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Dave Shaw notified me of a weird character being displayed as a "hot trend" on Google Trends this morning. It appears that Google is displaying a swastika as �. This appears to be some sort of chinese character, but the swastika is well known for usage in Nazi Germany, and has been a very controversial symbol since. Here is a picture of Google Trends at the time I write this When you view the trends result, you see there are only a blog posts but zero news articles, which makes you wonder what is really going on here. Is this...

DECATUR, Ala. (AP) — From the ground, the Wesley Acres Methodist retirement home looks like any other building. But fly over in an airplane, and the outline is unmistakable: It's one big swastika. Prompted by complaints from a Jewish activist, the agency that owns the government-funded building is planning to alter its shape to disguise the Nazi symbol. The move comes just a few years after a $1 million design modification meant to quiet similar complaints from a U.S. senator. "The difficulty is there are a limited number of options for fixing a building that has been there for some...

CORONADO, Calif. -- The U.S. Navy will spend as much as $600,000 to modify the appearance of a barracks complex in Coronado that resembles a swastika from the air. Navy officials said the spending for changes to the four L-shaped buildings were approved after satellite images from Google Earth revealed the swastika-like shape.

Zara withdraws swastika handbags The fashion chain Zara has withdrawn a handbag from its stores after a customer pointed out that the design featured swastikas. Zara said the bag came from an external supplier and the symbol had not been visible when it was selected. A customer who returned the bag to the shop when she noticed the symbol said staff had been "shocked" to see it. As well as being the Nazi symbol, the swastika is also a religious symbol for Hindus and Buddhists. The customer, Rachel Hatton, said, "I was quite shocked - I took it back to...

An official with the Institute on Religion and Democracy says it is outrageous that a leader in the United Methodist Church has called for the removal of U.S. flags from the denomination's churches. Minister Clayton Childers of the Capitol Hill-based United Methodist Board of Church and Society said the presence of a national flag can imply endorsement of national policies, which often are counter to the teachings of Christ. Childers even noted that the Swastika flag was displayed prominently in German churches during the Nazi era. Mark Tooley is with the Institute on Religion and Democracy (IRD). "Obviously," he notes,...

Germany Backs Off Urging EU Ban on Swastika 23:19 Jan 29, '07 / 10 Shevat 5767 (IsraelNN.com) Germany, which has taken its turn as presiding over the European Union (EU), said it will not press member countries to ban use of the swastika and to punish Holocaust deniers. The announcement in Berlin did not explain its reasoning, but several EU countries expressed views that a sweeping ban and punishment may not be practical. Germany, Austria and France have passed law that call for punishing Holocaust deniers, which is not a crime in other countries. Italy has backed off from an...

Hindus opposing EU swastika ban The Nazis hijacked the symbol from its Hindu origins Hindus in Europe have joined forces against a German proposal to ban the display of the swastika across the European Union, a Hindu leader said. Ramesh Kallidai of the Hindu Forum of Britain said the swastika had been a symbol of peace for thousands of years before the Nazis adopted it. He said a ban on the symbol would discriminate against Hindus. Germany, holder of the EU presidency, wants to make Holocaust denial and the display of Nazi symbols a crime. Mr Kallidai said his organisation...

Jewish New Year Begins At SundownPolice removed swastika banners hung from two freeway overpasses Friday, the day that the Jewish holiday of Rosh Hashana begins, authorities said. One Nazi emblem was found hanging over state Route 78 at Escondido Avenue in Vista. A California Highway Patrol officer took it down just before 6 a.m., authorities said. A second swastika banner was reported hanging from the Sea World Drive overpass on southbound Interstate 5 in San Diego, according to the CHP. When officers arrive, the banner had already been removed, authorities said. A CHP representative said that the banner found in...

RIGA (Reuters) - Hundreds of Latvians knitting 4,500 pairs of woollen mittens as gifts for the November NATO summit have been told to avoid a folk symbol said to ward off evil since it looks like a Nazi swastika. A spokeswoman for the NATO leaders' summit said the Latvian Thunder Cross, or Fire Cross, will not figure in the design of any of the thousands of unique pairs of mittens some 300 Latvians are producing for NATO delegates lest it be misinterpreted. The Thunder Cross is a folklore symbol used as a charm against evil for Latvians. It quite commonly...

Criticizing US President George W. Bush is fine in Germany, but doing so by displaying the Nazi swastika is a crime, and it's got film director Fatih Akin in trouble with the German authorities. Fatih Akin attending a film debut in Hamburg last year. Police in the northern city of Hamburg are investigating award-winning Turkish-German film director Fatih Akin, 32, for wearing an anti-Bush T-shirt bearing the word "Bush" in which the letter "s" was replaced by the swastika. Displaying Nazi symbols is a crime in Germany. He wore the T-shirt on a film set and an unnamed man who...

Free Press International 9.30.2005 Just across the bay from San Diego lies the United States Naval Amphibious Base in Coronado, California. On the base is a swastika shaped building. A very unusual building to be on a naval base to say the least. The building lies between Tulagi Rd. and Bougainville Rd and is called the "The Seals Lair" according to one source.

Giant ozone hole 'forming over Tibet'From: Agence France-Presse From correspondents in Beijing May 04, 2006 CHINESE scientists have warned a 2.5-million-square-kilometre ozone hole may be forming over the Tibetan plateau, state media reported today. While it does not yet qualify as a regular ozone hole, like the ones over the two poles, the area has seen a dramatic drop in ozone density in recent years, the Xinhua news agency said, citing China's Scientific Report journal. The decrease in ozone over the plateau was caused by atmospheric air movements rather than the global greenhouse effect, Xinhua quoted the journal as saying....

A German town hoping to be named Culture Capital of Europe has just noticed that council workmen laid a swastika in a cobbled street.Officials at Goerlitz have apologised after the large Nazi symbol, which is forbidden in Germany, was laid into the pavement late last year. It was done by workers employed by the local council to repave the pedestrian area and remained unnoticed for almost four months until a local resident complained. A spokeswoman for the office of Mayor Joachim Paulick said: "This is a catastrophe, especially as we are hoping to be named Culture Capital for 2010. We...

On February 24, Estonia celebrated 88th anniversary of its Declaration on Independence. A military parade was held in Tallin, the capital of Estonia. The parade was received by Estonian President Arnold Ruutel, Commander of the Defense Forces Tarmo Kouts ran the parade, Chief Chaplain of the Defense Forces Col. Tonis Nõmmik held a public worship. On the photo published by REGNUM one of the parade participators, a member of people's volunteer corps is pictured. According to REGNUM information, officials have given no commentaries, whether a swastika-shaped earring is an obligatory part of the Estonian volunteer corps uniform.

Commie Chic 2006.02.26 WTF is the deal with Commie chic these days? I see kids wearing Che shirts, Hammer 'n' Sickle watches, and other communism-related stuff at [anime] conventions all the time, and nobody but me seems to give a damn. Most of these poor kids can't be held responsible -- after all, most pUbLiK sKoOlz don't teach history anymore -- but how about us adults? We know better. There's a double standard here, that's what I think. If some kid were to walk into a con dealers' room in a swastika T-shirt people would be up in his grill...

Civil rights activist and NAACP Chairman Julian Bond delivered a blistering partisan speech at Fayetteville State University in North Carolina last night, equating the Republican Party with the Nazi Party and characterizing Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and her predecessor, Colin Powell, as "tokens." "The Republican Party would have the American flag and the swastika flying side by side," he charged. The talk so infuriated at least one black family in attendance that they got up in walked out in protest.

Thorns and Roses: 01.20.06 Truan's reaction to swastika banner was right on target Former State Sen. Carlos Truan refused to let political fervor triumph over decency at a recent gathering. Truan was at a press conference of Hispanic groups last week to announce marches protesting construction of a wall between Mexico and the United States when one activist flaunted a flag decorated with swastikas. Jose Chavira, spokesman for Frente Unida (United Front) of Mexico, displayed a flag with swastikas that compared President George W. Bush to Hitler. "We associate (Bush) with Hitler in Mexico," Chavira said. Truan would have none...

Swastikas for Campus ConservativesBy Jason AntebiFrontPageMagazine.com | December 9, 2005 Occidental College in Los Angeles may epitomize what’s wrong in higher education. Professors cancel class to encourage their students to attend a protest against the “Bush Regime,” campus leaders are forced into mandatory “diversity/sensitivity training,” and some far-Left students seem to believe that a liberal arts education consists of little more than painting a portrait of Bill Clinton. Tuition money – in excess of $40,000 per pupil – is wasted on courses such as "The Unbearable Whiteness of Barbie" and “Stupidity,” a mandatory course for some freshmen, which compares incidents...

IT was 60 years ago today that Adolf Hitler slunk for the last time into the private quarters of his Berlin bunker. With Soviet artillery shells shaking the earth above him and the last remnants of his empire crumbling, Hitler took with him a pistol for himself and a poison capsule for his mistress Eva Braun. The world was about to be rid for good of one of the most evil tyrants it has ever known.

WOLFEBORO — A 17-year-old New Durham junior refuses to let an indefinite suspension from high school prohibit him from expressing himself. Paul Hendrickson, of Old Bay Road, received the punishment two weeks ago for wearing an arm patch with a crossed-out swastika to Kingswood Regional High School. The teen said Thursday he wasn’t trying to make a stance against any group, especially his school, but he was not willing to surrender his freedom of expression or speech. He said he first wore the patch to school on March 28 without incident to make a statement against intolerance, but school officials...

ISTANBUL, Turkey - Turkish bookshops have a best seller, but some of them are hesitant about giving it too much display. It's "Mein Kampf." The popularity of Adolf Hitler's book, filled with anti-Jewish diatribes and dreams of world domination, is puzzling some Turks. Does it reflect rising anti-Semitic or anti-Western sentiment in Muslim Turkey? Or anger over Israel's treatment of the Palestinians and the war in Iraq (news - web sites)? Is it a backlash against the country's moves to join the European Union (news - web sites)? Or does it simply offer a cheap thrill? At least two new...

LONDON The other night, as I left the theater, I saw a woman wearing a fur hat. Some people, of course, don't like the sight of fur; I'm not one of them. But I noticed the badge on the front of her hat: a red and gold hammer and sickle. No doubt about it, she looked striking: the glittering, graphically coherent symbol set off by the soft shine of the fur. Yet it made me wonder what she had been thinking when she acquired her post-Communist trophy. Why, I wondered, is Communist chic acceptable, when -- as Prince Harry's swastika-wearing...

Harry's Swastika Prompts Talk of EU Ban 2 hours, 5 minutes ago Europe - AP By CONSTANT BRAND, Associated Press Writer BRUSSELS, Belgium - The European Union (news - web sites) may consider banning Nazi symbols in its 25 member nations after Britain's Prince Harry wore a swastika armband to a costume party, the bloc's top justice official said Monday. AP Photo AFP Slideshow: Prince Harry's Nazi Costume Criticized Franco Frattini, the EU's justice and home affairs commissioner, said he was open to discussing the issue at a Jan. 27 meeting of EU justice ministers. "It may be worth looking...

LONDON: Europe may be forced into considering a continent-wide ban on the swastika, one of the oldest, most globally recognized but also most reviled Sanskrit symbols in the West, in an anguished response to 'party prince' Harry's choice of Nazi uniform, swastika and SS badge as fancy dress. On Sunday, German politicians mooted discussing a ban at the next meeting of justice ministers from the 25 European Union (EU) member states. But Indophiles said it was a sad commentary on the swastika, which is translated from the Sanskrit to mean "it is well", even though Hitler's hijacking made it a...

PRINCE Harry is making amends for his Nazi fancy dress shame — by mucking out his dad’s pigs. Angry Charles has ordered Harry, 20, to do a series of lowly jobs at his organic farm near Highgrove, Gloucs. A Royal source said: “His father thought a few days getting his hands dirty might focus his mind.”

In the wake of British Prince Harry's display of a swastika at a party last week, German politicians are calling for a ban on display of the Nazi symbol across the entire continent of Europe. Germany has already prohibited the insignia within its own borders, along with the notorious "Heil Hitler" salute. It's also against the law to distribute Hitler's book "Mein Kampf," which can be read in most countries, including Israel. "The whole of Europe once suffered under Nazi crimes, therefore it makes sense to ban Nazi symbols across Europe," Silvana Koch-Merin of Germany's Liberal Party told Scotland on...

German lawmakers seek European ban on Nazi insignia www.chinaview.cn 2005-01-16 13:07:45 BERLIN, Jan. 15 (Xinhuanet) -- German lawmakers called for a Europe-wide prohibition on Nazi insignia Saturday after British Prince Harry wore a swastika at a fancy dress party. Harry caused outrage after he dressed as a Nazi official with a large swastika at the party. He then apologized for his gaffe in a written statement on Thursday. "All of Europe suffered under Nazi crimes in the past, therefore, it would be logical for Nazi symbols to be banned all over Europe," said Silvana Koch-Merin, vice president of the Liberal...

This is LONDON 14/01/05 - News and city section Charles backs Harry By Robert Jobson Royal Correspondent, Evening Standard Prince Charles is refusing to force Harry to visit Auschwitz or make a TV apology for his Nazi fancy dress stunt. The Prince of Wales is angry that his son is being pilloried for what he regards as a silly but harmless prank and wants to shelter him from further bad publicity. But the outrage over 20-year-old Harry's decision to attend a party in a German soldier's uniform with a swastika armband continues to reverberate around the world. The royal family's...

Simple and striking, the swastika is one of humankind's oldest symbols. Since the rise of the Nazi party in 1920s and 30s Germany it has, in the west at least, become one of its most terrifying. Spray-painted swastikas on Jewish or military graves are enough to evoke the horror of Hitler's movement. So when Prince Harry, the third in line to the throne, wears a Nazi flag on his arm at a fancy dress party it stirs a huge controversy. The swastika was not always so reviled, nor is it in every part of the world. It is a commonly...

Prince Harry has apologised after being pictured on the front page of The Sun in a Nazi uniform which he wore to a fancy dress party. The newspaper showed the Prince, with a cigarette and drink in hand, wearing a swastika armband. The 20-year-old said: "I am very sorry if I caused any offence or embarrassment to anyone." In a statement released by Buckingham Palace, he added: "It was a poor choice of costume and I apologise." On Harry's shirt collar was the badge of Wehrmacht - the German defence force. The Prince was at a fancy dress party...

Six Navy SEALs filed a lawsuit against the Associated Press and one of its reporters yesterday, saying the news organization revealed their identities, compromised their security and invaded their privacy by publishing personal photographs in a Dec. 4 story.     The complaint says AP reporter Seth Hettena used about 40 images from the personal photo-storage Web site of a Navy SEAL wife. [snip] The images were picked up by the Arab press, including Al Jazeera, and have made their way onto a billboard outside U.S. Naval Base Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where detainees from the war on terror are being kept. The...

We've discussed Jimmy Carter's legacy of friendship and warm support for the world's dictators many times already, notably on Venezuela, but a return to Carter's Cuba legacy may be an even worse experience, because of an unmistakable whiff of treason. Where do we start? Remember Jimmy Carter's cabinet appointments? People like Andrew Young, who hung out with the hate-America crowd over at the United Nations and denounced America and Israel with the gamiest dictators on earth? Carter had a lot of these rabid blame-America-firsters on his coattails, and some are more active than ever. One is named Wayne Smith, who...

Plants sow seeds of hate Fiona Hudson, city editor 10dec04 A FLORAL foul-up has left a city street lined with swastika shapes in a week of major Jewish celebrations. Gardeners hired by Melbourne City Council intended to arrange the purple and white pot plants into neat geometric shapes. But they left six 3m garden beds along Swanston St displaying large Nazi symbols. Jewish community representatives were appalled last night by the timing of the blunder. City venues including Federation Square are hosting hundreds of Jews this week to celebrate the eight-day Hanukkah festival. The council sent hired green thumbs to...

Reader Alfred Fluehr sent us the flyer reproduced below. He writes: First, there was the flyer from Tennessee Democrats that depicted Bush as a special Olympian. Mentally handicapped people probably aren't on the liberal list of those to be tolerant towards. Then there was the pamphlet which depicted whites using fire hoses on blacks. Obviously a ploy to stir racial hatred using images out of context that were forty years old. [Ed: Plus, the ones doing the spraying were all Democrats.] And now, we have this beauty of a flyer, posted around Penn State, depicting a boy jumping on a...

DULUTH - Three teenagers are charged with a felony after confessing that they vandalized campaign signs for President Bush and painting a swastika outside a Duluth home.

MADISON, Wis. -- Madison homeowners are livid after vandals defaced their homes. Someone burned an 8-foot-by-8-foot Nazi swastika on a home's lawn near where Bush-Cheney signs were posted. The vandals used grass killer to spray the symbol. Several nearby homes were vandalized -- all were within a two-block radius on the West Side, near Ice Age Trail, News 3 reported. State Republican Party officials claim it's the latest in a series of desperate acts by Democrats. Homeowners are angry, but resolute in what they plan to do next. "I just cannot believe that someone would take the liberty to do...

Haj Amin el Husseini arrived in Europe in 1941 following the unsuccessful pro-Nazi coup which he organized in Iraq. He met German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop and was officially received by Adolf Hitler on November 28,1941 in Berlin. Nazi Germany established for der Grossmufti von Jerusalem a Bureau from which he organized the following: 1) radio propaganda on behalf of Nazi Germany; 2) espionage and fifth column activities in Muslim regions of Europe and the Middle East; 3) the formation of Muslim Waffen SS and Wehrmacht units in Bosnia-Hercegovina, Kosovo-Metohija, Western Macedonia, North Africa, and Nazi-occupied areas of the...

France Seeks Jewish Cemetery Vandals France Vows to Catch and Prosecute Vandals Who Splashed Anti-Semitic Graffiti on Jewish Tombstones The Associated Press LYON, France Aug. 10, 2004 — The French government vowed Tuesday to catch and prosecute vandals who splashed anti-Semitic graffiti across about 60 Jewish tombstones in a cemetery in Lyon overnight, the third such attack here since May. The incident came on a day when a Jewish cemetery was found desecrated in the Czech Republic, and when lawmakers in New Zealand condemned vandals who wrecked Jewish gravestones in two cemeteries and torched a Jewish prayer house in recent...

Swastika Artwork Removed From Exhibit Fri Feb 20, 5:05 PM ET OSLO, Norway - A painting that featured the words Israel and the United States — and replaced each S with a Nazi swastika — was removed from an art exhibit Friday after it infuriated a Holocaust survivor and other Jews. Andreas Engelstad, owner of the Galleri A Minor in Oslo, said the Israeli Embassy demanded that the painting be removed, but that it was the reaction of other Jews that prompted his decision to withdraw it. "I took it down not because of the embassy, but out of respect...

<p>Microsoft Corp. said on Friday that its latest version of Office software inadvertently contained a font featuring two swastikas, and said it would offer tools to remove and replace the offending characters from the program.</p> <p>The swastika, which was made infamous by Nazi Germany, was included in Microsoft's "Bookshelf Symbol 7" font. That font was derived from a Japanese font set, said Microsoft Office product manager Simon Marks.</p>

Nazi flag doesn't fly with crowd School band director says halftime show was meant to be historical 09:15 PM CDT on Monday, September 29, 2003 By TAWNELL D. HOBBS / The Dallas Morning News Charles Grissom, director of the Paris High School band, said his intentions were true. The Blue Blazes Band would perform a historically accurate show titled "Visions of World War II" featuring flags and music to represent the combating nations. It would include a student running across the field with a Nazi flag and the tune composed by Franz Joseph Haydn that later became "Deutschland Uber Alles."...

Thu Sep 18,11:30 AM ET Jordan's Queen Rania (L), Jordan King Abdullah II (2nd L), U. S. President George W. Bush, and U.S. first lady Laura Bush (R) pose after Bush and King Abdullah spoke to the press following a meeting at the presidential retreat, Camp David, Maryland, September 18, 2003. The two leaders discussed the Middle East peace process. REUTERS/Larry Downing Close-up detail of shawl:

Sunday August 24, 2:59 PM Hong Kong's Nazi cool sends shivers across the world Fashion stores bedecked with swastikas, karaoke bars with photos of a "heiling" Adolf Hitler. Some 60 years after six million Jews were wiped out in the Holocaust, it seems the unspeakable has happened in Hong Kong: Nazis are cool. The former British colony, which saw its share of World War II horrors at the hands of the Imperial Japanese army, has been hit by a series of minor scandals this month involving an unexpectedly blatant use of Nazi imagery. Although condemnation has been swift and apologies...

BERLIN (Reuters) - German authorities suspended two police officers after photographs were found showing them giving the stiff-arm Nazi salute and carrying a flag bearing a swastika, officials said on Friday. The two officers were suspended after a court-ordered search of their homes and police stations uncovered the photographs, they said. "There is no room in the police force for extremists," Brandenburg state interior minister Joerg Schoenbohm said in a statement. Right-wing violence in Brandenburg and other eastern states, in which scores of people died, surged in the years after German unification in 1990, but has since subsided. Victims' groups...

adorned with 'swastikas' has been condemned. Rabbi Yakkov Kermaier, of Ohel Leah Synagogue, says it is probably an honest mistake, but he's called toy sets featuring the "Robocon" characters unacceptable. One character, the robot-like "Robowaru," has two swastikas on its chest and can be bought in the UK for around £2.60 with any purchase of six bottles of Coke. The figurines stand on small plastic pedestals with Coca-Cola logos on them. "It's not simply a politically incorrect symbol," Rabbi Kermaier said. "It's an emblem that represents the wholesale slaughter of six million Jews." Rabbi Kermaier acknowledged the Nazi swastika can...

Scott Lively, author of "The Pink Swastika" (a book which exposes the homosexual connection to the Nazi's) writes the following in his latest newsletter: “A sudden opportunity has arisen to tour Berlin with the man who led Nazi Deputy Fuehrer Rudolph Hess to the Lord. Lt. Colonel Eugene Bird was Commandant of Spandau Prison from 1964 to 1972 (where Hess was held) and co-authored a book with him. He has recently read 'The Pink Swastika' and praises it highly. He has volunteered to take me on a tour of Nazi sites in Berlin and provide me with the benefits of...

NEWS UPDATE  January 27, 2003 Student?s Pro-Life T-shirt Is Equivalent to the Swastika Says School Principal; Thomas More Law Center Enters Fray ANN ARBOR, MI ? The mother of an honor student at Abington Junior High School in Pennsylvania was told by the principal that her son?s pro-life t-shirt was unacceptable school clothing because its message was the equivalent of the swastika.  The t-shirt displayed the messages, ?Abortion is Homicide.  You will not silence my message.  You will not mock my God.  You will stop killing my generation.  Rock for Life.? This past November, the principal told the student to either cover...

[FBIS Transcribed Text] RIGA, Jan 23 (AFP) -- Around 20 youths on Thursday [23 January] protested outside Latvia's parliament against a proposal to ban the display of symbols similar to the Nazi swastika or the Soviet hammer-and-sickle. "The swastika is by no means something Hitler thought of," Dzintars Raivis, leader of the All for Latvia movement, told the Baltic News Service. The youths displayed copies of Latvian folk songs bearing reversed versions of the swastika associated with Hitler's Nazi regime which would be banned from public display under amendments approved by the parliament in a second reading on Thursday. The...

L O N D O N, April 30 — Jewish leaders on Tuesday condemned an attack on a London synagogue in which vandals painted a swastika on a lectern, smashed windows and defiled holy books. Vandals forced their way into the synagogue in Finsbury Park, north London, late Saturday and ransacked the building. They threw prayer shawls and skull caps on the floor, stamped on an Israeli flag and splattered green paint on the Holy Ark, where sacred scrolls are kept. "Tension in the Middle East leads to tension on the streets of Europe but this is one of the...