Friday 29 May 2015

The Adventures of Alex Haak

Alex Haak is an octogenarian Dutch immigrant to the US who now lives in Port Charlotte, Florida.
During the Second World War he lived in the Hague in the Netherlands. At the end of the war Haak was thirteen years old.

In 1949 he jumped ship on the East Coast. A year later he was called up for military service, even though he was an illegal alien at the time. He served in a non-combatant role in the Korean War. This allowed him to later become an American citizen through the naturalization of veterans act.
He then proceeded to fulfill the American Dream.

Haak had a good story. He spoke about the little Jewish friends from his neighborhood who he missed. He painted a picture of the occupation of the Netherlands as if it was a big Warsaw Ghetto, with many people dying from starvation on the streets.
This story established him as a victim and gained him much sympathy.
He became a Baptist. His fellow churchgoers were touched by his lack of animosity towards Germany and Germans.

Every now and then he said things that sounded strange to mainstream Americans. However, Haak managed to turn this to his advantage. He proclaimed that he was proudly outspoken and his slogan became, “Alex Haak will tell it like it is”.
He was a colourful figure. Unbuttoned loud shirts, a fedora hat and a cigar. He unabashedly called all women "honey".
Even though he only spoke broken English, he looked very American. Whatever he did, he was always beyond reproach.
After all, he was a victim.

Haak got married and he and his wife Roberta had three children. He dabbled in politics, became Police Commissioner and later Mayor of Toms River, a small town in New Jersey. He was a Republican then but later switched to the Democrats and finally became an Independent.

After a career of entrepreneurship he retired to Pinellas County, Florida in 2002 and tried to restart his political career.
He ran for City Commissioner in South Pasadena three times and lost every time. He also did not succeed in his attempt to become South Pasadena mayor in 2004.
His final roll of the political dice was running for mayor of St. Petersburg in 2009. He lost.

Haak is now 83 years old. What does he do with himself? He spends his time posting anti-Semitic and anti-Israel comments on a Jewish/Israeli newspaper site, The Times of Israel.
He is an octogenarian anti-Semitic troll.

Now for the background story. Starting back in the Netherlands.
Before and during World War II there was a Dutch Nazi party: the NSB (Nationaal-Socialistische Beweging). The ideas of the Dutch Nazis were similar to the ideas of the Strasserite wing of the German Nazi party.
One of the prime objectives of the NSB during the war was the indoctrination of youth. They seem to have succeeded with Haak. He still praises the NSB and is lyrical about its youth movement. His ideas about Jews and the Second World War also correspond to the NSB propaganda.

According to Haak there was/is a Jewish conspiracy to control the world. The Russian and German communists were part of this conspiracy. Hitler stopped them and the Jews then turned their attention to America. Jews now control America.
He later substituted Zionists for Jews and became quite modern.
Haak maintains that Churchill not Hitler was responsible for the war. Hitler was just fighting the Jewish conspiracy. He is also a Holocaust denier.

There are two things that stick out in Haak’s ideas.
Firstly, his extreme and particular hatred of Anne Frank and the other Jews who were hidden during the war.
Secondly, his effusive praising of the German occupiers because, among other things, they gave him (always “me” not “us”) extra food whenever he asked. The Nazis did not just give extra food to people. They usually only gave it in return for information, about things like the hiding places of Jews.

Haak had an uncle who helped Jews for money. That was the way he made a living. There were people like that.
After the transport of Jews to the death camps was completed, the Nazis and their Dutch collaborators intensified the hunt for the hidden Jews. The “Jew-hunters” called on all members of the youth movement and their friends to join the hunt.
Haak adored the Germans and the Nazi youth movement. He was an impressionable twelve year old and believed the Nazi propaganda.
For him the hated hidden Jews were the rich Jews (later he called them “the Zionist”) responsible for the war. 

All the hidden Jews his uncle was helping were betrayed to the Nazis. Nobody knows who betrayed them. Haak knew where they were hidden. It may have been him. He had the opportunity and the motive. That could be the reason he received extra food from the Nazis "whenever I want".
That would also explain why in his later years he trolls Jewish/Israeli newspapers. He is still justifying his betrayal.
However, there is as of yet no hard evidence. I did pass the information I had on to the American Anti-Defamation League (ADL). They are investigating but I doubt it will come to anything.

There is a strange twist to Haak’s story.
At the end of his life he has become a kind of grand old man for a part of the Florida Democratic party. He is friendly with four activists there: Susan McGrath, Darden J. Rice, Lucy Trimarco and Dana Young.
By substituting "Zionist" for "Jew", the Strasserite Haak has become mainstream.

No, Alex Haak need have no fear. He can enjoy his last years.
He will die more peacefully than Anne Frank and the other betrayed hidden Jews.