Sun, 15 Apr 2001
From: "AZAR Association"
This post contains two items:
1) The Jordanian Writers Association (JWA) Sets a New Date for its Forum on
Historical Revisionism in Amman
2) FYI: An Invitation to the JWA from a Zionist Institution in the USA
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1) The Jordanian Writers Association (JWA) Sets a New Date for its Forum on
Historical Revisionism in Amman:
After having its forum forcibly postponed on April 8th by Jordanian
authorities, the Jordanian Writers Association (JWA) has chosen a new date
for the gathering that will take place to discuss the theme of What
Happened to the Revisionist Historians Conference in Beirut? The forum
will take place on Sunday, April 22, 2001, at 6:30 in the evening, at the
offices of the Jordanian Writers Association in Amman. The speakers will be
the same ones who were supposed to speak in the postponed forum, except,
theyre much more enthusiastic : )
These speakers are:
1) Hayat Atiyah, a Lebanese journalist specialized in European historical
revisionism and a staunch secularist.
2) Arafat Hijjazi, a Jordanian journalist known for his anti-Zionist
stances.
3) Ibrahim Alloush, editor of the Free Arab Voice (www.fav.net), and a
member of the board of the Association against Zionism and Racism.
The moderator of the forum will be Dr. Hisham Ghassib, a university
professor and the president of the Socialist Thought Forum. As one of the
most prominent Marxist intellectuals in Jordan, Dr. Ghassib has expressed
extreme disgust with Arab leftists who are soft on Zionism or who supported
the expropriation of free speech in Beirut in the name of internationalism.
He says Arab leftists who take such positions need to re-read Marxs text On
the Jewish Question and the original positions of Lenin and the Third
International towards Zionism and Jewish immigration to Palestine, including
the consideration of the mere concept of a Jewish nation or Israel as
reactionary and contrary to the interests of working people everywhere.
Dr. Ghassib and the three speakers above were summoned by high officials of
the Ministry of the Interior on April 7th and informed that their forum
shall be postponed.
The JWA has already issued a statement denouncing the statement that was
allegedly signed by fourteen Arab intellectuals calling on the Lebanese
Government to ban the revisionist conference in Beirut. Furthermore, work
is ongoing with intellectuals from other Arab countries to host a conference
for revisionist historians somewhere in the Arab World with local Arab
participation.
No amount of oppression will keep the truth from getting out.
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2) FYI: An Invitation to the JWA from a Zionist Institution in the USA
http://www.wiesenthal.com/social/press/pr_print.cfm?ItemId=860
April 11, 2001
ANOTHER GATHERING ON HOLOCAUST DENIAL BLOCKED IN ARAB CAPTIAL; WIESENTHAL
CENTER INVITES JORDANIAN INTELLECTUALS TO 'SIT DOWN AND TALK'
Just ten days after Lebanese President Rafiq Hariri canceled a Holocaust
deniers conference in Beirut, a similar gathering slated for Amman, Jordan
was 'postponed', apparently over concerns that it would embarrass
Jordan's King Abdullah who is in Washington for his inaugural meeting with
U.S. President George Bush.
The three speakers and one moderator were informed last Saturday that the
"Forum on Revisionist (Holocaust) Historians" could not proceed on
April 8th, because of the potential embarrassment it could cause King
Abdullah on the eve of his first summit with President Bush.
"We welcome the decision by authorities to abort this gathering which,
rather than promote the free exchange of ideas and better understanding of
history, would have served as an endorsement of those forces seeking to
whitewash the Nazi holocaust, history's most documented genocide," said
Rabbi Abraham Cooper, Associate Dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center who led
the effort to cancel the deniers conclave in Beirut.
"We note that the Jordanian Writers Association is apparently planning to
condemn prominent Arab intellectuals who also spoke out against the denial
of the Shoah and that they plan to reschedule the Amman Forum," said Cooper.
"Instead, we at the Simon Wiesenthal Center, who were honored to host the
late King Hussein at its Museum of Tolerance in Los
Angeles, invites the head of the Jordanian Writers Union to send a
delegation to visit our institution and to meet face-to-face with survivors
of that horrific era. While we can have different attitudes towards peace in
the Middle East, people of good will should work together to reject
revisionism and antisemitism," he added.
Rabbi Cooper stated that there has been a rising tide of antisemitism,
Holocaust denial and allusions of Israelis as Nazis by top officials in
Syria, and in the official media in Egypt, Iran and the Palestinian
Authority.
"The goal is clear - the demonization of Israel and the Jewish people,"
Cooper concluded.
For more information, contact the Center's Public Relations Department,
310-553-9036.
[End of Press Release from Zionist Institution]
Dear Readers,
If you havent figured out the response of the Jordanian Writers Association
to the invitation from the Zionist institution yet, please re-read item one
above.
Not all Arab intellectuals are like the fourteen who signed the petition to
Lebanese authorities on the behalf of Rabbi Abraham Cooper, who was leading
the fight to ban the revisionist conference in Beirut according to the
statement from the Simon Wiesenthal Center above. The JWA will not be
party to breaking the psychological barrier with those who kill our people
and steal our land. If some Arab regimes and intellectuals are tripping all
over themselves to normalize relations with the invader, let the Zionists
know that most Arab people will never accept their occupation of Palestine
as normal. The atrocities committed by the Zionists in Palestine are the
REAL Holocaust, and the Palestinian Arabs are its true survivors. So long
as there is Zionism in Palestine, there will be resistance. A necessary
part of that resistance is resistance of the very idea that the Zionist
presence in Palestine is somehow normal or acceptable, under the pretext
that Jews died in WWII, or any other pretext.
Later
Ibrahim Alloush