In compiling our "Heroes and Heroines of the Holocaust" section of our website, we came across the Hiram Bingham IV name that was posted in a number of "Visas for Life: The Righteous Diplomats" photo exhibits. We did not know that all those exhibits were in fact the creation of one single person --Eric Saul, so yes we were impressed to see Hiram Bingham IV appearing in so many such exhibits. So much impressed that we created almost immediately a prominent entry in our stated web section with a special memorial page for the late Bingham IV.

After a number of days, we began to be frustrated in our inability to find in any official or semiofficial "Righteous Among the Nations" listings the name of Hiram Bingham IV. Almost in a timid and apologetic fashion we contacted Robert Kim Bingham, a son of Bingham IV, inquiring for documentation on his father's "Righteous Among the Nations" title. In his reply of April 17, 2003, Mr. Bingham stated:

"I understand the "Righteous Among Nations" nomination is still pending before the Yad Vashem --not decided yet. Dr. Eric Saul, Curator, Simon Wiesenthal Center (at VisasForLife@cs.com) may be able to give status of the nomination."

It was something about that answer that made us uneasy. We asked ourselves if there was a chance in heaven that Mr. Bingham, who has been collecting and fabricating every conceivable scrap of evidence for building up his larger-than-life image of his dad, in his elaborate website (see, Exhibit 1, hereto), would not know the exact status of his dad's "Righteous" nomination? Not a chance! Then and there, we recognized that something was not quite right here and thus that this case would require an extra amount of attention and scrutiny on our side. Notwithstanding Mr. Bingham's ESQUIRE "title" affixed to his name, we began having a sense that we are dealing with a less than honorable person. And that feeling never left us...

Who was this Dr. Eric Saul?, was our next question. We have performed a most intensive search on his academic background and credentials and we have come empty-handed. However in this search of ours, we found something interesting on the website of the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies (CHGS) of the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, USA. There, we found a response by Mr. Saul to an article written by the Holocaust survivor Joan R. Deman who pointed out in her article "A Rebuttal to the claims made by the Organization 'Visas for Life'" of a number of instances where Mr. Saul implanted fabricated evidence into the case of the Chinese Consul in Vienna (Austria), Dr. Feng Shan Ho. Mr. Saul's response (Exhibit 2, hereto) begins with this paragraph:

"I am the project director of the Visas for Life. The purpose of the Visas for Life project is to find, document and recognize diplomats who saved Jews and other refugees from Nazi persecution. Our program has traveled to seven countries and placed more than 100 exhibits honoring these diplomats. We are co-sponsored by a number of international, Jewish, civil rights and educational institutions. We are extremely careful in our research and documentation of the diplomats and their actions as rescuers."

Because of the reference encountered for a "Visas for Life" Organization, we made an extensive search to see if such an Organization actually existed. Again we came empty-handed. [For those not familiar, in the United States, an entity to claim to be an educational organization must be recognized by the United States Internal Revenue Service as an organization under 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. No such "Visas for Life" organization were we able to find to exist.]

All this triggered a number of "red" flags, as all signs pointed to an unmistakable conclusion that we are dealing with a "big time" crook and a "high class" research Holocaust impostor as we were very much impressed with the force of Ms. Deman's arguments. Because of all this, we took a "microscopic" look at Mr. Saul's current Holocaust work since we reasoned that if we were on the right track, then we must be able to discover a "big time" fraudulent scheme that would have matched our emerging portrait of him.

Well, upon examining the "composition" of Mr. Saul's "Visas for Life: The Righteous Diplomats," we noticed that not all the diplomats listed there were in fact "Righteous" within the meaning of Yad Vashem's title. Indeed, notwithstanding the fact that Hiram Bingham IV has not been awarded with the title of "Righteous," he has been placed in Mr. Saul's list as a "Righteous" diplomat in many of Mr. Saul's "Visas for Life" exhibits. (From the many examples available, see for instance our Exhibit 3, hereto that was taken from the CHGS website referenced hereinabove.) This recognition immediately prompted us to ask ourselves as to what was Mr. Saul's angle in all this. Clearly, we reasoned, that this was not an innocent slippage on his part so it was a fair question to ask: Why was he then introducing, in a deliberate way, under his "Righteous Diplomats" list, names of diplomats that were not "Righteous"? Also, we were wondering, What else was implanted into those apparent bogus "educational" exhibits?

As we were pondering over these questions, the answer was beaming right in our face thanks to Mr. Bingham's elaborate website (Exhibit 1, hereto) that we were studying. There, in the very first lines, in bold and upper case letters, reference is made to Mr. Bingham's dad as a

"UNITED STATES CITIZEN WWII "RIGHTEOUS DIPLOMAT," WHO BRAVELY RESCUED REFUGEES FROM THE HOLOCAUST."

My goodness, you had to be blind not to see the fraudulent scheme at work:

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Once Mr. Bingham had secured from Mr. Saul a place for his dad as a "Righteous Diplomat" into his "Visas for Life" exhibits, there was no need for him to wait for the result from the Yad Vashem on his dad's nomination for the true "Righteous" title. His dad already got this title from Eric Saul for a price, of course, unless you believe that Mr. Saul is Santa Claus! Now with this "Righteous" secured, Mr. Bingham was able to go full speed after what he really wanted: that of convincing the United States Postal Service that his dad, as a "Righteous Diplomat", is a deserving "hero" to have a commemorative stamp issued after him.

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Curious as to what would be Mr. Bingham's reaction, we confronted him directly with respect to the bogus "Righteous" title that he had secured for his dad. In his response (email of May 17, 2003) he stated:

"Dear Mr. Brattman:

Thank you for expressing your concerns. I copied to Dr. Eric Saul the earlier message from your staff. We share equally a strong desire for accuracy. I wish to ensure that no one is misled into thinking that my father has received the significant "Righteous Among the Nations" designation. I apologize if you and your staff were so misled (on occasion, a reporter has inadvertently misconstrued my reference to "righteous diplomat" to mean "righteous gentile"). To help prevent further misunderstanding, I have added the following sentence IN CAPS to the beginning of the mainpage of my website at http://pages.cthome.net/WWIIHERO/ :

"A NOTE OF CAUTION: SOME NEWSPAPER ARTICLES

HAVE ERRONEOUSLY STATED THAT HARRY HAS BEEN

AWARDED THE "RIGHTEOUS AMONG THE NATIONS" MEDAL

BY THE YAD VASHEM IN JERUSALEM, WHICH HE HAS NOT

(HE HAS ONLY BEEN NOMINATED FOR THIS HONOR)."

(Of course, the newspapers that he was referring were all fed by him in the first place with his misleading information and, notwithstanding his innocent apology he kept on his website the precious "Righteous Diplomat" title that he had secured from Mr. Saul who chose not to intervene and respond to any of our concerns. So we had a perfect mechanism in place: Mr. Bingham played the game of the "ignorant" claiming of not knowing anything about the issues at hand as he deflected all the issues raised by us to Mr. Saul who, in turn, chose to remain completely silent!)

The most painful part of our findings was not that we have discovered that the Bingham-Saul "show" was a masquerade of cosmic proportion, but that the wounds that Mr. Saul was able to inflict on Yad Vashem and its "Righteous Among the Nations" program were so deep and immense that in all likelihood they would never be able to heal completely. To see all this, we need first to reveal the extent of Mr. Saul's deception --the subject of our next section.

 

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