VOLAJRume JOURNAL 10 NO.3 march 2010
Past glories
he AJR Journal has always prided and whereabouts of Jews and others itself on the high quality of its from the cultural world who had been T literary, artistic and cultural forced into exile. So PEM’s Privat-Berichte content, including the reviews it publishes. first appeared in May 1936, drawing on Among the Jewish refugees from Hitler, the extraordinarily wide knowledge its with their rich cultural heritage, were a author had acquired during his years number of highly knowledgeable experts of reporting on Berlin’s cultural scene. in various fields of culture, on whom the From October 1936, it transferred with AJR Information was able to draw for the its author to London, where it continued erudite and polished reviews of books, until August 1939, reappearing in 1945 as plays and films that graced its pages. PEM’s Personal Bulletins. These formed But reviews are by their very nature the basis for PEM’s much-loved column ephemeral, and reviewers who delight one in AJR Information, ‘Old Acquaintances’, generation can all too easily be forgotten Paul Marcus which appeared regularly from January by the next. he emigrated in March 1933. 1948 until his death in April 1972. It is therefore a pleasure to welcome Marcus went first to Vienna, where PEM’s reports demonstrate his the appearance of a book devoted to the he hit upon the idea of publishing a encyclopaedic knowledge of the world work of the renowned reviewer and critic weekly newssheet to keep his fellow of theatre, cinema, cabaret and, later, Paul Marcus, commonly known by his refugees informed about the activities television in which actors, producers, initials PEM (the ‘E’ being included for directors, film stars, authors, composers, euphony only). The book is PEM: Der Rt Hon david cameron mp screenwriters and others from the Kritiker und Feuilletonist Paul Marcus, German-speaking lands were active. He edited by Jens Brüning, a longstanding was ideally equipped to keep his refugee champion of refugee writers forgotten in HOUSE OF COMMONS readers informed about the successes Germany. Brüning worked for many years LONDON SW1A 0AA and failures, the travails and tribulations, to restore the works of Gabriele Tergit, Leader of the Opposition February 2010 the anniversaries and, sadly, the deaths a leading refugee writer and frequent Holocaust Memorial Day Event of those they had admired and adored in contributor to AJR Information, to their It was a privilege to attend what was an especially pre-emigration days. Brüning’s edition rightful literary status; he was responsible moving event at the Guildhall, to mark Holocaust of PEM’s writings brings this out very for the recent reprint of the original Memorial Day and the 65th anniversary of the clearly; it nicely complements Thomas version of Tergit’s 1931 bestseller Käsebier liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau. Willimowski’s biography Emigrant sein ist erobert den Kurfürstendamm (reviewed in Events like this are hugely important. Just ja kein Beruf: Das Leben des Journalisten looking at the pictures of the survivors with our June 2004 issue). their children gave me immense hope that we PEM (2007). PEM himself produced Like Tergit (born Elise Hirschmann), can do better in future. That was the message one bestseller, Heimweh nach dem Paul Marcus was a young Jewish of the event itself, and has been the constant Kurfürstendamm: Aus Berlins glanzvollsten intellectual drawn irresistibly to the rich, refrain of the survivors. Most memorable of all Tagen und Nächten (1952), which, as dynamic and innovative cultural scene of was the chance to meet some of the survivors: its title implies, conveys the author’s hearing their life stories, and seeing their Berlin during the Weimar Republic; like courage in telling others, was one of the most ‘homesickness for the Kurfürstendamm’ Tergit, he had to flee the Nazis, eventually moving things I have ever witnessed. and his memories of Berlin’s ‘most settling in London. Marcus was born It is to the great credit of the survivors glittering days and nights’. in Beeskow, not far from the capital, in and their families that they have contributed Marcus’s journalism before 1933 reveals 1901, into an assimilated Jewish family; so much to the creation of a cohesive society, the enormous energy and enthusiasm by promoting the need for vigilance against his father was a businessman. Against his prejudice and the importance of tolerance and with which he threw himself into his father’s wishes, Marcus opted for a career mutual respect. We must determine to pass chosen field. He made it his business to in journalism, specialising in cinema and these lessons to each new generation. know, or at least know about, everyone the performing arts, then a particularly I would like to congratulate members of in the film business, the theatre and the flourishing section of Berlin’s artistic the Association of Jewish Refugees for all they popular performing arts. He revelled in have done to achieve this, and to wish you well world. He started by writing for minor for the future. the freedom to populate his pieces in the journals of varying degrees of repute, but Feuilleton (the arts and entertainment also for the Berliner Börsen-Courier, and section of a newspaper) with exuberant graduated to the Neue Berliner Zeitung– David Cameron and sharply observed snapshots of people Das 12 Uhr Blatt, for which he wrote until See ‘The Legacy of Hope’, page 13 continued overleaf
AJR JOURNAL march 2010
past gl0ries continued from page 1 Book on Jewish refugees and productions, spiced up with titbits ed Jannings’s career; nor were the writers from Germany and Austria of news about the performers. He was of that film, Robert Liebmann, a Jew who launched in London among those who elevated film reviews was to disappear in the Holocaust, and from mere advertisements for films to Carl Zuckmayer, whose play The Captain serious film criticism. Yet at the same of Köpenick had made him persona non time, his articles are often set in the racy grata in Nazi Germany. nightclubs frequented by Berlin’s actors This exposure of those who had col- and directors, or the offbeat cabaret luded with the Nazis was one of many establishments where rising comedians, fascinating features of PEM’s writings satirists and singers made their name. after 1945, for his knowledge spanned Before 1933, PEM ignored political the pre- and post-Hitler eras in a way few affiliations. His series of articles entitled could equal. His principal target was Veit Dr Anthony Grenville and Lord Moser ‘Wir trafen gestern’ (‘Yesterday We Met’) Harlan, director of the notorious anti- at launch of book chronicling history profiled both people who fled Germany Semitic film Jud Süss (1940), followed by of Jewish refugees from Germany and after 1933 and people who stayed, both Leni Riefenstahl, and he did not hesitate Austria PHOTO BY BEA LEWKOWICZ Jews and future Nazis. The series featured, to express his disgust when the Austrian Dr Anthony Grenville spoke about his among others, Robert Siodmak, who went actress Paula Wessely, who in 1941 had book Jewish Refugees from Germa- on to direct the classic film noirThe Killers uttered the words ‘Ich kaufe nicht bei ny and Austria in Britain, 1933-1970: in America, the actress Mady Christians, Juden’ (‘I don’t buy from Jews’) in Ucicky’s Their Image in ‘AJR Information’ at a star who also emigrated to the USA and Heimkehr, metamorphosed into a half-Jew its launch at the German Historical appeared in the anti-Nazi play Watch on driven to suicide in the 1948 filmDer Engel Institute in London at the end of the Rhine, and the composer of songs mit der Posaune. January. He was introduced by Pro- and cabaret shows Friedrich Holländer, PEM’s column in AJR Information fessor Andreas Gestrich, Director of the Institute, and Andrew Kaufman, famous for the song known in English as brimmed with the names of emigrants Chairman of the AJR. ‘Falling in Love Again’, sung by Marlene from Germany and Austria who became Dr Grenville is Consultant Editor Dietrich in the filmThe Blue Angel. famous in exile in Hollywood or London: of the AJR Journal and Co-Director of But the series also included politically directors like Otto Preminger, Fritz the AJR’s Refugee Voices audiovisual more dubious figures, like the Austrian Lang, Berthold Viertel and Billy Wilder, testimony project. Gustav Ucicky, who during the Nazi producers like Erich Pommer, and agents Copies of the book are available period was to direct Heimkehr, a dreadful like Paul Kohner – PEM had known Wilder at £45.00 hardback and £19.95 piece of Nazi propaganda. In 1931 Marcus (Double Indemnity, Sunset Boulevard, paperback from the publisher even wrote a piece, ‘Jannings führt sein The Seven Year Itch, Some Like It Hot, Vallentine Mitchell (tel 020 8952 9526), via the AJR (tel 020 8385 Fräulein Tochter aus’, with a sympathetic The Apartment) well in younger days 3070), from selected bookshops and account of the actor Emil Jannings, who of shared poverty. Actors who featured from Amazon. had played the lead in The Blue Angel but regularly included household names like later became a notorious Nazi, introducing Peter Lorre, Fritz Kortner, Ernst Deutsch, the films Emeric Pressburger made his daughter to Berlin nightlife. As late as Fritzi Massary, Elisabeth Bergner, Oskar in partnership with Michael Powell 1934, in a piece on the Viennese cabaret Homolka, Anton Walbrook and Lilli (The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, star and comedian Fritz Grünbaum, a Palmer, with whom PEM was invited back A Matter of Life and Death, The Red Shoes), Jew who was to die in Dachau, Marcus to Berlin for the 1957 International Film publicised the highbrow foreign films listed Ucicky alongside Kurt Gerron, the Festival. Names from the world of (light) screened at Georg Hoellering’s Academy Jewish actor/director who created the music – PEM had a fondness for operetta Cinema, and was a close friend of the role of Tiger Brown in the Brecht/Weill – included Mischa Spoliansky, Hans May great cartoonist Vicky (Victor Weisz). Threepenny Opera and was later forced and Robert Stolz. He kept his sharp eye on youthful talent, to make a Nazi propaganda film about PEM made a point of promoting drawing attention to young performers Theresienstadt concentration camp, German-speaking actors whose careers like the actor and singer Agnes Bernelle whence he was deported to Auschwitz. flourished in Britain: Martin Miller, and the actor Renee Goddard, whom he However, after his emigration to Lucie Mannheim, Albert Lieven, Karel saw in 1954 in John van Druten’s play I Britain and in the wake of the incorpo- Stepanek, Frederick Valk, Sybille Binder Am a Camera and who later rose to senior ration of Austria into the Third Reich, and Wanda Rotha. He praised the work positions in Associated Television and Marcus employed his prodigious store of of the cameraman Otto Heller, admired Channel 4; she is one of the few living knowledge to assail the falsehoods and links to PEM and his era. AJR Directors dishonesty of those who had gone over Gordon Greenfield Anthony Grenville to the Nazis. In an article for the Pariser Michael Newman Tageszeitung, a refugee paper, in 1939, he Carol Rossen exposed the mendacity of Emil Jannings’s AJR Heads of Department Susie Kaufman Organiser, AJR Centre autobiography, showing how it was fabri- Sue Kurlander Social Services cated to meet the criteria of Nazism. The AJR Journal The AJR great director Ernst Lubitsch, in whose Dr Anthony Grenville Consultant Editor Dr Howard Spier Executive Editor wishes all its members film Dubarry Jannings had first found Andrea Goodmaker Secretarial/Advertisements international fame, was not mentioned, a Happy Pesach as a Jew who had long since settled in Views expressed in the AJR Journal are not necessarily those of the Association of Jewish Hollywood; nor was Erich Pommer, who Refugees and should not be regarded as such. had produced The Blue Angel and restart-
AJR JOURNAL march 2010
The Day of Reckoning NEWTONS Long established Hampstead Solicitors his spring the people will have their the demands of the creditors, who are advise on say. Will it make any difference? owed one and a half trillion pounds! This Property, Wills, Estates THas any election ever produced the debt can never be repaid. The sins of the and Litigation miracle promised? This one certainly will fathers are visited upon their children not, as we all know. Moreover, how many and children’s children. Home visits arranged will bother to register their X? Last time, First, our prudent ex-chancellor, turned it was 60 per cent. This time, probably incapable prime minister, together with 22 Fitzjohn’s Avenue not even that. our flipping Darling, ‘borrowed’ our London NW3 5NB money to rescue the discredited bankers The people have become disillusioned Tel: 020 7435 5351 with Parliament, realising at last that the without asking our permission. The Fax: 020 7435 8881 law-makers are not concerned about our price of everything rocketed overnight lives, but theirs. We have witnessed the – and not by just a few per cent. More www.newtonlaw.co.uk spectacle of all of them burying their taxes were levied and the bank rate was snouts in the trough. Of course they dropped to near zero, thus eliminating are furious at having their sordid ways any interest on savings. The value of exposed for all to see. One would expect properties dived sharply and so did this sort of behaviour in a banana repub- the shares. However, much worse is lic – but in a country where democracy in store. The IMF has its sights on the JACKMAN . is a way of life? The UK even tries to defaulters who cannot pay back what export it – so far without much success. they have borrowed. The UK still basks SILVERMAN It was the great W. C. himself who said in the glory bestowed on it by its triple- COMMERCIAL PROPERTY CONSULTANTS ‘Democracy is a bad system, but I don’t A rating. However, if a future chancellor know of a better one.’ What would he does not satisfy this august body by say today? Words might fail even him. introducing the harshest measures ever For that matter, what is Britain still visited upon the citizens, this accolade doing in far-flung colonies when at will be withdrawn and a lower rating the same time it is audaciously telling will inevitably be set, with disastrous Israel to get out of the hostile territories consequences. The pound will sink like surrounding it? Note: Britain also voted a lead balloon. We will join the list of against Israel again recently in the UN. poor countries. Either way, the people There was a time when Great Britain will be the losers. Even Cassandra could Telephone: 020 7209 5532 boasted it had colonised one-quarter of not discern the depth of the abyss into [email protected] the earth. Even America! We remember which we would fall. the pink areas in our school atlases. None All would not be lost, however. There of those countries, thus subjected, ever is a way for us. It is away from these threatened the existence of this country. shores. We have escaped the murderers All this in the name of Democracy and and must now escape the robbers, liars, AUSTRIAN and GERMAN Commonwealth! Whose wealth? cheats and, above all, the terrorists, PENSIONS No wonder millions of the indigenous who would not be here if the British population are seeking a better life were not there. There is hardly a country PROPERTY elsewhere, vacating their properties where the sun shines less and where RESTITUTION CLAIMS and making way for even more millions snow causes more chaos regularly. The EAST GERMANY – BERLIN of immigrants who cost us billions. By Costa del Sol is the Brits’ favourite area; emigrating, the Brits escape the inevitable the Wienerwald has not yet succumbed On instructions our office will onslaught on their pockets resulting from to multiculturalism, although even Eilat assist to deal with your has just allowed 17,000 African non-Jews applications and pursue the into a population of 60,000! matter with the authorities wanted to buy However, who would want to wait until the pound is worth a fraction of For further information German and a euro? The currency exchange will and an appointment English Books certainly take place. Whilst the foreign please contact: pension would buy more, the value of Bookdealer, AJR member, the British one – among the lowest in ICS CLAIMS welcomes invitations to view Western Europe – will fall and so will that 707 High Road, Finchley and purchase valuable books. of any property, with disastrous effect. London N12 0BT Act while you are still able to. It is later Robert Hornung than you think! Don’t leave your fate to Tel: 020 8492 0555 10 Mount View, Ealing, others. Vote with your feet. Bring forth Fax: 020 8348 4959 London W5 1PR The Day of Reckoning. Email: [email protected] Email: [email protected] Tel: 020 8998 0546 Fred Stern (from the Costa del Sol)
AJR JOURNAL march 2010
Emigration
he day of departure. We are leaving the jewellery she has managed to hide. It is the country. My father is back from sewn into her clothes; it will not be found. Tprison. He has served his sentence for My mother becomes possessed. She criticising the race laws – in an ordinary accuses the woman of putting the whole prison within the city walls; it is still there. train-load of Jews in peril. She insists that He has not been tortured. He has allowed the jewels are removed from the clothes himself to be humiliated but he has and thrown out of the window. The other refused to obey an order to slap the face women in the carriage become agitated. of another Jew. He survives to tell the tale. The men remain silent. My father is in He has been saved by an officer, who knew the corridor. I watch as the woman with him as a lawyer, and orders him to remain the jewels tears at her coat, finds scissors in prison on the day of his promised and cuts and tears until gold and precious The author on arrival in England, July 1939 release. It is the day of Kristallnacht in stones fall on the floor. Someone opens Vienna. When my father finally comes and stamped onto our birth certificates. I the window and the woman throws out home, the majority of his friends and feel vindicated when my first grandchild her jewels just as we cross over a river on colleagues have disappeared. is called Sara. a railway bridge. I imagine that the gold My quiet, retiring mother has faced The good Dr Richter comes to say and precious stones sink in the water and embassies and consulates to find us a goodbye. She has stood by us but is afraid that the river is the Rhine. refuge, and she has faced the Gestapo to to be seen with us. She is afraid when I Perhaps my mother has really saved us; have my father freed. When he is, we are need to go to hospital to have my finger the search at the border is thorough. We given an ultimatum to leave the country stitched, four weeks before we leave. She are stripped and our clothes are minutely within 12 weeks. This is extended because takes me where Jews are not admitted. examined. I am asked whether my parents we already have an affidavit and a quota She says my name is Elfi Binks and I am have hidden anything inside me. I am number for America as well as a guarantee her patient. I am given a mild anaesthetic baffled and believed when I say ‘No.’ from England. We only lack an English and, when the stitching is done and I am After the searches and the controls we visa. We need it in order to be able to stay still drowsy, the surgeon asks me my name. are in the train again and we are waiting. in England, with our guarantor, until it is I don’t betray Dr Richter: ‘My name is Elfi We do not know why. We do not know our turn, under the quota system, to go to Binks.’ Dr Richter will not see us off. She what has happened in the rest of the America. I am versed in these intricacies. I has to support her parents; she cannot train. Everyone is back in our carriage but am also learning English, while my parents do more. we wait for an hour. My father gets on take elementary courses in how to be The most painful goodbyes are those and off the train looking for news, and a butler and an English cook. This will we cannot say. My grandmothers, aunts, my mother, who was heroic about the be the only work available to them. The uncles, cousins are in Czechoslovakia. jewellery, is hysterical about my father. courses are organised by the remnants of Negotiations to get them out are under The train moves off without any warning the Jewish Council in Vienna. way. This has also been explained to me. I but my father is on it. As the front of the There is not a great deal of packing leave my relatives behind with my toys. train passes the border, a man leans out when the visa is issued by the British Our leaving is not unmarked. Fräulein, and shouts: ‘Hitler verrecke!’ Our carriage embassy. No household goods – we have my first love, my father’s secretary, comes is towards the back of the train and we none left. No jewellery – that has been to the station to see us go. We are formal are still in Germany. A last stab of fear and confiscated. I couldn’t understand why with each other; we don’t know what to then we are also across the border and we ‘they’ would want my tiny Star of David say. We wave to her as the train draws also shout. I think we go to sleep. I am too on the fine gold chain, but it has been away. She has a list of my father’s debtors. sleepy at Ostend and Dover to register my explained to me: It will be melted down After the war she collects the money and first sight of the sea. with other Jewish artifacts. Our books keeps it. In due course, my father forgives It is July. So far, freedom is cold and have been given away. I can take Susie, much, but he never forgives that. wet. The seats in the train from Dover are my favourite doll, and the watch I have Our journey will take two days and not wooden. I think I know some English just been given for my tenth birthday. a night. We are going the longer way but I don’t know what these people are Everyone is allowed to take one watch. – through Aachen and Brussels and Ostend saying to me or to each other. We arrive at But I have to leave my skates – the skates – because the shorter route through Victoria Station. We do not need a porter I‘ve been unable to use since Jews were Holland costs more than we have left. for our meagre luggage and we cannot forbidden to go on the ice rink. In the end, Our carriage is full of refugees. The seats afford one. When a porter approaches, my we have only two medium-sized suitcases. are made of slatted wood. No one has father waves him away. But the man stays We don’t want to overburden ourselves room to stretch out, but I am the only close to us. He takes a shiny coin out of with too many clothes. Our bedding will child and I am encouraged to make myself his pocket. It is a new, yellow threepenny follow in a wooden box. comfortable. My father is too restless to bit with six edges. He holds it out to me We have two English pounds, seventeen sit; he walks up and down the corridors. and I hear him clearly when he says: ‘For shillings and six pence, all the money Until we cross the border at Aachen we luck in England, Miss, for luck in England.’ we are allowed to take. We have new are not safe. We have yet to be searched. The coin has lost its shine and it has been passports with new photographs, which We have yet to go through passport obsolete for a long time. I kept it in a show our left ears. We are told that is control. We have yet to go through child’s red-and-white leather pouch with how criminals have to be photographed. emigration. There are stories of people an edelweiss pattern round the edge and We have new names: my mother and I stopped at the borders. a draw-string to close it until my grandson are both Sarah and my father is Israel. Some of the women in the carriage went to Africa for his gap year. Then I gave The only two names Jews may use, they begin to exchange information. The men it him ‘for luck in Africa.’ are written into our passports as insults do not speak. One woman boasts about Hedi Argent (Schnabl)
AJR JOURNAL march 2010
Surviving Christnukah
t’s nearly spring, and spring cleaning Years went by, tectonic shifts of lang take over guard duties during Christmas? I has produced a Chanukah card from the uage, culture, geography, and I still put the idea to the senior sergeant major, Iback of a drawer. I have no idea who hadn’t looked a menorah in the eye, until an archetypal warrant officer, who, like sent it, but then the thought of Chanukah I watched Benno Elkan at work on the all his ilk, thought newly-commissioned always gives me a bad conscience because great seven-branched candelabrum that officers a threat to good order and military I have ignored it all my life. I suppose I stands in front of the Knesset, symbolising discipline. ‘You mean to have nothing but started off on the wrong foot by being the seven days of the creation and, inciden- Jews running the camp?’ put in the Catholic stream in my primary tally, my immortality. The more important I explained that it was not so much a school. The error was soon discovered, symbolism can be read up in Exodus; my take-over – more a matter of letting the but the priest was reluctant to let me go contribution came about like this: Elkan, Christmas faction get on with their dinner. – I made such a bright little Catholic. But The idea was put to the camp commandant my father wouldn’t even let him borrow and approved. I found it easy to round up me pour encourager les autres: he was I found enough volunteers by going through the a godless Jew, an ardent Zionist, who Christmas crackers, nominal roll, looking at the names. At 6 pm annulled his baptism when he was old mottoes and paper hats on Christmas Eve, my little band paraded enough to realise what his well-meaning and was very thoroughly looked over by the parents had considered a smart career hard to stomach, but cards sergeant major. He couldn’t find the words move in imperial Austria. presented a real culture shock. to express his misgivings. All he came out My father was a militant atheist. They kept coming – from absent with was ‘No gambling, mind. And this is In the 45 years or so that I lived with friends, people next door, the live ammunition you’ve got.’ him or he lived with me, I had never plumber wishing me more blocked Two hours on, four hours off, is not the known him to visit a synagogue. We most entertaining way to spend 24 hours, celebrated Christmas, of course, like so drains, arch-enemies from the but we had a constant stream of visitors many bourgeois Jews, but the angel at office, and in-laws who saw during the night to marvel at the all-Jewish the top of the tree was a decoration, not my wife every day. Each card guard and offer mostly good-natured a declaration, just as our Turkish rugs set a problem of taste, text and encouragement. The sergeant major spent didn’t make us Muslims. Christmas was a a restless Christmas, looking in every two festival of light – everybody’s light – with retaliation ... Sometimes, when I hours in case we had absconded with the nightly glow from the windows in our felt really aggressive, I just wrote the stores or sold the camp to a property street painting the snow red and gold, live the figures 3761 on a plain developer. carp sold from barrels full of icy water, and card to show how much ‘Did you run out of Jews?,’ he asked hot chestnuts and music on every corner. longer we have been when it was all over. ‘Becker missed his My father took music seriously and, Christmas dinner.’ when we children were at last allowed going than they. ‘I thought Becker was Jewish. He never into the drawing room, into the presence said a word.’ of the huge, silver-spangled tree and the ‘He tells me he’s baptised,’ the sergeant pervasive odour of hot candle wax and fir, on the strength of two candelabra he had major said. ‘Anyway, your lot can have next he was seated at the harmonium to play wrought for Westminster Abbey, was com- Christmas off,’ he added, still not in full my very favourite carol: ‘Es ist ein Reis missioned to sculpt the Great Menorah at possession of the point. entsprungen’. We all sang, my mother’s a time when I shared a house with him in I found Christmas crackers, mottoes clear voice soaring above ours, and even north London. Each branch was alive with and paper hats hard to stomach, but the servants, standing shyly to one side, figures from Jewish history and one day he cards presented a real culture shock. joined in when it came to ‘O Tannenbaum’ needed a model to hold a certain position They kept coming – from absent friends, and, inevitably, ‘Silent Night’. while he captured it quickly in plasticine. people next door, the plumber wishing A moment of stillness would follow, Would I mind taking my clothes off and me more blocked drains, arch-enemies but then there was no holding back as oblige? I thought I was reasonably good from the office, and in-laws who saw my we looked for our presents under the looking, so why not? wife every day. Each card set a problem sheltering branches of the tree. High ‘The Jews enslaved,’ said Elkan. ‘I must of taste, text and retaliation. Was it fair above us, my father stood ready to make it a really scrawny figure. Your head to recycle a Chanukah card, received as a douse the occasional flare-up when the I don’t need.’ Still, immortality of sorts, freebie from a Jewish charity, to go with flames got too close to the needles, or since a bit of me is there, on one of the a tip to the dustman? Should I show up the sparklers, suspended by their copper arms, for ever I hope, and Elkan has not my neighbour’s appalling taste with an spines, caused small conflagrations. done badly either, with his each-way bet: exquisite card of my own or outdo him There were two or three presents for Abbey and Knesset. in kitsch? And how could I keep religion each of us children: one big, two smaller That was many years after ‘O Tannen- out of it without appearing ridiculously – nothing like today’s hideous overload of baum’, when I had children of my own, bland? In the end, I relied on the usual parcels and packets whose wrapping gets born in a country that celebrated Christmas reproductions of old masters, charity cards ripped off in an unseemly frenzy, making in broad daylight and believed that carp painted by mouth, winter landscapes that a pile of waste bigger than that of the tasted muddy. One year I had a really bright anticipated climate change. Sometimes, presents. Year in year out, I could count on idea for celebrating Christmas. I had just when I felt really aggressive, I just wrote one gift for certain: the latest volume of got my commission as a second lieutenant the figures 3761 on a plain card to show Dr. Doolittle, which I started on then and and was hanging around Catterick Camp how much longer we have been going there and had usually finished by midday waiting for a posting. Why not round up than they. on Christmas Day. enough Jewish private soldiers and NCOs to Victor Ross
AJR JOURNAL march 2010
‘RIGHTEOUS GENTILE’ Sir – In 1939 my mother’s life was saved by Ernst von Harnack, who, well known for his part in the resistance, was executed after the failed 1944 plot against Hitler. I was only eleven at the time, too young to be accepted as a witness by Yad Vashem. Another family was saved before the war: Fritz and Gertrude Schönbeck and two sons (last known address: 116 Salmon Street, London NW9). They were interned on the Isle of Man. Carl Sachs, a Jewish businessman, was helped to escape to Switzerland. HOLOCAUST AND OTHER GENOCIDES Sir – Mary Rogers asks (January) the views To the best of my knowledge, no one Sir – Ruth Barnett (February, Letters) casti of AJR members on the current tendency of has applied to Yad Vashem for Ernst von gates those who consider the Holocaust ‘the Holocaust memorial services to commemorate Harnack to be honoured as a ’righteous property of Jews’. She also says that ‘The Jews victims of genocides other than the Shoah. gentile’. Renate von Harnack, his daughter, suffered, and so did many others.’ This is over- In correspondence with the Rt Hon Jack died recently and the family, united at the urn simplification and smacks of revisionism. Straw when Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD) setting, asked me to try again. If any readers The ‘Final Solution’ was about Jews. The was first instituted, I was assured that its have further testimony to support the appli- six death factories were built for Jews. Only dual purpose was to remember and, through cation, could they please contact me. Jews died because they were Jews. Who education, to work towards avoiding in (Dr) Elizabeth Rosenthal would have thought we would hear such future generations such atrocities as were 6 River Court, 21-23 Richmond Hill things uttered in our lifetime and by people endured by the Jewish people at the hands Richmond upon Thames, TW10 6QY who should know better. We live in an age of the Nazi regime. tel 020 8940 4757 when nothing is sacred and anything can be It is self-evident that genocide is not debunked – all in the interest of universalism. yet a thing of the past. We Jews therefore WMDS ON ENGLAND IN 45 MINUTES? Ruth Barnett says there have been 50 do well to recognise that, horrifically Sir – We witnessed the dire spectacle of the genocides since 1945 – teach them all and unique though our own relatively recent Iraq inquiry which deliberately omitted to ask none will be remembered. tragedy is, we do not have a monopoly TB how SH would have deployed WMDs on It’s beyond me why some ‘Kinder’ side on suffering, and that HMD is an occasion England in 45 minutes. Any answer would with the enemy – not just of Israel, but of when all victims of atrocity are appropriately have indicted him, releasing a torrent of Jews. I can understand they wish to mend remembered. Yom Hashoah is the day on lawsuits from which this country could never the world, but why turn against your own? which the Jewish people remember relatives recover. The whitewash, which was also I once confronted Suzanne Weiss, who had and friends whose lives were destroyed in applied to the errant parliamentarians who the gall to equate Jenin with Warsaw. More 1930s Europe. got away unscathed or had their repayments recently, Heidi Epstein joined Galloway’s Barbara Dean, Birmingham reduced, had been prepared beforehand. A Hamas road show to Gaza. Demonising Israel new set of MPs will make no difference unless Sir – On the recent correspondence regarding engenders the anti-Semitism which resulted real reforms are introduced. It would be the Holocaust in relation to other genocides, in the Holocaust. appreciated if, instead of logical deduction, and whether other genocides should Rubin Katz, London NW11 contributors would desist from besmirching legitimately be included in HMD, perhaps these hallowed pages with their nonsense. Sir – Ruth Barnett mentions the terrible referral to the etymology of the two Fred E. Stern, Wembley, Middx treatment of Armenians by the Turks in the words will help. The word holocaust, from First World War, though I am not convinced Greek, means whole burning or sacrifice, MIXED – NOT DILUTED that this atrocity was a genocide in the sense i.e. systematic killing. The word genocide, Sir – I am baffled by Fred Stern’s equation of a deliberate attempt to exterminate the also from Greek, means murder of race or (February) that adding cultures together whole Armenian people. tribe, i.e. systematic killing. subtracts. I am a product both of Jewish As I understand the situation, the It is mass murder in both cases, but the diaspora and English Protestant backgrounds. Armenians, as Christians, were, at the very German genocide was unique in that it was I consider myself mixed – not diluted. least, sympathetic to the Russians, whose done on an industrial scale and involved Lydia Thornley, London EC2 army was attempting to conquer Turkish burning – hence the word holocaust. It is Armenia from its base in the Caucasus pedantry to distinguish between methods LIFT VANS and a minority were actively supporting and appropriate to memorialise this ghastly Sir – Liesl Munden’s letter reminds me that invasion. This led the Turks to deport human propensity, in whatever form, on of an episode in Four Girls from Berlin, a Armenians from the border regions. That HMD. (Dr) Emil Landes, Highgate wonderful book by Marianne Meyerhoff. these displaced people were subject to Her best childhood friends in Berlin were disgraceful treatment and many died of SAYING KADDISH three non-Jewish girls, who stood by her starvation and exposure, and some were Sir – With regard to Otto Deutsch’s letter after the anti-Jewish laws had come in. Her massacred by lawless Muslim tribes with the (February), many of my family, including parents managed to send her to America, connivance of Turkish troops, is a blot on small children, were taken from Teresin but they remained behind. Her wonderful Turkey’s name that it has, to its shame, not to Maly Trostinec. I have documentary friends continued to visit her parents and been willing to acknowledge to this day. evidence that they were put into those to help them and one of them, at great risk The Turks may have been paranoid about special gas wagons. I have not visited the to herself, agreed to hide a box with some the Armenian masses and acted in a wholly site because we too are in our eighties. But precious family possessions. disproportionate manner, but they had some on several occasions, when my son and Her family did not survive. In 1945, reason to believe the latter were behaving son-in-law took vans of supplies to the after the war, the writer received a large as a fifth column in war time. Labelling needy Jewish families in Minsk, they did mysterious box in which she found these it a genocide has only had the effect of go there and were most moved by that family treasures – silver candlesticks, letters, strengthening Turkish intransigence, which wonderful memorial. They never failed to photograph albums and so on. These items has made it more difficult for them to say Kaddish – not only for our family but enabled her to remember her past. As her admit they acted improperly and offer any for everyone who died and was on arrival friends in post-war Germany were now apology. Clearly a great wrong was done to thrown into that ravine. So, Mr Deutsch, starving, she, in turn, was able to reciprocate the Armenians, but I fear that using the term please feel that it was said on your behalf their kindness by sending them wonderful genocide is counterproductive. for all your family. food parcels. Bronia Snow Martin D. Stern, Salford Nina Hofman, Lugano, Switzerland Esher
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Sir – It was April 1939 in Vienna when the Germany today is sufficient to ‘shake off the now seek to emphasise that the world there day came for the lift to be closed. We had gloomy mood aroused by that book’ – see has changed for the better. a Jewish firm of movers who packed the Grenville’s abovementioned article. Alan S. Kaye, Marlow, Bucks items we were allowed to take and checked Lorenz S. Beckhardt, Bonn, Germany them with a copy the Nazis held. My mother Sir – The Stefanie Hotel in Vienna’s Leopold had plates of sandwiches, pastries and, of ‘THE MOST IMPORTANT DIARY SINCE PEPYS’ stadt district has become a very smart hotel course, bottles of beer on a table next to Sir – I would like to add a few points not offering a very nice menu, including an the door. She gave the shipper a small bag mentioned in Dorothea Shefer-Vanson’s excellent Kalbsschnitzel. The Jewish Welcome of her jewellery and asked if he could slip the February ‘Letter from Israel’ on Viktor Service is making good use of the hotel, inviting bag into the lift. He said it would depend on Klemperer’s diary I Will Bear Witness. ex-Viennese from all over the world including which Nazi inspector came to check. I bought the book when the English the second and third generations. I had a The doorbell rang and the Nazi inspector translation was published, as one critic splendid week there and wish it could have entered the flat. The Nazi and the Jewish described it as the most important diary since been longer. Karl Katz, Bexley, Kent mover hugged each other and joked: ‘Quick, Pepys. Having read it, I wouldn’t rate it so close the lift and let’s have something to highly but it was very interesting for Jewish ISRAELIS AND PALESTINIANS eat!’ The lift was closed and sealed. The readers born in Germany. Sir – Eric Sanders is being simplistic when he mover gave my mother a sly wink. Of course, One most important point of Klemperer’s writes that the Israeli refusal to agree to East we didn’t know if the bag of jewellery was identity is that not only did he marry a non-Jew Jerusalem as the capital of a Palestinian state actually in the lift. Months later, when the but he himself converted to Christianity. Con- is an obstacle to peace. lift was unpacked in Bombay, the jewellery version, of course, did not save him from the What grounds has Israel for believing was there. I only hope the kind inspector who anti-Jewish legislation although, like many anything the Palestinians promise? When risked his life survived. others who married non-Jews, it did protect Ariel Sharon voluntarily gave them the Gaza Henry Rado, Harrow, Middx him initially from deportation. Strip, and affirmed that Israel only wanted Another point is that he was the son of a to live in peace with her neighbours, what BRITISH FIRST, JEWISH SECOND? rabbi who was first an Orthodox rabbi but happened? The beautifully cultivated place Sir – For Peter Phillips to say he is British first later a Reform one. the Israeli farmers left behind was destroyed and then Jewish makes little sense. I came to Klemperer could also be described as a and used as a launching ground for England on a Kindertransport and I love the self-hating Jew – hence his conversion to rockets. Hardly actions to induce confidence British for their compassion and having saved Christianity. Of course, he had to mix with in peace in the Israelis. If Hamas were to my life. The vast majority of Britons consider other Jews and attend Jewish funerals. Some succeed in taking over East Jerusalem, they you a Jew and then a Briton for whatever time during the Hitler years, he was asked would have no hesitation in launching reason and it is like that in every country. to rejoin the Jewish community, which he rockets over the whole of Israel, which it is The German Jews also thought they were steadfastly refused, stating he was now a their avowed intention to destroy. German first … I speak with some authority, believing Christian. Even before the advent of Hamas, having lived in some 20 countries. The most Incidentally, his diary was not published when Prime Minister Ehud Barak, hardly a important thing is not what you consider by himself but by his second wife, who found right-winger, offered Arafat most of the West yourself, but what others consider you! it after his death. I believe the diary created a Bank, East Jerusalem and other concessions, Henry Herner, Caracas, Venezuela sensation when it was published in German the Palestinians did not accept. Where was in 1996. The English translation by Martin their desire for peace then? CORE BELIEFS Chalmers came later. Mr Saunders further writes that Mr Netan- Sir – For Henry Schragenheim (January), Max Sulzbacher, Jerusalem yahu’s wish for peace is insincere: ‘Words belief in the ten plagues and the ‘splitting’ are cheap.’ Indeed they are. But we have yet of the Red Sea are core beliefs of the Jewish AN ADDITIONAL BERLIN MEMORIAL to hear one word of peace from the Fatah religion. The plagues are convincingly Sir – I think one item could be added to government. If only that were the case. In explained by fallout from the volcanic those mentioned by David Wirth in his their speeches and television interviews to eruption on Santorini within nine years of article on memorials in Berlin (January). The their people, they constantly reiterate that 1609 BC and the retreat, and then surge, of Bayrische Viertel had its own synagogue in ‘the whole land belongs to them – there is the Reed Sea by a resulting tsunami. Google the Münchener Strasse – it was not a building no such place as Israel.’ Unfortunately, the ‘Siro Trevisanato’ (PhD Microbiology). standing on its own but was situated in a media never publicises these speeches. Per- George Landers, Crete, Greece Hinterhaus (rear of a building), adjoining haps they have no Arabic translators. blocks of flats and not directly accessible Thea Valman, London NW11 SECOND GENERATION REFLECTIONS from the street. Sir – I belong to the second generation There is now a memorial in the street Sir – If Eric Sanders thinks Israel should give with regard to my father, who fled on the consisting of slabs of concrete (one depict- the ‘Palestinians’ half of Jerusalem, stop any Kindertransport from Wiesbaden in 1939, ing a menorah) and a metal plate inserted Jewish settlements on land they conquered and to the third generation with regard to in its base, which explains the reason for the in a war that was forced on them in 1967, my grandparents, who escaped via Portugal memorial. It reads: ‘There was a synagogue and encourage the establishment of a state to Britain in 1940. Some articles in recent here from 1909 until 1956. Due to its position of Palestine when one already exists under issues of the Journal – and many readers’ adjoining a block of flats, it was not destroyed the name of Jordan and all will be well – he opinions – seem rather outmoded to me, during the Pogrom-Night of 9 November is living in cloud-cuckoo-land. but I was very pleased to read Mr Grenville’s 1938. After the expulsion and destruction Hamas, established in Gaza with Iranian article ‘Reflections on German reunification’ of the Jewish fellow citizens by the National help after Israel’s withdrawal, has one main and Mr Phillips’s article ‘Jew against Jew’, Socialists, it had lost its function and was and unalterable aim: to write the Jewish state both in the February issue. I agree with demolished in 1956.’ Fritz Lustig, Reading off the face of the earth. every word. Ernest G. Kolman, Greenford, Middx To Mrs Shefer-Vanson’s ‘Letter from Israel’ BACK TO VIENNA on Viktor Klemperer and the composer Erich Sir – Is John Lawrence (Letters, January) aware Sir – My old friend Hegel used to say that Korngold, also in February, I would add that of the Jewish Welcome Service in Vienna and what experience and history teach us is that Korngold’s opera Die tote Stadt is being the thousands who have taken advantage of people and government have never learned performed not only in France but also in its 30-year existence? If so, he might accept anything from history. In your January issue, Germany, as it was in 2008 in Bonn. that, for all those who have returned to Eric Sanders suggested in all seriousness I too recommend Viktor Klemperer’s diary, Vienna under its auspices, including families that Israel should give up East Jerusalem which greatly helped me to get a feeling of bringing their younger generations, pride for peace. what life was like under Hitler – but, unlike Mrs seems to play no part. The whole exercise is I remember only too well that there was Shefer-Vanson, having read it, I didn’t have to carried out by younger Viennese, who took once one Neville of Westminster SW1 who travel to Israel to recover. Poking around in no role in the horrors of 70 years ago and Letters to the Editor continued on page 16
AJR JOURNAL march 2010
own sorrowful history. Chagall left France, the country of his adoption, in 1941. Sales of his work dwindled and he was dogged by personal tragedy. Then came news of A timely publication the Holocaust. And thus the gouache was THE WORLD OF YESTERDAY born – a Jewish, hermaphrodite Christ, by Stefan Zweig bearded but sensual, with Jewish figures translated by Anthea Bell f anything positive can emerge from climbing up towards him and a Nazi devil Pushkin Press, 2009, 505 pp. paper, the Middle East conflict, it is the quiet with a tail at the foot of the ladder. Here £20.00 Icourage of the Bereaved Families was a riposte drawn from the still anger he publication of this excellent new Forum, whose members have lost loved of absolute betrayal. translation of The World of Yesterday is timely in so far as there has been ones on both sides but who are dedicated David Glasser, Ben-Uri Co-chairman, T bought the work for £30,000 and presented a renewal of interest in the author since to reconciliation. Their exhibition, the recent translation of his novel The Post it as the pinnacle of a fundraising show to Cartooning in Conflict, at London’s Office Girl and Ronald Harwood‘s play St Martin-in-the-Fields, exposes the secure London premises for the Ben- Collaboration on the subject of Zweig’s irony of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Uri’s works, which unbelievably remain relationship with Richard Strauss during the absurdity of war. in storage. Over 75 per cent of the 1,000 the Nazi period. A group of skilled international works by 300 artists were created by first- Zweig completed this book in 1942, or second-generation immigrants. shortly before his suicide. It is not, strictly cartoonists present powerful images in speaking, an autobiography; his working What could be more moving than the which birds, guns and olive branches are title for it was ‘Three Lives’. The first recurring themes, alongside the general fate of misunderstood genius Vincent part, ‘The World of Security’ (perhaps Van Gogh? The Royal the most interesting), gives a fascinating Academy of Arts’ new picture of his youth – a happy one without exhibition, The Real any mention of anti-Semitism – in an Van Gogh: The Artist assimilated, middle-class Jewish family and His Letters (until in Vienna. He describes life at a Viennese gymnasium as a dry, cramming education, 18 April), reveals a though the boys lead a rich cultural life, polymath, a pantheistic playing truant to attend the theatre, nature-poet dogged by concerts and exhibitions and writing mental instability and lack poetry and prose, all under the eye of of self-belief. In extremis, their tolerant parents. Deciding to become he poured his soul into a writer, Zweig submits his first article to the Neue Freie Presse, the prestigious the ear of his financially Viennese newspaper. The editor, who supportive art-dealer accepts the article, turns out to be Theodor brother Theo, but cut off Herzl, who, Zweig says, ‘rose to greet me his own and finally shot and unwittingly I realised that the ironic Marc Chagall, Apocalypse en Lilas, Capriccio (1945-47). Gouache, himself in 1890 because witticism “the King of Zion” had some Lavis et encre de Chine sur papier. Signée en bas à gauche. Ben he despaired at his ‘lack truth in it.’ Uri collection, The London Museum of Art (2009) Zweig meets well-known cultural of progress’. The letters figures on his travels in Europe. But, rubble and brokenness of war. In one let us glimpse Van Gogh’s ten-year artistic when the First World War breaks out, his cartoon, an angel and a devil play cards cycle, including his Japanese phase, which dream of a united Europe is shattered. He with the fates of men. In another, two influenced some remarkable portraits. travels to neutral Switzerland to present women – an Israeli and an Arab – cry the The turbulent clouds, the orchards in his pacifist drama Jeremiah. At the end of the war, he returns to Salzburg. same tears. The message is clear: death which every leaf throbs with energy, the whirling brush strokes and the Yellow The narration now becomes less is indiscriminate, humans are equal and personal. Disappointingly, there is little on war is futile. House, a whimsical and longed-for place of post-war Vienna – the stream of poverty- The Ben Uri Art Gallery scored a hit refuge for artists, all reveal the yearning stricken Jewish refugees who arrived there with its much publicised acquisition of a of a restless spirit. during and after the war from Galicia, little-known gouache by Marc Chagall, Most poignant are the scenes painted or the hardships the Austrians suffered. This is surprising as he writes sensitively Apocalypse in Lilac, which it showed from his iron-barred asylum window at Saint-Remy, through which he could make on the subject in The Post Office Girl. It at the Osborne Samuel Gallery in would also have been interesting to hear out a square of wheat in an enclosure London. In its wake came a brief window something about ‘red Vienna’, when some of masterpieces in the Ben-Uri collection, from which he could see the sun ‘rise in of the most attractive social housing in including works by Auerbach, Bomberg, all its glory’. Europe was built. Kramer, Emmanuel Levy and that rare By the 1930s Stefan Zweig is very pre-Raphaelite Simeon Solomon. The conscious of Nazism stirring in Munich, just Annely Juda Fine Art across the border from Salzburg. In 1934 Chagall takes its rightful place besides 23 Dering Street (off New Bond Street) he leaves for England, but no longer feels Tel: 020 7629 7578 Fax: 020 7491 2139 Bomberg’s Ghetto Theatre and Kramer’s the famous writer promoting his works, Day of Atonement. CONTEMPORARY PAINTING but rather a refugee, albeit a fairly affluent AND SCULPTURE The newly acquired gouache has its one. He is not in Austria for the Anschluss
AJR JOURNAL march 2010 and does not mention Kristallnacht. A controversial thesis However, he shows his sensitivity when Des Kindes Chronik THE INVENTION OF THE he sees the hordes of Jewish refugees Dorle Potten, the author of Des JEWISH PEOPLE besieging the travel bureaux. This might be Kindes Chronik, a review of which by Shlomo Sand an episode from one of his novels: ‘There I appeared in last month’s issue of London: Verso, 2009, 332 pp. hardcover met a once very wealthy industrialist from the Journal, has sadly passed away. he very title of this book is provocative. Vienna, who had been one of our most Anyone wishing to order a copy of It deals with the age-old question ‘Who intelligent art collectors; he was so old, so her book should write to her daugh- is a Jew?’ Sand’s attempt to answer the grey, so weary that I did not recognise him T ter, Mrs Marion Gaze, at Poplar question is scholarly and detailed. at first. Weakly, with both hands he clung Farm, Silverleys Green, Cratfield, He begins by asking ‘What is a nation?’ to the table. I asked him where he was Halesworth, Suffolk IP19 0QJ. Is it a community of people of the same race going. “I don’t know,” he said. “Who asks and culture living in a particular country? By about one’s wishes nowadays? One goes that definition, even Britain falls short for wherever one is still admitted. Someone the international press, including that of Britain.’ To a people accustomed to seeing there is little racially in common between told me that I might to be able to get a visa the Celts of Cornwall and Wales and their for Haiti or San Domingo here.” My heart themselves as victims, it might seem inconceivable that another people could, Anglo-Saxon compatriots, let alone the skipped a beat: an old, worn-out man Huguenots, Irish, Jews and others who have with children and grandchildren atremble as it were, usurp that role – and blame Israel for its plight. made their homes here. How much more with the hope of going to a country which complicated is the Jewish situation! hitherto he would not have been able to This highly debatable theme is, in essence, that of Unveiling Hagar, a new Sand describes the Zionist narrative find on the map, there only to beg his which has dominated Jewish thinking way through and again be a stranger and play by the AJR Journal’s art critic Gloria Tessler. Max, a 60-something member of as follows: ‘We are the descendants of purposeless!’ Abraham and David who lived in the Holy Now in Bath, Zweig hears Hitler has a north London Jewish family, has just lost his wife, who has died after a long illness. Land and practised the Jewish religion, as invaded Poland and England is now at recorded in the Bible. The Roman Emperor, war with Germany. He fears internment Into his lonely life comes Layla, a Palestinian girl half his age. She too was married and Titus, destroyed our Temple in Jerusalem as an enemy alien. Here, I must admit and expelled our people westwards into to scepticism. Many eminent aliens were now pines to return to her homeland. The two find they have much in common. This Europe and into North Africa. The 20th interned and well treated; most were century Aliyah of Jews to Israel is the return swiftly released. But Zweig procures being a play about emotions, it’s necessary to suspend disbelief as the grey-haired of our people to their Promised Land.’ To Brazilian visas for himself and his wife and this is added the Christian story of the in 1941 they travel to that country. It is Jewish man, deeply conscious of his people’s age-old suffering, and the young ‘wandering Jew’, doomed to be homeless hard to understand his decision – unless as a punishment for killing Christ. he feared Hitler might invade England. His Palestinian nationalist girl form a romantic attachment – while Max’s sister Joan (Ruth Sand torpedoes the Zionist narrative, attitude to Judaism is equally ambivalent: claiming there is no record of a mass expul- ‘What was most tragic in this Jewish Lathan) expresses strong hostility towards the girl she perceives as an implacable sion, which was not the Roman practice. tragedy of the 20th century was that There were Jews elsewhere who may have those who suffered it knew that it was enemy of the Jewish people. On their wedding night (could it really left for economic reasons – there was pointless and that they were guiltless.’ apparently a sizable Jewish trading com- He argues that their forefathers, killed by not have been earlier!), the secret about Layla’s husband finally comes out. Max munity in Rome itself – or for other motives. the Inquisition and the Crusaders, at least He claims that the bulk of the indigenous knew they were suffering for their belief. can’t cope with what he hears. Layla, abandoning her refugee status in the UK, farming population remained in Judea and Now, however, Jews were conscious of that their descendants are the Palestinians their Judaism ‘rather as a burden than as returns to her homeland. This though is by no means the end of the story. of today, who later converted to Islam. something to be proud of’. So where did our Ashkenazi Jews come In Brazil in 1942, Zweig sent his The tale also includes two characters – Richard, a family friend and lawyer, and from? Sand states that at the beginning outstanding writings to his publisher and of the Common Era there was a good deal he and his wife then killed themselves. In Mrs Barnes, a non-Jewish neighbour, played by Barry Davis and Ellie Dickens. While they of conversion of many Middle Eastern his suicide note, he said he was too old to tribes to Judaism. There is evidence that begin another life. He was 60. In another inject a little more humour into a fraught situation, it’s difficult to see that they add their language was Hebrew and that they three years the war would be over. practised the Jewish religion. Chief among Thea Valman a great deal to the action. Likewise, I find it difficult to see that a cellist (Rebecca them he cites the Caucasian Khazars. Hewes), however exquisitely she plays Bach On one point, the author seems to me sonatas, adds much to the mood, which is mistaken: he claims that Yiddish was a late theatre already sufficiently sombre. adoptive language of the Jews. However, But, as the Palestinian girl Layla, Israeli it is fairly obvious that it is the mediaeval A tale of two conflicts actress Shani Erez is, quite simply, superb. German dialect spoken in Frankfurt and UNVEILING HAGAR Seductive, sparkling, shifting in mood it is a historical fact that when the Jews by Gloria Tessler from one second to the next, she is the were invited to settle in Poland by King directed by Ben de Wynter complete master of the evening, interacting Kazimir they brought this language with New End Theatre, London magisterially with the rejuvenated Max, them and it became the lingua franca of n her ‘Letter from Israel’ this month, played with depth by David Sparks. Erez East European Jewry. Dorothea Shefer-Vanson notes that in is a ‘revelation’, as reviewers are wont So where does this leave our claim to the UK Israel is increasingly viewed by to say. the Land of Israel? Have we no right to be I there at all? To this we must ask another Jews and non-Jews alike as the Goliath of Unveiling Hagar has been playing to full- the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – a shift in capacity audiences. Its Romeo and Juliet question: ‘Is our entitlement based on opinion caused, she says, by ‘a constant variation may not be an entirely novel one, purely ethnic grounds or are there other and consistent process of denigrating, but it makes for an engrossing evening. criteria which apply?’ demonising and delegitimising Israel in Howard Spier Reviews continued on page 10
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‘Untermenschen’ and ‘Asylum Seekers’: A report on a recent symposium China with a his ambitious meeting, in late January, been under threat of deportation, despite was organised by Meretz UK, a Jewish widespread sympathy among the population. Jewish flavour Tpressure group (‘Equality, Human This was followed by Ben Du Preez, formerly of by Ruth Barnett Rights, Peace and the Environment’). It was Amnesty International (Refugee Rights), who an interesting day but poorly attended, described the chaotic and constantly changing possibly because of the title but probably asylum policy of Israel, though he stressed that riends expressed horror when I also because few people are sufficiently Egypt’s was far worse. told them I had booked ‘a tour of devoted to this cause to want to sacrifice a A very informative talk was given by Mau- FChina with a Jewish flavour’. They whole Sunday. I had been asked to talk about rice Wren, Director of AsylumAid, who ana- asked why I would go to a country with my life and my autobiography, representing lysed the problem of asylum seekers in the UK. such an appalling human rights record, as it were the Kindertransports. It is a sorry tale: policies have been generated The programme included a touching largely by expediency and the pace has been such a selfish position on polluting the film, The Forgotten Refugees, describing forced by the BNP and UKIP, as well as the ecosphere, and so seriously curtailing its the plight of Jewish Iraqi, Iranian and tabloid press. The system in place now – with citizens’ freedom with censorship of the Egyptian refugees who have had a hard the bar set impossibly high – has unleashed internet etc. Couldn’t I find enough ‘Jewish life in Israel. This was followed by a talk by waves of people-smuggling, with all the hor- flavour’ elsewhere, they asked. Edwin Shaker, a refugee from Iraq who left rors that entails. The policy was essentially Of course I had my reasons: my dad that country in the 1970s. David Rosen- target-driven and the claims of torture victims berg talked about the 1905 Aliens Act in were often met with unwarranted scepticism. spent eight years over the WWII period this country and the dire effect this had on Some progress is being made in developing in Shanghai. After the war, he talked Jewish immigration (down from about 500 faster and more credible assessment for those endlessly about Chinese food and customs to three within four years). Subsequent seeking asylum. and related incidents from his legal practice acts placed further restrictions on those The day closed with an account by Pauline in Bubbling Well Road, but nothing about who managed to gain entry. All this was Levis of her five-year, ongoing battle to secure what it was really like in Shanghai. I wasn’t in marked contrast to British attitudes in the future of an Iranian student, and with a particularly interested in asking questions the 1930s – especially, of course, towards gifted young professional singer from the the Kindertransports. Congo (who had grown up in a refugee family then. Only since the first Kindertransport Another film – Out of Sight, Out of in the UK) singing African songs – a delightful reunion in 1989 had I become keen to Mind: Children of Asylum – illustrated the conclusion to an arduous but interesting day piece together my family story. appalling treatment meted out to chil- which, despite the small audience, provoked Reading books about the Shanghai dren who arrived more recently in the UK lively discussions. experience gave me a disturbing picture without their parents, e.g. from Uganda Leslie Baruch Brent of what it might have been like for my – a happy ending for some but not for father. How would he have felt escaping others, who were repatriated with an un- certain future. Nitzan Horowitz, an Israeli from Europe just before war broke out, former foreign affairs correspondent reviews spending six weeks or so on the seas with Ha’aretz before becoming a Meretz continued from page 9 not knowing whether the ship would member of the Knesset who has lobbied be allowed into Shanghai or sent back; on behalf of children of migrants born in That there was interchange of religious embarking into the ravages of the Sino- Israel, was unable to attend. His address ideas and culture among the peoples who Japanese war with nowhere to go and was delivered on his behalf, by telephone, inhabited the lands of the Middle East is by Rotem Ilam, a student who founded no money; facing swarms of starving not surprising. However, what remains of Chinese refugees pouring into Shanghai, the pressure group Israeli Children and the narrative which is relevant to our claim works with him on behalf of the children their corpses left in the roadside sewers; of migrant workers. She spoke about to Israel is that we are a community who depending on charity until he had passed the children born in Israel who regarded have practised for centuries the Jewish exams in English law and got a job; and, themselves as patriotic Israelis but have religion, which has its origin in the Land of finally, being interned by the Japanese in Israel, and that our sorry history in Christian Hongkew, a square mile of ghetto already Europe demands that we have a common overcrowded by Chinese, in the most ARTS AND EVENTS DIARY land with defended borders, where we can poverty-stricken part of Shanghai, not Mon 1 Gerald Curzon, ‘A Strange Affair: continue to live as a people. knowing if the Japanese would succumb Hannah Arendt and the Nazi Philo Another part of the book is of more to the demands of the Nazis in Shanghai sopher Martin Heidegger’ Club 43 immediate concern: the notion that to put all the Jewish refugees in a boat and Israel is a land without people for a sink it in the Wangpoo River? Mon 8 Prof Michael Alpert, ‘The Jews people without land has been shown So I wanted to experience Shanghai in the Ottoman Empire, 1492-1918’ to be erroneous. So what kind of state for myself. I was determined to go with Club 43 have the Jews created in that land? Is it a an open mind and save my criticism for Mon 15 Dr Ian King, ‘Kurt Tucholsky democracy? The answer is doubtful: there the shortcomings of my own government and the Struggle against German is no civil marriage; mixed marriages are on human rights and carbon footprints. It Fascism’ Club 43 frowned on if not actually banned; there paid off: we met nothing but disarming is no public transport on the Sabbath; and Wed 17 B’nai B’rith Jerusalem Lodge. friendliness from the Chinese people and the Arabs, who make up 30 per cent of Ruth Breckman, ‘Selected Opera eagerness to tell and show us everything the population, do not have equal rights Houses around the World’ At Kenton we wanted to know. In the cities (although of land or status with the Jews. This, he Synagogue Hall, 2.15 pm not so much in the countryside) the people believes, is a situation which cannot be wear modern dress – all the latest fashions Mon 22 Dr Hanne Castein, ‘Albrecht allowed to continue. – and have embraced Western culture and Dürer’s Self-Portraits (Illustrated)’ Despite this gloomy picture, if one is behaviour, even Macdonald’s. Club 43 not to become too depressed by all the Our itinerary began with a ten-hour Mon 29 Hall not available Club 43 conflicts surrounding our people in Israel, overnight flight to Beijing, where we one must give them credit for the many Club 43 Meetings at Belsize Square spent four nights before flying to Harbin Synagogue, 7.45 pm. Tel Ernst Flesch on creative and positive activities which are near the Mongolian and Russian borders. 020 7624 7740 or Leni Ehrenberg on also part of the scene. After two nights in Harbin, we flew to 020 7286 9698 Martha Blend continued on opposite page
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Xian for two nights. From Xian, we had its to the Terracotta the illuminating experience of a Chinese Warriors of Xian – overnight sleeper train to Kaifeng, where their sheer number Bad Memories we had two breakfasts but only one night. is awe-inspiring; by Marion Gross Our last hop was to Shanghai, where we the tiger park in I cried for the baby had two nights before the return journey Harbin – 800 ti- Who clung to her mother to London. gers uncaged; and Looking with wondrous eyes We were in excellent hands. Our Jewish the three theatre Into the focus of a camera Renaissance tour organiser met us in shows we attended Beijing’s impressive modern airport to – the Peking opera, The schoolgirl holding a cornucopia introduce us to Feng, our Beijing guide, largely mime, the Of candies as was the custom and to Professor Xu Xin, who was to Tang Dynasty Ex- I cried for her because she could not accompany us for the whole tour and travaganza in Xian, be a child from whom we were to learn so much. and the acrobatic Spontaneous and free In each city we had a new guide who show in Shanghai. Happy and forward looking specialised just in that city. Our every need Our first Jew- I cried for her because Hitler raised was taken care of. We became a unique, i s h e x p e r i e n c e his right hand intimate group. was a visit to the Opened the flood-gates of hatred All six cities we visited were amazing, lovely synagogue Destroying families with wide, tree-lined boulevards and in Tienjin, not far endless towering blocks of newly built from Beijing but no The journey is nearly over The road bends, I look back high-rise flats. We learned that traffic was longer in use. This To where I started contrasted with reduced to just manageable in Beijing by What lies ahead I do not know cars with certain number plates being a kosher Chinese The child inside me cries banned on different days of the week. dinner the same The woman I am tries Shoals of bicycles, scooters and electric evening in Chabad To comfort it bicycles overtook us at every traffic light House in Beijing! In Together we must walk and intersect. With remarkable ingenuity, Harbin, in the Jew- Into the future. First day at school, Berlin many of the cycles had a variety of vehicles ish cemetery that attached at the back; one elderly gent had been dug up and relocated to the out- able to take us to this address. Much of even had his missus attached behind in a skirts of the town, we learned of its vibrant the ghetto has been razed and rebuilt, wheelchair. Another cyclist was scarcely Jewish community that was denuded by but a portion has been earmarked to be visible peeking out from a mountain of emigration to Israel in 1948 and ended renovated and preserved and Hok San Lu cardboard boxes piled all round him. with the Cultural Revolution. We studied is in this not yet renovated area. House In the Lama Temple in Beijing, built its culture and people in the synagogue 125/5 is one of several large tenement in 1694 and used as a residence for the that had been renovated as a museum of houses around a walled yard. One of the visiting Dalai Lama, we were enveloped the former Jewish community. In Kaifeng, Chinese families living there invited us in. in the haze of incense burning in the we were welcomed at the Henan Provincial Poverty, dilapidation and lack of hygiene five courtyards between magnificent all- University by the students and staff of the were striking – but didn’t prevent the wooden temples painted with intricate Department of Jewish Studies, seeking to occupants from giving us a most friendly patterns in four colours – gold for the keep alive the memory of Jews in China welcome. An unimagined climax to what emperor and the universe, blue for the through promoting education about Jews. had been a momentous two weeks! heavens, green for the earth, and red for This was the brainchild of Professor Xu Yes, there was pollution: much of happiness. Even the Beijing taxis were Xin, who had already founded a thriving the time, visibility was little more than gold, sided with blue, green or red tops. university department of Jewish Studies 200 metres with the horizon hidden The pièce de résistance was an 80-metre- in Nanjing, and our reception was over- in a haze. But the people are amazing high Buddha made out of one sandalwood whelming. We learned that the Chinese and one cannot help but admire their tree. have no concept of anti-Semitism. Jews are spirit and enthusiasm in welcoming and The Temple of Heaven, built in 1420 in respected for their important contribution engaging with foreigners and their rapid the reign of Ming Emperor Yongle, is clearly to China’s financial and cultural develop- emergence into the 21st century. If Jewish a social meeting and recreation place, as ment. Apparently, European ‘blood theory’ Renaissance offer another China tour, I the long, covered walk leading up to it of superior and inferior ‘races’ did not heartily recommend it. was peopled with card-players, smokers, spread to China. Nor did Christianity, with dancers and a hubbub of cheerful chatter. its theology of Jews as ‘Christ-killers’, get Dragon kites and numerous other tourist much of a foothold, as the missionaries knick-knacks were offered to us. It was were expelled when they tried to ban an- spring grove good to see a large number of tour groups cestor-worship among converts. Chinese RETIREMENT HOME of Chinese people of all ages exploring culture reveres ancestors, nature and sages 214 Finchley Road like Confucius. Different parts of China their own country. The walk through London NW3 Tienanmen Square and on through the have developed variations of a mixture of London’s Most Luxurious Emperor’s Palace, the Forbidden City, was Buddhism and Taoism and have accepted amazing, as was the ‘Bird’s Nest’ Olympic Muslim, Jewish and Christian communities Entertainment Activities stadium in its Olympic Village and a coach as co-existing. Stress Free Living ride to the Great Wall. In contrast, a Finally, in Shanghai, we visited the 24 House Staffing Excellent Cuisine bicycle-rickshaw ride through the narrow memorial plaque, in Hongkew, to the Full En-Suite Facilities streets of one of the hutong (alley) districts Jewish refugees from Nazi persecution. In Call for more information or a personal tour of Beijing gave us a taste of the colourful the nearby Jewish Museum, my daughter 020 8446 2117 lantern-lit nightlife around a glittering found her grandfather listed in its database or 020 7794 4455 lake, but in an area of dire poverty. of refugees as ‘Dr R. Michaelis 125/5 Hok [email protected] Further highlights of the tour were vis- San Lu, Attorney at Law’. Our guide was
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Surrey Warm reception ‘Everyone always asks how we Some 15 of us were warmly received by Edmee Barta at her lovely house in Epsom. died – no one ever asks how we Ably assisted by Edith Vanstone, she lived,’ Austrian National Fund prepared an excellent buffet. leader tells London meeting Alfred Kessler Meetings cancelled ‘It is one of the big- Cleve Road ‘The Story of a Search’ gest challenges to Due to the wintry weather, nine Shirley Bilgora told a poignant story teach the younger January meetings in the South had about finding the final resting place of generation about to be cancelled. Where speakers were the loss in culture involved, it is hoped they can be re- her uncle Max Mann, who was killed in and humanity – to scheduled for later in the year. action in 1944. Shirley started looking for his grave in 2004 and at last located it in make them aware West Midlands (Birmingham) the Czech section of the French military of what we are Farewell tea for Corinne cemetery 60 miles from Calais. Eventually capable of doing to others, in the Ilse Schlesinger hosted a lovely tea party she succeeded in having the cross on his hope that the words ‘Never again’ will in honour of Corinne Oppenheimer, a grave replaced by a Star of David. have some meaning,’ Hannah Lessing told much-loved AJR member who is leaving David Lang Next meeting: 23 March, 10.30 am. Prof a crowded meeting of the AJR and the Birmingham to live near her daughter in Anglo-Jewish Association together with London. Corinne and her late husband Ladislaus Löb, ‘Rezso Kasztner – a Jewish Schindler?’ the Austrian Ambassador, Dr Gabriele Paul were co-founders of our local group. Matzner-Holzer. She will be greatly missed. Lia Lesser Radlett Extraordinary experiences Ms Lessing, General Secretary of the Dr Helen Fry introduced her latest book Austrian National Fund and Head of the Harrogate A wonderful afternoon in Austrian delegation at the Task Force for each other’s company Freud’s War, while James Hamilton outlined the history behind the novel International Co-operation on Holocaust Guided by Susanne Green, we spent a Education, Remembrance and Research, wonderful afternoon in each other’s Goodnight Vienna. Fritz Starer Next meeting: 17 March. Judith Kelner, was speaking at the Residence of the company. Eugene told us about his visits ‘Desert Island Discs’ Ambassador of the Republic of Austria around the country attending Holocaust in London. Memorial Day services and acting as The Austrian National Fund subsidised speaker. Rosl reported on a service at the Churchill’s German a great variety of projects, she said. It is Central Methodist Hall in York. In addition, thanks in part to support from the Fund we recalled our first meeting in Harrogate Army repeated by that there will be an Austrian Refugee over seven years ago. Inge Little popular demand Voices project comprising a film, a book Next meeting: 5 May and an exhibition focusing on the lives of former refugees from Austria. Brighton & Hove Sarid ‘Most of the Jewish victims live today ‘A meaningful object and its story’ in the USA, Israel and Great Britain Two ladies, spiritual healers, talked – some as far away as Malawi, Zambia about their introduction to their calling. and Thailand,’ Hannah Lessing said. Others shared their experiences, showing She added: ‘We fully understand that treasured items and photographs of their the symbolic compensation payment to families. Ceska Abrahams victims of the Nazis has been received Next meeting: 15 March. Helen Fry, ‘Refugees with disappointment. At the same Who Fought in the Second World War’ time, these measures show that a new generation of Austrians is recognising the Bromley CF A friendly afternoon (from left) Willy Field, tank driver, 8th victims of their country’s terrible past and Gathering at Eva Byk’s home, we enjoyed an Hussars; Harry Rossney, Infantry, but at least attempting to compensate that afternoon of informality and friendliness. posted to War Graves Commission as a which cannot be compensated.’ Hazel Beiny signwriter; Helen Fry; Bill Howard, RN ‘A survivor put it most succinctly,’ signals on HMS Bellona; Colin Anson, Next meeting: 15 March, 2-4 pm. At home she concluded, ‘Everyone always asks 3 Tp 10 Cdo of Leanne Segal how we died – no one ever asks how A repeat screening of this TV documen- we lived.’ Edinburgh Not exactly as intended tary, at the New London Synagogue, It was intended to be a Viennese musical was attended by a large audience. The occasion but it turned out quite different. film is based on the book by Helen SECOND GENERATION Everyone spoke at once, exchanging Fry, who introduced it. The audience information – even straying into match- included a dozen of us ex-servicemen MEETINGS making territory. But we enjoyed every and women, who played their part in Mon 1 March ‘Uncovering Secrets in minute of it. We did look through the defeating the Nazi menace. Everyday Lives – Two Books Triggered Memorial Book in search of families from Harry Gilbert by Wartime Documents’. Jewish Book Debrecen. Thanks again to Francoise Week in association with Second for being our hostess and providing the ALSO MEETING IN MARCH Generation Network. Rosemary scrumptious sandwiches and cakes. Bailey, Marc Stevens, chaired by Norfolk 1 March. Lunchtime Get- Jonathan Kish Sophie Lewis. At Royal National together and discussion Hotel, Bedford Way, London WC1, Oxford The Jews of Ostrava Wessex 9 March. Myra Sampson, 1.00 pm. £8 David Lawson’s talk, delivered with slides ‘Abstract Expressionism: Is This Great and anecdotes, was particularly relevant as Art?’ Tues 9 March ‘Free to Have Fun?’ one of our members came from that area. Nottingham (East Midlands) Informal discussion evening. Central Anne Selinger 10 March. Lunchtime Get-together London. Tel 0781 357 4699 for Next meeting: 16 March. Rabbi Daniela Bristol/Bath 11 March. Lunchtime Get- details Thau, ‘Main Religions of the World’ together with Peter Suchet speaking Tues 16 March Talk and Tour of Wiener Café Imperial about his family Library. Evening. At 4 Devonshire We were enthralled with tales of Willy Field’s Cardiff 18 March. Lunch and Andrea Street, London W1. Tel 0781 357 4699 80th birthday celebrations. Hazel Beiny Cameron, ‘The Story of Pear’s Soap’ for details
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‘The Legacy of Hope’ Paul Balint AJR Centre 15 Cleve Road, London NW6 Holocaust Memorial Day, 2010 Tel: 020 7328 0208 at which Dr Lola Barnett recalled how she came to be in this country. AJR LUNCHEON CLUB Hana Eardley, Inge Goldrein and Wednesday 17 March 2010 Sonia Strong spoke to the Liverpool Schools Parliament at the Town Hall Sue Mariner Council Chamber, attended by over 200 ‘My Career in Music’ pupils representing 40 Merseyside junior Please be aware that members should not schools. A school presented Sonia with a automatically assume that they are on the Luncheon book of poetry and artwork by children Club list. It is now necessary, on receipt of your copy in Theriesenstadt entitled I Never Saw of the AJR Journal, to phone the Centre on 020 7328 Another Butterfly. The schoolchildren 0208 to book your place. included their own artwork. The Liverpool AJR Holocaust Memorial Book, including the DVD Never Forget, KT-AJR Kindertransport special has been distributed to 100 Merseyside interest group junior and secondary schools. Guido Alis AJR service at Monday 1 March 2010 Belsize Square Synagogue AJR represented at Dr Margaret Brierley ‘Non-Jewish Zionism and Filo Guest speaker Dr James Smith, Co-Founder other HMD events of the Beth Shalom Holocaust Centre, As well as the AJR’s service at Belsize Judaism and Unknown History’ emphasised the value of such testimonies Square Synagogue and the national event KINDLY NOTE THAT LUNCH as the AJR’s Refugee Voices audiovisual at Guildhall, AJR staff attended a number WILL BE SERVED AT 1.00 PM ON MONDAYS project. At the time of the Holocaust, he of events, including: City Hall in London, Reservations required said, ‘Ordinary people did not do enough. hosted by Mayor Boris Johnson; Brent Please telephone 020 7328 0208 Governments did not do enough. We Town Hall; a special commemoration of put barriers up, saying “It’s a Jewish Czech Scrolls at Westminster Synagogue; Monday, Wednesday & Thursday problem!”’ a Glasgow City HMD event, attended by 9.30 am – 3.30 pm During the service, which was led by members of the Glasgow AJR Group at Please note that the Centre is Rabbi Rodney Mariner, AJR members which the AJR’s Scotland Memorial Book closed on Tuesdays lit memorial candles and Kaddish was was on display; East Renfrewshire HMD March Afternoon Entertainment recited. with AJR member Eva Clark; events in Mon 1 KT LUNCH – Kards & Games Newcastle and at Northumbria University; Glenda Jackson, Member of Parlia- Klub ment for Hampstead and Highgate, said: a Cheshire HMD event; and events at the Tue 2 CLOSED ‘This year’s theme, “The Legacy of Hope”, London Jewish Cultural Centre and the Wed 3 Mike Marandi was made human and tangible by those Imperial War Museum. Thur 4 Geoffrey Strum I was privileged to meet and speak with. Additionally, the AJR helped find Mon 8 Kards & Games Klub Of course, we were in a synagogue which speakers for commemorative events in Tue 9 CLOSED came into being by the dedication and Darlington, where Sylvia Hurst was the Wed 10 Paul Coleman commitment of Jewish refugees, who, guest speaker, and in Cardiff, where Thur 11 Jane Rosenberg having escaped the horrors of Nazism, Charlotte Jones addressed an audience at Mon 15 Kards & Games Klub gave thanks by never forgetting those the university student union. Tue 16 CLOSED who had not. Thank you for all the work Staff were also present at HMD events Wed 17 LUNCHEON CLUB you and your association have done, and sponsored by the AJR: the Northwood and Thur 18 Stefan & Arjan continue to do, providing that “Legacy of Pinner Liberal Synagogue and Finchley Mon 22 Kards & Games Klub – Hope” every day.’ Reform Synagogue educational events, Monday Movie Matinee and the Glasgow Holocaust lecture. Tue 23 CLOSED Liverpool HMD Wed 24 Chris Sausman Centre for Thur 25 Mock Seder Lunch German-Jewish Studies Mon 29 CLOSED – PESACH Tue 30 CLOSED Wed 31 CLOSED – PESACH
The film Daring to Resist: Three Women Face the Holocaust, by Martha Goell Lubell and Barbara Attie (USA 1999), was shown and a panel discussion chaired by Professor Christian Wiese, Director of the Centre for German-Jewish Studies, AJR table at Liverpool Town Hall HMD event: took place. (from left) Inge Goldrein, Kay Fyne, John Freddie Knoller with University of Sussex The event was introduced by the Mayor Goldsmith, Susanne Green Vice-Chancellor, Professor Michael Farthing of Brighton and Hove, Councillor Ann As part of the Liverpool HMD activities, Holocaust survivor Freddie Knoller was Norman and University of Sussex Vice- many AJR members attended the Service guest speaker at the Centre for German- Chancellor Professor Michael Farthing. It of Remembrance at Liverpool Town Hall, Jewish Studies’ HMD commemoration. was supported by the AJR.
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family announcements 4-DAY TRIP MOCK SEDER Deaths THURSDAY 25 MARCH 2010 Brooke, Henry Died suddenly 5 February TO GLASGOW 2010. Deeply mourned by his wife Heddy, Rabbi Katz will lead our family and friends. Sunday 9 May to Pre-Seder Service at 11.30 am Wednesday 12 May 2010 for 12 noon Sutton-Steiniger, Sonja It is with great For members in the South, we will be Cost £15.00, payable in sorrow that the family of Sonja Sutton- flying from Luton to Glasgow return. advance to AJR at Steiniger, widow of John Steiniger, announce For Northern members, alternatives 15 Cleve Road, London NW6 3RL her death at home in Bayswater, London, at are flying, train or driving On first-come-first-served basis the age of 93. Sonja died as she wanted to, in her own home surrounded by everything she PROVISIONAL ITINERARY loved. The cause of death was heart failure. Sunday 9 May She will be greatly missed by her daughter, Fly to Glasgow from Luton to arrive by 1 pm HOLIDAY IN son-in-law, grandson, granddaughter and PM Tour of Gorbals, where Jewish immigrants her recent great-granddaughter. settled on their arrival in Glasgow EASTBOURNE or The AJR are doing another holiday at In Memoriam Pollok House and Pollok Park with tea in the original the Lansdowne Hotel kitchens 3-4 March 1943 Martin and Lottee Friday 16 July to Friday 23 July Reichenback and the other 281 Dresden EVE Dinner with entertainer at Glasgow New £520 per week dinner, bed and breakfast Jews deported from Hellerberg camp and Synagogue plus £40 per week single room murdered at Auschwitz on this night. Monday 10 May supplement AM Trip to Loch Lomond with lunch to include transport from Cleve Road, classified PM Burrell Collection – contains over 9,000 works lunch on outward journey of art Summer rental in Mevasseret Zion, EVE Dinner at L’Chaims Kosher Restaurant Book early to avoid disappointment Israel, July and August. Well-appointed Please contact Carol Rossen or Tuesday 11 May Lorna Moss on 020 8385 3070 house with small garden. Can sleep six. AM Garnethill Synagogue and Jewish Archives Easy access to Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. PM Kelvingrove Art Galley and Museum Holocaust Rent negotiable. Tel. +972-2-5345910. Section with Deborah Haase EVE Laughter in the Rain – a musical by Neil JOIN US FOR A WEEK Sedaka at The Kings Theatre IN BOURNEMOUTH HOLIDAY FOR Wednesday 12 May NORTHERN MEMBERS AM Giffnock Synagogue and Queens Park at the Sun 27 June – Sun 4 July 2010 Synagogue Stained Glass Windows by John Clark. Royale Hotel at the Inn On The Prom John Clark may take us on this tour (formerly Anglo Suisse) 11/17 South Promenade, St Annes Lunch at the café at House for an Art Lover, designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh in 1901 Sunday 9 May to Sunday 16 May Tel 01253 726 726 Estimated cost £400 (depending on mode of £420 per week, dinner, bed The cost, including Dinner, Bed and travel), 3 nights’ hotel stay and all above visits and breakfast Breakfast, is £582.50 per person All flights and bookings must be made by plus £30 supplement for single room For booking form contact 24 March 2010. Please contact Susan Harrod on 020 8385 3070 for application form to include transport from Cleve Road, Ruth Finestone on (direct line) lunch on outward journey 020 8385 3082 or 07966 886535 Please contact Carol Rossen or Lorna Moss on 020 8385 3070 FIRST FLOOR RETIREMENT ARE YOU INTERESTED FLAT FOR SALE in kenton IN A 5-DAY TRIP TO First floor retirement flat with lift. Warden- switch on electrics assisted. Entryphone system BUDAPEST? 1 fitted bedroom, lounge/dining room, If you are, please call Rewires and all household fitted kitchen, modern bathroom/WC Carol or Lorna on 0208 385 3070 electrical work Electric economy heating, residents’ Numbers will be limited lounge, laundry room and games room PHONE PAUL: 020 8200 3518 Communal gardens Please note there will be a certain Mobile: 0795 614 8566 New 99-year lease amount of walking involved In excellent condition Near shops, synagogues, buses and trains Home Care Asking price £139,000 ColvinCare through quality and Please call Carol on PillarCare professionalism 01923 857 822 or 0794 7694 844 Quality support and care at home Celebrating our 25th Anniversary 25 years of experience in providing the Hourly Care from 1 hour – 24 hours highest standards of care in the comfort ADVERTISEMENT RATES of your own home Live-In/Night Duty/Sleepover Care FAMILY EVENTS First 15 words free of charge, Convalescent and Personal Health Care £2.00 per 5 words thereafter Compassionate and Affordable Service CLASSIFIED, SEARCH NOTICES £2.00 per 5 words Professional, Qualified, Kind Care Staff BOX NUMBERS £3.00 extra Registered with the CSCI and UKHCA 1 hour to 24 hours care DISPLAY ADVERTS Registered through the National Care Standard Commission Per single column inch 65mm £12.00 Call us on Freephone 0800 028 4645 Studio 1 Utopia Village Call our 24 hour tel COPY DATE 5 weeks prior to publication 020 7794 9323 7 Chalcot Road, NW1 8LH www.colvin-nursing.co.uk
14 AJR JOURNAL march 2010
heo Marx was a man whose actions Obituary through the junior membership group and spoke far louder than his words: their journal Focus – an original Facebook T throughout his life he put the needs Carl Theodore Marx – which allowed everyone, in whatever of family, community and society before his Born 1920 in Frankfurt, theatre of war they were found across the own. His understated generosity touched died 2010 in London globe, to keep in touch with each other. the lives of everyone he met as well as Not surprisingly, it was through WLS, at a those of many who never even knew of family business, Erma dance he organised, that he met the woman his existence. Limited, until it was sold in with whom he would spend the rest of his Theo was born on 10 March 1920 in 1985. He became an active life, Anne Marie Kohnstamm. Frankfurt, Germany, the son of Erna member and treasurer Theo also loved the calm, quiet things and Erich Marx. From the start, he was of his electro-technical of life and was at ease in his own company. surrounded by close family ties on both trade association BEAMA He had a disciplined, enquiring mind and a sides and throughout his life it was his and was for many years prodigious memory, which, together with profound belief in the importance of family involved in committee work at the British his love of order, made him a natural and that fuelled his actions. Standards Institution. gifted collector. He spent enjoyable years He was a quiet yet effective man, Theo’s commitment to his German- compiling comprehensive collections, all who hid his light not under a bushel but Jewish heritage and unshakeable belief in allied to his interest in European history behind an enigmatic smile, a succession community was selfless and multi-layered. – from stamps of a number of European of carefully chosen bow ties, and a love of He emerged as a quiet, understated leader, countries, rare coins and historical atlases all things chocolate. supporting the displaced and drawing to ephemeral items such as bus tickets and He was 14 when he was sent to school people together from all over the world. tube maps. His cataloguing was Victorian in England. His father, already alert to These qualities led to Theo’s becoming in its scope and endeavour and there was the threat Hitler posed, decided that an deeply involved with the Association of a determination in him that enabled him English education would be best, though Jewish Refugees. Elected its Vice-Chairman to see any task through. Theo’s love of it was three years before the family moved in 1974, he became its Chairman from 1976 unity and order was both a comfort and a and Theo travelled back and forth during to 1994, continuing as a trustee until 2008. motivation for him, but he liked nothing school holidays. He transformed the organisation from more than to share these gifts and skills One of Theo’s early strengths was one serving only a small and diminishing with others. an ability to accept life’s events without part of the refugee community into one His exceptional ability to catalogue, bitterness. This stood him in good stead which continues to this day to serve the coupled with his sociability and interest when he arrived in 1934, as a boarder, changing needs of refugee families. He in people, found their ultimate expression at Mill Hill School in north-west London built up the social services department and in the compilation of his wife Anne’s fam- without having previously spoken a word chaired the house committees of two of the ily tree. Spanning 600 years, it included of English. He thrived, winning prizes for retirement homes for which the AJR was nearly 4,000 people, encompassing every essays in history and learning a number then still responsible. Major innovations he continent and including detailed historical of other languages. He became fluent introduced include the move from Hannah notes on each period, a history of the Jews not only in English and French – and, of Karminski House and the establishment of in every location, and individual snapshots course, German – but also spoke creditable the Paul Balint AJR Day Centre. of everyone featuring who they were, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch and Italian. Following retirement, Theo devoted what they did and how they lived. The His parents finally arrived in London in even more time to the AJR, in 1990 enterprise took Theo and Anne around 1937, settling in Wembley Park, which launching the Residential Care Appeal in the world and was completed before the meant a return to normal family life, though conjunction with the CBF – a successful advent of the internet. Theo was also on he remained a boarder. project to raise £4 million for 21 new the committee of the Leo Baeck Insti- Not only a natural linguist but also a sheltered accommodation units, 13 new tute and the results of this research are gifted historian, Theo was expected to rooms with toilet facilities (!), a further 102 lodged with the Institute in New York. He qualify as an engineer, so he switched to rooms with toilet facilities, and 15 rooms subsequently organised an international matriculating in science and gained a place to offer nursing facilities. He reduced the reunion in New York and Germany for to study mechanical engineering at City and age of those on the executive committee over 140 family members. Guilds College (now Imperial College). to an average of 51, over a generation Theo’s beliefs in continuity, tradition During his three years at City and younger than those in the homes; oversaw and community translated into a lifelong Guilds, he made life-long friendships the Thank-Offering to Britain Fellowship commitment of giving back, improving the and was elected secretary of the student given annually by the British Academy society around him and drawing people union. He remained involved with Imperial from monies raised by the AJR; served together. But through all his achievements College throughout his life. He was on and off as Chairman of the Otto Schiff he preferred to let others take the limelight, unable to sit for his finals as the hysteria House Committee; and played a substantial taking pride in their achievements rather surrounding foreign nationals came to a role in the AJR Information, providing both than his own. head two weeks before his exams and he, editorial and technical assistance. Theo took pride in tradition, his culture, along with many members of the German- Theo’s interest in history and his cultural community and the wider society and his Jewish community, was interned on the heritage led him to become an active profession but, above all, in his family, his Isle of Man. At Onchan Camp he started council member of the Wiener Library, children (Caroline, Eleanor and Geoffrey), the English University, teaching English where he could help focus international and his seven grandchildren. to the internees. scholarly attention on the Holocaust and He was truly a man who understood that On his release from the camp, Theo the plight of Jewish refugees. He also everything – no matter how small – was was seconded to an aircraft factory and helped the community to set up the now part of a bigger whole. later joined his father, who had started an thriving Centre for German-Jewish Studies Theo died peacefully in his sleep, after a engineering company, helping with war at Sussex University. long illness, at Hammerson House in north work. Due to the need to support his father Theo played an active role in organis- London on 6 January 2010. His work and and the family business, he was unable to ing events at the West London Synagogue his gifts will live on through all those whose return to college at the end of the war to (WLS) during the war. His gift of being lives he touched. finish his degree. He successfully ran the able to connect people found expression
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with Israel. Now, the David and Goliath Letter from situation is regarded as having been reversed, and the climate of opinion in Israel Britain has shifted accordingly. This reminded me of what a woman in the street said to me in London last summer, when a pro-Palestinian Believing in miracles a necessity demonstration went past us. ‘What’s it t a recent event entitled ‘Any citing the consistent support of the all about?’, I asked. ‘They just want their Questions’, organised by the British British government for Israel irrespective own country, dear,’ she replied. Ah, if only AZionist Federation and the Israel, of which party is in power, the strong things were that simple. Britain and Commonwealth Association, trade links between the two countries, But to get back to the panel discussion. a panel replied to questions submitted in and Britain’s advocacy of a two-state Replying to the question about the advance by members of the 400-strong solution to the Israel-Palestinian problem. NGOs, Ambassador Phillips said that audience who had come to Jerusalem from Nevertheless, he could not deny that Israel should be proud of their activities, all over Israel. there was a constant and consistent as they constituted proof of Israel’s Most of the audience and the panel process of denigrating, demonising and openness and freedom of debate. He consisted of representatives of Israel’s delegitimising Israel in the international stated that he had visited Hebron as the English-speaking population. The attrac press, including that of Britain. guest of one of these and had been deeply tion was the presence of the British When the ambassador referred explic- impressed by the work they were doing in Ambassador to Israel, Tom Phillips, on the itly to ‘the occupied territories’, several bringing information out into the open. He panel. The questions, which were read out audience members protested, while oth- added that even if in some instances the by Zionist Federation Chairman Andrew ers tried to suppress the hecklers. Miri information they provide is distorted by Balcombe, related to a variety of subjects Eisin, former international media advisor others and used for anti-Israeli propaganda which concern Israelis today. These to ex-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and a purposes, their existence is nonetheless included the negotiations for the return member of the panel, rebuked the protest- admirable. of kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit, Iran’s ers for failing to display the courtesy to the Of course, no such discussion could nuclear ambitions, the attitude to and speaker that the situation required and end on a serious note, so we were treated repercussions of the Goldstone report, order was quickly restored. to a final question about what each and concern about the growing influence Ambassador Phillips expounded his member of the panel would change of NGOs both inside and outside Israel. view of what influences the tenor of in Israeli society. The overwhelming But the question which stirred up the opinion in the UK, noting that the British majority was in favour of improving the most interest (and reactions from the generally tend to support the underdog, driving habits of the average Israeli. But audience) was the one which related to and this is how they now perceive the let’s be realistic: that is not very likely to the growing groundswell of anti-Israel Palestinians. This was in stark contrast happen. However, as Ben-Gurion once opinion among both the Jewish and the to the general perception of the situation said, anyone in Israel who doesn’t believe general public in the UK. Ambassador prior to the Six Day War in 1967, when in miracles isn’t a realist. Phillips tried to play down this trend, the British public tended to sympathise Dorothea Shefer-Vanson
letters to the editor continued from page 7 thought he could trade the land of a far-away Peter Phillips asks if Israel has the right present-day Israel, which often makes many people for peace and kept waving a piece of to defend itself ‘even if, sometimes, with of us ashamed to be Jewish? paper about – and look what happened. more violence than might be necessary’. The Nicholas Jacobs, London NW5 If my learned and honourable friend second half of this question can be left to had been a subscribing member of the those with a belief in fair play. Sir – Recently the IDF and the Israeli police C of E and had gone to church last Xmas, he The answer to the first part is that, like any have increased their war against human would have heard the congregation sing the other country, Israel has the right to defend rights activists. Non-violent protests in the carol ‘Once in Royal David’s City’, confirming itself if it is not oppressing another people East Jerusalem neighbourhoods of Sheikh that Jerusalem was built by a king of Israel and expanding its territory at their expense, Jarrah against the expulsion of Palestinians and is, and has been since time immemorial which is what it has been and is now doing. from their homes by extreme right-wingers – irrespective of who occupied it quite No, I do not want to wipe Israel off the map. have met with a violent and disproportionate illegally – Jewish. All of it. To change the I want to be able to envisage a post-Zionist police response. The IDF have responded with words to ‘Once in Palestinian East Jerusalem’ Israel in which cultural Zionist and other insufferable harshness to protests against the just doesn’t sound right. Frank Bright Jews can live alongside Palestinians in a separation fence in the Palestinian villages of Martlesham Heath, Suffolk secular state (as Peter Phillips himself says) Bil’in and Na’lin. in which everyone is free to practise their The Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz writes: Sir – With respect to Peter Phillips’s religion and in which there would be no state ‘What the police are doing in Sheikh Jarrah characteristically good-natured article religion. This would actually fulfil the terms and what the IDF is doing in Bil’in and Na’alin (February), I would like to speak up for those of the Balfour Declaration, which promised should disturb every Israeli, whether right-wing he calls ‘Jewish do-gooders’ who ‘wash their a ‘home’ – not a state – for the Jews. or left-wing, because this is about the very dirty linen in public’, on the principle that it This may sound like pie-in-the-sky, but is it nature of the regime of the country in which is better to wash it in public than not at all. not better to work towards than the reality of we live.’ Peter Prager, London N12
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