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There is little doubt as to the almost saintly role of Ukrainian

(Greek) Catholic Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky. Sheptytsky,

Archbishop of L'viv and head of the church, was widely known as being

sympathetic to the Jews. ... The elderly metropolitan wrote directly

to SS commander Heinrich Himmler in the winter of 1942 demanding an end

to the final solution and, equally important to him, an end to the use

of Ukrainian militia and police in anti-Jewish action. His letter

elicited a sharp rebuke, but Sheptytsky persisted even though the death

penalty was threatened to those who gave comfort to Jews. In November

1942 he issued a pastoral letter to be read in all churches under his

authority. It condemned murder. Although Jews were not specifically

mentioned, his intent was crystal clear.

We can never know how many Ukrainians were moved by Sheptytsky's

appeal. Certainly the church set an example. With Sheptytsky's tacit

approval, his church hid a number of Jews throughout western Ukraine,

150 Jews alone in and around his L'viv headquarters. Perhaps some of

his parishioners were among those brave and precious few "righteous

gentiles" who risked an automatic death penalty for themselves and

their families by harbouring a Jew under their roof.

The towering humanity of Sheptytsky remains an inspiration today.

(Harold Troper Morton Weinfeld, Old Wounds, 1988, pp. 17-18)

He [Sheptytsky] dispatched a lengthy handwritten letter dated August

29-31, 1942 to the Pope, in which he referred to the government of the

German occupants as a regime of terror and corruption, more diabolical

than that of the Bolsheviks. (Raul Hilberg, Perpetrators, Victims,

Bystanders, 1992, p. 267)

One of those saved by Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky was Lviv's Rabbi

Kahane whose son is currently the marshal commander of the Israeli Air

Force. (Ukrainian Weekly, June 21, 1992, p. 9)

Sheptitsky himself hid fifteen Jews, including Rabbi Kahane, in his own

residence in Lvov, a building frequently visited by German officials.

(Martin Gilbert, The Holocaust, 1986, p. 410)

However, despite the widespread agreement that the Catholic church headed by

Sheptytsky was outspoken and courageous in its defense of Jews, you have consistently

portrayed Christianity in general, and the Catholic church in Lviv in 1941 in

particular, as being virulently anti-Semitic. I refer, for example, to your fable of

the alcoholic priest in Western Ukraine who incites a pogrom (Alan Levy, The Wiesenthal

File, 1993, p. 24), which fable I have already brought to your attention in my letter

to you of December 8, 1994; and I refer as well to your story of the Ukrainians who you

say almost executed you:

As the shots and shouts of the boisterous Ukrainians drew closer to

Wiesenthal, he heard a new sound: church bells. The Ukrainians heard

it, too. Good Orthodox Catholics all, they laid down their arms for

evening mass.

Wiesenthal and his friend had stood five or six bullets away from

extinction. (Alan Levy, The Wiesenthal File, Constable, London, 1993,

p. 36)

Now if it is the case as we have just seen above that the Catholic church

unambiguously and unequivocally stood for the defense of Jews, then we would expect

devout Catholics to not be among the executioners of Jews. Conversely, given that

someone is among the executioners of Jews, we would expect him not to be a devout

Catholic. Your portrayal of sadistic executioners as being simultaneously devout

Catholics is incongruous and elicits incredulity.

But your story goes beyond the incongruous to the grotesque. You portray a team

of executioners who have been repeatedly drinking vodka - and may therefore be depicted

as drunk. You say that they have also just been shooting prisoners in the back of the

neck, and then lifting the bodies from the floor and placing them into makeshift

coffins - therefore, the executioners are also covered with blood. Assuming that these

executioners did not have a place to shower and had not brought with them a change of

clothing, and assuming that the church bells are signaling the imminent commencement of

mass so as not to leave time for showering and changing, then I have trouble conjuring

up a credible image of these executioners arriving at the church for mass. To accept

your image requires us to accept that the appearance of drunk and blood-spattered

executioners at a mass would not attract notice and repugnance - a supposition which is

erroneous and offensive. And it requires us also to accept that the mind set of

executioners engaged in genocide is so similar to Christians engaged in devotion, that

they make the transition instantaneously and seamlessly - another supposition which is

erroneous and offensive.

Mr. Wiesenthal, I entreat you to either explain and defend your bizarre story, or

else to withdraw it.

Yours truly,

Lubomyr Prytulak

HOME DISINFORMATION PEOPLE WIESENTHAL 3285 hits since 18Jan98

Wiesenthal Letter 24 Jan 18/98 Reversing victim and victimizer

The caption at the top of the photographs shown below is from LIFE magazine, 11Jun45, p. 50. The caption in German

and Latin at the bottom of the Simon Wiesenthal drawing below was, of course, included with the drawing in Simon

Wiesenthal's KZ Mauthausen, 1946, p. 64. This caption says:

The Gallows