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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, 
they’re 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 Marx’s 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.

############################################
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 haven’t 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


  

    

    

    
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Co-editors: Nabila Harb Harb@freearabvoice.org
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