From the book to the interview		The Holocaust Industry: the book by Giovanni De Martis From the book to the interview by Giovanni De Martis The interview
Giovanni De Martis
Before publishing “The Holocaust Industry”, Norman Finkelstein was an almost unknown professor at the Hunter College, University of New York. He had never dealt with the topic of the Holocaust, except when he “demolished”, in a book review, Daniel Goldhagen’s work “Hitler’s Willing Executioners” – not a difficult operation indeed, given the number of criticisms Goldhagen received from the entire academic world in the U.S. Earlier Finkelstein had written two books on the Middle East conflict, characterized by a distinct pro-Palestinian connotation.
Fnkelstein is connected to the American Left (i.e., Noam Chomsky’s school) and, before publishing “The Holocaust Industry”, he was an underpaid, 47-year-old professor (he himself complained about the $22,000 per year he earned at the Hunter College.) “the Holocaust Industry” brought Finkelstein under the spotlights from one day to the next. There are two possible explanations for this: either this is a genial work or, as is often the case, it appears at the right moment, in the right “packaging”. Some doubts about the geniality of this work are certainly legitimate. In the first place, the topic is all but original. Shortly before “The Industry of the Holocaust”, a book entitled “The Holocaust in American Life”, by a certain Peter Novik, had been published in the United States. Novik tackled more or less the same issues as Finkelstein, with softer tones, and from a sociological standpoint. Secondly, Finkelstein’s book is politically incorrect, is full of insulting adjectives, and sounds more like a political invective than an academic study. We can easily rule out geniality as a success factor, even without engaging in an in-depth analysis of Finkelstein’s arguments. The reasons are to be found elsewhere, i.e., in the particular time at which it appears, and in its “packaging”. Finkelstein’s book appears at a time of deep crisis in american studies of the Holocaust. While there is a proliferation of foundations and institutions that should promote studies of the Shoah, no works of real significance have been published for a long time. Raoul Hilberg – the father of studies on this topic, with his monumental work “The destruction of European Jews” – is a 75-year-old professor and, for obvious age reasons, after his immense contribution he is no longer in a position to provide us with great pictures and interpretations. No doubt, besides elderly Professor Hilberg there are other historians of great value (e.g.: browning, Breitman, etc.), but instead of producing significant works, in recent years they spent their time in wild squabbles. In 1996, young historian Daniel Goldhagen, with the publication of a book that condemns the whole German people as responsible for the Holocaust, started a controversy which diverted scholars from more important occupations. In the last decade, the best books on the Shoah (e.g.: Wolfgang Sofsky’s “order of Terror”) came out of the universities of dear old Europe. In addition to the crisis in American historiography, there is the Arab-Israeli conflict with its new escalation. As general attention is increasingly focussed on the Middle East, the public warmly welcomes any studies on the subject, especially if they are “new”, that is, if they can upset consolidated concepts, generally accepted or acceptable opinions, or serious analyses. Finkelstein’s book falls into this framework: the ground is receptive. But that’s not enough. A good “packaging” is also necessary. Usually, attention is attracted either through intelligence or through clamour. Finkelstein chooses the latter technique. An old story tells about a Longobard queen who incited her son, who had descended into Italy, to destroy Roman monuments because, since he could not go down in history as a constructor, at least he could have become immortal as a destructor. Finkelstein fully adopts the “Longobard strategy”. As this is a barbaric concept, it is not difficult to put into practice. The ingredients are few and the method is simple. Just take a famous character – the more famous, the better – and cover him with insults, accuse him of the worst crimes, and there you are the goal is reached. And then, if the famous character is a bearer of generally accepted and shared ideas, those ideas are attacked too, just to play it safe. The target of Finkelstein’s “Longobard strategy” is Elie Wiesel. A Nobel Prize for Peace, a survivor of the Nazi annihilation camps, a celebrated writer, elie Wiesel is an ideal target. But that’s not enough. The “Longobard strategy” must be supported by another technique: the “discovery of a plot”. Whoever is familiar with the American movie culture, knows that paranoia always pays. The average American has a passion for secret powers who plot in the dark, on behalf of secret and powerful organizations aiming at ruling both the market and the world. A plot is a simple, fascinating and effective explanation for problems and issues which would otherwise require long and time-consuming analyses. Finkelstein brings out of his hat the most widely plot in the world: the Jewish plot. International Jewish organizations, in cohoots with the Israeli Government, after 1967 would have come up with a sophisticated scheme to penetrate into the “nerve centere” of the United States. By exploiting the memory of the Holocaust, this diabolic and effective scheme would, on one hand, lead the Jewish lobby to a stable occupation of power and, on the other hand, legitimate Israel within the american society as a “persecuted subject”. So the Jewish plot would have invented “the uniqueness of the Holocaust”, minimized all genocides of the past, present and future world, created research institutions and organizations with the sole, secret purpose of dominating the United States of America. But, as it is universally known, Jews are greedy, and it is their greed that exposes this “great secret scheme”. The demand for “exhorbitant compensation” from Swiss banks would mark the final goal of this project. As everyone knows well, Swiss banks are, by definition, week subjects, helpless and unable to resist the pressure exerted by the Jewish lobbies. And so the circle of the scheme is closed: thanks to the Holocaust, power and money fall into the hands of Jewery who, as all know, seek nothing but power and money. Since the days of the notorious “Protocols of the Wise Elders of Zion”, fabricated by the Czarists and utilised by the Nazis, no-one had painted such a comprehensive picture of the great plot of international Jewery. But Finkelstein has another trump card to play: an almost perfect trump card. He is Jewish, and both his parents are Jews and Holocaust survivors. This fact automatically legitimates him: an anti-Semitic Jew would be an absurdity. In addition, unlike the Jews of the lobbies, he is poor. His mother received the miserable amount of $3500 as compensation for her sufferings during the Shoah. The circle closes: “Longobard strategy”, “discovery of the Jewish plot”, and the author’s Jewish origins. At this point the content of the book, the theses it develops, hardly matter. The bomb-book is ready. Obviously, Finkelstein is a totally unhoped-for blessing for all Holocaust deniers. It is not surprising that all negationist and neo-nazi websites promote Finkelstein’s book, and use ample excerpts of it. The book really provides all a professional negationist requires: Jewish plot, Israeli zionism, greed. For years, negationists have been talking about “dogmas” of official historiography, and finding someone who maintains that the uniqueness of the Shoah is nothing but a cunning strategy to extort money from Europeans is like finding a treasure. Incidentally, we Europeans, within the whole of Finkelstein’s theory, are seen as poor idiots. In front of the powerful international Jewish organizations, the helpless Swiss bankers give in, for fear of reprisals on the part of the U.S. Government, while the Germans open up their purse, in order not to be accused of anti-Semitism. Some doubts concerning the alleged “stupidity” of Swiss bankers are legitimate. The agreement signed by Swiss banks envisages that compensations involve only the so-called “dormant” accounts, that is, those current accounts opened before or during the war, whose owners never came back to claim the relevant amounts. The agreement explicitly states that there cannot be any further requests for compensation, and it excludes the gold taken fro mthe Jews and deposited by the Nazis in Swiss banks, and works of art confiscated to the Jews and deposited in Switzerland. At first sight, even Swiss bankers can take good care of their business, and they do not look like week subjects, vulnerable to intimidations. Finkelstein’s book is a work based on a thesis that exposes itself to an incredible number of objections. Many are of the opinion that re-distribution of compensation money was not carried out in a transparent manner. Many criticisms were raised on this point in the U.S., even within American Jewery. The question that could be asked is whether the wish to expose any possible frauds or embezzlements justifie writing a book which, as the saying goes, “throws away the baby with the bath water”. It is certainly possible to criticise anybody – including Elie Wiesel -, but personally attacking one’s counterpart, accusing him of material and intellectual dishonesty, does certainly not represent the normal way of debating issues. Defining the Simon Wiesenthal Centre a bunch of heartless, unscrupulous businessmen whose only goal is to rake up funds, does not seem to set the appropriate stage for a constructive discussion. Finkelstein’s book falls into that category of writings that want to provide simple answers for complex issues. In this respect, the plot theory stimulates the most naive imaginations. The interview we carried out via e-mail with prof. Finkelstein meant to clarify with him direct the gap that separates him from Holocaust deniers. For this reason, we thought it was fair to give him a chance to state it clearly himself. We cannot agree with Finkelstein when he says it was the “Holocaust industry” that created Holocaust denial. Holocaust deniers have been active for a long time. If 1967 is the year when, according to Finkelstein, the engine of the “Holocaust industry” was started, we could quote operations of Holocaust denial dating back to long before that year. The general impression we receive is that Finkelstain is not very concerned about providing Holocaust deniers with good ammunitions. Our opinion is, however, that whoever has got ammunitions, sooner or later will use them, and whoever sells such ammunitions cannot shun responsibility.