WSJ: Nazi Hunter (Simon Wiesenthal)

Wall Street Journal ^ | September 21, 2005 | Editorial

[OESY]

In taking note of the life of Simon Wiesenthal, the great Nazi hunter who died yesterday at 96 after surviving the Soviet NKVD, numerous German death camps and a 1982 assassination attempt, we are reminded of Andrew Jackson's famous aphorism: "One man with courage makes a majority."

...[I]t is difficult to remember that when Mr. Wiesenthal began tracking Nazis from a tiny "Documentation Center" in the Austrian city of Linz, his work was hardly popular. Much of Europe wanted to put its collaborationist chapters behind it; some of the most prominent Nazis had fled to distant corners and assumed new identities; the world's attention was otherwise engaged....

Equally remarkable was Mr. Wiesenthal's insistence on backing up his allegations with voluminous documentary evidence. This could get him into scraps, as when he refused to denounce Kurt Waldheim, the one-time SS officer and later U.N. Secretary General and President of Austria, as a war criminal. Some Jewish leaders accused him of a cover-up; Mr. Wiesenthal replied that "accusations from Jewish sources must be able to stand up to all tests of credibility." Such evidentiary standards stand in stark contrast with those of groups such as Amnesty International, with their loose and incendiary accusations of "torture" at Guantanamo or "war crimes" in Jenin.

Toward the end of his life, Mr. Wiesenthal lent his name to a number of centers dedicated to advancing the cause of tolerance world-wide. With the resurgence of virulent anti-Semitism, particularly in Europe and the Muslim world, the cause has only grown in importance. Yet there is a risk that a specious and open-ended form of "tolerance" might obscure more fundamental objectives: justice for the perpetrators of atrocities, and remembrance for their victims. Simon Wiesenthal delivered both, and we owe it to his memory to carry on that work.

[stockpirate]

Andrew Jackson's famous aphorism: "One man with courage makes a majority."

I like that saying.

[OldFriend]

Notice my new tagline!

[twigs]

I just heard a caller on Bill Bennett's morning show say that Laura Bushes father was with the unit which rescued Wiesenthal from the concentration camp.