Dave Emory’s entire lifetime of work is available on a flash drive that can be obtained here. (The flash drive includes the anti-fascist books available on this site.)
COMMENT: For decades, we’ve been researching the Croatian fascists known as Ustachi. (There are various spellings–one will see “Ustashe,” and other variants.) Holding sway in Croatia after the German invasion of Yugoslavia, they were supported by the Vatican and incorporated into the GOP ethnic outreach organization after the war.
Following the breakup of Yugoslavia, Croatia manifested “neo-Ustachi” elements returned to power in Croatia. A Croatian football (soccier) player recently stirred up those revanchist sentiments following Croatia’s defeat of Iceland in a World Cup qualifying match. Joe Šimunić led the crowd in the “Za Dom Spremni” Ustachi World War II political cheeer.
In an interview in Rolling Stone magazine, Bob Dylan made a reference to the Ustachi slaughter of Serbs (as well as Jews and gypsies) by the Ustachi. Subsequently, Dylan was charged with a hate crime by France/EU! A number of thoughts in connection with this:
- Bob Dylan is an American citizen, not a citizen of any EU country.
- Rolling Stone is an American publication.
- What Dylan said is not a violation of American law.
- The French indictment would thus have profound international ramifications if it were allowed to stand.
- None of the stories about the French indictment have provided historical background.
EXCERPT: To people who follow the pronouncements of Bob Dylan, his comment in a Rolling Stone interview in September 2012 suggesting that American blacks could sense whether whites had slave-master blood “just like Jews can sense Nazi blood and the Serbs can sense Croatian blood” may have seemed just the sort of vaporously impressionistic, emotionally pointed kind of thing that Mr. Dylan has been known to say for decades.
But to the Representative Council of the Croatian Community and Institutions in France, an organization that looks after the interests of France’s 30,000 Croatians, those were fighting words. Now they have led to Mr. Dylan, who built his early career singing songs that denounced racism, being charged under a French law prohibiting “public insult and inciting hate.”
On Tuesday, Agnes Thibault-Lecuivre, a spokeswoman for the prosecutor’s office in Paris, told The Associated Press that the French government had filed preliminary charges. Mr. Dylan’s last encounter with the French government was just over two weeks ago, when he was awarded the Legion of Honor, France’s highest prize.
The French government must have known that the charges were brewing when they gave Mr. Dylan the award: Vlatko Maric, the secretary general of the council, announced in November 2012 that his group had filed a complaint with the French government. That complaint led to the current charges. . . .
EXCERPT: This is video of Australian-born Croatia defender Joe Šimunić leading fans in a chant after Croatia beat Iceland to qualify for the world cup. “For the homeland,” Šimunić calls, and the crowd responds, “Ready!” But it’s more complicated than that.
The salute—“Za dom spremni”—dates back to the 19th century, giving Šimunić plausible deniability. But it only became famous, and notorious, during the Second World War as a symbol of the Ustaše, a fascist and ultranationalist group that ruled Croatia as a Nazi puppet state and advocated and undertook genocide against Serbs, Jews, and Romani.
Think of it as the equivalent of “Sieg Heil”. The Croatian Constitution does, banning it in certain instances. So do FIFA and UEFA, who have previously fined the Croatian Football Federation for the chant’s use by fans, often accompanied by the Nazi salute. (As in many Eastern and Southeastern European countries, soccer and ultranationalism have a cozy, complicated relationship.) . . . .
. . . . . Damnit, we could have had adorable little Iceland in the World Cup instead. Now we just get fascism.
G’day Dave,
Do you know about that man?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAmqiXoLsoA
Right at the beginning, in the first minute or so he says journalists are not always to blame since it is broadcasters which control what comes out — ok so far — then adds that in the case of the BBC, it is owned by Siemens. What ??!! Did I hear that right?
Also, a piece of news from pretty Switzerland: l’Affaire has been “white gold” to Swiss data hosting companies (using bunkers under the Snowy peaks) which have since tripled their business.
http://www.lematin.ch/high-tech/web/snowden-beurre-hebergeurs-suisses/story/17612911
Will keep an eye peeled about the Dylan story, although with France at such a historical low point, and so much incompetence and ridiculousness from the current administration, I wonder if it should be taken all that seriously? But the EU connexion is significant of course, especially given Croatia’s recent joining of the EU.
When Croatia’s new government was assembled back in December, the outgoing prime minister, Zoran Milanovic, had a rather frank way of characterizing the new government: criminal and pro-Ustachi:
“That’s their choice, they will have to live with it, get up and pray to God or to whatever they believe in. The coalition they chose, which was unfortunately put together by Bandic, who is accused, and by former chiefs of secret services, contains transparently Ustasha elements.”
So was that just sour grapes by the leader of the power losing power, or might Croatia’s new government actually be pro-Ustachi? Well, if the selection of Zlatko Hasanbegovic, the new culture minister, is any indication of the government’s Ustachi sentiments, it’s pretty pro-Ustachi:
“The recently appointed minister spent a considerable part of his political life in extremist political organizations and has never distanced himself from this past. Instead, he has directed his efforts towards denying that his statements represent relativization of World War II, claiming that all of his statements have been taken out of context.”
That certainly doesn’t bode well for Croatia’s cultural zeitgeist. Neither does this:
“Brentin concluded that both the Croatian media and the political elites clearly avoid condemning such incidents because they come from a “similar ideological family”.”