This was written in an author’s column for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, entitled ‘How the Holocaust Historian Became a Denier of Genocide” by Menachem Z. Rosensaft, a lawyer from New York and founder of the Federation of Jewish Child Survivors.
Remembering the Holocaust under attack
After the German government made it clear that it was reconsidering the decision to award him with the highest civic honors, Greif told “Haaretz”: “I’m not the only one who was attacked personally. I think the memory of the Holocaust is under attack. I can’t imagine that the German government will even consider not giving me the medal I deserve because it will be interpreted as Holocaust denial.”
In addition, Greif accused the “Muslim Brotherhood organization” of conducting anti-Semitic campaigns against him which resulted in Germany’s decision not to award him the medal.
To the dismay of responsible historians, Greif repeatedly exaggerated the number of Serb victims in the complex of Croatian death camps in World War II in Jasenovac, often called the “Auschwitz of the Balkans”, where, according to the United States (U.S.) Holocaust Memorial Museum, between 77.000 and 99.000 Serbs, Jews, Roma, and others were killed.
In 2019 alone, Greif multiplied that estimate ten times, setting the number of victims of that camp at “at least 800.000” and “at least 700.000” on two different occasions. In the same year, he was appointed full professor at the University of Belgrade.
Further, in July 2021, under the appearance of pseudo-science and without any attempt or even bluffing of objectivity, Greif and his commission published a report of more than 1.000 pages in which they unanimously deny that genocide was committed in Srebrenica.
I know what genocide means…
After submitting the report to the President and Prime Minister of the Republika Srpska (RS), Greif left no doubt as to why he was given the lead role in the commission: “I am a Jew, I know what genocide means … Nobody can tell me what genocide is, and this event was not genocide. And we proved it,” he said back then.
Someone obviously didn’t do his job and didn’t take the time to examine Greif’s activities other than his Auschwitz-related work from two decades ago. A simple Google search could have saved the German Foreign Ministry significant public embarrassment.
And then poor Greif seriously jumped the shark, so to speak, wrapped himself in a pathetic self-pitying cloak of suffering. Although he studiously denies the genocide in Srebrenica, he believes that not getting a medal is equal to genocide. Imagine that.
E.Dz.
Source: Avaz
