Re: Jewish leader: German firms ignoring Shoah


"Heinrich" <Heinrich@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:67bb74F2o91mkU2@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
An angry vice president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, Dieter
Graumann, has sharply criticized the robust trade relationship between
Germany and Iran.

Bloody hell. Is there no end to their whining, ferchrissake?

They seem to be working themselves up to a holocaust or something.





"Business with Iran is booming, while morality is wasting away. German
companies, of all things, are doing business with a country that advocates a
new Holocaust," Graumann said at an event on Tuesday celebrating Israel's
60th birthday.

"This miserable profiteering is a scandal," Graumann added, speaking at the
Konrad Adenauer Foundation - a think tank aligned with Chancellor Angela
Merkel's Christian Democratic Union party.

State Minister in the Chancellor's Office Hildegard Müller, a Christian
Democrat who spoke after Graumann, said the German government recognized the
Iranian "threat toward Israel."

Müller was unavailable for further comment on unilateral action to end the
German trade relationship with Iran. While Merkel has declared Israel's
security to be part of the German national interest, critics argue that her
government is failing to dramatically curtail its trade ties with Iran.

In 2007, the trade amounted to more than ?4 billion. Economic relations
between Iran and Germany represent a politically sensitive test for the
"special relationship" between Israel and Germany.

"The current economic relationship - that is, business as usual between
German firms and the Islamic dictatorship in Iran - should be focused
against the background of the Holocaust - that is, German responsibility for
the unprecedented nature of the Holocaust," said Jörg Rensmann, a spokesman
from the Mideast Freedom Forum Berlin - a nonprofit that aims to raise
public awareness of the Iranian threat to the international community and
Israel.

More than 50 German firms, many of which provide sophisticated engineering
equipment, were present at the Iranian oil show between April 16 and 20 in
Teheran. The Jerusalem Post obtained a copy of the list of companies. The
on-line list showing firms at the "General Information German Pavilion" in
Teheran was quickly removed from the home page and is no longer accessible.

Peter Op de Laak, a sales manager at Bergrohr - a company that manufactures
steel pipes and displayed an exhibit at the oil show - told the Post that he
and representatives of other German firms had been welcomed by the first
secretary of the German Embassy, Peer Horstmann, at his Teheran residence.

The German Engineering Federation "considers business with Iran to be
legitimate," said Klaus Friedrich, the head of the federation's Middle East
department. He confirmed that German Ambassador Herbert Honsowitz had been
present at the oil show.

Honsowitz, who delivered a speech on German-Iranian relations, told Iranian
Press TV in November that the "German Embassy is trying to take measures
toward maintaining and improving economic ties between the private sectors
of the two countries."

The Post received a statement from Honsowitz denying his comments to Iranian
Press TV that "German exports to Iran have not decreased because a large
portion of them reach Iran through the United Arab Emirates."

However, the ambassador's statement did not deny his efforts to expand
Iranian-German economic relations.

When asked if the engineering association shared Merkel's notion of a
"special responsibility" toward Israel in view of the Holocaust, which she
outlined in her March speech in the Knesset, Friedrich said it was the first
time the association had been asked this question.

In an e-mail to the Post, Friedrich wrote that "the accusation that German
economic relations with Iran are supporting a new Holocaust" are "polemical
and false."

Regarding the role of German engineering firms in contributing to Iran's
nuclear program and technological infrastructure, Friedrich said he "was
surprised" that "the German press has not inquired" regarding German
Engineering Federation (VDMA)'s activity in Iran. He wrote that "the VDMA
has been observing the Iranian nuclear program with great attention and
concern."

Also in reply to Graumann's speech and the issue of of German companies'
responsibility toward Israel, Felix Neugart, a spokesman for the German
Chambers of Industry and Commerce, told the Post that "we cannot comment on
this because of the political implications."

Central Council of Jews in Germany secretary-general Stefan Kramer, who was
present at the Adenauer Foundation event, named the German electrical giant
Siemens and the energy corporation RWE as two companies commencing deals
with Iran and endangering Israel's national security.

Annett Urbaczka, a spokeswoman for RWE, declined to answer a telephone query
seeking comment.

Wolfram Trost, a Siemens spokesman, said Siemens would continue to be active
in Iran and saw no "special responsibility" toward Israel, because Siemens
had an "international responsibility" and was not locked into a particular
country.

German critics view Siemens as rejecting its historical responsibility
toward Israel. Siemens played a key role during the Holocaust in exploiting
Jewish concentration camp victims as slave laborers for war production.

"The Iranian president denies the Holocaust. He has threatened Israel, which
is the state of Shoah survivors, with annihilation. The threat of a new
Holocaust by a nuclear-armed Iran must be taken absolutely seriously, so
that German firms - above all, Siemens - must be questioned about their
current direct or indirect support for a regime that threatens the Jewish
state with annihilation and promotes anti-Semitic terrorism through its
proxies Hamas and Hizbullah," Rensmann said.




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