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Show WeeMy Special atfrso" American lawmakers come to defense of ex-Nazi . Some distinguised members of. Congress were persuaded to intervene inter-vene to stop the deportation of a former Nazi concentration camp official who Led about his past to gain admission to the United States after World Warn. The members are keeping some curious company. The accused war criminal's most .vehement defender, , is Dr. -..Max., Rubel, an jEstonian immigrant and a director of the Captive Nations Committee. A letter he wrote to Secretary of State George Shultz fairly reeks of anti-Semitism, accusing the Justice Department investigators of doing the bidding of "Jewish Zionists" and collaborating with the Soviet KGB when they go hunting ex-Nazis hiding in this country. The lawmakers recruited by Rubel and other Eastern European emigre activists either wrote letters to Shultz (more moderate in tone) or otherwise showed sympathy for the accused war criminal. They include Rep. Dante Fascell, D-Fla., chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee; Commit-tee; Sen. Alfonse D'Amato, R-N.Y.; Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M.; Sen. Dennis DeConcini, D-Ariz.; Rep. Don Ritter, R-Pa., and , before he left the Senate, Foreign Relations Committee Chariman Charles Percy, R-m. D'Amato, apparently fearing the wrath of New York's Jewish voters if he runs for re-election in 1986, later repudiated his original letter protesting protest-ing the deportation. An aide to D'Amato asked our associate Lucette Lagnado not to report either the senator's initial support or his subsequent repudiation. The center of the furor is Karl Iinnas, a 65-year-old, Estonian-born resident of Long Island, N.T. Evidence gathered by the Justice Department's Office of Special Investigations revealed that Iinnas had been an official in a concentration concentra-tion camp in Nazi-occupied Estonia and had ordered and participated in mass executions of Jews and other prisoners. Iinnas was stripped of his U.S. citizenship by a federal court for failing to mention his dark past on his immigration papers. He now faces deportation to the Soviet Union, of which Estonia is a de facto constituent republic. Linnas bases bis appeal on the technical grounds that the U.S. i government doesn't, officially recog-, recog-, nize the 1940 , Soviet takeover of Estonia.Xhough he would willing i to be deported to his homeland, he says, the government can't send him back to a country that doesn't exist in U.S. eyes. State Department lawyers . reiected this argument. Rubel' s letter to Schultz perpetuates perpetu-ates some of the more outrageous "historical" blatherings of deep-dyed deep-dyed anti-Semites. He describes the Soviet Union in World War II as "exclusively ruled by Marxist Zionist Jews as the ruling class." In fact, Jewish Soviet leaders were systematically exterminated by Stalin Sta-lin in the purges of the 1930s. Rubel also distorts the desparate heroism of the few Baltic Jews who managed to excape the Nazi death squads and join local partisan groups behind the lines. He describes them as "leaders of extermination battalions, bat-talions, killing innocent people and burning their abodes." EXECUTIVE MEMO: Few Americans have even heard of the Bureau of Land Management, let alone know its function. And BLM officials apparently want to keep it that way: They have proposed a new system for keeping secrets they don't want Congress or the public to know. According to an internal memo. the new system will be designated SAM, for Special Action Memorandum. Memoran-dum. It will cover all memos "which solicit data, information, opinions, comment, estimates or response from any bureau office." To make the point perfectly clear, the memo states: "SAMs will NOT be routinely available to the public unless they are released in response to a request after appropriate review and approval." appro-val." An IRS official in Chicago asked his secretary to book him a flight to New York, where he was to visit the IRS office in downtown Manhattan. But when he deplaned, he wondered why the famous" New York skyline had shrunk to a few grain elevators. Turned out he was in Manhattan, Kan... . .... ', ,-- : J. .; The .official used his personal "credit card to fly to the' right Manhattan, but was reimbursed only $100 the limit for a credit-card transaction under federal regulations for the $284 flight. The agency recently conceded that the trip to Kansas was a mistake, not a joy ride, and coughed up the $184. The official whose job it is to see that Energy Department employees are treated fairly has filed a complaint against the department for not treating him fairly. Nathan Pearson, the agency's equal-opportunity officer, is reported to be upset by the fact that he has been passed over for an annual bonus despite his official performance perfor-mance rating of "outstanding." Pearson obviously can't handle his own complaint, so a special equal employment officer will have to be appointed to deal with this matter. HEADLINES AND FOOTNOTES: Following a graveside service for William Stanford, the Agency for International Development auditor who was killed by hijackers at the Tehran airport, AID administrator Peter McPherson was given the American flag to pass along to Stanford's widow. But McPherson had to ask the dead man's daughter which mourner wa$ her mother. The Pennsylvania House of Representatives recently passed a resolution proclaiming rock star Bruce Springsteen to be the true "Boss" of rock-and-roll and praising the singer for his belief in the young people of America and in their individualism." The media-shy Springsteen had no comment on the honor. |