He’s Jewish.
I picked up on the name too. Why would one Jewish person argue against the atrocities committed on his fellow people with the mountain of evidence in the background saying the contrary.
Was listening to this speaker several mornings ago on my favorite radio station which is a Christian radio station that broadcast “It seems to me”. I came charging up out of the bed before normal time when this regular speaker went off the deep end and started on about a “zionist plot” to get the US to bomb Iraq. Whew! I emailed the station to get more info but haven’t heard yet. Surprised me out of my normal sleep-deprived world.
He's Jewish, his parents are Holocaust survivors, and he's not a Holocaust "denier" -- that's a silly overstatement.
Finkelstein's thing is that he accuses a set of people who he posits are profiting from a "Holocause industry", including such people as Eli Weisel -- that makes him a lightning rod for criticism.
I'm not taking a position as to whether anything he says has merit, but it's not "denial". And his attack on Alan Dershowitz was well-grounded.