ORIGINAL: Thanks to everyone who’s emailing about this in the context of the Marc Garlasco controversy, but I intentionally passed up mentioning the “Flak88″ who posts regularly on Stormfront.org. I’m sure it’s not the Marc Garlasco Flak88 who posts on the medals forums.
The Stormfront Flak88 is the top hit for a bunch of searches on that handle, not least of which is “flak88 israel.” But the Stormfront Flak88 is a vulgar racist who complains about unclean Turks and then complains even more that they’re the only ones in Germany who sing nationalistic songs. He has challenges spelling, writing sentences, and conveying thoughts. He lists himself in Europe while the Marc Garlasco Flak88 puts New York in all his profiles. Same handle, different guys.
If it was proven that the Marc Garlasco Flak88 was the same as the Stormfront Flak88, I’d consider that strong evidence against my previous post. For all his faults real or imagined, the HRW Marc Garlasco is neither crude nor stupid. I would guess that he clings very, very tightly to the belief that he’s a history buff who happens, for purely familial reasons, to be utterly fascinated by the Nazis.
I think that’s one convenient bridge too far, and that his obsession colors the rest of what he does. I think he has very strong but tangled beliefs about Jews and the Jewish state that spring from a place that has nothing to do with level-headed analysis. But nothing I’ve read and no one I’ve spoken to leads me to believe he’s an unsophisticated racist like Stormfront Flak88.
It’s easy to get over-excited about these things, and collector Garlasco’s medals are insanely creepy. But we shouldn’t get distracted from the real scandal. This guy has spent the last few years producing untenable anti-Israel boilerplate for human rights organizations, UN committees, and international tribunals. Every time pro-Israel groups suggested that no one could make this many mistakes innocently they were told to stop “stifling legitimate criticism of Israel with implicit accusations of antisemitism.” Hmmmmmm.
UPDATE: Also: while it’s normally a good guess to associate “88″ with the well-known hate symbol, in this case its a relatively innocuous reference to the 88mm caliber Flak gun.
Again: Garlasco’s not a vulgar racist. He’s simply not. He’s someone torn by sensibilities that make him wildly inappropriate as a choice for a Middle East investigator. How he got to that position and stayed in that position despite error after debunked error goes to the heart of HRW’s inappropriate obsession with and bias towards Israel. They couldn’t notice anything wrong with the way he approached the conflict because, well, that’s how they all approach the conflict. That’s the scandal – that despite having ideological inclinations and personal tics, he fit right in.
References:
* Marc Garlasco – Is HRW’s Anti-Israel Investigator A Nazi-Obsessed Collector? [MR]
Previously:
* Human Rights Watch Holds Saudi Fundraiser, Promises To Demonize Israel
* Human Rights Watch Shill Has Meltdown – Rants About “Sharanskys Of The World,” Dares Critics To Find “One Incident” Of HRW Bias (UPDATED: Nasrallah Bragged About Using Human Shields)
* Human Rights Watch Earns Their Saudi Pay, Publishes Another Thinly-Sourced Report Demonizing Israel (UPDATE: Video Of Hamas Soldiers Hiding Behind White Flags)
