This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream
media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously
biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in
each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Source: BBC
Nov 30, 2007
A bag belonging to a World War II soldier from Lancashire has been discovered in the Egyptian desert after lying there for more than 60 years.
Alec Ross, from Burnley, lost the bag containing personal letters and photos, while serving with the 8th Army.
Egyptian tour guide Kahled Makram found the bag in the Sahara desert and traced Mr Ross's family through a BBC website on World War II.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Nov 30, 2007
Deep divisions have emerged at the heart of Danish government after a bitter row blew up over the country's failure to extradite a Nazi war criminal, a Dane, from Germany.
There were angry exchanges between Danish politicians following The Daily Telegraph's report on Søren Kam's peaceful life in the sleepy Bavarian town of Kempten im Allgäu.
The 86-year old former SS-Obersturmfuehrer has been indicted for murder in Denmark and is wanted for questioning for his alleged r
Source: http://www.examiner.com
Nov 29, 2007
The Smithsonian has all the money it needs to complete renovation of the National Museum of American History and reopen the site this summer, but it still has not set a firm opening date.
Officials will commit to a reopening date this February, according to director Brent Glass. The project has finished the demolition phase and is now moving into new construction; the property closed in September 2006.
Fundraising accounted for $39.1 million of the cost of the project,
Source: http://www.mentalfloss.com/
Nov 29, 2007
During World War II, the British secret service hatched a master plan to smuggle escape gear to captured Allied soldiers inside Germany. Their secret weapon? Monopoly boxes. The original notion was simple enough: Find a way to sneak useful items into prison camps in an unassuming form. But the idea to use Monopoly came from a series of happy coincidences, all of which started with maps.
Source: AP
Nov 29, 2007
A wall mentioned in the Bible's Book of Nehemiah and long sought by archaeologists apparently has been found, an Israeli archaeologist says.
A team of archaeologists discovered the wall in Jerusalem's ancient City of David during a rescue attempt on a tower that was in danger of collapse, said Eilat Mazar, head of the Institute of Archaeology at the Shalem Center, a Jerusalem-based research and educational institute, and leader of the dig.
Artifacts including pottery sh
Source: Salon
Nov 29, 2007
It was one of the most dramatic moments in the
modern history of the Middle East — the world's nations voting one by one in
the U.N. General Assembly to partition the Holy Land into separate Jewish and
Arab states.
Exactly 60 years later, the concept remains at the heart of renewed attempts to
resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. At this week's U.S.-sponsored peace
conference outside Washington, Israel and the Palestinians again pledged
efforts to wrap up a peace treaty that wou
Source: CNN
Nov 29, 2007
Former Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney both criticized the Confederate flag during the CNN/YouTube debate on Wednesday.
The flag happens to be hoisted on the Statehouse grounds in the early primary state of South Carolina, where both candidates are leading in polls.
The candidates were asked by YouTube user Leroy Brooks from Houston, Texas if "this flag right here represents the symbol of racism, a symbol of political ideol
Source: Reuters
Nov 29, 2007
A 200-year-old cannon wheeled out by Indian villagers to greet a visiting minister exploded after being overstuffed with gunpowder, killing two men, a newspaper reported Thursday.
Residents of Badoli village in western India's Rajasthan state had planned the gun salute Tuesday evening to welcome Kirodi Lal Meena, a state minister, the Times of India reported.
The minister left immediately after the accident, which also injured six other people.
Source: Telegraph (UK)
Nov 29, 2007
Germany continues to shelter a former SS officer who is wanted for murder and for his alleged role in the deportation of hundreds of Jews to Nazi concentration camps.
The Daily Telegraph has tracked down former SS-Obersturmfuehrer Søren Kam to the peaceful suburbs of Kempten im Allgäu, a town about 75 miles from Munich.
Dr Efraim Zuroff, a veteran Israeli Nazi-hunter, will be in Europe next week to mount “Operation Last Chance”, to bring men such as Kam to justice and t
Source: Salon
Nov 29, 2007
New York Times public editor Clark Hoyt did me the honor yesterday of replying to my column last week asking him to stop the brawl over Ronald Reagan and race on the paper's Op-Ed page. Hoyt declined to step in, but he did pass along news that Times editorial pages editor Andrew Rosenthal had already said, "Enough," which means we won't have another unconvincing rejoinder on the topic from David Brooks. Thanks, Andy! Hoyt defended the Op-Ed page debate as healthy, which is fine, becaus
Source: Der Spiegel
Nov 29, 2007
The war cemeteries of the Western Front are as well-maintained as if they had been built this year. Their poignant message of peace is equally fresh.
World War I ended 89 years ago in November 1918, only a handful of veterans are still alive and family memories of the uncles, fathers and grandfathers who fought are fading fast.
But the cemeteries and war memorials of France and Belgium, where much of the worst fighting took place, remain as pristine and well-tended as i
Source: Der Spiegel
Nov 29, 2007
Holocaust researchers are delighted that the massive International Tracing Service archive in Germany has finally opened its doors to the public. Families of Holocaust victims now have an unprecedented chance to learn about their relatives' fates.
Source: Bloomberg
Nov 29, 2007
Josef Stalin may have been cruel, but he was first and foremost a great leader.
That rewriting of the history of the ruthless Soviet dictator who killed millions of real and imagined enemies comes from a new manual for Russia's high-school teachers endorsed by President Vladimir Putin. The book exemplifies Russia's growing nostalgia for its bygone superpower days -- a sentiment Putin stokes at every turn in his quest for political hegemony. Russia feels t
Source: CBC
Nov 29, 2007
Members of all federal parties unanimously passed a motion Wednesday recognizing that Japan used women as sex slaves during the Second World War.The motion also encourages the Canadian government to press Tokyo to make a "formal and sincere apology" in its legislature to all victims, referred to as comfort women. The women were rounded up from Japan's occupied territories, including China, during the 1930s and '40s.
New Democrat MP Olivia C
Source: AP
Nov 29, 2007
After more than 60 years, Nazi documents stored in a vast warehouse in Germany were unsealed Wednesday, opening a rich resource for Holocaust historians and for survivors to delve into their own tormented past.The treasure of documents could open new avenues of study into the inner workings of Nazi persecution from the exploitation of slave labor to the conduct of medical experiments. The archive's managers planned a conference of scholars next year to map out its unex
Source: NYT
Nov 29, 2007
Immigration over the past seven years was the highest for any seven-year period in American history, bringing 10.3 million new immigrants, more than half of them without legal status, according to an analysis of census data released today by the Center for Immigration Studies in Washington.
One in eight people living in the United States is an immigrant, the survey found, for a total of 37.9 million people — the highest level since the 1920s.
The survey was conducted by
Source: Lee White at the website of the National Coalition for History (NCH)
Nov 28, 2007
This week, the Bush administration decided not to appeal a federal district court judge’s decision that invalidated a crucial section of Executive Order (EO) 13233, which broadened the rights of presidents and former-presidents to withhold federal records from the public for indefinite periods of time.
On October 1, Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly gave historians and researchers a partial, but significant victory in a lawsuit questioning the legality of the Executive Order. The judge s
Source: Lee White at the website of the National Coalition for History (NCH)
Nov 28, 2007
On November 28, the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum released approximately 122,800 pages of historical materials from the Nixon presidency at the National Archives in College Park, MD.
In the largest release of Nixon-related materials under mandatory review, the Nixon Presidential Library released over 10,000 pages of documents that were previously withheld from public access, and that were re-reviewed for release and/or declassified.
The documents are from the
Source: Discovery News
Nov 28, 2007
Infected rams and donkeys were the earliest bioweapons, according to a new study which dates the use of biological warfare back more than 3,300 years.
According to a review published in the Journal of Medical Hypotheses, two ancient populations, the Arzawans and the Hittites, engaged "in mutual use of contaminated animals" during the 1320-1318 B.C. Anatolian war.
"The animals were carriers of Francisella tularensis, the causative agent of tularemia,"
Source: Russia Today
Nov 28, 2007
A large settlement dating back to the first century BC has been found in the Russian republic of North Ossetia. But since the archaeological site is in a valley next to a hydroplant under construction, there's a race to unlock its secrets, before it's flooded.
Most of the 60 people working at the site in the Zaramag Valley are amateurs with professionals guiding them.
Every day they antique jewellery, tools, weapons and crockery that once belonged to the ancient tribe o
