Faurisson risks jail for 60-word summary of his research during Tehran conference
A brief resumé of the hearing held last week in Paris, by Alison Chabloz.
In contrast to the
Court of Appeal hearing given last March, this latest bout of Ziocon persecution of revisionist, Robert Faurisson, was held in the
17° Chambre Correctionelle of the High Court at the
Palais de Justice
in Paris, ensuring that numerous members of the public who’d gathered
there to support the professor were able to witness the proceedings from
the court room’s spacious gallery.
Starting an hour late owing to the morning session having overrun the
allocated time-slot, magistrates initially dealt with several other
cases, lasting for almost another hour, before it was the turn of the
world’s foremost ‘Holocaust’ revisionist to defend himself against three
separate charges. There was no apology forthcoming from the court for
this delay which of course had the negative effect of reducing valuable
debating time as well as causing magistrates to rush the proceedings.
Two charges for contesting a crime against humanity (one of which
brought by former Justice Minister, Pascal Clément) and a third for
racial defamation brought by the LICRA –
Ligue contre le racisme et l’antisémitisme.
All three complaints targeted a speech made by the professor in 2006
at a conference on the ‘Holocaust’ in Tehran, Iran. A star witness in
the person of
Lady Michele Renouf
who had travelled from London for the hearing would testify after the
initial debates. For once, the number of lawyers on the accused benches
seemed to outnumber those of the prosecution by five to two (five to
three, if we include the state prosecutor). In reality, however, Robert
Faurisson’s defence was assured by Maître Damien Viguer alone. Three
immense dossiers were produced and placed on the judge’s desk almost
completely hiding the magistrate himself. Cue: hushed, slightly amused
tittering from the public benches.
The defence’s principle argument rested on the fact that Faurisson’s
speech in Tehran had been delivered in English and had lasted only ten
minutes. As his speech had been given outside French territory, French
law would not apply. In this case, however, it was the professor’s
written essay
The Victories of Revisionism, published
in Tehran then distributed on the Internet, that had led to the three
charges. The article details the major successes of Robert Faurisson’s
revisionist career and, in particular, confessions of his adversaries
which substantiate the professor’s outright technical and moral victory
over his detractors. It is this same article which Maître Viguer uses
consistently in defence of his client during the many trials brought by a
judicial system which is plainly rotten to the core.
The judge, a man in his forties with curly, dark ginger hair and a beard, began by reading Faurisson’s article (see
Part 1 and
Part 2).
The longer the reading went on, the more the judge seemed to be taking
in Faurisson’s words. Towards the end, the judge’s face had completely
disappeared behind the hand-held, stapled bundle of A4 sheets.
Faurisson’s counsel, Maître Viguer, asked that the two complaints for
contesting crimes against humanity be nullified because of legal
non-compliance. After a short break for deliberation, the court reserved
its ruling in relation to this matter until September 27. Thus, only
the third charge of ‘racial defamation’ would be deliberated on this
humid afternoon in the centre of the French capital.
The charge of defamation brought by LICRA concerned the following passages of Faurisson’s article:
“President Ahmadinejad (then head of the Islamic Republic of Iran)
used the right word when he said that the alleged Holocaust of the Jews
is a myth: that is to say, a belief maintained by credulity or
ignorance.
“The alleged Hitlerite gas chambers and the alleged genocide of Jews
form one and the same historical lie, which allowed a gigantic political
and financial swindle whose main beneficiaries are the state of Israel
and international Zionism and whose main victims are the German people –
but not their leaders – and the Palestinian people in their entirety.”
The accusation’s charge of defamation lay solely on the ‘argument’
that, by these statements, Faurisson was clearly targeting the Jewish
community. The judge asked Faurisson to explain.
Faurisson’s retorts were confident and unrelenting: citing Israel and
international Zionism is not the same as citing “the Jews”. The public
as well as the officers of the court present were then treated to an
hour and a half’s
exposé by the man himself. Unlike orthodox
historians who merely repeat the given narrative, he would actually go
out on the job, tape measure in hand. The 60-word phrase, he explained,
is the summary of his lifetime’s work in the field of revisionism. As he
advised his students, the key to success when researching any subject
is the ability to resume this work in a phrase of approximately 60
words. The enormous body of work he carried out began in the 1950s when
he first asked:
“Show me a photo, an architect’s plan or even a drawing of a gas chamber.”
Faurisson continued his testimony with an explanation of Rudolf Höss’
witness statement at the Nuremberg International Military Tribunal,
gained via torture, in particular sleep deprivation. Then, a brief
lesson on the explosive quality of Zyklon-B with analysis of actual
execution chambers which employ this same gas (
no longer used)
in the USA. In the 187 pages of court transcripts from Nuremberg
concerning Auschwitz, practically nothing is dedicated to the subject of
gassing.
The professor went on to expose the lies of Elie Wiesel in his book
Night
as well as other fabrications concerning execution by boiling water at
Treblinka which also feature in the Nuremberg transcript. So many false
witnesses: only last week
we learned of yet another in the news.
The judge, at this point, interjects with “You’ve therefore not
modified your proposals after all this time..?” The female magistrate
present appears to have fallen asleep! Such is the contempt for
Faurisson’s indisputable strength of character, as apparent and all the
more humbling here and now, at the grand old age of 87, as when he
started his research more than six decades ago. Faurisson’s conclusions
are based on fact, documented evidence, repeatable scientific experiment
and, above all, are the fruit of a lifetime’s study and research. What
reason other than insanity would make him change his proposals “after
all this time”?
Faurisson elaborates on the magical six million number. In August,
1944, Wilhelm Hötll, friend of Eichman, gave a witness statement
purporting that the sensational sum could be reached by adding the four
million in Auschwitz ‘extermination camp’ to another two million
slain Soviets. This was the first time the phrase
extermination camp was used in place of
concentration camp. However, Hötll was never called to testify at Nuremberg.
The prosecution declines the opportunity to grill Faurisson; Maître
Viguer invites the professor to talk about the conference in Iran.
Contrary to media reports, the 2006 conference was inclusive of all
opinions concerning the ‘Holocaust’. The professor remembers one
adversary challenging him to go to the National Archives in Washington
where he would see the evidence that his findings were erroneous. The
poor fellow hadn’t bargained on the professor already having been to
these very same archives where, amongst other clues, he uncovered
documents relating to the 32 RAF sorties over Auschwitz, none of which
had succeeded in showing smoke billowing out from the crematoria
chimneys.
Maître Viguier questions the professor further on the origin of all
these lies surrounding the “Holocaust”. Faurisson replies that it’s
impossible to say; the rumour runs and runs. The CICR had also heard
rumours of gas chambers at Auschwitz, yet their investigation team was
unable to find anyone confirming these rumours. Even Eric Conan in
French weekly,
L’Express, said of the gas chamber exhibit at
Auschwitz “Tout y est faux” – everything is false. 1.7 million people
visit Auschwitz annually.
At this point, the judge decides to call Lady Renouf to hear her
witness statement. As this will be in English, the court has arranged
for an accredited translator to be present. After giving her name and
details, Lady Renouf first congratulates Maître Viguier for his bravery
in accepting to defend the professor. Her witness statement follows in
short phrases which are immediately translated for the benefit of the
court. We hear confirmation that Faurisson’s speech was an impromptu
affair which lasted only ten minutes and Lady Renouf makes reference to
the professor’s English-spoken heritage, owed to his mother being a
Scot. She repeats Faurisson’s anecdote, often used to introduce himself
to an English-speaking audience, that his French ear should not listen
to his Scottish ear because, whereas Scottish law permits inquiry and
research into the “Holocaust”, French law does not.
Linguistic confusion arises when Lady Renouf speaks of
guidelines (in
French, “les consignes”) on how the “Holocaust” should be taught in
schools, published in Stockholm in 2000. The translator is unable to
translate the word for
guidelines, using “guides” instead. Whether or not the
greffière
recorded a corrected version is uncertain; perhaps the court thought
that Lady Renouf was talking about “tour guides”, at Auschwitz or
elsewhere?
The Stockholm International Forum on the Holocaust where the
‘Holocaust’ education guidelines were first announced was also the site
of two physical attacks on Faurisson by Jewish terrorist organisation
LDJ (Ligue de Défence Juive or Jewish Defence League). These guidelines
instruct all public and private schools worldwide not to give a platform
to revisionists. Lady Renouf summarises, stating that historical debate
and rational argument do not seem to be part of educational guidelines
on this subject. There are no questions from the court.
Maître Viguier promptly urges the professor to talk about a
case dating back to 1983
when he was accused of “falsifying history”. Faurisson explains that
this was the catalyst which led to creation of the 1990 Fabius-Gayssot
Act. He also recalls the work of British historian and
semi-revisionist David
Irving, along with the fact that neither Churchill nor de Gaulle ever
mention any gas chambers. In fact, during WW1 already, UK national
newspaper the
Daily Express had written about enemy gas
chambers as early as 1914. An investigation after the war ended in 1918
proved that the story was a propaganda lie. Again, in 1943, the same
story about gas chambers appears in the
Daily Express. This
time, however, there was no similar post-war investigation. Another
piece of vital evidence is the documented case of Marinka in Russia
where the local mayor was shot dead by the German army for killing a
Jewish woman. Many such examples exist yet are suppressed from public
knowledge.
The professor then relates his victories over Raul Hilberg and Jean-Claude Pressac; cites Valerie Igounet’s book of smears
Histoire du négationnisme en France and tells us that Ariane Chemin didn’t know who Hilberg was when she interviewed the professor in Vichy for
Le Monde
newspaper. Faurisson also names the director of Yad Vashem 1953-1959,
Ben-Zion Dinur, who resigned after coming to the realisation there were
far too many false witnesses.
Change of tone as Mâitre Christian Charrière-Bournazel
representing LICRA comes to the bar. He’s clearly unhappy about having
been forced to listen to Faurisson for
two hours (in reality
Faurisson had only spoken for an hour and a half), although it’s
doubtful Charrière-Bournazel will be complaining quite so much when
he receives his fat fee. The only accusation is restricted to the same,
tired refrain: when Faurisson mentions the state of Israel and
international Zionism, Faurisson means
Jews. Faurisson is a
racist. Faurisson has already been
prosecuted and
convicted, etc., etc.
The state prosecutor raises even more eyebrows as she tries to
stabilise her microphone (no working mic and a dodgy translator suggest
the French judiciary can’t afford to run their courts properly?).
Diabolical smears regards Faurisson’s personality as well as the
obligatory jibe about using the court room as a platform from which,
according to
Madame la Procureure, Faurisson would take immense
gratification. Perhaps the most telling phrase amongst all the outright
lies and smears (paid for by the French tax payer, of course) is when
the prosecutor states Faurisson should no longer be given the
possibility of further court appearances.
Maître Viguier once again stands to contest the accusation’s claims.
That the professor’s words in Tehran constitute ‘defamation’ is a
fraudulent lie. The professor’s work is that of an historian. Viguier
protests his colleague’s conflation of Israel and Jews, defiantly and
correctly stating that conflict in the Middle East could be seen as one
direct result of the lies of the Shoah. Faurisson’s work, he insists,
will last as long as does this
mensonge (“lie”). Viguier deplores the
moral order
inflicted upon revisionists in the name of war and war crimes, and
which effectively prevents revisionists from doing their job.
The judge invites Faurisson to have the last word. Faurisson is
finally able to respond to Charrière-Bournazel’s earlier attacks by
comparing the lawyer’s attitude and manner to that of an
enflure (in the sense of
over-exaggerated, self-important, turgid).
This warrants an admonishment of Faurisson by the judge, who then fails
to chastise Charrière-Bournazel for leaving the court in a show of
brazen pomposity whilst Faurisson is still speaking.
Faurisson finishes with another couple of examples of dubious witness
statements and mistranslations which have been used by propagandists to
bolster the case for a presumed genocide of countless Jews. We’re told
of the wildly varying death toll estimates and asked why those who
revised the official Auschwitz death toll – down from four to
one-and-a-half million – were not punished in the same atrocious manner
which Faurisson has been subjected to throughout his career.
The prosecution is demanding a month’s prison sentence and a 3,000
euro fine in the event of a guilty verdict. We shall now have to wait to
September 27 to hear the court’s ruling.
Further reading:
The revisionists’ total victory on the historical and scientific level
