[Newsbot]

Title: Graffiti on monument commemorating Nazi SS division being investigated as a hate crime
Category: Misc CDN
Posted By: BeaverFever
Date: 2020-07-17 16:33:34
Canadian

[BeaverFever]

Unbelievable. Apparently there are two similar monuments in Canada, both in Edmonton.

[BeaverFever]

$1:

An incident involving graffiti spray painted on a monument to those who fought in Adolf Hitler’s SS is being investigated as a hate crime by an Ontario police force.

Someone painted “Nazi war monument” on a stone cenotaph commemorating those who served with the 14th SS Division. The monument is located in Oakville in the St. Volodymyr Ukrainian Cemetery.

The division, made up of Ukrainians who pledged allegiance to Hitler, was part of the Nazi’s Waffen SS organization. Some members of the division have been accused of killing Polish women and children as well as Jews during the Second World War.

Halton Regional Police believe the graffiti was spray painted on the cenotaph sometime around June 21. Police said they were investigating the incident as a “hate-motivated” crime but they declined to release images of the graffiti so as to stop “further spreading” of the message.

But researcher Moss Robeson, who has written articles on Ukrainians who collaborated with the Nazis, provided details about the graffiti and the monument on Twitter, prompting questions about why Halton Regional Police think members of the Nazi SS can be the subject of hate crimes.

In response to questions from this newspaper, Const. Steve Elms, spokesman for Halton-Regional Police, cited a section of the Criminal Code that noted those communicating statements in any public place inciting hatred against any identifiable group could face imprisonment not exceeding two years. “This incident occurred to a monument and the graffiti appeared to target an identifiable group,” he explained in an email to questions about how a hate crime could be perpetrated against members of the SS.

.. The 14th SS Division, also known as the Galizien Division, was formed in 1943 when Nazi Germany needed to shore up its forces as allied troops, including those from the U.S., Canada, Britain and Russia, started to gain the upper hand and turn the tide of the war. In May 1944, SS leader Heinrich Himmler addressed the division with a speech that was greeted by cheers. “Your homeland has become more beautiful since you have lost – on our initiative, I must say – the residents who were so often a dirty blemish on Galicia’s good name – namely the Jews,” Himmler said. “I know that if I ordered you to liquidate the Poles, I would be giving you permission to do what you are eager to do anyway.”

There are allegations members of the 14th SS Division took part in killing hundreds of Polish civilians in 1944 in the village of Huta Pieniacka. Some Ukrainians dispute that the SS division took part in the killings or they argue that only small elements from the unit – and under Nazi command – were involved. Others argue the SS members were heroes who fought against the Russians.

In 2017, a Polish judge issued an arrest warrant for then 98-year old Michael Karkoc, a 14th SS Division deputy company commander for war crimes. Karkoc, living in the U.S., died before he could be tried in court. He had been accused of coordinating the massacre of 44 civilians, including women and children, in the Polish village of Chłaniów in 1944.....

[Sunnyways]

$1:

The 14th SS Division, also known as the Galizien Division, was formed in 1943 when Nazi Germany needed to shore up its forces as allied troops, including those from the U.S., Canada, Britain and Russia, started to gain the upper hand and turn the tide of the war.

I don’t think this unit was formed to fight off invading hordes of American, Canadian or British soldiers in 1943. Germany’s principal problem remained in the east.

[BeaverFever]

Sunnyways Sunnyways:

$1:

The 14th SS Division, also known as the Galizien Division, was formed in 1943 when Nazi Germany needed to shore up its forces as allied troops, including those from the U.S., Canada, Britain and Russia, started to gain the upper hand and turn the tide of the war.

I don’t think this unit was formed to fight off invading hordes of American, Canadian or British soldiers in 1943. Germany’s principal problem remained in the east.

Does that matter?

[Sunnyways]

Not really. Ukrainians were stuck between a rock and a hard place. I wouldn't condemn them for fighting Stalin's army when they got the chance. Joining the SS was a step too far, obviously, and it is very weird that these monuments exist. I never heard of them before.

[Thanos]

^
This. The participation in pogroms and massacres by the Ukrainian auxiliaries is unforgiveable, and Ukraine itself (just like Japan and Hungary) has done a terrible job of taking responsibility for their behaviour in World War Two. That being said, Ukraine suffered terribly under Russian dominance for centuries and has every rightful reason to hate Russia. From the czars to the communists and now thru to Putin the Ukrainians have been treated as less than cattle by Russians. This isn't a black-and-white issue at all, not when it was typically Ukrainian civilians who ended up piled in mounds of thousands of corpses at the hands of Russians. Those Ukrainian Canadians who put up those monuments in Hamilton and Edmonton are the ones who were basically evicted from their own country by Russian oppression and mass-murder. Their own excuse-making for their countrymen's violent counter-reaction against Russian, Polish, and Jewish civilians isn't acceptable but it certainly is understandable.

[BeaverFever]

I’m not as outraged by the fact that Ukraine’s “freedom fighters “ of that period they want to honour committed atrocities, that’s true in almost every war and every army, especially liberation movements.

But it’s a monument to a specific Nazi SS Division, called out by name. Even if this division had never directly participated in any massacres, its a Nazi SS division

[PublicAnimalNo9]

BeaverFever BeaverFever:

I’m not as outraged by the fact that Ukraine’s “freedom fighters “ of that period they want to honour committed atrocities, that’s true in almost every war and every army, especially liberation movements.

But it’s a monument to a specific Nazi SS Division, called out by name. Even if this division had never directly participated in any massacres, its a Nazi SS division

Well oh my god, you better never go to Normandy then. You'll be right fucking outraged.

[herbie]

In a rare instance of sanity calling actual Nazis "Nazis" is not a hate crime. This is now being investigated as common vandalism.

[BeaverFever]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

BeaverFever BeaverFever:

I’m not as outraged by the fact that Ukraine’s “freedom fighters “ of that period they want to honour committed atrocities, that’s true in almost every war and every army, especially liberation movements.

But it’s a monument to a specific Nazi SS Division, called out by name. Even if this division had never directly participated in any massacres, its a Nazi SS division

Well oh my god, you better never go to Normandy then. You'll be right fucking outraged.

Oh dear you’re horribly misinformed again.
Did someone tell you there are monuments celebrating Nazis in Normandy?

[Scape]

[PublicAnimalNo9]

BeaverFever BeaverFever:

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

BeaverFever BeaverFever:

I’m not as outraged by the fact that Ukraine’s “freedom fighters “ of that period they want to honour committed atrocities, that’s true in almost every war and every army, especially liberation movements.

But it’s a monument to a specific Nazi SS Division, called out by name. Even if this division had never directly participated in any massacres, its a Nazi SS division

Well oh my god, you better never go to Normandy then. You'll be right fucking outraged.

Oh dear you’re horribly misinformed again.
Did someone tell you there are monuments celebrating Nazis in Normandy?

Awww pumpkin, it is you who are misinformed so. Headstones are monuments. Names are engraved on them with their unit. They are all monuments to specific soldiers, some of whom are specifically shown to be SS.

I get, to a degree anyway, why the Ukrainians have a monument here.
History as it's taught these days has a nasty habit of looking at the Nazi-Soviet War with the false dichotomy of good guy vs bad guy. They were both assholes to the nth degree but for the Ukrainians, the Germans were a hoped for bulwark against Soviet aggression. In fact, communist aggression within Europe was the exact cause of the rise of right-wing fascism in the first place. I specify "right-wing" because a lot of Russians hated Stalin and dubbed him a "red fascist".

As for people being "disappeared" from the streets. Seems they don't stay "disappeared" for very long based on at least one person's experience from the OP.

But as I said earlier, if you're going to associate with radicals and/or act in solidarity with their "campaigns", you're going to be viewed as a radical and treated as such. You made your bed, suck it up.

[Sunnyways]

In WWII it was understandably difficult for Eastern Europeans to believe that Hitler could actually be worse than the Soviets - even though we now know that would have been the case for at least the Slavic peoples among them - which is why so many countries and nations sided with the Nazis. My Hungarian landlady in Calgary, a committed NDP supporter herself, would become contorted with contempt for both sides when she considered the subject. At the war’s end, there was a rumour the Americans were close to Budapest so her father left the house to greet them. When he returned crestfallen and without his watch, nothing more needed to be said.