Omnibus Russia Ukraine crisis

Serryah

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According to my wife, who comes from Germany, Hitler's grandfather was half Jewish. The story is that Hitler wanted his grandfather to finance his stay in arts school and the old man refused, causing young Adolph to have a hate for Jews.

Careful, some might start to question your support of Israel with talk like that.
 

Twin_Moose

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Was Hitler Jewish? | History News Network

The more consequential claim, which caused popular debate, was issued by Hans Frank, a Nazi lawyer whom Hitler had asked to investigate his ancestry, and who published his alleged findings while waiting execution at Nuremburg. This is the famous "Graz story", which asserted that Hitler's grandmother, Maria Anna Shicklgruber, had been employed by a Jewish family, the Frankenbergers, in the city of Graz, and that there was correspondence and even child support payments exchanged between the family and Maria. However, Kershaw highlights that this story is highly inaccurate as there is no record that Maria was ever in Graz. Furthermore, while there was a family of a similar last name in Graz, they were not Jewish—especially given that Jews were not even permitted in that section of Austria (Styria) until the 1860s.

Ultimately, the answer to the question, in both of its forms, is a definitive 'no.'

Hitler Jewish? DNA Tests Show Dictator May Have 'Had Jewish And African Roots' | HuffPost The World Post

Another British paper, The Sun, identified more of the people involved and how two of the samples were obtained:
A journalist working for a magazine in Brussels managed to get hold of a sample from Alexander Stuart-Houston, 61, a grand-nephew of Hitler living in America, after picking up a serviette he had dropped.
Reporter Jean-Paul Mulders used the services of historian Marc Vermeeren to find Hitler's Austrian cousin, a farmer called Norbert H, and 39 other distant relatives of the Fuehrer.
Norbert H apparently gave a saliva sample willingly.
"Hitler would not have been happy," said Professor Ronny Decorte in a Google translation of the Knack's web-version of the story. Decorte, a genetics expert from Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (a Flemish research university), says that Hitler apparently wasn't "Aryan" -- what the Nazi would have considered "pure." But the research doesn't seem to be conclusive with respect to which groups Hitler may have descended from.
 

spaminator

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Ukrainian prosecutor says Russia uses rape as war tactic, calls Putin war criminal
Author of the article:Reuters
Reuters
Publishing date:May 03, 2022 • 19 hours ago • 1 minute read • Join the conversation

IRPIN — Ukraine’s prosecutor general accused Russia on Tuesday of using rape as a tactic of war and described Russian President Vladimir Putin as “the main war criminal of the 21st century.”


Russia has previously denied targeting civilians and has rejected allegations that its forces have committed war crimes in Ukraine.

The Kremlin did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment on the accusations and has dismissed previous suggestions that Putin is a war criminal.

Visiting the devastated city of Irpin near Kyiv, Prosecutor General Iryna Venediktova said Ukraine was collecting information on allegations of rape, torture and other suspected war crimes by Russian forces.

Venediktova said the allegations included the rape of women, men, children and an old woman. Asked whether rape was a deliberate Russian strategy in the war, she told a news conference: “I am sure actually that it was strategy.”


“This is, of course, to scare civil society … to do everything to (force Ukraine to) capitulate,” she said.

She provided no specific details of the rape allegations, saying some of the victims remained in Ukraine and were afraid of speaking out for fear of Russian forces returning.

Venediktova said Putin bore responsibility for what happened in Ukraine as commander-in-chief of the Russian armed forces.

“Putin is the main war criminal of the 21st century,” she said, recalling Russian military interventions in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, Russia’s Chechnya region, Syria and in Ukraine in 2014

“If we speak about (the) crime of aggression, we all know who started this war, and this person is Vladimir Putin,” she said.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov in March dismissed as unforgivable a comment by U.S. President Joe Biden in which he said Putin was a war criminal.
 
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spaminator

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Canada to investigate sexual violence against women in Ukraine as war crimes
Author of the article:Canadian Press
Canadian Press
Marie Woolf
Publishing date:May 05, 2022 • 11 hours ago • 2 minute read • Join the conversation

OTTAWA — Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly says Canada will help investigate sexual violence by Russian troops against women and girls in Ukraine.


Speaking in Ottawa after talks with Ann Linde, Sweden’s foreign affairs minister, Joly said RCMP officers helping to investigate war crimes in Ukraine will help gather evidence of rape and sexual violence by the Russian military.

Joly said Canada has provided 10 RCMP officers to help gather evidence of possible war crimes in Ukraine that could be used in a case at the International Criminal Court.

She said she thinks there is “strong evidence of a genocide” against the Ukrainian people by Russia.

MPs in Canada have already voted symbolically to label Russian targeting of Ukrainian civilians a genocide.

Both foreign ministers expressed concern that sexual violence toward women was being used by Russia as a weapon of war in Ukraine, saying such crimes must be highlighted.


They said specialist support is needed for Ukrainian women and girls fleeing to neighbouring countries who may have been raped and abused by invading troops.

Linde said Sweden has been at the forefront of investigating war crimes against civilians, including sexual violence toward women.

It has already sent “experts on investigating sexual and gender-based crime” to help the International Criminal Court with its war crimes investigation. They are interviewing refugees, “mainly women and girls and children,” as witnesses.

Speaking after talks with her Swedish counterpart, Joly reiterated Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s support for Sweden joining NATO.

Linde said Sweden wanted “security assurances” from other NATO countries if it applies for membership in the military alliance, in case there are reprisals from Russia for choosing to join. Russia is already engaging in disinformation campaigns, including falsely labelling prominent figures in Sweden as Nazis, she said.


Earlier this week, Ukraine’s ambassador-designate to Canada said Russia must be held accountable for its troops committing sex crimes, including against children.

Yulia Kovaliv told MPs at a House of Commons committee that Russia is using sexual violence as a weapon of war. She said Ukraine was compiling “horrific documented evidence” of war crimes, including sexual crimes by Russian soldiers.

“The horror is that children are victims of these sexual crimes, which are done (before) the eyes of their parents,” Kovaliv said. “Sexual crimes is part of the Russian weapon (against) Ukraine.”
 
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Twin_Moose

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