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Continued from Page! Semitism came from the people. Now it comes directly from the Government. Since the Six Day War, the Polish Government has made an issue of those Jews who collaborated during World War I with the Nazis in an effort to con vince the Polish public that those Jews who perished were the vic tims of their own traitors. Furthermore, they have begun destroying the archives of the Jewish Historical Institute of War saw. They have removed documen tation linking Poles in efforts to help the Germans put Jews into concentration camps. What enrages Wiesenthal even more, is the impudence onf the Polish Government in its reparations negotiations with the German Republic. Poland is claiming reparations for all of its citizens who were victims of the War, including those Jews who died at the hands of Polish fascists. A thorough investigator, Wiesenthal prides himself that not one of the 1100 people whom he has charged before the courts has brought a counter claim of libel. In some cases, their families come to his assistance. One of Eichmann’s sons, for instance, later sold him information about other Nazis living in South America under assumed identities. Wiesenthal’s intricate web of in formers spans the whole world. “Our power is in the addresses of our helpers all over the world,” he explains. “Interpol does not help us, because Interpol does not con cern itself with anything political. If I receive information about someone for example, in Bolivia, I check my book of addresses, and in a matter of days, that person is being investigated.” For every successful investiga tion, there are countless frustrations. For example, there is the case of a Lithuanian who migrated under an alias from Ger many to Australia in 1948, and between 1958 and 1960 migrated to the United States. This man was responsible for personally killing 1300 Jews in a period of ten days. Wiesenthal knows who the man is, but needs proof of the assumed identity. There is only one person, the widow of a Lithuanian doctor in Australia, who can furnish him with this proof, and she refuses to talk. He has been working on this particular case since 1958. He works in a voluntary capaci ty, receiving funds from survivors of the camps — not so much the ones who have done well for themselves, as the little people who send a few dollars at a time, but send it regularly. Wiesenthal is the first to admit that what he does is not a fulfil ment of justice. He cites the case of a man who drove thousands of Jews into the concentration camps and was given a nine-year sentence. “All sentences against the Nazis have only a symbolic character” he says. ‘The trials are more impor tant.” He is anxious that young Jews growing up today, should know this chapter in the history of their people. “Jews know the histories of all nations, but not their own he reflects sadly, “and Jewish histories are always repeating themselves.” He does not believe in imparting the history of the holocaust to children at an age when they are still too young to comprehend its magnitude. He waited till his own daughter was 15, ‘and then I told her everything.” He is sensitive to eternal Jewish vigilance. “The murderers of tomorrow are born today” he warns. In this regard, he is less concerned with the rise of neo- Nazism than with the emergence of the New Left. “From the Jewish point of view,” he believes, “the New Left is more dangerous than the New Right, because the New Left is neither new, nor left. This is a masquerade of political anti-Semitism with a mixture of ideologies from all totalitarian regimes.” We return to the subject of the 30th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Wiesenthal reluctantly permits a bitter edge to creep into his voice. “If anyone can honestly say that he remembers the six million Jews every day, it is !’ he emphasizes. “I'm looking at everything that happened with the eyes of 1943. The big Jewish leaders of the world look with the eyes of 1973. They remember only on anniversaries.” with the eyes of 1973. They remember only on anniversaries.” GOVERNOR JIMMY CARTER is shown signing a proclamation designating this past May 7 as the officially-recognized date on which citizens of Georgia would celebrate Israel’s 25th anniversary. Attending the ceremonies were (from left): Consul General of Israel Benjamin Bonney, Miss Wendy Lipshutz of the Atlanta Jewish Youth Council, Atlanta Jewish Welfare Federation board member Robert Lipshutz, AJWF Israel Committee Chairman Mrs. Henry Caplan and AJWF cam paign director David Amdur.
Newspaper Details
Atlanta Southern Israelite
Atlanta, Georgia, US
Fri, May 11, 1973
Page 8
Full Page
Clipped by
Anonymous
USA 18 Feb 2026
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