ГУЛаг Палестины

Wiesenthal was making his appearance on 60 Minutes in the role of an eyewitness to

the Wiesenthal-Safer Lviv Pogrom, or at least as a researcher who had documented it,

yet in the quotation immediately above, Simon Wiesenthal's use of "It is said that"

gives the contrasting impression that he is no more than passing along a rumor

concerning events that he has neither witnessed nor verified.

In conclusion, the Wiesenthal-Safer story of a massive pre-German Lviv pogrom is not

supported in historical writing, and is even contradicted by other testimony, some

of it leading Holocaust historian Raul Hilberg's, and some of it your own expert

witness Simon Wiesenthal's. Thus, unless you are able to substantiate the

Wiesenthal-Safer pre-German Lviv pogrom, you will invite the conclusion that it

never took place, and that your implanting it into the minds of 30 million 60

Minutes viewers constituted an attempt on the part of two individuals Simon

Wiesenthal and yourself - to fabricate a piece of history.

In Fact, the Consensus Seems to be that in

the Days Prior to German Occupation, it

was the NKVD that was Killing Ukrainians

In contrast to what appears to be a lack of substantiation of the Wiesenthal-Safer

story that in the days prior to German occupation Ukrainians were murdering Jews, I

do in my reading keep stumbling across quite a different story - that in the days

prior to German occupation, it was the NKVD that was murdering Ukrainians. Below

are 22 such statements. These statements were discovered not through any systematic

or exhaustive search, but rather only through casual reading. A systematic and

exhaustive search would turn up a much larger number of such statements.

In order to demonstrate that the NKVD had a general policy of killing Ukrainians

prior to retreating, of which the Lviv massacre was but a single instance, I include

descriptions of such killings in several locations.

"NKVD," in case you are interested, is an acronym for the Russian "Narodny

Komisariat Vnutrenikh Del," which translates as "National Commissariat of Internal

Affairs," and which bland title gives no hint of the NKVD's true role.

Please note that the block quotation immediately below is attributable to Simon

Wiesenthal, and that in it he demonstrates an awareness of the NKVD massacre of

Ukrainians, such that omitting mention of this massacre on your 23Oct94 60 Minutes

broadcast, The Ugly Face of Freedom, must be considered not an oversight, but a

willful suppression of relevant information:

(1) Thousands of detainees were shot dead.

When the German attack came on 22 June the Soviets had no time to

take with them the people they had locked up. So they simply

killed them. Thousands of detainees were shot dead in their cells

by the retreating Soviets. (Simon Wiesenthal, Justice Not

Vengeance, 1989, p. 35)

(2) The NKVD burned prisons with prisoners in them.

While the movement to the East was taking place, the NKVD carried

out mass arrests and executions, chiefly of Ukrainians - especially

those who tried to avoid evacuation. In the jails most prisoners

whose period of imprisonment was more than three years were shot;

others were evacuated if possible. In several cities the NKVD

burned prisons with prisoners in them. (Volodymyr Kubijovyc,

editor, Ukraine: A Concise Encyclopaedia, University of Toronto

Press, Toronto, 1963, Volume I, p. 878, Vsevolod Holubnychy and H.

M. wrote this section)

(3) Succeeded in annihilating some 10,000 political prisoners.

The Bolsheviks succeeded in annihilating some 10,000 political

prisoners in Western Ukraine before and after the outbreak of

hostilities (massacres took place in the prisons in Lviv, Zolochiv,

Rivne, Dubno, Lutsk, etc.). (Volodymyr Kubijovyc, editor, Ukraine:

A Concise Encyclopaedia, University of Toronto Press, Toronto,

Volume 1, p. 886)

(4) Mainly members of the city's [Lviv's] intelligentsia.

Before fleeing the German advance the Soviet occupational regime

murdered thousands of Ukrainian civilians, mainly members of the

city's [Lviv's] intelligentsia. (Encyclopedia of Ukraine, Volume

3, p. 222)

(5) NKVD slaughtered their prisoners en masse.

The Soviets' hurried retreat had tragic consequences for thousands

of political prisoners in the jails of Western Ukraine. Unable to

evacuate them in time, the NKVD slaughtered their prisoners en

masse during the week of 22-29 June 1941, regardless of whether

they were incarcerated for major or minor offenses. Major

massacres occurred in Lviv, Sambir, and Stanyslaviv in Galicia,

where about 10,000 prisoners died, and in Rivne and Lutsk in

Volhynia, where another 5000 perished. Coming on the heels of the

mass deportations and growing Soviet terror, these executions added

greatly to the West Ukrainians' abhorrence of the Soviets. (Orest

Subtelny, Ukraine: A History, 1994, p. 461)

(6) Liquidated with a shot at the scruff of the neck.

Right after the entry we were shown 2,400 dead bodies of Ukrainians

liquidated with a shot at the scruff of the neck at the city jail

of Lemberg [Lviv] by the Soviets prior to their marching off.