George Jonas
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George Jonas (born June 15, 1935) is a Hungarian-born conservative Canadian writer, poet and journalist, a self-described classical liberal.
He was born in Budapest, the son of Dr. Georg M. Hübsch and Magda Hübsch (née Klug). During the Holocaust in Hungary in 1944-45, Jonas went into hiding with his family. Jonas worked as a radio producer in Budapest before escaping after the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. He came to Canada in 1956 and worked for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation from 1962 to 1985 as a scriptwriter and producer.
He worked as a columnist for the Toronto Sun from 1981 to 2001 when he moved to the National Post where he remains a regular contributor. He has written 14 books, 1 play, and two operas. His 1984 book Vengeance, describing the events of Operation Wrath of God, is the basis for two films: TV-film Sword of Gideon (1986) and feature film Munich (2005) directed by Steven Spielberg. Jonas has complained of what he considers pro-Palestinian distortions in Munich. Specifically, Jonas feels that the script writer Tony Kushner, a Jew who has referred to the formation of Israel as a "mistake," failed to make a moral distinction between terrorism and legitimate military actions.[1] At the same time, many critics claim that Jonas's mysterious source for the book, who claimed to be the head of a Mossad hit team code named 'Avner', was in fact nothing of the sort and had fabricated the story. In a lengthy article in Macleans magazine in January of 2006, Jonas admits that there is no way of verifying if his source was truthful. However, Jonas did attempt to verify some details of the story by visiting the places in Europe where his source claimed to be operating, and at least to that extent he is satisfied with the evidence.
Jonas was married to Barbara Amiel from 1974 to 1979, and they remain good friends. (A book he cowrote with Amiel, By Persons Unknown: The Strange Death of Christine Demeter, won a 1978 Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Fact Crime book.) Although Jonas is of Jewish descent, his grandparents converted to Christianity before his birth. Jonas notes in his memoirs that Amiel insisted on being married in a synagogue, which was the first time Jonas had been inside one.
[edit] Work
- Beethoven's Mask: Notes On My Life and Times, Key Porter Books, 2005.
- The East Wind Blows West, 1993.
- Politically Incorrect, 1991.
- A Passion Observed: A True Story of a Motorcycle Racer, 1989.
- Crocodiles in the Bathtub, 1987.
- Greenspan: The Case for the Defense, 1987.
- The Scales of Justice: Volume II, 1986.
- Forward for "In the Name of the Working Class" written by Sandor Kopasci,Grove Press, 1986.
- Vengeance: The True Story of an Israeli Counter-Terrorist Team, 1984.
- The Scales of Justice: Seven Famous Criminal Cases Recreated, 1983.
- Final Decree, 1981.
- By Persons Unknown: The Strange Death of Christine Demeter co-written with Barbara Amiel, 1977.
- Cities, 1973.
- The Happy Hungry Man, 1970.
- The Absolute Smile, 1967.
