Entries Tagged 'books' ↓
January 31st, 2008 — Rachel Ehrenfeld, U.S. law, UK, activism, books, censorship, counterjihad, litigation jihad, terrorism
What You Can Do:
Friends,
I have been anxiously following the travails of courageous author Rachel Ehrenfeld, who dared to expose the Saudi connection to terrorist funding, and has since been hit with one frivolous and ridiculous lawsuit after another. From personal experience, I can tell you that this is the way that fanatics and the enemies of free speech wear down and intimidate authors with the guts to tell the truth. They wear them down financially, because lawyers are expensive and you have to use a lawyer even if you are completely innocent and the other side are self-serving, immoral liars and/or idiots with absolutely no case. They wear you down emotionally, because you have to face court dates, and public scrutiny, and the fear of some clueless judge (like the one in Britain Rachel faced) finding you guilty and imposing multi-million dollar fines against you.
Now, the capital of freedom and of publishing, New York, is about to pass legislation that will stop the success of the kind of lawsuits facing the Rachel Ehrenfelds of the world, protecting them from the insanities of foreign justice. You can help to see this law passed. Below, details. Please, please get involved. Brigitte Gabriel, another author I admire, has written the letter below. Please write the assemblymen involved, Please write influential editors of influential papers. Help us to see this happen!!
Naomi
For more articles,please visit my Web page at: http://www.NaomiRagen.com
Libel Terrorism Protection Act
We are concerned with the bi-partisan “Libel Terrorism Protection Act,” introduced in the New York Assembly and Senate by Assemblyman Rory Lancman (D) and Senator Dean Skelos (R).This bill has been introduced to protect New York authors who investigate and expose the enablers of terrorism from libel lawsuits filed in foreign courts.
Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld, author of Funding Evil: How Terrorism is Financed – And How to Stop It, was the target of one of those lawsuits. The wealthy Saudi who filed the lawsuit against Dr. Ehrenfeld in the United Kingdom has successfully silenced more than 40 authors and publishers, including many Americans. If these lawsuits are allowed to continue, the ramifications for our cherished freedoms of speech and the press are chilling and ominous. The sooner “The Libel Terrorism Protection Act,” is signed into law, the sooner New York – the publishing capital of the U.S. and the free world – and New York authors will be protected from meritless and frivolous libel suits filed in foreign jurisdictions.
The “Libel Terrorism Protection Act” directly affects me (Brigitte). My first book, Because They Hate, was published by a New York publisher. My second book, scheduled for release later this year, will be published by that same New York publisher. Passage of this New York law will bring much-needed legal protection to the work I am doing. If you agree that this protection is essential to preserve the ability of authors like myself to speak out on matters of terrorism, please carefully read the action items below and then ACT! today. Thank you!
ACTION ITEMS
If the links don’t work, please just Google to get this information!
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For those of you who live in New York State, please contact your Assembly Member and State Senator today. Contact them either by phone or email or both. Tell them you are calling in support of the “Libel Terrorism Protection Act,” bill number A9652, and ask for their support of the bill. The links below will take you to a listing of New York’s Assembly Members and Senators
http://senate.state.ny.us/senatehomepage.nsf/senators?OpenForm
http://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/
In addition, if you have time, contact the Chair-person of the Judiciary Committees in both the Assembly and the Senate. The bill has been referred to these committees. Ask for the chairperson’s support for the bill. The links below will take you to the chair persons of the Assembly and Senate Judiciary Committees.
Helene E. Weinstein http://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/?ad=041 (Assembly)
http://senatordefrancisco.org/50/default.aspx (Senate)
Write a short letter to the Editor of your local newspaper, explaining the background of the bill and why it’s needed. Elected officials usually monitor letters to the editor as one way to keep their fingers on the local pulse.
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For those of you who do not live in New York State, please contact the two Judiciary chair persons identified above. When you do, emphasize how important this bill is, that it is a model for other states and the federal government, and thus it has national implications – which is why you, a resident of a state other than New York, are contacting them. You, too, could send letters to the editor of New York newspapers. This would demonstrate to the press, public and New York legislators that “the nation is watching.”
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Forward this email to other people you know, using the forwarding link at the bottom.
It is critical that we help get this legislation passed. We cannot allow those involved in terrorism to succeed in silencing those who would expose their activities. Please ACT! today. And if you can financially help us make this nationwide grassroots lobbying effort successful, please click here:
https://www.donation-net.net/Act4America/donate.cfm ?dn=1097&commid=1687484&id=17022
Thank you for your support and your activism.
Brigitte Gabriel, Founder and President
Guy Rodgers, Executive Director
ACT for America
P.O. Box 6884
Virginia Beach, VA 23456
www.actforamerica.org
ACT for America is an issues advocacy organization dedicated to effectively organizing and mobilizing the most powerful grassroots citizen action network in America, a grassroots network committed to informed and coordinated civic action that will lead to public policies that promote America’s national security and the defense of American democratic values against the assault of radical Islam. We are only as strong as our supporters, and your volunteer and financial support is essential to our success. Thank you for helping us make America safer and more secure.
https://www.donation-net.net/Act4America/donate.cfm
?dn=1097&commid=1687484&id=17022
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January 23rd, 2008 — Canada, Islam, Mark Steyn, Sharia, YouTube, books, censorship, counterjihad, litigation jihad, political correctness
Mark Steyn Punctures Liberal Delusions
“Multiculturalism and its impact on democratic society” panel from “The Collapse Of Europe?” Conference. Panel Moderator is Evan Sayet. Panelists are Ibn Warraq, Mark Steyn, Douglas Murray, and Sally McNamara. Hosted by the American Freedom Alliance on Sunday, June 10, 2007 at Pepperdine University in Malibu, CA.
Controversial author, Mark Steyn speaks at a Goldwater Institute breakfast about his book “America Alone” and America’s war against international terrorism.
Mark Steyn Faces Canada’s Kangaroo Courts
Litigation Jihad and Canada’s “Human Rights Commission”
Mark Steyn is yet another member of the anti-jihadist community who is under siege by the enforcers of political correctness. Merely for having written the truth about unchecked Islamic expansionism in western societies, Steyn is being prosecuted by Canada’s misnamed “Human Rights Commission” (HRC), at the federal level.
Recently, fellow Canadian writer Ezra Levant has also been interrogated by the provincial HRC in Alberta for having published the Mohammed cartoons.
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January 22nd, 2008 — Rachel Ehrenfeld, U.S. law, UK, YouTube, activism, books, counterjihad, litigation jihad, terrorism
(Originally posted on The Terror Finance Blog
by Rachel Ehrenfeld on January 21, 2008 at 17:42)
NY State Assemblyman Rory Lancman gets it. Concerned with the growing threat of the Islamist Financial Jihad on our freedoms, Lancman authored the Libel Terrorism Protection Act in New York with Senate Deputy Majority Leader Dean Skelos.
When we think about those fighting the war on terror, we of course first think of our soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq. They are on the front lines, risking their lives to protect our country. We also think about our local cops and firefighters and first responders. They are defending our cities, unearthing terrorist plots and rushing to the scene of attacks to save and rescue lives.
But every American has an obligation to do their part, in whatever way they can, to contribute to victory over Islamic fundamentalism. So while soldiers fight, cops protect, and even individual citizens who “see something” make sure to “say something,” our journalists and authors discover and publish the truth about terrorists and their enablers the financiers, frontmen and terrorism-friendly regimes who provide the financial, logistical and political support and cover which enable the terrorists to exist, operate and strike.
The 19 men who boarded airplanes on September 11, 2001 and flew them into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a Pennsylvania field were merely the tip of a long and elaborate sword aimed at the West, a worldwide network of moneymen, coordinators, facilitators, propagandists and apologists who compose the terrorist network which delivered those 19 men to American airports.
The ability of our journalists, authors and press to expose these enablers and inform the American people, to discover and report the truth, is the most important weapon we have in the war on terror. The information they unearth informs not just the general public, but policymakers who must make choices about strategies and tactics, resources and priorities, allies and adversaries, in how best to fight this war. Without their work, we are all merely groping around in the dark.
The terrorists and their enablers know this.
That’s why American journalists and authors who relentlessly and doggedly pursue the truth about terrorism networks are being met with a barrage of libel lawsuits in kangaroo courts on phony-baloney libel charges in overseas jurisdictions who donât share our belief in freedom of speech or a free press.
England seems to be the enablers’ favorite forum, perhaps because since it is a Western country we might expect it to have libel laws which reflect what we Americans assume to be common Western values about freedom of speech, and to give an English libel judgment the same stamp of approval we would give an American one. In fact, America’s commitment to free speech and a free press is unique in the world. English libel law has barely evolved over the centuries. Authors are guilty until proven innocent, lack of negligence on the part of the author is irrelevant, statements of opinion are hardly more protected than statements of fact, an author=s unsuccessful effort to prove the truth of a statement can bring punitive damages and libel is even punishable as a misdemeanor crime.
New York author Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld, who has written extensively on terrorist financing, has experienced libel terrorism firsthand. Twenty-three copies of her book, Funding Evil: How Terrorism is Financed and How to Stop It, were sold in England over the internet. Additionally, a chapter of her book was available for viewing on the website of an American television network. On that basis, she was sued for libel in England by a Saudi businessman whom she identified in her book as a terrorist enabler through his financial support of organizations with terrorist ties.
What’s shocking is not that an English court found against Dr. Ehrenfeld (not only was the deck stacked against her in any event but Dr. Ehrenfeld, as a matter of principle and financial inability to defend herself overseas, declined to show up for her show trial), but that New Yorkâs courts have refused to recognize its jurisdiction over the Saudi businessman in order to hear Dr. Ehrenfeld’s suit to declare this libel judgment unenforceable in New York. Dr. Ehrenfeld lives and works in New York, her assets are in New York, and the English judgment requires her to take actions in New York to prevent her book and its assertions from ever reaching England again.
As Americans and as New Yorkers, we must to act to protect our journalists, authors and press.
Legislation which I have authored in New York with Senate Deputy Majority Leader Dean Skelos will overrule New York’s highest court and give Dr. Ehrenfeld the opportunity to make her case here in the United States. It will give New Yorks journalists, authors and press the tools they need to continue to fearlessly expose the truth about terrorism and its enablers, and will ensure that New York, and America, remain a beacon of free speech and a free press. Other states will, we hope, follow New York’s lead, and Congress itself will act to protect the entire country from the scourge of libel terrorism.
Mr. Lancman is a New York State Assemblyman, a Democrat in the Twenty-Fifth District, Queens.
Further information is available on: www.acdemocracy.org.
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January 13th, 2008 — Jenn Sierra (author), activism, books
Mark W. Smith, author of The Official Handbook of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy, has updated the handbook for the 2008 Presidential elections: The Arguments You Need to Defeat the Loony Left This Election Year
My favorite part of the book is a tongue-in-cheek flowchart in the preface, called “The Smoking Gun,” detailing the “conspiracy.”
The rest of the book, however, is an excellent compilation of this election year’s talking points. It’s a great quick-reference for bloggers and social networkers who find themselves in combat with leftist rhetoric on a daily basis. It covers all of the hot topics in the debates and news soundbytes, like immigration, the war, governmental power, socialism, abortion, and media bias. It also has a toolkit at the end for conservative voters, which gives a who’s who of the current giants in the conservative movement, and lists resources such as think-tanks print media, blogs, and right-leaning news teams, a 2008 voting guide, and an election-night scorecard.
The book is written from the viewpoint of a main-stream conservative (sometimes called “neocon”) viewpoint, so all political conservatives everywhere may not necessarily agree with absolutely every point Mark W. Smith makes; however as a resource, the information is invaluable. Smith’s straight-talk, to-the-point style, and dry humor make the manual easy to reference and fun to read.
Since the book is geared toward the 2008 elections, Smith has done an excellent job of covering the most relevant issues, but I would very much like to read more from this author in an off-election year on some other issues that are vitally important to the conservative movement, such as our educational system, the re-writing of our United States history, and the role of religion in government. Mark has done an excellent job of periodically updating this manual as needed; let’s hope he keeps ‘em coming!
October 28th, 2007 — China, Kosovo, Russia, Serbia, airlines and aviation, books, counterjihad, disaster preparedness, ecoterrorism, enemy propaganda, mainstream media, outsourcing, political correctness, travel
(Updated 11/20/07, 11/24/07, 12/25/07)
You might know the answer to these questions:
Is the Pentagon bureaucracy on your side?
You think so? Then why does the Pentagon get its advice from a flagrant bigot who refuses to appear on a panel of speakers with an Israeli?
Yesterday, the University of Delaware asked Asaf Romirowsky to step down from an academic panel at the University of Delaware because another panelist, University of Delaware political scientist Muqtedar Khan, didn’t want to share the podium with anyone who served in the Israeli Defense Forces.
If Khan was just an academic, that would be one thing. But he also straddles the policy world: Khan is a a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution, and a Pentagon consultant. According to an e-mail he sent to the University, he gave a workshop at the Pentagon yesterday afternoon.
Is the Department of Justice on your side?
You think so? Then why did the DOJ botch the first Holy Land Foundation (HLF) trial so thoroughly? True, there’s going to be another trial, but why couldn’t they have gotten their ducks in a row to do it right the first time?
Is the VA on your side?
You think so? Then why did they censor the text used in the flag folding ceremony for veterans in national cemeteries, in response to an anonymous complaint that was clearly motivated by anti-Semitism?
CW31 (cbs13.com) in California reports that, the traditional flag-folding recitation has been banned at national cemeteries due to a complaint filed at the Riverside National Cemetery. The complaint was apparently specific to the 11th fold of the ceremony, which honors Hebrew soldiers, Kings David and Solomon, and gives tribute to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
VA contact information
Is Wal-Mart on your side?
You think so? Just because of their “falling prices”/”everyday low prices”? How do you expect to afford even those “low prices” when all of the jobs have been sucked out of the US and exported to places like China?
Steve Dobbins has been bearing the brunt of that switch. He’s president and CEO of Carolina Mills, a 75-year-old North Carolina company that supplies thread, yarn, and textile finishing to apparel makers–half of which supply Wal-Mart. Carolina Mills grew steadily until 2000. But in the past three years, as its customers have gone either overseas or out of business, it has shrunk from 17 factories to 7, and from 2,600 employees to 1,200. Dobbins’s customers have begun to face imported clothing sold so cheaply to Wal-Mart that they could not compete even if they paid their workers nothing.
Here’s the comment I wrote for this article (I fixed a few typos and tweaked the formatting to make it work for this blog, because the comment form accompanying the article did not allow HTML):
I used to shop at Wal-Mart, back in their “Buy American” days. I stopped when I noticed that the good brands disappeared and the quality of everything in the store began getting worse and worse.
In essence, Wal-Mart is forcing their suppliers to outsource everything overseas, to destroy whatever reputation for quality they once had, and to become dependent on Wal-Mart. Then Wal-Mart makes the relationship unprofitable.
Here`s the solution:
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Never buy anything at Wal-Mart [or, for that matter, Sam's Club].
If you`re so broke that you can`t afford anything better, then go to a flea market or a second-hand store, or do without. How much clutter do you really need, anyway?
For the holidays, give your child one good toy, or a good book or game, from somewhere else, not five pieces of cheap, breakable, poorly-designed garbage from Wal-Mart.
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If you`re a supplier, don`t start doing business with Wal-Mart. Find ways to survive and prosper without getting sucked into their system.
- If you`re a journalist of any type, report more stories like this about what Wal-Mart is doing to America`s manufacturing base, communities, employment prospects, and reputation for quality.
Expose the abysmal quality of the outsourced rubbish that American firms are importing from places such as China, partly or wholly in response to pressure from Wal-Mart. The lead paint fiasco is only the beginning.
There are a lot more scandals if you want to look for them. Follow the money! Just for starters: Look at political contributions. Look at where their employees are getting their health care.
Finally, please stop comparing Wal-Mart to companies such as A&P that maintained a reputation for quality during the era when they were able to out-compete other companies.
Remember: If cost is your only consideration, everything turns into a race to the bottom. You will eventually end up spending all your money on a lot of junk, none of which would be worth the price even if it were free!
Also see:
Is the FBI on your side?
You think so? Then why do they refuse to acknowledge jihadist terrorism when they see it?
Sleep safe tonight. Your children might just be getting their education from a mentally ill Muslim who is on the FBI’s Terrorist Watch List… There are just so many things wrong with this, I don’t even know where to start!
FBI: Teacher who attacked base guards was suicidal, not terrorist
The Associated Press – Jacksonville.com
. . .
Ahmad’s mother said the first-year teacher at Miami Central High School is mentally ill and had recently been in a mental institution, where officials reported he tried killing himself.
Oh, and by the way: If you happen to live in Miami, you just might want to ask what (if any) background checks are being done on prospective teachers!
(Added 11/7/2007) And what about this?
Again the US government reaches out to the wrong people: FBI’s Latest Outreach Outrage.
As reported in the Detroit Free Press (see: Detroit’s FBI chief: Violence extremism cuts across religions), two top FBI officials from that office “spoke to about 50 Muslims inside the Islamic Organization of North America, or Tanzeem-e-Islami.” The Free Press described the organization as merely “a Sunni mosque with a primarily Pakistani congregation” and tells us that the meeting was nothing more than “part of an effort by the FBI to reach out to Muslims and other communities.”
As everyone, especially the FBI, should know by now, the IANA is an Islamist pressure group.
(Added 11/20/2007) And this?
If the FBI wants the support of the American people when it comes to fighting terror in the skies, it needs to treat them with respect. Annie Jacobsen has the harrowing tale of what happened when a Good Samaritan was transformed into a terror suspect. Required reading for Thanksgiving travelers.
In a nutshell, an innocent traveler saw someone exhibiting bizarre behavior on an airliner. He reported what he saw, but then, the FBI hauled him in as the suspect. The FBI eventually let him go and considers the matter “resolved.” Naturally, since he’s pro-American and not a jihadist, the ACLU is uninterested in helping him recover damages. Of course, there’s no word on what happened to the person who actually was behaving strangely on the plane.
Oh, and by the way, how many more enemy moles are working at the FBI, the CIA, or the State Department?
(Added 11/24/2007) This many more?
Intelligence official: ‘FBI might as well put out a sign – Double agents wanted’
Posted: November 20, 2007
9:35 p.m. Eastern
Thanks to lax background checks, even after 9/11, the Hezbollah spy who managed to obtain sensitive jobs at the FBI and CIA is not the first terrorist supporter to infiltrate the U.S. government.
An alleged al-Qaida operative also infiltrated the Environmental Protection Agency, according to federal investigators and court documents obtained by WND.
The case, details of which are revealed here for the first time, involves Waheeda Tehseen, a Pakistani national who obtained a sensitive position with the EPA in Washington as a toxicologist even though she was not a U.S. citizen.
Like the Lebanese national suspected of passing secrets to Hezbollah, Tehseen lied about her citizenship on her government application, a falsehood that the government failed – in both cases – to catch in its security background investigation.
You probably won’t know the answer to this question:
Are Serbs, and Serbian-Americans, on your side?
You think not? Especially after everything that’s happened in the past sixty years?
Think again!
It may surprise you to know that, even now, Orthodox Christian Serbian-Americans pray every Sunday in church for America’s government and armed forces. Serbs, in Serbia and elsewhere, are waiting for Americans to come to their senses about jihadism in the Balkans and elsewhere, preferably before it’s too late to avoid widespread destruction to what’s left of the civilized world!
Download this book – FREE of charge – and read the other articles that follow.
Free book available in PDF format, courtesy of Andy Wilcoxson:
Gen. Mihailovic’s only crime was resisting the twin evils of Hitler’s fascism and Stalin’s communism.
. . .
“Because the book is out of print and the publisher went out of business more than 50 years ago copies of it are hard to come by, so I scanned my copy, and through the magic of the Internet you can download your own copy of the book in PDF format by right clicking this link and selecting “Save Target As” (please note file is 137 MB).”
. . .
General Mihailovich fell seventeen months after the so-called “liberation” of Yugoslavia. Reports from Belgrade on March 24th, 1946, announced his capture under puzzling circumstances on March 13th, 1946. His trial before a Communist military court began on June 10th, 1946. He was “sentenced” to death on July 15th, 1946, and murdered on July 17th, 1946.
General Mihailovich is no more. He has departed this world convinced that he was abandoned by the Allies. The voices that were raised abroad in his defence were not allowed to reach him and he died without the satisfaction of knowing that in the opinion of many he died an innocent man and a great soldier.
General Mihailovich is no more, but the legends of his heroic deeds are becoming more and more popular and they live in the hearts of the people.
General Mihailovich is no more. He has departed this world. Those who have murdered him have not only perpetrated a crime, they have also committed a grave mistake, for democratic public opinion is well aware of General Mihailovich’s merits.
General Mihailovich is no more. The last words of this great patriot were concise and poignant. He said:
“I strove for much, I undertook much, but the gales of the world have carried away both me and my work.”
But wait, there’s more!
Technorati : Bosnia, CIA, China, FBI, Kosovo, MSM corruption, Serbia, U.S. law, counterterrorism, disaster preparedness, ecoterrorism, enemy propaganda, jihadism, military, political correctness
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September 8th, 2007 — Christianity, Czech Republic, CzechRebel (author), Islam, Kosovo, Nazism, Orthodox Christianity, Serbia, books, history, medical
By CzechRebel
Aftermath to One of History’s Most Important Assassinations
Growing up as a Czech-American in the shadow of the Second World War, I learned the heroic tale of the “Czechoslovakian” commandos who managed to kill one of the most dangerous Nazi leaders in the entire Third Reich. Assassination has gotten quite a bad name in recent years. We think of the JFK murder and of the subsequent changes in US foreign policy that put the tactic of assassination of any head of state-even of the most dangerous criminal-off limits, and we tend to condemn the practice out of hand.
Even so, how many lives could have been saved if someone had the foresight to have assassinated Hitler and/or Stalin? Perhaps there are others who belong in that list also, but the actions of Hitler and Stalin could have been so easily predicted. Hitler put the pen to his evil and left us a book full of his nefarious plans. Stalin was so dangerous that even Lenin, at the end of his life, warned that he should be kept out of power.
The Assassination of Hitler’s More Evil Successor?
While those two were dangerous enough, there was a third man of incredible evil on the world stage during the time of the Third Reich. He was a fiercely competent, up-and-coming Nazi leader whom many expected would someday succeed Hitler in power. That man was Reinhard Heydrich. Assigned to oversee occupied Czechoslovakia (now two separate states, the Czech Republic and Slovakia), he conducted a brutal reign of terror over the Slavic inhabitants, whom the Nazis regarded with hatred and contempt.
Were Heydrich to have become Hitler’s successor, he most likely would have continued Hitler’s evils, but with far greater efficiency.
The story of the assassination itself is relatively straightforward. Two men-Jan Kubis, a Czech, and Josef Gabcik, a Slovak-had been trained in Britain, as were many other Eastern European resistance fighters during WW II. One was to conceal a submachine gun under his raincoat and the other was to hold a hand grenade, while waiting for Heydrich’s open-top car. The grenade would be tossed into the oncoming vehicle and the machine gun would pump Heydrich’s body full of bullets.
But on the day of the assassination, May 29, 1942, the gun jammed and would not fire. The grenade was tossed under the vehicle. It produced only enough shrapnel to injure Heydrich, who rose from the explosion, drew his pistol and shot at the fleeing assassins.
Nazi Vengeance
However, something unexpected intervened. The explosion had damaged Heydrich’s spleen and had driven contaminated upholstery fragments from the car into his body. An infection set in and Heydrich was dead within a few days. On what came to be his deathbed, Heydrich had ordered extensive and brutal reprisals.
Even after the death of Heydrich, the Nazis obediently continued their reprisals against the Czech people, of which the most infamous was the destruction of the village of Lidice. All men and older boys were given shovels and told to dig what would be their graves. The women and children were whisked off to concentration camps where most of them died. The buildings of the town of Lidice were burned or otherwise destroyed, so as to leave no trace of the community.
The Czech underground resistance movement hid Jan Kubis and Josef Gabcik at Saints Cyril and Methodios Church. The Nazis discovered the resistance hideout in the crypt below the church and began storming the building. The resistance fighters killed and injured many Nazis before realizing that their ammunition was in short supply. Rather than face torture and interrogation at the hands of the Nazis, the resistance fighters took their own lives in a final act of defiance.
The story was told to us many times. The most notable was a television docudrama from a series called, if I remember correctly, This Is True. The battle scene at the church is still vivid in my memory. I do remember a clergyman suffering Nazi persecution as a result, but the fact that the Church was Eastern Orthodox either slipped my memory or had been covered up completely.
The Orthodox Perspective
Jan Hus Opposed the Roman Church
The Czech Republic and Slovakia are not generally thought of as bastions of Orthodox Christianity. But for a quirk of history, it might well have been otherwise. About 100 years before the time of Martin Luther, Jan Hus was burnt at the stake for heresy. Hus died in the same way, and on the same day, as Joan of Arc. Like Luther, Hus saw the need to reform the Roman Church. Unlike Luther, he had planned to combine his movement with the Orthodox Church in Constantinople. Tragically, Constantinople fell to the Turks before those plans could come to fruition.
Had Jan Hus succeeded, there might have been no cause for a Protestant Reformation.
On September 6, 1987, The Orthodox Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia canonized Bishop Gorazd for his martyrdom as a result of his heroism in the aftermath to the Heydrich assassination.
Nazi hatred of Orthodox Christians was extreme, and it went hand in hand with their contempt toward Slavic peoples. While the Final Solution to the Jewish problem was well publicized, the Serbs, who are Orthodox Christians, were also high on the list of peoples that Hitler and company wished to exterminate. Hitler’s hatred of the Czechs was well known; he once called Czechoslovakia “a dagger in the heart of Germany.” His demand for what he called the Sudetenland-which included much of Bohemia, the largest province in Czechoslovakia-led to one of the savage Nazi land-grabs of the years before World War II. Therefore, the combination of being both Czech and Orthodox Christian would have put such an individual into two of the categories of Nazi hatred.
Hitler’s reaction to the Heydrich assassination was predictable. He always took revenge for any sign of defiance with vastly disproportionate rage and cruelty. It also appears that Hitler used the Heydrich assassination as a pretext for hunting down and killing Orthodox Christians in Czechoslovakia.
Bishop Gorazd wrote a letter to Nazis offering to surrender himself to their captivity in return for stopping their slaughter of his fellow Orthodox Christian countrymen. True to Nazi infamy, they not only arrested, tortured, and killed Bishop Gorazd, but also captured and killed over 250 other Orthodox Christians, including some priests. The Orthodox Church could no longer function until after the war, but thanks to Bishop Gorazd, many Orthodox believers survived. The Czech Orthodox Church thrives once again in the present-day Czech Republic.
The Invisible Christianity
How the Orthodox angle to this story escapes notice is truly amazing. In the last hundred years or so, most parts of the world with a significant Orthodox Christian (a/k/a “Eastern Orthodox”) population have suffered at the hands of the Nazis, the Communists or the Muslim Ottoman Turks. In many cases, two or even three of these evil forces have persecuted Orthodox Christians.
Yet, this persecution seems to go unnoticed in the Western world. During the 1999 Kosovo War, the media successfully mischaracterized the conflict as “ethnic violence.” Viewing it in those terms, the media were hard pressed to explain the “anomalies” where ethnic Serbs and ethnic Albanians had worked together to prepare for an invasion of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). The explanation is simple enough-why wouldn’t Orthodox Christian Albanians and Orthodox Christian Serbs have cooperated to protect one another from the KLA or any other Islamic terrorist organization? President Reagan said it best when he remarked that any organization clever enough to use the word “liberation” in its name would be able to get away with murder. So it has been for the Muslim narcoterrorists of the Kosovo Liberation Army-at least for the time being.
The very fact that Hitler felt secure in taking revenge on innocent Orthodox Christians in retaliation for Heydrich’s assassination was just one more example of the invisible nature of Orthodoxy. Had the victims been Baptist, Lutheran, Roman Catholic or Methodist, there would have been an international outcry of religious persecution.
The Early Church
The people of the Orthodox Christian faith claim to be the remnant of the Early Church of the New Testament. The Roman Church claims legitimacy through Apostolic succession, and some other Christian denominations regard themselves as special sects based upon a revival of New Testament practices. But the Orthodox Christian Church is truly unique in claiming a faith unchanged since the time of the Early Church, perhaps since the actual time of the Apostles.
There is an eerie sense that the level of persecution encountered by the Orthodox Christian community in the past hundred years is likewise similar to that directed against the Early Church. In fact, the twentieth century saw more persecution of Orthodox Christians than any other. The martyrdom of Bishop Gorazd is yet another spine-tingling example, and his heroism serves as an inspiration to us all.
Links:
Technorati : Czech, Heydrich, Hitler, Islam, Kosovo, Lidice, Nazism, Orthodox Christianity, Serbia, St. Gorazd, WWII
Del.icio.us : Czech, Heydrich, Hitler, Islam, Kosovo, Lidice, Nazism, Orthodox Christianity, Serbia, St. Gorazd, WWII
Ice Rocket : Czech, Heydrich, Hitler, Islam, Kosovo, Lidice, Nazism, Orthodox Christianity, Serbia, St. Gorazd, WWII
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