New York, NY, March 22, 1996...The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today said it was "astonished" to learn that St Martin's's Press, a prominent American publishing house, would publish and promote as serious scholarship the work of known Holocaust Denier and Nazi apologist, David Irving.

Following is the text of the letter sent by Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director to Mr. Roy Gainsburg, President, St. Martin's Press, Inc.:

We were astonished to learn that an institution of your prominence and reputation will publish and promote as serious scholarship David Irving's Goebbels: Mastermind of the Third Reich.

Surely you must know that Mr. Irving is a well-known Holocaust Denier and an apologist for the Nazi regime. A pseudo-scholar, he has no academic credentials as a historian and his writings on Hitler, Nazis and the Holocaust have been consistently shown to be replete with errors, oversights, poor research and fantasy.

We would hope that you will at least categorize the book as a work of fiction and not allow it to be passed off as a legitimate historical tract.

The Anti-Defamation League, founded in 1913, is the world's leading organization fighting anti-Semitism through programs and services that counteract hatred, prejudice and bigotry.