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Friday, February 4, 2000


 

Irving'I find the Holocaust endlessly boring'

 

By Tom Segev
Ha'aretz Correspondent

British historian David Irving says that, had the Jews not been allowed to set up a state in Palestine but were sent to Madagascar instead, as proposed in the plan he attributes to Nazi Germany, "the world would be a happier place."

In an interview with Ha'aretz, Irving claims that during the 1956 Sinai Campaign he took part in a demonstration supporting Israel, but today he sees no big difference between Israelis and Nazis. The interview was held in Irving's home in London's Mayfair district, as he sat under a large portrait of U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt, whom he praised for extricating his country from a deep crisis, commenting: "like Hitler."

The interview with Irving came at the end of a long day of hearings in the libel case he filed against American historian Deborah Lipstadt over a book she wrote describing him as a Holocaust denier. Irving does not deny that the Nazis murdered Jews, but claims that they did not systematically murder millions in gas chambers. Asked where all the Jews that he claims the Nazis did not murder disappeared to, Irving said: "The fact is there are Jews everywhere. That's how they are. They always pop up again, everywhere. Maybe they changed their names to Israeli names." But he's not too interested in that. He finds the Holocaust endlessly boring, he says.

Irving added that the Jews should ask themselves why they are hated so much, and always have been, everywhere. "What is it in them that generates this hatred? They would do well to think about that."

"There is no doubt that they are hated today in part because of all the 'Holocaust propaganda' they are constantly spreading. It's become impossible to open a newspaper or see a television program these days without coming across the Holocaust. Holocaust, Holocaust, everywhere Holocaust. The Holocaust has 'hijacked' all the media, all of Western culture. The world is fed up with it. People are losing their patience and are liable to resort to acts of violence against Jews. If the Jews don't stop, they can expect a genuine Holocaust."


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February 4, 2000
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