Time for the US to have hate crime legislation

Time for the US to have hate crime legislation

Shoah Denier Squares Off With Jewish Agency Aide

By NATHANIEL POPPER, Forward

A mounting Internet feud has led to the expulsion of a public leader of the Holocaust revisionist movement from Amazon.com and triggered a slew of threatening e-mails against a Jewish communal official.

The trouble started soon after Allyson Rowen Taylor, associate director of the Los Angeles office of the American Jewish Congress, ordered one of Hitler's favorite books, "The Riddle of the Jew's Success," September 10 from a seller on Amazon.com's marketplace.

Only afterward did she find out that she had purchased the book from Holocaust revisionist Michael Santomauro, who runs an e-mail list called ReportersNotebook that is dedicated to Holocaust denial as well as to anti-Jewish and anti-Israel material.

(Allyson is a friend and co-founder with Roz Rothstein of StandWithus in Los Angeles. Her experience with holocaust denier and self proclaimed neo-Nazi Santamauro is indicative of the worst abuses of the internet and cyberspace for judenhass. Ironically, as I understood it from Professor Abella of York University who lectured at Yale last week on Canadian Antisemitism that this episode would be prosecutable under your hate language laws. Allyson is to be commended for contending with the invasion of both her's and her family privacy. She has shone the hot kleig light disinfecting us from this home grown acolyte of Julius Streicher, editor of the Nazi rag, Der Sturmer.a virulent racist anti-Semite. Gerry Gordon)

When Amazon banned Santomauro from its marketplace a few weeks later — due to e-mails he had sent to Taylor — Santomauro distributed Taylor's home address and e-mail account to his thousands of subscribers. The AJCongress official was immediately hit with a barrage of threatening e-mails — one of which led Taylor to contact the Los Angeles police.

"Since you support Zionists," the anonymous e-mailer wrote, "I'm sure you won't mind having your family members shot and your house bulldozed."

The Internet has been a boon for Holocaust revisionists, who have found few other mainstream outlets for their ideas and products. Earlier this year, Santomauro began selling "The Riddle of the Jew's Success" on the Amazon marketplace, which serves as a middle man between Internet buyers and sellers. The book, which was written by Theodor Fritsch, was first published in 1887 and became one of Hitler's favorites. In an e-mail to supporters, Santomauro wrote that the book explained how "Judaism is a conspiracy against non-Jews. Its aim is to fulfill the covenant and gain dominion over mankind by controlling wealth."

Santomauro reprinted 1,000 copies of a translation of Fritsch's book, and by September he had sold more than 100 of them. Taylor came across the book as part of her work with the AJCongress, where she said she is "in charge of monitoring antisemitism and anti-Americanism on high school and college campuses."

Taylor has posted a number of online reviews of books relating to Israel and Judaism on Amazon.com. In a review of a book edited by prominent left-wing Israeli historian Tom Segev on Israeli political dissent, she wrote, "If you like lies, revisionist history, falsehood, and numbers without statistics to back them up, then this is the book for you."

On the same day that Taylor bought "The Riddle of the Jew's Success" from Santomauro, she posted a review of the book. In it, she wrote, "Shame on Amazon and shame on you if you purchase this trash." Santomauro wrote to Taylor using the e-mail address he had received through the order, and asked her why she had written a bad review before reading the book. (Taylor said that she had read excerpts before purchasing it.)

Amazon prohibits sellers from having any contact with customers that is unrelated to the transaction. Taylor said that soon after, she received two more e-mails from Santomauro's personal e-mail account. One of which, she said, "talked about Jews masturbating over body parts." When Amazon asked for a customer review of her experience, she sent along the e-mails from Santomauro.

In an interview with the Forward, Santomauro said he sent the e-mails only after Taylor asked to join his ReportersNotebook e-mail list. Taylor countered that she did request to join his list — for monitoring purposes — but only two days after receiving the first batch of e-mails. Neither claim could be confirmed, because both Santomauro and Taylor told the Forward that they had deleted their e-mails from the relevant time period.

This is not the first time that Santomauro's various email lists have gotten crossed. He also runs a roommate-matching service on the Internet. In 2003, he was swamped with complaints after his Holocaust revisionist e-mails accidentally were sent out to his real estate clients.

In this case, Amazon wrote to him October 11 telling him he was "no longer able to sell on our site," because of "inappropriate e-mail contact that originated from your e-mail address."

Santomauro told a different story in e-mails that he sent out to his supporters after he was banned by Amazon. He immediately wrote to his ReportersNotebook list, proclaiming that he was the target of a "professional campaign to smear booksellers that deal with the 'Jewish Question.'" He told his readers to protest to Amazon. Then he sent out a separate e-mail with Taylor's home and e-mail addresses. Santomauro told the Forward that he sent out Taylor's personal information in order to help journalists who wanted to write about the story.

Since then, Taylor said, she has received about 50 threatening e-mails. A friend helped Taylor track down the person who sent the most threatening e-mail, and she reported it to the domestic terrorism unit of the FBI.

Santomauro said he saw nothing wrong with his decision to publicize her address: "For somebody who is trying to destroy my livelihood, and saying things in derogatory ways — I didn't see what was wrong to announce her address." About the threatening -emails, Santomauro said, "How do I know it's not a campaign being fabricated in cahoots with the [Anti-Defamation League]?"

Neo-Nazi Internet magazine National Vanguard picked up on Santomauro's story and reprinted his telling of it. It did not include a response from Taylor. The magazine identified her as an "alleged operative of the ADL" because of an e-mail she wrote to one of Santomauro's supporters, saying she intended to pass along the book to the organization.

An ADL official told the Forward that the organization has had no contact with Taylor about the incident.

Taylor said that the threats have diminished, However, the AJCongress official added that she is ready to pursue a restraining order against Santomauro if she receives one more. She also has written to Amazon, asking the site's operators to display prominently the fact that sellers on the site will receive buyers' contact information.

"Had I known I was giving all my information to Santomauro," Taylor said, "I would have done things differently."

Posted by Ted Belman at October 27, 2005 09:27 AM

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Comments

1. BobW said:

What is a "Jewish communial official"?

IMPORTANT: I need to know what a "Jewish communial official" is.

Hate laws will be leveraged AGAINST Jews. The US already has some hate laws.

More dangerous to America's Jews than the Santomauros is the weekly newspaper "The Forward". It's viewed by many as anti-Middle America. Don't rely on my statement. Read it to determine how it "sells" in Peoria and Tulsa.

Again, I ask for and look forward (pun intended) to learning what's a "Jewish communal official".

Kol tuv,
BobW
Just an Israelite; not even a "Jewish communal official"

Posted by: BobW on October 27, 2005 10:44 AM

2. Laura said:

"More dangerous to America's Jews than the Santomauros is the weekly newspaper "The Forward". It's viewed by many as anti-Middle America"
......................................................
BULLSHIT! You sound as bad as the anti-Semitic scum like santomauros.

Posted by: Laura on October 27, 2005 02:12 PM

3. BobW said:

Shalom Laura,

Regardless how I may SOUND,and I might sound as bad, my comment related to a different subject.

Start attending meetings of non-Jews who read and monitor The Forward.

You might change your opinion.

Over the years I've had a few letters to the editor published in The Forward. I'm familiar with the paper, how it's changed over the years and how many gentiles react to the paper.

Again, please check out how the Middle America "politico" crowd responds to The Forward.

Kol tuv,
Bob

Posted by: BobW on October 27, 2005 03:03 PM

4. Tim said:

Hate crime laws are a perversion of justice that do nothing to curb sick minds and are used by the enemies of reason to shut up fair criticism. In Canada hate crime legislation is used against Christians who oppose homosexuality and abortion. A crime is a crime.

Posted by: Tim on October 27, 2005 04:18 PM

5. allyson said:

Bob and Laura, just imagine how you would feel if you ordered a book from Amazon, and recieved death threats just for being a Jew? The Forward is the messenger who brought the story to light, and someone you both read it.

Posted by: allyson on October 27, 2005 04:36 PM

6. Ted Belman said:

David Matas, counsel for B'Nai Brith Candada wrote a book on the tension between free speech and banning hate speech. I intend to read it. Hate speech legislation shouldn't prevent criticism of an ideology like Islam.

Also it inhibits Christian speech. All in all a complex issue.

Posted by: Ted Belman on October 27, 2005 04:51 PM

7. BobW said:

Shalom Allyson,

Your point is understood and accepted.

My point is that the paper does more harm than good.

Kol tuv,
Bob

Posted by: BobW on October 27, 2005 05:36 PM

8. Leonard said:

I understand that most of the revisionist/hate websites originate in the United States.In most countries in Europe such incitement would constitute a criminal offence. Apparently, not so in the USA. What sort of pressure can be bought to bear to close such sites down? or is the right to spew anti-semitic hatred enshrined in the American constitution.

Posted by: Leonard on October 27, 2005 06:33 PM

9. BobW said:

Shalom Leonard,

No pressure can work as yet. The US is not ready. The USG recognizes the problem and is addressing it. Still, it is only one of many problems within the US as the country restructures from the New Deal programs of pre WWII.

Two months ago America Offline (AOL) signed an agreement with Department of Homeland Security to do something more than liaison. I believe the AOL counterparts will also be "encouraged" to sign up with the DHS program.

From what I can make of it, the web monitoring/blocking programs resemble the banks and financial institutions' screening and reporting requirements.

The US is in no way ready to take action on anything eminating from eg the AOL-DHS program. The enforcement apparatus is still in preparation.

It's going to take a long lead time - with the presumption that things remain on schedule - to address the hate programs on the web. Let's envision AOL reporting to DHS a clear case of illegal hate; ie hatred with explicit threats of violence from a group with the means to act on their threats. Envision the case is developed and turned over to the Justice Dept for prosecution. Now, what happens when the senior political echelon tells the Justice Dept NOT to prosecute the case because it will trigger the relocation of an investment with a jobs program from the US to elsewhere. This is what's going on today. I support Senator Arlen Spector for his responsible maneuvering of the Judiciary Committee to maintain US political stability and adjusting other matters accordingly.

The USG (Executive Branch) recognizes all of this and is responding in tandem with the Senate. We have institutions from prior eras. It is very difficult to close them down and build modern vehicles to address the dangers such as antisemitism, terrorism in general and sophisticated crimes.

Look at America's military academies. They are now approximations of British finishing schools and very expensive to maintain. The US even continues to keep it's Merchant Marine Academy as a Naval reserve program, even though the US all but eliminated it's US flag fleet.

The computer and web is a modern telegraph and shortwave radio program. The real matters are just two fields not having changed from prior times: personnel and finance.

Again, the US is not ready to take on the web. The USG is working very fast to do this. I could not do anything faster or even suggest from the sidelines how to accelerate things. The pace is very fast.

Kol tuv,
Bob

Posted by: BobW on October 28, 2005 06:58 AM

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