax designed to advance the interests of Jews:
*"The title of App's major work on the Holocaust, The Six Million Swindle, is informative because it implies on its very own the existence of a conspiracy of Jews to perpetrate a hoax against non-Jews for monetary gain." Mathis, Andrew E. [http://www.holocaust-history.org/denial/abc-clio/ Holocaust Denial, a Definition] , The Holocaust History Project, July 2, 2004. Retrieved May 16, 2007.
*"Jews are thus depicted as manipulative and powerful conspirators who have fabricated myths of their own suffering for their own ends. According to the Holocaust deniers, by forging evidence and mounting a massive propaganda effort, the Jews have established their lies as ‘truth’ and reaped enormous rewards from doing so: for example, in making financial claims on Germany and acquiring international support for Israel." [http://www.jpr.org.uk/Reports/CS_Reports/no_3_2000/index.htm The nature of Holocaust denial: What is Holocaust denial?] , JPR report #3, 2000. Retrieved May 16, 2007.
*"Why, we might ask the deniers, if the Holocaust did not happen would any group concoct such a horrific story? Because, some deniers claim, there was a conspiracy by Zionists to exaggerate the plight of Jews during the war in order to finance the state of Israel through war reparations." Michael Shermer & Alex Grobman. "Denying History: : who Says the Holocaust Never Happened and why Do They Say It?", University of California Press, 2000, ISBN 0520234693, p. 106.
*"Since its inception in 1979, the Institute for Historical Review (IHR), a California-based Holocaust denial organization founded by Willis Carto of Liberty Lobby, has promoted the antisemitic conspiracy theory that Jews fabricated tales of their own genocide to manipulate the sympathies of the non-Jewish world." [http://www.tau.ac.il/Anti-Semitism/asw2000-1/usa.htm Antisemitism and Racism Country Reports: United States] , Stephen Roth Institute, 2000. Retrieved May 17, 2007.
*"The central assertion for the deniers is that Jews are not victims but victimizers. They 'stole' billions in reparations, destroyed Germany's good name by spreading the 'myth' of the Holocaust, and won international sympathy because of what they claimed had been done to them. In the paramount miscarriage of injustice, they used the world's sympathy to 'displace' another people so that the state of Israel could be established. This contention relating to the establishment of Israel is a linchpin of their argument." Deborah Lipstadt. "Denying the Holocaust -- The Growing Assault onTruth and Memory", Penguin, 1993, ISBN 0-452-27274-2, p. 27.
*"They [Holocaust deniers] picture a vast shadowy conspiracy that controls and manipulates the institutions of education, culture, the media and government in order to disseminate a pernicious mythology. The purpose of this Holocaust mythology, they assert, is the inculcation of a sense of guilt in the white, Western Christian world. Those who can make others feel guilty have power over them and can make them do their bidding. This power is used to advance an international Jewish agenda centered in the Zionist enterprise of the State of Israel." [http://www.adl.org/holocaust/theory.asp Introduction: Denial as Anti-Semitism] , "Holocaust Denial: An Online Guide to Exposing and Combating Anti-Semitic Propaganda", Anti-Defamation League, 2001. Retrieved June 12, 2007.
*"Deniers argue that the manufactured guilt and shame over a mythological Holocaust led to Western, specifically United States, support for the establishment and sustenance of the Israeli state — a sustenance that costs the American taxpayer over three billion dollars per year. They assert that American taxpayers have been and continue to be swindled..." [http://www.adl.org/holocaust/theory.asp Introduction: Denial as Anti-Semitism] , "Holocaust Denial: An Online Guide to Exposing and Combating Anti-Semitic Propaganda", Anti-Defamation League, 2001. Retrieved June 12, 2007.
*"The stress on Holocaust revisionism underscored the new anti-Semitic agenda gaining ground within the Klan movement. Holocaust denial refurbished conspiratorial anti-Semitism. Who else but the Jews had the media power to hoodwink unsuspecting masses with one of the greatest hoaxes in history? And for what motive? To promote the claims of the illegitimate state of Israel by making non-Jews feel guilty, of course." Lawrence N. Powell, "Troubled Memory: Anne Levy, the Holocaust, and David Duke's Louisiana", University of North Carolina Press, 2000, ISBN 0807853747, p. 445. ] For this reason, Holocaust denial is generally considered to be an antisemitic [Antisemitic:
*"Denying the fact, scope, mechanisms (e.g. gas chambers) or intentionality of the genocide of the Jewish people at the hands of National Socialist Germany and its supporters and accomplices during World War II (the Holocaust)." [http://eumc.europa.eu/eumc/material/pub/AS/AS-WorkingDefinition-draft.pdf Working Definition of Antisemitism] . EUMC. Contemporary examples of antisemitism
*"It would elevate their antisemitic ideology — which is what Holocaust denial is — to the level of responsible historiography — which it is not." Deborah Lipstadt, "Denying the Holocaust", ISBN 0-14-024157-4, p. 11.
*"The denial of the Holocaust is among the most insidious forms of anti-Semitism..." Roth, Stephen J. "Denial of the Holocaust as an Issue of Law" in the "Israel Yearbook on Human Rights", Volume 23, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1993, ISBN 0792325818, p. 215.
*"Contemporary Holocaust deniers are not revisionists — not even neo-revisionists. They are Deniers. Their motivations stem from their neo-nazi political goals and their rampant antisemitism." Austin, Ben S. [http://www.mtsu.edu/~baustin/revision.htm "Deniers in Revisionists Clothing"] , The HolocaustShoah Page, Middle Tennessee State University. Retrieved March 29, 2007.
*"Holocaust denial can be a particularly insidious form of antisemitism precisely because it often tries to disguise itself as something quite different: as genuine scholarly debate (in the pages, for example, of the innocuous-sounding Journal for Historical Review)." [http://www.jpr.org.uk/Reports/CS_Reports/no_3_2000/index.htm The nature of Holocaust denial: What is Holocaust denial?] , JPR report #3, 2000. Retrieved May 16, 2007.
*"This books treats several of the myths that have made antisemitism so lethal... In addition to these historic myths, we also treat the new, maliciously manufactured myth of Holocaust denial, another groundless belief that is used to stir up Jew-hatred." Schweitzer, Frederick M. & Perry, Marvin. "Anti-Semitism: myth and hate from antiquity to the present", Palgrave Macmillan, 2002, ISBN 0312165617, p. 3.
*"One predictable strand of Arab Islamic antisemitism is Holocaust denial..." Schweitzer, Frederick M. & Perry, Marvin. "Anti-Semitism: myth and hate from antiquity to the present", Palgrave Macmillan, 2002, ISBN 0312165617, p. 10.
*"Anti-Semitism, in the form of Holocaust denial, had been experienced by just one teacher when working in a Catholic school with large numbers of Polish and Croatian students." Geoffrey Short, Carole Ann Reed. "Issues in Holocaust Education", Ashgate Publishing, 2004, ISBN 0754642119, p. 71.
*"Indeed, the task of organized antisemitism in the last decade of the century has been the establishment of Holocaust Revisionism - the denial that the Holocaust occurred." Stephen Trombley, "antisemitism", "The Norton Dictionary of Modern Thought", W. W. Norton & Company, 1999, ISBN 0393046966, p. 40.
*"After the Yom Kippur War an apparent reappearance of antisemitism in France troubled the tranquility of the community; there were several notorious terrorist attacks on synagogues, Holocaust revisionism appeared, and a new antisemitic political right tried to achieve respectability." Howard K. Wettstein, "Diasporas and Exiles: Varieties of Jewish Identity", University of California Press, 2002, ISBN 0520228642, p. 169.
*"Holocaust denial is a contemporary form of the classic anti-Semitic doctrine of the evil, manipulative and threatening world Jewish conspiracy." [http://www.adl.org/holocaust/theory.asp Introduction: Denial as Anti-Semitism] , "Holocaust Denial: An Online Guide to Exposing and Combating Anti-Semitic Propaganda", Anti-Defamation League, 2001. Retrieved June 12, 2007.
*"In a number of countries, in Europe as well as in the United States, the negation or gross minimization of the Nazi genocide of Jews has been the subject of books, essay and articles. Should their authors be protected by freedom of speech? The European answer has been in the negative: such writings are not only a perverse form of anti-semitism but also an aggression against the dead, their families, the survivors and society at large." Roger Errera, "Freedom of speech in Europe", in Georg Nolte, "European and US Constitutionalism", Cambridge University Press, 2005, ISBN 0521854016, pp. 39-40.
*"Particularly popular in Syria is Holocaust denial, another staple of Arab anti-Semitism that is sometimes coupled with overt sympathy for Nazi Germany." Efraim Karsh, "Rethinking the Middle East", Routledge, 2003, ISBN 0714654183, p. 104.
*"Holocaust denial is a new form of anti-Semitism, but one that hinges on age-old motifs." Dinah Shelton, "Encyclopedia of Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity", Macmillan Reference, 2005, p. 45.
*"The stress on Holocaust revisionism underscored the new anti-Semitic agenda gaining ground within the Klan movement. Holocaust denial refurbished conspiratorial anti-Semitism. Who else but the Jews had the media power to hoodwink unsuspecting masses with one of the greatest hoaxes in history? And for what motive? To promote the claims of the illegitimate state of Israel by making non-Jews feel guilty, of course." Lawrence N. Powell, "Troubled Memory: Anne Levy, the Holocaust, and David Duke's Louisiana", University of North Carolina Press, 2000, ISBN 0807853747, p. 445.
*"Since its inception in 1979, the Institute for Historical Review (IHR), a California-based Holocaust denial organization founded by Willis Carto of Liberty Lobby, has promoted the antisemitic conspiracy theory that Jews fabricated tales of their own genocide to manipulate the sympathies of the non-Jewish world." [http://www.tau.ac.il/Anti-Semitism/asw2000-1/usa.htm Antisemitism and Racism Country Reports: United States] , Stephen Roth Institute, 2000. Retrieved May 17, 2007.
*"There is now a creeping, nasty wave of anti-Semitism ... insinuating itself into our political thought and rhetoric ... The history of the Arab world ... is disfigured ... by a whole series of outmoded and discredited ideas, of which the notion that the Jews never suffered and that the Holocaust is an obfuscatory confection created by the elders of Zion is one that is acquiring too much, far too much, currency." Edward Said, "A Desolation, and They Called it Peace" in "Those who forget the past", Ron Rosenbaum (ed), Random House 2004, p. 518. ] conspiracy theory. [Conspiracy theory:
*"While appearing on the surface as a rather arcane pseudo-scholarly challenge to the well-established record of Nazi genocide during the Second World War, Holocaust denial serves as a powerful conspiracy theory uniting otherwise disparate fringe groups..." [http://www.adl.org/holocaust/theory.asp Introduction: Denial as Anti-Semitism] , "Holocaust Denial: An Online Guide to Exposing and Combating Anti-Semitic Propaganda", Anti-Defamation League, 2001. Retrieved June 12, 2007.
*"Before discussing how Holocaust denial constitutes a conspiracy theory, and how the theory is distinctly American, it is important to understand what is meant by the term 'Holocaust denial.'" Mathis, Andrew E. [http://www.holocaust-history.org/denial/abc-clio/ Holocaust Denial, a Definition] , The Holocaust History Project, July 2, 2004. Retrieved December 18, 2006.
*"Since its inception in 1979, the Institute for Historical Review (IHR), a California-based Holocaust denial organization founded by Willis Carto of Liberty Lobby, has promoted the antisemitic conspiracy theory that Jews fabricated tales of their own genocide to manipulate the sympathies of the non-Jewish world." [http://www.tau.ac.il/Anti-Semitism/asw2000-1/usa.htm Antisemitism and Racism Country Reports: United States] , Stephen Roth Institute, 2000. Retrieved May 17, 2007.] The methodologies of Holocaust deniers are often criticized as based on a predetermined conclusion that ignores extensive historical evidence to the contrary. [
*"'Revisionism' is obliged to deviate from the standard methodology of historical pursuit because it seeks to mold facts to fit a preconceived result, it denies events that have been objectively and empirically proved to have occurred, and because it works backward from the conclusion to the facts, thus necessitating the distortion and manipulation of those facts where they differ from the preordained conclusion (which they almost always do). In short, "revisionism" denies something that demonstrably happened, through methodological dishonesty." McFee, Gordon. [http://www.holocaust-history.org/revisionism-isnt/ "Why 'Revisionism' Isn't"] , The Holocaust History Project, May 15, 1999. Retrieved December 22, 2006.
*Alan L. Berger, "Holocaust Denial: Tempest in a Teapot, or Storm on the Horizon?", in Zev Garber and Richard Libowitz (eds), "Peace, in Deed: Essays in Honor of Harry James Cargas", Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1998, p. 154.]

ee also

Documentaries that have to do with life after the Holocaust:
*"Marion's Triumph"
*"The Boys of Buchenwald"
*"Pola's March"
*"Luboml"

* Reparations Agreement between Israel and West Germany

Notes

Further reading

External links, references, and other resources are listed at Holocaust (resources).