Postwar Jewish Displacement and Rebirth Jewish Identities in a Changing World

Home , Law of Return

Series Editors

Eliezer Ben-Rafael, Yosef Gorny, and Judit Bokser Liwerant

VOLUME 23

The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/jicw Postwar Jewish Displacement and Rebirth

1945–1967

Edited by

Françoise S. Ouzan and Manfred Gerstenfeld

LEIDEN | BOSTON The preparation of this volume has been supported by a grant from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.

Cover illustration: Holocaust Survivors Arriving in New York, USA, ca. 1947–8. Clemens Kaslisher (photographer) collection (unit no. 7836 Beit Hatfutsot, the Museum of the Jewish People, Tel Aviv University).

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This book is printed on acid-free paper. Contents

List of Contributors vii Acknowledgements xi

Introduction—Diverging Groups of Jewish Displaced Persons 1 Manfred Gerstenfeld and Françoise S. Ouzan

part 1 The Plight of the Uprooted: Social and Legal Responses 11

Reflections on the Multinational Geography of Jews after World War II 13 Sergio DellaPergola The Law of Return: A National Solution to an International Issue, 1945–1967 34 Jacques Amar Health Care Services for Holocaust Survivors in Postwar Austria, 1945–1953: A Pattern of Jewish Solidarity 46 Ada Schein

part 2 Postwar Jewish Migration and Czechoslovakia 61

Dilemmas of Minority Politics: Jewish Migrants in Postwar Czechoslovakia and Poland 63 Kateřina Čapková The Postwar Czech-Jewish Leadership and the Issue of Jewish Emigration from Czechoslovakia (1945–1950) 76 Jan Láníček vi contents

part 3 Postwar Reconstitution of Jewish Communal Life and Dynamics of Identities 97

Life during the Camps and After: Displacement and Rehabilitation of the Young Survivors 99 Izio Rosenman American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return to Jewish Communal Life (1945–1952) 112 Françoise S. Ouzan A Forgotten Postwar Jewish Migration: East European Jewish Refugees and Immigrants in France, 1946–1947 137 David Weinberg The Postwar Renewal of Jewish Communities in the Netherlands 150 Manfred Gerstenfeld

part 4 Emigrating to Israel from Europe and the Middle East 171

Reasons for Emigration of the Jews from Poland in 1956–1959 173 Ewa Węgrzyn Memories of a Forgotten People: A Conflict of Expectations 185 Shmuel Trigano The Reasons for the Departure of the Jews from Morocco 1956–1957: The Historiographical Problems 196 Yigal Bin-Nun Not Just a Language Barrier: Israel’s Media and Communication with New Immigrants in the 1950s 212 Rafi Mann

Index 221 List of Contributors

Jacques Amar has a PhD in Law and a PhD in Sociology. He is a Senior Lecturer in Private Law at the University of Paris-Dauphine and a member of the “Institut de Droit Dauphine” in Paris, as well as Vice Chairman of the Shibboleth Actualités de Freud Association.

Yigal Bin-Nun obtained his BA and MA in History at Tel Aviv University and his PhD at Paris VIII University with a thesis on “The Secret Relations Between Israel and Morocco 1955–1967.” His second PhD thesis from the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes deals with “The Historiography of The Texts Describing the Beginnings of The Kingdom of Israel.” He was a lecturer at Paris VIII University and his numerous publications pertain to the history of independent Morocco and the historiography of biblical texts.

Kateřina Čapková is a Senior Researcher at the Institute for Contemporary History in Prague and teaches Modern Jewish History at Charles University and NYU in Prague. Her current research focuses on Jews in Czechoslovak and Polish border regions after 1945. Her monograph, Czechs, Germans, Jews? National Identity and the Jews of Bohemia, (Berghahn Books: Oxford–New York 2012; in Czech 2005, 2nd revised ed. 2013) was given the “Outstanding Academic Title for 2012” Award by Choice.

Sergio DellaPergola born in Italy and residing in Israel since 1966, is the Shlomo Argov Professor Emeritus of Israel-Diaspora Relations at the Hebrew University’s Avraham Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry and its former Chairman. An internationally-renowned specialist on the demography of world Jewry, he published numerous books and over 250 papers. He is a member of the Yad Vashem Committee for the Righteous of the Nations, received the Marshall Sklare Award from the Association for the Social Scientific Study of Jewry (1999) and the Mifa’al Hapayis Michael Landau Prize for research in Demography and Migration (2013). viii list of contributors

Manfred Gerstenfeld is a member of the Board of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and its former Chairman (2000-2012). He has been an international business strategist for forty years. His background is in chemistry, economics, environ- mental scholarship, and Jewish studies. Gerstenfeld has published more than twenty books. They have appeared in seven languages. He is the 2012 recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award of the Journal for the Study of Anti-Semitism.

Jan Láníček is a post-doctoral Fellow in Jewish History at the University of New South Wales in Sydney. He received his PhD from the University of Southampton in Britain in 2011. He published a book entitled, Czechs, Slovaks and the Jews, 1938-1948: Beyond Idealisation and Condemnation (Palgrave, 2013) and co-edited a volume on Governments-in-Exile and the Jews during the Second World War, (Vallentine Mitchell, 2013).

Rafi Mann is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Communication at the Ariel University in Israel and a teaching Fellow in the Communication and Journalism department at the Hebrew University, Jerusalem. He authored and co-authored several books on Israel’s media and history. In 2013, he was awarded The Prime Minister Prize for his latest book entitled The Leader and the Media: Ben-Gurion and the Struggle over Israel’s Public Sphere, 1948-1963.

Françoise S. Ouzan received her PhD in history from the Paris-Sorbonne University. She was an Associate Professor at the University of Reims prior to her current positions as Senior Research Associate at the Goldstein-Goren Diaspora Research Center of Tel Aviv University and at the French Research Center in Jerusalem (CRFJ/CNRS/MAE). She is the author of several books and articles on displaced persons, antisemitism and American Jewry, and recently co-edited Holocaust Survivors: Resettlement, Memories, Identities (Berghahn Books: New York, 2012).

Izio Rosenman is a Polish child survivor of the Buchenwald Nazi concentration camp. He arrived in France at age 10 and became a researcher and Professor of Physics as well as a Psychoanalyst and Child Psychotherapist. He is Chairman of AJHL, list of contributors ix the French Association for Secular and Humanistic Judaism, and Editor in Chief of the magazine Plurielles.

Ada Schein is an independent historian and an educator. She holds a PhD in Holocaust studies from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Her research covers the Holocaust and its aftermath, in particular the absorption of the survivors into Israeli society in the early stages of statehood. Among her publications is Dwell in Safety: Holocaust Survivors in Rural Cooperative Settlement, with Shlomo Bar-Gil (Jerusalem, Yad Vashem, 2010).

Shmuel Trigano is Professor of Sociology of Religion and Politics at Paris University, Founding Director of the Université Populaire du Judaïsme (2014–) of Pardès, a European Journal of Jewish Studies and Culture (1985–). He is President of the Observatoire du Monde Juif (2001). He created ‘Controverses’ (2006– 2011), a journal of ideas. He has been the Founding Director (1986–2013) of the College of Jewish Studies at the Alliance Israélite Universelle. Professor Trigano has published 21 books in the field of philosophy, political thought and Jewish studies.

Ewa Węgrzyn wrote her doctoral thesis about the emigration of Polish Jews to Israel from 1956 to 1959. She teaches at the Institute of Jewish Studies at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland.

David Weinberg is Professor Emeritus at Bowling Green State University and Wayne State University. From 1993 through 2013, he served as Director of the Cohn- Haddow Center for Judaic Studies and Professor of History at Wayne State University and has been a visiting professor in numerous universities. He is presently preparing a study of the reconstruction of Jewish life in Western Europe after World War II, which will be published as part of Littman Press’ Library of Jewish Civilizations.

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the Goldstein-Goren Diaspora Research Center of Tel Aviv University for having organized the international conference that gave birth to this volume, and for its generosity in supporting research on postwar Jewish identity. Our special thanks go to Simha Goldin, director of the Center, as well as to Ora Azta and Sara Appel, its two pillars. We appreciate the support of the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany and of the Centre de Recherche Français à Jérusalem (CRFJ/CNRS/ MAE) in the organization of the conference. We also wish to thank our copy-editor, Yohai Goell and the editors of Brill for their advice and efficiency, in particular Katelyn Chin, Julia Berick, and Paige Sammartino. We would like to extend our gratitude to Eliezer Ben-Rafael, Judith Bokser-Liwerant and Yosef Gorny for having encouraged us to publish our volume in the Brill series of “Jewish Identities in a Changing World”.

Introduction—Diverging Groups of Jewish Displaced Persons

Manfred Gerstenfeld and Françoise S. Ouzan

The immediate postwar era has witnessed almost a century of displacement of populations, forced or voluntary, and has initiated the development of a policy on refugees.1 This volume offers insights into the major Jewish migration movements and the rebuilding of European Jewish communities in the mid-twentieth century. Its articles illustrate many facets of these people’s often traumatic experiences. They include the rehabilitation of individuals who had to find their way again in their countries of origin or who had to start from scratch in a new land. They follow their experiences and hardships which vary from country to country and from one community of migrants to another. For the sake of comparison, this book also addresses the mass exodus of Jews from Arab and Muslim countries. Such a perspective provides a broader insight into how those challenges were met. These two migrations were a result of persecution, or well-justified fear thereof, as well as discrimination. As a consequence, similarities and differences between Holocaust survivors and migrants from Muslim countries complement our understanding of the issues at stake in Jewish migration. The resurgence of antisemitism continued in the war’s aftermath in some eastern European countries and also became more prevalent in Muslim countries.2 Thus antisemitism led to further emigration. Both the Jews who survived the Shoah and those who emigrated from hostile Muslim countries had to find their place in societies which functioned without them. Holocaust survivors who returned to their European countries of origin had to make major efforts to reintegrate.3

1 The Uprooted: Forced Migration as an International Problem in the Post-War Era, ed. Göran Rystadt (Lund, Lund University Press, 1990). For an articulated survey of the historiography on postwar ‘relief’, see Sharif Gemie and Laure Humbert, “Writing History in the Aftermath of ‘Relief’: Some Comments on ‘Relief in the Aftermath of War’” Journal of Contemporary History 44, 2 (2009): 309–18. 2 La fin du Judaïsme en terres d’Islam, ed. Shmuel Trigano (Paris: Denoël, 2009). 3 Manfred Gerstenfeld, interview with David Bankier, “Wartime Jews in Post-War Europe: A Cool Reception at Best,” in Europe’s Crumbling Myths: The Post-Holocaust Origins of Today’s Anti-Semitism, Manfred Gerstenfeld (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Yad Vashem, and World Jewish Congress, 2003), 93.

In many places, various individuals and groups had amassed belongings by looting or acquiring Jewish possessions at cut-rate prices. The Jews often had to fight to get part of their possessions back and many times did not succeed. Having survived terrible conditions, they lacked the physical and spiritual stamina to fight against insensitive bureaucracy and its intricacies. Survivors’ homes and workplaces had also been taken over by others. According to estimates, only 20 percent of pre-war Jewish possessions have been returned.4 We should bear in mind that already during the Second World War several leaders in exile of occupied countries had expressed their reservations about the return of Jews to their lands of origin. In this book, essays on countries such as Poland and Czechoslovakia refer to this. As a consequence also of their postwar experiences, for many Jews the question of migration became an important issue. For Jewish concentration camp survivors who found themselves in Germany at the end of the war, the answer to this question was almost always in the affirmative. For Jewish Displaced Persons (DPs) who came from eastern Europe, the issue of returning to their countries of origin was a major one in view of the postwar situation there. Often, they lived their lives in temporary conditions, waiting for an immigration certificate for Palestine or languishing for years in a DP camp in the hope of obtaining a visa to America or elsewhere. For survivors who returned to western Europe or emerged from hiding, the existential question was posed thus: should one try to rebuild one’s life in a place that was directly associated with the memories of murdered family members and friends, or should one go live elsewhere—and if so, in which country? Other diverse and complex situations arose in the aftermath of the war: many Jews who dwelt under Communist regimes would later realize that they had chosen the wrong country. Subsequent waves of emigration would lead to a further substantial reduction in the number of Jews residing in these countries. Survivors who migrated to other countries came to communities in which all jobs were already taken and where they faced a number of handicaps. The same is true for those who fled or left Muslim countries, either for Israel or elsewhere. These moves frequently involved identity crises. Survivors and refugees often had to reshape their identities in different ways. Moreover, the societies

4 Sidney Zabludoff, “Restitution of Holocaust Era Assets: Promises and Reality,” Jewish Political Studies Review 19, 1–2 (Spring 2007): 3–14. In France, for instance, the restitution process was easier than in Belgium or in the Netherlands; see Jean-Marc Dreyfus, “Post -Liberation French Administration and the Jews,” in Holocaust Survivors: Resettlement, Memories, Identities, ed. Dalia Ofer, Françoise S. Ouzan, and Judith Tydor Baumel-Schwartz (New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2012), 115. Introduction 3 into which they arrived viewed them differently from how they saw themselves. The experiences of survivors during the war had been life-threatening. Many emerged from the war with major health problems and/or psychological scars which would often resurface many years later. Postwar events were also traumatic for those who returned to their societies of origin or migrated. In Poland, many survivors risked their lives by returning shortly after the war and a number of them were murdered. In many countries there was little sympathy from non-Jewish neighbors for the Jews’ wartime experiences. How were survivor communities to confront the memory of the Holocaust when these memories were not shared by the surrounding non-Jewish population? In countries which had been occupied by the Germans, there was often a psychological need to stress and sometimes exaggerate the importance of the national resistance against the occupiers.5 At the same time, there were disagreements among Jews themselves as to how to deal with memorials.6 If one wants to focus on a brighter future, should one dismiss the past as much as possible? The positions of Jewish individuals and communities on these issues often changed over the decades. On a national level, there were other questions. Should the murderous persecution of the Jews be considered part of the history of the country to which they belonged? The atrocities had not been initiated by the countries occupied by the Germans, even if a variety of their nationals had collaborated with them and others were directly involved in the persecution of Jews. Even though Jews had been far harder hit percentage-wise than other people, after the war their major torment was often neglected or became anonymous within the general history of wartime suffering. In Communist countries, Jewish suffering was not separated from the general society’s wartime plight. In addition, the attitudes of Jews toward the punishment of war criminals were often not iden- tical with those of the majority society. The Jews’ input was hardly considered until much later on some occasions. In western Europe, Jewish memorials were initially established mainly within Jewish environments, i.e., synagogues, cemeteries, and institutions. Specific commemoration of Jewish victims found its place in the public domain only much later. This also resulted from the changing viewpoints in general society on what had happened during the war and its aftermath, how history was recounted, and on how the place of Jews in society was perceived.

5 Tsilla Hershco, “The Jewish Resistance in France during World War II: The Gap between History and Memory,” Jewish Political Studies Review 19, 1–2 (2007): 49–57. 6 De la mémoire de la Shoah dans le monde juif, ed. Françoise Ouzan and Dan Michman (Paris: CNRS éditions, 2008). 4 Gerstenfeld and Ouzan

Of a different nature were the organizational problems of the postwar Jewish communities in lands which had been occupied by the Germans. The decimation of the Jews meant that how they organized after the war had to be different from their pre-war situation. This was not only the result of their reduced numbers. Jews had many other major pressing needs, including social assistance and restitution of private and communal assets. Moreover, a different but no less important problem still had to be dealt with: the upkeep of a large number of cemeteries by the much smaller postwar Jewish communities. In that context, the issue of Jewish identity appears most complex. The Germans did not differentiate between those who belonged to the organized Jewish community and those whom they considered as Jews. After the war, there was a need for a more inclusive approach in Jewish organizations. Many Jews had remained with little or no family and thus were very much alone and sought social contacts in the remaining Jewish community. Others, however, did not want to identify in any way with being Jewish, sometimes hiding that fact not only from the outside world, but even from their own children. Some of these people or their offspring would take a renewed interest in their Jewish roots many decades later. Due to their special needs, postwar Jewish communities were very dependent on the attitude of governments and local authorities. The situation differed from country to country, especially between the Communist and democratic countries. Many national ideological factors played a role here as far as day-today life and memorialization of the past were concerned. When people and organizations from outside wished to help the Jews, there was often a problem in understanding their specific spiritual and psychological needs. Many of the issues discussed above are interrelated, as shown in several articles in this volume. From today’s vantage point, one can maintain that despite all the problems, many Jewish migrants from the Middle East and Europe have rebuilt their lives. Numerous Jewish communities in Europe were re-established and several of them flourished once again. Holocaust survivors and Jewish migrants from Muslim countries made many significant contributions to Israel and the other countries to which they migrated.7

7 Several articles in this volume draw on papers presented at the International Conference on Displacement, Migration, and Social Integration (1945–1967) held at Tel Aviv University, 15–16 May 2011. The conference was initiated by Françoise Ouzan and the team of the Goldstein-Goren Diaspora Research Center of Tel Aviv University, in cooperation with the Centre de Recherche Français de Jérusalem (CRFJ/CNRS/MAE) and with the support of the Claims Conference. The academic steering committee included Dalia Ofer, Dina Porat, Simha Goldin, Florence Heymann, Maurice Roumani, and Astrid von Busekist. Introduction 5

The complexity of the issues related to postwar Jewish migration is further demonstrated by the diversity of the articles of this volume. Part One is devoted to the plight of those uprooted after 1945 and the social and juridical responses it entailed. Providing a wide framework, Sergio DellaPergola reflects on the consequences of Jewish mobility. He focuses on the emergence of transnational identities and connections as well as on the evolving patterns of identification of individuals with their near or more distant environment. The consequences of the displacement of populations engendered by the Third Reich are multiple. Focusing on Displaced Persons in the DP camps of Austria, Ada Schein examines a neglected issue. Providing medical treatment for Jewish refugees was essential to enable them to move on from Vienna to the American zone of occupation. The American Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) realized that a comprehensive healthcare policy needed to be planned to address the medical demands of the Displaced Persons waiting for a visa in DP camps. Cooperation between the JDC, the Jewish Agency, and Holocaust survivors was not easily created during the DP camps period. However, it played a central role in later enabling the young State of Israel to devote attention to needy Holocaust survivors, those handicapped and chronically ill who could only find refuge in the Jewish state. Was the Law of Return “a national solution to an international problem”? Jacques Amar raises this question and provides analytical tools for understanding the legal parallels and interactions between the international law concept of the refugee and the Israeli Law of Return. Indeed, the adoption of that law, considered the crucial feature of Israeli immigration, coincided with the emergence of the status of refugees under international law. From 1950 until 1967, given the war’s aftermath and the forced migration of Jews from a number of North African countries, implementation of the Law of Return was mainly interpreted as a solution to the Jewish refugee problem. After the Six- Day War (1967), Israel was no longer a land of refugees, since migrants came mainly by choice and no longer out of fear of persecution or because they were deprived of their nationality and citizenship. Part Two is devoted to postwar Jewish migration and Czechoslovakia, essentially a country of transit. What was the part played by humanitarian considerations in the political decisions taken by this pivotal country? In the official rhetoric of most governments, the humanitarian aspect of the refugee problem is generally emphasized. However, a closer analysis often reveals that nar- row political concerns weighed heavily when governments had to respond to refugee crises. Focusing on Jewish refugees in Polish and Czech border regions after 1945, Kateřina Čapková argues that political decisions were part of a political strategy 6 Gerstenfeld and Ouzan aimed at presenting a democratic image of the respective states. In that context, empathy seemed to have been out of the picture. As a matter of fact, these policies particularly affected Jewish refugees from the territories that had been annexed by the Soviet Union, i.e., eastern Poland and Carpathian Ruthenia. For instance, several thousand Jews feared the so-called ‘repatriation’ to Carpathian Ruthenia because they perceived it as ‘deportation’. It was because of that threat that Jews went to DP camps in Germany.8 However, thousands of them remained in Bohemia where they rebuilt a vital communal life in the former Sudetenland. What was the attitude of the Jewish communal leadership after the war in Czechoslovakia? Examining the crucial year of 1948, when Czechoslovakia was among the first states to grant de jure recognition to the State of Israel, Jan Láníček tackles that issue with a wealth of archival material. He focuses on the activities and public discourse of the Council of the Jewish Religious Communities in Bohemia and Moravia and enquires about the attitude of the ‘cleansed’ Jewish leadership, after the Communist coup in Czechoslovakia. Part Three focuses on the postwar revival of Jewish communal life. Izio Rosenman, a former ‘Buchenwald child’, narrates his own story while relating it to life in concentration camps and the difficult ‘reconstruction’ that followed for young survivors. While he differentiates between the concentration camp experiences of an adult and that of a child or an adolescent, he sheds new light on the powerlessness of parents in the concentration camp and how it affected children. How did young survivors rebuild their lives in spite of their traumatic memories and handicaps? To that complex question, Izio Rosenman answers with a simple word: tears. They had to learn how to cry again and to express their emotions. Was it preferable for their personal reconstruction to stay in a foster family or in a children’s home?9 Concentration camp children were thought to be weird, so being among themselves in a home gave them a sense of security. Rosenman depicts how he perceived the part played by the

8 Tommie Sjöberg, The Powers and the Persecuted: The Intergovernmental Committee on Refugees (ICGR), 1938–1947 (Lund: Lund University Press, 1991), 198. 9 This question haunted Judith Hemmendiger, then a young social worker who took care of a group of ‘Buchenwald children’ in an OSE children’s home. Interviews of Judith Hemmendiger by Françoise Ouzan, Jerusalem, October 2009. See also Judith Hemmendiger and Robert Krell, The Children of Buchenwald: Child Survivors of the Holocaust and Their Post-war Lives (Jerusalem: Gefen, 2000). For the practical purposes of our volume, the term Shoah (destruction, devastation, extinction) has been considered as equivalent to the term Holocaust (a voluntary religious sacrifice). Although the two words are used interchangeably in public discourse, the former is clearly more appropriate. Introduction 7

Oeuvre de Secours aux Enfants (OSE) which strove to revive Jewish communal life in France. The crucial role of Jewish chaplains in the rebirth or revival of Jewish cultural and Jewish life in France is often understated.10 Through case studies, Françoise Ouzan analyses the multifaceted impact of American Jewish chaplains, both in DP camps and in the disrupted French Jewish communities at the end of the war. They helped restore the practice of Judaism and returned dignity to survivors, reinvigorating Jewish life in Rheims or in postwar Paris. Unofficial cooperation by the U.S. Army with Jewish chaplains enabled them to overcome obstacles. To what extent did survivors have an impact on the societies into which they integrated or reintegrated? David Weinberg shows that their arrival and settlement had a profound impact on religious life and Jewish educational institutions. The influx of observant eastern European Jews revitalized French Judaism in many ways. Immigrants contributed to the maintenance of an active Yiddish life, at least in the first generation. The Yiddish press in France also helped to acculturate the new arrivals, providing them with guidance on French behavior in public, or on the French language. However, by the mid- and late 1950s, almost half of the eastern European Jews who had arrived a few years earlier had left France for Palestine/Israel or for the United States and Canada, or even for Poland or Rumania. Those who remained vivified eastern European Jewish religious and cultural life in France. Their children later assumed important positions in the nation’s economy and cultural life. The situation of the Jews in the Netherlands after the war is both complex and little known. Manfred Gerstenfeld’s article is focused on the postwar revival of the Jewish community in the Netherlands, where he grew up. He relates that more than 100,000 of the 140,000 Dutch Jews were murdered in the Holocaust. From the end of 1943 until the liberation in May 1945, no Jews had been seen in the public domain in the Netherlands. The postwar reception of the Jews into Dutch society had many negative aspects. During the first ten years after the war, the re-emerging Jewish communities were up against major difficulties. The government largely neglected the heavily damaged Dutch Jewry. After 1955, the situation improved significantly. In the twenty-first century, however, Dutch Jewry has again been confronted with major challenges. Part Four focuses on another crucial aspect of postwar migration, especially after the creation of the Jewish state: emigration to Israel from Europe and the Middle East. What at that time motivated Jews to emigrate from Poland to

10 Yehuda Bauer and Alex Grobman were among the first historians to emphasize the lasting effect of chaplains on survivors and on the Zionist tendencies of postwar refugees. 8 Gerstenfeld and Ouzan

Israel? Ewa Węgrzyn devotes her contribution to this emigration from 1956 to 1959. While Poland had once been the homeland of the Jews, it became a ruin after their genocide. Centuries-old traditions perished as many representatives of the world of science and Jewish culture had been exterminated, including leaders of social and political life. There were three large waves of Jewish emigration, the first from 1945 until 1949, the second one to the end of the 1950s, and the third in 1968. An important point remains the negative attitude of Polish society, which destroyed the hopes of many Jews to rebuild their lives in a land that had already been witness to numerous pogroms, even after 1945. Adopting a sociological approach, Shmuel Trigano contends that European migration in the aftermath of the Shoah has been interpreted according to humanitarian expectations. That is why the pattern of memory referring to the ethos of the victim won out over the political impact of the destruction of the Jews. He further demonstrates that, to the contrary, Jewish migration from the Arab world has not yet been interpreted. Since Jews in the Arab world were not massively decimated as were European Jews, their tragedy has been minimized. Why did the Jews leave Morocco? Yigal Bin-Nun focuses on the reasons for this departure as well as on the historiographical problems it entailed. The starting point of his study is the history of Morocco and its Jewish community and its contacts with Israeli emissaries who strongly promoted aliyah for the Jews, convinced as they were of the dangers facing Jews in Morocco. The history of the Jewish community during the early years of Moroccan independence was characterized by permanent concern about an impending disaster. It was then that the Jewish community was forced to face numerous questions, among them whether to seek personal and communal success in Morocco, or rather to flee for fear of a disaster. Can the history of the three-way relationship between Israel, the Moroccan government, and Moroccan Jewry be titled “the catastrophe that did not happen”? There are countless viewpoints from which the integration of different groups of immigrants into Israeli society can be studied. Rafi Mann chose to conduct such an analysis through the prism of the media, in particular radio (Kol Israel). “The Voice of Israel” was considered the main media channel by the state. Such a perspective raises central issues: how did the absorbing society communicate with the newcomers who were neither students nor soldiers and could not understand Hebrew? The author contends that Yemenites were treated differently than Jews who had migrated from the Middle East and North Africa. As immigration from Yemen had started in the 1880s, they were already part of the ‘Yishuv’, the Jewish community that lived under the British Mandate before the independence of Israel. Israel’s leading political party Introduction 9

Mapai struggled in the early 1950s to communicate with Arabic speaking new immigrants, as Arabic radio broadcasts had a different aim—notably to counter the propaganda war of enemies—and not to educate newly arrived citizens. Mapai published a weekly magazine in Arabic (the Homeland, El Watan) which had a limited circulation, as if Arabic had remained the language of the enemy. Was the absorbing elite able to establish effective mass communication with immigrants in the first years of the fledgling state? How did it exacerbate tensions between the great majority of Oriental Jews who spoke Arabic and the absorbing elites? This is an issue that has lasting consequences for today. ∵ In short, the various articles of this volume tackle sociological and concep- tual issues, some of which still resonate today. Our conclusions emphasize the fact that the postwar Jewish refugee issue can be viewed from three different standpoints: the problem of Jews from eastern Europe, and especially Poland where pogroms still occurred after the Second World War; the issue of the postwar reintegration and assimilation of Jews who had been socially rejected and/or deported as was the case in France; and finally, the social exclusion of North African Jews and the threats to their lives. Antisemitism in Europe and in particular in Poland cannot be compared to the anti-Jewish feelings and strategies of exclusion suffered by the Jews in North Africa. Political and social contexts were different. However, further research is needed in areas providing an insight into the various forms of integration, cultural assimilation, and strategies of acculturation.

Jerusalem, May 2014

PART 1 The Plight of the Uprooted: Social and Legal Responses

∵

Reflections on the Multinational Geography of Jews After World War II

Sergio DellaPergola

Overview

Historians often—though not necessarily all or always—tend to define the subject of their research in terms of a given time periodization reflecting the different contexts within which history operates. Such changing contexts reflect radical transformations in politics and governance regimes, the economy, religion, technologies, logistics, and above all, the shared paradigms of knowledge and expectation which crucially influence the capacity of men and women to act. A typical division of labor in Jewish historiography often pre- vails between specialized studies of the period of the Shoah, its antecedents and consequences, versus longer term studies of Jewish society before and after what can be naturally perceived as the planetary chasm in the modern history of the Jews. On the demographic and sociological side of the disciplinary range, these and similar constraints surely operate and affect judgment of observed events, but the relevant time and other contextual circumstances do not necessarily coincide with those of the historian. Demographic processes tend to evolve more fluidly, in the longer run, and according to a set of drivers which do not change much in substance, although they may come into being from time to time under entirely different circumstances or may generate quite different consequences under similar initial circumstances. These drivers operate in the biological domain (births and deaths), in the mobility domain (incoming and outgoing migration), and for members of a minority also in the cultural identification domain (joining the specific group or severing links with it). All of these are worthy of attention as timeless and universal phenomena that jointly shaped the whole course of Jewish history, as part of the history of mankind, and in particular as ways that have determined the geographical configuration of the Jewish presence. Jewish population has been and is dispersed globally and constitutes the paradigm of a multinational transnational diaspora. Exposure of Jews to different local environments and the contingencies of a changing geography deeply affected the intensity and quality of interaction of Jews with their non-Jewish neighbors, and remarkably penetrated the deeper

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ��4 | doi 10.1163/9789004277779_003 14 DellaPergola layers of Jewish self-appraisal, knowledge, religion, and political behavior at the local level—hence the cumulative global profile of the Jewish collective. Since the eve of World War II, in addition to the catastrophic consequences of persecution and systematic annihilation, the intensive absorption of international migration determined important shifts in the geographical distribution of the Jews across and within countries. Further changes in the size and visibility of Jewish communities worldwide and in Europe were related to internal changes in marriage patterns and the family, and to changes in Jewish identification. After the upheavals of World War II and the Shoah, of postwar mass migration and dislocations, world Jewry was able to regain a new and more stable configuration, which in turn enabled the resumption of inter- rupted social mobility processes and unprecedented socioeconomic achievement. An entirely new global Jewish geography emerged, with Israel eventually arising as the largest center of contemporary Jewish life, the persistence of a strong Jewish presence in North America, and conspicuous centers of Jewish life in other main urban areas in the western countries. This occurred along with drastic decline of the Jewish presence in eastern Europe, its virtual disappearance from Muslim countries, and the decline or death of Jewish life in the small city that for long had constituted the backbone of Jewish life and culture. At the same time, patterns of Jewish identity and creativity were remarkably resilient, in spite of the constant erosion generated by assimilation and ageing, while significant changes occurred in the basic meanings and forms of expression of Jewish identity. This article extends, updates, and elaborates materials already discussed in broader lines elsewhere.11 We provide here an integrated view of some aspects of Jewish population distribution with special attention to Europe before and after the Shoah and during the seventy years since World War II. We search for deeper socioeconomic and socio-cultural drivers beyond time and geographical divisions, toward a better understanding of the global forces that contribute to shaping the Jewish experience.

11 Sergio DellaPergola, “International Migration of Jews,” in Transnationalism: Diasporas and the Advent of a New (Dis)order, ed. Eliezer Ben-Rafael and Yitzhak Sternberg (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2009), 3–34; id., “Jews in Europe: Demographic trends, Contexts, Outlooks,” in A Road to Nowhere?: Jewish Experiences in Unifying Europe, ed. Julius H. Schoeps and Olaf Glöckner (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2011), 3–34. Reflections on the Multinational Geography of Jews 15

Jewish Population Changes, 1939–2013

Let us first review the major shifts in Jewish population distribution—globally and with special attention to Europe—between 1939 and 2013.12 The whole period can be divided into three parts: the years of World War II (1939–1945); the years of reconstruction until the watershed of the Six-Day War (1945–1970); and the more recent period (1970–2013) (see Tables 1 and 2). World Jewish population was estimated at 16.5 million in 1939, of which 9.5 million in Europe (58%), and was reduced to 11 million in 1945, of which 3.8 million (35%) in Europe. The total loss of 5.7 million Jews in Europe reflects a somewhat higher number of direct and indirect victims of the Shoah minus some natural increase that occurred in countries not subject to the enemy’s duress. Between 1939 and 1945, Jewish population diminished by about 400,000 in western and central Europe, and by about 5.3 million in eastern Europe and the Balkans (here including Turkey, most of whose Jewish population lived and lives on the European side of the Bosporus). Jewish population between 1939 and 1945 globally declined by 33%, in Europe by 60%— 30% in western Europe and 65% in eastern Europe. Looking at individual countries during the war period, the Jewish population that suffered most was in Poland (–97%), followed by Greece (–89%), Austria and Czechoslovakia (–88%), Yugoslavia (–84%), Germany and the Netherlands (–77%), the Baltic countries (–74%), Belgium (–66%), Byelorussia (–61%), Hungary (–55%), and Ukraine, here assessed together with Moldova (–51%). These figures point to the exceptionally tragic incidence of the Shoah in countries all across Europe’s occupied regions in eastern Europe, the Balkans, central and western Europe. The Jewish population in several other European countries, including the major Soviet republic of Russia and other western European countries suffered somewhat to quite lower losses. A few Western areas, such as the United Kingdom, the Scandinavian countries, the Iberian Peninsula, and Switzerland, added some Jews through absorption of refugees or internal growth. Moreover in 1945 there remained a significant bulk of over 200,000 Displaced Persons, nearly double the amount on the eve of the war. The process of reconstruction of European Jewry that began immediately after World War II brought about the gradual normalization of the more acute cases of displacement, return to normal family life, and a temporary substantial increase in the low Jewish birth rate that had prevailed since the 1930s. Much broader Jewish population redistribution involved the emigration to

12 Sergio DellaPergola, “World Jewish Population 2013,” American Jewish Year Book 113, Arnold Dashefsky and Ira M. Sheskin, eds (Dordrecht: Springer, 2013), 279–358. 16 DellaPergola

Table 1 Jewish Population Distribution, Thousands, 1939–2013

Country 1939 1945 1970 2013

World, total 16,500 11,000 12,645 13,855 Europe, total 9,500 3,800 3,232 1,416 As % of world 58 35 26 10

Western Europe, total 1,350 944 1,112 1,039 As % of world 8 9 9 7

Portugal, Spain, Gibraltar 6 9 10 13 France 320 180 530 478 Italy 47 29 32 28 Switzerland 19 25 20 17 Austria 60 7 8 9 Germany 195 45 30 118 Belgium, Luxembourg 93 32 34 31 Netherlands 141 33 30 30 United Kingdom, Ireland 345 350 395 291 Scandinavia 17 24 23 24 Displaced persons 107 210 0 0

Eastern Europe, total 8,150 2,856 2,120 376 As % of world 49 26 17 3

Poland 3,225 100 9 3 Baltics 253 66 66 11 Byelorussia 375 147 148 12 Russia 903 860 808 190 Ukraine, Moldova 1,863 916 875 69 Czechoslovakia 357 42 14 7 Hungary 404 180 70 48 Romania 520 430 70 9 Bulgaria 50 45 7 2 Yugoslavia 75 12 7 4 Greece 75 8 7 4 Turkey 50 50 39 17

Source: Sergio DellaPergola, “Demography”, EncyclopaediaJudaica, 2d ed., vol. 5 (Jerusalem 2006), 553–72; id., “World Jewish Population 2013” Reflections on the Multinational Geography of Jews 17

Table 2 Jewish Population Percentages of Change, 1939–2013

Country % Difference % Difference % Difference 1939–1945 1945–1970 1970–2013

World, total –33 15 10 Europe, total –60 –15 –56

Western Europe, total –30 18 –7

Portugal, Spain, Gibraltar 50 11 29 France –44 194 –10 Italy –38 10 –12 Switzerland 32 –20 –13 Austria –88 14 13 Germany –77 –33 293 Belgium, Luxembourg –66 6 –9 Netherlands –77 –9 0 United Kingdom, Ireland 1 13 –26 Scandinavia 41 –4 3 Displaced persons 96 –100 –

Eastern Europe, total –65 –26 –82

Poland –97 –91 –64 Baltics –74 0 –83 Byelorussia –61 1 –92 Russia –5 –6 –76 Ukraine, Moldova –51 –4 –92 Czechoslovakia –88 –67 –54 Hungary –55 –61 –31 Romania –17 –84 –87 Bulgaria –10 –84 –71 Yugoslavia –84 –42 –46 Greece –89 –13 –31 Turkey 0 –22 –56

Source: Table 1 18 DellaPergola

Israel of many Shoah survivors and the massive transfer there of a large segment of the Jewish population in Islamic countries prompted by violence that accompanied Israel’s War of Independence. Subsequently, Israel continued to constitute the main country of access for Jewish migrants from eastern Europe, that in the meantime had mostly fallen under the control of the Soviet Union. In turn, with the advancement of the process of decolonization, especially in North Africa, large scale Jewish migration impacted the geography of European Jewry. The net consequence during the years 1945–1970 was a further reduction of European Jewry by nearly 600,000 (–15%), but while western Europe gained on balance 168,000 (+18%), eastern Europe lost 736,000 (–26%). The country that benefited the most was France—a nearly three-fold growth—with moderate gains of 10–15% in the UK, Austria, Italy, and Spain. On the other hand eastern European countries saw their Jewish population diminish by as much as 91% in Poland, 84% in Romania and Bulgaria, 67% in Czechoslovakia, 61% in Hungary, 42% in Yugoslavia, and 33% in Germany. The Soviet republics in Europe were quite more stable, at a time when some of those displaced during the war resettled while emigration to the West and Israel was only at its very incipient stages. The more recent period (1970–2013) was dominated by significant emigration from the Soviet Union, the collapse of the USSR, and the massive exodus from what now became the Former Soviet Union (FSU). The Jewish population in Europe diminished by 1.8 million (–56%), from over 3.2 million in 1970 to just above 1.4 million in 2013 (10% of world Jewry). There was a decline of about 100,000 in western Europe (–7%) and over 1.7 million in eastern Europe (–82%). Looking at individual countries, the most affected were Byelorussia and Ukraine together with Moldova (–92%), Romania (–87%), the Baltic states (–83%), Russia (–76%), Bulgaria (–71%), Poland (–64%), Turkey (–56%), Czechoslovakia (–54%), Yugoslavia (–46%), and Hungary and ]Greece (–31%). Among Western countries, the UK and Ireland underwent a decline of –26%, and several other countries (France, Italy, and Switzerland) lost around or more than 10%. The main beneficiary of population transfers was Germany whose Jewish population grew nearly four-fold, with smaller increases in Spain and Portugal, Austria, and Scandinavia. These population shifts are graphically portrayed in Figure 1 where percentages of Jewish population change in each period before and after World War II are displayed. Countries are consistently displayed in the same order as the ranking of population change—from most negative to most positive— between 1939 and 1945. While there are manifest differences between the three periods in the amount of population change in each country, it is notable that some of the countries that lost the most during the Shoah continued to lose significantly in the following periods. Reflections on the Multinational Geography of Jews 19

‒

Poland Greece Austria Czechoslovakia Yugoslavia Germany Netherlands Baltics Belgium EAST. EUR. TOTAL Byelorussia Hungary Ukraine, Moldova France Italy WORLD TOTAL WEST. EUR. TOTAL Romania Bulgaria Russia Turkey United Kingdom Switzerland Scandinavia Portugal, Spain Displaced persons ‒ ‒ ‒ ‒ Figure 1 Jewish Population Percent Difference, 1939–2013* * Countries ranked in the same order as by percent of change in 1939–1945 source: table 2.

Whether it was mainly the consequences of the Shoah or other possible factors that determined subsequent Jewish population changes in Europe is, therefore, a question that requires further scrutiny. One way to look at the issue is to jointly process and synthetize the country-by-country percentages of growth or decline over the three periods considered here. This is done here through a Small Space Analysis (SSA) of the relevant data. SSA is a procedure relying on Facet Theory which helps to find deeper latent relationships that exist within complex data sets.13 The results are presented graphically in ways much more effective and friendly than a huge correlation matrix or even statistical inference procedures. In Figure 2, the combined similarities and dissimilarities between Jewish populations in twenty-two European countries or group of countries over three periods of time are plotted so that each country is marked by a serial number. The distances between country markers represent the degree of similarity or dissimilarity in the respective paces of change not only over the whole period covering the years 1939–2013, but also in each

13 Shlomit Levy, “Lawful Roles of Facets in Social Theories,” in Facet Theory: Approaches to Social Research, ed. David Canter (New York: Springer-Verlag, 1985), 59–96. Reflections on the Multinational Geography of Jews 21 of the periods 1939–1945, 1945–1970, and 1970–2013. Two very close points indicate that the Jewish populations in the respective countries co-varied significantly; two distant points indicate that the respective Jewish populations grew or declined at very different paces. In addition, the whole space can be partitioned searching for a more general underlying logic beyond single country proximity and distance. Indeed it appears that all countries affected by the Shoah occupy one portion of the space, while all countries not affected occupy another portion. This would testify to the salience of the Shoah in population developments in the longer term as a discriminating factor in the demographic development of European Jewry. However, further space partitions appear that are unrelated to the Shoah. Among countries affected by the Shoah, all those in western-central Europe occupy a contiguous portion of space in the upper part of the figure, while all countries in eastern Europe and the Balkans occupy another portion in the lower part. Within the latter, the European republics of the FSU occupy a definite sub-space of their own. With some necessary adjustments concerning the position of Bulgaria and Turkey, the SSA map demonstrates that there are powerful similarities and dissimilarities between Jewish population trends related not to the Shoah but rather to the general geopolitical regional environment. For example, two countries that suffered similar drastic population reductions—the Netherlands and Poland—appear to be close, yet on the two sides of the east-west European divide. All in all, two major explanatory factors can be detected in the individual country profiles: one is the incidence of the Shoah in the country, from maxi- mum to minimum; the other is the main trend of Jewish population change between 1945 and 2013. Clearly, whatever the incidence of the Shoah, Jewish populations in western European countries were more resilient or even capable to grow more than those in eastern European countries. We further elaborate below on the socioeconomic and socio-cultural correlates of these distinctions.

The World Jewish Migration System, 1948–2103

Between the second half of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twenty- first century roughly 10 million Jews moved from, to, and across countries and continents. More than half, about 5.2 million, moved between 1948 and 2013. These figures stand against a total Jewish population estimated at 10.5 million in 1900, 16.5 million in 1939, 11 million in 1945, and 13.8 million in 2013, and 22 DellaPergola

Growth Portugal, Spain, Gibraltar France Western-Central Europe Italy Switzerland Austria Germany Belgium, Luxembourg Netherlands , Ireland Scandinavia Baltics Poland Byelorussia Russia Ukraine, Moldova Czechoslovakia Hungary Romania Bulgaria Yugoslavia Jewish Greece popul. Turkey trend Not afected by the Shoah

Eastern Europe – Balkans

Decline

MaximumShoah incidenceMinimum Figure 2 Small SpaceAnalysis (SSA) Representation of European Countries by Direction of Population Change, 1939–2013 Source: table 1.

demonstrate the uniquely high impact of migrants out of total Jewry. The mere observation of the size and distribution over time of this imposing human flow provides important interpretative clues about its nature. Not only did migration constitute the main vector of Jewish population redistribution, it also demonstrated the systemic nature of global Jewry. Consistent reciprocity modes were established across the main poles of Jewish settlement and resettlement. The intensity of such relationships was strongly affected by the nature of each type of place; hence the transfer of a person from place to place affected the likelihood of further movement from each place to another, with consequences for the volume and mobility directions across the whole Reflections on the Multinational Geography of Jews 23

Jewish migration system. Understanding the intermediary role of migration is therefore essential to development of a concept of a global Jewish society. It is a prerequisite in any attempt to move beyond the limited analytic perspective of the Jewish community within a given country toward an essential appraisal of the linkages, parallelisms, and mutual dependencies across a broader space. Figure 3 demonstrates a schematic concept of a world Jewish migration system based on four pillars: two main expediting areas, eastern Europe and

– = , ,

WESTERN , EASTERN EUROPE COUNTRIES [ % to Israel] (%) ,

(%) , , MUSLIM COUNTRIES , ASIA, AFRICA ISRAEL (%) [% to Israel]

– = , ,

WESTERN , EASTERN EUROPE COUNTRIES [ % to Israel] ( %) ,

(%) , , MUSLIM COUNTRIES ASIA, AFRICA , ISRAEL [ % to Israel] ( %)

Figure 3 World Jewish Migration System: Distribution of Main Flows by Areas of Origin and Destination, Number and Total Percent, 1948–2012* * The two main migration streams in each period are outlined with the dashed line Source: sergio DellaPergola, “migration,” encyclopaediaJudaica, 2d ed., vol. 14 (Jerusalem ENCYCLOPEDIA, 2006), 207–19; israel central bureau of statistics, statistical abstract of israel; and author’s estimates. 24 DellaPergola the Islamic countries in Asia and Africa; and two receiving areas, the Western countries and Israel. The estimates reported here refer to two main periods, 1948–1968 with a total estimated migration of nearly 1.9 million, and 1969– 2012, with a total of over 3.25 million migrants. Israel was the principal recipient of Jewish migration, 69% of the total during the earlier period and 59% during the latter. Thus Israel’s Jewish population gradually grew from a peripheral outlier of about 5% of total world Jewry to its largest single component with over 43% of the global Jewish population. During the first two decades, the two main migration streams were from Asia-Africa to Israel (37% of the global total) and from eastern Europe to Israel (27% of the global total). Israel received 81% of all Jewish migration from eastern Europe and 71% of the total from countries in Asia and Africa (the other main recipient being France). Since 1969, the two main streams were from eastern Europe to Israel (31% of total migrants) and from eastern Europe to Western countries (21% of the total). The share of total migrants choosing Israel diminished to 59% from eastern Europe and increased to 81% from Asia and Africa. During the earlier period, the migration balance between Israel and the Western countries and vice versa generated a constant surplus in favor of the latter, 10% versus 5% respectively of total migrants. During the latter period, both migration streams were more powerful, but also more balanced: 17% versus 16%, respectively. All in all, the highest emigration propensities relative to Jewish population size were from Asia-Africa, followed by eastern Europe. Israel featured relatively low and diminishing emigration propensities, and the lowest characterized the complex of Western countries—though with highly significant internal differentials (see below). Built in these large-scale Jewish migration transfers were considerable differences in the demographic, socioeconomic, and cultural characteristics of migrants. The profiles of migrants who moved from the same major area of origin to different areas of destinations were measurably different. Some of these differences reflected migration policies in the countries of origin and destination, while other aspects reflected the self-selection of migrants embed- ded in their own ideological propensities and extended family ties. All in all, Jewish migrants to western Europe and other Western countries featured a somewhat higher educational and occupational profile and an age composi- tion with significantly lower dependency ratios and more favorable conditions for initial absorption of immigrants. Some of these initial structural Jewish population gaps and imbalances actually became more acute during the first years after immigration, namely in Israel, but the longer term overall trend of Jewish immigration absorption was one of significant upward social mobility Reflections on the Multinational Geography of Jews 25 and sub-ethnic convergence. These features have been described elsewhere in greater detail.14

Socioeconomic Correlates of Global Jewish Population Distribution

Having seen the general picture of Jewish international migration and the emerging role of Israel as its main target, the first general impression may be that ideal motivations among Jews in the Diaspora and Israel’s accrued role on the international scene after 1948—and most likely even more after 1967— provide the main interpretative clue to the volume of migration and its variation over time. While the choice of Israel as a country for resettlement is not neutral and certainly reflects the involvement of idealistic components in decision-making, it is essential to also relate migration to Israel to a broader set of more general determinants, such as the socioeconomic status of the country in relation to other countries. In other words, besides the unique ideational factors that certainly play a role in explaining migration to Israel, other more general factors shared by Israel with other countries must be assessed as well. Significant variations in the pace of migration to Israel over time and across countries have been documented elsewhere.15 Here we focus on the relationship that may exist between the frequency of migration—expressed by the fraction of Jews who migrate to Israel per 1,000 of the Jewish population in the country of origin—and the level of development in the country of origin. Development is measured through the Index of Human Development (HDI), a measure suggested by the Human Development Programme of the United Nations.16 HDI is a compendium of three variables: the level of education, the level of health, and the level of income measured in terms of real purchase

14 See Sergio DellaPergola, Georges Sabagh, Mehdi Bozorgmehr, Claudia Der-Martirosian, and Susana Lerner, “Hierarchic Levels of Subethnicity: Near Eastern Jews in the U.S., France, and Mexico,” in Sociological Papers, 5, 2, ed. Ernest Krausz and Gitta Tulea (Ramat Gan: Bar Ilan University, 1996), 1–42; Sergio DellaPergola, “ ‘Sephardi and Oriental’ Migrations to Israel: Migration, Social Change and Identification,” in Studies in Contemporary Jewry, 22, ed. Peter Medding (New York: Oxford University Press, 2007), 3–43; id., “International Migration of Jews.” 15 Sergio DellaPergola, Jewish Demographic Policies: Population Trends and Options in Israel and in the Diaspora (Jerusalem: The Jewish People Policy Institute, 2011). 16 United Nations Development Programme, Human Development Report 2013: The Rise of the South: Human Progress in a Diverse World (New York: United Nations Development Programme, 2013). 26 DellaPergola

, Oversea Anglo Latin America , Western Europe Eastern Europe Asia-Africa

Figure 4 World Countries, by Number of Migrants to Israel per 1,000 Jews in Country of Origin, and Country’s HDI Ranking, 2013 Source: DellaPergola, “world jewish population 2013”; israel central bureau of statistics, statistical abstract of israel; united nations development programme, human development report 2013.

power among the total population in a given country. All countries can be assessed on these diverse measures and the synthetic indicator can be ranked from highest (1st) to lowest. In 2013, 186 countries could be assessed and ranked. Table 4 represents the relationship that existed in 2013 between the frequency of immigration to Israel per 1,000 Jews in the country of origin, and the country’s HDI rank. It should be noted that Israel itself was classified 16th out of 186—quite a high ranking. It therefore can be immediately surmised that migration to Israel is not only a consequence of ideational considerations but also a move to a country with a rather high standard of development, potentially attractive to residents of countries with a lower level of human development. As a general caveat it should also be mentioned that when factoring in two more variables—a measure of equality in income distribution and a measure of gender equality—Israel’s ranking deteriorates significantly from 16th to 21st and 25th respectively. In comparison the United States, which occupies 3rd place in the general HDI ranking, loses many more positions becoming 16th after adjusting for income inequality, and 41st after adjusting for gender inequality. The main HDI measure nonetheless constitutes a usable analytic tool for comparative purposes. Reflections on the Multinational Geography of Jews 27

In Figure 4 the respective rates of migration to Israel per 1,000 Jews in a country are represented with a logarithm scale in order to make reading of the data easier. The original data are tremendously skewed and the log scale allows better comparability, remembering that each ‘floor’ on the left scale is ten time higher than the level below. The correlation between country HDI rank and the frequency of migration to Israel is very powerful and negative: -61.1%. The R2 measure of explained variance of country migration rates is 0.373, meaning that if we assume that migration were to be explained exclusively by the levels of education, health, and income in the general population of a country, those basic variables alone would explain 37.3% of the total country variance. Reality is of course rather more complex, as it involves many more possible cultural, political, and personal determinants of migration, but this simple functionalist explanation is singularly powerful. Significant differences in the migration propensities outlined in Figure 4 appear not only between individual countries but also between broader geo- cultural regions. The lowest migration rates appear among countries here defined as Oversea Anglo—the transoceanic human and cultural product of past migrations initiated in the British Isles, including the U.S., Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. These countries also share some of the top HDI rankings. A second group of countries with somewhat weaker HDIs and higher migration rates is western Europe, followed by eastern Europe. Countries in Latin America and the FSU share comparatively similar HDIs, but migration rates from the FSU are significantly higher. Finally, in countries in Asia and Africa which today have only minimal Jewish populations, small numbers of migrants are sufficient to generate high migration frequencies. The extreme case is Ethiopia which, besides being one of the poorest countries in the world, generates a migration of persons (the Falash Mura) whose Jewishness is attained only after actual migration and conversion in Israel.17 Therefore, relatively large numbers of migrants in this case match with a Jewish population basically extinguished in the country of origin, thus producing artificially high migration rates. The large-scale and at the same time selective impact of Jewish international migration naturally affected the geographical configuration of world Jewry. By carefully assessing the final product of such movements one gains further insights on their deeper determinants and meaning. Figure 5 represents the relationship that existed in 2013 between the number of Jews per 1,000 of the total population (again expressed on a logarithm scale) in over 90 countries

17 Conversion in Israel is performed under the authority and rules of the Orthodox Chief Rabbinate. 28 DellaPergola

. Oversea Anglo Latin America . Western Europe Eastern Europe . Asia-Africa

. Figure 5 World Countries, by Number of Jews per 1,000 Total Population in Country of Residence, and HDI Country Ranking, 2013 Source: DellaPergola, “world jewish population 2013”; united nations development programme, human development report 2013.

(excluding Israel), and the level of development of the respective countries. Development is again measured through the HDI. Countries are arrayed along the horizontal axis according to the country rank among 186 with available data. The simple correlation between the two variables (country development and relative presence of Jews) is again very high: 64.4%. Assuming a direc- tional relationship between level of development and Jewish presence, the R2 measure of explained variance is 0.415, meaning that HDI ranking of a country alone explains 41.5% of inter-country variation in the percentage of Jews out of total population. This is a very high result, pointing to an extremely robust relationship. Evidently, one might postulate that the development of a country does not determine the relative presence of Jews but rather depends on it. No matter how attractive this hypothesis may look, it seems to reflect a rather naïve way of thinking on world affairs. The current geographical profile of world Jewry is radically different from the one that prevailed in the past, when the Jewish presence was determined by political and religious circumstances, and often led to the need to find whatever niches were available at the less developed periphery of the global system. Reflections on the Multinational Geography of Jews 29

The current configuration instead reflects the freedom of movement of the last generation, especially since World War II, and the natural tendency of people to try to improve their environment if given the opportunity and there are no constraints to the choice to leave a country or to settle in a different one. In particular, many people would seek for improvement in their socioeconomic opportunities and in the legal framework governing the degree of freedom and civil rights available. The socioeconomic and legal/civil rights frameworks appear to be powerfully correlated. As already noted, the exodus from the FSU demonstrates the huge effects on migration and on local population size when sudden changes emerge in such given opportunities. Figure 5 also demonstrates the global regional differences in the relative intensity of the Jewish presence (per 1,000 in the total population). As a rule, those countries that we have labeled ‘Oversea Anglo’ (US, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand) have some of the better HDI rankings and the highest percentages of Jews—followed on both accounts by western Europe, and by eastern Europe. Latin America and the FSU (after the great exodus) have comparatively similar HDI ranking/Jewish percentage situations but at a given HDI level the percentage of Jews in the FSU is still generally higher. Finally, countries in Asia and Africa (with the notable exception of Japan and Korea) have the lowest level of development as measured by HDI, and the lowest percentages of Jews.

Geo-Cultural Correlates of Global Jewish Population Distribution

So far we have stressed particularly some functional determinants and correlates of Jewish migration and population distribution, namely standard of living and access opportunities of migrants. It remains to be ascertained to what extent other factors of socio-cultural nature may be associated to the emerging environment of Jews. Studies of modernization have insisted on the non-random global distribution of resources, values, and attitudes related to deeply rooted beliefs and institutional constraints that characterize different national cultures and identities.18 Different geo-cultural areas can be distinguished in the modern world, each with a certain degree of internal coherence and a measurable amount of difference vis-à-vis other areas. Eight primary geo-cultural areas comprise: English speaking (European and extra-European) countries, Protestant Europe, Catholic Europe, ex-Communist, Latin America,

18 Ronald Ingelhart and Christian Welzel, Modernization, Cultural Change and Democracy: The Human Development Sequence (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005). 30 DellaPergola

Table 3 Jewish Population Distribution by Major Civilization Regions, 2013

Civilization Jewish Total Jews % Total % Jews per region* population population 1,000 of total

Total world 13,854,800 7,056,691,800 100.0 100.0 1.963

English speaking 6,216,200 443,248,000 44.9 6.3 14.024 Israel and Palestine 6,014,300 11,909,800 43.4 0.2 504.987 Catholic Europe 563,600 213,871,000 4.1 3.0 2.635 Latin America 384,900 599,003,000 2.8 8.5 0.643 Ex-Communist 374,600 408,300,000 2.7 5.8 0.917 Protestant Europe 189,300 132,470,000 1.4 1.9 1.429 Sub-Sahara Africa 71,300 858,900,000 0.5 12.2 0.083 Muslim 31,150 1,080,100,000 0.2 15.3 0.029 Confucian Asia 9,450 3,308,890,000 0.1 46.9 0.003

* Ranked by Jewish population size Source: Inglehart and Welzel, Modernization, Cultural Change and Democracy; DellaPergola, “World Jewish Population 2013”; Population Reference Bureau, 2012 World Population Data Sheet (Washington: Population Reference Bureau, 2012)

Africa, Confucian, and South Asia. To these, a ninth category—the State of Israel together with Palestine—must be added for the specific analysis of the global Jewish collective. Table 3 reports Jewish population distribution in 2013 subdivided into these nine geo-cultural areas. We slightly adjusted the regional typology by separating North Africa from Sub-Sahara Africa and merging the former with the largely Muslim south Asia into a new category labeled Muslim, while Confucian is labeled here Confucian Asia. It is worth noting that in the general mapping of global cultures Israel’s position would fall on the border- line between Catholic Europe and ex-Communist countries and in the vicinity of other Mediterranean countries.19 This is not entirely surprising: in the first place because of the actual geographical location of Israel; second, because of the singular role played by religion in Israel’s modern civil society; and third because of the leading role central planning and the trade unions played in Israel’s economy, at least during the formative years of the state.

19 Ibid. Reflections on the Multinational Geography of Jews 31

Contemporary Jewish population is today overwhelmingly concentrated in two areas, each with over six million persons: one is the English speaking countries (UK and Ireland, U.S. and Canada, Australia and New Zealand) with 44.9% of the total, and the other is Israel and Palestine with 43.4% of the total. The remaining 12% of world Jewry is fragmented between Catholic Europe (4.1%), Latin America (2.8%), ex-Communist countries (2.7%), Protestant Europe (1.4%), Sub-Sahara Africa (0.5%), Muslim countries (0.2%), and Confucian Asia countries (0.1%). It follows that the percent of Jews per 1,000 of total population is highly variable: it stands at slightly about half in Israel (including the total population of the Palestinian territory), approaches 1.5% in English speaking countries, reaches 2.6 and 1.4 per 1,000 respectively in Catholic and Protestant Europe, and stands well below 1 per 1,000 in all other major regions that comprise 88.7% of the world’s total population. In other words, the Jewish presence in the course of time has largely become a specialized attribute of socioeconomic and human development: 94% live in geo-cultural regions that comprise more developed countries with 11% of the global population, and 6% live in geo-cultural areas with less or much less developed countries that comprise 89% of the world population. But, notably, development cannot be seen as neutral to the underlying popular and institutional culture. What we have here termed the English speaking region—the one that still comprises the largest number of Jews—combines for the most European English speaking roots with a tradition of large scale immigration and cultural pluralism, if not multiculturalism, grounded on ethnic and religious diversity and a solid tradition of democratic governance and attention to civil rights. Such an environment has proven to be the most congenial for the contemporary Jewish presence. On the other hand, Israel—the closest com- petitor in terms of absolute numbers and by far the most dominant in terms of Jewish density—has achieved a combination of fairly advanced country development with the potential advantage of a local hegemonic Jewish civilization. Western Europe, with its Catholic and Protestant options, remains a very distant and tiny third Jewish residential option in global perspective. Other civilizational areas characterized by political instability, lesser affluence, and autocratic political regimes have turned into massive reservoirs of Jewish emigration or—as in the case of vast areas in Asia and Africa—have never attracted sufficient numbers of Jewish immigrants.

Concluding Remarks

Looking back at the whole period reviewed here, from the eve of World War II to the present, an extraordinary mutation occurred in the geographical 32 DellaPergola environment within which the Jewish experience has continued to unfold. During the first decades of the twentieth century much of Jewish geography was still determined by ancient interdictions that prescribed where Jews would be allowed to reside, regardless of the qualities of such places and regardless of the peculiar characteristics of the Jews themselves. But the last decades have seen a dramatic readjustment of the Jewish presence largely based on an environment’s carrying capacity of a population group generally well educated and, given the opportunity, capable of bringing to fruition its occupational skills. Jews ended up being overwhelmingly concentrated in the more developed countries of the world, and within these in the more developed regions, in the leading cities and towns, and in the socially more appropriate residential neighborhoods. A corollary was the emptying or near evacuation of vast areas that previously had known intensive Jewish settlement. Jews ended up being mostly identified with Western societies, and within that general typology with the more specific brand of the English speaking cultural pluralist democracy rather than with other brands of society strongly characterized by uniform national, ethnic, or religious identities. The other winning situation was the creation of an ethno-religious state of the Jews themselves. While this was a long held ideal option, the State of Israel would not have been capable of bearing and facing its existential challenges—namely a perennial security challenge—unless it had been capable of growing to economic competitiveness and to a preferen- tial position in relation to a majority of other countries in the world. International migration was obviously the leading mechanism of such a transformation as a place’s level of development stood in a positive relationship with attracting new immigrants and in a negative relationship with losing emigrants. The net balance of international migration directly affected, posi- tively or negatively, Jewish population size and the proportion of Jews within a country’s total population. Thus the relationship between level of country development and intensity of Jewish presence was constantly reinforced. It cannot be assumed that the social, economic, and institutional characteristics of a place were unaffected by its underlying cultural and normative premises. Such macro-cultural determinants, by affecting the level of development of a place, indirectly affected the likelihood of Jews to remain if they were there previously, or to join if they migrated from elsewhere. Macro-cultural determinants also affected directly and indirectly other drivers of population growth (not dealt with directly in this article), such as family patterns and fertility, health patterns and longevity, or openness or closure to changes of religious identity. The results in terms of the likelihood of Jewish existence being continued were striking and far reaching, as we have demonstrated. From this perspective, the Reflections on the Multinational Geography of Jews 33 very demographic essence of the Shoah, discussed at the beginning of this article, cannot be disentangled from the same macro-cultural determinants. The Shoah was not a random event that might have occurred anywhere but was a non-casual component of a more complex socio-cultural and political package that had deeper and farther reaching demographic consequences. The underlying factors at work in the past may also provide some theoretical guidelines regarding possible or likely directions for the future of Jewish communities worldwide. • It should be recognized that Jews often did in the past, and still do in the present depend on circumstances beyond their control; • The ultimate challenge consisted and will consist in the ability to preserve not a mere community of presence—driven by and dependent on favorable market forces, but a community of creativity—able to nurture and transmit its own demographic momentum and cultural identity; • Learning from past experiences, a realistic assessment of where and how Jewish individuals and their institutions can best shape their own demographic and cultural future should combine with a willingness to initiate policy decisions and cooperative processes apt to promote these goals.

Transnational diasporas and the Jewish diaspora in particular, reflect the existence of personal and institutional networks among people who maintain social relations and collective identities across international boundaries. Transnational identities and connections can emerge as a consequence of geographical mobility and of the evolving patterns of identification of individuals with their proximate or more distant social environment—in terms of space and place, as well as in ideational terms. This article has reviewed some of the main quantitative and structural developments of Jewish geographical distribution over the last tens of years. Attention was paid to what can be termed the systemic, functional, harder, rather than to the individual, ideational, softer, aspects of the transnational Jewish diaspora. Nonetheless, one should be aware that the features outlined here at the aggregate level carry much relevance for the deeper and more complex layer of personal needs, community patterns, and institutional fabric among the global Jewish collective. Discussion of the latter calls for a more detailed and qualitative analytic approach than the one presented here. The Law of Return: A National Solution to an International Issue, 1945–1967

Jacques Amar

Israel’s ‘Law of Return’ is often referred to as “a central feature of Israeli immigration law”20 and it is sometimes even argued that it constitutes the foundation of Israeli ethnic democracy.21 The Law of Return, adopted by the Knesset, the Israeli Parliament, on 5 July 1950, in general provides that every Jew has the right to immigrate to Israel. According to Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion,

This law [the Law of Return] recognizes that it is not the State which generates for the Jew outside the Land [of Israel] a right to settle in the State, but rather this right is imprinted in him in the very fact that he is a Jew, if he merely has the will to join the settlement of the Land.

And he concluded that “the historical right of every Jew, no matter where he is, is to return and settle in the Land of Israel.”22 From a historical perspective, the adoption of the Law of Return was obviously heavily marked by the post-Second World War context and the need to address the issue of Jewish refugees. On the international stage, the adoption of the Law of Return coincided with the emergence of the status of refugees under international law, also developed to cope with the same issue. Drawing on this historical parallel, this article presents the legal parallels and interactions between the international law concept of the refugee and the Israeli Law of Return and shows how the two legal corpuses offered two fundamentally different solutions to the same problem. This article focuses on the period between 1945 and 1967. From 1950 to 1967, given the aftermath of the Second World War and the forced migration of Jews

20 Dan Ernst, “The Meaning and Liberal Justifications of Israel’s Law of Return,” Israel Law Review 42 (2010): 564. 21 Yoav Peled, “Ethnic Democracy and the Legal Construction of Citizenship: Arab Citizens of the Jewish State,” The American Political Science Review 86 (1992): 432–43; Sammy Smooha, “The Model of Ethnic Democracy: Israel as a Jewish and Democratic State,” Nations and Nationalism 8 (2002): 475–503. 22 David Ben-Gurion, in Divrei Haknesset (Knesset Debates) 6 (1950), 2035–37 (Hebrew); quoted in Ernst, “Meaning,” 565.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ��4 | doi ��.��63/9789004277779_004 The Law of Return 35 from a number of Arab countries, including Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt, Iraq, Yemen, etc. Implementation of the Law of Return was essentially turned toward coping with the refugee question. Thereafter, a number of other issues arose, such as the legal definition of a ‘Jew’ for purposes of the Law of Return, as indicated by the 1970 amendment of the law. From an international law perspective, the years 1945–1967 marked the adoption of the entire and definitive corpus of international law relating to the status of refugees, as shown in the following brief chronology: • 20 April 1946, establishment of the International Refugee Organization (IRO); • 15 December 1946, adoption of the constitution of the IRO; • 14 December 1950, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees was created by a resolution of the UN General Assembly; • 28 July 1951, adoption of the UN Convention relating of the Status of Refugees; • 28 September 1954, adoption of the UN Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons; • 30 August 1961, adoption of the Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness; • 4 October 1967, adoption of the Protocol relating to the Status of Refugees.23 This article adopts the approach developed by Justice Haïm Cohn on the Jewish aspects of international law, who writes that

looking at international law today . . . , something has changed: the Jews are no longer only an object of international law. . . . ; they, as incorpo- rated in a Jewish State, have now become one of the subjects of international law.24

Examining the intention and the scope of the Law of Return in light of international law, this article tests and answers the two questions raised by Justice Cohn: With respect to the refugee question, what does it mean “to become a subject of international law” and what does it mean “to be a subject of international law.”

23 For a general exposure, Guy S. Goodwin-Gill and Jane McAdam, The Refugee in International Law, 3d ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), 270. 24 Haim H. Cohen, “Jewish Aspects of International Law Today,” in id., Selected Essays (Tel Aviv: Bursi Pub. House, 1991), 346. 36 Amar

To start with a simple definition, a refugee is someone who has been deprived of his nationality and his citizenship. That, for instance, was one aspect of the Nazi persecution. Without any nationality and by extension without any citizenship, an individual is left without any protection. In that sense, and even before the enactment of any refugee status at the international level, from an individual’s perspective one became a subject of international law, i.e., protected by international law, when one ceased to be a refugee and acquired citizenship. This idea is illustrated by the particularly notorious example of the ocean liner St. Louis aboard which 907 German Jews, deprived of their nationality, attempted to flee persecution in Germany.25 First, the Cuban government refused to grant them entrance visas, and then these refugees were denied permission to land by every country in Latin America. The United States dis- patched a gunboat to ensure that the St. Louis remained at a distance which prevented its passengers from swimming ashore. Canada argued that the passengers of the St. Louis were not a Canadian problem. In the end, the Jews aboard the ship returned to Europe, where many died in gas chambers and crematoria. Without any nationality or international law status protect- ing them, these Jews were left to face the persecution of the Third Reich. In 1945 there were forty million refugees in Europe; the most pitiable probably being the Jewish survivors of Hitler’s Holocaust. That is why some say that “the Convention relating of the status of refugees . . . was enacted largely in response to the experience of Jewish refugees in Europe during the period of World War II.”26 From an international law perspective, the first question that needs to be answered is why creating a refugee status was necessary rather than, for instance, granting a right to citizenship. We argue that the creation of a status of refugee under international law during the post-Second World War period was necessary because of the deficiencies of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that was adopted at the same period. We then take the situation of the Jews expelled from North Africa as a case study to analyze the deficiencies presented by the concept of refugee under international law and to show

25 Sarah A. Ogilvie and Scott Miller, Refuge Denied: The St. Louis Passengers and the Holocaust (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2006). 26 Sale, Acting Commissioner, Immigration and Naturalization Service, et al., Petitioners v. Haitian Centers Council, Inc., et al., 509 US 155 (US SC, 12 January 1993), at 207–8, quoted in James C. Hathaway, The Rights of Refugees under International Law (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 340. The Law of Return 37 how the Law of Return interacted with the international law refugee status to offer a more durable solution to the refugee problem. This article will finally show how the Law of Return framed Israeli immigration policy, empowering the State of Israel to “be a subject of international law.”

Becoming a Subject of International Law

The International Refugee Organization (“IRO”) was originally founded in 1946 with a temporary mandate which was to expire in 1950. Between 1947 and 1951, the IRO undertook massive resettlement projects and relocated more than one million Europeans to the Americas, Israel, southern Africa, and Oceania. However, given that there were more than forty million refugees in Europe at the time, these efforts proved to be insufficient. During the same period, the member states of the United Nations were discussing the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Of particular interest in the context of the present article, the member states debated whether to recognize a universal right of asylum. The initial draft of Article 14 of the Declaration provided that everyone has the right to seek and be granted asylum.27 However, the final version of Article 14 merely refers to everyone’s right to seek and enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.28 Had the first version been adopted, a convention relating of the status of refugees would not have been necessary. Indeed, giving individuals without any nationality or citizenship a right to be granted asylum—i.e., a right to be granted a nationality and citizenship—would have solved the refugee issue. One could argue that giving individuals a right vis-à-vis a state would have been a clear infringement upon the sovereignty of states. However, regardless of the original draft of Article 14, the entire Declaration may be read as negat- ing states’ sovereignty and granting direct rights to individuals. The two articles preceding and following Article 14 are clear examples of this interpretation:

Article 13: “Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.”

27 René Provost, International Human Rights and Humanitarian Law, Cambridge Studies in International and Comparative Law, vol. 22 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 292–300. 28 S. Prakash Sinha, Asylum and International Law (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1971), 109. 38 Amar

Article 15: “Everyone has the right to a nationality. No one shall be arbi- trarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.”

Reading these articles literally, one could be tempted to conclude that with the adoption of the Declaration there was no need for a convention relating to the status of refugees. In some respects, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is the framework that confirms Hannah Arendt’s ‘thesis’ that had the Declaration existed before the Second World War, the genocide would not have been possible (paradoxically enough, the later works of Hannah Arendt do not mention the Declaration).29 In the same vein, it is interesting to note that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was inspired by a Jew, René Cassin, and could be read as the ‘Charter of the Wandering Jew’ that includes the following motto: “Entitled to be anywhere outside of Israel.” However, the Universal Declaration on Human Rights turned out to be a mere declaration without any enforceable legal obligation upon any state. As Justice Haïm Cohn puts it, “whatever the Universal Declaration may say, no State has undertaken any legal obligation to abolish cruel punishment; and any State which grants asylum or abolishes cruel punishment, does so.”30 Due to this inherent defect of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, it soon became necessary to adopt other texts, not a mere declaration but real binding conventions, agreements among sovereign states: one on the status of refugees and one on statelessness. These are the origins of, and the meaning behind, the two conventions ratified in 1951 (Refugees) and in 1954 (Stateless Persons).31 Furthermore, the very distinction made by the two conventions between a refugee and a stateless person appears to be the consequence of an ambiguity created by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Because the Declaration granted every individual the right to have a nationality, the likelihood of being stateless became minor. However, since the Declaration did not include the right to be granted asylum the likelihood of being a refugee remained substantial. So, in theory, the two conventions applied to different groups of people and granted them different rights and benefits. In reality, many provisions of

29 For instance, we found no mention of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in her Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil (New York: Viking, 1968). 30 Haïm Cohn, “United Nations Commission of Human Rights, 1957, Asylum,” in id., Selected Essays, 311. 31 Paul Weis, “The Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons,” The International and Comparative Law Quarterly 10, 2 (April 1961): 255–64. The Law of Return 39 the Convention on Statelessness either are also provisions of the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees or are modified versions thereof. As a consequence, any interpretation or application of the provisions of the Convention on Statelessness requires an analysis of the articles of the Refugee Convention from which they originated and, if applicable, an analysis of the reasons why such articles were modified. To sum up, despite the existence of two conventions in international law, the refugee problem has always been conceived as an issue of stateless ness, either de jure or de facto. Pursuant to the 1951 convention, a refugee is a person who

owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality, and is unable to or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country . . .

And, according to the two conventions, the solution to this problem must be either to re-acquire the normal ‘community’ benefits of the original nationality or to acquire a new nationality with all its normal benefits. In this framework, and contrary to the opinions of Professor Irwin Cotler32 and others,33 it seems that with the creation of the State of Israel and the adoption of the Law of Return, the status of refugee ceased to apply to the Jews. To test this hypothesis, we propose to examine the second major Jewish refugee issue that both the Law of Return and the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees faced, i.e., the forced migration of Jews from Arab countries following the creation of Israel. In January 1948, a “Text of Law Drafted by the Political Committee of the Arab League” provided that starting on an unspecified date, all Jews (except Jews that were citizens of non-Arab states) would be considered “members of the Jewish minority state of Palestine,” their bank accounts would be frozen and used to finance resistance to “Zionist ambitions in Palestine.” Furthermore, Jews

32 Irwin Cotler, “Revisionism, Rejectionism, and Arab-Israeli Peace,” Jerusalem Post, 12 July 2011. 33 Statement by Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon, First Ministry of Foreign Affairs Conference on Jewish Refugees from Arab Countries, 3 April 2012: “At this juncture in time I call for putting an end to the historic injustice and call upon the Arab League to assume responsibility and admit it was they who caused the Jews from Arab countries to become refugees.” http://mfa.gov.il/. 40 Amar believed to be active Zionists would be interned and their assets confiscated.34 In the years following the creation of Israel, Jews in most Arab countries were forced to leave their traditional homes against their will and in the process to abandon all that they possessed. This applied to more than 400,000 Jews in Iraq, Yemen, and North Africa, including 20,000 Jews for whom life had become impossible in Egypt.35 However, these Jews were not able to claim the status of refugees. They were not counted as refugees because they were readily and immediately received as new immigrants to Israel, pursuant to Article 1 C(3) of the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees: “The Convention shall cease to apply to any person if he has acquired a new nationality and enjoys the protection of the country of his nationality.” In addition, Moroccan Jews were not considered refugees as they had not been deprived of their nationality. The only exception was Algeria, where Jews were French citizens and therefore this status did not apply to them at all. That perhaps explains why, contrary to Tunisian Jews, the vast majority of Algerian Jews chose to settle in France and not to benefit from the Law of Return. This analysis of the interaction between the Law of Return and refugee status under international law was used in a number of court decisions in the 1950s, specifically by the French Administrative Commission when considering the refugee status of Jews who had migrated to and resided in Israel. Individuals who had acquired Israeli nationality through the Law of Return were considered to be within the scope of Article 1 C(3), particularly when Israeli passports had been used, and therefore could not benefit from the status of refugees under the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees. In one case, the French Commission maintained that the “très graves difficultés”—in other words, the great difficulties of living in Israel—which had motivated the individual to leave Israel were not attributable to the political or administrative authorities of Israel and could not be equated with persecution or lack of persecution. In other words, the Law of Return enabled individuals forced to leave their countries to cease to be refugees and to become—once again—subject to international law as accessing the benefits of a national community. In that sense the Law of Return offered a more durable and coherent response than

34 Bat Ye’or [Gisèle Littman], Islam and Dhimmitude: Where Civilizations Collide (Madison, NJ: Farleigh Dickinson University Press, 2002), 175. 35 The Forgotten Millions: The Modern Jewish Exodus from Arab Lands, ed. Malka Hillel Shulewitz (London and New York: Continuum, 2000). The Law of Return 41 did international law to the persisting problems of refugees after the Second World War.

Being a Subject of International Law

To fully explore the interactions of the Law of Return with international law, one needs to analyze it from the perspective of the State of Israel. From a state perspective, “to be a subject of international law” means to have a ‘say’ on international issues. As a sovereign state, Israel is entitled to define who is allowed to enter its territory and, through the Law of Return, it sets a general principle and some exceptions. The first article of the Law of Return grants every Jew the right to come to Israel as an oleh (immigrant) and the second article implements and delin- eates the scope of this right. In that sense, Israel is like any other country: the Law of Return is nothing more than Israel’s immigration policy. The sole— but perhaps major—difference from other countries is that it ties religion to nationality.36 By defining Jewish immigration as a ‘return’, the Law of Return provides a statutory enunciation of the relationship between the State of Israel and the Jewish Diaspora. According to David Ben-Gurion, the right to return is not an entitlement granted to Jews by Israel, but rather a ‘natural’ right of every Jew in the world that precedes and constitutes the State of Israel. Further to that idea, Article 4 of the Law provides that

every Jew who has immigrated to Israel before the enactment of the Law, and every Jew who was born in Israel, whether before or after the enactment of the Law, shall be deemed to have come to Israel as an oleh under the Law of Return.

In that respect, the Law of Return seems to blatantly deviate from the immigration laws of other countries. However, the Law of Return is not as unique as it is commonly claimed to be. First, countries have the right to impose ethnic criteria. For instance, Germany adopted a similar criterion (being born in Germany) at the end of the Second World War for a very simple reason: it had to solve an important refugee issue. Given the circumstances, some scholars have qualified the German

36 Liav Orgad, “Illiberal Liberalism: Cultural Restrictions on Migration and Access to Citizenship in Europe,” American Journal of Comparative Law, 58, 1 (2010): 53–106. 42 Amar

Nationality Law as a humanitarian gesture to rescue co-ethnics from ‘oppres- sion’ under Soviet rule.37 Second, contrary to the Zionist myth, Article 2—rather than Article 1— of the Law of Return served as the foundation of Israel’s immigration policy, allowing Israel to choose who is allowed entry into its territory. Similar to every other country, Israel may refuse entry to a Jew with a criminal past on the basis of the Law of Return. Professor Sagit Mor, of the Faculty of Law at University of Haifa, highlights in her research the real scope of the Law of Return.38 Pursuant to Article 2 of the Law of Return,

an oleh’s visa shall be granted to every Jew who has expressed his desire to settle in Israel, unless the Minister of Immigration is satisfied that the applicant (1) is engaged in an activity directed against the Jewish people; or (2) is likely to endanger public health or the security of the State.

Article 2 does not make any reference to a theoretical ‘natural right’ but reads as a rule of law, with a principle, exceptions, and parameters clearly defining the exceptions. According to David Ben-Gurion, “without article 2 of the Law of Return which gives the law its realistic form, article 1 would merely be empty rhetoric.” Pragmatically speaking, Ben-Gurion rejected the idea that sick people should be treated in Israel and insisted that the desired immigrant should be a productive person, someone who is “capable of participating in the project of renewal and of sovereignty for the Jewish people.”39 According to Professor Dvora Hacohen, the Ministry of Immigration very early on issued “Instructions Concerning Visas to Immigrants and Tourists.” These instructions included restrictions based on economic, medical, and religious standards with a particular emphasis on the strict enforcement of health restrictions designed to screen out the disabled, the sick, and the aged. In January 1949 these instructions were further amended and elaborated.

37 Alexander Yakobson and Amnon Rubinstein, Israel and the Family of Nations: The Jewish Nation-State and Human Rights, Israeli History, Politics, and Society, vol. 50 (London and New York: Routledge, 2008), 147–52. 38 S. Mor, “ ‘Tell My Sister to Come and Get Me Out of Here’: A Reading of Ableism and Orientalism in Israel’s Immigration Policy (The First Decade),” Disability Studies Quarterly 27, 4 (2007) http://www.dsq-sdsarchives.org/_articles_html/2007/fall/dsq_ v27_04_2007_fall_st_02_mor.htm; id., “Disability Rights in Israel: Between Socio-political Conceptualization and Legal Recognition,” Access to Justice and Social Rights 79 (2009): 80–130 (Hebrew). 39 Mor, “Tell My Sister.” The Law of Return 43

The new guidelines were entitled “Medical Rules to Approve Immigration” (Medical Rules, 1949) and provided the physicians that were in charge of the screening process abroad with a comprehensive set of rules. The introduction to the Medical Rules stated:

We require that every oleh be mentally and physically healthy and capable of work. One should particularly observe: . . . 4) that the candidate shall have no impairment that totally or partially limits his work capacity.

Persons who fell under any of the categories listed in the Medical Rules were banned from immigration unless they were given a special permit granted on an individual basis.40 However, given the refugee issue existing at the time and the need, highlighted above, to grant a ‘refuge’, when declared as related to ‘rescue immigration’ (aliyat hatzalah) certain regions were exempted from the screening rules. In other words, people in these regions were exempt from the Medical Rules if they were at risk to become refugees or stateless. In all these respects, the Law of Return seems very much like every other country’s immigration law: it defines a select right to migrate to Israel, with exemptions to cope with the contemporaneous issue of refugees and stateless persons. Yet, the 1950 Law of Return granted the right to come to Israel without granting Israeli nationality. Although David Ben-Gurion established a relationship between the Law of Return and the principle of nationality, explaining that “this law states the principle of nationality, on the basis of which the State of Israel was established,” the very text of the Law did not implement it. Indeed, it was only in 1952 that Israel adopted a law on nationality, which in its Article 2 states that “Every ‘oleh’ under the Law of Return, 5710–1950(1), shall become an Israeli national.”41 Until 1952, the sole text establishing a relationship between the right to immigrate to Israel and the right to nationality was the Registration of Inhabitants Ordinance adopted in 1949. The Ordinance provided that “every resident who has attained the age of 16 years shall notify to the registration office the particulars of registration enumerated in section 4(a) to (j),” which Section 4 links nationality and religion. That explains how the famous issue of

40 Dvora Hacohen, Immigrants in Turmoil: Mass Immigration to Israel and Its Repercussions in the 1950s and After (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2003), 129–52. 41 Paul Weis, Nationality and Statelessness in International Law, 2d ed. (Alphen aan den Rijn: Sijthoff & Noordhoff, 1979), 114. 44 Amar

‘Who is a Jew?’ arose out of the interconnection between the Law of Return and the Registration of Inhabitants Ordinance. Later legal developments show that additional texts were necessary to provide a solution for the ambiguous silence of the Law of Return: • The Government decision of 20 July 1958 stated that anyone declaring in good faith that he is a Jew and who does not profess any other religion shall be registered as a Jew; • The Population Registration Law of 1965 reiterated and confirmed the relationship between nationality and religion. Under this law, ‘resident’ means a person who is in Israel as an Israeli national or under an oleh’s visa or certificate, or under a permit of permanent residence.42

On this point, the 1962 case of Brother Daniel Rufeisen marked a turning point. The plaintiff was a Jew who had converted to Christianity. According to the halakhah (Jewish religious law), he was still a Jew. Had he concealed his cross and lied about his faith, he would have been granted the right to immigrate to Israel. Yet, despite the halakhic rule, he was not allowed to enter the country and, on account of the Law of Return, he became stateless.43 Given these developments, the question soon became whether being Jewish constitutes a nationality, as raised by the case of Benjamin Shalit.44

In conclusion, this article has shown that while a legal regime was created under international law to cope with the refugee issue and protect refugees in the post-Second World War context, such a regime was insufficient to address the situation of the Jews around the world, particularly Jews forced to leave Arab countries in the 1950s and early 1960s. Counterbalancing the status of refugees under international law, the Law of Return offered a fundamentally different solution to the problem of Jewish refugees during the same period: under the Law of Return, Jews ceased to be or to avail themselves of the status of ‘refugees’ and the State of Israel became their ‘refuge’. Between 1952 and 1968, a total of 600,000 immigrants arrived in Israel. Three-quarters of them

42 For a synthesis, see Suzie Navot, The Constitutional Law of Israel (Alphen aan den Rijn: Kluwer Law International, 2007), 193–96. 43 Rufeisen v. Minister of the Interior, (1962) 16 PD 2428, in Selected Judgments of the Supreme Court of Israel, vol. 5 (Jerusalem, 1971), 38. Rufeisen was ultimately able to immigrate to Israel, acquired Israeli citizenship through naturalization, and lived the rest of his life at the Stella Maris Carmelite Monastery in Haifa. 44 Shalit v. Minister of the Interior (1969) 23 PD (II) 477, in ibid., 35. The Law of Return 45 came from Arab countries in North Africa, and the rest were mostly from eastern Europe.45 After the Six-Day War (1967), the number of immigrants from western countries, including western Europe, North and South America, and Australia increased, and they constituted a third of the total of 280,000 immigrants who arrived in Israel between 1969 and 1974. For this wave of immigration, Israel was no longer a land of refugees. Immigrants came by choice and not out of fear of persecution. Although some immigrants were encountering difficulties in their home countries, they were not being deprived of their nationality and citizenship. At that point in time, the Law of Return became Israel’s immigration policy, similar in many aspects to the immigration law of any other countries. It is thus possible to say that since 1967 Israel is no longer a refugee destination for Jews, but a country that has to define its identity without the support of international law. The amendment of the Law of Return in 1970 can be interpreted as a consequence of this evolution. In parallel and at about the same time, refugee status under international law, the creation of which had been necessitated by the deficiencies of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, became less of a paramount concept with the adoption of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights in 1966, which complements the Declaration of 1948. Ironically, Israel is one of the rare democracies in the world that has relied on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights since 1964.

45 Talia Einhorn, “The Legal Framework for Israel’s International Trade: International and Domestic Perspectives,” in Israel among the Nations: International and Comparative Law Perspectives on Israel’s 50th Anniversary, ed. Alfred E. Kellermann, Kurt Siehr, and Talia Einhorn (The Hague: Kluwer Law International, 1998), 157. Health Care Services for Holocaust Survivors in Postwar Austria, 1945–1953: A Pattern of Jewish Solidarity

Ada Schein

In his book Holocaust Historiography Prof. Dan Michman articulated this following historical insight:

On the eve of the Holocaust one could hardly speak any longer of a ‘Jewish People’ as an inclusive unit in any substantive sense. Instead, there were scattered Jewish groups, some of which objected expressly to any attempt to force them to affiliate with a Jewish people.46

These weak ties among sectors of the Jewish People were challenged after the Holocaust. In the short twilight period between the catastrophe of World War II and the establishment of a sovereign Jewish state, a fascinating drama was enacted in Europe: the rehabilitation of the Jews and the Jewish communities. The fate of Holocaust survivors who were liberated on German, Austrian, and Italian soil was unique. Those who refused to return to their countries of origin were concentrated by the Allies in assembly centers, received a status of ‘displaced persons’, and cared for by the international relief organization UNRRA. This was the nucleus of she’erit hapletah (the surviving remnant).47

* This article is based on Ada Schein, Health In Temporary Conditions: Health-Care Services for Holocaust Survivors in Austria 1945–1953, Search and Research, Lectures and Papers, vol. 16 (Jerusalem: The International Institute for Holocaust Research, Yad Vashem, 2010). The main resources for this study are found in the Yad Vashem Archives, The Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People, and The Central Zionist Archives, all in Jerusalem, as well as The Pinchas Lavon Institute for the Labour Movement and the Haganah Archives, both in Tel Aviv. 46 See Dan Michman, Holocaust Historiography, a Jewish Perspective: Conceptualizations, Terminology, Approaches and Fundamental Issues (London: Vallentine Mitchell, 2003), 401. 47 On the double translation of the phrase she’erit hapletah as ‘saved remnants’ and ‘saving remnants’, see Zeev Mankowitz, “She’erit Hapletah: The Surviving Remnant, an Overview,” in Holocaust Survivors: Resettlement, Memories, Identities, ed. Dalia Ofer, Francoise S. Ouzan, and Judy Tydor-Baumel-Schwartz (New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2012), 10–15. For a detailed review of the state of the art of historical research on she’erit hapletah, its historical development, the main themes, and disputes, see Dalia Ofer ,“She’erit

Although historians have thoroughly researched the ideological, political, and educational aspects of this rehabilitation and have stressed the major role of the encounter between she’erit hapletah and the Yishuv (the Jewish community in Mandatory Palestine) and the State of Israel, the aspects of health care in this rehabilitation have been totally neglected. Where the issue of the new immigrants’ health has been broadly explored, however, is in the context of the selective immigration policy in the early 1950s as a response to the waves of mass immigration into Israel. In this context the focus of historical research mainly centered on the standpoint of the absorbing establishment and its attitude toward the Jewish immigrants coming from North Africa and Asia.48 To a certain extent, historians have neglected the health care of Holocaust survivors as a group, and certainly have not investigated medical issues per- taining to them as immigrants before they came to Eretz Israel. Dr. Mark Dworzecki, a physician and himself a Holocaust survivor, wrote a few articles on the health of “survivors from Holocaust countries,” according to his definition. He played an active role in international medical conferences during the 1950s, and naturally he focused on the health condition of the individual survivor.49 The situation in Austria was unique. Whereas most of the Jewish survivors and refugees were concentrated in postwar Germany, Austria served as a transit country for Jews belonging to various groups. These divided into former concentration camp inmates who were returning to their countries of origin, mainly Hungary and Rumania; Polish and Lithuanian Jews who were smuggled across European borders in their efforts to leave the Continent and draw nearer to Eretz Israel; Rumanian Jewish refugees fleeing from severe famine and harsh living conditions; and lastly, Jews from Czechoslovakia and Hungary seeking

Hapletah in Israeli Historiography,” Iyunim Bitkumat Israel: Studies in Zionism, the Yishuv, and the State of Israel 17 (2007): 465–511 (Hebrew). A comprehensive review of non- Israeli research on Holocaust survivors is yet to be written. 48 On the selective immigration policy toward Jews from Morocco and Tunisia, see Avi Picard, “Immigration, Health, and Social Control: Medical Aspects of the Policy Governing ‘Aliyah’ from Morocco and Tunisia 1951–1954,” Journal of Israeli History, 22, 2 (2003): 32–60; Dvora Hacohen, “Mass Immigration or Selective Immigration in the Discussions of the Government and the Jewish Agency,” The Eleventh World Congress of Jewish Studies, vol. B 2 (Jerusalem: World Congress of Jewish Studies, 1994), 357–60 (Hebrew); Shifra Shvarts, “A Selective Medical Choice or Free Immigration: The Dispute on the Medical Limitation in the Mass Immigration of the 1950s,” Harefuah 139 (2000): 476–82 (Hebrew). 49 See Mark Dworzecki, “She’erit Hapletah in Israel: A Study of the Demographic and Biological Problems of Immigrant Holocaust Survivors,” Gesher 1 (1956): 83–115 (Hebrew). 48 Schein to escape after Communist takeovers in these countries. More than 195,000 Jews passed through the American Zone of Occupation in Austria between September 1945 and April 1950.50 This article examines the health care services for Holocaust survivors in Austria through the prism of the interrelations between Holocaust survivors and other Jewish groups around the world. It argues that although the Allied Forces and the international relief organizations—UNRRA and later the International Refugee Organization (IRO)—were responsible for the provision of medical treatment for the DPs in Austria, the development of health care services in the Jewish DP camps was due to the enhanced ties between Holocaust survivors, the American Joint Distribution Committee (JDC, or the ‘Joint’), and the emissaries from the Land of Israel who later represented the nascent Jewish state. I will demonstrate the development of health care services for Holocaust survivors in Austria as a result of growing Jewish solidarity between these three groups. One may observe four stages in this process: 1. After the liberation, Fall 1945; 2. 1946 to mid-1947; 3. Mid-1947 to May 1948; 4. From the establishment of Israel, May 1948.

First Stage: After the Liberation, Fall 1945

When World War II ended, 1.65 million people of diverse nationalities in Austria were liberated from forced labor and concentration camps by the Allied forces. Among them, nearly 20,000–30,000 Jewish prisoners, mostly from Hungary and Rumania, were liberated from Mauthausen and the forty- nine satellite camps surrounding it. A week before the liberation, 9,000 Jews were still registered in Mauthausen. The number was probably higher; 3,000–4,000 Jewish prisoners were liberated from the Ebensee camp, while in the area of Salzburg and the Tirol there were Jewish prisoners who had been brought by the Germans in the death marches from the Dachau concentration camp.51 American soldiers found some 15,000–18,000 Hungarian Jews in Gunskirkirchen near Wels. Most of the survivors were brought there on death

50 Thomas Albrich, “Bricha: Fluchtwege durch Österreich,” in Überlebt und Unterwegs: Jüdische Displaced Persons in Nachkriegsdeutschland, ed. Fritz Bauer (Frankfurt and New York: Campus Verlag, 1997), 223. 51 Susanne Rolinek, Jüdische Lebenswelten 1945–1955: Flüchtlinge in der amerikanischen Zone Österreichs (Innsbruck: Studienverlag, 2007), 29. Health Care Services for Holocaust Survivors 49 marches during the summer of 1944 and early 1945.52 Most awful were the death marches from the camps on the border between Hungary and Austria to Mauthausen, since it was there that the idea of extermination by labor was realized in the cruelest way.53 The Allied forces took upon themselves the enormous challenge of caring for the former concentration camp inmates. The liberating military troops organized hospitals, gathered the dying people, and gave them first aid. The initial policy of the Allies was to heal people and help them to return to their countries of origin. Austria became a transit country for Holocaust survivors since the beginning of the summer of 1945. First came former concentration camp inmates who wanted to return to their countries of origin, mainly Hungary and Rumania. They stayed in Vienna for a few days and moved on. In the course of May–June 1945 5,240 people passed through Vienna: 4,440 of them were Hungarian Jews, 200 were Polish Jews, and the remainder from various countries.54 Historians have estimated that during the summer of 1945 72,000 Jews were returned to Hungary by trains, more than 2,000 of them straight from Auschwitz.55 Those who refused to return were concentrated in assembly centers, where they were sheltered, fed, and given medical treatment by UNRRA. The survivors were given the temporary legal and administrative status of ‘displaced persons’ and were allowed to receive help from international and private organizations. Austria was divided into four occupation zones: the district of Upper Austria, with Linz at its center, and the district of Salzburg were under American military rule; the districts of Stiria and Karintia, with the cities Gratz and Klagenfurt, were occupied by the British army; the Tirol district and the city of Innsbruck were under a French military regime; Burgenland and Lower Austria were occupied by the Soviets.56 Within a short time, the assembly

52 On the death marches of the Hungarian Jews through Austria in the spring of 1945, see Eleonore Lappin, “The Death Marches of Hungarian Jews through Austria in the Spring of 1945,” Yad Vashem Studies 28 (2000): 203–42. 53 Uri Lapidot, “Death Marches to Mauthausen from Camps on the Hungarian-Austrian Border,” Yalkut Moreshet 46 (April 1989): 75–100 (Hebrew). 54 See Yad Vashem Archive (hereafter YVA) O-37/73. 55 On the desire of Hungarian Jews to return to Hungary, see Yeudah Nadich, “Report of the Jewish Displaced Persons (Report No. 2),” 25 Sept. 1945, Central Zionist Archives (here after CZA), A140/324. See also Yehuda Bauer, Out of the Ashes: The Impact of American Jews on Post-Holocaust European Jewry (Oxford: Pergamon Press, 1989), 18. 56 On the occupation zones in Austria, see Christine Oertel, Juden auf der Flucht durch Austria: Jüdische Displaced Persons in der US-Bezatzungszone Österreichs (Wien: Werner Eichbauer Verlag 1999), 123–56. 50 Schein centers in the American and British zones of occupation became an attraction for many DPs from the Soviet zone, since the Soviets refused to establish separate camps for DPs. Instead, they demanded that the DPs choose between two alternatives: to return to their counties of origin or to settle permanently in new places. This Soviet policy led the DPs to wander to Western zones of occupations.57 Simultaneously, two groups of Austrian Jews returned to their country of origin in order to rebuild their lives there: returnees from concentration camps, especially from Theresienstadt, and Jewish immigrants who had rapidly fled or abruptly been forced to leave Austria following its annexa- tion by the Third Reich in 1938. Very shortly after the liberation from Nazi occupation, Jewish solidarity grew: the survivors of the Jewish community in Vienna organized medical relief for the returnees from Theresienstadt and other concentration camps. The connecting link between the war and postwar periods was Dr. Emil Tuchman, a Viennese Jew who survived the war as an administrative manager of the Rothschild Hospital, even after the hospital building had been confiscated by the SS and the sick inmates were transferred to another building of the Jewish community.58 After the liberation, Dr. Tuchman was appointed by the JDC as a ‘trustee’ (Vertrauensmann) in Vienna for distributing food and medications which were delivered to the city. His incarceration by the Soviets after being accused of cooperating with the Nazis removed him from the scene. In a short time, Jewish aid committees were established in Vienna to assist the returnees from the concentration camps during their short stay in the city. The Hungarian committee was the first to help Jewish groups from Poland who reached Vienna by the ‘Brichah’ (Flight) organization on their way to Italy, hop- ing to get nearer to Eretz Israel.59 The main figure in self-organization of the Jewish refugees in Vienna was Bronislav Teichholz who initiated a meeting of the representatives of the aid committees to establish an umbrella organization that would represent Jewish former concentration camp inmates and Jewish refugees. On 24 August 1945 they established The International Committee for Former Concentration Camp Inmates and Refugees (International Kommittee

57 Wolfgang Jacobmeyer, Vom Zwangsarbeiter zum heimatlosen Ausländer: Die Displaced Persons in Westdeutschland 1945–1951, Kritisch Studien zur Geschichtswissenschaft, vol. 65 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1985), 123–56. 58 On Dr. Emil Tuchman, see Rivka Elkin, “Was He Indeed ‘a Man after Their Own Hearts’? Directors of the Jewish Hospitals in Berlin and Vienna in the Shadow of the Nazi Regime,” Moreshet: Journal for the Study of the Holocaust and Antisemitism 5 (2008): 82–112. 59 Testimony of Asher Ben Natan, Haganah Archives (hereafter HA), Record Group 114, File 105. Health Care Services for Holocaust Survivors 51 für sämtliche durchreisende jüdische KZ-ler und Flüchlinge), or briefly, The International Committee.60 Providing medical treatment for those refugees was necessary to enable them to move on from Vienna to the American zone of occupation. In September 1945 a health department was established by the International Committee and Dr. Otto Wolken was appointed to head it. At the first meeting of the International Committee Dr. Wolken presented the plan for medical treatment for returnees from the concentration camps: medical examinations, providing showers, caring for pregnant and nursing women, isolating those afflicted with contaminating diseases, preparing wards for short hospitalization, and providing immunization.61 Dr. Wolken, a Viennese Jew born in 1903, had been arrested by the Gestapo in 1938. He was deported to several concentration camps. In 1943 he reached Auschwitz, where he became the main doctor in the camp’s hospital until the liberation of Auschwitz by the Soviet Army. After the liberation he spent some time in Poland, where he provided convicting testimony against Nazi medical

60 Bronislav Teichholz was born on 20 February 1904 in Rzesow. He served in the Judenrat of Lvov for a short time. He succeeded leaving Lvov and joined a band of fugitives, Jewish and non-Jewish, near the Polish-Hungarian border who called themselves partisans but were apparently little more than an armed band roving the Carpathian forests. At the beginning of 1943 he crossed the border into Hungary, where he was arrested and inter- rogated in Munkacs and then succeeded in reaching Budapest where he joined a group of Jewish Polish refugees who were assisted by Rudolf (Rasa) Kasztner. Teichholz became the main figure in the organization that dealt with providing food, clothes, and certificates to illegal refugees. When the Germans entered Hungary, Teichholz joined the Zionist underground. He succeeded in crossing the Slovakian border with forged Arian documents, and after serving as a translator in the Russian Army, he finally became a worker for the Hungarian Red Cross. As such he was sent to Rumania about May 1945 but returned from there when it became clear that the Rumanian Red Cross was already active in helping Jews. When the Red Cross intended to send him back to Vienna, Levi Argov approached him and told him to go to Vienna as a member of the Brichah. This description is based on Yehuda Bauer, Flight and Rescue: Brichah (New York: Random House, 1970), 158–62. Bauer used oral testimony given him by Teichholz on 21 October 1966, The Institute for Contemporary Jewry of the Hebrew University, the Department of Oral Documentation, A 89(4). 61 Chefarzt Primarius Dr. Otto Wolken, “Die Entwicklung des Sanitätsreferates im Internationalen Komitee für jüdische KZ-ler und Flüchlinge in Wien (Rothschildspital),” 24 October 1947, HA, Record Group 114, file 112, p. 2. 52 Schein practices in Auschwitz. In July 1945 Dr. Wolken returned to Vienna and volunteered as a physician in the service of the International Committee.62 Within a short time, the International Committee succeeded in receiving official recognition from the Austrian government, the American and British forces, the International Red Cross, and the JDC. The International Committee received the agreement of the American authorities to turn the building of the former Rothschild Hospital into a refugee camp for Jews who spent only a short time in Vienna. The Austrian government agreed to provide food to the refugees who came to the city according to a daily ration of 1200 calories per capita. Since 20 October 1945 the International Committee received from the JDC canned products such as sardines, cheese, and milk powder which enabled it to take care of the children, sick returnees from the concentration camps, and refugees who passed through Vienna.63 During the first months after the liberation, the JDC concentrated its activity on delivering food and medications. Reuben Resnik, the director of the JDC in Italy, was appointed to take charge in Austria. At the end of May 1945 he toured all around Austria, met the military officers in charge, and made the arrangements to distribute food and medications from the International Red Cross stores.64 The official status of the JDC vis-à-vis the USFA (United States Forces Austria) was determined on 6–7 October 1945, when the JDC was recognized as an adviser of the American army on all issues relating to the Jewish DPs. In November 1945, Dr. Joseph Schwartz, director of the JDC in Europe, and General Foster Tate agreed that all the JDC workers would be attached to the

62 Dr. Otto Wolken was born on 27 April 1903 in Vienna. He graduated from the Faculty of Medicine and practiced in Dermato-orology. In 1933 he began working as a general physician in the hospital in Sankt Pölten and as a physician in the nearby community of Dreisen. In 1938, a week after the occupation of Austria by the German army, he was arrested as a Communist by the Gestapo. After being imprisoned for a year-and-a-half, he was sent to a few camps until he reached Auschwitz 1 where he was imprisoned for two years. In Auschwitz he served as a doctor of the prisoners in the camp dispensary, gaining their love. When the camp’s prisoners were evacuated by the Germans in February 1945, he succeeded to survive in a shelter and he continued to provide health care to the sick prisoners until the Soviets entered the camp. See Wolken, “Die Entwicklung,” 1–2. For additional personal details, see International Tracing Service, ITC/W-1318, Bad Arolsen, Germany. 63 “Bericht für die Zeit von October 10, 1945–October 31, 1945,” Yad Vashem Archives (hereafter YVA), DPA, JM 10.550/64. 64 Reuben Resnik to Joseph Schwartz, 20 July 1945, YVA, DPA, JM 10.548/5. Health Care Services for Holocaust Survivors 53 military units and serve as official advisers on problems of the Jewish DPs. Dr. Benson Saks was nominated as JDC director for Austria.65 The activity of the JDC suffered from inefficiency and the organization was strongly criticized by the soldiers of the Jewish Brigade66 and the survivors themselves.67 Criticism even found its way into the Jewish press.68 Yet it was only partly justified. During the first six months of its activity, only 1.6 percent of the JDC’s expenditures were devoted to medical treatment; the main expen- diture, 47.6 percent, was disbursed as direct allocations to the camps and the communities.69

Second Stage: 1946 to Mid-1947

The situation was totally changed when tens of thousands of Polish Jews came to Austria by the efforts of the Brichah organization. Most of them were Jews who had repatriated from the Soviet Union to Poland, but failed to settle there. The extreme antisemitic atmosphere drove them out of the country. After a short stay in Vienna the arrivals were transferred to the American Zone of Occupation in Austria, and later they moved on to the American Zone of Occupation in Germany. From November 1945 to April 1947 more than 107,525 Jews passed through the American zone in Austria. 44,721 of them left legally, including groups that were transferred to Germany, while another 41,521 left the area by illegally smuggling across the borders.70 The first steps of self-organization of the Jewish survivors in the American Zone of Occupation were taken in summer 1945. A temporary central committee was established in Salzburg representing twelve Jewish centers in Austria. The first conference of she’erit hapletah in the American Zone of Occupation took place on 29 September 1945. The conference decided to establish two central

65 James Rice, “Six Months Report of the JDC Activities in the American Zone of Austria from September 1945 to Feb. 28, 1946,” JDC Archive in Jerusalem (hereafter JJA) NY-AR 45–54#144. 66 Idith Zertal, From Catastrophe to Power: Holocaust Survivors and the Emergence of Israel (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 186–88. 67 See a letter of Israel Eichenwald to Joseph Schwartz, CZA, S6/456 (Hebrew); a version in German is in S25/5238. 68 See, for example, the critical article written by author Yitzhak Ziv-Av, “The JDC Must Explain,” Congress Weekly, 23 November 1945, JJA, NY AR 45–54#112. 69 Rice, “Six Months Report.” 70 Statistical data based on Amos Rabel’s report on the Jewish refugees entering and leaving the American Zone in Austria, HA, Record Group 114, File 112. 54 Schein committees: one in Salzburg, the Zentral Comitet far di Juden in Estreich, and the other in Linz, the Zentral Comitet far di Jidn in Oberestreich. The military authorities officially recognized the second organization on 28 November 1945. The JDC had a tense relationship with the camp committees. Therefore, the JDC asked the military authorities to arrange new elections for the committees. On January 1946 a new committee was elected in Salzburg and a month later also in Linz. On 17 March 1946 a first national conference of the Jewish refugees convened in Linz and a new central committee was elected. The Jewish Central Committee for the American Zone in Austria represented the Jewish survivors who settled in the permanent camps of UNRRA, the Jewish refugees in the camps that were run by the American Army, and the Jews who joined the small Jewish communities in Salzburg and Linz. Health care services were doomed to operate on an ad-hoc basis, particularly during 1945 and 1946, as long as the Brichah organization continued smuggling hundreds of people per day from eastern Europe to Vienna and then into the American Zones in Austria and Germany. Actually, the Brichah posed a challenge to the Allied Forces, UNRRA, the IRO, as well as the JDC, and forced them to respond to a constantly changing set of circumstances. Dispensaries, including wards for short hospitalization, were established in the DP camps administered by UNRRA. Each person was obligated to be immunized against typhus. The injection was recorded in the dispensary’s records and served as assurance of getting a DP card.71 However, the shortage of skilled medical crews forced UNRRA to recruit Jewish physicians and nurses from among the refugees. The situation in the transit camps supervised by the army was even worse, and their medical services were totally inadequate. The army provided only minimal medical care, just to prevent diseases and incon- veniency. Serious patients were hospitalized in central hospitals administered by the army, UNRRA, or the municipalities. The Jewish DPs themselves played an active role in establishing health care services in the camps. They organized central and local health departments that cooperated with the bodies administering the camps; Jewish physicians among the survivors helped to run the in-camp dispensaries and to immunize the Jewish population in order to prevent epidemics; and lastly, the seriously ill were sent to local Austrian hospitals.72

71 Fay Calckins, Welfare Officer UNRRA 322 to Dicy Dodds, Area Welfare Officer, 16 August 1946, YVA, DPA, JM 10.559/306. 72 Major I. Abrahamer, Memorandum, 18 April 1946, YVA, DPA, JM 10.548/6. Major Abrahamer of the United States Public Health Services was attached to UNRRA in Salzburg. He had been in Austria for almost a year, and returned to the U.S. on 1 May 1946. Health Care Services for Holocaust Survivors 55

Throughout 1946, the JDC saw its duty as supplying supplementary food and medical aid, while responsibility for caring for the inmates in the permanent or transit camps should remain in the hands of UNRRA and the American army. Only in late 1946, when the number of Jewish DPs in the American zone in Austria reached 27,700, the number of children and pregnant women increased, and UNRRA intended to end its operations and be replaced by the IRO did it became obvious to the JDC that it should deepen its involvement in providing health care services in the DP camps. Dr. David Graubert, who had been appointed chief medical officer of the JDC, declared on 20 September 1946 that it was urgent to prepare a comprehensive medical plan to respond to the medical needs of the Jewish survivors in Austria.73 In 1947 a sort of stability was achieved when the passage of refugees through Austria slowed down somewhat.

Third Stage: Mid-1947 to May 1948

In Austria, in contrast to Germany, an umbrella health care body representing the survivors and working with the JDC had not been established. However, a pattern of cooperation was eventually worked out, and the JDC became the most prominent body in health care policy providing a wide range of services including public health care and preventive medicine, dental care, mother and child care, preparation for immigration and vocational training, and medical rehabilitation for the disabled and chronically ill. One of the manifestations of cooperation between the JDC and the Central Committee for the American Zone in Austria was a conference of Jewish physicians and dentists in the American zone in Austria that convened on 19 April 1947 with the participation of Dr. Karl Lederer, the physician in charge of the JDC in Austria.74 The aim of the conference was to establish an organization of those engaging in the medical profession. The conference discussed the

73 “Report of Harold Nordlicht, JDC Representative in Linz, May to September 1946,” 8 October 1946, JJA, NY-AR 45–54#112. 74 Dr. Karl Lederer was a physician in Eretz Israel. In 1943 he enlisted for military service in the British Army and reached Austria; see Nissim Levy and Yael Levy, The Physicians of the Holy Land, 1799–1948 (Zikhron Ya’akov: Itay Bahur—Publishing, 2008), 222 (Hebrew). Dr. Lederer was appointed as physician on behalf of the JDC in early 1947; see Dr Schmidt to AJDC Austria, 28 March 1947, JJA, Geneva II B/C/ 20.021. 56 Schein problems of medical work inside the Jewish DP camps with the aim of improv- ing the medical services.75 During 1947 thousands of Jewish refugee came from Rumania. Crowding in the Jewish DP camps increased again, and conditions in the Rothschild Hospital and five other refugee houses in Vienna deteriorated. The JDC financed all the provisions for the Rumanian refugees since the American authorities refused to supply them food and medications. What did the Jewish Agency do in that period? In contrast to the JDC’s deep- ening involvement in health care in the DP camps, the Jewish Agency avoided dealing with health issues during the first two years. The official delegation of the Jewish Agency reached Austria in late 1946 and mainly helped those who were in the transit camps. But when the Agency did become involved with health issues, it primarily performed medical examinations to assess the health of the masses who wished to immigrate to Eretz Israel. Early in 1947 Dr. Theodor Gruska, the head of the medical service for newcomers, and Dr. Joseph Meir, the head of Kupat Holim (the ‘Sick Fund’ of the Histadrut, the General Federation of Labor), were sent to tour the DP camps in Europe. Their mission was defined as follows: “To prevent the immigration of medically non- fit people to Eretz Israel.”76 As a result of their tour, they concluded that a medical apparatus from Eretz Israel should be established in Europe to ensure that providing medical care in Europe would enable “to save the Agency thousands of liras.”77 In historical context, it should be noted that medical examination of those who wanted to immigrate to Eretz Israel was a well known procedure in the Zionist movement.78 Hygienic practices were an integral part of the Zionist ideology that aimed to create a ‘new human being’ in Eretz Israel.79 The difficult situation of hospitalization in Eretz Israel stimulated the Jewish Agency

75 On the conference, see “Land-Konferenz fun Yidishe Doctoirim in Salzburg,” Oifgang, 12 June 1947, YVA, O-37/11. The article is in Yiddish handwriting. 76 See Minutes of the Meeting of the Committee for Services to Newcomers, 3 February 1947, CZA, S6/8205 (Hebrew). 77 Ibid. 78 On medical examination during the Mandate period, see Eyal Katvan and Nadav Davidovich, “Health, Politics and Professionalism: Medical Examination of Jewish Immigration to Palestine, 1925–1928,” Israel: Studies in Zionism and the State of Israel: History, Society, Culture 11 (2007): 31–60 (Hebrew); Eyal Katvan, “The Establishment of ‘the Medical Office’ and the Central Apparatus for Examination of Immigrants to Palestine (1934–1939),” Iyunim Bitkumat Israel 18 (2008): 167–92 (Hebrew). 79 See Nadav Davidovich and Shifra Shvarts, “Health and Hegemony: Preventive Medicine, Immigrants and the Israeli Melting Pot,” Israel Studies 9, 2 (2004): 150–79. Health Care Services for Holocaust Survivors 57 to establish a medical apparatus that supervised all medical examination in Europe. On 24 November 1947 a medical department was established to supervise the medical examinations of all those who wished to immigrate to Eretz Israel. Dr. Joseph Kot was appointed as the physician in charge of all the ‘trust doctors’ (those considered as deserving the trust of the Jewish Agency) in the offices established by the Jewish Agency after the war in the various countries. In the beginning of 1948 the Jewish population in Austria numbered 33,412 people. They included 26,555 adults: 17,392 aged 18 to 45, 6,539 aged 45 to 60, and 2,639 over 60. The children numbered 6,857, of which 1,748 were youth aged between 12 and 18. Mass medical examinations for those who wanted to immigrate to Eretz Israel aimed to respond to the needs of the country, and later on they came under the authority of the Israeli health system. In an agreement signed by Dr. Kot and the JDC in Austria, it was decided that the medical examinations would be carried out by the medical apparatus of the JDC in Austria, but supervised by three physicians from Eretz Israel: Dr. Karl Lederer, Dr. Pinchas Robinson,80 and Dr. Doron, who was appointed as JDC physician in the Salzburg District.81 Although no medical selection policy was ever publicly declared, in effect such a policy was implemented during 1948 and the first years of statehood. Actually the Yishuv preferred the young and healthy among the immigrants, those who could actively participate in the military struggle to establish the Jewish state.82 After the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution on 29 November 1947 calling for the creation of two states in Palestine, a comprehensive operation of recruiting Jewish DP camps inmates for military service in Eretz Israel was begun. A central recruitment committee was authorized to release people from military service on the basis of medical considerations. At the beginning of 1948 pressure to leave Austria increased after the Austrian government adopted the Compulsory Work Law declaring that everyone capable of work should be registered in an employment bureau, including Jewish refugees, who had been previously exempted from this obligation.83

80 Pinchas Robinson enlisted in the British Army in 1941. After service in Egypt, he reached Austria with his unit, where he devoted his efforts to instructing Jewish physicians by publishing medical bulletins. 81 Jacob Landes, “Supplementary Report: Medical Program—Austria,” 24 January 1948, JJA, Geneva II, 322/B, C.20/02. 82 See, for example, Emissary Department of the Jewish Agency to Eliezer Dambitz, 2 February 1948, CZA, S86/6 (Hebrew). 83 Baruch Jaffe to the Emissary Department of the Jewish Agency, 10 February 1948, CZA, S86/125 (Hebrew). 58 Schein

Thus the Jewish Agency faced a dilemma: How to ensure that this human reservoir would immigrate to Israel, to strengthen settlement and to join the ranks of the Israeli Army, and simultaneously how to prevent the coming of the sick and the aged? In 1948, and especially after the declaration of Israel’s independence in May, the Jewish Agency tightened its cooperation with the JDC in order to perform mass medical examinations with the aim of preclud- ing the ill and infirm from immigrating to Israel. In effect, this policy had been implemented in Austria and Germany already five years before it was carried out among the immigrants coming from North Africa and Asia. The data of the mass medical examinations in Austria were summarized by the JDC physicians: 20,411 people were examined; 11,472 (56.2 percent) were found healthy while 8,939 (43.8 percent) were sick or suffered from an unclear health condition. The results of the medical examinations were delivered to the delegation of the Jewish Agency in order to determine who would be allowed to make aliyah.84 13,728 people of those who had undergone the examinations left Austria and most of them immigrated to Israel.

Fourth Stage: From the Establishment of Israel, May 1948

The government of Israel declared its clear-cut stance on the question of the immigrants’ health in a statement by Minister of Immigration Moshe Shapira on 20 September 1948:

In contrast to the Mandatory authorities’ position, all those who are in the service of the immigration offices and work on behalf of them should encourage all those elements who can contribute to the building of the state. More than ever, we are compelled to be strict in such an emergency hour that morally unwanted persons and people who might interfere with our war effort will not infiltrate into the state. A special strictness would be demanded in relation to the immigrants’ health.85

Only in October 1948 did the bureau for coordination discuss the issue of the health of Holocaust survivors. As Prof. Shifra Shvarts has shown, opinions varied between ultimate refusal to permit the entry of the old and the weak who

84 Dr. Robinson et al., “Medical Examinations and Mass Treatment of Jewish Refugees in Austria in 1948,” Harefuah 37, 4 (15 Aug. 1949): 43–46 (Hebrew). 85 Moshe Shapira, “Instructions for Providing Visas to Immigrants and Tourists,” CZA, A252/4/2 (Hebrew). Health Care Services for Holocaust Survivors 59 were not suitable for participation in the military struggle or physical work, and suggestions to solve their problems in medical institutions abroad.86 The absorption of half a million immigrants in the first two years after the establishment of Israel resulted in a marked deterioration in the quality of Israel’s health care system, and forced the young nation to delay the immigration of the chronically ill and handicapped. Consequently, they remained in the DP camps in Austria, mostly cared for by the JDC. In 1948, the JDC established a rehabilitation center in Ebelsberg for those found in the mass medical examinations as “not medically eligible for Israel,” aiming to prepare them for immigration by giving them vocational training according to their physical abilities.87 In spite of the detailed preparations made by the JDC, the rehabilitation center did not function well.88 In 1949 the Jewish Agency decided to increase the rate of immigration from Austria and signed an agreement with the American military to close the Jewish DP camps rapidly.89 The rehabilitation center in Ebelsberg was forced to absorb many people who refused to immigrate to Israel or preferred to stay in the camp until they could find better opportunities elsewhere abroad. A solution for unhealthy people was found only when Israel, the Jewish Agency, and the JDC agreed to establish MALBEN, a special institution for care of the handicapped and immigrants with long-term illnesses.90 The JDC continued to support Jews who stayed in Austria, either in the DP camps or in the Vienna Jewish community, while simultaneously funneling financial resources into immigration to Israel and the care of the chronically ill and social welfare cases. It was a responsible and realistic stance. Cooperation between the JDC, the Jewish Agency, and Holocaust survivors was gradually built up during the DP camp period and played a crucial role in creating the foundations that would carry out the JDC’s activities in Israel. It was an arduous and tortuous process subject to many inner tensions, but it enabled the nascent State of Israel to broaden its commitments toward the neediest people among the Holocaust survivors and other handicapped and chronically ill patients who had made their home in Israel.

86 Shvarts, “A selective medical choice,” 476–82. 87 Betty E. Gitlin, Medical Social Consultant, to P. Robinson, Act. Chief Officer, 11 January 1948, JJA, 278B.277A#8. 88 Dr. P. Robinson, AJDC Austria, to Dr. J. Shapiro, Medical Department Paris, 23 July 1949, JJA, NY AR 45–54#124. 89 See the correspondence between Beckelman and Passman, 22 June 1949, JJA, Geneva 322B/C. 20.017. 90 Pnina Romem, Malben Institutional Care and Rehabilitation of the Hard Core Immigrants (Zikhron Ya’akov: Itay Bahur-Publishing , 2012) (Hebrew).

PART 2 Postwar Jewish Migration and Czechoslovakia

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Dilemmas of Minority Politics: Jewish Migrants in Postwar Czechoslovakia and Poland

Kateřina Čapková

After World War II, Czechoslovakia and Poland were ruled by pro-Soviet pro- visional governments. Each became a Communist state within the next few years and came under the direct impact of Stalin’s policies. Both championed the idea of a nationally homogenous state without the national minorities that, according to the propaganda, had been responsible for the end of their interwar democracies. Despite these similarities, postwar Czechoslovakia and Poland developed different policies towards the Jews. Whereas the Czechoslovak government refused to acknowledge the rights of the Jewish national minority, the Polish government accepted, though only temporarily, the right of the Jewish minority to a distinct minority policy. I would argue that the legal position of Jews in both countries was a result of a political decision that had little to do with either the needs of the Jews or empathy towards them. Instead, it was part of a political strategy in which propaganda and the democratic image of the country played the major role. The effects of these different policies towards the Jews were especially felt by Jewish refugees from the territories that had been annexed by the Soviet Union (eastern Poland and Carpathian Ruthenia). In both cases, it was in these parts of interwar Poland and Czechoslovakia that the largest Jewish communities were situated. One could also legitimately argue that in the Polish case the argumenta- tion was the other way round. As Yosef Litvak and Hanna Shlomi have shown, the issue of the repatriation of Polish Jews from the Soviet Union determined the recognition of Jewish nationality in Poland.91 If we compare the Polish

* Research for this article was made possible thanks to the Alexander von Humbolt Foundation, Germany. 91 Yosef Litvak, “Polish-Jewish Refugees Repatriated from the Soviet Union to Poland at the End of the Second World War and Afterwards,” in Jews in Eastern Poland and the USSR, 1939–46, ed. Norman Davies and Antony Polonsky (Hampshire and London: Macmillan, 1991), 227–39; Hanna Shlomi, “The ‘Jewish Organising Committee’ in Moscow and ‘The Jewish Central Committee’ in Warsaw, June 1945–February 1946: Tackling Repatriation,” in ibid., 240–54.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ��4 | doi 10.1163/9789004277779_006 64 Čapková government’s agreements with the Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia, the difference is obvious. In Poland, former citizens of the former eastern Poland who held Polish nationality as well as Jewish could ask for ‘repatriation’.92 In Carpathian Ruthenia, only citizens of Czech or Slovak nationality could opt for Czechoslovak citizenship.93 The restrictions placed on Jews from Carpathian Ruthenia, who could not opt for Czechoslovak citizenship, did not prevent thousands of Carpathian Jews from moving to the Bohemian territories, where they settled mostly in the border regions from which the German-speaking population was being expelled. Because of the threat of deportation back to Carpathian Ruthenia (called ‘repatriation’), a few thousand of them left for DP camps in Germany.94 Several Carpathian Jews, sometimes even those holding Czechoslovak citizenship, were deported back to Carpathian Ruthenia during 1947.95 Still, thousands did remain in Bohemia and re-established the Jewish communities in the borderlands, in the former Sudetenland. Even after the exodus in 1948–50, these communities were among the most vital in the Bohemian territories.

92 On 9 September 1944 an agreement was signed between the USSR and the Polski Komitet Wyzwolenia Narodowego (the Polish Committee of National Liberation) in Lublin about repatriation which became the basis for the individual agreements between the Soviet republics which were to receive parts of pre-war Poland (Ukraine, Belorussia, and Lithuania). For the text of the agreements, see Stanisław Ciesielski, ed., Umsiedlung der Polen aus dem ehemaligen polnischen Ostgebieten nach Polen in den Jahren 1944–1947 (Marburg: Verlag Herder-Institut, 2006), 76–105. 93 Jan Černý and Václav Červenka, Státní občanství ČSSR: Ucelený výklad právních předpisů, upravujících československé státní občanství (Prague: Orbis, 1963), 188–89. 94 Zorach Warhaftig, Uprooted: Jewish Refugees and Displaced Persons after Liberation (New York: Institute of Jewish Affairs of the American Jewish Congress and World Jewish Congress, 1946), 64. Kurt Wehle, the secretary of the Council of Jewish Religious Communities in Bohemia and Moravia, estimates the number of Carpathian Jews fleeing to the DP camps in the American occupation zone of Germany at 6000; see Kurt Wehle, “The Jews in Bohemia and Moravia, 1945–48,” in The Jews of Czechoslovakia: Historical Studies and Surveyes, ed. Avigdor Dagan, Gerture Hirschler, and Lewis Weiner, 3 vols. (Philadelphia and New York: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1968–84), 3:507. 95 This is stated in a memorandum sent by the Council of Jewish Religious Communities in Bohemia and Moravia to the Ministry of Interior, dated 17 December 1947; quoted in Jaroslav Vaculík, “Židé z Podkarpatské Rusi jako optanti pro československé státní občanství v letech 1945–1947,” in Mezinárodní vědecká konference: Akce Nisko v historii “konečného řešení židovské otázky”: k 55. výročí první hromadné deportace evropských Židů: sbornik referatu, ed. Ludmila Nesladkova (Ostrava: Facultas Philosophica Universitatis Ostraviensis, 1995), 296. Dilemmas of Minority Politics 65

In contrast, the ‘repatriation’ of Jews from the eastern regions of the former Poland was organized by the Polish government and the Central Committee of Polish Jews. The trains were destined mostly for Lower Silesia, another territory from which the Germans inhabitants were expelled.96 Many of the approximately 100,000 Jews who were in Lower Silesia in July 1946 left during the second half of that year or 1947 because of the pogroms, mostly with the help of Brihah organizers.97 Like some of the Carpathian Jews, most of them ended up in DP camps in Germany. But even after this flight and after the emigration to Israel following its establishment, the Jewish population in Lower Silesia played a considerable role in postwar history, since nearly half of all remaining Polish Jews were living there.98 The main argument made in this article is that even though recognition of Jewish nationality in Poland was temporary, lasting only until 1949, it had a far- reaching impact on the postwar history of Jews in Poland. A comparison with the Carpathian Jewish refugees of Czechoslovakia elucidates the difference. Before setting out to compare the Jewish refugees’ reactions to these different external political settings, it is worthwhile to reconsider the question whether these two Jewries were already different at the end of the war. There are two primary distinctions to be made between Polish Jews coming from the Soviet Union and those from Carpathian Russia: their wartime experiences and their numbers. Most of the approximately 200,000 Jewish repatriates from the Soviet Union were either deported to the interior of the USSR after the Soviet attack of Poland in September 1939, or they fled to the Soviet Union during the war. Some survived gulags, but most of them were working in different parts of the USSR and their children had to attend mostly Russian-language schools. That is why many of the repatriates were fluent in Russian after the war alongside their frequent knowledge of Polish and Yiddish.

96 For details about the repatriation, see Elżbieta Hornowa, “Powrót Żydów polskich z ZSRR oraz działalność opekuńcza Centralnego Komitetu Żydów w Polsce,” Biuletyn ŻIH (Żydowskiego Instytutu Historycznego) 133–34 (nos. 1–2) (1985): 105–122 (Polish, with English summary); Bożena Szaynok, Ludność żydowska na Dolnym Śląsku 1945–1950 (Wrocław: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego, 2000), 44–60. 97 Natalia Aleksiun-Mądrzak, “Nielegalna emigracja Żydów z Polski w latach 1945– 1947,” Parts 1–3, Biuletyn ŻIH, 96 (nos. 2–4) (1996): 67–90; 34–49; 36–48 respectively; Yehuda Bauer, Flight and Rescue: Brichah (New York: Random House, 1970. 98 See the map in Bożena Szaynok, “Migrationen der polnischen Juden in den Jahren 1944–1956,” in Zwangsumsiedlung, Flucht und Vertreibung 1939–1959: Atlas zur Geschichte Ostmitteleuropas (Bonn: Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung, 2010), 147. According to this map, 47 percent of all Jewish inhabitans of Poland lived in the spring of 1947 in Lower Silesia. 66 Čapková

Some of the Carpathian Jews, too, survived in the Soviet interior and enlisted in the Czechoslovak Army units of the Red Army in 1943. Still, a proportion- ally high number of Carpathian Jews hid in Hungary, while several thousand of them survived work camps (operated by Hungarians after the occupation of Carpathian Ruthenia by Hungary in March 1939) or Nazi concentration camps. The relatively high number of Holocaust survivors among Carpathian Jews corresponds with quite late deportations to Auschwitz from May to June 1944.99 It is assumed that approximately 20 percent of the pre-war Jewish population (i.e., about 25,000) of Carpathian Ruthenia survived the war.100 Even though this number represents only a fraction of the Polish repatriates from the Soviet Union, according to my estimate Carpathian Jewish refugees accounted for approximately 40 percent of the postwar Jewish population in the Bohemian territories and were clearly dominant in the Jewish communities in north and west Bohemia. Linguistically, most of the Carpathian Jews were multilingual thanks to their pre-war and war experiences. Yiddish, Hungarian, and Czech/ Slovak were among the languages most frequently spoken. It is questionable whether they also differed in ideological and religious terms. In the historiographical literature, on the one hand we can find the dominant narrative of the mostly leftist Polish-Jewish repatriates and, on the other hand, that of the mostly Orthodox or other religious Jews from Carpathian Ruthenia. Even though this might have been true for a part of both groups, I would like to argue that both migrant groups were heterogeneous and that the external political setting after the Second World War surely added more arguments for the above-mentioned narratives. My research comparing the situations in the two neighboring countries reveals that there were three phenomena that differed in them. These had an impact on the different integration processes of Jewish refugees as well as on different models of identity. The condition of the Jews in each country differed from that in the other in institutional infrastructures, linguistic conditions, and the extent of recognition and appreciation of the Jewish communities re- established by the Jewish refugees.

99 See Yeshayahu A. Jelinek, The Carpathian Diaspora: The Jews of Subcarpathian Rus and Mukachevo, 1848–1948 (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007), 325–27. 100 Paul R. Magocsi, “Jews: ‘Subcarpathian Rus’ and the Prešov Region,” in Encyclopedia of Rusyn History and Culture, ed. Paul R. Magocsi and Ivan I. Pop, rev. and exp. ed. (Toronto and Buffalo: University of Toronto Press, 2005), 220. Dilemmas of Minority Politics 67

Institutions

In postwar Poland, the administration of Jewish affairs was placed on a totally new basis, independent from the religious communities. Since November 1944 the Centralny Komitet Żydów w Polsce (CKŻP; Central Committee of Polish Jews), with Emil Sommerstein as chairman, was responsible for all matters concerning the Jews in postwar Poland. As David Engel has convincingly demonstrated, the accusations that the CKŻP was a Polish Yevsektsia are misleading. The CKŻP was the transformed Jewish Committee of Lublin, an organization established spontaneously by local Jews to help needy Jews. It was important for the CKŻP that diverse Jewish political parties were represented in this body, to ensure that the Communists did not have a majority. Moreover, even though it was under the direct supervision of the Polish Ministry of the Interior and, in its first year, was dependent on government funding, the CKŻP enjoyed relative independence in decision making.101 The CKŻP was responsible for the registration of Jews, organizing the repatriation of Jews from the Soviet Union, all social and charitable networks, the establishment and control of separate Jewish primary and secondary schools, legal matters, and the restitution of property. An important item on the agenda of the CKŻP was the so-called ‘productivization’ of the Jews. This project was clearly part of Communist ideology and actually also mirrored Polish prejudices against Jews who allegedly had been only slightly integrated into the working class. However, it also largely corresponded to the concept of con- structive relief offered by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC). From the end of 1945, it was the JDC which generously supported all the activities of the CKŻP and its branches and funded, for example, orphan- ages, schools, hospitals, so-called productivization programs, theater, and periodicals.102 The local Jewish communities played only a minor role in the organization of Polish Jewry in the postwar period.103 The Jewish Committees were much

101 David Engel, “The Reconstruction of Jewish Communal Institutions in Postwar Poland: The Origins of the Central Committee of Polish Jews, 1944–1945,” East European Politics and Societies 10, 1 (1996): 85–107. 102 See the Archives of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, New York (hereafter, AAJJDC), files 728–33. 103 For the pressure applied by the CKŻP on Jewish religious communities to acknowledge its supremacy, see Józef Adelson, “W Polsce zwanej ludową,” in Najnowsze dzieje Żydów w Polsce w zarysie (do 1950 roku), ed. Jerzy Tomaszewski (Warsaw: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN, 1993), 429–33. On religious communities in Lower Silesia, see Ewa Waszkiewicz, Kongregacja Wyznania Mojzeszowego na Dolnym Slasku na tle polityki wyznaniowej Polskiej 68 Čapková more visible and active. The CKŻP was alone at the top of the pyramid, ruling over Jewish Committees at the level of the voivodeships, with local Jewish Committees at the bottom. After the dissolution of the CKŻP in late 1949, a new organization, the Towarzystwo Spoleczno Kulturalne Żydow w Polsce (TSKŻ; Social and Cultural Association of the Jews in Poland) was established.104 In a very limited way it continued some of the CKŻP activities. All the charitable institutions, as well as the schools, were put under state control. Nevertheless, the TSKŻ in Lower Silesia organized courses in Yiddish and dance, theater groups, bridge parties, music lessons, lectures on Jewish history and culture, meetings for different age groups, and summer camps for Jewish children, where Yiddish and Hebrew songs were learnt and the Polish and Israeli flags were flown from the masts in the middle of the camp (something hardly imaginable in Czechoslovakia in the 1950s and early 1960s). The integration of Carpathian Jews into Bohemian society took totally different forms. Because of the refusal of the Czechoslovak government to recognize Jewish national rights, the only focal centers of Jewish life were the Jewish religious communities. In the Bohemian territories the highest institutional organ was the Council of Jewish Religious Communities in Bohemia and Moravia (Rada židovských náboženských obcí v Čechách a na Moravě) with its headquarters in Prague. The responsibilities of the representatives of the Council went far beyond the religious framework—registration of Jews, restitution of Jewish property, and charitable institutions—and they were also involved in the joint organization of the Brihah. Whereas in Poland the CKŻP was the agency distributing money from the JDC, in Czechoslovakia the Council of Jewish Religious Communities was the most important recipient of these funds. As a result of the Holocaust, the Prague religious community cared not only for Jews who were members of a Jewish religious community before the war, but also for those of another faith who were considered Jews under the Nuremberg Laws or who had Jewish spouses, and also for Jews who were convinced Communists. The Council decided to represent all these Jews in their efforts at rehabilitation and restitution of their property.105 In Slovakia,

Rzeczypospolitej Ludowej, 1945–1968 (Wroclaw: Wydawn. Uniwersitetu Wroclawskiego, 1999). 104 For more on this organization, see Grzegorz Berendt, Życie żydowskie w Polsce w latach 1950–1956: Z dzejów Towarzystwa Społeczno-kulturalnego Żydów w Polsce (Gdańsk: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Gdańskiego, 2008). 105 See Wehle, “The Jews in Bohemia and Moravia,” 502–3. As noted above, Kurt Wehle was the secretary of the Council of Jewish Religious Congregations in Bohemia and Moravia. Dilemmas of Minority Politics 69 by contrast, the agenda of religious communities and restitution issues was divided between the Central Union of Jewish Religious Congregations in Slovakia (Ústredný Sväz židovských náboženských obcí na Slovensku) and the Organization of Victims of Racial Persecution at the Hands of the Fascist Regime (Sdruženie fašistickým režimom rasove prenásledovaných).106 This self-understanding of the Jewish community, which goes beyond a religious definition, is still present in the Czech Republic today. That is also why, after the great political changes of November 1989, the name of the institution was changed to the Federation of Jewish Communities in Bohemia and Moravia, and the word ‘religious’ was omitted.107 The non-recognition of Jewish nationality in Czechoslovakia had a direct impact on the integration of the Carpathian Jews. The only place of regular meeting with other Jews was the prayer hall (most synagogues in the former Sudetenland had been destroyed during the Kristallnacht). There was a clear difference between the religious service conducted by these newcomers, who were mostly Orthodox, and that of the local German-speaking Jews, who favored Reform Judaism. Therefore, a network of people who supplied the community members with kosher food had to be established. No Jewish schools existed alongside state-run schools in Czechoslovakia, though in Aussig/Ustí nad Labem for example, an afterschool heder was introduced for boys. Cantor Samuel Landerer met with his pupils in the prayer hall.108

Language

Stalin’s theory of nationalism was based on the assumption that a nation requires a national language. In reaction to this theory, which was thoroughly analyzed in the Bulletin of the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw,109 and also in keeping with the ideology of the Bund,110 Yiddish was favored in Poland

106 Ibid., 503–4. 107 See http://www.fzo.cz/ [accessed 2 Aug. 2012]. 108 Interviews with Malvina Hoffmann, 21 Oct. 2010, Prague; Pinchas Landerer, 18 May 2011, Tel Aviv; Harry Farkaš, 6 Jan. 2010, Prague. 109 See, e.g., A.M. Pankratova, “Di badaytung fun J.V. Stalins artikel vegn sprakh-kentnish far der historisher visnshaft,” Bleter far Geshikhte, Yidisher Historisher Institut in Poyln 3, 3–4 (1950): 135–61 (Yiddish); P. Tretiakov, “Etlekhe frag vegn der apshtamung fun felker in likht fun di shafungen fun J.V. Stalin vegn shprakh un shprakh-kentenish,” ibid.: 162–87 (Yiddish). 110 Der Algemeyner Yidisher Arbeter Bund in Lite, Poyln, un Rusland (The General Union of Jewish Workers in Lithuania, Poland, and Russia), known simply as the Bund, was a dominant Jewish organization in Poland in the 1930s. Their interwar leaders were influenced 70 Čapková as the Jewish national language. Wavering between Yiddish and Polish was typical of the Jews of postwar Poland. The discussions of the CKŻP Presidium were conducted in Polish, whereas its official periodical, Dos naye lebn, was in Yiddish. Most Jewish schools in Lower Silesia used Yiddish as the language of education and the CKŻP school inspectors had to ensure that all school signs in the classrooms were in Yiddish.111 On the other hand, the inspectors’ reports reveal that the schools had difficulty finding enough teachers to teach in Yiddish and that most of the children spoke better Russian or Polish than Yiddish. Summing up the situation in Jelenia Góra, Jawor, Boków, Złoteria, and Chojnów, the inspector Calina Gitler writes:

The abortive and forcible implementation of the Yiddish language as the language of instruction for the children and the teachers, who (with small exceptions) do not know Yiddish, causes new pedagogical problems. Teaching of Yiddish in those schools became a fiction and the Polish language is prohibited. As a result the children do not know either Polish or Yiddish and they continue to speak Russian.112

Hebrew was taught only to a very limited extent, mostly in the few Zionist-run schools and in the kibbutzim. The only primary school with Hebrew which was under the auspices of the CKŻP was in Bialystok.113 Because of this official support of the Yiddish language and culture, hundreds of books were published in Yiddish. Most of these publications were pro-Soviet, aimed at mobilizing the Jewish masses for the Communist cause. Such Yiddish-language Communist propaganda was not a new phenomenon;

by Marxism, but were at the same time promoters of Jewish nationalism. For more see Daniel Blatman, “Bund,” in The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe, http://www. yivoencyclopedia.org/article.aspx/Bund [accessed 2 Aug. 2012]. 111 Archives of the Jewish Historical Institute, Warsaw (hereafter, AŻIH), CKŻP, Oswiata, 303/IX/4, letter of the Presidium of the CKŻP to Ministerstwo Oswiaty, 16 Apr. 1948. Regulations about the use of langugages: inside the school all inscriptions should be in Yiddish, outside the school-building in Yiddish and Polish. 112 “Nieumiejętne wprowadzanie siłą języka żydowskiego jako wykładowego do środowiska dziecięcego i nauczycielskiego, w którym żydowski /z małymi wyjątkami/ nie jest znany stwarza nowe trudności pedagogiczne. Nauka żydowskiego w tych szkołach staje się fikcją, a język polski czemś zakazanym. W rezultacie dzieci nie znają ani polskiego, ani żydowskiego i mówią w dalszym ciągu po rosyjsku.” AŻIH, CKŻP, Oswiata, 303/IX/22, Protokol Wizytacji na Dolnym Sląsku, 29 December 1946–9 January 1947. 113 Helena Datner, “Szkoły Centralnego Komitetu Żydów w Polsce v latach 1944–1949,” Biuletyn ŻIH 169–71 (nos. 1–3) (1994): 106. Dilemmas of Minority Politics 71 it continued the tradition of similar publications by Jewish Communists in interwar France, Poland, and the Soviet Union, to name just the most important European centers. But in addition to these ideological writings, published in tens of thousands of copies, a remarkable number of original works were also published, mostly testimonies of Holocaust survivors and fiction based on the postwar reality. The great Yiddish writers—Sholom Aleichem, Mendele, and Peretz—were also published in huge numbers.114 Yiddish was heard in theaters as well; there were two official Yiddish theaters, both directed by Ida Kaminska.115 In the Bohemian territories, including the former Sudetenland, Czech was the only official language of education and the civil service. During the resettlement of the border regions after the expulsion of the ethnic Germans, many linguistically different groups came together. In addition to Czechs from the interior of the country, there were Magyars from Slovakia, Slovaks, Roma and Sinti, Greek Communists, and many Czechs from Czech national minority communities in Yugoslavia, Ukraine, and elsewhere, whose language was often hard for other Czechs to understand.116 Whereas some of these groups, despite state pressure, tried to maintain their linguistic differences, the Carpathian Jews supported Czechoslovak linguistic policy. In all the interviews I have conducted so far, the interviewees have emphasized how well they spoke Czech and also that they or their parents spoke without an accent. One of the reasons for this smooth linguistic assimilation was their positive attitude to the Czechs, who, thanks to the image of interwar Czechoslovakia, were considered pro- Jewish and democratic, unlike the Ruthenians, Ukrainians, and Slovaks, with whom these Jews had recently had negative experiences during the war. This linguistic assimilation was, however, also part of their tactic not to stand out, to try to be invisible to the state and avoid any police interrogation, especially

114 Joanna Nalewajko-Kulikov, “The Last Yiddish Books Printed in Poland: Outline of the Activities of Yidish Bukh Publishing House,” in Under the Red Banner: Yiddish Culture in the Communist Countries in the Postwar Era, ed. Elvira Grözinger and Magdalena Ruta (Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz Verlag, 2008), 111–34; Magdalena Ruta, “The Principal Motifs in Yiddish Literature in Poland (1945–1949): Preliminary Remarks,” in ibid., 165–84. 115 Izshak Turkow Grudberg, Yiddish Teatr in Poyln (Warsaw: Yiddish Bukh, 1951) (Yiddish); Krysia Fisher, Michael C Steinlauf, Henryk Grynberg and Robart Newman, Ida Kaminska (1899–1980): Grande Dame of the Yiddish Theater: Exhibition Catalogue (New York: YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, 2001). 116 Jaroslav Vaculík, Poválečná reemigrace a usídlování zahraničních krajanů (Brno: Masarykova Univerzita v Brně, 2002); Matěj Spurný, Nejsou jako my: Česká společnost a menšiny v pohraničí (1945–1960) (Prague: Antikomplex, 2011). 72 Čapková during the first few months after the war when most of them still did not hold Czechoslovak citizenship. Yiddish remained the language of everyday communication at home and after services in the prayer halls, though it was mostly only the older generation that spoke Yiddish at home; with children born after the war, most parents spoke Czech. Linguistic assimilation accelerated Jewish integration into the surrounding society. In the interviews, the phenomenon of living in two separate worlds is strikingly prevalent. Carpathian Jews were well integrated into Czech society. Most of them quickly found jobs as laborers, in the management of factories, and in the civil service. Smooth integration into the economic infrastructure was actually one of the reasons why, in the final tally, many of these Jews were not sent to the Soviet Union, since the Czechoslovak Ministry of Labor intervened to permit them to remain in Czechoslovakia.117 Their children joined the Communist youth organization and had an active social life at school. They went to summer camps with their non-Jewish class- mates, raising problems for children from Orthodox families, that were mostly resolved by compromise. In contrast, the other part of their recollections has to do with their Jewish life, which most of them tried to conceal once outside the home or the prayer hall. One interviewee told me that she and her brother were even called by their Yiddish names at home and in the Jewish community, but went by other names at school and elsewhere in public.118 Even under such conditions most of these Jews managed to maintain Jewish traditions, and a remarkably high proportion of the second generation now belongs to Orthodox communities in the United States, Israel, or Germany.

Status of the Jewish Communities in Border Regions

The last major difference between the situation in Czechoslovakia and that in Poland relates to the role of the Jewish communities re-established by the Jewish refugees, which appears in the narrative of postwar Jewish history in both countries. Jewish sources relating to the new communities in Lower Silesia strongly reflect the idea that a new experiment was starting in a new era—namely, homogenous Jewish settlement as part of a Polish democratic state. This idea of a ‘Yiddisher Yishuv’ in Lower Silesia was associated with the revival of the Yiddish language and culture, with the huge project of productivization of

117 Wehle, “The Jews in Bohemia and Moravia,” 507. 118 Interview with Malvina Hoffmann, 21 Oct. 2010, Prague. Dilemmas of Minority Politics 73 local Jews, and the idea of remaking the former German (and therefore Nazi) territories into a region where Jews would rebuild democratic Poland. The term ‘Yiddisher Yishuv’ appears in the Jewish press of the time, in the materials of the Jewish faction of the Polish Worker’s Party, and in documents and speeches of CKŻP members.119 There is even a twenty-minute propaganda film in Yiddish by Nathan Gross, Yiddisher Yishuv in Nidershlesye (1946), which praises the achievements of Jewish repatriates in rebuilding postwar Poland. It shows their cultural life as well as their achievements in industry and agriculture. In some of the secondary literature there are comparisons of the Jewish entity in Lower Silesia with those of Birobidzan and the Crimea. I would argue that the Polish Communists never seriously supported the idea of a ‘Yiddisher Yishuv’. Unlike the Jewish Communists, who were mostly unhappy about the illegal and legal emigration of Jews after the Kielce pogrom in July 1946, the Polish Communists could scarcely conceal their satisfaction that the Jews were leaving the country. As Bożena Szaynok has convincingly argued, this clash of the Jewish and the Polish visions of Lower Silesia is clearly manifested in the 1948 exhibition on the ‘Recovered Territories’: when the Jews tried to show their achievements, their part of the exhibition was cancelled by the Polish organizers only a day before the exhibition opened.120 Nevertheless, some remnants of the project of the ‘Yiddisher Yishuv’ were misused for propaganda as late as the 1960s. One example is the last Yiddish-language secondary school in Wrocław. Until 1968, when it was closed down, official visitors to Communist Poland from Cuba and the Soviet Union, or Communist journalists from Western countries, traveled from Warsaw to Wrocław to visit this symbol of successful Jewish integration into Communist society.121 In clear contrast to the idea of the ‘Yiddisher Yishuv’ in Lower Silesia, the re-established Jewish communities in north and west Bohemia were neglected not only by Czechoslovak politicians, but also by the Jewish religious community in Prague. Some representatives of the Prague Jewish community welcomed the Carpathian Jews, who helped restore religious life in the Bohemian territories. The few cantors and ritual slaughterers in postwar Bohemia came mostly from Carpathian Ruthenia, a trend that had actually begun in the

119 See the many articles about the ‘Yiddisher Yishuv’ in Dos naye lebn, e.g., “Di gest antt- sikt min Yiddishn Yishuv in Nidershlezye,” Dos naye lebn, no. 42 (9 June 1947): 6; see also Yaakov Egit, Tsu a nay lebn: Tswey yor yiddisher yishuv in Nidershlesye (Wroclaw: Nidershlesye, 1947) (both in Yiddish). 120 Szaynok, Ludność żydowska, 169–70. 121 See Szyja Bronsztejn, Z dziejów ludności żydowskiej na Dolnym Śląsku po II wojnie świa- towej (Wroclaw: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wroclawskiego, 1993), 36. 74 Čapková interwar period. On the other hand, some local Jews feared that the arrival of Orthodox Jews from Carpathian Ruthenia would incite antisemitism. The different religious traditions, educational backgrounds, and often also different wartime experiences of most of the Carpathian Jews raised an invisible barrier between the refugees and local Jews.122 This barrier also led to the border-region communities being omitted from postwar Bohemian Jewish history, with a far-reaching impact on historiography.123 ∵ In conclusion, the short-lived recognition of the Jewish national minority in postwar Poland and the refusal to grant Jews special national rights in postwar Czechoslovakia had direct consequences for the daily life of Jewish refugees in each country. In the early postwar years a diversified institutional network headed by the CKŻP was created in Poland, twelve Jewish political parties renewed their activities, a network of Jewish schools—mostly with Yiddish as the main language—was established, and a huge number of Yiddish books were published. The shock caused by the change in policy in late 1949 and early 1950 was enormous. The only legal organization, apart from the religious communities, was the TSKŻ. There were few Yiddish schools and the two Yiddish theaters were nationalized and unified. In comparison to Czechoslovakia, however, this was a great achievement, since no such parallel secular Jewish institutions existed there alongside the religious communities. In Bohemia, the refugees were mostly concentrated in Jewish communities and developed a widespread social network that enabled them to maintain Jewish traditions. Thanks to their linguistic assimilation they integrated well into the surrounding society. Whereas Yiddish was misused in Poland for ideo-

122 Jelinek, Carpathian Diaspora, 330. 123 The Jewish settlers in north and west Bohemia are neglected in all of the newest publications about the resettlement in the borderlands: Adrian von Arburg, “Abschied und Neubeginn: Der Bevölkerungswechsel in den Sudetengebieten nach 1945,” in Als die Deutschen weg waren: Was nach der Vertreibung geschah, Ostpreußen, Schlesien, Sudetenland: das Buch zur WDR-Fernsehserie, ed. Włodzimierz Borodziej (Berlin: Rowohlt Berlin, 2005), 185–220; František Čapka, Lubomír Slezák, and Jaroslav Vaculík, Nové osídlení pohraničí českých zemí po druhé světové válce (Brno: Akademické nakladatel- ství, 2005); Matěj Spurný, Flucht und Vertreibung: Das Ende des Zweiten Weltkrieges in Niederschlesien, Sachsen und Nordböhmen (Dresden: Sächsische Landeszentrale für Politische Bildung, 2008); id., Nejsou jako my; Andreas Wiedemann, “Komm mit uns das Grenzland aufbauen!”: Ansiedlung und neue Strukturen in den ehemaligen Sudetengebieten 1945–1952 (Essen: Klartext, 2007). Dilemmas of Minority Politics 75 logical reasons and to put political pressure on the Jewish minority, Yiddish in Czechoslovakia, because of government policy, became a language associated with religion and tradition. It is perhaps a freak of history that in both cases the year 1968 witnessed the end of lively activity in the Jewish communities of the Bohemian and Polish border regions. Most Carpathian Jews, who were hardly visible in Bohemia, left the country after the invasion by troops of the Warsaw Pact. The years 1967–68, marked by antisemitic propaganda of the Gomułka government, also mark the absolute end of the dreams of a Polish-Jewish sym- biosis that had been developed by the last Jewish Communists. The Postwar Czech-Jewish Leadership and the Issue of Jewish Emigration from Czechoslovakia (1945–1950)

Jan Láníček

On 28 July 1948, the newly appointed Israeli minister to Prague, Ehud Avriel (Überall), presented his credentials to the president of Communist Czechoslovakia, Klement Gottwald. In his short inaugural speech, Avriel stressed his joy at serving as the first Israeli minister to the country that traditionally had a friendly attitude towards Jewish national aspirations. He also expressed his conviction that both countries would be able to continue with close relations in the future. Several decades later, in his memoirs, Avriel recol- lected his service in postwar Czechoslovakia as follows:

During the period immediately following World War II, the Czechoslovak government, having just re-established its authority in its liberated homeland, showed understanding for the problems and struggle of the Jewish underground liberation movement in Palestine. It also demonstrated willingness to help the Jews rebuild their lives in the Jewish homeland. . . . After the establishment of the state of Israel, the Czechoslovak authorities showed great understanding in helping Jews incapable of adjusting to the Communist regime to emigrate to the Jewish [h]omeland.124

Avriel’s memoirs present a dominant historical narrative of the relations between Czechoslovakia and the state-in-the-making, Israel, dealing with the attitudes of the respective political representatives. Available historiography predominantly analyzes the attitudes of the Czech non-Jewish population towards the survivors of the Holocaust, or presents the official policies of the Czechoslovak political representations concerning the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine and later the initial support of Communist Czechoslovakia

* This article was written as part of the grant project GAČR 13-15989P: “The Czechs, Slovaks and Jews: Together but Apart, 1938–1989.” 124 Ehud Avriel, “Prague and Jerusalem: The Era of Friendship,” in Jews of Czechoslovakia: Historical Studies and Surveys, ed. Avigdor Dagan, vol. 3 (Philadelphia and New York: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1984), 554, 562.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ��4 | doi ��.��63/9789004277779_007 The Postwar Czech-Jewish Leadership 77 for the State of Israel.125 In contrast, this article examines the so-far neglected part of Czechoslovak-Jewish postwar history and enquires into the attitudes of the official Jewish representatives in liberated Czechoslovakia towards the Jews settling in postwar Europe. It analyzes their attitudes towards the soul- searching of Jewish survivors on whether to stay in the traumatic area, the territories where during World War II the Nazis attempted to exterminate the entire Jewish population, or to leave for another country. As Avriel emphasized in his memoirs, one of the main issues the new Jewish state intended to negoti- ate with Czechoslovakia was the possibility of extensive Jewish emigration to the Middle East. The Jewish national territory was to offer a homeland to all Jews who wanted to settle there, but the Jewish state also needed new immigrants who would help in the creation of a stable national economy and safeguard the territorial integrity of the independent state.

125 For available historiography, see Petr Brod, “Židé v poválečném Československu,” in Židé v novodobých dějinách: Soubor přednášek FF ÚK, ed. Václav Veber (Prague: Univerzita Karlova, 1997), 177–89; Ivica Bumová, “The Jewish Community after 1945: Struggle for Civic and Social Rehabilitation,” in Holocaust as a Historical and Moral Problem of the Past and the Present: Collection of Studies from the Conference, ed. Monika Vrzgulová and Daniela Richterová (Bratislava: Dokumentačné stredisko holokaustu, 1998), 253–78; Helena Krejčová, “The Czech Lands at the Dawn of the New Age (Czech Anti-Semitism 1945–1948),” in Anti-Semitism in Post-totalitarian Europe, ed. Jan Hančil and Michael Chase (Prague: Franz Kafka Publishers,1993), 115–24; id., “Czech and Slovak Anti-Semitism, 1945–1948,” in Stránkami soudobých dějin: Sborník statí k pětašedesetinám Karla Kaplana, ed. Karel Jech (Prague: Ústav pro soudobé dějiny AV ČR, 1993), 158–73; Yeshayahu Jelinek, “Zachraň sa, kto môžeš: Židia na Slovensku v rokoch 1944–1950: poznámky a úvahy,” Acta Judaica Slovaca 4 (1998): 91–119; Kurt Wehle, “The Jews of Bohemia and Moravia: 1945–1948,” in The Jews of Czechoslovakia: Historical Studies and Surveys, vol. 3, ed. Avigdon Dagan (Philadelphia and New York: The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1984), 499–530; Petr Bednařík, “Vztah židů a české společnosti na stránkách českého tisku v letech 1945–1948,” PhD diss., Univerzita Karlova, Prague, 2003; Anna Cichopek- Gajraj, “Jews, Poles, and Slovaks: A Story of Encounters, 1944–48”, PhD diss., University of Michigan, 2008; Monika Hanková, “Kapitoly z poválečných dějin židovské komunity v Čechách a na Moravě (1945–1956),” M.A. thesis, Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Prague, 2006; Hedvika Novotná, “Soužití české společnosti a Židů v letech 1945–1948 ve světle různých pramenů,” M.A. thesis, Faculty of Humanities, Charles University, Prague, 2003; Petr Sedlák, “Poté: Postoj a přístup k Židům v českých zemích po druhé světové válce (1945–1947/1953),” PhD diss., Institute of History, Masaryk University, Brno, 2008; Blanka Soukupová, “Židé a židovská reprezentace v českých zemích v letech 1945–1948 (mezi režimem, židovstvím a judaismem),” in Židovská menšina v Československu po druhé světové válce: Od osvobození k nové totalitě, ed. Blanka Soukupová, Peter Salner and Miroslava Ludvíková (Prague: Židovské museum v Praze, 2009), 55–80. 78 Láníček

Several crucial points should be considered when discussing the attitude of European Jewish politicians towards the future of Jewish communities in the Diaspora. The years 1945–1950 were filled with the Zionist struggle for the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine and later for securing the existence of the newly independent State of Israel. Inevitably, the creation of Israel offered an outlet to which a majority of the Jews who desired to do so could freely migrate and settle. May 1948 presents a key moment when discussing postwar Jewish migration from liberated eastern Europe, as well as from DP camps established all across divided Germany. Yet in Czechoslovakia, 1948 was also crucial from another perspective; the coup on 25 February 1948 established a Communist dictatorship over this semi-democratic country with an outstanding reputation concerning its treatment of the Jewish minority. Between 1946 and 1948, Czechoslovakia facilitated Jewish migration from eastern Europe to Palestine when more than one hundred thousand Polish Jewish refugees passed through its territory on their way to Palestine. Furthermore, in addition to this support for practical Zionism, the Czechoslovak government, represented by President Edvard Beneš, Foreign Minister Jan Masaryk— but also by various Communist politicians, among them the Deputy Foreign Minister Vladimír Clementis—vocally defended the partition plan adopted on 29 November 1947 by the United Nations General Assembly to establish two independent states (Arab and Jewish) in British Mandate Palestine.126 Later the Communist regimes in eastern Europe, following the leadership of the Soviet Union, backed the establishment of the Jewish state, and Czechoslovakia was one of the first states to grant the new Israel de jure recognition.127 Nevertheless, this article, although taking into consideration the general political line followed by the people’s democracies, will predominantly scruti- nize the attitude of the official Jewish leadership in Czechoslovakia which, for various reasons, was not very appreciative of mass Jewish migration from the region. Focusing on the crucial year of 1948, it will analyze how the attitude of the Jewish communal leadership in Czechoslovakia developed after the liberation of the country by the Allies in May 1945 in the shadow of the realiza-

126 For the background of the postwar Czech-Jewish and Slovak-Jewish relations, see Jan Láníček, Czechs, Slovaks and the Jews, 1938–1948: Beyond Idealisation and Condemnation (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013). 127 Gabriel Gorodetsky, “The Soviet Union’s Role in the Creation of the State of Israel,” Journal of Israeli History 22, 1 (2003): 4–20; Československo a Izrael v Letech 1945–1956: Dokumenty, ed. Marie Bulínová et al. (Prague: Ustav pro Soudobe Dejiny, 1993), 267–71, and Document 28, Message by the Czechoslovak prime minister for the government and the president about the recognition of the State of Israel, 19 May 1948 (sent 20 May 1948), 101–2. The Postwar Czech-Jewish Leadership 79 tion that more than 80 percent of Czechoslovak Jews did not survive the hell of the Nazi concentration camps or decided not to return to Czechoslovakia from their exile in the United States, the United Kingdom, Palestine, or elsewhere. The essay focuses on the activities and public discourse of the representatives of the Council of the Jewish Religious Communities in Bohemia and Moravia (RŽNO—Rada židovských náboženských obcí), the umbrella organization representing the Jews in the Czech territories (Bohemia and Moravia). Subsequently, the second part of the article enquires into the attitude of the purged Jewish leadership following the Communist coup in Czechoslovakia and the establishment of Israel, at the time when a majority of Jews living in Czechoslovakia decided to leave the Republic and intended to move to their new homelands elsewhere, but mostly in the Middle East.

The Jewish Leadership in Liberated Czechoslovakia

Discussing the ideological conflicts among Jewish groups in liberated Poland, Natalia Aleksiun asserts that the war and the catastrophe of Polish Jewry did not reduce internal rifts between Polish Zionists and Bundists,128 the two most influential Jewish groups in the country. After the establishment of the Central Committee of the Jews in Poland (CKŻP—Centralny Komitet Żydów Polskich), both Zionists and Bundists, although cooperating in the revival of the communities in Poland, continued their competition for the souls of Jewish survivors and tried to persuade them, respectively, that their emigration—even illegally—or the reconstitution of their lives in Poland, were in their best interests. These conflicts often embittered relations among the handful of survivors at a time when a united approach of communal leadership might have helped to promote the interests of the community.129 Similar to the situation all over Europe, Jewish survivors returning to Czechoslovakia from concentration camps or from exile in other countries did not receive a warm reception in their liberated homeland. Although the Czechoslovak government trumpeted to the world that the country was not a land of antisemitism and that the Jewish question did not exist there, many

128 Der Algemeyner Yidisher Arbeter Bund, or simply the Bund, was a Jewish leftist, social- democratic movement that promoted the idea of Jewish cultural distinctiveness, but at the same time opposed the idea of Jewish political nationalism and emigration to Israel. 129 Natalia Aleksiun, “Where Was There a Future for Polish Jewry? Bundist and Zionist Polemics in Post-World War II Poland,” in Jewish Politics in Eastern Europe: The Bund at 100, ed. Jack Jacobs (New York: New York University Press, 2001), 227–42. 80 Láníček of the unfortunate, destitute Jewish survivors faced considerable obstacles on their way to rehabilitation due to their Jewish origin. Much has been written about postwar antisemitism in Europe, especially in Poland, but the situation in Czechoslovakia differed slightly.130 Czechoslovakia was not a country of crude, violent, or physical antisemitism, of pogroms and violent riots. With minor exceptions in Slovakia, which cannot even remotely be compared to the situation in Poland, the main obstacles encountered by the Jewish survivors in the country were of a bureaucratic nature.131 Yet in the background of these paper battles, for example to receive confirmation of one’s citizenship or restitution of property, the specter of national antisemitism often appeared. As on so many occasions since the nineteenth century, the Jews in Czechoslovakia were still, even after the war, caught up in the national struggle between Czecho/Slovaks and the minorities, especially the Germans and Hungarians. A majority of the Jews during the nineteenth century integrated into the German and Hungarian nations. This trend had been reversed in the first half of the twentieth century, with most of the Jews abandoning the German and Hungarian cultural milieu. Yet after 1945 they were still accused of siding with the enemies of the Czech and Slovak nations. Even though especially the number of German-speaking Jews in Bohemia was minimal, the fact of the previous alleged Germanization of the Czech territories by Jews served well as a pretext to hinder Jewish restitution by low-level bureaucrats who considered the claims and often had their own interest in the property the Jews wanted to reclaim.132 Although the central Czechoslovak legislation did not include any anti-Jewish laws, many of the decrees issued by President Beneš impacted on the rights of individual Jews. Most significantly, Jewish issues in postwar Czechoslovakia developed against the background of a massive ethnic transfer of almost three million Sudeten Germans from Czechoslovakia and the efforts to transform Czechoslovakia into an ethno-national country of a

130 For the situation in Poland, see, for example, Jan T. Gross, Fear: Anti-Semitism in Poland after Auschwitz: An Essay in Historical Interpretation (New York: Random House, 2007); David Engel, “Patterns of Anti-Jewish Violence in Poland, 1944–1946,” Yad Vashem Studies 26 (1998): 43–85. 131 Jana Šišjaková, “Some Problematic Issues of Anti-Semitism in Slovakia during the Years 1945–1948,” in Holocaust as a Historical and Moral Problem of the Past and the Present: Collection of Studies from the Conference, ed. Monika Vrzgulová and Daniela Richterová (Bratislava: Dokumentačné stredisko holokaustu, 2008), 410–19; Michal Šmigeľ, “Murders of Jews in Northeastern Slovakia in 1945: The Kolbasov Tragedy,” in ibid., 420–32; Ivan Kamenec, “Protižidovský pogrom v Topoľčanoch v septembri 1945,” Studia Historica Nitrensia 8 (1999): 85–97. 132 For more details, see Láníček, Czechs, Slovaks and the Jews, chap. 5. The Postwar Czech-Jewish Leadership 81 purely Slavonic character. Inevitably, the Jews, who were caught up in this conflict, wondered after their return whether to stay or leave. There were fewer than 25,000 Jews (including 8,500 repatriates from Sub- Carpathian Ruthenia) in the historical territories of Bohemia and Moravia after liberation and approximately 30,000 Jews in Slovakia.133 They constituted approximately 15 per cent of the pre-war Czechoslovak Jewish population. From the very beginning of their efforts, the Jewish leadership in Bohemia and Moravia had to fight an increasing number of battles with the Czechoslovak bureaucracy to ensure the rights of particular groups of Jews, but also of affected individuals. The Czech Jewish leadership was built on the ruins of its previous community, with a major part of its pre-war and war-time leaders either permanently in exile or murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz.134 The leadership of the community was thus assumed by Arnošt [Ernst] Frischer, who spent the first years of the war in Jerusalem and in 1942 moved to London, where he served as the only Zionist member in the Czechoslovak parliament in exile—the State Council. In March 1945, Frischer, in his concluding speech before departing from London, announced his retirement from Jewish public affairs; instead, he intended to revive his construction company in Moravská Ostrava. Not fully able to comprehend the murderous dimension of the Nazi extermination campaign against the Jews, he concluded that the Jewish community in Czechoslovakia would best be served by its war-time leadership and the personalities that would eventually emerge from hiding.135

133 Hanková, “Kapitoly,” 21–22; Bumová, “The Jewish Community after 1945.” Yehoshua Büchler estimated the number of Jews in postwar Slovakia at 32,000, see Yehoshua R. Büchler, “Reconstruction Efforts in Hostile Surroundings: Slovaks and the Jews after World War II,” in The Jews are Coming Back: The Return of the Jews to their Countries of Origin after WWII, ed. David Bankier (New York and Jerusalem: Berghahn and Yad Vashem, 2005), 257. 134 Livia Rothkirchen, “Czech and Slovak Jewish Leadership: Variants in Strategy and Tactics,” in The Holocaust and History: The Known, the Unknown, the Disputed, and the Reexamined, ed. Michael Berenbaum and Abraham J. Peck (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2002), 629–46; Jan Láníček, “The Czechoslovak Jewish Political Exile in Great Britain during World War Two,” in Exile in and from Czechoslovakia during the 1930s and 1940s, ed. Charmian Brinson and Marian Malet, The Yearbook of the Research Centre for German and Austrian Exile Studies, 11 (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2009), 167–82. 135 “Plans for Czech Jews to Return Home: Statement by E. Frischer,” European Jewish Observer, 30 Mar. 1945: 1. For more on Frischer’s activities during the war, see Jan Láníček, “Arnošt Frischer und seine Hilfe für Juden im besetzen Europa (1941–1945),” in Theresienstädter Studien und Dokumente 2007 (Prague: Sefer, 2008), 11–91. 82 Láníček

However, the reality encountered by Frischer upon his arrival in Prague persuaded him to re-enter public affairs and play a prominent role in the re- establishment of the Jewish communities in Bohemia and Moravia. The RŽNO, as the umbrella organization for the Jewish communities in Bohemia and Moravia, was created in September 1945 and Frischer became its chairman. The Council focused on the political defense of the rights of Jewish survivors, as well as provision of social and community care for the destitute returnees from the concentration camps. The RŽNO wanted to secure their rights as equal citizens of Czechoslovakia and facilitate their rehabilitation and recu- peration as ordinary human beings. These efforts proved that the Jewish community leaders in 1945 did not expect any massive emigration of Jews from the country and understood the need to re-establish the Jewish communal and social services that would help the survivors to rehabilitate themselves in their homeland.136 As early as mid-1945 any possibility for massive Jewish emigration elsewhere seemed very bleak. The western democracies, including the United States, still adhered to their restrictive immigration policies and were not willing to open their gates to any considerable numbers of refugees. Palestine, which appeared as a natural destination to many of the Jewish survivors, was still ruled by the British Mandatory power and Whitehall did not change its policy of the White Paper adopted in May 1939 which minimized the annual entry of immigrants.137 Moreover although the Jewish survivors in postwar Czechoslovakia encountered significant complications with their restitution, their situation still did not compare to the desperate lives of 250,000 Jews in the DP camps in occupied Germany, Austria, and Italy.138 Simultaneously, the developments in neighboring Poland soon indicated that there was another group of more than 200,000 Jews, a majority of whom wanted to leave Europe as soon as possible.139 After their return to their former places of residence, Jewish survivors in Poland met with a generally hostile environment which took the form of overt violence, on several instances even pogroms with tens of

136 For more information about the establishment and tasks of the RŽNO, see Soukupová, “Židé a židovská reprezentace”, 58–59. Soukupová (p. 80) documents immense efforts to re-establish Jewish communal organizations in Czechoslovakia. 137 On American and British policies, see especially Monty Noam Penkower, Decision on Palestine Deferred: America, Britain and Wartime Diplomacy 1939–1945 (London: Frank Cass, 2002); Arieh J. Kochavi, Post-Holocaust Politics: Britain, the United States & Jewish Refugees 1945–1948 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2001). 138 http://www1.yadvashem.org/odot_pdf/microsoft%20word%20–%206273.pdf 139 For the numbers, see Engel, “Patterns of Anti-Jewish Violence.” The Postwar Czech-Jewish Leadership 83

Jews being murdered by their neighbors (the major pogrom took place in July 1946 in Kielce).140 Hence, this being the reigning environment in east central Europe, a majority of the Jews in Czechoslovakia decided not to risk any immediate emigration. With the rule of law still maintained in Czechoslovakia, with Beneš as the president and the iconic Masaryk as foreign minister, most Jews in the Czech territories decided not to anticipate future developments and wait for their restitution that, they believed, was forthcoming. Maybe also the convoys of the Brihah, Jewish refugees passing through Czechoslovakia on their way from Poland to the Adriatic ports, persuaded the Czechoslovak Jews that their situation was not desperate enough to force them to leave their homes and set out on this long and uncertain journey.141 The situation in Czechoslovakia was summed up by the RŽNO in its memorandum, in English, to the delegation of the Anglo-American Committee of Enquiry on Palestine which visited Czechoslovakia in early 1946:

[The RŽNO] have confidence that in the due course, the Jews, who will take their place in the general structure of the Czechoslovak Republic, which is going to be a national state of Czechs and Slovaks, will find here the conditions necessary for their economic life. We think also that they will be a very useful element, because they are intelligent and diligent people.142

In contrast, the RŽNO and the Slovak Jewish leadership admitted that the environment in Slovakia was entirely different and that sixty percent of the Jewish survivors were allegedly desperate to leave as soon as possible, ninety percent of them for Palestine. All in all, the RŽNO expected an eventual decrease in the number of potential émigrés once the rule of the law was re-established throughout the whole Republic and especially after the restitution law would be implemented in Slovakia. Many of the Jews would eventually realize that

140 Ibid.; Gross, Fear; Anna Cichopek, “The Cracow Pogrom of August 1945: A Narrative Reconstruction,” in Contested Memories: Poles and Jews during the Holocaust and Its Aftermath, ed. Joshua D. Zimmerman (New Brunswick, NJ and London: Rutgers University Press, 2003), 221–38. 141 On Brihah and Czechoslovakia, see Yehuda Bauer, Flight and Rescue: Brichah (New York: Random House, 1970), 179–89; id., Out of the Ashes: The Impact of American Jews on Post- Holocaust European Jewry (Oxford: Pergamon Press, 1989), 105–11; Kochavi, Post-Holocaust Politics, 185–92. 142 Archiv bezpečnostních složek ministerstva vnitra ČR (ABS), 425-230-8, Memorandum submitted by the RŽNO to the Anglo-American Committee of Enquiry on Palestine, February 1946. 84 Láníček they had roots in Europe and that they wanted to share their future with the Czech nation.143 Even if we allow for political exaggeration in similar addresses, the fact is that there was no general exodus of Czechoslovak Jews between 1945 and 1948. In August 1947 Frischer, in his address to the European Zionist Conference in Karlovy Vary, suggested that only approximately 2,500 Jews had left Czechoslovakia for Palestine between 1945 and 1947 and an almost identi- cal number reached it indirectly, via other lands of transit.144 Nevertheless, the RŽNO was aware of the unfriendly environment in postwar Czechoslovakia and of the doubts constantly being expressed about the Jews’ loyalty. Thus the Council recognized the necessity to justify the Jewish position in liberated Czechoslovakia and to prove that not all the Jews who lived in the country intended to emigrate; in fact the Council considered it fundamental to prove that a significant part of the survivors could not, and did not want, to leave the country. With antisemitic sentiments in Czech society bubbling beneath the surface, the RŽNO and the Jews in Czechoslovakia, in general, adopted two ways to justify their desire to stay in the country: emphasis on Jewish participation in the resistance during World War II and an assimilationist discourse. There was a disproportionate number of Jews among the pre-war Czechoslovak refugees and they formed a significant segment of the Czechoslovak armed forces stationed during the war in the Middle East, Britain, and the USSR.145 Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Czechoslovak Jewish soldiers fell in the battle for the liberation of the country; Věstník Židovské obce náboženské v Praze, the official bulletin of the RŽNO, repeatedly relayed in its pages short memoirs of former soldiers or commemorative speeches by their commanders and comrades. These articles served as testimony that the Jews

143 ABS, 425-230-8, Memorandum prepared by the Central Union of the Jewish Communities in Slovakia, 10 February 1946; see also “Anglo-American Committee of Enquiry on Palestine,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 3/VIII, 30 Mar. 1946: 21. Concerning the optimism in relation to Slovakia, see Peter Meyer et al, The Jews in the Soviet Satellites (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1953), 145. 144 “Evropská sionistická konference v Karlových varech dne 12. srpna 1947,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 16/IX, 15 Aug. 1947: 229. Israeli statistics state that 770 Czechoslovak Jews reached Palestine in 1946 and 2,064 in 1947; see Meyer et al., The Jews in the Soviet Satellites, 146. 145 Láníček, “The Czechoslovak Jewish Political Exile”; see also Peter Heumos, Die Emigration aus der Tschechoslowakei nach Westeuropa und dem Nahen Osten 1938–1945 (Munich: Oldenburg Verlag, 1989), 207, 268; Erich Kulka, Jews in Svoboda’s Army in the Soviet Union: Czechoslovak Jewry’s Fight against the Nazis during World War II (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1987); id., Židé v československém vojsku na Západě (Prague: Naše Vojsko, 1992). The Postwar Czech-Jewish Leadership 85 fought during the war on behalf of Czechoslovakia. Štěpán Barber, one of the Jewish soldiers but also a community activist, published an article in the first issue of Věstník in September 1945. Barber stressed that for some time during the war Jews accounted for at least half of all the rank-and-file in the army. He asserted that after the war Jewish soldiers could proudly look everybody at home in the eyes. However, he also noted the first obstacles in the rehabilitation efforts encountered by Jews after their return to Czechoslovakia. Although they could understand the initial difficulties, Barber admitted, they still hoped that those who for several years had equally faced death with their co-citizens would also eventually find equality in life in the renewed Republic. He concluded his article with a rhetoric question that addressed the concerns of many of the Jews in postwar Czechoslovakia: If in the end this will not be the case, “then what did we fight for?”146 Perhaps even more important than emphasis on the past common struggle were the perspectives for the future community of Czechs and Jews, articulated with the help of the assimilationist discourse adopted by the Jews in postwar Czechoslovakia. The Jews wanted to stress and justify their desire to stay in Czechoslovakia and dispel any doubts that were being raised about their loyalty. As recently suggested by Lisa Peschel, the first postwar memoirs published by survivors of the Theresienstadt ghetto were filled with references to Czech- Jewish culture, in several cases even white-washing the German-Jewish past of the authors.147 With the national homogenization of the country in full swing, thousands of Jewish survivors became aware of their peculiar position because of their former upbringing in and adherence to the German cultural milieu. We can follow similar trends in the official discourse of the Jewish community leaders. In searching for examples of the Jewish desire to be part of the Czech nation, these leaders found powerful stories in the recent hor- rific past. They repeatedly referred to the events of 8 March 1944 (this date became the symbol of Czech-Jewish suffering during the war), when almost 4,000 deportees from Theresienstadt were murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau. The fact that the Jews, whilst being forced into the gas chambers sang Hatikvah (the Zionist anthem) alongside the Czech national anthem Kde domov můj? (Where is My Homeland?) was proof of the deep love felt by the Jews for Czechoslovakia and their desire to be an integral part of the

146 Štěpán Barber, “Vrátili se vojáci,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 1/VII, 1 Sept. 1945: 6. 147 Lisa Peschel, “ ‘A Joyful Act of Worship’: Survivor Testimony on Czech Culture in the Terezín Ghetto and Postwar Reintegration in Czechoslovakia, 1945–48,” Holocaust and Genocide Studies 26, 2 (Fall 2012): 209–28. 86 Láníček community.148 According to the assimilationists, the main promoters of the idea that the Jews were only a part of the Czech nation, it was the Nazi occupation that reminded them of their being Czechs. When in the concentration camps, they suffered deeply from their forced uprooting from the Czech surroundings and from the Czech nation. As František Fuchs, a representative of the assimilationists in the RŽNO, noted in 1947, those concentration camp prisoners intensively experienced their belonging to the Czech nation, and this experience and hope for a new life among Czechs gave them the strength to struggle for their survival; the sons of the Czech nation hoped for reintegration into Czech society.149 Already in London, in his farewell address in March 1945, Frischer emphasized that it was necessary for the Jews to respect the postwar democratic establishment in Czechoslovakia, including its political program. The Jews, Frischer alleged, had always been a state-building community and they wanted to take part in the rebuilding of the new society in Czechoslovakia. He hoped that those who would decide to return to Czechoslovakia would be happy there; during the war the Jews proved that they loved the country from the depth of their hearts.150 With the creation of the RŽNO in September 1945, all ideological streams among Czech Jews closed ranks and decided to work together for the benefit of the community.151 Apparently, the war and the persecution revived the sense of belonging to the Jewish community also among people who had been almost entirely assimilated before the war. The need to re-establish the community, but especially to facilitate social services for all those affected by the Nazi racial policies, blurred the borders between otherwise conflicting ideological groups in the community, such as the Orthodoxy (Agudists), Assimilationists, or Zionists.152 Representatives of the Zionist groups sat on the same board as ardent assimiliationists who addressed the floor of the RŽNO with speeches about the need not only to talk in Czech, but also “to think and feel Czech.”153 A general shift towards the assimiliationist discourse was also apparent in the official Czech-Zionist rhetoric. Frischer, who before the war had been the

148 Rebenwurzel, “Nezapomeň!” Věstník ŽON v Praze 3/VII, 28 Oct. 1945: 18. 149 “O židovské otázce,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 9/IX, 1 May 1947: 118–19. OK. 150 “Jak viděl člen státní rady Ing. A. Frischer politickou situaci v Československu v první době po osvobození,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 1/VII, 1 Sept. 1945: 4–5. 151 Soukupová, “Židé a židovská reprezentace,” 72–73. Soukupová argues that despite the ideological differences among the particular Jewish groups, pragmatism in the end prevailed and they agreed on cooperation. 152 Hanková, “Kapitoly,” 36–37. 153 “S tribuny sjezdu,” Address by Julius Lederer, Věstník ŽON v Praze 2/VII, 1 Oct. 1945: 11–12. The Postwar Czech-Jewish Leadership 87 last chairman of the Zionist Jewish Party, during an audience with President Beneš expressed understanding for the new directions in Czechoslovak economic life, namely socialization in industry. The RŽNO delegation that he headed assured the president of the loyalty of the Czechoslovak Jews to the country and its government. No one among the Jews had betrayed the Republic, regardless of the language they spoke in daily communication. As proof of their loyalty, Frischer proposed to the minister of the interior that he would advise Jews, who had declared their Jewish nationality before the war to choose Czech or Slovak nationality after the war. He only requested that the Czechoslovak state would not consider their previous declaration of Jewish nationality as a hostile, disloyal act towards the Czechoslovak Republic. The delegation then noted that although there were only a few Czech Jews remaining in the country, their spirit had not been broken and they were ready to join in the difficult task of building a common “ideal of a better future” with the Czech and Slovak nations for the benefit of their common homeland.154 In 1947, during the elections to the Prague Jewish Congregation, both ideological opponents—the Zionists and assimilationists—presented a united ballot and appealed to the electorate to vote for this ‘List of Unity’. The program of the joint list represented the two-fold ideology of the community leadership: to join the Czech and Slovak nations in building a new society, advocating the rights of the Jews as equal citizens, while at the same time supporting the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine open to emigration for those who wished to move there.155 More or less without any significant opposition, the list won the election and both parties continued their cooperation until the Communist purge in early March 1948. The leadership of the community continued to fight for the equal rights of Jews and against any discrimination practiced by particular groups of Jews, such as those who in 1930 declared their German nationality. Although they were aware of the Jewish predicament in postwar Czechoslovakia, they rarely blamed the government and other Czechoslovak authorities. The RŽNO repeatedly expressed its appreciation of the government’s policies in relation to Jewish issues and expressed confidence in the forthcoming normalization of the Jewish condition in the country. Significantly, the Jewish communities praised the new socialist order, perceiving it as a way of building a just order from which also Jews would benefit as citizens with equal rights. This left-wing tendency of the Jewish leadership was entirely in accordance with the prevailing sentiments in Czech society at large.156

154 “U pana presidenta,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 4/VII, 15 Dec. 1945: 26–27. 155 “Svobodné volby do pražské náboženské obce židovské,” Věstník 5/IX, 1 Mar. 1947: 57–58. 156 Ibid., 57. 88 Láníček

Regardless of their efforts to integrate into the Czech and Slovak nations, all leaders of the Jewish community agreed that it was necessary to create a Jewish state in Palestine. This may perhaps seem surprising in the case of the assimilationists, who themselves admitted after the war that many Czech Jews had opposed the creation of a Jewish state before 1939.157 But the situation had been changed by the war and by the fate of European Jewry under the Nazis. After the war, the assimilationists, too, began to call for what they labelled as the ‘normalization’ of the Jewish question in Europe. Their final aim was that by means of strict policies of either assimilation or Zionism, the Jewish question would eventually cease to exist. This political program corresponded entirely with the intentions of the Czechoslovak government, which perceived Zionism as a means to solve the apparent Jewish problem in Europe. The Jews who defined their Jewishness in national terms were expected to leave Europe forever.158 Hence Zionism, as the revival of the Jewish national movement in Palestine, was not only to fulfill the dream of Jewish nationalists but to solve the problem of the assimilationists and of the Czechoslovak government as well. Fuchs commented in September 1946 that the assimilationists fully understood the desire of Jewish nationalists to move to Palestine and supported their efforts. They understood the difference in national sentiments between the two groups, but also the desire of the Jews who wanted to emigrate from Czechoslovakia for other, for example psychological or family, reasons. Only those who wanted to live in Czechoslovakia and desired to be part of the Czech and Slovak nations were expected to remain in the country.159 The approval by the UN of the partition plan for Palestine in November 1947 led to massive celebrations among the Jewish communities in Czechoslovakia. There were festive meetings organized by the RŽNO and a succession of speakers toasted the birth of the new Jewish state. In their addresses the official representatives especially praised the Czechoslovak and Soviet leaderships for their support of Jewish nationhood. Nevertheless, these public meetings and addresses offered the Jewish leaders another opportunity to present their assimilationist discourse. Fuchs, an assimilationist on the board of the RŽNO, noted that the entire community, regardless of ideological affiliation, celebrated the creation of the Jewish state which was to be established as a homeland for hundreds of thousands of unfortunate people scattered in the

157 Dr. [Otto] Muneles, “K židovskému problému,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 4/IX, 15 Feb. 1947: 37–38. 158 For a detailed analysis of the attitude of Czechoslovak politicians towards Zionism, see Láníček, Czechs, Slovaks and the Jews, 116–45. 159 František Fuchs, “Stanovisko,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 9/VIII, 5 Sept. 1946: 82. The Postwar Czech-Jewish Leadership 89

DP camps in Germany.160 The message was clear: the Jewish state was not to be a homeland for Jews who connected their Jewishness with “love and loyalty” to Czechoslovakia. Similarly, when Frischer addressed the celebratory assembly of the RŽNO on 14 December 1947 he stressed that Palestine was a small territory which had never been intended as a homeland for all the Jews living in the world, estimated in late 1947 at approximately 10 million. The establishment of a Jewish state, as already promised in the Balfour Declaration of 1917, was not to impact on the status and political rights of Jews living in other countries all over the world; the Jewish state was not to solve the so-called Jewish problem as such. Although the Jews who remained in the Diaspora would look to the Jewish state as their spiritual and cultural center, Frischer asserted, it would not impact on their patriotism to their current countries of residence. Jews, just like Catholics and Communists, could look to a center elsewhere— Jerusalem, Rome, or Moscow—but all these groups could at the same time be good patriots in the Diaspora.161 Shortly after the United Nations approved the partition plan, another event indicated that a significant number of Czech Jews did not intend to leave Czechoslovakia and wanted to prove beyond any doubt their loyalty to the Czechoslovak state. On 16 January 1948, the Association of Czech Jews (Svaz Čechu-židů) was re-established as the mouthpiece of the assimilationist movement.162 The Association advocated the idea of a beneficial community of the Jews with the Czech nation, or rather promoted the idea that while Jews might adhere to Judaism in the religious sense, from a national standpoint they belonged to the same community as the rest of the Czech population; they were part of the Czech nation. The Association had developed extensive activities in the pre-war period—it was banned in 1939—and its relations with other sectors of the Jewish community in the Czech territories, including the German-speaking Jews and the Zionists, were very tense.163 The founding meeting of the renewed Association in January 1948 provided to the leaders of the Association—who at the same time sat on the RŽNO board—with another platform through which they could present the assimilationist discourse to the

160 “Slavnostní projev: závěr,” Address by František Fuchs, Věstník ŽON v Praze 28/IX, 15 Dec. 1947: 391. 161 Arnošt Frischer, “Splněný sen a závazky, které ukládá,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 2/X, 9 Jan. 1948: 9–10. 162 “K valné hromadě ‘Svazu Čechů-židů’ 18. ledna 1948 v Praze,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 3/X, 16 Jan. 1948: 27. 163 Kateřina Čapková, Czechs, Germans, Jews: National Identity and the Jews of Bohemia (New York: Berghahn Books, 2012), 92–168. 90 Láníček public. The resolution adopted at the meeting sent a clear message to the Jews in the Czech territories, but especially to the Czechoslovak government:

Knowing the Nazi persecution of the Jews of Europe and the fact that hundreds of thousands of Jews are still wandering about without hope of a peaceful home or the possibility of a human existence, we welcome the decision of the United Nations to set up a Jewish state in Palestine. In this connection, however, we declare that our home is here in the country of the Czechs and in the midst of the Czechs. We trust that the entire civilized world will assist in securing the Jewish state in Palestine. With the creation of the Jewish state in Palestine Zionism outside of Palestine loses its right of existence.164

The assimilationists supported the Zionists in their efforts for a Jewish state, but when its establishment was sanctioned by the international community Zionist political activities in the Diaspora lost their raison d’être. The forthcoming Zionist migration was greeted by the assimilationists also for another reason: that part of the Jewish population which constantly reminded the Czechoslovak non-Jewish population of the existence of Jewish particularistic demands and about their distinctiveness would eventually leave the country. One of the major obstacles on the path to assimilationist success was going to disappear.

The Action Committee of the RŽNO and the Communist Worldview

The Communist coup and the establishment of the one-party dictatorship did not immediately change Czechoslovak policy on the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine. During the first fifteen months of its existence, Communist Czechoslovakia also adopted a lenient approach towards Jewish emigration to the Middle East. At the same time, with the passage of time, the Communist leadership overtly suggested that the only possibility for the Jews who decided to stay in Czechoslovakia was “complete assimilation.”165 The leadership of the RŽNO was purged immediately after the February coup. Frischer, the chairman, was demoted and Kurt Wehle, the secretary

164 “Home of Czech Jews is Czechoslovakia, Says Conference of Jewish Leaders in Prague,” Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Daily News Bulletin, 27 Jan. 1948. 165 Interview with Minister of Information Václav Kopecký, Věstník ŽON v Praze 8/X, 20 Feb. 1948: 84. The Postwar Czech-Jewish Leadership 91 general, quickly left Czechoslovakia for France. Following the example of other political parties and enterprises, a new Action Committee was established and pro-Communist and assimilationist members were elected to the leadership. Following the purge, only one Zionist member remained on the board and this only in an advisory capacity. During its first meeting the Action Committee introduced the new program of the RŽNO, fully in line with the revolutionary environment of the people’s democratic Czechoslovakia. They rejected all ‘reactionary’ elements of the previous RŽNO leadership, accusing them of supporting particularistic claims of the Jews against the interests of the new Czechoslovakia and also of backing the capitalist Jewish claimants’ demand to receive back their property.166 During the first two years of the Communist regime, the RŽNO had to cope with the complex ideological stance of the Communist government which, although supporting Israel as the state-to-be and allowing thousands of Jews to emigrate there, at the same time kept stressing that there was no reason for the Jews in Czechoslovakia to move to the new state. They should rather join in the common effort to build a new society without prejudices, following the social ideal of the Soviet Union.167 The Communists’ decision to allow extensive emigration of Jews to Israel in 1948–49 was a significant exception in Czechoslovak policy, because emigration to other countries was generally not allowed, in fact forbidden. Already in 1948, the Czechoslovak government allowed the recruitment of soldiers for the Haganah, the Jewish para-military force in Palestine.168 Later the main incen- tive to leave Czechoslovakia for Israel was the agreement reached between the Czechoslovak state and the Israeli ambassador to Prague, Ehud Avriel, approved directly by the inner circle of the CPC and not even discussed in the government.169 Czechoslovak communists promised to allow 20,000 Jews to leave for Israel during the first months of 1949, until 15 May. However, the Jews faced bureaucratic obstacles and had to pay high fees, which caused significant difficulties for those who lacked extensive financial means. Furthermore, only individuals who were economically dispensable, especially those who were not necessary for completion of the first five-year plan, were allowed to leave.

166 American Jewish Year Book 51 (1950): 359. 167 Interview with university professor Dr. Arnošt Kolman, Věstník ŽON v Praze 20/X, 14 May 1948: 229; “Pavel Reiman, Věrně za republikou pro jednotnou kandidátku,” ibid., 21/X, 21 May 1948: 241–42. 168 Jiří Dufek, Karel Kaplan, and Vladimír Šlosar, Československo a Izrael, 1947–1953: Studie (Prague: Ústav pro soudobé dějiny AV ČR—Doplněk, 1993), 24–25. 169 Ibid., 26. 92 Láníček

Those excluded came mostly from certain professions, such as physicians, nurses, and certain groups of engineers.170 Yet as early as 1949 a significant number of Czechoslovak Jews was not certain whether to leave their homeland and move to the uncertainty offered by the new state which only recently survived a war of independence. A report prepared by the American Jewish Committee stated that there was a significant number of Jews in Czechoslovakia “who would like to emigrate, but not to Israel. There [was] quite a number of such persons who have no possibility of emigrating except to Israel, where they do not want to go because they know the difficulties too well. They would have to start all over again after four years and give up [their present] comparative comfort.”171 Although the Communists were slowly tightening the screws, the antisemitic campaign of the late Stalinist period did not start in Czechoslovakia until 1950. During the first year of the Communist dictatorship, the attitude of the purged Jewish leadership in Czechoslovakia towards emigration to Israel remained ambiguous. Immediately after February 1948, the RŽNO appealed to the Jews to join with the entire society in the building of socialism.172 The issues of Věstník in late 1948 and 1949 were filled with references to the 1917 Bolshevik revolution which entirely turned the wheels of history and offered the Jews equality and security in the classless Communist society. The Soviet Union was praised as the country that liberated the Jews from the Nazi yoke and hence saved the remnants of the once flourishing communities. Later, in stark contrast with the “British imperialists,” the Soviet Union backed and facilitated the creation of the Jewish state in Palestine.173 Pavel Reiman, a Communist ideologue and a member of the Central Committee’s Committee on Jewish Affairs, suggested to the Jewish community in the pages of Věstník that only membership in the family of states with the Soviet Union and other people’s democracies could ensure the existence of the Jewish state. However, turning to the Jewish community in Czechoslovakia Reiman enphasized

170 Meyer et al., The Jews in the Soviet Satellites, 147. 171 Ibid., 149. In contrast, Joshua Shai, the director-general of the Israeli Ministry of Information, predicted in late 1949 that the entire Jewish population of Czechoslovakia, alongside that of Poland, would move to Israel in 1950; see Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Daily News Bulletin, 20 Dec. 1949. 172 “Akční výbor RŽNO se představil,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 20/X, 12 Mar. 1948: 117–18. See, for example, the speech by Fuchs, one of the pre-February members who remained in the RŽNO leadership. 173 Emil Ungar, “Rada židovských náboženských obcí před novými úkoly,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 11/XI, 18 Mar. 1949: 121–22. The Postwar Czech-Jewish Leadership 93 that the influence of the Soviet Union was beneficial not only in the Middle East. The situation of the Jews in the people’s democracies also considerably improved thanks to the impact of Communist ideology on ordinary people. The perceived Jewish question had, in substance, been overcome and the Jews could join the other Czechoslovak citizens in building a bright future. The Jews should have realized that there was no apparent reason for their emigration from Czechoslovakia and instead they should rather have joined the entire nation in building Communist Czechoslovakia.174 The Jewish leadership soon followed suit. During 1948 and 1949, they never appealed to the Jews directly not to leave the country for Israel and to stay in their current homeland; the fact that some Jews decided to leave for Israel was not attacked. The situation changed slightly in early 1949, when Mapai, the Labor party, won the general elections in Israel and the electorate rejected radical left-wing parties, including the Communists. As a consequence, the political establishment in Israel was attacked by the RŽNO for its ‘right-wing’ reactionary policies. Mapai was presented not as a left-wing party, but rather as a group of pro-Western, pro-capitalist politicians who intended to sell the achievements of the Israeli proletariat to the Western imperialists, now represented by the United States and their Marshall Plan.175 Even then a rather ambiguous message emanated from the articles published by Věstník. In August 1949, when immigration to Israel by Czechoslovak Jews had already sharply decreased, Věstník brought to the public attention an interview with a certain Erich Zoller who had emigrated to Israel several months ear- ler, but had already returned (it was not clear whether he intended to stay in Czechoslovakia). Zoller presented a dark image of Israel as a country without any functioning economic and social system. He suggested that with a very high and constantly rising rate of unemployment there was only a minimal chance for new immigrants to find decent employment. Israel was living in a pre-revolutionary stage, with a wave of strikes paralyzing the whole country and brutal policemen trying to stop the working class from making their just demands. These public protests of all sections of Israeli society, including women with small children, sharply contrasted with the luxurious neighborhoods in which the wealthy lived. Zoller warned the readers that it was almost impossible for ordinary persons to get decent accommodation in Israel and therefore public parks in Tel Aviv were at night filled with people sleeping on

174 “Říjnová revoluce—nová cesta k řešení židovské otázky,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 45/X, 5 Nov. 1948: 489. 175 “Půjčka nástrojem amerického vměšování do izraelských záležitostí . . . ,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 33/XI, 19 Aug. 1949: 365. 94 Láníček the benches. Apparently, the main purpose of the article was to show the Jews in Czechoslovakia that there was still a long journey awaiting Israel on its way to becoming a developed country with social justice for all its inhabitants. Appealing to the older and middle-aged generations, the interviewee noted that the social and pension system, as well as an adequate health care system, were non-existent in Israel. The younger generation, such as families with children, ought to be aware that education was not free in Israel.176 The main impression the reader could get from the interview was rather mixed. It was apparent that Israel was not a country for people who had become used to what was presented as an easy and comfortable life in Communist Czechoslovakia. Persons who intended to move to Israel to improve their social and economic status had been misled and should understand that their lives were perfectly secure in the Communist world. Czechoslovakia, thanks to the Communist revolution and to its alliance with the Soviet Union, had overcome all the exploitation by the past bourgeois societies. Yet, at the same time, the interview highlighted the upcoming struggle of the Israeli proletariat against capitalist exploiters, this fight in which, Zoller concluded, the Israeli proletariat had nothing to lose, only to gain. The victory of the Israeli proletariat in their fight against Mapai and its policy of currying favor with Western imperialists could ensure that in the future the immigrants would be easily integrated into the life of the community; Israel would eventually find its way into the camp of “peace and progress.” The reader was left wondering whether he was supposed to leave for Israel and partake in the struggle of the Israeli proletariat or whether to wait in Communist Czechoslovakia for the outcome of this difficult but inevitable clash.177 The Jewish leadership was aware that they could not change the decision of a significant part of the Jewish population to seek a new homeland in Israel. Yet those who followed their Zionist heart and decided to emigrate to the Jewish state were supposed to understand the circumstances under which the world community enabled the Jews to have their state. Emil Ungar, the head of the purged RŽNO, addressed the emigrants in March 1949, emphasizing that the Czechoslovak Jews, who decided to emigrate to Israel, ought to be repeatedly reminded that all the achievements of Israel were accomplished only thanks to the socialist camp and its “anti-imperialist policies.” Only alliance with the people’s democracies and the support of the ‘peace camp’ could secure the future existence of the independent Jewish state. The new immigrants allowed to leave the Communist bloc were supposed to be indoctrinated in Communist

176 “Izrael očima přistěhovalců,” Věstník ŽON v Praze 33/XI, 19 Aug. 1949: 366. 177 Ibid. The Postwar Czech-Jewish Leadership 95 ideology and to further support the class struggle of the Israeli proletariat against the pro-Western and pro-imperialist establishment in Israel.178 Regardless of the twofold policies of the Communist regime and of the communal leadership, the number of Jews who decided to leave Czechoslovakia (mostly for the new Jewish state) dramatically increased in the second half of 1948. In that year 5,000 Czechoslovak Jews left for Israel, and 3,000 for other countries. There were also Jews who joined the first wave of illegal emigration by anti-Communist political refugees following the February 1948 coup, but it is almost impossible to determine their exact number. In late 1948, the Czechoslovak Bureau of Statistics estimated that 42,000 Jews lived in the country, a noticeable drop in comparison with statistics for 1945.179 For later years, the Encyclopaedia Judaica asserts that 18,879 Jews went from Czechoslovakia to Israel in 1948–1950, while more than 7,000 emigrated to other countries.180 Other sources suggest that instead of the 20,000 Jews agreed upon between Avriel and the Czechoslovak state, only approximately 15,000–15,500 left the country in 1949.181 During 1949 it became apparent that Israel would not join the socialist camp and also that the Israeli proletariat would not rise up against the pro- Western government. Already in late 1948 and early 1949, Communist func- tionaries and the RŽNO attacked Zionism as a tool in the hands of the World Zionist agencies led by bourgeois politicians who went against the interests of the Jewish working classes.182 In mid-1949, Czechoslovakia stopped mass emigration of Jews and all applications were assessed on an individual basis. In early 1950, when the Communists closed the doors of Czechoslovakia to any further legal emigration, around 18,000 Jews lived in the country; approximately 5,000–5,500 of them intended to leave and had already registered for emigration to Israel. Other sources estimate that between 14,000 and 18,000 Jews lived in Czechoslovakia at the end of 1950.183 During 1950, only 401 Jews from Czechoslovakia reached Israel; however most of them had already left the country earlier. In February 1951, the Israeli Embassy in Prague approached the Czechoslovak government with the request that another 3,000 Jews be

178 Emil Ungar, “Rada židovských náboženských,” 122. 179 American Jewish Year Book, 51 (1950): 356–60. 180 Avigdor Dagan et al., “Czechoslovakia,” in Encyclopaedia Judaica, 2d. ed. (Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2007), 22 vols., 5:359. 181 Meyer et al., The Jews in the Soviet Satellites, 147. 150. 182 Hanková, “Kapitoly,” 72–74. 183 American Jewish Year Book 52 (1951): 346; 53 (1952): 331–33; Dagan et al., “Czechoslovakia,” 359. 96 Láníček allowed to emigrate to Israel. The Ministry of National Security promised to consider the request, but only on an individual basis. In the end, the ministry approached 1,030 Czechoslovak citizens to submit their applications in case they were interested in moving to Israel. Allegedly, 464 applicants contacted the ministry by 28 August 1952, but only eight applications were approved; 218 were rejected.184 In 1951, the Communist minister of information, Václav Kopecký, documented the changed Communist attitude when any further emigration to Israel was compared to sending mercenaries to the future front of the imperialist war against the Soviet Union. Israel was apparently considered a hostile country, under the influence and in the service of Western imperialists.185 Hence all further emigration schemes from Czechoslovakia were stopped and the country embarked on anti-Zionist and antisemitic campaigns, following the example of the Soviet Union. The Czechoslovak campaign reached its peak during the Slánský Trial in November 1952, when 11 of the 14 accused and 8 of the 11 executed were Jewish and their Jewish origin was overtly stressed during the trial and in its proceedings.

184 Československo a Izrael v Letech, 1945–1956, 267–71, Document 101, resolution and documentation for the 93rd meeting of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, 3 Sept. 1952. 185 Ibid., 248–52, Document 98, Václav Kopecký’s address at the meeting of the CC CPC, 6 Dec. 1951. PART 3 Postwar Reconstitution of Jewish Communal Life and Dynamics of Identities

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Life during the Camps and After: Displacement and Rehabilitation of the Young Survivors

Izio Rosenman

The objective of this article186 is to show how the children and adolescents who survived concentration camps were able to integrate into society after the liberation, and, more precisely, to point to the difficulties and the processes of that integration. Actually, very few children or adolescents did survive the concentration or extermination camps: there were one thousand at Buchenwald,187 about six hundred at Auschwitz-Birkenau, and a hundred at Bergen Belsen.188 In order to understand the problems faced by these children and adolescents when they left the Nazi concentration camps and tried to find their place in simple daily existence, one must try to understand how concentration camp conditions prevented them from developing as normal children and adolescents. It is also necessary to examine how their acquired psychological characteristics and personalities were impaired and how the experience in the camps changed their relationship to themselves, as well as to others. Finally, we need to look at the ways in which these events were reflected in their behavior after the war. For a child or an adolescent, the concentration camp experience was quite different from how adults went through situations of violence and trauma. It was also quite different from the trauma lived through by very young children. One most instructive study in this regard was carried out by Anna Freud on a group of very young children, aged from three to five, who had been in the Terezin concentration camp and were subsequently received in a children’s shelter in England. She paid particular attention to language acquisition, and also observed the spontaneous formation of groups among these children. One can term these groups ‘neo-siblings’.189

186 I thank Susan Sacks, Yohai Goell, and my son Gabriel for help in translating this article. All references in the notes (except when otherwise noted) are to the French edition of the books; quotations from the English are translated from the French. For the convenience of the reader, I have noted English editions when they exist. 187 Robert Krell, The Buchenwald Children and Other Survivors, in http://www.1939club .com/1939%20Articles-6.htm. 188 http://www.ce.berkeley.edu/~coby/essays/coalchild.htm. 189 Anna Freud, “Survie et développement d’un groupe d’enfants: une expérience bien par- ticulière,” in id., L’enfant dans la psychanalyse (Paris: Gallimard, 1976), 110–60.

Mine is a retrospective analysis conducted decades later, and is based on several studies that have enriched my way of thinking. It especially focuses on the experience of the children from Buchenwald that I know well—I was one of them—and on my personal experience. Unlike adults, young people are in the process of building their personalities and finding a certain autonomy based on their human experience, that is to say, in relation to the human environment in which they grow up.

Main Characteristics of the Concentration Camp Experience for Young People

I would argue that for young people the most significant aspects of the concentration camp experience are the presence of arbitrary violence and death, the loss of time reference points in an unpredictable world, and their observing adults around them as either powerless or harmful. In the eyes of a child or an adolescent in normal life, an adult is first and foremost someone who will protect him, one on whom he can rely and who wants what is good for him. An adult constitutes an identifying image, someone the child or adolescent would like to emulate, an intermediary between that young person and the external world who represents the stability of his environment. This is absolutely essential because a child can only mature where his environment is consistent, in a loving and trustworthy space secured by adults, whether mother, father, or other persons. In contrast, the child’s first experience in the camp is that his own parents are unable to protect him, either because they are dead or because they are in another camp or another place, and even if they are present (in fact, if one of them is there), they are still not able to protect him. The first disturbing element is the violence the family has suffered, even before the child was separated from his family: as young children—some, and I have known such people—witnessed members of their family being assassinated by the Nazis. These children bear deep wounds, greater perhaps than most of those who lost their families, wounds impossible to heal completely and that need to be heard and recognized. This is a dramatic experience of inflicted death that some adults go through later on, but for which children and adolescents are unprepared. For this reason it is legitimate to say that their childhood and/or adolescence have been stolen from them and that they have grown up too quickly. Like adults, they develop defense mechanisms, in particular insensitivity, in order to protect themselves against suffering. The young person is left unarmed, lacking internalization of good experiences which Displacement and Rehabilitation of the Young Survivors 101 can provide her or him love and confidence, such as positive parental images provide. The second significant aspect is the quality of the relationship that the young person will develop from then on with the adults around him;190 in the camp, they represent essentially a continuing threat hanging over him, a situation opposite to a normal one. Threatened as he is, the young person must be constantly on his guard and cannot allow himself to enter into genuine exchanges. He is subjected to an ongoing threat of death, similar to the one weighing on the adults around him. This takes two forms: he sees prisoners dying and is surrounded by death, or—what may be even more distressing— he witnesses the violence that kills them.

The Powerlessness of Parents in the Concentration Camp At the beginning of the war, when families were living under conditions of limited freedom and not yet in concentration camps, parents maintained a certain degree of ability to help their children. As long as children and parents were living together in civil society, though at war, parents could still make use of their friendships, influence, and connections—sometimes even their money—to protect their children, for example, by arranging for them to be hidden. In the case of my family we were still living in the ghetto of Demblin, Poland, my home town, at the time of the second deportation which was to send one thousand Jews, including my grandfather, to the Sobibor gas chambers. My sisters, my cousins, and I were able to escape from the deportation square thanks to the help of the Polish fire chief, whom my father knew. He literally extracted me from the column before it was taken by train to Sobibor, taking me away and hiding me under his fireman’s cloak. Of course, there are exceptions. Some parents were able to help the children even in the camps: in Buchenwald, my father managed for a time to be assigned to a work force in Weimar to repair German homes that had been bombed. Through this opportunity he was able to obtain food for both of us from time to time. There are also examples of reversed protection situations: a child may have been able to protect his father or mother simply because he pleased the Kapo or another prisoner, for example, the Blockältester, either for sexual reasons (as in the case of those who were called Piepel), or only out of tenderness or compassion. This happened to me personally: I could bring food for my father and myself from the yard of the crematorium into which I was smuggled by an inmate working there.

190 All references in the masculine refer to the feminine gender as well. 102 Rosenman

In a concentration camp, the first thing a prisoner must learn in order to survive is that total arbitrariness reigns there. Parents are helpless because all power is elsewhere and they have no influence over it. Above all, however, such power may be demonstrated at any instant, which means that one never knows what may happen in the very next instant. The child may watch his father eat a bit of bread and then see the Kapo pass by who, for no apparent reason, bludgeons his father to death.

Unlimited Power and Lawlessness in the Camps In normal life, law is a transcendent standard to which everyone is submitted. In the camp, law applies only to the prisoner. In fact, there is no law, but rather arbitrary rules that constantly change. The prisoner does not face the law, but rather a capricious power. But these are lethal caprices. Arbitrariness makes protection impossible. The combination of violence, arbitrariness, and death constitutes the most destructive element. There is discontinuity in time, a breakdown of the values on which one relies. Words such as justice, respect, or love no longer have meaning. Little by little, everything that constitutes the child’s value system disappears. This system of injustice and arbitrary power can even destroy the relationship of protection that naturally exists between parent and child. Because life is reduced to the protection of life, what Giorgio Agamben calls “naked life,”191 everything that creates a sense of duty and ethics breaks down. And in the camps, it happened that parents took a child’s food ration, or vice versa. In his testimony, Night, Elie Wiesel describes a young man who throws himself at his father and hits him so that he can take his bread. Once he has seized the bread, others begin to beat him; they end up killing him for the piece of bread. In this passage, Wiesel’s comment is only: “I was fifteen years old.”192 What is even more difficult for a child or a young person is the destruction of all that creates bonds to other humans. Through the concentration camp system, the Nazis attempted to reduce man to nothing more than an isolated individual, with no bonds; Hannah Arendt calls this desolation.193 The Nazi system organizes the reduction of the prisoners to an anonymous mass, in which each individual is entirely alone. The result is the possible disappearance

191 Giorgio Agamben, Homo sacer: Le pouvoir souverain et la vie nue (Paris: Le Seuil, 1997); quoted in Nathalie Zaltzman, La résistance de l’humain (Paris: Puf, 1999), 19. 192 Elie Wiesel, La nuit (Paris: Les éditions de Minuit, 1958), 158 (Night [New York: Bantam Books, 1982]). 193 Hannah Arendt, Le système totalitaire (Paris: Le Seuil, 2005), 226–29 (The Origins of Totalitarianism [New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., 1951]). Displacement and Rehabilitation of the Young Survivors 103 of any ethical principles, which may lead to the theft of bread rations or a neighbor’s clothing, which in those conditions was a death sentence for the person robbed. But for a child in the camp, this is even worse. Worse, because the child lives, develops, and breathes through the presence of and the bonds to others. This is the basis of his growth, the objects of love, hatred, compassion, and cooperation. For a mature adult, a degree of mistrust is part of life, compensated by the trust acquired in prior experiences. In contrast, when a child’s relationship to the world has been constructed on mistrust, he has nothing to compensate for that bad experience. Fred Zinnemann’s 1948 film, The Search, tells the story of an American soldier stationed in Germany. He takes care of a young child who survived the camps and becomes a wild child, unable to trust anyone. The adolescent is threatened by such a danger of becoming a lawless person. There is another danger for the adolescent, greater than for the adult: becoming too well-adapted to the camp, because he hardly knows any other living conditions. Since a young person is malleable, he can be formatted. In Fatelessness, Imre Kertész writes about an adolescent who is fourteen years old when he arrives in Auschwitz and who, after some time there, seems to find everything he sees quite normal. It is as if the world of Auschwitz was the natural order of things, as if he soon knew no other.194 What enables humans to resist destruction? It is the very affective resources, the parental bonds, their ideals and identity. On this point, concerning parental image and identity, we may compare, for example, Wiesel and Kertész: a united family for Wiesel, a divided family for Kertész. The result for Wiesel is a firm Jewish identity; for Kertesz, it is an empty, or, even worse, a negative one, until he recovers it through writing.

What Happens after Liberation, when the Nazis Leave?

If we look at the young people at the very moment of liberation, we see that their situation is strange: they sense no law, there are no longer any rules. In my opinion, the disappearance of the rules imposed by the concentration camp is construed as the disappearance of all rules, and results in both a sense of being all-powerful and a desire for revenge. Liberation means leaving the camp, but where does one go? Does one decide for oneself? Under such circumstances a person lacks the means to carry out

194 Imre Kertész, Etre sans destin (Arles: Actes Sud, 1999), 122 (Fatelessness: a Novel [New York: Knopf, 2004]). 104 Rosenman any decision, unless one comes up with a ‘trick’, because living by tricks is indispensable, such as hustling and so forth. These are habits the prisoners have acquired in the camp, and this is equally true, if not more, for adolescents. There emerge certain transgressive behaviors, such as theft, conceived as normal when stealing from German civilians carrying a gun or other weapons. Among examples of this behavior are organizing a black market, and so on. Samuel Pisar, who was sixteen years old when liberated, describes such behavior in detail in one of the chapters of his autobiography, Of Blood and Hope.195 Sometimes the transgression is far more serious. After the war, it became extremely difficult for persons engaging in education to set up any collective rules, especially among adolescents. What is basic here, in my opinion, is the prior experience of violence and distrust196 in the camp that inevitably led to a refusal to comply with any order given, and hence, any law whatsoever.

How to Rebuild Lives?

Tears In the concentration camp, it was absolutely necessary to become hardened in order to bear the life there. Total numbness to emotion was a habit acquired so as to avoid suffering too much. Once liberated from the camps, the children had genuinely forgotten how to cry and even how to play, at least during the initial period. Noteworthy is the testimony of a witness, Rachel Minc, a Jewish lady who devoted her time and energy to the ‘children of Buchenwald’. In her book she recalls an event in June 1945, just after the arrival of the survivors in France. A representative of the French government welcomes the 430 survivors, sitting in a huge circle on the lawn. He says that those who want to could immediately become French citizens.

A huge sarcastic laughter resounds, some saying: “To work in your mines.” “In the deep black underground hole.” The old man [an envoy of Jewish American organizations] is paralyzed; no sound leaves his throat; he

195 Samuel Pisar, Le sang de l’espoir (Paris: Robert Laffont, 1979), 114 (Of Blood and Hope [New York: Macmillan, 1982]). 196 In Lumière des astres éteints: la psychanalyse face aux camps (Paris: Grasset, 2011), Gérard Haddad, a Jewish French psychoanalyst, summarizing his own work and that of many of Israeli scholars, insists on the deadly consequences of distrust among Holocaust survivors, leading sometimes to suicide or grave psychiatric disorders. Displacement and Rehabilitation of the Young Survivors 105

begins to weep. Then, among the survivors, Aron, a sixteen-year-old young man, stands up and says: We thank you for these tears. We didn’t know that we were still able to cry. We thought that in our chests there was stone instead of a heart. When our parents were taken to their death, we didn’t cry. When we were humiliated, tortured, beaten, we didn’t cry. . . . When we were dragged day and night along snowy roads, we didn’t cry. Only one thing counted for us: the animal struggle for life, in the immensity of death. We were heartless. And now, we are human beings again.197

The first and main factor which helped young people, first to resist internal destruction and then to rebuild themselves, was the lives they had led before being transported to the camps. I call this their emotional capital, stock, or resources which each child brought with him into the torment and the hell of the concentration camp. Had the child been raised in an atmosphere of a loving, protective, and supportive home where the parental couple loved each other? Early childhood emotional development strengthened by positive parental relationships provided these youth with both a certain protection against internal collapse and a basis on which to rebuild their lives subsequently. This emotional capital also includes stored-up memories of moments lived and words spoken, of the parents’ plans for the future, possibly promises made, as well as the child’s identification with his parents’ choices, whether religious or politically committed. This is a fundamental factor in creating a feeling of continuity and loyalty. One may say that this capital helps the child in solidifying his connections with time, gives him a sense of the continuity of his own history, and helps to compensate for the violence he has seen and/or suffered, as well as ever- present death, so close at hand. For example, Henri Parens, a survivor imprisoned as a child, was helped to escape from the French camp of Rivesaltes at the age of thirteen. Sent to the United States, where he later became an American psychoanalyst, he writes:

In our opinion, disturbed relationships following the Shoah were invari- ably associated with disturbed relationships existing prior to the tragedy. Judith Kestenberg and Ira Brenner express this idea as follows: “Children who had been raised in caring families were more trusting and had more

197 Rachel Minc, L’enfer des innocents: les enfants juifs dan le tourmente nazie: récits (Paris: Éditions du Centurion, 1966), 22–23. 106 Rosenman

hope for survival than those who came from dysfunctional families or who had lacked maternal affection.”198 On this point, I agree with Judith Kestenberg and Ira Brenner, along with Anna Orenstein, an American psychoanalyst and Auschwitz survivor: our personal experiences as they relate to our capacity for human relationships are key to our ability to adapt to the traumas we have undergone.199

From the point of view of cultural differences, young people could be distinguished by their origins. Those who were born into very pious families had firm moral bases. They followed in the footsteps of their predecessors. The value system was far stronger among the religious because it transcends mankind and finds a logical place in loyalty to the parents. Among the ‘children of Buchenwald’, some of those born to important, religious families of rabbis went to Palestine, as did the future Israeli Chief Rabbi Lau, who was eight years old at the time of the liberation. Others left for the United States and were rapidly assimilated into the religious communities where their parents felt at home, becoming major religious figures.200 The outcome was similar for those whose families had a strong political identity, either Zionist or Communist, and who were old enough to have absorbed it. These young people possessed a kind of sensitivity to the extended human community, a community of shared values and deep-seated moral principles, who helped them during and after the war. The second factor in reconstructing lives seems to have been the presence and the possibility for dialogue within the all-important experience of a positive relationship with the new geographic and human environment. Such environments were available, for example, in children’s homes that took in youngsters immediately after the war. In France, the Red Cross facilitated admission to France of 430 young survivors of Buchenwald by taking charge of their entrance and entrusting them to the OSE,201 which then placed them in its children’s homes.

198 Henri Parens, Retour à la vie: Guérir de la Shoah, entre témoignage et résilience (Paris: Tallandier, 2010), 378–79 (Renewal of Life: Healing from the Holocaust [Rockville, MD: Schreiber Pub., 2004]). 199 Judith Kestenberg and Ira Brenner, The Last Witness: The Child Survivor of the Holocaust (Washington: American Psychiatric Press, 1996), quoted in Parens, Retour, 378–79. 200 Judith Hemmendinger, Les enfants de Buchenwald: que sont devenues les 1000 enfants juifs sauvés en 1945? (Lausanne: Pierre-Marcel Favre, 1984). 201 OSE, acronym of Œuvre de Secours aux Enfants, one of the oldest Jewish organizations for helping children, founded in 1912 in St Petersburg, Russia. Displacement and Rehabilitation of the Young Survivors 107

A first step toward integration could be undertaken in the context of this collective living. In the first children’s home, Ecouis, there were meetings on the lawn with several hundred young people at a time as well as singing in Yiddish, dancing, and discussions. These moments provided an opportunity to explore anew the liberty to express one’s emotions, to learn once more how to play, laugh, and cry.

Games and Songs

Apart from the bonds of love, games constitute the greater part of childhood. Games allow children to explore the world and their relationships to other people because games take place in an imaginary world, which is not exactly like the real one. This world can be built or destroyed at will; here, the child is the master, while at the same time he is learning the rules of life. Little by little, a game gives a sense of control over the environment. It helps to build predict- ability, so indispensable to construction of each person’s self and to the belief in a stable world, that is to say, knowing that when one takes an action, one can anticipate the consequences. Games produce a stable and trusting relationship with the world. Songs play an analogous role to that of games, since they develop a sense of solidarity, and the words also create some imaginary world. In contrast, some observers have testified to the presence of game play- ing among children in the ghetto and even in certain death camps such as Majdanek. I am referring here to the important work of George Eisen.202 This can be understood as a fight against the real presence of death. At Buchenwald, Block 66 was a children’s block with more than eight hundred children and young inmates. It had been set up at the beginning of 1945 by the underground organization inside the camp203 in order to save the children, because the sanitary conditions were deplorable at that time when many Jews arrived from other camps, such as Auschwitz, after the death marches due the westward advance of the front. Block 66 fell to the responsibility of Antonin Kalina, a Czech inmate who took very good care of the young people. What was very rare in the camp is that Kalina was assisted by a Polish inmate of Jewish origin named Gustav Schiller, who had been arrested for participating

202 George Eisen, Les enfants pendant l’Holocauste: jouer parmi les ombres (Paris: Calmann- Lévy, 1993), quoted in Catherine Coquio and Aurelia Kalisky, L’Enfant et le Génocide: Témoignages sur l’enfance pendant la Shoah (Paris: Robert Laffont, 2007), p. xlvii (Children and Play in the Holocaust: Games among the Shadows [Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1988]). 203 Myriam Rouveyre, Enfants de Buchenwald (Paris: Julliard, 1995), 110–12. 108 Rosenman there in the Polish underground. This man of remarkable charisma played a highly significant role among the young people, even after the war, as a model of authority and energy. He came to France with a group of young people. Actually, very few—about a dozen—of the children in Block 66 were between the ages of eight and ten. All the others were either adolescents or young people over eighteen years old. In Blocks 8 and 23, there were also several dozen children. The children and adolescents in Block 66 benefited from an exceptional regime: they were exempted from work and from block call in the Call Place, and thus spent the entire day inside the block, at least in principle. Block 66 was located behind the small camp and the SS never entered it for fear of infec- tious diseases. There had probably been room in this block for the children to play games, at least from time to time. The initial stay in a free community a month or two after leaving the camp was an important transition to free life. The educational staff soon understood that it was also necessary to accept, during the transitional period, a certain degree of violence from the young people, a consequence of what they had suffered or witnessed, and of the freedom experienced again and compre- hended as an absence of rules and law. Learning to live free again in a group, i.e., to accept stable common rules in these children’s homes, was a first step in rebuilding their lives.

The Role of the Educational Staff

In this framework, the role of the educational staff was essential, particularly the ability to listen to the individual histories and dramas. Setting out on the road to rehabilitation implies to acknowledge the violence and trauma suffered, as Judith Herman reminds us.204 Based on my own personal experience, these teachers and educational staff members were mediators between us and the outside world. They helped in the search for surviving parents or family living in other countries and readily welcomed the young survivor. And through them I found almost all of my nuclear family still alive: my mother and my two sisters; my father had died from typhus in Buchenwald after the liberation. But the most essential element was probably the ability of these people—teachers, educational assistants, and various other persons—to serve as identification figures or as parental substitutes, an essential support for the future. This aspect was even more important

204 Judith Herman, Trauma and Recovery (New York: Basic Books, 1992), 70. Displacement and Rehabilitation of the Young Survivors 109 for the younger children. We have all maintained very strong bonds with our staff from that period, Judith and Niny, who were in charge of the children’s home and were at that time very young women. People who serve as identification figures can be very different: some help to discover the world, others the culture, and yet others to discover the Jewish roots of the young survivors. I remember people there who, in my case, played such a role: Michel, who played flute and taught me to discover the sky’s constellations, T. Carmi, a young man who came especially from the USA, stayed with us for two years, and later became one of the most famous Israeli poets. He taught me Hebrew when I was ten, a language I have never forgotten, even though I don’t live in Israel. And Binem, who was both part of the educational staff and my friend from the camp, before Buchenwald, who introduced me to Judaism through Hassidic stories. I must mention here my friend Elie Wiesel who came with us from Buchenwald and remained with us in the children’s home. After sixty-five years I remember with emotion how the entire dining room, filled with forty people, fell silent when he was singing Sabbath songs. One should emphasize, for displaced persons who are uprooted, the importance and variety of the threads which weave a link to their past and present worlds. Moreover, decades later the bonds woven during this period of childhood or adolescence still remain very strong for most of the survivors. A third factor important in the process is the creation of groups of a familial type, what I call neo-sibling, which appeared, in particular, among those—the majority—who had lost their family. These neo-sibling (brotherhood) group- ings were sometimes established previously, inside the camp itself. For example, my friends Elie Buzyn and Armand Bulwa: the former gave to the latter his belt on the Call Place, which saved his life and sealed their brotherhood for life. I can say the same of my relation with my friend David Perlmutter, with whom I came to France, after being liberated from Buchenwald. Together with Lulek Lau, we formed the youngest trio of Buchenwald children in France. I still consider David as my young brother. Henri Parens cites the example of three young boys of eleven who made up such a tight trio while in Rivesaltes.205 One capital fact should be mentioned: in the concentration camp one can survive only by solidarity with the others. Even in the camp, in this barbaric universe, everybody is looking for somebody who will help him, who will protect him, who can prevent someone from stealing his blanket, or his jacket which he has put under his head, or his piece of bread while he sleeps, or who will grab away his soup, and so on. This need is ever more vital for the very young.

205 Parens, Retour, 378. 110 Rosenman

In the postwar period, there is a fundamental difference between those who found their close family—parents, brothers, or sisters (as happened to me)—and those who did not. For these children, it was essential to create a sort of family: a group of people, a kind of brotherhood, with whom one consults, shares mutual aid, talks, recalls memories, and with whom one cel- ebrates birthdays. Even today all the ‘Buchenwald children’, now aging adults, celebrate their ‘anniversary’ the 11th of April, the day of their liberation in 1945. Sometimes these neo-siblings (brotherhoods) were lifelong substitutes for the disappeared families.

The Role of the Public School

One last factor that should be mentioned in this context is the role of the public school and its teachers, who were a medium of passage to civil society, a process common to displaced persons. For the child survivors, it was difficult to acquire a new language adapted to their new environment, which was not the inhumane one of the concentration camp. The younger children needed this adaptation before acquiring a precise foreign language, in our case, French. Indeed, one should remember that the world of the children’s homes was quite closed off with minimal contact with the outside world. Thus, the primary school teacher or secondary school teacher was very important for the young camp survivors, as one of the benevolent figures of the welcoming country, in our case France. They also served as an identification figure for mobilizing energy and knowledge on the world of culture. In addition, they were indispensable for learning the new language, particularly for the younger ones who had not yet acquired the full possession of their mother tongue. Now I would like to dwell on problems connected with social and professional integration, and mention two aspects: one positive and one negative. The assistance I have mentioned succeeded in enabling most of the children and adolescents to quickly enter the public school system, and then professional life. Some of these young people have indeed rebuilt their lives bril- liantly, notably in the United States: one can find among them researchers, well-known writers, and doctors. However, it should also be noted that very few of the young camp survivors, in France, were able to undertake academic studies or high level education in non-academic institutions. Many of them have suffered from that, believing it to be a direct result of the war. What is the reason for that outcome? Indeed, one known factor may have played a role: their social and cultural origins. However, another factor is also quite significant: the ideology of some Displacement and Rehabilitation of the Young Survivors 111 of the educational staff. These people had a tendency to push the young people to choose a profession rapidly in order to enter active life as fast as possible, become autonomous, and also to reduce the financial burden on the tutor organization. That is why only the most brilliant pupils and those showing a strong will were encouraged and given the opportunity to enter and continue academic studies. The others were sent to vocational schools such as those of ORT, the Jewish professional schools network. Nevertheless, the survivor children who found themselves in a Jewish collective framework, i.e., children’s homes, have often had a more fulfilling life than those who found themselves in a more individual framework, such as an adoptive family or a classical orphanage.

Leaving the Children’s Home

Lastly, I would like to mention a moment of special difficulty: leaving the children’s home. The rule was that at eighteen one should leave the children’s home, an extremely difficult moment materially, but above all psychologically. Elie Wiesel’s memoirs are a poignant testimony on this theme.206 One should bear in mind, as I have mentioned, that the children’s home formed a closed world; the children lived there with their neo-siblings and their friends. That was their entire world. Leaving the children’s home meant leaving one’s brothers, friends, lover (if he or she had one), to find oneself in a small maid’s room, lost, with no friends, a truly wrenching source of anxiety, without a definite life for the future. From that stemmed veiled anger against those who had taken the decision for you. This evocation of the shock at the moment of leaving the common house will help the reader fathom the extent of the extraordinary role played by the OSE children’s homes in the postwar period, in the rescue of children and adolescents, as a sort of rehabilitation space before a new life could begin.

206 Elie Wiesel, Tous les fleuves vont à la mer: Mémoires (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1994) (All Rivers Run to the Sea: Memoirs [New York: Schocken, 1996). American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return to Jewish Communal Life (1945–1952)

Françoise S. Ouzan

He Heals Their Broken Hearts and Binds Up Their Wounds (Psalms, 147:3)

President Abraham Lincoln acted in a matter of Jewish historic significance when he appointed Jewish chaplains for the army and for military hospitals. In July 1862, a new law had made it possible for rabbis to serve as military chaplains alongside Protestant ministers and Catholic priests, which was a significant step in the Americanization of the Jewish religion. The first American Jewish military chaplain was appointed during the Civil War. The Second World War gave Jewish chaplains a unique opportunity to help survivors, although taking care of traumatized civilians was not included in their military tasks. Moreover, they were not prepared for that encounter and therefore had not received any training from the National Jewish Welfare Board, upon which they depended.207 Although they risked a court-martial, the multifaceted support they sought to provide implied resorting to illegality. Approximately sixty chaplains out of the three hundred and eleven who served on active duty took the initiative to alleviate the Displaced Persons’ plight in

* I wish to thank the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture and the Fondation pour la Mémoire de la Shoah for the support given to my broader research on survivors. I am also grateful to Alex Grobman for sharing with me the information and insights he gained from his interviews with chaplains. 207 Rabbi Abraham Klausner states that if Rabbi Eli Bohnen was the first to enter Dachau, he (Klausner) “was the first chaplain to enter Dachau and stay on, that’s the difference”; interview of Abraham Klausner by Yehuda Bauer, August 1962, Oral History Division, Hebrew University. Alex Grobman’s book, Rekindling the Flame: American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors of European Jewry (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1993), paves the way for research on Jewish chaplains. Grobman explains why the chaplains’ help to the DPs depended on their personalities: “Since the chaplains were not acting as official representatives of the American rabbinate, or any organization, while engaged in this activity, each chaplain had to decide the extent of his own involvement” (192). See also Klausner’s own account of his crucial impact in rehabilitating the DPs, Abraham J. Klausner, A Letter to My Children: From the Edge of the Holocaust (San Francisco: Holocaust Center of Northern California, 2002).

DP camps.208 Some chaplains also tried to assist in the revival of Judaism and Jewish communal life in the towns to which they were sent when rabbis did not come back from concentration camps, as was the case in France.209 Strange as it may seem, regulations in postwar Europe at first prohibited the chaplains from ‘fraternizing’ with the survivors. However, they fought to get the regulations changed, moved as they were by the plight of these uprooted people who were eager to search for relatives. Until three months after the liberation of the death camps, the Jewish welfare organizations were not allowed to tender their help to the DPs so as not to interfere with the Army. These uprooted populations were then still surrounded by barbed wire, and Jewish DPs sometimes co-existed with their former tormentors who stayed in the refugee camps under the guise of Displaced Persons unwilling to go back to countries annexed by the Soviet Union. To complete this brief picture, some Jewish survivors still wore their former concentration camp uniforms. As a result, demoralization was a major danger. For most east European survivors whose families had been decimated and whose countries had become graveyards for the Jews, emigration often was the real liberation.210 However, the doors of Palestine were closed, American immigration policy was still very restrictive, and most countries were not willing to accept a large number of Jews. The so-called ‘apathy’ of the DPs, languishing in a refugee camp three or four years after the end of the war, has become a myth. The impact of the Jewish military chaplains on survivors sheds light on the ‘Displaced Persons problem’ and on its implications on the creation of the State of Israel. Through case studies, this article will examine to what extent some chaplains played a role in restoring a normative Jewish life, both in DP camps and in the French towns to which they were assigned, as in the case of Rheims, in the north-east of France. Chaplains Isaac Klein and Hersh Livazer were sent to

208 This figure is provided by the American Jewish Historical Society Online exhibit. Chaplain Herbert Friedman gives the figure of about 60 chaplains whom he classifies as “helping the DPs” by taking risks. Interview of Chaplain Herbert Friedman by Alex Grobman, Oral History Division, Hebrew University, August 1975. 209 Of the 330 000 Jews who lived in France in July 1940, about 76,000 had been deported while only 2,500 came back from deportation. However, the number of surviving Jews was higher than in other European nations. See Jean-Marc Dreyfus, “Post-Liberation French Administration and the Jews,” in Holocaust Survivors: Resettlement, Memories, Identities, ed. Dalia Ofer, Françoise S. Ouzan, and Judy Tydor-Baumel-Schwartz (New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2012), 114. 210 See Françoise S. Ouzan, “New Roots for the Uprooted: Holocaust Survivors as Farmers in America” in ibid., 233–37. See also id., Ces Juifs dont l’Amérique ne voulait pas, 1945–1950 (Bruxelles: Complexe, 1995), 19–84. 114 Ouzan that small town. For this purpose, oral history (interviews with chaplains and survivors) as well as memoirs are interwoven with published and unpublished material of the period. Four main issues will be addressed. The first three are the chaplains’ support of the survivors’ move to rehabilitation in Displaced Persons camps, their role in reviving the flame of Judaism, and the nature of their help towards the postwar reconstruction of Jewish communal life. Last but not least, the chaplains’ participation in the Brichah underground movement and immigration to the Land of Israel will be briefly broached as another aspect of their willingness to combat the demoralization of survivors as they waited hopelessly for a visa that would enable them to start life anew. In some cases, years after the end of World War II the so-called ‘hard core’ Jewish DPs had not managed to return to normal life.211

Who are the Displaced Persons?

The status of Displaced Person does not refer only to Jews but also to members of different nationalities and religions who had been uprooted by the Third Reich. From 1945 to 1952, more than 250,000 Jewish Displaced Persons lived in camps, assembly centers, or urban centers in Germany, Austria, and Italy. In 1945, most of them were concentration camps survivors, but this fluctuating number then included 150,000 Polish Jewish survivors who had been repatriated from the Soviet Union and fled eastern Europe after the Kielce pogrom on 4 July 1946. Anti-Jewish violence had convinced many survivors that they could not return to their prewar homes, where their houses had often been confiscated by neighbors. For these reasons, and also because eastern Europe was a graveyard where their families had been massacred, they were reluctant to be repatriated. Therefore, they were called ‘the hard core’ or the ‘non-repatriables’

211 The Föhrenwald DP camp closed down in February 1957, after having been taken over by the German administration on 1 December 1951. The presence of the JDC continued at least until 1954, for among the ‘die-hard’ DPs, many suffered from tuberculosis and could not start rebuilding their lives actively, while no hope for emigration to the United States was possible for a refugee suffering from a lung disease such as TB (a tuberculosis epi- demic had broken out in the summer of 1946, with 382 cases). See Angelika Königseder and Juliane Wetzel, Waiting for Hope: Jewish Displaced Persons in Post-World War II Germany (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2001), 97–101. See also Françoise Ouzan, “Föhrenwald, dernier camp de personnes déplacée: îlot de vie juive sur le sol allemand ou ‘salle d’attente de l’immigration’?” Revue d’Histoire de la Shoah 182 (2005): 211–32. American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return 115 by the U.S. Army whose colossal effort of repatriation was meant to take no longer than six months. Jewish refugees from western Europe could more easily expect to reclaim their possessions. In September 1945, almost six million DPs had been repatriated out of a total of about eleven million refugees. Ill- prepared to handle around one million DPs (about 20 percent of them being Jews), the Allied armies (American and British in particular) were responsible for the harsh treatment of DPs between April and August 1945. The various camps (ranging from stables to barracks, or, more rarely, hotels) were administered by the Allied authorities and UNRRA (United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration), followed in 1948 by its successor agency, the IRO (International Refugee Organization). Within the group of Poles, Ukrainians, and Balts, many had been former Nazi collaborators who did not wish to return to their countries for fear of being considered traitors. Because of overcrowded conditions in the camps, the Jewish DPs (she’erit hapletah, the surviving remnants) suffered from antisemitism after the liberation before the establishment of Jewish DP camps by the autumn 1945. Where could they emigrate? Hopeful American Jewish Army chaplains served as representative of the Jewish DPs, not only carrying their mail but also their requests.

What Obstacles did Chaplains have to Overcome?

Ongoing tensions between DPs, the Army, German civilians or the German police—used as a supplementary force to enforce laws against black- marketing—were mostly due to the fact that Jews were still perceived as a burden, even behind barbed wire. Any DP, Jewish or not, could be arrested if he had in his possession a can of American food, extra butter, or American cigarettes and sentenced to several weeks or months in prison. On 29 March 1946, a tragic incident occurred when two hundred armed German police with dogs entered the DP center at Stuttgart, searching for alleged black-marketeers. A young father who had just been reunited with his wife and children was killed. After this event General McNarney, who replaced Eisenhower as commander of the U.S. forces, rescinded the authority of German police to enter the camps.212 How were chaplains to help survivors search for family and friends?213

212 Criticism of the Army by historian Leonard Dinnerstein, as well as the account of the Stuttgart killing, can be found in Leonard Dinnerstein, America and the Survivors of the Holocaust (New York: Columbia University Press, 1982), 49–71. 213 Grobman, Rekindling the Flame, 101. Chaplain Eugene Lipman organized a comprehensive package and mail service program that was illegal, but indispensable to survivors. 116 Ouzan

Resorting to illegality to help the DPs was often necessary. On his own initiative, Rabbi Abraham Klausner, a Reform rabbi who dedicated himself to helping the DPs, turned a hospital into a Jewish facility, beginning to move Jewish patients and doctors into the hospital.214 Indeed, the idea of being treated by German doctors brought back fearful memories of lethal experiments and many rumors circulated about the Germans’ misdeeds. However, as historian Alex Grobman puts it: “The Army and UNRRA had enough of Klausner and his unorthodox approach to helping the displaced persons. When Klausner requested an extension of his military tour of duty (which he completed in the latter half of 1946), he was turned down.”215 Klausner was not the only one to come under the scrutiny of the military; others, such as Herbert Friedman, a Captain in the 9th Infantry Division of the Third Army commanded by General Patton, almost faced court-martial for violation of army regulations.

From Survivors’ Self-Help to the Aid of Chaplains

From a Jewish Self-help Committee to the Central Committee of the Liberated Jews in Bavaria After the liberation, Jews were refused separate representation and separate Jewish refugee camps, but some veterans of the underground led by concentration camp survivors Yechezchiel Tydor, Eliyahu Greenbaum, and Arthur Poznansky established a Jewish self-help committee among whose projects was a temporary hospital. The committee was aided by two American chaplains, Robert Marcus and Hershel Schachter.216 Zeev Mankowitz describes the momentum that was then generated by the survivors and their remarkable achievements and prescient insights:

On August 8, the Council of the Liberated Jews in Bavaria met for the first time and elected the new Central Committee which consisted of five representatives from Munich, three each from Landsberg, and Feldafing with Dr Zalman Grinberg who continued to direct the St. Ottilien hospital reelected as chairman.217

214 Interview of Abraham Klausner by Yehuda Bauer, August 1962. 215 Grobman, Rekindling the Flame, 175. 216 Chaplains Marcus and Schachter published the first newspaper of the survivors in liberated Germany: Tehiat Hametim (Resurrection of the Dead). 217 Zeev Mankowitz, Life between Memory and Hope: The Survivors of the Holocaust in Occupied Germany (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 101. American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return 117

As the democratically elected representative of she’erit hapletah (the Surviving Remnants), it served as their voice vis-à-vis the Army and UNRRA and fought, among other issues, for official recognition of the Jews as a people. It invited guests such as Nahum Goldmann and David Ben Gurion.218 Mankowitz listed some of the main concerns of she’erit hapletah: “Why, when so many perished, did I survive? How shall I honor the dead and preserve their memory? Where is my home? Who can I trust? Where shall I build my future?” and more.219

Passover 1946: Forced Migration of Uprooted European Jews and Redemption in Zion As early as 15 April 1946, the reprinting by the U.S. Third Army of A Survivors’ Haggadah for the Passover service in the Munich enclave was achieved with the help of Chaplain Abraham J. Klausner.220 The celebration of Passover was the first time Pessah (which means ‘passing over’ in Hebrew) was celebrated after six years of war and quasi-enslavement. It assumed a special significance as it took place in Berlin, in what was once “the capital of world tyranny,” to borrow Chaplain Friedman’s words.221 Written and arranged by survivor Yosef Dov Sheinson, a Kovno author who had survived four years in concentration camps, this work was initially published through the joint efforts of two Zionist organizations. It was meant as a supplement to the original story of the Exodus by its author, a Lithuanian Jew. Sheinson closely intertwined the trials of the Jews under Hitler followed by their liberation with the previous hardships and ill treatment of the Hebrews under Egyptian rule. The shift from the original Hagaddah to the new didactic structure enhances the contemporary transpositions since the concentration camps supplant the Egyptian pyramids as places of harsh slavery. The contemporary forced migration of the

218 Ibid., 101–2. 219 Zeev Mankowitz, “She’erit Hapletah: The Surviving Remnant, an Overview,” in Holocaust Survivors: Resettlement, Memories, Identities, ed. Dalia Ofer, Françoise S. Ouzan, and Judy Tydor-Baumel-Schwartz (New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2012), 11. 220 A Survivors’ Haggadah was published again by the American Jewish Historical Society in 1998 and a second edition by the Jewish Publication Society after Saul Touster, a scholar, discovered a copy in his attic among his father’s papers some fifty years after the printing by the U.S. Third Army. This publication includes reproductions of the text in Hebrew and Yiddish with its original illustrated borders hand-drawn by Yosef Dov Sheinson and seven stark woodcuts of scenes from the death camps by Milklós Adler, a fellow survivor. 221 Interview of Chaplain Herbert Friedman by Alex Grobman, Oral History Division, Hebrew University, 28 April 1975. 118 Ouzan uprooted Jews thus overlaps the exodus of the Hebrews. The main narrative line recounts the hardships of the persecuted Jews as a result of the indiffer- ence of the Allies and bystanders, adding to the trauma of returning home and feeling still unwanted. Redemption is to be found in Zion.222 This is reflected in the text of the Haggadah:

The surviving remnants came out of caves, out of forests, and out of death camps, and returned to the lands of their exile. The people of those lands greeted them and said: We thought you were no longer alive and here you are, so many of you . . . And the people of Israel ran for their lives, smuggled themselves across borders . . . and they went to Bavaria in order to go up to our Holy Land.223

Klausner wrote an introduction to A Survivors’ Haggadah praising General Lucian Truscott, General Patton’s successor as military commander of the American Occupied Zone in Germany. He also added an ‘A’ insignia of the U.S. Third Army, emblazoned on the cover of the Haggadah. In that way it could be easily printed as an American government document! How did the survivors find paper when it was so scarce after the war? Shlomo Shafir, a concentration camp survivor and former editor of an underground Zionist paper, managed to convince Bruckman K.G., a German company that had been a printing sup- plier for the Nazis, to print Sheinson’s work. Shafir paid the company by trading cigarettes and food distributed by UNRRA, which was in charge of caring for the DPs.224 Chaplain Abraham Klausner had brought essential improvement to the morale and to the plight of the surviving remnants. First, by painstakingly com- piling lists of survivors which make up volumes entitled She’erith Hapletah, he gave them support and hope for the future. This was crucial in a period of postwar despair and chaos; Klausner had spent the previous winter burying the dead. Second, by motivating the DPs to form the Central Committee for

222 Mankowitz, Life between Memory and Hope, 86–87. Mankowitz offers deep insights: the main narrative of the Survivor’s Hagaddah is told in mock biblical prose and “Sheinson, a strong advocate of Jewish and Zionist unity, used his supplement to settle accounts with those who, from his point of view, were sowing senseless dissension among the youth of She’erith Hapleitah.” Mankowitz aptly points to what he calls “the unique contours of survivor Zionism” (p. 87). 223 A Survivors’ Haggadah, ed. Saul Touster (New York: American Jewish Historical Society, 1998), 27, 29, 31. 224 Interview with historian Shlomo Shafir, a survivor of Stutthof and Dachau, January 2004. American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return 119

Displaced Persons in Bavaria while still in the Displaced Persons camps, he led them to regain control over their destinies. In that way, the needs of the DPs were better understood and conveyed, in particular their wish to emigrate to Palestine as well as the impossibility of their returning to countries where their families had been decimated and where antisemitism was rampant and bloody pogroms were carried out. In that context, the American Army, through Jewish chaplains, did not ignore the spiritual needs of the survivors.

The Survivors’ Talmud, the U.s. Army and Chaplain Herbert Friedman

As if to more fully exterminate Jewish souls, the Nazis had burnt all the volumes of Jewish works that they could. Precisely from the DP camps, a tremendous effort on the part of survivors, rabbis, chaplains, and members of the Army resulted in a 1947 edition of some twenty oversized volumes of the Babylonian Talmud, containing commentaries on the Old Testament. It was published in Germany under the auspices of the American Army of Occupation.225 General McNarney had been persuaded of the necessity of this endeavor by Rabbi Philip Bernstein and his aide Chaplain Herbert Friedman. But it was two rabbis who had survived the Holocaust, Samuel Abba Snieg and Samuel Jacob Rose, who found strength to initiate this long and difficult enterprise.

Engraved in our memories is that bitter day in the ghetto when the decree came from the Nazis, may their memory be blotted out, to gather up all the books in one place to destroy them. . . . This is the first time in the long history of the Jewish people that a government has helped us to publish the books of Talmud, which are our life and length of days.226

At the bottom of the opening page is a depiction of a Nazi concentration camp or labor camp surrounded by barbed wire. Above are the palm trees and the landscapes of the Holy Land. “From bondage to freedom, from darkness to a great light” reads the legend in Hebrew letters. That sentence is in fact a quote from the Passover Haggadah.

225 A complete set of the 1950 edition of the Talmud (which is a rarity) is in the Library of Congress’ Hebraic Section in Washington; see website of the Jewish Virtual Library. http:// www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/loc/Talmud.html, accessed 28 July 2013. 226 Quoted in Gerd Korman, “Survivors’ Talmud and the U.S. Army,” American Jewish History 73 (1984): 2–85, electronic version: http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/articles/138. 120 Ouzan

The title page of the first volume indicates an edition of the complete Talmud published in Munich and Heidelberg in 1948 by the rabbinic organization of the American sector, in particular Rabbi Philip Bernstein, Secretary of CANRA,227 assisted by Chaplain Herbert A. Friedman, along with the American Military Command and the American Jewish Distribution Committee (AJDC) or JDC in Germany. They both made the point that it would be in the best tradition of American democracy to help restore the spirits of those they had saved from certain death in concentration or extermination camps. Through the understanding of the American Military Command, or whether by an absence of opposition on their part, immense tasks were accomplished at a time when the basic necessities were often lacking in Europe.228

The Chaplains’ Support of the Survivors’ Move to Rehabilitation in Dp Camps

Rabbi Judah Nadich enlisted in 1942 as an Army chaplain and was the first American rabbi to serve as a chaplain in the European Operations Theater. Born in Baltimore in 1912, Nadich was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary in 1937. He was based in Paris after its liberation in August 1944, where he served at the Office of the Theater Chaplain. This position enabled him to inform American Jewish organizations about the plight of France’s Jews. He also became an unofficial spokesman on Jewish affairs for American news correspondents. In 1945 he was appointed as General Dwight Eisenhower’s adviser on Jewish affairs. Thanks to this position, Nadich visited several Jewish refugee camps in Germany, where he witnessed the awful conditions under which Jewish Displaced Persons were living. After Nadich issued a report on these refugee camps, and especially after the Harrison report published in September 1945229 that was greatly inspired by Chaplain Klausner’s remarks and wording about the appalling living conditions of the DPs and their needs, Eisenhower ordered commanders to treat Displaced Persons more humanely

227 The National Jewish Welfare Board (JWB) had established the JWB Committee on Chaplains which was later reorganized in order to become CANRA, the Committee on Army and Navy Religious Activities. The American Government had authorized the JWB to recruit Jewish chaplains for the military. 228 Grobman, Rekindling the Flame, 154–65, 175–76. 229 The Harrison report was published in the Department of State Bulletin 13 (30 Sept. 1945). The Eisenhower Presidential Library in Abilene (Kansas) has a version of this report with comments by General Eisenhower in the margins of the document. American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return 121 and to provide them with adequate housing and food. Later, he was finally convinced that creating Jewish DP camps (where Jews would not be the victims of postwar antisemitism) was not a mere repetition of a previous segregation, as Eisenhower first maintained.230 Briefly summed up, the Harrison report was a crucial document which had an impact in four domains: it led Army officials to be more understanding toward Jewish DPs, it called upon the British to admit more Jews into Palestine in accordance with the Balfour Declaration, it informed the American press about the plight of DPs, and encouraged the members of the U.S. Congress to liberalize immigration laws. As a consequence, the chaplains’ initiatives were unofficially guided by the Harrison report insofar as their efforts extended to reaching the Jewish homeland in Palestine.

Jewish Chaplains as a Bridge Between Dp Camps and the Holy Land

In his memoirs, Chaplain Hersh Livazer explains that having traveled to the Holy Land after the German surrender enabled him to serve as a link between Displaced Persons in DP camps and the Yishuv, the Jewish community in Palestine. He considered what he did then as “the most worthwhile achievements in [my] army career”:

I took with me thousands of letters, written by DPs to their relations in Palestine. And brought back sums of money as well as replies. In the complicated task of redistribution, I was greatly helped by Rabbi Shalom Wohlgelernter of the Vaad Ha-Hatzalah and Rabbi Rosenberg of the Distribution Committee. I also, at the request of my Rabbi, who was a very active member of the Vaad, purchased a large number of very much needed articles and brought them back to the camps. The British mandatory government always put a special railroad car at my disposal, free of charge, for this purpose.231

230 In spite of the praise of General Eisenhower by Judah Nadich, notably in his diary and in his book, it should be said that Eisenhower’s reluctance to admit the necessity of separate Jewish camps is clearly evident in his commented version of the Harrison report in the archives of the Eisenhower Library. 231 Hersh Livazer, The Rabbi’s Blessing: From the Memoirs of a U.S. Army Chaplain (Jerusalem: Sivan Press, 1980), 107. 122 Ouzan

Livazer also greeted the Jewish Brigade232 when he heard that it was being transferred from Germany to Holland and Belgium and stopped at Mont d’Or, a French town which was under American jurisdiction. He did so instead of General Thrasher, the Commander of Oise Base Section, who regretted being unable to greet them because of a meeting with General Lee, due to arrive on an inspection tour. When Livazer met the Jewish Brigade, he made a point of addressing them in Hebrew, aware as he was of the cultural discrepancies he would have to bridge: “Our job has not been finished. We have conquered our enemies; now we must concentrate on conquering our friends.”233 He was applauded. Hersh Livazer had been raised in a Hassidic home in Poland, educated there in a yeshivah, and emigrated with his parents to Palestine in 1929. In 1931, apparently because of a malaria outbreak, he traveled on his own to the United States and took a post as a rabbi of a synagogue in New York for a year. He arrived in America as an adult and learnt to speak good English while he also spoke Hebrew, Polish, and Yiddish. These skills served him well when he joined the U.S. Army as a chaplain in 1943. He worked closely with the Jewish Agency delegation headed by Dr Haim Hoffman (later Yahil), whose headquarters were in Munich and whose team impressed him by their efficiency between 1948 and 1951.

Chaplains’ Involvement in Emigration to the Land of Israel

Initially, an underground clandestine organization, Brichah, was mostly composed of survivors, who took the lead in building this network for Jewish refugees fleeing Poland, especially after the Kielce pogrom on 4 July 1946. It was given added momentum by the postwar chaos and by the fact that frontiers were not clearly defined and could be crossed relatively easily. In his book, Abraham S. Hyman, who served as an assistant to William Haber, General Clay’s Jewish advisor, accounts for the specific role chaplains played in this

232 The Jewish Brigade (formed in September 1944) was a military formation of the British Army that served in Europe during the Second World War. It fought under the Zionist flag and included more than 5,000 Jewish soldiers, who constituted three infantry battalions with Hebrew as the official language. It was under the command of Brigadier Benjamin, a regular Jewish officer of the British Army. The British disbanded the Brigade in July 1946. 233 Livazer, The Rabbi’s Blessing, 107. American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return 123 network: “Brichah could assume that if it was within their power to help, they would regard it as a high privilege to render services requested.”234 In his scholarly account, Yehuda Bauer, a leading historian and former member of the Palmach, explains that Brichah leaders had only directed the flow of the refugees without instigating it:

The movement was conditioned by antisemitism and economic depri- vation, by mass murders that preceded it and their political and psychological consequences. The originators and the leaders of the Zionist movement were duty-bound to help their brethren, fleeing panic-stricken from Eastern Europe. What they did was to channel this flow intelligently into a reservoir that would turn the misery of the people into a powerful weapon that would lead them to a better life.235

According to Leo W. Schwartz who directed the American Jewish Joint Distri bution Committee, which also helped Brichah unofficially, the underground

234 Abraham S. Hyman, The Undefeated (Jerusalem and New York: Gefen Books, 1993), 202. That book provides a good illustration of the instinctive Zionism of Jewish DPs. Chaplain Herbert Friedman’s oral history (12 June 1992, Oral History collection of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum) provides information on the work of the Zionists in the DP camps. See also Françoise Ouzan, “Rebuilding Jewish Identities in Displaced Persons Camps in Germany (1945–1947),” Bulletin du Centre de Recherche Français de Jérusalem, 14 (Spring 2004): 98–111; online: http://bcrfj.revues.org/index269.html#ftn14. Alex Grobman encapsulates the raison d’être of the chaplains in Brichah as well as their multifaceted work: “Until the survivors received appropriate support from American Jewry, the JDC and the Army, the chaplains would continue to be needed. They would be asked not only to provide material aid but to listen to the problems of displaced persons, to offer them advice, to intervene with the military on their behalf, to work with the Berihah, and to continue informing American Jewry on their plight”; Grobman, Rekindling the Flame, 133. 235 Yehuda Bauer, Flight and Rescue: Brichah (New York: Random House, 1970), 320–21. Elsewhere Bauer states: “The move toward Palestine, then and later, cannot be explained without considering the initial push given by the appearance of the Palestinian Jews, and it is fairly clear that the chaplains fortified this effect by their identification with Zionist tendencies,” Yehuda Bauer, “Jewish Survivors in DP Camps and Sheerith Hapletah,” in The Nazi Concentration Camps: Structure and Aims, the Image of the Prisoner, the Jews in the Camps: Proceedings of the Fourth Yad Vashem International Historical Conference, Jerusalem, January 1980, ed. Yisrael Gutman and Avital Saf (Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1984), 495. 124 Ouzan movement would have been delayed had it not benefitted from the untold support from Army members and UNRRA officials in Germany.236 To the Army, the UNRRA, the Jewish Agency, and the Joint, Jewish chaplains brought a ‘supportive’, ‘interlocking’ contribution, to borrow Herbert Friedman’s words, since the Haganah237 needed the cover of Army uniforms of Jewish chaplains as well as their determinative role in getting the U.S. Army’s help.238 For instance, Chaplain Lifshutz, who held Zionist sympathies and had worked closely with DPs in Austria where a network of nineteen DP camps were established, was also an active participant in the Brichah. He assisted survivors in Austria to reach Eretz Israel prior to May 1948. Through his help, 1,000 to 1,500 DPs were smuggled out across Austrian borders to reach Palestine as part of the illegal immigration, the ma‘apilim.239 Other chaplains among the sixty who were most active with the DPs on their own initiatives deserve to be mentioned. Arieh Nesher, a survivor who emigrated to the Jewish national homeland in Palestine, expressed his gratitude towards Chaplain Lipman: “He solved problems with a sick woman, with a child who could not go on . . . when somebody was picked up and arrested by a policeman . . .”240 After the violent Kielce Pogrom in Poland, 150,000 Jews desperately fled the country. At the end of 1946 there were 250,000 DPs in sixty-four camps in the American zones of Germany and Austria. Chaplain Herbert A. Friedman recounts his participation in the logistics of a famous episode:

In 1947 the Exodus ship of Brichah loaded in Port de Bouc near Marseille and sailed from Sète, on the other side of Marseille. I helped bring 5000 people to that ship. That required a convoy from the American zone of

236 Leo W. Schwarz, The Redeemers: A Saga of the Years 1945–1952 (New York: Farrar, Straus and Young, 1953), 234–35. 237 The Haganah (Defense in Hebrew) was a Jewish paramilitary organization in British Mandatory Palestine from 1920 to 1948. It then became the core of the Israel Defense Forces. In reaction to the White Paper which severely restricted emigration to Palestine, in May 1941 the Haganah created the Palmach (Striking Force), an elite commando section of over 2,000 men and women, which organized illegal immigration to Palestine (ha‘apalah). 238 Interview of Chaplain Herbert Friedman by Alex Grobman (n. 13 above). 239 Miriam Braver Lifshutz, The World is my Pulpit: The Amazing Life of Remarkable Rabbi, Chaplain (Lt.Col) Oscar M. Lifshutz (Lakewood: Gilyon Publishing, 2010). I am grateful to Rabbi David Gefen for providing me with that testimony. 240 Interview of Arieh Nesher by Alex Grobman, Oral History Division, Hebrew University, 28 January 1975. American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return 125

Germany, down across France into French territory, of 100 trucks with 5000 people.241

In February 1948, Chaplain Hersh Livazer was sent to Munich, to the DP division. He was under the command of Colonel Joseph Decker who was friendly towards Displaced Persons, who appreciated him and knew he was in charge of immigration from occupied Germany to Israel. Again, Livazer availed himself of the opportunity to help DPs immigrate to Eretz Israel as he was in contact with a leader of Aliya Bet, the illegal immigration, and was ready to use his access to Colonel Decker in order to impel him to allow these transports and to a certain extent encourage them. Indeed, Livazer had told him that it was in the interest of the American government, and in particular of the American taxpayer, to empty these temporary assembly centers as quickly as possible. By considering all aspects of the Displaced Person question, he convinced the general, as related in his memoirs: “The sooner we get rid of them, the better it will be for all concerned.”242 His arguments persuaded the Colonel, who at first thought his hands were tied by the British policy of drastic restriction of immigration certificates. Among the many tasks performed by chaplains such as Isaac Klein and Hersh Livazer were cleaning and restoring desecrated synagogues, reclaiming Jewish children from convents, and rebuilding broken Jewish communities, all huge endeavors requiring determination and courage.

Reconstructing Jewish Communal Life in France: The Cases of Rheims and Paris

Before the war, the French city of Rheims (Reims in French spelling) had a large Jewish community: more than a hundred families, i.e., about 600 registered members, in 1939.243 Many of its members had been deported, never to return. Those who hid in distant cities and villages survived through the help of non-Jews. About forty-eight families, i.e., about 109 members remained after

241 Herbert A. Friedman, “A Military Chaplain’s Perspective,” in Life Reborn: Jewish Displaced Persons 1945–1951: Conference Proceedings, ed. Menachem Z. Rosensaft (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, 2001), 69. 242 Livazer, The Rabbi’s Blessing, 148. 243 Serge Ejnès, Histoire des Juifs de Reims pendant la Seconde Guerre mondiale: with the collaboration of Jocelyne Husson and Françoise Nochimowski, préface by Serge Klarsfeld (Reims: S. Ejnès, 1995), 15. However, secular Jews in Rheims were never registered. 126 Ouzan the war, participating more or less in the life of the community.244 However, when Chaplain Hershel Livazer, a forty-year-old Orthodox rabbi, assisted by Chaplain Isaac Klein, a thirty-nine year old Conservative rabbi of the Ninth Bomber Command, organized prayers at the beautiful local synagogue, it instilled new life in the Jewish community. The synagogue was intact in spite of German bombings. The two chaplains’ charisma, their initiatives, and their services infused new blood into the decimated assembly. The synagogue, which was endowed with a women’s gallery (“a rare thing then in Europe,” noted Livazer in his memoirs)245 and a pipe organ on the gallery,246 was packed with Jewish soldiers, as well as the main hall. Most of the women who had been deported to extermination camps never came back to the women’s gallery.247 On Sabbath mornings, seventy to eighty military men were present at the services “while ninety-nine per cent of the civilian population attended services and did whatever they possibly could to make life for us soldiers more pleasant.”248 This warm attitude was well reciprocated by army personnel, as Livazer accurately noted:

Many officers, even the non-religious ones, used to donate their weekly rations of whiskey—two bottles—to these affairs, and even the quar- termaster, a non-Jew, did his best to help us arrange provisions for the kiddushim, giving us all kinds of American sardines and cookies with a rabbinical hechsher [rabbinical approval].249

To this day, those who were then young children in the community of Rheims remember the religious services organized by Livazer and Klein, the Sabbath zemiros (songs for the Sabbath) and the se‘udah shelishit, the third sabbati-

244 Ibid. 245 Livazer, The Rabbi’s Blessing, 77. 246 To this day, the pipe organ still functions. That musical instrument caught the eye of Chaplain Isaac Klein; see Isaac Klein, The Anguish and the Ecstasy of a Jewish Chaplain: Memoirs of World War II (New York: Vantage Press, 1974), 128. The synagogue was saved from the hands of the Nazis who had transformed the magnificent building into a warehouse. 247 Interview with Françoise Nochimowski, Rheims, 18 October 1999. A few pocket prayer books printed by the National Jewish Welfare Board remain in the library of the cultural center adjacent to the synagogue as well as about two hundred thick prayer books for the High Holidays “specially issued for Jews in the Armed Forces of the United States” and still in use to this day. 248 Livazer, The Rabbi’s Blessing, 77. 249 Ibid., 78. American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return 127 cal meal eaten in the auditorium adjoining the synagogue, at a time when everything was missing.250 At this point, it is important to bear in mind that Chaplain Livazer’s duty was first and foremost to supervise the military cemeteries in the small cities around Rheims as well as those in Belgium, Holland, and Luxembourg and attend to the needs of Jewish soldiers! For the Jewish festival of Purim, he read the Scroll of Esther four times in France, once in Belgium, as well as in Holland, as did most Jewish chaplains. During the six months he remained there, Chaplain Isaac Klein organized a religious school and a youth group, thus impacting on the Jewish identity of the young members of the decimated Jewish community of Rheims which was suffering from the non-return of its members.251 Klein explains:

In connection with the reorganization of the community, I went to Paris to get some help from the Consistoire. I requested the services of a rabbi for Rheims. In all of France, they told me, only fifteen rabbis had survived, and they had been earmarked for the larger communities. When I came back with the sad news, I agreed to serve as a rabbi but only unofficially. Officially, I was completely at the service of the United States Army.252

Before coming to Rheims, Klein was stationed in Chartres, where he discovered twelve Jewish families who had been in hiding in the vicinity, although the mayor of this French town had assured him that no one had returned from deportation. Klein did his best to give back the pride of being Jewish to these unexpected survivors. The “Jewish Chaplain of the American Forces” was often greeted with affection and pride.253 To a certain extent, he represented the Jew as a hero and no longer as a victim, so that such a figure was necessary for the new identification of the Jewish survivors after the Holocaust. It certainly was Passover that entailed more concern, hard work, and highly thought out logistics. Chaplains Livazer and Klein organized services at the synagogue as well as the Passover ‘Seder’ of 1945 since four to five thousand soldiers were expected! A special permit from the French Ministry of Provisions being necessary to buy poultry on the local market, much cunning

250 Interview with David Talmud, a former POW, Rheims, 11 November 1995. 251 Ejnès, Histoire des Juifs de Reims, 15. 252 Klein, The Anguish and the Ecstasy, 131. 253 Interview of Rabbi Isaac Klein of Springfield, MA by Yehuda Bauer, August 1963, Oral History Division, Institute of Contemporary Jewry, Hebrew University. See also Grobman, Rekindling the Flame, 29, who details in depth the work of efficient chaplains such as Joseph Shubow. 128 Ouzan was needed to avoid waiting until the approaching festival. While all members of the Jewish community of Rheims were involved in the Passover preparations (children also participated in the event), Livazer obtained three hundred and fifty turkeys, geese, ducks, and chickens which he slaughtered according to the Jewish rite. The chaplain told fifty German prisoners of war to pluck them. He recalls his difficulties in being obeyed by them. Finally, he gave over the job of handling them to a “Jewish Sergeant who had escaped from a concentration camp in Austria and volunteered for the American army.”254 To a certain extent, by doing so he had helped that survivor regain his dignity and self-confidence. These two values had been doomed to destruction in the inde- scribable concentration camp living conditions. An invitation to that memorable 1945 Seder was sent by Chaplain Livazer to the Commander-in-Chief, General Eisenhower, who at the time was at the SHAEF Forward Headquarters in Rheims.255 Indeed, that small French town was a strategic army base for the Allied armies (who would mark the war’s end there, in a room of a high school, on 7 May 1945). Although General Eisenhower accepted the invitation and had agreed to speak in the Rheims synagogue, General Thrasher, then chief of the Oise Base Section, asked Livazer to withdraw the invitation for fear that French collaborators would plant a bomb in the synagogue during the Seder. However, by swiftly agreeing to participate in the Passover Seder, Eisenhower had expressed his concern for the Jewish experience, past and present, a fact that Chaplain Nadich emphasized when praising the General. All the military chaplains were faced with difficult logistical problems in the chaos of immediate postwar Europe. How was one to provide decent food for the young American soldiers who had fasted on the Day of Atonement? This was also a problem that had to be solved for the Jewish DPs and the German Jewish civilians who worshipped at the makeshift synagogues. It required brainstorming and efficiency as well as good relationships with the Army authorities of occupation.

254 Grobman, Rekindling the Flame, 80. 255 We quote Livazer on this point: “I had been assigned to the biggest and most strategic base in all Europe, at Rheims. The headquarters of the High Command of all the Allied forces at the Front, excluding Russia, was stationed there. General Eisenhower, Commander-in- Chief, spent most of his time in Rheims which teemed with hundreds of generals from all the countries that participated in the war, including those which had been defeated by the Nazis”; Livazer, The Rabbi’s Blessing, 73. American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return 129

Infusing Jewish Life in Postwar Paris

At the beginning of 1946 the army gave Chaplain Livazer a new assignment: he was to be deputy chaplain of the Western Base, and once in Paris he benefitted from the warm hospitality of the family of one of the few remaining ritual slaughterers. Mr Warhman’s home became a center for the activities of the emissaries who would meet there, among whom were those of the Va‘ad ha-Hatzalah (Rescue Committee) who came from Jerusalem, headed by Chief Rabbi Isaac Herzog.256 As Livazer relates in his memoirs, in postwar France, there was a shortage of everything.

France in general and Paris, in particular, were at that time like an empty shell: the Germans had removed almost everything of value, and supplies, particularly food supplies, were extremely scarce. I was in the for- tunate position of having kosher wine and other articles hard to secure in early postwar France. Everything that I brought over to the Wahrman’s for their guests was taken from the army. I have not a shadow of doubt that the army knew all about it but overlooked it—there was little that a chaplain could not do as long as he behaved tactfully and refrained from exploiting his position for personal gain.257

Organizing Passover 1946 in Paris under those conditions represented a new challenge for the chaplain. Eight hundred members of the Allied military forces were to attend as well as soldiers of the Jewish Brigade. It was impossible to get kosher meat on the French market unless non-kosher meat was supplied in exchange, because meat was rationed. In addition to his assignment to organize Passover in a large restaurant on Boulevard Haussmann, Livazer also had requests from the religious ‘kibbutzim’. These were frameworks in which groups of Jewish Russian refugees and partisans in St Germain and Bayeux prepared themselves for kibbutz life in the Jewish homeland in Palestine which became the independent State of Israel on 14 May 1948. Other religious institutions also asked the chaplain for kosher meat and Passover items. However, Livazer could not take undue risks as the military police was authorized to arrest him for doing business on the black

256 On the activities of the Orthodox Va‘ad ha-Hatzalah and its assistance to Jewish survivors, see Alex Grobman, Battling for Souls: the Vaad Hatzala Rescue Committee in Post- Holocaust Europe (Jersey City: Ktav Publishing House, 2004). 257 Livazer, The Rabbi’s Blessing 110. 130 Ouzan market: “Quartermasters and senior officers knew what was going on while I was delivering meat to the French butchers, but nobody said a word.”258 While in Paris, Hersh Livazer admits, he could not refrain from giving a listening ear to the partisans and refugees at a time when a stream of Displaced Persons reached the city. In this he benefitted from different types of help, among them that of a French lawyer and of the Parisian rabbis. If most refugee problems were solved by the Joint Distribution Committee which provided shelter for them and the Ze‘irei Agudath Israel in America which sent parcels to postwar refugees, he did try to complement the parcels by finding necessary products such as oil. The chaplain stayed in his office at the Majestic Hotel in the morning and in the Aguda offices in the afternoon, again resorting to supplies from military storerooms. Livazer commented on the attitude displayed by Army personnel:

It is interesting to note that the quartermasters and senior officers at headquarters knew what was on but remained silent, knowing that we were not selling anything on the black market. Many of the officers had been to concentration camps and had seen with their own eyes what the Germans had done to Jews.259

Livazer’s blend of warmth, dedication to Torah, and charisma during his twenty-two years of service in the U.S. Army enabled him to have an impact on the military, in particular on his servicemen, and, last but not least, on broken individuals: the Jewish victims of the uprooting of populations triggered by the Third Reich.

When a Former Refugee Meets Postwar Unwanted Refugees

Beginning his book with a letter to his wife, dating back to March 1945, that is an account of a Passover Seder aboard the biggest troop carrier of the U.S. Army, Chaplain George Vida sums up a situation which he aptly captures in one sentence: “Life is stranger than fiction.” He indirectly explains why he was so very eager to help the DPs with whom he identified:

Remember, only a few years ago, we were on a ship like this, you and I and the children, leaving Czechoslovakia as beaten refugees. My eight

258 Ibid., 112. 259 Ibid., 119. American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return 131

years as Rabbi in Gablonz were nothing but smoke. Our dreams and aspirations, our hopes for the future were shattered. We were going toward an unknown future in a new country, to start a new life, to build a new reputation, to learn a new language, to begin a new page. This was five years ago. Today I am an American citizen, an officer in the U.S. Army, a Chaplain. Still, five years ago, you were with me—I was not alone. Today, with 18000 people, I am still very much alone. None of the others can truly understand how I feel going back to Europe.260

Chaplain George Vida was a Conservative rabbi who fled Hungary in 1939 at the age of thirty-three. He had lost close relatives in concentration and extermination camps. His own father, Sandor Vida, was assassinated in Auschwitz in June 1944. Chaplain Vida benefitted from ‘compassionate leave’ from the G1. This mysterious terminology was explained through a memorandum which said that “military personnel stationed in Europe who have, or had before the war, close relatives in Europe, may be granted ‘compassionate leave’ for the purpose of locating and aiding those relatives.” George Vida accordingly asked for leave. He finally found his brother Imre who had survived the death camps but lost his wife and a four-year-old son. George begged him to immigrate to America but Imre preferred to stay in Hungary, with the irrational hope that someone from the family would come back.

An Advocate for the Uprooted As he felt he had been saved to carry out his mission with Displaced Persons, Chaplain Vida expressed his desire to do his utmost for the survivors whom he helped in the Zielsheim Jewish DP camp in Germany, the biggest assembly center. He also visited DP camps with the members of the Anglo-American Commission of Inquiry on Palestine and spoke with Bartley Crum and Sir Frederick Leggett in favor of the DPs.261 They arrived in Frankfurt on 6 February

260 George Vida, From Doom to Dawn: A Jewish Chaplain’s Story of Displaced Persons (New York: Jonathan David Publishers, 1977), 3. His volume is dedicated to the memory of his father, Sandor Vida, “whose life ended in Auschwitz in June 1944.” 261 In December 1945 Bartley Crum, a San Francisco attorney in his mid-forties, was appointed by President Harry S. Truman as a member of the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry on Palestine. Sir Frederick Leggett, a British member of the committee, was at first hostile to the Jewish refugees, but after visiting DP camps he understood the urgent need for them to have a homeland in Palestine. Bartley Crum stated: “Sir Frederick and I now felt clearly the deep gap between those who had seen the displaced persons camps and those who had only seen part of the picture,” Bartley C. Crum, Behind the Silken Curtain: A Personal Account of Anglo-American Diplomacy in Palestine and the Middle East 132 Ouzan

1946, accompanied by two secretaries and two journalists: Ruth Gruber, who adopted a militant point of view in favor of DPs and Gerold Frank who wrote well documented and moving accounts of the DP tragedy.262 Chaplain George Vida’s involvement also points to the Jewish chaplain as an advocate of the uprooted.263 Indeed, it was an endeavor he continued later when he was once again a civilian rabbi. Chaplain Vida went back to Munich for a new assignment. This was in 1952, when the DP camps were closed, except for Föhrenwald. This last assembly center, which remained open until February 1957, sheltered basically those who were unfit to begin a new life, those who suffered from tuberculosis and were admitted nowhere, those still too weak to plan their emigration, as well as those who came back disenchanted from the hard life in Israel and hoped to emigrate again elsewhere. There, the Jewish Welfare Board reminded him that his “primary job was to take care for the spiritual needs of members of the United States Army.”264 It implied that the work he intended to do with the DPs was outside the scope of his job. That admonition was echoed both by a fellow Jewish chaplain in Nuremberg and by the Executive Officer of the Munich Military Post who called him and warned him about that time- consuming activity in unequivocal terms: “There was a Jewish Chaplain here before you came who spent more time with DPs than on his duty. I am warning you. Watch your step.”265 Vida did not do so. Vida noted that the Munich of that time was very different from the immediate postwar Munich when it was the scene of the headquarters of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, the office of the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, and the first office of the Palestinian Jews who came to work with DPs.

(New York: Simon and Schuster, 1947), 128. His fascinating book relates how six Americans and six Britons resolved their differences to present a unanimous report. Among other items, it recommended “the immediate issuance of 100,000 certificates of entry to Palestine” for DPs. 262 Born in 1911, Ruth Gruber, an American journalist, photographer, writer, and humanitarian, was a former special assistant to the Secretary of the Interior. Among her numerous books, she published Destination Palestine: The Story of the Haganah Ship Exodus 1947 (New York: Current Books, 1948). 263 Vida, From Doom to Dawn, 61–74. 264 Ibid., 85. On the influence of rabbis on Jewish identity, see Isaac Hershkovitz, “Rabbis as ‘Shapers of Identity’: Agents of the Past in the Post-war European DP Camps,” on line: academia.edu, Bar Ilan University, Israel, Department of Philosophy, www.academia .edu/1705630/Rabbis_as_Shapers_of_Identity_Agents_of_the_Past_in_the_Post-War_ European_DP_Camps. 265 Vida, From Doom to Dawn, 85. American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return 133

In 1952, he felt in the midst of a hostile country which liked neither Jews nor Americans. We have briefly attempted to show to what extent many American chaplains met Holocaust survivors’ expectations when they assisted them. More importantly, the chaplains not only provided services to the DPs but encouraged their initiatives through the creation of the Central Committee in Munich, which represented a form of self-government and was a significant achievement. Many chaplains went beyond their line of duty, as exemplified by the case of Abraham Klausner, whose name has become associated with she’erit hapletah. Among the numerous tributes paid to him by chaplains, the words of his friend George Vida sum up some of Klausner’s gigantic achievements:

He helped the DPs to organize the first Committee of Liberated Jews, later the Central Committee in Munich. He organized a conference in December 1945 in Munich and at one time, 300 DPs went through there in one day and each one received a shower, a set of brand new underwear, some other clothing and a meal. All this from voluntary contributions of American soldiers and their relatives.266 ∵ Our case studies have shown the chaplains’ efforts at rehabilitating survivors in many ways. Strengthening Jewish identities267 not only among their own soldiers but also among survivors as well as members of Jewish communities in Europe was no easy task in the postwar chaos. In DP camps, their impact,

266 Ibid. Vida provides additional valuable details concerning the changes made in the main hospital where DPs feared being treated by German doctors: “This Central Committee took over the St. Ottilien Hospital and manned it with DPs, trained nurses and doctors there, while healing the many DPs,” ibid., 84. As noted, Vida was also an interpreter and liaison officer to the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry on Palestine. After serving in Korea where he met former DPs who had enrolled in the US Army, Vida returned to Germany to serve as a chaplain in Munich from 1952 to 1955. 267 In a pocket-size prayer book of the Jewish GI (“Abridged for the Jews in the Armed Forces of the United States”), one can read the following sentence in the preface: “This little volume of devotion serves not only the men who use it but also the highest ideal of America.” A prayer for the United States of America and “the people who dwell therein” also appears in this small volume. It is copyrighted by the National Jewish Welfare Board and was published in 1943 by the Jewish Publication Society in Philadelphia. A copy is in the personal archives of the author. 134 Ouzan both collective and individual, had been crucial, since those chaplains acted as unofficial advocates of the ‘surviving remnants of European Jewry’. Rehabilitation had begun in DP camps where chaplains helped Displaced Persons regain their dignity, fight demoralization, establish hospitals with Jewish doctors in Munich (as did Klausner), trace the lost members of their families or the place and date of their massacre by the Nazis, as well as find a country of immigration. Through their help, the two infamous letters ‘DP’ assumed the symbol of ‘Destination Palestine’. In other instances they were instrumental in tracing American relatives of the survivors with the collaboration of Jewish organizations such as the American Joint Distribution Committee, whose work was central in the rehabilitation of postwar refugees, or that of the National Council for Jewish Women, whose branches in the United States were most active in this matter. The achievements of the American Jewish chaplains examined briefly in this article prove that almost no relevant issue related to rehabilitation and reconstruction was beyond their reach if there was a will to help and the desire to behave as a ‘mench’.268 This fact had been confirmed explicitly both by Chaplain Livazer and by Chaplain Friedman269 who praised the high-ranking American military for their active or tacit cooperation with the chaplains willing to help DPs. However, the chaplains constantly had to explain to military authorities why Jewish DPs opposed repatriation to eastern Europe, where pogroms took place after the end of the war. The object of this article is to make clear that unofficial cooperation by the U.S. Army with Jewish chaplains and the readiness of the army forces to help in any way possible enabled them to overcome obstacles. That fact has often not received enough attention due to a focus on antisemitic attitudes among high- ranking officers from West Point and in particular because of General Patton’s visceral hatred of the Jew as a homeless refugee deprived of the refinements of the White Anglo-Saxon Protestant culture. That is one of the reasons why the DP problem as seen from the perspective of Jewish chaplains provides a more balanced picture of the postwar chaos in the European Theater and of the bias against Jews in the U.S. Army.270

268 In Yiddish, a ‘mench’ is a person who is good to other people, as every Jew is meant to be. 269 Livazer, The Rabbi’s Blessing, 113–14; Interview of Chaplain Herbert Friedman by Alex Grobman. 270 The Patton Papers, comp and ed. Martin Blumenson, 2 vols. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1972–72), 2:751, from which we quote the despicable lines from General Patton’s diary: “Harrison and his ilk believe that the Displaced Person is a human being, which he is not, and this applies particularly to the Jews . . . who are lower than animals.” See Françoise S. American Jewish Chaplains and the Survivors’ Return 135

Alongside their military duties, some chaplains worked closely with survivors in Displaced Persons camps, helping to provide those refugees with a ‘transition’ from the life of an internee to that of a civilian gradually regain- ing freedom and self-dignity. Maintaining postwar Jewish identity appeared as a challenge after the Holocaust. Although the Jewish chaplains had not anticipated the possibility of being the first to meet Jewish survivors, their crucial role was instrumental in the rehabilitation of those who survived the Holocaust, no matter to what branch of Judaism they belonged. Over and above their struggle to provide the help and services needed by the DPs, some of them reinvigorated Jewish life in disrupted French communities at the end of the war, “when it was completely disorganized and practically non-existent.”271 The postwar reconstruction of Jewish life and communities in France has been made tangible through case studies. This perspective has shed new light on an important aspect of the social and military history of the city of Rheims, where the Act of military surrender was signed in the early hours of 7 May 1945. In a small schoolhouse where General Dwight Eisenhowers’ headquarters were situated, Jodl, the chief of staff of the Wehrmacht, accepted an unconditional surrender in the presence of Lieutenant General Walter Bedell Smith who represented Eisenhower, absent from the signing for reasons of protocol. On that day, the War Office in London was informed: “The mission of this Allied Force was fulfilled at 2.41, local time, May 7th 1945.”272

Ouzan, “Antisemitism in the US at the End of the War and in Its Aftermath: Attitudes toward Displaced Persons,” in Antisemitism Worldwide, 2003/2004 (2005): 51–74. See also Joseph Bendersky, The “Jewish Threat”: Anti-Semitic Politics of the U.S. Army (New York, Basic Books, 2000). It seems that few among the military were willing to help the Jews. However, our article shows that the unofficial collaboration of the American Army with helpful Jewish chaplains balances the picture of pervasive antisemitism in an American institution. 271 This last quote refers to a report about France after the war in European Jewry Ten Years after the War: An Account of the Development and Present Status of the Decimated Jewish Communities of Europe (New York: Institute of Jewish Affairs of the World Jewish Congress, 1956), 196. 272 However, Stalin insisted that Nazi Germany should also sign a surrender document to the occupiers of Berlin. The Germans signed another act of military surrender on 8 May 1945 at Karlshorst, just outside of Berlin. The ‘Act of Surrender’ of 7 May 1945 can be seen in the ‘War Room’ at the Museum of Surrender which served as Eisenhower’s temporary headquarters (Musée de la Reddition, Rheims). 136 Ouzan

Chaplains Klein and Livazer were greatly missed by the Jewish community in Rheims.273 The latter was discharged from the U.S. Army due to ill health in 1965 and came to live in Israel.

273 Interview with David Talmud, Rheims, 7 June 1987. Both chaplains mention in their memoirs how sad it was for them to leave the Jewish community of Rheims. Isaac Klein, for example, wrote: “I got to know everyone of these surviving families, some of them quite intimately. While this made the departure a painful experience, I had the satisfaction that by now (April 8, 1945) my work in Rheims had been completed. No loose end was left untied. The congregation was well organized. The children had developed the habit of attending Hebrew classes and had the ability to read”; Klein, The Anguish and the Ecstasy, 167. A Forgotten Postwar Jewish Migration: East European Jewish Refugees and Immigrants in France, 1946–1947

David Weinberg

East European immigration is a familiar and recurrent theme in modern French Jewish history. Following figuratively if not literally in the footsteps of almost a million of their non-Jewish compatriots who signed up to work in the mines and fields of the Nord and the Midi, tens of thousands of Jews from Poland and Rumania journeyed to France during the period of the great immigration in the three decades before World War I. Their numbers grew significantly in the 1920s and early 1930s in the wake of the growing economic crisis in Poland and the efforts by the newly-independent regime in Warsaw to ‘polonize’ the nation’s economy and culture. Throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, both Jews and non-Jews in eastern Europe viewed France as a place of asylum for victims of religious and political persecution and a viable alternative to the rapidly closing doors of America. Even the advent of the Dreyfus Affair in the 1890s could not dim the country’s image among Jews in the towns and villages of eastern Europe as the home of liberty, freedom, and equality. Indeed, if the published comments of recent arrivals in the French capital in the period directly before and after World War I can be believed, the phrases “Heureux comme Dieu en France” (Happy as God in France) and its Yiddish variant “Azoy gliklikh vi Gott in Frankraykh” were on the lips of almost every Jew seeking to escape from the religious persecution and economic trib- ulations in Russia, Poland, and Rumania. Yet the circumstances surrounding the arrival of the nearly eighty thousand east European Jews to France in the period between the end of 1946 and the beginning of 1948 were markedly different from those of previous migrations. The difference, of course, had to do with the conditions under which they left their former homelands and the nature of their reception. First and foremost was the fact that they were not immigrants, at least not in the strict sense of the word. Most of those who arrived in 1946 and 1947 had not journeyed directly from their homelands. Instead, they had undergone a prolonged westward trek in a series of short and generally unplanned stages. The story of Jews returning to their homes in eastern Europe after World War II has been told many times. Unable to recover their property or locate their relatives, and facing antisemitic attack and economic immiseration, many sought refuge in the

Displaced Persons camps of occupied Germany, especially in the American zone. Among them was a large contingent of Polish Jews who had fled to the Soviet Union after the Nazi takeover of the eastern part of the country in 1941. Though Polish Jewish refugees from Russia would soon become the major population group in DP camps, they had not actually directly suffered the ravages of the Holocaust and, at least technically, had not lost their citizenship. It was because of this distinctive situation that British authorities labeled them ‘infiltrees’ and denied them aid. While those fleeing the Soviet Union did eventually receive official status as DPs in the American zone, there was simply not enough room or money to care for them. Unable to migrate legally to Palestine or to the United States, many drifted into the small French occupied zone, which bordered the American and British zones. Harassed by French army and government officials who were mainly interested in exploiting the area for their own economic benefit and who had little interest in aiding victims of Nazism, much less other unwanted foreigners, east European Jews of all stripes crossed over into neighboring France itself. As the wave grew, those leaving DP camps for France would be joined by a variety of other Jewish transients, including orphans, political activists, unemployed workers, and demobilized Polish Jewish soldiers arriving from the Soviet Union. In 1947 alone, local officials of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee—which was also known as the Joint or the JDC— estimated that as many as 18,000 DPs and refugees from Poland entered the country, and more were expected to arrive in the following year. Many saw France as merely a stopping-off point on the way to Palestine. Countless others were caught up in the frenzy of mass migration of millions of people all over the European continent after the war and were unsure of their final destination. While awaiting their departure to Palestine or elsewhere, they were convinced that they would find support from the local French Jewish community whom they mistakenly believed had not suffered grievously from the ravages of the Holocaust. Refugees had also heard rumors that the Joint, which had struggled to minister to their needs in camps and cities in Germany, was ramping up its activities in Paris in preparation for those who were in transit to Palestine. The reception in France proved far more problematic, however, especially for the first wave of refugees. It was common knowledge among administrators of DP camps that many east European Jews in occupied Germany had been engaging in black marketeering in order to survive. The sudden departure of thousands of Jews from DP camps and their arrival at the French border thus occasioned xenophobic fears of moral corruption and violence on the part of officials in the French Zone that mirrored the panic that had swept over the A Forgotten Postwar Jewish Migration 139 nation in the wake of the German invasion some seven years earlier. Already in 1946, as the first trickle of Jews began to leave DP camps for France, a member of the military staff in occupied Germany warned his fellow countrymen that Polish Jews “were intending to infiltrate France, either openly or through fraud.”274 As Jews crossed into eastern and northern France, their desperate search for food and shelter triggered deep-seated folk memories, especially in rural areas where few Jews had lived, of medieval brigands and highwaymen who preyed upon unsuspecting townspeople. Admittedly, for officials in Paris, the influx did not come as a complete sur- prise. Already in the first year after liberation, the Joint and the Jewish Agency had been in contact with security and immigration officers to seek permission for a select number of Jewish DPs to use France as a transit point. The journey across France to awaiting ships in Marseilles and other Mediterranean ports was to be an orderly process administered by Jewish relief workers and activists of the Haganah’s illegal immigration branch know as Mossad Le-Aliyah Bet, supported by sympathetic Frenchmen, and generally out of sight of the general public. The result was that the French regime maintained a rather liberal policy toward ‘transitaires’, as they were called, granting temporary asylum to a limited number who planned to go on to another country and even assist- ing in the illegal sailings of ships from its ports. As a disincentive to remaining in France, those in transit would be given short-term group transit visas, which were contingent on assurances from the Joint, the Jewish Agency, and the Intergovernmental Committee on Refugees, or IGCR, that they would be leaving France shortly.275 The first ship to leave for Palestine from France after the war sailed from La Ciotat, near Marseilles, in late June 1946. Between 1946 and 1948, some sixteen thousand refugees left from French ports for Palestine and later Israel.276 Other refugees traveled to embarkation points in Italy and North Africa or found their own circuitous routes to the Land of Israel. Yet as the east European flight to France became a torrent, it severely taxed sources of international Jewish aid and nearly overwhelmed plans for mass aliyah. The major task of the Mossad Le-Aliyah Bet was ensuring that olim arrived at their point of departure and preparing them for their voyage. The Joint was to provide for basic needs while they were in transit. Neither organization had planned for such a massive

274 Cited in La Libération des camps et le retour des déportés: l’histoire en souffrance, ed. Marie- Anne Matard-Bonucci and Edouard Lynch (Brussels: Editions Complexe, 1995), 30. 275 See, for example, ‘Influx of Jews from Poland to Paris’, note by ‘Mrs. Spender’, 19 Dec. 1945, in Central Zionist Archives, Jerusalem (CZA), C2/842. 276 Figures taken from website: http://www.palyam.org/English/Hahapala/List_of_ships. 140 Weinberg influx. The result was that thousands of ‘transitaires’ were forced to wait for six months or longer before their departure, their time spent in France often proving harsh and burdensome. And then there were the thirty to fifty thousand Jews who may have hoped to join the orderly emigration to Palestine but were unable to do so or who had never seriously considered aliyah.277 As aliens, they would not receive assistance from already strapped social service agencies. To make matters worse, the first wave of European Jews arrived in France during the winter of 1946–47, which like the winter before, was bitterly cold and snowy, leading to severe shortages of food and fuel. The result was that thousands of east European Jews in France found themselves completely destitute, living from hand-to-mouth. Tuberculosis raged throughout the community of new arrivals, and mortality rates soared. Huddling together in crowded neighborhoods in Paris, they were easy targets of antisemitic and nativist attacks—or so native Jewish leaders feared. Efforts by the Joint to remove refugees and immigrants from public view by temporarily settling them outside of Paris proved unsuccessful, as many simply found their way back to the French capital where they were certain of receiving aid. The large number of sick men, women, and children in the migration forced the relief organization to appoint a medical officer in Paris to deal with their problems. A special agency called the Conseil interoeuvres d’aide aux immigrants et transitaires juifs (Interagency Council to Aid Jewish Immigrants and Transients), comprised of seventeen organizations, was established in 1946 to channel all demands for French visas and legal migration.278 By November 1947, the situation had become so serious that the JDC announced that it would not assist anyone in France who did not have a visa for entry into another country.279

277 The figures are approximate. According to Ben Shephard, The Long Road Home: The Aftermath of the Second World War (New York: Knopf, 2011), 342, the International Refugee Organization convinced the French government to accept some thirty thousand DPs into the country, while a further five thousand were taken by Morocco, Tunisia, and French Guiana. 278 The Joint was eventually led to withdraw from the Conseil interoeuvres, convinced that several of the Conseil’s constituent Zionist organizations were pressuring refugees to join convoys traveling from Poland to Paris, thereby increasing the financial burden on the JDC for their daily upkeep. 279 See, especially, the various reports of the Emigration Committee of the HICEM/AJDC office in Lisbon, found in YIVO Files 809–20; Maurice J. Goldbloom, “Western Europe,” American Jewish Yearbook 48 (1946/47): 290. A Forgotten Postwar Jewish Migration 141

It was an empty threat, which reflected the Joint’s increasing financial difficulties and its concerns about the British blockade of ships bound for Palestine. But thousands of the new arrivals could not or did not want to leave. By the end of the year, it was estimated that the Joint was aiding one in five of Jews living in France, with 19,000 adults and 11,000 children receiving direct assistance.280 Its allocation for 1947 to France had more than doubled from the previous year and now rivaled monies provided to the DP camps and to Poland.281 Whether they left or stayed, the fate of the recent wave of east European Jews was now becoming a central focus of Joint activity in France. Finding accommodations remained an especially severe problem. Two years earlier, returning deportees to Paris and Lyons had proved unable to oust squatters from their apartments and homes, in part because of the serious housing shortage in the country. In 1947, the situation had improved only slightly and it would remain a serious problem into the early 1950s. As a short- term measure, the Joint operated twenty hotels of its own, largely in Paris, to accommodate the new arrivals. It also rented four hundred rooms in one-hundred and fifty other hotels. Both would-be immigrants and ‘transitaires’ also struggled to find employment. In a climate of slow economic recovery, state bureaucrats insisted that all refugees who wished to remain permanently in France had to have work permits. Unfortunately, the country’s greatest need was for unskilled and semi- skilled laborers in heavy industry, a sphere of economic activity that attracted few east European Jews. White-collar workers and professionals fared little better. In seeking to resume their past occupations, they found that intern- ment in camps had made them largely ignorant of recent developments and techniques in their fields. Besides, they lacked knowledge of the French language and of French business, legal, and medical practices. Refugee lawyers and teachers faced special difficulties, their admission to professional associa- tions blocked by leaders traditionally allied with right-wing movements and parties. In the first months after the war, outside observers had believed that east European Jewish artisans who might choose to settle in France and Belgium would simply take up where they left off in their former homelands. As the “best agents” for supplying basic necessities in a situation of scarcity, the econ- omist Jacob Lestschinsky had written in a report on Jewish economic life in

280 Quand même 6, 1–2 (Jan.–Feb. 1948): 6. 281 The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee—Report, October 1914 through December 31, 1973 (New York: Loeb & Troper, 1974) Schedule 31. 142 Weinberg

France on the eve of liberation, Polish and Rumanian craftsman would play a crucial role in the nation’s postwar recovery.282 The sudden arrival of tens of thousands of refugees a year and a half later made a mockery of Lestschinsky’s rosy predictions. Newly-arrived craftsmen were no match for the hundreds of older Jewish immigrant laborers who had survived the war and had returned to Paris to resume their employment in the so-called ‘Jewish trades’ of clothing, leather, and textiles. Never having secured citizenship, this group nevertheless benefited from their prewar experience to prevent recently-arrived Jews from eastern Europe from participating in large numbers in the underground piecework economy. In a situation of rampant unemployment and radical fluctuations in the economy, immigrants also engaged in a fierce struggle with native workers and merchants who had found jobs and new economic opportunities after the deportations of east European Jews during the war.283 Even if they did manage to find employment in the ‘Jewish trades’, the new arrivals had to contend with entrepreneurs who thought nothing of exploiting ‘illegal’ aliens, and with zealous policemen hired by the government to search them out. Many of the new immigrants were physically weak and psychologically debilitated. Few were familiar with the language and culture of their new home. Not surprisingly, Jews who did not plan to settle in France faced the most difficult challenges in finding jobs. Realizing the worst fears of many native Frenchmen, ‘transitaires’ often took up illegal activities to earn quick money, convinced that they would be gone by the time police tracked them down. Hundreds joined native Frenchmen in the burgeoning black market that was rampant in a national economy still suffering from chronic shortages and rationing. Local French community leaders were incensed by the ‘uncivilized’ behavior of the ‘transitaires’. A French community leader cited one example in discussions with JDC officials in the early 1950s. Several hundred Polish Jews had announced their intention to work in the mines of Valenciennes in the Nord and in Lens (in Belgium) in order to secure a visa, but soon after their arrival reverted to peddling. The growing visibility and criminal behavior of ‘foreigners’, French Jewish authorities warned, threatened to unleash an antisemitic backlash.284

282 Jacob Lestschinsky, “Certain Guiding Principles for the Jewish Reconstruction Work in France,” no date, American Jewish Archives MS361 C100/9. 283 See, for example, the description of the attitudes of the French government toward recently-arrived Polish Jewish workers in Le Monde juif, Aug. 1946, p. 4. 284 The information on the behavior of Jewish ‘miners’ in France is taken from an interview on 26 November 1952 by T. Petersell of the JDC with Marcel Sachs, secretary-general of A Forgotten Postwar Jewish Migration 143

For a short while, JDC officials experimented with settling east European Jews on agricultural tracts. The organization hoped to expand on its successful hakhsharah programs, i.e., preparing laborers for farming work in the Land of Israel. It also hoped to make the recent arrivals less visible in French society. For those immigrants who chose to remain in western Europe, however, the program had little appeal. Polish and Rumanian Jews had no interest in relo- cating to rural France. They did not believe that they would be accepted by traditional farmers and agricultural laborers. Nor would the skills that they would learn in an agricultural collective easily prepare them for the rigors of a highly competitive French agricultural environment. At the same time, the decision to place east European Jews outside major urban areas would mean that they would have little contact with organized Jewish communal life. While sensitive to the power of rural life in the French postwar national ethos, JDC officials were ultimately forced to conclude that refugees who had decided to remain were either unwilling or incapable of working on local farms.285 Far more promising was the effort to retrain east European Jews to enter the fields of heavy industry and manufacture. The responsibility for teaching new vocational skills to refugees in postwar Europe was shared by the Joint and ORT, an acronym for the Russian Obshchestvo Rasprostraneniya Truda sredi Yevreyev (Society for Spreading Work among Jews), but increasingly known by its English name, the Organization for Rehabilitation through Training. Founded in the late nineteenth century to promote the development of the skilled trades and agriculture among Jews of the Russian Pale, and based in both Paris and Geneva, ORT remained active in interwar eastern Europe and in the Soviet Union. Its programs to develop ‘productive’ careers for Jewish merchants and small businessmen generally met with strong approval by the Soviet government. After the war, the organization’s desire to find gainful employment for physically and psychologically debilitated survivors of the Holocaust led it to expand its activities into DP camps. Later on, the gradual decline in the DP camp population redirected ORT’s attention to other parts of central and western Europe, including France, where it took up the Joint’s challenge to prepare survivors and refugees for careers in industry and manufacture.

the Consistoire Central israélite. A summary of the interview can be found in the Joint Distribution Committee Archives–Jerusalem, Laura Margolis Collection. 285 For information on the activities of the Joint’s agricultural program in 1945, which was administered by ORT, see Eric Schieber, Un an de reconstruction juive en France (Paris: Association française de propagation du travail industriel, artisanal et agricole parmi les juifs, [1946]), 15–17. 144 Weinberg

The training organization was particularly concerned with finding jobs for young people, not only so that they could earn money but also to steer them away from criminal activity, which ORT officials were convinced was a direct result of idleness and unemployment. In cities like Paris, Marseilles, Lyon, Nice, and Strasbourg, the organization expanded its activities by creating vocational schools, supporting apprenticeships, and establishing cooperatives among artisans and small factory owners. As the nature of skilled labor changed in the early 1950s, ORT introduced new technological skills into its courses, including television and automobile mechanics, and dental hygiene.286 Yet the program to retool east European immigrants for industry and manufacture had only limited success in France. Many would be dismissed in the early 1950s as the nation slowly regained its economic footing and native workers took advantage of expanding job opportunities. The improvement in the economic situation also brought an increase in the standard of living, which made it difficult for relief agencies that continued to supplement the salaries of employed immigrants with additional funds to keep pace. When international organizations like the Joint and ORT approached the local Jewish community, they found only a lukewarm response. Established east European immigrant relief agencies, such as the Fédération des sociétés juives de France, were clearly sympathetic to the plight of the new arrivals, but they lacked the funds and personnel to help the mass of men, women, and children who flocked to their soup kitchens, shelters, and employment bureaus. More importantly, as the early months after the war had painfully revealed, the immigrants’ social service system, which continued to be based on individual landsmanshaftn (mutual aid societies), was simply not geared to providing massive aid. Traditional French Jewish philanthropic organizations, which were largely dominated by native-born elites, were especially uncom- fortable ministering to the refugees and immigrants. Rooted in a tradition of both bienfaisance, or voluntary charitable giving by wealthy families, and ‘helping our own’, some prominent native Jews had been openly hostile to the first east European Jews who arrived in the immediate postwar period. Many had been impoverished by the war and resented being listed in relief lists alongside those whom they regarded as ‘schnorrers’ (beggars). Little had changed in the two years since liberation. While praising organizations like COJASOR (Comité juif d’action sociale et reconstruction) for their excellent work, local representatives of the JDC such as Laura Margolis complained about the bitter

286 Emmanuelle Polack, “Les Ecoles professionelles de l’ORT-France et la transmission du judaïsme, 1921–1949,” Archives juives 35, 2 (2002): 64–66. A Forgotten Postwar Jewish Migration 145 in-fighting and duplication that marked communal aid efforts.287 Indeed, it was not until 1950 that the Joint was able to convince local officials to create central agencies to coordinate their fundraising and to combine the almost three hundred separate social service institutions that had been functioning in the community in the postwar period. No wonder that in 1946 and 1947 most communal and religious leaders were convinced that the best solution to the plight of the new arrivals was for them to migrate to Palestine and the United States as soon as possible. In a more profound sense, the influx of thousands of Jews fleeing DP camps and eastern Europe initially raised serious questions about the unity of the community. Indeed, east European Jews who arrived in 1946 and 1947 from DP camps generally kept to themselves and shunned interaction with members of the general Jewish community. The Yiddish journal Di Videroyfboy, published in Paris and distributed to new arrivals in both France and Belgium in the late 1940s, for example, rarely mentioned any local activity, preferring instead to concentrate on the difficulties that east European Jews faced in securing visas to come to the West, commenting on the comings and goings of other Polish immigrants who had gone to live in Palestine, the United States, and South America; and detailing the struggle of the Yishuv (the Jewish community) in the Land of Israel. At least at the beginning, cultural events attended by newly- arrived refugees and immigrants dwelt largely upon the world that had been destroyed in the war.288 It was not only the burden of caring for the newcomers that led local leaders to urge that they leave as soon as possible or at least integrate more fully into their communities. It was also the fear of an antisemitic backlash. Though there were no major outbreaks of anti-Jewish sentiment in the wake of the arrival of east European Jews in 1946 and 1947, there was little question that their concentration in areas of historical Jewish settlement such as the 3rd, 4th, 11th, and 20th arrondissements in Paris, made them easy targets for occa- sional attacks by neo-Fascist hooligans. All too often, policemen stood by and

287 At the same time, Margolis had a keen sense of the mixed response that the Joint created among local leadership. As she remarked in an address delivered at the JDC Country Directors’ Conference on 3 February 1947: “I think the important thing is to know to what extent the JDC . . . has the right, through the power which it has, namely money—I don’t like to use the word ‘force’—to direct the program so that there is no duplication of effort or at least as little duplication of effort as possible”; Joint Distribution Committee Archives–Jerusalem, Laura Margolis Collection. 288 See, for example, Di Videroyfboy, #2 (20 Nov. 1946): 1, 6. 146 Weinberg did nothing.289 In several cases in France, Jews were arrested in attempting to defend themselves against attacks. Left-wing groups within the French community took advantage of the relative lack of involvement by established communal organizations in the daily life of the recent arrivals. On a personal level, local Communist movements played upon the refugee’s deeply-felt sense of anomie in his new home. The highly structured environment of Communist groups, their strong leadership, rigid discipline, and clearly defined goals, proved extremely attractive to many disoriented and despairing refugees and immigrants. Well into the 1950s and early 1960s, after Communists had lost much of their influence in the communities of western Europe, the Jewish militants’ fluency in both Yiddish and the local language enabled them to act as a bridge between postwar east European Jewish immigrant parents and their native-born children. On a practical level, Jewish militants provided newly-arrived east European Jews with an opportunity to integrate into French social, political, and cultural life. Within Communist organizations, immigrant Jews came face to face with Frenchmen. Recruiting actively in night schools, factories, and social clubs, Communist movements and especially their youth groups helped new arrivals to learn the local language, to gain needed work skills, and to find lodging. Ironically, the immigrant group that seemed to have most difficulty dealing with the Parti communiste français, or PCF, and its satellite organizations within the French Jewish community, such as the Union des Juifs pour la résistance et l’entr’aide, or UJRE, were long-time political activists. Though increasing the ranks of Jewish activist organizations and boosting the circulation of the communist Yiddish newspaper, the Naie Presse, militants schooled in the harsher political climate of Poland and the Soviet Union were decid- edly unhappy with the compromises that both the national party and the UJRE made to gain acceptance among broad segments of the population. The feeling was mutual on the part of PCF leaders. Throughout the late 1940s, Party officials under the watchful eye of the Soviet Union pressured authorities to convince refugees to return to their homeland to help build new socialist societies.290 And many did return, where they assumed important positions within the Polish Communist Party and in the Communist-dominated Central Committee of Jews in Poland.

289 See, for example, the discussion in the minutes of CRIF, 4 Mar. 1947, in the CRIF Archives, housed at the Centre de documentation juive contemporaine in Paris. 290 Sidney Liskofsky, “Immigration Prospects,” American Jewish Yearbook 49 (1947/48): 136; and the comments in the Paris Zionist daily Unzer Vort, 27 July 1945: 2. A Forgotten Postwar Jewish Migration 147

The Communist movement was not the only political organization in the French community to benefit from the influx of east European Jews in the late 1940s. The wave of refugees included a goodly number of ardent Zionists, or at least individuals who were willing to consider the possibility of making aliyah. It was not coincidental that both right-wing and left-wing Zionist groups gained greater visibility in the French Jewish community in the year and a half before the proclamation of the Jewish state. Special emphasis was placed on attracting young refugees and immigrants. The goal was not only to recruit able-bodied individuals for aliyah but also to counter the appeal of local Communist groups. The arrival and settlement of east European Jews in France also profoundly impacted Jewish religious life and Jewish educational institutions. With the death of many native-born rabbis and teachers during the war, local communities called upon Polish and Rumanian refugee rabbis and scholars to assume pastoral and teaching duties. From its inception, the arrangement was fraught with problems. Ignorant of the local language and culture and unfamiliar with the responsibilities of the ‘modern’ rabbi, east European rabbis and melam- dim (traditional religious teachers) were generally unable to provide counsel- ing to alienated Jews and balked at establishing contact with Christian clergy. Trained in Polish yeshivot, they were much stricter in their interpretation of Jewish law than graduates of the Paris-based Ecole rabbinique. Many refused to follow the dictates of ‘unlearned’ western rabbis who headed central religious institutions. Local officials often despaired that traditional rabbis and teachers would be rejected by their constituents and students, and were weakening the attempt to revive communal religious activity. At the same time, the influx of observant east European Jews revitalized French Judaism in important ways. To the outside observer, it seemed as though the Paris community had resumed the diverse and rich religious life that had shaped its distinctive character before the war. Much like their forebears in interwar Paris, observant immigrants shunned consistorial synagogues and established their own shtiblakh.291 Hasidic groups also gained new visibility, as followers of the Lubavich and Satmar sects settled in the immigrant neighborhoods of northern and eastern Paris. At the same time, the established east European immigrant synagogues, whose membership had been decimated by the Holocaust, hired several immigrants with liturgical skills to lead daily services and read from the Torah.

291 Shtibl, in Yiddish, means ‘small house’; in modern usage, the plural form shtiblakh refers to small synagogues, often several of them in separate rooms in the same building. 148 Weinberg

Immigrants also helped to maintain an active Yiddish life, at least through the first generation. The European bureau of the Yiddisher Kultur Farband (Yiddish Culture Association) or IKUF, which was based in New York, distributed stirring historical works of past Jewish heroes and partisan songbooks from its Paris office and sponsored concerts, public readings, and dance recit- als throughout western Europe.292 Troops from Poland, Russia, and the United States performed Ansky’s The Dybbuk and other works that both evoked and poked fun at east European Jewish daily life before small but appreciative audiences in France and Belgium. What immigrants craved even more from their cultural productions, however, was escape. Henrietta Jacobson, the popular actress of the New York Yiddish stage, summed up the mood of immigrant audiences in western Europe in 1950 in a short speech she delivered to a Brussels audience before the performance of a musical farce entitled Rifkele der Rebben (The Rabbi’s Daughter). “We are not promising you either literature or great art,” she proudly announced, “but we can promise that you will laugh wholeheartedly.”293 While serious writing and theater were largely absent—with the exception of hastily- composed Holocaust memoirs—the Yiddish press flourished. For many readers, newspapers and journals were their only link to Jewish life, a private rather than a public affirmation of their Jewish identity. The Yiddish press also served to acculturate the new arrivals, providing useful tips on the French language and culture, and on how to behave in public. By the mid- and late 1950s, the shock in France in general and in the French Jewish community specifically caused by the arrival en masse of refugees and immigrants was slowly giving way to the more pressing needs of revival and stabilization. In any case, almost half of the east European Jews who had arrived only a few years earlier had already left France. Some had moved on to Palestine and later to Israel; others had secured visas to come to the United States and Canada; still others had returned to Poland and Rumania to take governmental positions in the new Communist regimes that came to power in the late 1940s. Those who remained, however, helped to revivify east European Jewish religious and cultural life in France. Their children, who quickly integrated into French society, would later assume positions of importance and

292 For further details on its activity, see the packet of correspondence between the European Bureau and the Arbeter Ring in Belgium, in the Archives of the Musée juive de Belgique, Brussels, Boîte MM156. 293 Cited by Bernard Klieger in an article published in ATID 3, 42 (9 Dec. 1950): 7. See also the information on the French Jewish cabaret, which featured songs from New York’s Second Avenue Yiddish theater, in ATID 7, 13–14 (5 Apr. 1952): 6. A Forgotten Postwar Jewish Migration 149 influence in the general Jewish community and in the nation’s economy and cultural life. Though considerably smaller in number than previous migrations of east European Jews, the Jews who arrived from occupied Germany in 1946 and 1947 and chose to settle in France shared their legacy in contributing to the transformation of modern French Jewry. The Postwar Renewal of Jewish Communities in the Netherlands

Manfred Gerstenfeld

Preamble

In past decades, research in various areas of scholarship concerning the Holocaust has been integrated into a single discipline. Holocaust Studies has thus become a specific academic field. This development has made it possible to better understand the characteristics and impact of the Shoah, as well as to study its origins. Similarly, it would be beneficial to establish Post-Holocaust Studies as an academic discipline in its own right. Issues related to the Shoah in postwar societies should be studied within a single area of scholarship. Topics concerning the Holocaust which emerged after the Second World War in various disciplines are more than simply interrelated. They are so interwoven, that an integrated field of study is necessary. Issues discussed below, concerning Jews in the Netherlands after the Second World War, touch upon various disciplines. Only by analyzing them jointly can one obtain a better understanding of the characteristics and experiences of postwar Dutch Jewry. Post-Holocaust Studies, however, embrace many other areas than the ones discussed here. They also comprise how the Holocaust has impacted on legislation, for instance on human rights laws. Other important areas of these studies are Holocaust education and how the Holocaust has affected art. This in turn involves literature about the Holocaust period, theater, music, and so on. Another central field of Holocaust Studies is how Holocaust history is documented and researched. Abuses of Holocaust history and their categorization are yet another field in which much more research should be undertaken.294

* All references to works originally published in Dutch are to those editions. For the convenience of the reader, I have noted English editions when they exist. 294 Manfred Gerstenfeld, The Abuse of Holocaust Memory: Distortions and Responses (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and Anti-Defamation League, 2009). See also id., “Continuing to Distort the Holocaust: 2009–2011,” in The Holocaust Ethos in the 21st Century: Dilemmas and Challenges, ed. Nitza Davidovitch and Dan Soen (Cracow and Budapest: Austria, 2012), 461–480.

Antisemitism Before and During the War

Jews had always been outsiders in the Netherlands to some extent. There was social antisemitism before the war. Some of its manifestations were that several social and sport clubs did not admit any Jews. There were professions, such as the diplomatic service, in which one did not find Jews, nor were there Jewish mayors. Social antisemitism in the Netherlands never involved extreme violence. Before the war—other than during the Middle Ages in the territories which later became the Netherlands295—no Jews were ever killed just because they were Jewish. Remarks by former Dutch Deputy Prime Minister Els Borst illustrate this social antisemitism:

Before the war for instance, at family gatherings for a birthday, it was quite common to hear comments such as “a typical Jewish trick” or “the Jews take good care of themselves.” That was when someone had done something smart with money. I already noticed this as a young child. None of us would have wanted to do anything evil to a Jew. Yet there was a feeling of “they have done very well financially,” despite the fact that there were many very poor Jews in Amsterdam.296

Dutch Jewry was the hardest hit of all western European Jewish communities. There were an estimated 140,000 Jews in the Netherlands at the beginning of the German occupation in May 1940. Of these 107,000 were deported. Only 5,000 survivors returned, mainly from Bergen Belsen and Theresienstadt, and a smaller number from Auschwitz. From the end of 1943 until the liberation in May 1945, no Jews were seen in the public domain in the Netherlands. Non-Jews, other than those who were hiding or helping Jews, no longer maintained any connections with Jews. Such contacts before the war, however superficial, were multiple. This was not only true in Amsterdam, where approximately 9 percent of the pre-war population was Jewish. Of the original 25,000 Jews who went into hiding, an estimated

295 Bert M.J. Speet, “De Middeleeuwen,” in Geschiedenis van de Joden in Nederland, ed. Johan C.H. Blom, Renate G. Fuks-Mansfeld, and Ivo Schöffer (Amsterdam: Balans, 1995), 25, (Bert J.M. Speet, “The Middle Ages,” in The History of the Jews in the Netherlands, ed. Johan C.H. Blom, Renate G. Fuks-Mansfeld, and Ivo Schöffer [Oxford and Portland: The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 2002]). 296 Interview with Els Borst, in Manfred Gerstenfeld, Judging the Netherlands (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, 2011), 207. 152 Gerstenfeld

16,000 survived the war. The others were betrayed and are thus included in the figure for the deported. There were about 10,000 Jews in mixed marriages who were exempt from deportation. Less than a thousand Jews survived the war in the Westerbork transit camp. An unknown small number of Jews fled abroad during the war, while some others survived by passing as non-Jews.

The Image of Dutch Wartime Behavior Dutch wartime history is well documented. Yet the myth persists internationally that, in general, the Dutch people assisted Jews during the war. This is true only for perhaps one courageous percent of it. The myth of much wider support for the Jews springs largely from Anne Frank’s diary. It tells how she and her family were hidden by good Dutchmen, but the diary ended before Anne could relate that they were probably betrayed by bad ones. It is often conve- niently forgotten how the Frank family, after being arrested, was transported to and guarded in the Westerbork transit camp by Dutchmen before Anne was sent to Auschwitz and later to Bergen-Belsen, where she died. The house in Amsterdam in which the Frank family and others were hidden has become a much visited museum. For a number of years its management used it as a venue for leftwing exhibitions about racial discrimination and other injustices. Occasionally, Israel bashing went on there, too.297 The assistance which Dutchmen gave to the Nazis was found at society’s highest levels. When non-Jews were forced to sign a declaration that they were Aryans, the issue came before the High Court of Justice whose members had been appointed under the democratic pre-war government. A majority of judges approved the German measure, despite the fact that it contradicted the country’s constitution. One result was that the Jewish president of the High Court, L.E. Visser, had to leave his position.298 Mayors, policemen, judges, and officials collaborated in anti-Jewish activities. The Dutch government in exile in London took little or no interest in the fate of its country’s Jewish citizens. “Why didn’t Queen Wilhelmina at the time people signed the declaration of being Aryans, appeal explicitly to the conscience of the [Dutch] people?” That is one of the many questions historian Nanda van der Zee asked in her critical book about the Queen and the government in exile. She remarked about the Queen: “As far as the Jews are concerned, her speeches on the radio . . . gave the impression that little could be

297 David Barnouw, Anne Frank voor beginners en gevorderden (The Hague: Sdu, 1998), 89. 298 Jacques Presser, Ondergang: De Vervolging en Verdelging van het Nederlandse Jodendom 1940–1945, Part I (The Hague: Staatsuitgeverij and Martinus Nijhoff, 1965), 32, 42, (Ashes in the Wind: The Destruction of Dutch Jewry [London: Souvenir Press, 1968]). The Postwar Renewal of Jewish Communities 153 done for them; they are only mentioned in passing, preferably in a subordinate sentence.”299 Political scientist Isaac Lipschits maintains that the Dutch postwar government had shirked responsibility for the crimes perpetrated against the Jews in the Netherlands during the war. “After the war it asked: ‘How could we have instructed the Dutch police not to implement the German orders?’ This was a very weak argument because, in 1944, the Dutch government in exile told the rail workers to strike, which they did.”300

Postwar Antisemitism

There were approximately 30,000 Jews in the Netherlands after the Second World War. This figure was calculated on the basis of Jewish religious law and thus included only those born of a Jewish mother.301 A substantial number of them no longer desired any connection with organized Jewry. Yet often many—and in some cases all—of their acquaintances were Jews. This is illustrated by the autobiography of former Amsterdam Mayor Ed van Thijn. When as a child he wanted to attend Hebrew school, his father told him: “We are not going to be listed anywhere anymore.” His mother changed her first name from Sara to Selma, which did not sound Jewish.302 Van Thijn did not have a bar mitzvah, yet all of his parents’ friends were Jewish. His parents forbade him to eat some types of non-kosher food such as ham, bacon, or eel. They did not base this prohibition on religious rules, instead they said that he would get acne from it, or that it was the cause of his asthma.303 At the end of his life, his father however, requested to be buried in a Jewish cemetery and Van Thijn had to follow the Jewish custom of a week of mourning.304 There were places where Jews met, most of whom were unaffiliated swith the organized Jewish community. One was on the stands of the stadium of

299 Nanda van der Zee, Om Erger te Voorkomen (Amsterdam: Meulenhoff, 1997), 194. 300 Manfred Gerstenfeld, interview with Isaac Lipschits, “The Dutch Government: Discriminating against the Survivors through a So-called Egalitarian Approach,” in Manfred Gerstenfeld, Europe’s Crumbling Myths: The Post-Holocaust Origins of Today’s Anti-Semitism (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Yad Vashem, and World Jewish Congress, 2003), 185. 301 Hanna van Solinge and Carlo van Praag, De Joden in Nederland anno 2009 (Diemen: AMB, 2010), 6. 302 Ed van Thijn,Het verhaal (Amsterdam: Meulenhoff, 2000), 21. 303 Ibid., 24. 304 Ibid., 161. 154 Gerstenfeld the Amsterdam Ajax soccer club. That became a meeting point where Jewish fans could be in Jewish company. It created a substitute family atmosphere for those who had lost many relatives during the Holocaust. Journalist Simon Kuper writes about this Jewish Dutch ‘family’ of Ajax fans: “It didn’t include blood relatives. After the Holocaust there were many such families. A Jewish survivor who was your murdered grandfather’s age, became your ‘substitute grandfather’. Other people were your ‘uncles’. You invented ‘cousins’ and tried to return to a [normal] life.”305 Similarly, a Jewish-owned non-kosher sandwich shop in the center of Amsterdam became a meeting point for these fans.306

Jews Return After the war, returning or re-emerging Jews had to find places to live as well as employment. They had no money and their possessions had been systematically looted during the war.307 Their wartime experiences were radically different from those of the great majority of the Dutch non-Jewish population and often did not resonate with them. The welcome the Jews received in postwar society was mixed, at best. Many survivors complained that their reception into Dutch society was cold, if not hostile.308 Leading Dutch Holocaust historian Jacques Presser mentioned that he himself was well-received by his academic friends, yet for others, the reception was awful. He wrote: “There is little doubt that, certainly in the first years after the liberation in the Netherlands (and not only in the Netherlands), there was a significant—let’s put it neutrally—negative attitude toward the returning Jews.”309 At the turn of the twenty-first century, the postwar return of the Jews became the subject of several books and articles. Journalist Michal Citroen titled her book, Nobody Is Expecting You. She wrote:

I was surprised, and more particularly angry, about what I found in my research. The nasty remarks the Jews heard, the disgusting bureaucracy that blocked them at every step when they were trying to build a new

305 Simon Kuper, Ajax, Holland and the War (Tel Aviv: Maariv, 2008), 180 (Hebrew). 306 Ibid. 307 Gerard Aalders, Roof (The Hague: Sdu, 1999), (Nazi Looting: The Plunder of Dutch Jewry during the Second World War [Oxford: Berg, 2004]). 308 Dienke Hondius, “A Cold Reception: Holocaust Survivors in the Netherlands and Their Return,” Patterns of Prejudice 28, 1 (1994): 47–65. 309 Jacques Presser, Ondergang. De vervolging en verdelging van het Nederlandse jodendom. Part 2, (Den Haag: Staatsuitgeverij, 1965), 515. The Postwar Renewal of Jewish Communities 155

existence; the scandalous neglect by the authorities, the horrible egocen- tric behavior of all those who felt harmed, the ongoing care-free antisemitism, [a continuation, albeit milder] of the German occupiers, and the scandalous lack of compassion from other Dutchmen.310

Historian Dienke Hondius wrote:

After the many negative reactions and lack of empathy for their experiences, most Jews decided to remain silent about them. Thus there emerged between Jews and non-Jews, and also within the Jewish community itself, a long period of silence. Feelings of guilt and shame undoubtedly played a role, but this should not be overstated. The Jews did not talk because nobody wanted to listen to their experiences.311

Isaac Lipschits explained the title of his book, The Little Shoah:

In the liberated Netherlands, Jews were not threatened physically. But we found there other symptoms from the period of the Shoah. Verbal antisemitism had sharpened, looting continued and the Jewish community was disparaged. The deportations and exterminations had ended, but the identification and isolation of the Jews continued. The Shoah was a break out of fire. In May 1945, the flames were extinguished, yet the fire still smoldered. It was a disaster which followed upon a catastrophe. . . . The reception was so cold, bureaucratic, hostile, humiliating, so disappoint- ing, that I call the postwar period “the time of the little Shoah.”312

The First Ten Postwar Years During the first ten years after the war, the re-emerging Jewish communities faced many difficulties. Due to its special needs, the Jewish community was greatly dependent upon the attitude of the government and local authorities. Jews were often discriminated against, and there were major bureaucratic problems. In some parts of Dutch postwar society, profound antisemitism, which had been brought to the Netherlands by the German occupiers, was much more

310 Michal Citroen, U wordt door niemand verwacht: Nederlandse joden na kampen en onder- duik (Utrecht: Het Spectrum, 1999), 9. 311 Hondius, “A Cold Reception.” 312 Isaac Lipschits, De Kleine Sjoa: Joden in naoorlogs Nederland (Amsterdam: Mets & Schilt, 2001), 10. 156 Gerstenfeld severe than it had been prior to the war. After the war, all German laws of the occupation period were revoked. Thus the Jewish community resumed ritual slaughter, which had been forbidden by the Germans. Thereafter, the Dutch Animal Rights Movement proposed that the German measure forbidding unstunned ritual slaughter would remain in force. Some local politicians also refused to allow kosher ritual slaughter.313 Israeli historian Joel Fishman posits that the problematic situation of the Jews changed substantially only after ten years had passed. In 1955, a memorial meeting took place in Amsterdam’s New Church on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the liberation of the Netherlands. The city’s chief rabbi, Aron Schuster, who was among the speakers, stated that Jews were still experiencing discrimination. He added that “an antisemitic ideology [Nazism] has left its trails in the Netherlands even in circles where this had been inconceiv- able before.” At that gathering Queen Juliana, her husband Prince Bernhard, and representatives of the government and main churches were present. Rabbi Schuster is also quoted as saying that the official government attitude toward the Dutch Jewish community was “as if we did not exist.” Their position in Dutch society, however, improved considerably after an investigation by Senate President Jan Anne Jonkman at the request of Queen Juliana.314

Re-Establishment of Community Organizations

After the war, the Jewish religious community had to be re-established. As the southern part of the Netherlands had already been liberated in 1944, it was there that the first Jewish organizations emerged. For a few years the Jewish Coordination Commission (JCC) was the main organization of Dutch Jewry. It received several million guilders of financial assistance from the American Joint Distribution Committee.315 The JCC disappeared when the JDC withdrew its funding in 1947. Its social department was continued as the Jewish Social

313 Bart Wallet, “Ritual Slaughter, Religious Plurality and the Secularization of Dutch Society (1919–2011),” in The Actual Fascination of Sacrifice, ed. Anne Marie Korte, Joachim Duyndam, and Marcel Poorthuis (Leiden: Brill, forthcoming). 314 Joel Fishman, “Een keerpunt in de naoorlogse geschiedenis van de Nederlandse joden: De toespraak van opperrabbijn Schuster in de Nieuwe Kerk (1955),” in Hetty Berg and Bart Wallet (eds.), Wie niet weg is, is gezien: Joods Nederland na 1945 (Zwolle: Waanders: 2010), 118–29. 315 Chaya Brasz, Removing the Yellow Badge: The Struggle for a Jewish Community in the Postwar Netherlands, 1944–1955 (Jerusalem: The Institute for Research on Dutch Jewry, 1995); Conny Kristel, “Leiderschap na de ondergang: De strijd om de macht in joods The Postwar Renewal of Jewish Communities 157

Organization (JMW). Another remnant of the JCC’s activity was the coordination of Jewish childcare.316 This was important, as there were many orphans after the war. Gradually, a struggle developed between Zionist personalities who had filled key roles in the JCC and the leaders of the re-emerging Ashkenazi community (NIK), which formally observed Orthodox practice. The Zionists claimed that there was no future for a renewed Jewish community in the Netherlands. They believed that all Jews should leave for Palestine. This soon proved itself to be illusory, as most Jews had no intention of emigrating.317 Before the war, the Dutch Zionist Organization (NZB) represented no more than a few percent of Dutch Jews. It was a small elite movement with but little influence. The Shoah, however, seemed to have proven the world view of the Zionists. While Dutch Jews had viewed themselves as an integral part of Dutch society, the attitudes and conduct of many non-Jews during the war had shown them that this was often not the case.

Orphans One issue of major concern to the Jewish community was the placement of Jewish children whose parents had been murdered during the war. A new expression had been coined for these orphans: ‘War Foster Children’. The term indicated that it was not clear where they should be placed. Tens of thousands of non-Jews had saved Jewish children whose parents were later murdered. After the war a sizable number fought to keep these orphans rather than transfer their custody to family members or Jewish institutions. In the Dutch ‘pillar’ concept, religious communities assumed responsibility for the social and psychological problems of their members. In one of its letters, the JCC wrote to Dutch authorities in London: “We would like to recall that it has always been the Dutch tradition that Jewish children who, for whatever reason, could not be taken care of by their parents, would be entrusted to Jewish families or Jewish institutions.”318 This traditional practice was no longer applied to these Jewish orphans.

naoorlogs Nederland,” in Binnenskamers: Terugkeer en opvang na de Tweede Wereldoorlog: Besluitvorming, ed. Conny Kristel (Amsterdam: Bert Bakker, 2002), 209–34. 316 Bart Wallet, “Om ‘een uitgeteekenden joodsche levensweg’,” in Wie niet weg is, is gezien: Joods Nederland na 1945, ed. Hetty Berg and Bart Wallet (Zwolle: Waanders: 2010), 99. 317 Chaya Brasz, “Onontbeerlijk Maar Eigengereid: De zionistische inmenging in de naoorlogse joodse gemeenschap,” in Binnenskamers: Terugkeer en opvang na de Tweede Wereldoorlog: Besluitvorming, ed. Conny Kristel (Amsterdam: Bert Bakker, 2002), 235–60. 318 Elma Verhey, Om het Joodse Kind (Amsterdam: Nijgh & Van Ditmar, 1991), 73. 158 Gerstenfeld

A public commission decided whether these children would be returned to Jewish family members, placed in Jewish institutions, or stay with the foster family which had hidden them during the war. A struggle for the custody of the children ensued between the remnants of the Jewish community and Christian members of the committee dealing with this issue. Fishman writes:

Upon examining the administrative development and ideological basis of the Commission for War Foster Children, one may observe that, from its inception, its spirit and structure were inherently offensive to the Jewish minority and, out of necessity, predicated an adversary relationship.319

The aftermath of the war often posed psychological problems for Jewish children who had been hidden, as well as for their parents. Psychologist Bloeme Evers-Emden summed it up:

Often the hidden children had to change addresses several times, leading them to ‘turn off their feelings’, so as not to be overwhelmed by grief. After the war, many of them could not ‘turn on’ their feelings and suffered from emotional deficiencies. As for the parents, many had undergone ‘anticipated mourning’ out of fears that they or their children would be killed before they could reunite, and this made it difficult for them to receive the returned children. Sometimes the natural parents could not ‘forgive’ the ‘hiding-parents’ for caring for their children. The hiding-parents, for their part, often suffered from grief after the child’s departure.320

American sociologist Diane L. Wolf posited that the hidden children fully experienced what we now call ‘post-modern families’ shortly after 1945, many decades before the term was coined. Owing to persecution, genocide, and war, children from former proletarian and petit-bourgeois Jewish families found themselves caught in a web of relationships with multiple parents and families for which there were no guiding terms or models. Thus, the complicated

319 Joel S. Fishman, “The War Orphan Controversy in the Netherlands: Majority-Minority Relations,” in Jozeph Michman & Tirtsah Levie, (eds.) Dutch Jewish History, [Vol. 1]: Proceedings of the Symposium on the History of the Jews in The Netherlands, November 28– December 3, 1982, Tel Aviv-Jerusalem (Jerusalem: Tel Aviv University and Hebrew University of Jerusalem, The Institute for Research on Dutch Jewry, 1984), 431. 320 Bloeme Evers-Emden, “Hiding Jewish Children during World War II: The Psychological Aftermath,” Jewish Political Studies Review 19, 1–2 (Spring 2007): 39–47. The Postwar Renewal of Jewish Communities 159 forms we now see in blended families were present sixty years ago for these surviving children.321 Many other Jewish children had only one parent. Their families also became precursors of what is quite commonly found now in Western societies. About the children who were lucky enough to have two parents it was often asked: “What is the difference between a Jewish child and a non-Jewish one?” The correct answer was: “Non-Jewish children have grandparents.”

Psychological Factors After the war, only a few psychiatric specialists expected that war experiences would cause more traumas in the longer run. This was indeed the case. Much work on psychiatric treatment of Shoah survivors was undertaken in the 1960s and 1970s.322 A well-known, yet controversial, figure was psychiatrist Jan Bastiaans. He treated war survivors with the drug LSD. After the effect of the drug had worn off, people remembered what they had said during their hallucinations.323

Centralization and Inclusiveness The re-emerging Jewish community faced a large number of disparate problems. New organizations had to be established to provide a variety of services for special postwar needs. Funds had to be raised. Historian Bart Wallet says:

Soon differences with the pre-war situation emerge. The overall community is much smaller. Many Jewish communities can no longer provide a complete package of services for an integral Jewish life . . . This situation leads to centralization. More things have to be done together. The NIK, by far the largest Jewish organization, thus developed new activities. . . . The policy is now more inclusive. The pre-war Jewish community emphasized ‘being Dutch’. It had a strong nineteenth-century character due to its class consciousness. After the war, people who do not pay ‘church tax’ became full-fledged members of the community. The same is

321 Diane L. Wolf, Beyond Anne Frank: Hidden Children and Postwar Families in Holland (Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London: University of California Press, 2007), 336. 322 Ido de Haan, Na de ondergang: de herinnering aan de Jodenvervolging in Nederland 1945– 1995 (The Hague: Sdu, 1997), 131–56, Chapter 4: “De betekenis van het vervolgingstrauma,” 131–56. 323 Annet Mooij, “De Langste Schaduw: Het denken over psychische oorlogsgevolgen,” in Binnenskamers: Terugkeer en opvang na de Tweede Wereldoorlog: Besluitvorming, ed. Conny Kristel (Amsterdam: Bert Bakker, 2002), 261–92. 160 Gerstenfeld

true for foreign Jews who do not hold Dutch passports. There are initiatives in various communities to give women passive voting rights.324

The Rabbinate Only a few Dutch rabbis survived the war. Before the war, there was a chief rabbi in each of the three major cities: Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and The Hague, as well as in most provinces. The much smaller postwar number of Jews led to a situation in which most provinces could no longer afford a chief rabbi of their own. Centralization was thus necessary. Rabbi Elieser Berlinger had come to the Netherlands from Sweden in 1954. He became chief rabbi of the Utrecht Rabbinate in 1956,325 which meant that he filled the position for the communities outside of the three major cities. Rabbi Berlinger played a major role in the religious life of provincial Jewry. For small Dutch communities at the time, his visits—accompanied by his wife— became a major event. Particularly in the smaller communities, there was a widespread feeling that there was no Jewish future. Rabbi Berlinger said publicly that he wanted to leave for Israel with all the members of the communities for which he was responsible. In 1974 he stated: “If a Jewish community has shrunk because of emigration to Israel, I consider that a big success. Dutch Jewry has a great future in Israel.”326 In 2012, his successor, Chief Rabbi Binyomin Jacobs, said, “I see myself as a life guard of Dutch Jewry. It is the saving of drowning persons. The [overall] potential remains small.”327 Arrangements had to be made for special groups. The first Army rabbi was appointed in 1956. This was a part-time position, as he was also the religious functionary in Arnhem. The first student rabbi was appointed in 1964. In some towns, there were Jewish inmates in prisons who were regularly visited by someone on behalf of the Jewish community.

Education and Other Services In the first year after the war both an elementary and a high school were established in Amsterdam where Jewish pupils could recoup part of the studies they had lost during the war. Thereafter, regular Jewish schools began functioning there.

324 Manfred Gerstenfeld, interview with Bart Wallet, “Heroprichting: centralisatie en ‘inclusief’ denken,” Aleh, January-February 2013. 325 Manfred Gerstenfeld interview with Chief Rabbi Elieser Berlinger, NIW, 11 August 1961. 326 Bart Wallet and Hetty Berg, “65 jaar joods Nederland,” in Wie niet weg is, is gezien: Joods Nederland na 1945, ed. Hetty Berg and Bart Wallet (Zwolle: Waanders: 2010), 7. 327 Sarah Whitlau, “Een rabbijn heeft altijd dienst,” NIW, 15 June 2012. The Postwar Renewal of Jewish Communities 161

Before the war there had been many Jewish communities which employed a religious functionary who acted as Jewish teacher and cantor. After the war, many of these communities had so few members that they barely functioned, or not at all. The NIK thus established a Central Education Commission (C.O.C), whose itinerant teachers gave Jewish lessons. For instance, in 1960 eleven such teachers taught about 180 pupils spread over 40 Dutch municipalities. From time to time, these teachers also tried to maintain contact with parents of the students.328 The NIK also had a Central Contact Commission (C.C.C.). For instance, in 1960 a staff member established contacts with local Jews in more than 100 Dutch municipalities. This aimed at “bringing dispersed Jews closer to Judaism and in particular, to make those who lived in isolation aware of the fact that they belonged to the greater Jewish community, i.e., the NIK.”329 The C.C.C. also organized regional meetings in various places.330 After the war, ritual slaughter was still performed in a number of locations throughout the country, and there were also some kosher bakeries. Yet the number of kosher facilities decreased gradually. By the early 1960s, there were only two kosher butchers left in provincial towns, i.e., in Enschede and Utrecht. Nowadays, there is only one kosher butcher in all of the Netherlands, in Amsterdam.

Social Problems There were also major social problems. As noted above, a new organization, the JMW, was founded after the JCC stopped functioning. It lent assistance to all Jews. It was active throughout the Netherlands and played an important role, as it was often the sole Jewish connection for Jews who were not members of any Jewish organization.331 The JMW’s status was enhanced over the decades and it gradually wid- ened its activities. It also initiated demographic studies on Dutch Jewry.332 In recent years, activities aiming at strengthening the community have increased.333

328 Mau Kopuit, “Cijfers spreken boekdelen,” NIW, 22 September 1961. 329 Ibid. 330 “Bijeenkomst C.C.C.,” NIW, 9 February 1962. 331 Isaac Lipschits, Tsedaka: Een halve Eeuw Joods Maatschappelijk Werk in Nederland (Zutphen: Walburg Pers, 1997). 332 Ibid. 333 Manfred Gerstenfeld, interview with Hans Vuijsje, “JMW: Hulpverlening en Samenlevings- opbouw,” Aleh, February–March 2012. 162 Gerstenfeld

The Amsterdam Ashkenazi community (NIHS) made an important effort to tackle other social issues. Loneliness was a problem for many people who had lost large parts of or their entire families in the war. This led to initiatives undertaken by the NIHS to establish clubs where these people could meet. Later, social tourism was organized, in which survivors would travel as a group to domestic and foreign destinations.334

Migration According to the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), about 4,500 Jews emigrated from the Netherlands between 1948 and 1954. Of these, 1,500 left for Israel and 3,000 to other countries, mainly the United States. Historian Chaya Brasz estimates that at least 6,000 Jews emigrated from the Netherlands in the first fifty years after the war and that half of them went to Israel. Brasz men- tions that the real figure was even higher, as German and stateless Jews who emigrated from the Netherlands should also be included.335 There was a strong feeling amongst some of the emigrants that Dutch society had failed the Jews. A few years ago Hetty Berg interviewed a hundred Dutch Jews, mainly in the Netherlands and in Israel, who were born between 1912 and 1966. She asked them to tell about life for Jews in the Netherlands in the decades after the war. Some of those in Israel explained why they had left the Netherlands. Judith Kool-Franken, born in 1917, said:

The reception [in the Netherlands] was not always cordial. I had heard that someone had guarded a certain number of items for my parents. He threw us out of the house and asked: “Why did you come back?”. . . . When Israel was established, we decided to leave for there because there was nothing which kept us here. . . . I have never regretted that decision.336

Gila Ban, born in 1929, said: “All of the youths wanted to leave. It was a flight. It was a necessary flight. One couldn’t adapt oneself and marry in the Netherlands.”337

334 Isaac Lipschits, Rafael Gerstenfeld [1900–1976]: Een man van goede daden (Zutphen: Walburg Pers, 2004), 101–37, Chapter 6: “De sociale afdeling.” 335 Chaya Brasz, “De Nederlands-Joodse Diaspora”, Center for Research on Dutch Jewry, (Jerusalem, 2000). 336 Hetty Berg, “De oorlog voorbij,” in Wie niet weg is, is gezien: Joods Nederland na 1945, ed. Hetty Berg and Bart Wallet (Zwolle: Waanders: 2010), 35, 337 Ibid. The Postwar Renewal of Jewish Communities 163

Former Dutch Ambassador to Israel Como van Hellenberg Hubar said that he was aware that many Dutch Jews did not come to Israel because they were Zionists, but because they no longer felt at ease in the Netherlands. While he admitted that the positive image of the Dutch wartime attitude toward the Jews was false, he still wanted it to be maintained. Hellenberg Hubar added a bizarre remark:

The myth of the ‘good Dutchman’ can have a positive effect. A myth can serve as an ideal, an example that one has to live up to. The positive norm contained in this myth is part of the norms and values of the Netherlands. If one attacks the myth, then the danger exists that the norm, in this case tolerance, will also be affected. Tolerance in itself is not something obvious, but a result of the conscious choice to give space to others. One has to work on this. In this context, the destruction of the myth could be problematic.338

A different issue concerning migration was that in 1944 a number of Dutch Jews had been exchanged from the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp for German Templers in Palestine. This led to an early awareness in the Dutch Jewish community in Palestine of the problem of war trauma. Dutch Jews in Israel comprise a small community of an estimated 10,000 people. As a collective, it has made one major contribution to Israeli society through Elah, its pioneering organization for the social and psychological treatment of Dutch war survivors. This would later lead to the establishment of a similar organization, Amcha, which offers socio-psychological services to Israeli survivors of all origins. Regarding Jewish immigration into the Netherlands, the economically heavily damaged country viewed itself in the postwar years as over-populated. It promoted emigration and wanted to avoid immigration. Yet several hundred Jewish Displaced Persons managed to come to the Netherlands in the immediate postwar years. Furthermore, some immigration resulted from the Hungarian crisis in 1956.339 Five hundred Rumanian Jewish children came for a transitory period to the Netherlands and were housed there in the former Jewish psychiatric institution in Apeldoorn. They later left for Israel.340 Later

338 Miriam Dubi-Gazan, “Como van Helleberg Hubar en de mythe van de ‘goede Nederlander’,” Joods Journaal, Winter 2000: 68–69. 339 Ibid. 340 Wallet, “Om ‘een uitgeteekenden joodsche levensweg’,” 106. 164 Gerstenfeld on, Jewish immigration, mainly from Israel, increased. At present the number of Israelis in the Netherlands is around 9,000.341

Restitution The Dutch government in exile in London had decided that all Dutchmen were equal, and therefore no special arrangements should be made for surviving Dutch Jews.342 This ‘politically correct’ policy led in practice to a highly discriminatory attitude. It expressed itself in a major way as far as restitution was concerned. The position of the surviving Jews whose possessions had been systematically looted by the occupiers was radically different from that of the great majority of the Dutch population. The Dutch government focused on rebuilding its heavily damaged society. Extending justice to the surviving Jews was a marginal issue at best. A particularly negative role was played by Socialist Minister of Finance Pieter Lieftinck. The restitution process dragged on for more than ten years.343 The struggle for Jewish rights had to be led by the Jews themselves. There are many examples of this. Lipschits notes that Jewish survivors in the Netherlands often had to make major efforts to obtain postwar justice.344 The leading Dutch historians dealing with the fate of the Jews during the war were also Jewish. The partial failure of the Dutch restitution process was one of the factors leading to its renewal at the end of the 1990s. This was also an indirect result of the major international publicity surrounding the scandal of dormant Swiss bank deposits. A number of commissions of inquiry investigated postwar restitution issues and identified substantial Jewish funds withheld after the war.345 The Dutch government, banks, insurance companies, and the Amsterdam Stock Exchange thereupon made additional payments to the Dutch Jewish community. The Dutch government furthermore apologized for the conduct of the postwar governments. On 21 March 2000, it presented a document to the Dutch Parliament in which it acknowledged that “looking backwards with today’s

341 Van Solinge and Van Praag, De Joden in Nederland anno 2009, 176–78. 342 Gerard Aalders, Berooid (Amsterdam: Boom, 2001), 19–49l Chapter 1: “Rechtsherstelvoor bereiding tijdens de oorlog: De theorie.” 343 Wouter Veraart, “Sanders contra Lieftinck: De ongelijke strijd om het rechtsherstel in de jaren van wederopbouw,” in Binnenskamers: Terugkeer en opvang na de Tweede Wereldoorlog: Besluitvorming, ed. Conny Kristel (Amsterdam: Bert Bakker, 2002), 173–08. 344 Manfred Gerstenfeld, interview with Isaac Lipschits (above, n. 7), 186. 345 Manfred Gerstenfeld, “Investigating Much, Paying Little: The Dutch Government and the Holocaust Assets Inquiries,” Jerusalem Letter/Viewpoints, 424, 15 February 2000. The Postwar Renewal of Jewish Communities 165 knowledge and eyes” there was “too much formalism, bureaucracy and, above all, chill in the postwar restitution process.” In view of this, “the government expresses sincere regrets and apologizes to those who suffered then, without however presuming wrong intentions by those responsible.”346 This apology included a new fallacy. It declared that the postwar administrative failures of the Dutch authorities were largely unintentional. This asser- tion was contradicted by the conclusions of the commissions of inquiry.347 The renewed Dutch restitution process is analyzed in detail in the present author’s book, Judging the Netherlands.348

Judging War Criminals

After the war, the Dutch legal system failed to severely punish many of the German war criminals they had caught, or the many Dutch who had helped or collaborated with the Germans. Historian Ido de Haan wrote: “Many were condemned, but almost all were freed within a short time. Of the 152 [criminals] condemned to death: in 100 cases the punishment was converted to a life sentence, eleven people were judged in absentia, and one committed suicide. Only 40 were actually executed.”349 In the verdicts of the courts, the persecution of Jews played a minor role. As far as wartime mayors are concerned for instance, Lipschits wrote: “The responsibility for the persecution of the Jews wasn’t considered very seriously. A written rebuke was made if the mayor had given the order to arrest Jews, or had informed about the presence of a Jewish child, and so on.”350 Several of the major German criminals responsible for the persecution and deportation of the Jews were pardoned after they had been condemned to death by a Dutch tribunal. For a long time, pressure was applied to free those who were still in Dutch jails. The last two, Franz Fischer and Ferdinand Hugo aus der Fünten, were released in 1989.351 This lenient approach toward those who had harmed the Jews was apparent at many levels. For example, notary services were frequently required under the Nazi occupation to liquidate

346 Government of the Netherlands, “Regeringsreactie naar aanleiding van de rapporten Tegoeden Tweede Wereldoorlog,” 21 March 2000. 347 Gerstenfeld, “Investigating Much, Paying Little.” 348 Gerstenfeld, Judging the Netherlands. 349 De Haan, Na de Ondergang, 104. 350 Lipschits, De Kleine Sjoa, 169. 351 Hinke Piersma, De Drie van Breda (Amsterdam: Balans, 2005), 188. 166 Gerstenfeld

Jewish possessions. After the war, active collaboration was considered pun- ishable either by dismissal or a rebuke. The Justice Ministry found that the behavior of several hundreds of notaries required detailed investigation. By November 1946, however, only thirteen had been dismissed and only seven had been privately rebuked.352

Commemoration

Another topic of importance is how the murdered Jews were commemorated. Initially, memorial plaques or monuments which were put up were mainly in Jewish institutions or cemeteries. An attempt failed to erect a memorial on the Jonas Daniel Meyerplein, the square in the heart of Amsterdam’s former Jewish quarter between the ancient Portuguese synagogue and the destroyed Ashkenazi synagogues. The Amsterdam municipality opposed the idea.353 On that very square, the municipality later erected a memorial for non-Jews who had undertaken a two-day solidarity strike with the Jewish community in February 1941. Mozes H. Gans, then the editor of the Jewish weekly NIW, wrote that it reminded him of a memorial to anti-aircraft units on the graves of those who had been killed by a bombardment.354 Ironically, the first monument put up publicly by the Jews was one com- memorating the non-Jews who had helped them during the war. This was done at a time when the Jewish dead were not yet publicly memorialized.355 Many public memorials for Jews were established much later; even today new monuments are still being erected. There have also been other important developments concerning remembrance and the documenting of history. There are now books on Jewish war monuments in various provinces.356 Many books have been written over the past fifty years on the history of Jews in various Dutch towns, while others are in progress. Multiple books on the Holocaust are still being published, one of

352 Aalders, Berooid, 196. 353 Frank van Vree, In de schaduw van Auschwitz (Groningen: Historische Uitgeverij, 1995), 94. 354 Mozes Heiman Gans, NIW, 19 December 1952, quoted in Martin Bossenbroek, De Meelstreep: Terugkeer en Opvang na de Tweede Wereldoorlog (Amsterdam: Bert Bakker, 2001), 342. 355 Van Vree In de schaduw van Auschwitz, 93. 356 For example, H. Hamburger and J.C. Regtien, Joodse oorlogsmonumenten in de provincie Overijssel, (Bedum: Profiel, 2002). The Postwar Renewal of Jewish Communities 167 the most important is that by Guus Luijters and Aline Pennewaard, titled In Memoriam and published in 2012, which lists the names of children murdered during the war.357 Another new development to memorial- ize the murdered is the Stolpersteine, the ‘stumbling stones’ introduced by German sculptor Gunter Demnig in 1997. Ten years later, the first ones in the Netherlands were laid down.358 There are now Stolpersteine in many Dutch municipalities.359 At the same time, there is substantial ‘Holocaust fatigue’. Many people no longer want to hear about what happened to the Jews during the Second World War. There is also advancing Holocaust distortion. One example out of several is the dedication of a new memorial for the war dead in the village of Geffen, in 2012. The municipality intended to inscribe on the plaque the names of Jewish victims of the town, murdered by the Germans, as well as those of German soldiers who fell there. It was one more event in the Netherlands which intended to confuse the memory of the victims with that of the perpetrators. After protests from Jewish organizations, it was decided that no names would appear on the monument.360 It is no coincidence that this whitewashing of the past happens from time to time in the Netherlands. Postwar Dutch governments have never admitted that the Dutch government in exile in London hardly made any effort to help its persecuted Jewish citizens. There was also major collaboration by Dutch authorities in the Netherlands with the German occupiers. In almost all occupied countries, postwar governments have admitted the role their countrymen played in the persecution of the Jews and have subsequently apologized. But as successive Dutch governments refuse to apologize for the failures of the wartime government, it is not surprising that in several Dutch locations history is falsified by intermingling the memory of victims and perpetrators.

357 Guus Luijters, In Memoriam: De gedeporteerde en vermoorde Joodse, Roma en Sinti kinde- ren 1942–1945 (Amsterdam: Nieuw Amsterdam, 2012). 358 www.stolpersteine-borne.nl/de_familie_spanjaard-2.htm. 359 Stolpersteine (herdenkingssteentjes) in Hillegersberg geplaatst, Rotterdam World Port World City, 4 May 2011; www.rotterdam.nl/www_rotterdam_nl_stolpersteineherdenkings steentjesinhillegersberg_geplaatst. 360 “Geen namen op monument Geffen,” Brabants Dagblad, 18 October 2012. 168 Gerstenfeld

Conclusion

At present, the number of people in the Netherlands who consider themselves Jews is over 50,000 or 0.3 percent of the Dutch population. Of these, more than 15,000 were born of a Jewish father but not a Jewish mother, and are not considered as Jews by Jewish religious law.361 After difficult postwar years, the Jewish community in the Netherlands developed successfully for a number of decades. Nowadays, the community’s position is increasingly undermined, partly through assimilation and partly due to an increase in antisemitism. Furthermore, Jewish traditions such as ritual slaughter and circumcision are under frequent attack. This is often ‘collateral damage’ resulting from activism mainly targeting Muslim communities. The lack of consideration for living Jews cannot be ‘compensated’ for by a more widespread interest than before in Jewish culture or in the memory of dead Jews. On 5 May 2011, Dutch National Liberation Day, an interview was published with one of the two Dutch Chief Rabbis, Binyomin Jacobs. He said: “Many Jews are now reminded of the ‘prelude’ to the Second World War.” He added: “There is fear among the Jews.” Rabbi Jacobs mentioned that he and another rabbi have had many conversations in the past few weeks with Jews who feel threatened. His conclusion was even more far-reaching: “I hope that the Jewish people will not have to be liberated from the Netherlands as our ancestors were from Egypt.”362 In recent years, the problem of the future of the Jewish community in the Netherlands has also become an issue of public debate. It came to the fore when senior Dutch politician Frits Bolkestein said in 2010 that conscious Jews would do well to advise their children to leave the Netherlands for America or Israel. He said this in light of the poor integration of mainly Muslim immigrants and the problems this would cause, specifically for Jews.363 Bolkestein’s statement engendered public debate. There were also a number of newspaper interviews with recognizable Jews who spoke about the physical and verbal antisemitic attacks they had experienced. The lengthy public discussions also

361 Van Solinge and Van Praag, De Joden in Nederland anno 2009, 166. 362 Jeroen Kanis, “Rabbijnen: steeds meer Joden zijn angstig,” Reformatorisch Dagblad, 5 May 2011. 363 Manfred Gerstenfeld, Het Verval: Joden in een Stuurloos Nederland (Amsterdam: Van Praag, 2010), 109. The Postwar Renewal of Jewish Communities 169 led to a parliamentary debate. However, no effective measures have since been undertaken by the authorities and thus these problems continue to fester. The Jews’ main function in the Netherlands today is a symbolic one. It includes their place in antisemitic stereotypes: their role as the absolute victims, as misrepresented role models for Muslim immigrants, as ‘Dutch- appointed representatives’ of Israel, as the typical outsider, and so on.364 The factual contribution of the Dutch Jewish community to society in the Netherlands is small. If all those who consider themselves Jews emigrated, their place would soon be filled by others and Dutch society would hardly change at all.

364 Ibid.

PART 4 Emigrating to Israel from Europe and the Middle East

∵

Reasons for Emigration of the Jews from Poland in 1956–1959

Ewa Węgrzyn

In historiographical literature, the twentieth century is very often called “the era of migrants.”365 Although migrations of large groups of people are a permanent element of social life, this period is considered unique in the history of mankind. In the last century this phenomenon was particularly intensive, relating to large groups of people. Reduced communities of European Jews, suffering from one of the most horrendous crimes of genocide in the history of mankind, played a significant role in the process of migration, especially in the second half of the twentieth century. A population of several million Polish Jews, drastically reduced to tens of thousands, was also struggling with the issue of its further existence. Those who survived the war now had to make a difficult choice: stay or leave? Poland, their homeland before the extermination, where they had been born and lived for generations and the site of the graves of their ancestors, suddenly became a ruin. Centuries-old Jewish traditions perished irrevocably within several years: there were no longer yeshivas, no rabbis or synagogues. Many respected representatives of the world of science and Jewish culture had been killed, including leading figures in social and political life. The Jews who survived were not the same minority they had been before the war. As a consequence of the changes in Poland after the end of the Second World War, there were three large waves of Jewish emigration from that country. The first was from 1945 to 1949, the second in the late 1950s, and the third in 1968.366 In the history of many countries, waves of emigration were accompanied by significant social and political changes within them. A similar situation occurred in the case of the emigration of Polish citizens to Israel in the years 1956–1959. Eleven years after the end of the Second World War and the establishment of a new political regime, Poland faced the first significant wave of workers’ protests. The Poles demanded changes, the period of Stalinist terror was coming to an end, and a new era in the policy of the People’s Republic of

365 Krystyna Kersten, Polacy, Żydzi, komunizm: Anatomia połprawd (Warsaw: Niezależna Oficyna Wydawnicza, 1992), 13. 366 Michael Checiński, Poland, Communism, Nationalism, Anti-Semitism (New York: Karz- Cohl Publishers, 1982), 38.

Poland (Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa or PRL)—the thaw—had begun. It was this new policy that opened a previously closed door to emigration for Polish Jews. From October 1956, under the rubric of “uniting families,” it was possible for Polish citizens of Jewish origin to go to Israel. Though some of them still saw their future in the People’s Republic of Poland, a vast majority decided to emigrate. Basically, it is estimated that between 1956 and 1959 approximately 51,000 Jews left Poland for Israel.367 In the second half of the 1950s, for the vast majority of Polish Jews the desire to emigrate was becoming more intensive. Although the decision to emigrate between 1956 and 1959 was voluntary, in fact most people leaving Poland were forced to leave because of increasing antisemitism. It even affected those who bound their future with Poland and did not consider emigration. Painfully experiencing the results of antisemitism made them change their previous way of thinking about their own national identity and plans to tie their future with Poland. Therefore, when taking the decision on emigration, the extensively reported anti-Jewish incidents were extremely important. The interpretation of antisemitism in the fifties is very complex. Together with the crisis of power and the Stalinist system, antisemitism appeared as a factor in political horse-trading. Among those struggling for leadership of the inter-party factions (the so-called ‘Natolinczycy’ and ‘Puławianie’) there was an increasing tendency to use demagogy and antisemitic slogans to dismiss people of Jewish origin. It was a way in which politicians were trying to prove the national character of the government and to win the trust of the people. Antisemitism was officially stigmatized, but at the same time certain people were reminded of their original, non-Polish sounding, surnames and the Jews belonging to Security Organ were accused of Stalinist crimes. A theory was also promulgated maintaining their sole responsibility for anarchy, loss of Polish sovereignty, and economic collapse. The said theory was substantiated by the fact that many key positions in the security services, economic administration, the party machine, and propaganda were held by people of Jewish origin. Jews had been perceived as an economic rival for many years, alien to Polish territory, as those who had killed Christ and were opposed to Christianity. After the Second World War new stereotypes were added: a Jew was a Communist who brought to Poland a strange system imposed by force. It may be claimed, therefore, that Jews fell victim to party structures where it was found con- venient to use the concept of the ‘Jewish plot’ as an instrument in political internecine feuds.

367 August Grabski, Żydowski ruch kombatancki w Polsce w latach 1944–1949 (Warsaw: Trio, 2002), 35. Reasons for Emigration of the Jews From Poland 175

Fights in the higher echelons resulted in antisemitic outbursts in the street. Antisemitic incidents occurred, for example, in Łódź, Wałbrzych, Bytom, Dzierżoniów and Legnica.368 Opinions of an antisemitic nature were on the increase together with the progressing thaw, and a significant growth in their number was reported after the release of information about the resignation of Jakub Berman from the Political Office of the government.369 Many activists on both higher and lower party levels displayed every sign of real antisemitism, and antisemitic feeling in Polish society was articulated almost unhindered. The most serious riots occurred in October 1956 in Lower Silesia where the threat of “Judeo-Commies” and “the responsibility of the Jews” for Stalinism were popular topics during party meetings. It should also be underscored that society approved of the idea of national regulation of staff. This watchword coincided with difficult times for the economy when citizens were struggling to keep or obtain employment and, regardless of ethnic origin, mass layoffs were taking place. During this period several thousand people lost their jobs in Lower Silesia, a direct effect of the application of so- called downsizing for economic reasons, i.e., reduction of job positions, among others, in the military sector, government administration, the party machine, and special services. In spring 1956, local activists of the Jewish Social-Cultural Association (TSKŻ) in Poland noted the increase in antisemitic behavior. Children were particularly lamented as they became the target of assaults by their peers at school. When harassing their Jewish schoolmates, children from non-Jewish families explicitly manifested the antisemitic attitude prevalent in their families. This is what Karol Becker says about his school situation:

Later, in 1956, I experienced two incidents in which I had to get into fights, there was no other way. . . . And the second incident happened later and the background was the Sinai War. Generally the situation in

368 Marcin Szydzisz, “Dolnośląski oddział TSKŻ,” in Współcześni Żydzi:Polska i diaspora: Wybrane zagadnienia, ed. Ewa Waszkiewicz (Wrocław: University of Wrocław, 2007), 88. 369 In May 1956 Jakub Berman submitted his resignation from membership in the Political Office of the Central Committee, and Hilary Minc did so in October 1956. The dismissal of two such influential people was interpreted as a general sign of the tendency to displace people of Jewish origin in the public sphere. It should also be noted that at that time both Jews and Poles were placed on trial, as well as Soviet advisors and representatives of other minorities. However, this was not mentioned publicly. That is how a myth was created that the majority of criminals in the system were Jews. The supporters of this idea wanted to divert people’s attention from their own responsibility for unlawful and totalitarian government, which of course was motivated by the desire to stay in power. 176 Węgrzyn

the class was tense, . . . he came to me and said: “So, the Kikes will soon hit Moscow, won’t they? Look how rife these Kikes are! . . . After this extermination and after the war we were brought up this way and it was not the upbringing, we were given to understand that if you want to stay here [in Poland—E.W.], you need to fight. . . . So I hit him hard . . . I knew I had my handicap, my Jewish handicap, and whatever happens, they will point a finger at me.370

Lower Silesia was a region where antisemitic behaviour was the most intensive.371 This was the consequence of the fact that the area was inhabited by a significant number of Jews who had settled there after the Second World War. Initially, antisemitic attacks manifested themselves only in verbal assaults. Later, however, there were also incidents involving physical violence. Jews were attacked in public places and institutions. There were anti-Jewish riots also in Wałbrzych, and if it had not been for the quick intervention of the army and militia, they would have resulted in a pogrom.372 In Wrocław and in other cities, signs calling for Jews to leave Poland appeared on a large scale on the doors of Jewish flats. No less dramatic were the acts of hooliganism in Dzierżoniów, Bielawa, Wałbrzych, Wrocław, and Ziębice. The distribution of brochures with antisemitic content was also a form of pressure on the Jews. This was observed in Legnica, Jawor, Kudowa Zdrój, and in Wrocław.373 Consequently, many people suffered from anxiety, nightmares, a sense of vulnerability and threat. The memories of the pogrom in Kielce were still vivid. Ya‘akov Barmor, then the Israeli First Legation Secretary in Poland, wrote in a confidential note to Shaul Avigur, who at the time was the liaison with eastern European Jews:

370 Interview with Karol Becker, Tel Aviv, 17 July 2008. Born in 1941 in Siberia, Becker went to Israel in 1957. A philosopher, historian, journalist, and translator, in cooperation with the Polish Institute in Tel Aviv, he lives and works in Tel Aviv. 371 Marcin Szydzisz, “Przejawy antysemityzmu i emigracja ludności żydowskiej z Dolnego Śląska w latach 1956–1957,” in Państwo Izrael: Analiza polityczno—prawna, ed. Ewa Rudnik (Warsaw: Trio, 2006), 116. 372 Paweł Wieczorek, “Z dziejów wałbrzyskich Żydów (1945–2005),” in Współcześni Żydzi: Polska i diaspora:Wybrane zagadnienia, ed. Ewy Waszkiewicz (Wrocław: University of Wrocław, 2007), 64. 373 Paweł Machcewicz, “Antisemitism in Poland in 1956,” in Poles, Jews, Socialists: The Failure of an Ideal, Polin: Studies in Polish Jewry, 9, ed. Antony Polonsky (London: Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 1996), 170–87. Reasons for Emigration of the Jews From Poland 177

The signs of antisemitism, which had been initially limited to small communities, have started to appear in their most severe form in schools, after-school clubs, and even in shops and in the streets. . . . Recently, with great difficulty, we managed to stop the riots in Wałbrzych, but alarming information was coming from Szczecin. . . . Undoubtedly, the authorities are on the alert and ready to prevent the outburst of real riots. Nevertheless, there are clear signs that the government is trying to get rid of the Jews in order to lay the rumors to rest that power is in Jewish hands.374

Jews were repeatedly accused of crimes or offences they had never committed. One example is the case of Bohdan Piasecki. In January 1957, this sixteen- year old boy, the son of the Chairman of the PAX Association, was kidnapped in Warsaw. In December 1958 his body was found by chance in a building on Świerczewskiego Street. Alleged Jewish involvement appeared as significant in this case: it was established that the owner of the taxi cab which drove away with the kidnappers and Bohdan Piasecki was Ignacy Ekerling, who previously had been employed as a chauffeur for the Jewish Institute of History in Warsaw. During the investigation of the crime, it was suspected that he had provided the kidnappers with the taxi cab, having known about the planned kidnap- ping and murder. Ekerling was apprehended at the border during his attempt to leave for Israel and accused of aiding and abetting a crime. However, the trial was never conducted because the accusation was withdrawn upon the prosecutor’s request. Party activists of Jewish origin were appalled by the developing antisemitism, but the authorities of the Polish People’s Republic, wary of losing political support among certain segments of society, initially did not make any attempt to counteract antisemitic acts. According to some Jewish Communist Party activists, the absence of intervention was deliberate, and certain incidents were given public exposure to force Jews to leave the country. In summing up the issue of antisemitism in the second half of the 1950s, it should be emphasized that the authorities were convinced that the most efficient method of solving the problem of antisemitism would be to reduce the number of Jews in the country by facilitating their emigration. A reduction in the Jews’ participation in what were widely understood to be the structures of power aimed at increasing the popularity of the Party in the eyes of society.

374 Confidential note from Ya‘akov Barmor to Shaul Avigur, 16 Oct. 1956, Israel State Archives, 130.11/2508/14. 178 Węgrzyn

It was also said that the exit of all Jews for Israel should be facilitated, but only if this was what they wanted. Widely reported antisemitic riots and lack of a strong reaction from the government accelerated the process of deciding to leave. In addition, the belief that part of the Jewish population thought that Poland was not the right country with which to bind their future gained force. Fear of emigration particularly affected small Jewish communities, but larger centers of Jewish life were not immune from it. Most applications were submitted by the inhabitants of Lower Silesia, where the number of requests for permission to leave reached 14,000 by the end of 1956. This was also the region in which traces of antisemitism were most painfully felt—attacks first and foremost directed at Jews working in Lower Silesian cooperatives. The main targets of antisemites were people in managerial positions. In comparison to Lower Silesia, the emigration panic in other provinces was not so common; however, it showed a growing tendency (e.g., in Cracow and Łódź). The mass emigration of the second half of the 1950s also signified the loss of faith on the part of tens of thousands of Jews in the possibility of creating Polish-Jewish co-existence and the ability of so-called real socialist countries to satisfy the material and spiritual needs of the citizens, including the Jews. Communist reality disappointed a significant number of Jews who sym- pathized with Communism. Their faith, that this system would eliminate all forms of xenophobia and antisemitism, thereby ensuring equal rights to all Polish citizens, was to be completely devastated. The discrepancy between the ideological conception of Communism and the real situation in which the state system did not contribute to the improvement of the condition of national minorities, caused discouragement and was significant in persuad- ing people to emigrate. Jews were let down by the system which, by means of its slogans, promised that all traces of intolerance would die out. In reality, the new system did not guarantee these equal rights. Sensing no support from state and party institutions and fearing for their security, the Jews decided to emigrate in large numbers. Karol Becker describes his father’s decision:

My dad decided to leave Poland because he was disappointed as a Communist. He wanted to live in Poland, he wanted to come back to Poland after the war, his only spiritual possibility was just to be in socialist Poland because he felt like a participant and a citizen equal to other citizens. My dad was working in the Ministry of Security, he belonged to the Volunteer Reserve Militia [ORMO] for some time. He strongly identified himself with Poland, but his Poland was the socialist one. So when he became disappointed as a Communist after the twentieth convention [of Reasons for Emigration of the Jews From Poland 179

the Soviet Communist Party in Moscow during which Khrushchev read a confidential report criticizing the crimes of Stalin—E.W.] he felt a crisis of faith; he felt then as if he had lost ground. He wasn’t dismissed, he left himself because he knew that . . . he did not believe in his work anymore. He believed that the Communist Party would not make a fuss about his ethnicity. This was his main reason for sympathizing with Communism.375

Fear of the rigorous policy of the state authorities against the Jewish minority was very often mentioned when referring to the reasons which contributed to a rapid increase in the number of people applying to go to Israel. Liquidation of Jewish institutions aroused apprehension in Jews that even worse repressions would come soon. It was feared that the situation of the Jewish community in Poland would become similar to that of their brethren in the USSR. Another reason was fear of the next war in Europe. No less significant was also the need for ties to relatives living abroad, because daily existence on the real socialist model excluded the possibility of paying regular and relatively frequent personal visits. Władek Cynamon, for example, claims that one of the main reasons which determined his parents’ decision to leave Poland was the desire to join their family which had left for Israel in the earlier wave of emigration.376 When relating to the reasons for emigration, it is also important to note that some Jews had wanted to leave Poland at the beginning of the 1950s, but were unable to do so. Now, between 1956 and 1959, this group could take advantage of the situation and leave. It is worth emphasizing that from 1951 to 1955 opportunities for emigration were very limited. So the favorable opportunity to emigrate was taken advantage of in the late fifties by those Jews who, for various reasons, did not manage to leave the country in the forties and were repeatedly trying to leave in the subsequent years. The memories of Ilona Dworak-Cousin are a good illustration of this situation:

My dad was anti-Communist, after what happened in Russia he couldn’t put up with the regime here, with everything. He did not want to live in Communist Poland. I have his application here from 1950, he asked to leave Poland and he was refused. Poland after the war needed the intelligentsia and engineers to rebuild the country. . . . It was not until 1957 that he got it [i.e., permission].377

375 Interview with Karol Becker, Tel Aviv, 17 July 2008. 376 Interview with Władek Cynamon, Tel Aviv, 12 July 2009. 377 Interview with Ilona Dworak-Cousin, Ra‘anana, 16 July 2008. She was born in 1949 in Wrocław and came to Israel in 1957. She serves as chairman of the Israel-Poland 180 Węgrzyn

The parents of Aleks Danzig also did not receive permission to leave in 1948: “My parents wanted to leave as early as 1948, but they did not get permission. My mum was always a Zionist, she wanted to live in Israel. When they got the chance to leave during Gomułka’s time, they decided to abandon Poland.”378 Zvi Rav-Ner’s father, too, wanted to leave Poland for ideological reasons: “My dad was a Zionist. I guess in 1935 Zeev Jabotinsky came to Przemyśl. My dad was then in Beitar [the youth movement of the Revisionist Zionist Organization— E.W.], he was constantly listening to Jabotinsky’s speeches, so Zionism was always present in our home.”379 Mass emigration was also a consequence of Jewish awareness that fulfill- ment of their dreams of emigrating to Israel or other Western countries might be thwarted by the closing of borders. There were also those who set out on this journey in order to get out of the country for the West. They very often ended up in Austria, from where they tried to get to other countries. The decision to leave was also influenced by the news from Israel, where the Sinai War was being waged. Military action by the Jewish state against USSR-supported Egypt aroused nationalistic sentiments in parts of the Jewish community. For example, Arie Golan recalls:

After the war my parents understood that Jews needed their country, that they couldn’t rely on anybody, they had to have their own country, to live in their own country. This was the main motivation for them to leave.380

Important reasons influencing the decision to emigrate were the perceptible pressure on Jewish society and a conviction that the majority of Jews were leaving Poland. The feeling of loneliness, departing neighbors, and what seemed to be the end of Jewish life in Poland made those who had hesitated so far seek a better life abroad. The ‘emigration scare’ is what influenced the decision of

Association and is a popularizer of Polish culture in Israel and a poet. She lives and works in Ra‘anana. 378 Interview with Aleks Danzig, Yad Vashem, Jerusalem, 21 September 2010. Danzig was born in Warsaw in 1950 and came to Israel in 1957. A historian, he cooperates with Yad Vashem, where he deals with educating Polish teachers about the Holocaust. He lives in Kibbutz Nir Oz in the Negev desert. 379 Interview with the Israeli ambassador to Poland, Zvi Rav-Ner, Embassy of Israel, Warsaw, 17 October 2010. Rav-Ner was born in 1950 in Świdnica and came to Israel in 1957. A member of Israel’s diplomatic corps, he has filled the post in Warsaw since April 2009. 380 Interview with Arie Golan, Jerusalem, 7 July 2008. Born in Germany in 1950, he came to Israel in May 1957. A popular radio broadcaster, primarily of a news magazine over Kol Yisrael, Golan lives and works in Jerusalem. Reasons for Emigration of the Jews From Poland 181 those who did not sympathize with Zionism or even opposed this ideology and the State of Israel. Fearing for their immediate family and fear of the prospects of living in Poland in a small Jewish community led Jewish people to also decide to leave the country. This is how Mieczysław Litmanowicz describes his decision:

I was made to leave because everybody was leaving. This was some kind of psychosis. It was said everywhere that this friend was packing bags, another had already submitted his documents, and the other had quit his job . . . Everybody was talking only about the fact that everybody was leaving.381

Henryk Karpinowicz’s parents also gave in to this emigration psychosis:

We were living a very good life in Poland. My parents decided to leave because they saw that suddenly everybody was leaving. Suddenly they felt that they would be the only Jews in Poland, they were simply afraid of being left alone, without people around them.382

Such a great increase in applications was also motivated by rumors regarding so-called staff regulation. People were afraid of losing their jobs as a result of downsizing and the difficulties of finding employment by persons of Jewish origin. Many thousands of people, among them many Jews, lost their jobs. Other reasons for this situation included both the difficult economic situation of the People’s Republic of Poland (PRL) and the lack of possibilities to expand private businesses to a larger scale. Young people were made to leave because they felt they were second-class citizens. For those who focused on building their careers, it became clear that their origin may be an obstacle to achieving their professional and political ambitions. Unwilling to be deprived of the opportunity to develop their careers and reach a higher material status, they decided to leave. This, for example, was the main reason given for leaving Poland by Roman Frister:

I was naïve to believe that the political thaw would make it possible for me to get a different, stable, and more interesting job. The opportunity came totally unexpectedly. A friend of the Orbis director disclosed that the company was looking for a head of the Foreign Tourism Department

381 Interview with Mieczysław (Moshe) Litmanowicz, Jerusalem, 9 July 2008. 382 Interview with Henryk Karpinowicz, Tel Aviv, 3 February 2009. 182 Węgrzyn

and he would support my candidacy for this position. . . . My file, full of all possible recommendations, was sent for final approval to the Central Committee [KC] (I was not a member of the Party). I was waiting patiently for the reply. Weeks were passing by but nothing happened, I had neither hide nor hair of an answer. . . . It was only when I lost my patience and went personally to the office of one of the General Directors of Orbis, the case was finally solved. “I didn’t know how to tell you,” said the director disclosing his embarrassment. “Your application was rejected. We were told that there were too many Jews in managerial positions here and we needed to find another person.” It was then that I suddenly realized I was Jewish. This news was like a bolt out of the blue. Because I was Polish—I cannot even say that I was a Pole of the Jewish faith, because I have never been to a synagogue in my entire life. I knew I was Jewish, I never hid it, but suddenly it appeared that a Pole and a Jew does not mean the same in certain situations. And, as I said, the cup of bitterness was filled to the brim and I decided to leave Poland. . . . I knew about antisemitism but I had never got my fingers burnt, so this problem had never existed for me. It was only this decision—that I couldn’t work there because there were too many Jews in managerial positions—which made me realize that I was a citizen of the PRL, that I was Polish but with a tiny question mark. And I did not like that.383

The absence of belief in the ability to live a normal life in Poland and to provide a family with economic, physical and spiritual security was considered another reason for the new wave of exodus. It was claimed that leaving was a protest against the fact that the socialist regime could not create the atmosphere which would prevent them from leaving. As Michael Handelzalts recalls:

My parents were actually building their lives anew in postwar Poland. There were no roots and no past, nothing that could keep them there. I guess in the fifties they realized that PRL was not their country and it was not possible to live there. When the opportunity arose, they decided to leave.384

383 Interview with Roman Frister, Tel Aviv, 16 July 2008. Born in Bielsko in 1928, he went to Israel in May 1957. He is a regular correspondent for Polityka magazine in the Middle East, is the author of books, and takes photographs as a hobby. Frister lives in Tel Aviv. 384 Interview with Michael Handelzalts, Tel Aviv, 16 February 2009. Born in Warsaw in 1950, he came to Israel as a child in September 1957. A journalist, theater critic, and member of Reasons for Emigration of the Jews From Poland 183

A significant factor influencing the decision to emigrate was the fear children’s parents in atheistic and Jewish families had of the consequences of renewed implementation of universal instruction in religion in schools. By an order of the minister of education issued on 8 December 1956, these classes were to be a voluntary subject. Only in centers under the auspices of the Children’s Friends Association were religious classes not conducted because in 1949 a secular model of upbringing was given a statutory basis. There was fear that children from Jewish families would become the object of stigmatization and other repressions.385 Additionally, the pro-emigration tendencies were influenced by the actions of Israel’s diplomatic mission in Warsaw as well as of international Jewish organizations such as the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee. In this case an important factor encouraging emigration was the granting of extensive financial aid to Jews by agencies of Israel and Zionist organizations. People who finally despaired of living in Poland were assured that after leaving the country they would not be left alone, that they would find work and homes in the new homeland. So the will to leave was deepened by the pressure of Jewish societies from abroad who expected Polish Jews to leave the Diaspora and live in the Jewish homeland. Government restrictions and the reluctant attitude of part of Polish society dashed the hopes of many Jews for recreating individual and group life in the People’s Republic of Poland. However, not everybody left. Some thought that the political and economic difficulties were only temporary and, when overcome, the situation would improve. Many still believed in the foundations of the existing system which were to bring universal justice regardless of national origin or religious beliefs. There were many Jewish social activists in the country who, despite the problems, wanted to continue with the centuries- long tradition of the Polish-Jewish community. Others, when deciding to stay in the country, were driven merely by patriotism. Furthermore, the financially and professionally established sectors of Jewish society did not want to give up what they had already achieved. Others, who did not maintain close relations with the Jewish community, also remained in the country. These people had already been assimilated for a long time or were in the process of assimilating, and in terms of culture were deeply rooted in Polish society. Those who were characterized by a deep lack of a sense of togetherness with other Jews chose

the editorial staff of Ha‘aretz daily, Handelzalts lives and works in Tel Aviv. 385 Interview with Aleksander Klugman, Tel Aviv, 14 July, 2008. Born in 1925 in Łódź, he emigrated to Israel in 1957. A journalist, publicist, author of several books and Polish-Hebrew dictionaries, Klugman lives in Tel Aviv. 184 Węgrzyn

Poland as a symbol and meaning of their own identity. Therefore, between 1956 and 1959 they did not submit applications to leave for Israel. However, for most of them living in Poland did not last long—after the incidents in March 1968 they were forced to emigrate by the People’s Republic of Poland authorities.386 Most Jews were leaving, some were considering emigration, but there were also those who had no intention of leaving Poland. Their determination and ideological attitude is well depicted by a contemporary witticism: “Who would stay in Poland if borders were open and everybody who wanted could emigrate? Only Jews who want to prove they are not Zionists.”

386 Jaff Schatz, “Świat mentalności i świadomości komunistów polsko-żydowskich—szkic do portretu,” in Społeczność żydowska w PRL przed kampanią antysemicką lat 1967–1968 i po niej, ed. Grzegorz Berendt (Warsaw: National Remembrance Institute, 2009), 48. Memories of a Forgotten People: A Conflict of Expectations

Shmuel Trigano

Between WWII and the 1970s there was a massive transfer of distant Jewish populations from Europe and Arab Muslim lands. For the most part they gathered in the State of Israel, and two-thirds of them were of Sephardi origin. How was this historic phenomenon constructed, both intellectually and method- ologically? The authors of articles in this book unite these two populations under the category of ‘refugees’, but is that the sole possible interpretation of this momentous event? The main issue is to decide what are the nature and identity of these two populations. There are two possible interpretations: a) The phenomenon refers to a combination of circumstances due to a historical coincidence. In such a case, identification of the two populations is possible on the basis of a humanitarian criterion, or through an ideological argument, i.e., the Zionist one; b) The phenomenon refers to a genuine and internal rationality in synergy, of course, with a global rationality related to greater events. In such a case, identification of the two populations is possible on the basis of a political criterion. Therefore, the combination of these two populations may be based on a humanitarian or a political rationale. In the first case, the assumption is that the Israeli nation was born of a series of circumstances and has no intrinsic existence; in the second case, that the Jewish People was the determining cause.

An Epistemological Issue

By ‘humanitarian’ interpretation, I mean an interpretation which considers the experience of the Jews as plagued by migration, and the State of Israel as a humanitarian “camp” rather than just as a sovereign state. If the State of Israel arose as a consequence of an antisemitic persecution, its nature is rooted in the irrational and not in the political, even if it has a political impact. Such an interpretation (‘humanitarian’) is also an ideological and political option, not a neutral one. It involves a dissociation of the two populations which are supposed to have nothing in common except having suffered from antisemitic hatred.

This is a truly epistemological issue and the root of contradictory expectations that jostle together around this question. What is at stake is the definition of the Jews as a people, which evidently derives from how the State of Israel, that after this migration became the figurehead of the Jewish collective condition, had to be understood.

The Eclipse of the Political Dimension

My interpretation will stress the political assumption that the Jews are a people. But we have to recognize here that we still face an unresolved issue, even if it is a crucial one for understanding the framework of contemporary Jewish existence. How were these two huge phenomena constructed in the symbolic realm: the destruction of the Ashkenazi European world and of the Sephardi North African and Middle Eastern world? Until today, the sole European migration—after the Shoah—has been constructed only according to the humanitarian interpretation. That is why the ‘memory’ pattern prevailed over the political one. It is characterized by four components stressing suffering, the victim ethos, the generalization of its reality, and an almost religious symbolical system, i.e., its sacralization. From this perspective the Jewish population is understood not in political, but rather in ethnic terms. In contrast, Jewish migration from the Arab Muslim world has remained a forgotten matter, not even recognized as a memory. Comparatively, certain facts acted upon the minimization of this tragedy: even if an entire world did disappear between 1940 and 1970, Jews were not massively exterminated as in Europe. Paradoxically, this trauma has been linked with the discriminatory manner in which this population has been treated in Israel, more than with the exclusion and expulsion to which they were subjected in their native country. I have tried to build a pattern of variables for the expulsion-exclusion of Jews in Arab Muslim countries. It shows that the same processes occur, more or less, and at different periods of time.387

387 See La fin du judaïsme en terres d’islam, ed. Shmuel Trigano (Paris: Denoël, 2009), and the pattern upon which I elaborated in “La fin du judaïsme en terres d’islam: une modé- lisation,” Octobre 2009, http://www.controverses.fr/pdf/Fin_judaisme_terre_d_islam_ Shmuel%20Trigano.pdf. See also id., “Antisionisme et antisémitisme,” Controverses 14 (2010): 158–71, http://www.controverses.fr/pdf/n14/trigano14-2.pdf; id., “The Expulsion of the Jews from Muslim Countries, 1920–1970: A History of Ongoing Cruelty and Discrimination,” Changing Jewish Communities, 15 November 2010 [electronic journal of Memories of a Forgotten People 187

Regarding the Shoah, its genuine political dimension in the native countries has also been totally disregarded if not denied, especially in Israel. It should have indeed been over-exposed because of the Middle East conflict, especially when the Palestinians created the myth of the Nakba to hijack the political impact of the Shoah and to rework its symbolism to their advantage by turning it against Jews.388 It indeed allows one to draw a parallel, because it constitutes a counter phenomenon in the plan of historical causality. Of one million Sephardi Jews, 600,000 found refuge in Israel, so there was an exchange of populations when the Arab and Israeli states were created. The denial of this reality in Israel gave preference to the Zionist motive in the Sephardi aliyah, obscuring the expulsion they suffered and the ‘Arab original sin’. Even the unity of this population has been denied in spite of its massive nature389 with the creation of a specific global ideological-political category, Edoth HaMizrakh. Eda (ethnic group) stresses the exteriority to the nation, and also these communities’ inferior status (tribal and under-national). This category placed the Sephardi population on the fringes of the Israeli nation when one should have spoken about ‘the Jewish people’ because this was the first time in history that Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jewries gathered in the same place, in such a massive way, and in a sovereign framework.

The Sociology of Knowledge Approach

Different expectations in respect to the Jewish migratory phenomenon have different ideological bases, but every ideological perspective is connected to

the Jerusalem Center of Public Affairs], http://www.jcpa.org/JCPA/Templates/ShowPage. asp?DRIT=4&DBID=1&LNGID=1&TMID=111&FID=623&PID=0&IID=5174&TTL=The_ Expulsion_of_the_Jews_from_Muslim_Countries,_1920–1970:_A_History_of_Ongoing_ Cruelty_and_Discrimination. 388 The 1948 so called (today) ‘refugees’ are indeed the vanquished party in a war of extermination they launched against the new State of Israel together with the Arab League. They are not ‘innocent victims’ but vanquished aggressors. An easy comparison might be done with the fate of one million Jews in Arab Muslim countries who were expelled and despoiled although they were not part of any conflict. 389 And its own self-awareness. There was a “Memorandum from the Sephardi Communities Representatives in Eretz Israël” presented in 1946 to the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry which warned about the collective fate of this Jewry; see The Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry on Palestine, ed. Azriel Carlebach (Tel Aviv: Z. Leyneman, 1946), 2 vols., 2:671–75 (Hebrew). I would like to thank Dr. Tsvi Zameret who brought this document to my attention. 188 Trigano a social basis. What militates for the triumph of the humanitarian interpretation? It is something attached to the modern condition of the Jews. The approach of social morphology helps us to understand that and to evaluate the ideological coefficient of this interpretation. Migration is itself the disruption of a social form, the transition from one form to another. In order to examine the Jewish case, we have to assume that the Jews have a ‘form’ because they exist. Each of those two populations constituted, in the principle itself of their existence, a whole, an entity, if only because they shared a common fate in all European states just as in the ten Arab Muslim countries.390 This morphological fact (the massification of the Jews) is objectively true, regardless of its subjective acknowledgment by the players in the arena of history. The gathering of these two migratory movements in Israel helps us understand this collective and global condition, because this is where it took shape, concretely and manifestly, even if not always consciously.

The Morphological Disruption of European Judaism

The most obvious, as well as the most obscure, morphological transformation concerns the European migration. The political morphology of the mass destruction of the Jews is indeed significant. The Jews, who were citizens and nationals as individuals in their respective countries, were massively expelled from each European country. Yet, at the same time, also expelled from all the European countries, as if they were nationals of a foreign people, unknown in modern and democratic Europe. With the Shoah, the Jews as a people objectively resurface on the political modernity stage, whereas emancipation required and ratified the obliteration of their peoplehood, and even more so of their collective and cultural identity. All the Haskalah (Jewish Enlightenment) literature advocating their emancipation is a vibrant testimony to this reality.391

390 In thirty years, between 1940 and 1970, the similar destiny of Jewish populations from ten Arab Muslim countries, from the Atlantic to the Indus, is striking, for it is the consequence of a policy shared by all the Arab Muslim countries that are supposedly different as national states. It indicates the similar condition and destiny of Jews in those countries, so that they appear to form a coherent whole that has suffered the same process of national exclusion. Such an approach enables a theoretical leap. The book I edited, La fin du judaïsme en terres d’islam (above, n. 1), brought together the history of the ten Jewish communities as they came to an end in those countries, in order to compare their experience. This was the first time such a study was carried out. 391 See the explanation in my publications, La République et les Juifs après Copernic (Paris: Les Presses d’aujourd’hui, 1982); L’avenir des Juifs de France (Paris: Grasset, 2006); and Memories of a Forgotten People 189

This disruption has remained incomprehensible until today not only for Europeans, but also for Jews, since their existence and consciousness form one body with ‘modern ideology’—the emancipationist ideology which recognized them only as individuals. French anthropologist Louis Dumont coined the notion of ‘modern ideology’, interpreting modernity as an ideology, too. This throws light on some aspects of things, but conceals others (e.g., how the modern idea of equality is blind to the perpetuation of hierarchies in modern society). Regarding the Jews, there is no mental framework in modern ideology to understand the collective condition of the Jews in its political scope.392

Conflict of Expectations

European Perspective From a European viewpoint, the Jewish collective fate in the Shoah is incomprehensible, except when referring to victimhood: fatality, racism, barbarism, and irrationality. From this perspective, a Jewish collective is only regarded as ‘victims’ or ‘refugees’. Contemporary leftists sometimes argue that Hitler himself invented a Jewish People, so that every form of collective Jewish identity after the Shoah (i.e., as diasporic communities or as the State of Israel) triumphantly bear Hitler’s policy and are essentially Nazi. All the anti-Zionist views equating Zionism with Nazism come from here. In this sense, Europe can understand the existence of the State of Israel only in ‘ethical’ terms: as a humanitarian solution and not as a plainly political fact or a sovereign subject. And this view has political consequences: it irresistibly leads to a doctrine ruling on the harm caused to innocent Palestinians as a consequence of the political solution to this humanitarian problem. They are the final victims of the Shoah, ‘victims of victims’ in Edward Saïd’s phrase, implying that the first

a résumé in “The French Revolution and the Jews,” Modern Judaism 10, 2 (May 1990): 171–90. 392 However, this ideological blindness does not concern only Jews but is shared by all political modernity regarding the condition of any collective identity. Democratic individualism, just as purely legal citizenship, has turned it into an irrational that resurfaced through the outbursts of nationalism and totalitarianism, both attempting to reform a totality against the specific-to-individualism fragmentation. They went hand in hand with the antisemitic phenomenon, another attempt to reconstitute a social totality (see Jean Paul Sartre’ analysis in Réflexions sur la question juive) through an excluded referent: the Jews. Antisemitism has been the unique and catastrophic way to understand the Jews as a people in the abstract democratic citizenship: grasped through the secret Jewish plot. 190 Trigano ones became torturers. Here is where the post- Zionist theory of the ‘original sin’ of the State of Israel was born.

Israel’s Perspective There is also a specific Israeli bias regarding the Jewish migratory phenomenon. From Israel’s viewpoint, Sephardi migrants were not considered ‘refugees’ but future citizens. Arriving in Israel, they were considered as the forever-awaited members of the Israeli nation (although not particularly wanted).393 This helps us understand how much, in the State of Israel, the (exilic) ‘Jewish People’ has been transformed into the ‘Israeli nation’. At the same time, European Jews have nevertheless—and without consistency—been considered as ‘refugees’. This became evident when Israel accepted—rightly, in my opinion—German reparation monies. This even though Ben Gurion’s decision constituted a crisis for the Israeli citizenship’s ideological doctrine, (that citizenship severs ties with the Jewish exilic past and condition). The population coming from Arab Muslim countries, on the contrary, was not considered as ‘refugees’ and Israel never presented it as a political claim against Arab States in the international arena, as did the Arabs with the ‘Palestinian refugees’.

Arab Muslim Perspective How is the dual Jewish migratory movement perceived from the Arab Muslim perspective? Unlike the European doctrine of victimhood, it views the migratory phenomenon concerning the European Jewish population as violent and colonial, but at the same time as a rebellion and a betrayal in what concerns the Jewish Sephardi population. According to its narrative, this last migration was a non-event. The Jewish historical destiny also refers here to the unthinkable. In Muslim consciousness, which is very powerful in those countries that have attained modernization in the past few decades, Jews were and are considered a dhimmi people. Their destiny is a collective one indeed, but subject to Shari‘a law, relegating them to the segregative status of a pariah. The possibility of their emancipation or of their accession to sovereignty is inevitably understood as violence committed against Islam. And that is indeed what happened. The choice of Israel—the Zionist choice—by two-thirds of these Jews, has to be understood as a process of rebellion which occurred within Islamic lands, in Palestine, by a people in the chains of Islam. This event—which for the Jews is a process of self-determination—is dou- bly unthinkable from the Arab perspective because the Jews’ emancipation

393 Consider Ben Gurion’s statement that he was only interested in their women’s bellies . . . Memories of a Forgotten People 191 began in countries during the colonial era when Jews were liberated from their dhimmi condition by the colonial powers that succeeded Ottoman imperial domination. This viewpoint is strengthened with the immigration of European Jews, at the time related to colonial powers. Here is precisely where the Arab rejection of Israel in this new era is rooted, beginning after the Second World War when Arab nationalist movements were gaining in strength.

The Political Problematic

At the opposite end of the de-politicization of the Jewish migratory movements there is a political interpretation. The first hypothesis of such an explanation concerns the collective destiny of those two populations, in each of the areas they came from and in Israel, where they joined the Israeli nation and regarded themselves as a nation. A double scope is also at stake here: Jewish and global. The experience of postwar migrations and the disappearance of Diaspora centers is indicative of the re-appearance of the forgotten Jewish People on the modern stage of history and politics through the existence of Israel. It involves three moments: first, the massification of European Jewry—beyond national compartmentalization; the massification of Jewry from Muslim countries— over and above their residence in the new states; and then the unification of those populations in a third term, the State of Israel, opening a new era in Jewish history. The mass gathering of Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jewries for the first time in history meant the resurgence of a people on a global scale, an entity which, through the State of Israel, stands in politics and history as a sovereign body, and certainly not as a humanitarian refuge for persecuted people. This resurgence is inseparable from political modernity. It is not the return of an ‘archaic’ condition.

In Arab and Muslim Countries What happened to the Jews and to Zionism had already happened to other dominated nations in the Ottoman Caliphal Empire, and this teaches us a les- son. The Greeks first became independent in 1822. Then came the Armenians, from the moment a national movement was coming into being (with the Armenian Revolution Federation created in 1890 at Tiflis). Their first clash occurred under the Ottoman Empire with the slaughter of 1894–95 and afterwards, with the Genocide of 1915–1916, under the ‘Young Turk’ regime, which is the pattern for secular and radical nationalism in a Muslim country. Zionism constituted the third historical instance of a non-Arab Muslim nationalism, 192 Trigano when the Ottoman Empire was falling apart and Arab nation-states that had never existed before were developing through a nationalist movement. The destiny of Jews in those countries must be considered as a part of this global national emancipation process of dominated peoples such as Armenians and Greeks who, after the colonial period, had no choice but regression to dhimmi status. The destiny of the Jews has not been the product of historical fate (racism), as if they were a random gathering of Jewish ‘petit blancs’, the poor underclass Jews, the back-up troops of colonial powers, a destiny that colonial defeat forced them to flee. This destiny to an end with the final decline of the colonial powers, because these powers saved them and freed them from a pariah status. The fact that a majority of them have found refuge in Israel has to be understood in a positive way and not negatively as a reaction to hatred. This is the crystallization of the collective destiny of a people which remained a people until the end of the Ottoman Empire and even after the constitution of differentiated Arab nationalities. If Jewish conditions in Europe became those characteristic of individualism, a collective condition was indeed more preserved in the East during the colonial era, when Jews had a specific status (European nationalities) in a diversified society and afterwards in the new Arab nation-states, which did not succeed in creating a real citizenship.

The Jewish National Process

As for European Jews, since Theodor Herzl, a Jewish national process was developing against the background of the crisis of emancipationist citizenship. Seemingly, this a consequence of the antisemitic and nationalist phenomenon that refused citizenship to Jews because of their peoplehood. Actually, the Jews just followed the evolution of political modernity that began with the 1789 Declaration of Human Rights which constituted the nation as a legal citi- zenry based on democratic individualism and, a few dozens of years later, by the appearance of national mass identities. The turning point occurred in the Jewish world only forty to fifty years after the so-called 1848 ‘Spring of Nations’ in which nationalism emerged— the opposite of democratic individualism. This evolution did not happen because it was part of the democratic project but—let me employ a psycho- analytic notion—as the unmanaged backlash of the repression of democratic individualism. Nation(alism) is the byproduct of democratic individualism. That is why Zionism stayed within the Emancipation logic, except that it did not define the Jews as individual and anonymous citizens, but as a democratic nation. That Memories of a Forgotten People 193 is why it inaugurates a new version of Jewish modernization: auto-emancipation. And that is the paradox of political Zionism.394

Cause of this Dual Destiny

The unified destiny of these two populations is due to an intrinsic cause: the political status of the Jewish condition in political modernity. Yet this situation is part of a larger landscape. The histories of the Arab Muslim world and of Europe are not separated, and not only because of colonialism. The ins and outs of European politics also link them. This historical interweaving has several aspects: it enabled dhimmi Jews’ emancipation while also transmitting to the colonized peoples the concept of the nation-state. Paradoxically, Arab nationalism is indeed a by-product of European colonialism and nationalism,395 including its possible antisemitic development,396 whose anti-Zionist version was first created by the Arabs in the 1920s. All the Arab and Muslim (Turk, Iranian) nationalisms have been more or less antisemitic and decreed at certain times and in certain countries anti-Jewish laws, which, in their more systematic form, were similar to the Statute of the Jews under the Vichy regime. The antisemitic dimension of Arab nationalism also comes from Europe’s political evolution. Arab nationalists allied themselves with the Axis powers, Hitler’s Germany and Mussolini’s Italy, because the Allies’ enemies were becoming their friends397 to fight the colonial powers.

394 That is to say, maintaining the fundamental logic of political modernity and therefore, concerning the Jews, a logic which has difficulty in recognizing collective identity in general, and more precisely (and that is paradoxical) the reality of a Jewish people underlying the Israeli nation. 395 Therefore, two processes are active in determining the Jews’ destiny: an Islamic oumma process liberating itself from the colonial yoke, and a process of Arab nationalism creating new nation-states following the Western pattern: an Islamic globalization process simultaneously at stake with a process of fragmentation aimed at creating national states. There is no internal contradiction in this dual process: pan-Arabism, on a national basis, and pan-Islamism have always converged one towards the other. 396 To be distinguished from genuine Islamic and Qur‘anic anti-Judaism. 397 For the history of this convergence between Arab nationalism and Nazism and fascism, see Roger Faligot and Rémi Kauffer, Le croissant et la croix gammée: les secrets dl l’alliance entre l’Islam et le nazisme, d’Hitler à nos jours (Paris: Albin Michel, 1990); Juliette Bessis, La Méditerranée fasciste: l’Italie mussolinienne et la Tunisie (Paris: Karthala, 1981). 194 Trigano

Historians have only begun studying this development.398 It concerns Israel, Zionism, and Jews from the Arab Muslim world. Indeed, Palestinian Hajj Amin al-Husseini, who was the Arab nationalist leader, Jerusalem’s Mufti, a dignitary with the Nazi regime, and the leader of a Muslim SS unit in Yugoslavia, committed a large part of the Arab nationalist movement to support Nazi Germany and its politics of the extermination of Jews. This has linked the destiny of Jews from Arab Muslim countries with that of European Jewry, both of them, then, becoming parts of a same strategic sphere. Iraqi Jews knew a pro-Nazi regime, Algeria’s Jews suffered from the Vichy exclusion, Tunisian Jews began to suffer from Nazi persecution. Hitlerism didn’t have time to carry out its extermination enterprise with this Jewry because of the Allies’ landing in North Africa and Rommel’s defeat in Libya. The temporality of these two Jewries is different, however. The consequence of the European events took thirty years to impact upon the Sephardi world, but the same logic applies in both spheres. The constitution of European nation-states had banished the possibility of a Jewish collective existence: their collapse in the First World War made it resurface tragically with the dead end of the Second World War. On the other hand, the collapse of the Ottoman Empire had liberated the dhimmi peoples, whereas the establishment of Arab nation-states jeopardized this liberation.

The Israeli Perspective

The encounter of those migratory movements in Israel raises the question of a Jewish people in an Israeli nation, in political modernity, in democracy, and in modern nationality. Some phenomena—in the news and in the discussion of the place of Judaism in the State of Israel, of the Law of Return, or of the ideology of the ‘negation of the Exile’, are all vivid testimonies to this problem. From this standpoint the political construction of the migrant population from Arab Muslim countries has a major function to play in understanding not only the relationship between Israel and these countries in times of military conflict, but also of its relationship to itself as a historical Jewish People. Because the emancipation of this population occurred in a multi-cultural and colonial area, it indeed remained closer to peoplehood. Its fate constitutes a

398 See, among others, Mathias Kuntzel, Jihad and Jew-hatred: Islam, Nazism and the Roots of 9/11 (New York: Telos Press, 2007); Martin Cüppers and Klaus-Michael Mallman, Croissant fertile et croix gammée: le Troisième Reich, les Arabes, la Palestine (Lagrasse: Editions Verdier, 2009). Memories of a Forgotten People 195 lever to free oneself from ‘modern ideology’ which obscures recognition of the Jewish collective. It represents the emergence of a different temporality in the modern temporality specific to Zionism. The existence of Israel lends more validity to the main question put to political modernity: what is the place of collective identity in a system based upon democratic individualism? As for the Jews, the question is: does the Jewish People have a place in the logic of political modernity? This holds extremely important consequences for the political and international status of the State of Israel in today’s conflict. The Reasons for the Departure of the Jews from Morocco 1956–1967: The Historiographical Problems

Yigal Bin-Nun

The history of the Jewish community in independent Morocco is one limited in time. The almost total evacuation of this ethnic-religious minority is an opportunity for a historian to trace its itinerary in a country that was transformed from a French protectorate into a new independent state maintaining close ties with the former colonial power as well as with the Arab Muslim world and developing third world countries. Aware of the issue, the historian can evaluate more easily the failure of its integration into Moroccan society and the reasons that led to its departure ten years after the end of the colonial era. He can also observe with lucidity how attractive the young Israeli state, though coping with difficulties to survive or exist, was to the eyes of a minority torn between its long local history in Morocco, its French culture, and its Jewish identity. The pattern followed by historians when writing about the modern history of the Jews in eastern and western Europe might be incompatible when we attempt to adapt it artificially to the Moroccan conjuncture. Certain concepts, such as emancipation, assimilation, antisemitism, haskalah (Enlightenment), and Zionism, are applicable to Jewish communities in which a dichotomist distinction took place between, on the one hand, assimilation into the country of origin and, on the other hand, the alternative of a specific Jewish nationalism. The second option advocates the realization of an active Zionism with various successive stages: ‘escape’ (flight from the hell of concentration camps), ha‘apalah (‘illegal’ immigration to Palestine during the British Mandate period), aliyah (immigration), halutsiyut (realization of a pioneering lifestyle on the kibbutz or in a moshav), haganah (Jewish self-defense), etc.399

399 Yaron Tsur, “The Ha’apala and the Edification of a National Society: the Influence of Clandestine Immigration from Morocco on the Relationships between Israel and the Moroccan Jews,” HaTsiyonut 17 (1990): 145–74 (Hebrew). See also id., A Torn Community: The Jews of Morocco and Nationalism 1943–1954 (Tel Aviv: Am Oved, 2001) (Hebrew); Yaron Tsur and Hagar Hillel, Jews in Casablanca: Studies on the Modernization of the Jewish Leadership in a Colonial Diaspora, North African Jewry in the 19th and 20th Centuries, 1–2 (Tel Aviv: Open University, 1995) (Hebrew); Yaron Tsur, “Jewish Historiography and the

This structure might entail confusion, given that instead of the conventional dichotomy between assimilation and particularism we are confronted with a different structure, consisting of three poles applying attraction on the various social layers of the community in question. That is actually the case of the Jewish community of twentieth-century Morocco, exposed to three distinct poles of attraction: specific Jewish identity, French civilization, and Moroccan reality. The decisive choice between these three has somehow changed over time. Resigned support of the French occupier was succeeded by a short period of identification with the newly independent state and the hope of integrating into its society. But uncertainties and anxiety about the future of the new regime incited the Jewish population to opt for solutions implying leaving Morocco. Thus was accomplished the evacuation of the local Jewish community. Under the pretext that some imminent danger was threatening this community and that it was their duty to save those people at any cost, the Israeli emissaries and the international Jewish organizations became involved with the destiny of Moroccan Judaism by evoking hypotheses which later proved to be wrong. Alexander Easterman, of the World Jewish Congress (WJC), was aware of the difference in nature between the Jewish community of Morocco and European Judaism. According to him, throughout the history of the Jewish diaspora in eastern Europe the Jews appear as being persecuted and compelled to wander from one place to another, striving to find a refuge that would allow them to live as they please, and looking for ways to provide for their family. In Morocco, on the contrary, the situation was the opposite: the Moroccans did all they could to hold the Jews back in their country by persuasive, political, and

Ethnic Problem,” in Making Israel, ed. Benny Morris (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, (2007), 231–77; id., “Modern Identities of Jews in Muslim Lands: The Arab-Jewish Option,” Pe‘amim 125/127 (2011): 45–56 (Hebrew). In these publications Tsur tried to fit Moroccan Jewry into a conventional historical structure and used a terminology having a communal connection with Judaism in both eastern and western Europe. Even for Meir Knafo, one of the first volunteers in Misgeret, it was essential that his activities be perceived as a characteristic chapter of the history of Zionism: “The history of Misgeret, and its place in the contemporary history of Zionism where it should occupy an essential place. . . .” To him, this affiliation is more outstanding than the identification of Misgeret with the history of Israel or with that of the Jewish community of Morocco. See the testimony of Meir Knafo, Organization of Persons Active in Ha‘apalah from North Africa (Irgun Peilei Haha‘apalah miTsfon Africa; hereafter IPHTA), ed. Meir Knafo, IV, July 1994, Tel Aviv. 198 Bin-Nun economic means.400 Contrary to this point of view, Foreign Affairs Minister Golda Meir only saw in the sinking of the ship Egoz one more link in the chain of the exploits of the ha‘apalah, part of the long history of the Jews’ struggle against antisemitism.401 Moshe Sharett also saw in this tragedy one more page in the history of Jewish martyrdom: “I think that in the whole chapter of the martyrdom of our immigration until today, there has not been one episode like the one of the present Jewish emigration from Morocco.”402 The ideology that fuelled the activity of the Israelis in Morocco actually relies on a basic axiom claiming that in the Diaspora any Jew, as such, is in constant danger due to eternal and universal antisemitism. The State of Israel only has the right to exist if it assumes its responsibility to extend protection to any Jew in the Diaspora. Eliezer Shoshani, the historian of this emigration, has found a justification for the intervention of the Israeli emissaries in the Jewish community of Morocco by referring to the responsibility incumbent upon Israel to watch over the destiny of all the Jews in the world, “whether the Jew is actually asking for it or he does not explicitly demand it.” He believes that no one could contest the right of Israel to intervene and to interfere in the Jewish Diaspora. Israelis had no difficulty in interpreting the meaning of

400 Alexander Easterman’s speech at the 4th general ssembly of the political department of the WJC in Stockholm, August 1959. See Yigal Bin-Nun, “La négociation de l’évacuation en masse des Juifs du Maroc,” in La fin du Judaïsme en terres d’Islam, ed. Shmuel Trigano (Paris: Denoël Médiations, 2009), 303–58; id., “The Contribution of World Jewish Organizations to the Establishment of Rights for Jews in Morocco (1956–1961),” Journal of Modern Jewish Studies 9, 2 (2010): 251–74; Michael Laskier, “Jewish Emigration from Morocco to Issrael: Government Policies and the Position of International Jewish Organizations, 1949–56,” Middle Eastern Studies 25 (1989): 357–58. 401 “The Sinking of the Immigrants’ Ship off the Coast of Morocco,” Declaration by Minister of Foreign Affairs Golda Meir, 18 Jan. 1961, in Divrei haKnesset (Knesset Debates) 30, 754 (Hebrew); Yigal Bin-Nun, “Israeli Media Assault on Morocco after the Sinking of the Immigrant Ship ‘Egoz’, January 1961,” Kesher: Journal for the History the Press in the Jewish World and Israel 38 (Spring 2009): 55–65 (Hebrew); Asher Kesher, “Tough Nut to Crack,” Yediot tiqshoret, Ashdod, 2 Aug. 2013: 544–48 (Hebrew); Shmuel Segev, Operation Yakhin: The Secret Immigration of Moroccan Jews to Israel, 2d ed. (Tel Aviv: Ministry of Defense Pub. House, 1985), 185 (Hebrew); see also id., The Moroccan Connection: The Secret Ties between Israel and Morocco (Tel Aviv: Matar, 2008), 87–97 (Hebrew). 402 Moshe Sharett’s speech at the meeting of the Mossad le-teum (Liaison committee between the government and the Jewish Agency), no date, in Eliezer Shoshani, Testimonials from Friends, roneotyped document, ‘top secret’, copy no. 76, [April 1964] (Hebrew); Yigal Bin- Nun, “The Relationship between the Emissaries of the Israeli Mossad and the Jewish Community of Morocco,” REEH: Revue Européenne d’Etudes Hébraïques 9 (2004): 57–70 (Hebrew). The Historiographical Problems 199 this responsibility. Therefore, the act of delegating Israeli agents to Morocco is irreproachable. In his view, there is no difference between the operations of the Mossad403 in Morocco and the dispatching of Israeli paratroopers to Nazi Europe in the midst of World War II. The evacuation of the Jews from Morocco is a significant victory for Israel in the accomplishment of Zionistic ideology.

If we were to attribute to the State of Israel any accusation for actions taken or not taken, the inculpation for having intervened in favor of the Jews of those diasporas, before it was too late, would gladly be accepted. In addition, there would be in such an act on its part one more point to justify its existence in the eyes of the nations.404

Meanwhile, Shoshani was forced to admit that despite the fact that the creation of the State of Israel was the direct consequence of the hypothesis according to which any Jew around the world was in danger, “It appeared that the obvious danger connected to their physical existence [of the Jews in Morocco] was not such an emergency. . . . But there is no hope or future for the Moroccan Jewish Diaspora, and as long as it goes on existing . . . the sword of Damocles is hover- ing above its head.”405 According to him, “the years gone by since the independence of Morocco until today [1963], have not justified the catastrophic hypotheses about the condition of the Jewish Diaspora in Morocco. Instead of the acts of violence that were anticipated as inevitable, a state of tolerance established itself and the Jews were allowed to leave the country almost freely.” Because of such tolerance, Shoshani deplored this state of affairs in the following terms: “This situation does not enable to foster among the volunteers [of the Israeli clandestine network] and even among their leaders, a state of tension in the activities of the clandestine organization of defense.” One could

403 The Mossad (Organization for Information and Special Operations) was founded in 1951. It deals mainly with information as well as secret activities beyond Israel’s borders, whereas the Shin-Bet or ‘Shabak’ (General Security Services) ensures internal security. The chief of the Mossad is directly responsible to the prime minister. In its early days the Mossad was also active in organizing self-defense and emigration of the Jewish communities in Arab countries. Isser Harel, as head of security services, was in charge of the Mossad as well as of the Shin-Bet commanded by Israel (Isy) Dorot. See Inès Bel Aiba, Younès Alami, Ali Amar, and Aboubakr Jamaï, “Le Maroc et le Mossad,” Dossier spécial et éditorial, Le Journal Hebdomadaire, Casablanca, no. 167 (3–9 July 2004): 3–4, 20–29. 404 Eliezer Shoshani, Nine Years out of a Thousand, roneotyped document, top secret, copy no. 76, [April 1964], 37 (Hebrew). 405 Ibid., 24. 200 Bin-Nun sense among the members of Misgeret406 “an atmosphere of weariness, discouragement, as well as a loss of interest and calling for the matter. . . . If the years pass without any aggressive act committed by the [Muslim] majority and without any acts of violence being provoked, it results in an imbalance in the moral sanity of the leaders. . . .” According to the ideology of Misgeret, the Moroccan authorities had successfully outmaneuvered the intentions of the Israeli network’s leaders, thanks to their favorable behavior towards the country’s Jews.407 The chief of Misgeret headquarters in Paris, Ephraim Ronel, was convinced that the sinking of the Egoz and the arrests caused by the distribution of an Israeli flier were not justifiable, despite the fact that he had given his consent to those actions: “[These two events] encourage us to ask ourselves the following question: Are we really allowed to put in danger the lives of Jews, men, women, and children, while there is no risk of an immediate pogrom in sight and that their lives are not in danger?”408 These examples pertinently concretize the discrepancy between the ideological precepts that motivated the Israeli emissaries and the social reality which was revealed to them in Morocco. This gap between intentions and reality led the Israeli emissaries to promote inappropriate activities that more than once caused damage to the families that they had come to rescue. Needless to say, those emissaries sincerely believed in the concepts that were guiding their actions. Nevertheless, their ideological conviction was so strong that it altered their perception of reality. Many years later, with hindsight, some of them had to admit that on the face of it their positions were incompatible with what had been revealed to their eyes. A relative shift had occurred in them between their former ideas and their appreciation of events thirty or forty years later. Confronted with this change when they were giving their accounts, they claimed almost unanimously: “You have to understand the climate of the time.” In other words, their ideas and actions were in some way just a reflec- tion of the consensual ideology in Israel in those days, so much so that they were incapable of subscribing to the reality that was unfolding before their eyes. Let us note, by the way, that the question of historical judgment of the past is a topic largely debated by various historiographical schools. However, despite outrageous objectivist positions, it is obvious that a historian can only

406 Misgeret is the name of the network established in Morocco by the Mossad, first to supervise Jewish self-defense and then the clandestine emigration. 407 Shoshani, Nine Years, 39. 408 Testimony of E.R. [Ephraim Ronel], in Shoshani, Testimonials. See also Ephraim Ronel (Rosen), “The Misgeret from Operation Egoz until Operation Yakhin 1960–1964,” IPHTA III, 45. The Historiographical Problems 201 interpret events according to his own opinion and depending on the time when they are written. Indeed, he can by no means pass judgment contrary to his conscience or his convictions. The secret, underground, conditions that were essential to the efforts of the Israeli emissaries in Morocco inevitably gave birth to some myths, independent of reality or facts—so little disclosed until this very day. Many years later, the evacuation of the Moroccan Jews, despite the ‘defense secret’, aroused squabbling between the Israeli emissaries and the employees of the Jewish Agency, as well as within each group, to determine who would bear the “honor of having saved Moroccan Judaism.”409 These differences of opinion emanate mainly from the agents’ gap of information about the operations initiated by their predecessors or their successors. Consequently, they are lacking a global view of the situation and do not have enough distance enabling them to judge correctly the part of each of the protagonists in these operations. Furthermore, needless to say, certain emissaries who deplore the minimization of the part they played in the rescue of the Moroccan Jews are not necessarily the ones who had a capital share in these operations. In addition, one could note the harsh words of Naftali Bar Giora in one assembly of the Clandestine Volunteers Organization and of the North African ha‘apalah:

As soon as the rescue operation was over, already a long time ago, out of nowhere are coming some people who claim to have played the most essential part in this activity. From time to time some publications mention names of volunteers who boast about actions they have never accomplished and on the other hand, those who actually did them are not known to the public.410

More than anything, the ideological framework of the rescue operation was the source for all kinds of myths, such as the cruelty of the Moroccans, the tor- ture inflicted upon emigrating families, antisemitic acts of violence against the Jews of Morocco, and the legendary exploits of some emissaries. The first head of Misgerets in Morocco, Shlomo Yehezqeli, who bequeathed us a most lucid testimony, addresses this topic in his memoirs, written shortly before his death in 1993. He knew what had been said about the role of each emissary in the vicissitudes of a period of time that he had followed closely in Morocco and in Paris, from August 1955 until the end of the Operation Yakhin:

409 Eyal Ehrlich, “Who Saved the Jews from Morroco. The Lost Honor of Secret Agents,” Ha‘aretz Weekly Supplement, 29 May 1987 (Hebrew). 410 Naftali Bar Giora’s testimony, IPHTA III, quoted in Bin-Nun, “The Relationship,” 65. 202 Bin-Nun

However much importance I attach to that myth and to its propagation due to its educative value, and despite my opposition to the new tendencies to tear them apart, we are responsible for the propagation of those myths. We must uphold the truth and it is our duty, the generation of clandestine volunteers here present, to safeguard it, unmask any falsifi- cations or exaggerations, and prevent that some inconvenient truths be concealed. The greater the nucleus of these myths, the stronger is its psychological influence and perpetuity. I promise you, and you actually all know, that the genuine history will be able to create the myth we wish for. Who knows whether in fifty years from now some ambitious researcher will cast doubt on this this truth.411

Thus, the story of those days somehow unfolds itself between some truth- conscious and staunch partisans, and the great majority, more interested in a blend of truth and myth in various doses, often livened up by Isser Harel’s regrettable statement: “Moroccan Judaism needs myths.”412 Regarding the written history of those times, it is crucial to note three characteristic features that weigh on the work of reconstructing the events. These are secrecy, silence, and oblivion, each of which has left its mark on the history of this emigration. Secrecy was linked to the clandestine activity by Israel’s emissaries to Morocco. Silence was the necessary motto of the Moroccan authorities’ policy in the manner in which they paid attention to the exit of the Jews. Oblivion characterizes a community that has been uprooted from its geo-cultural environment, moving away out of obvious necessity from its recent past, and even needs to put memory in standby to integrate into Israel, its new adoptive country. In such an atmosphere of discretion and dissimula- tion, it stands to reason that the history of the Jews of Morocco is relatively little known by the Jewish public in general and by Moroccan Jews in particular. Indeed, the dramatic events that had turned their lives upside down took place without them being aware of them, and often even without their leaders knowing either. This is the reason why writing about the history of that period of time clashes with the interpretation of its components on a field where the actors who took part in it are still making efforts to dissimulate it. In relation to the reconstruction of the events, we must bear in mind the characteristics of the 1950s in general and those in Morocco in particular. Jewish Moroccan society and its leaders were divided into several very distinct social environments, unfamiliar with each other. The most important was that

411 Shlomo Yehezqeli, “The First Days,” IPHTA IV. 412 Testimony of the emissary Dan Kariv, Kfar Saba, 21 Jan. 1998. The Historiographical Problems 203 of the directors of Jewish institutions and members of the committees of the various communities. They would often gather at meetings, debates, or recep- tions. Far away from that group was a nucleus of Jews involved in Moroccan political and social life. It included members of both wings of the Istiqlal, of the Wifaq, and the senior civil service in the new administration. Alongside them were members of the Communist Party as well as fervent partisans of integration who, though relatively detaching themselves from the community, were acting with strong convictions.413 In the third circle youth group counsel- ors and their executives were intensely active. Also, mainly coming from the Département Educatif de la Jeunesse Juive (DEJJ) but keeping their distance from all, were a significant number of volunteers from Misgeret and Israeli youth movements, working under a remarkable cover of secrecy. Since there was little communication between these groups, there was no community-wide means of passing information. There existed within the ruling class an involuntary and artificial partition that tightly separated the various social environments. Consequently, a great number of Jewish personalities had little idea about the concerns of the other groups of this hetero- genic society. This artificial partition persisted even after the mass departures of Moroccan Jews. Moreover, one of the prestigious leaders of the Moroccan Jewish scouts and of the DEJJ, who had taken part in numerous social projects which brought together masses of youth, had not even been informed of the sinking of the Egoz, nor of the Israeli fliers distributed a month later, of the arrests, or of the Misgeret volunteers who fled.414

413 Yigal Bin-Nun, “The Movement for Integration of Jews in Moroccan Society after Independence (1956–1967),” Pe‘amim 125/127 (2011): 235–84 (Hebrew). 414 This is Claude Sultan who was asked to replace Edmond Sadoun as director of the boarding school of the ORT Ain Sebaa in Casablanca because the latter had to flee from Morocco after the arrests triggered by the propagation of the Israeli flier. Sultan only heard about the sinking affair at the beginning of the 1980s when David Amar asked him to write a letter about the transfer of the bodies from the sinking to Israel; interview with Claude Sultan, Paris, 1 June 2001. Even Professor Haïm Zafrani only heard that the ship Egoz had sunk after several months, despite his involvement in the communities’ public life; interview with Haïm Zafrani, Paris, 22 May 2001. Salomon Azoulay testifies that even in the 1980s when André Azoulay, Hassan II’s counselor, was asked to intervene about the reburial of the bodies of the victims in Israel, he did not know what all this was about; interview with Salomon Azoulay, Paris, 11 June 2001. See also Bin-Nun, “Israeli media assault”; id., “Fes-Meknes Branch of ‘Misgeret’ and Its Collapse after the Israeli Announcement of February 1961,” in Fes and Other Cities in Morocco: A Thousand Years of Creativity, ed. Moshe Bar Asher, Moshe Amar, and Shimon Sharvit (Ramat Gan: Bar Ilan University Press, 2013), 359–96 (Hebrew); Segev, Operation Yakhin, 185. 204 Bin-Nun

Nevertheless, there is considerable documentation on this epoch that enables reconstructing quite precisely the events that took place as well as the relationships between the various protagonists of this diplomatic affair: the Moroccan authorities, the Israeli emissaries, the representatives of world Jewry, and the leaders of the local Jewish community. Apart from some documents, most of the mass of archival material has not yet been studied. That is why our knowledge about the period is not only insignificant but often incompatible with reality as reflected in those documents. Because of the intensity of the events and the persistence of Israel to act quickly and intensely to evacuate the Jews, a considerable body of correspondence is available consisting of letters, telegrams, and reports on the talks between several Israeli organizations, Jews, and Moroccans who had any influence on this emigration. These elements of course, include the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Jerusalem, the Jewish Agency, and the Mossad. Among the most active international Jewish organizations are the World Jewish Congress and the American Jewish Committee, but also the Alliance Israélite Universelle, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, The Joint (The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee), Bnai Brith, and more. We can also point to the existence of numerous reports compiled by delegates of world Jewish organizations, mandated by Israel, or by Israelis whose identity has been concealed. When dealing with those archives and the testimonies of volunteers from Misgeret, it has been necessary to undertake a fastidious reconstruction effort to decipher the identity of the many people designated by pseudonyms. Decoding pseudonyms was particularly complex, because the emissaries had several pseudonyms, which generated confusion and mistakes of identification.415 Moreover, thanks to this ample documentation

415 In daily life, each emissary to Morocco had several identities confirmed by passports, the main ones being British, Austrian, German, Belgian, and French. When uncovered, the emissaries were compelled to get themselves a new identity that the Israeli Embassy in Paris had already prepared ahead of time In his relationships with other emissaries in Morocco, each emissary used another pseudonym, sometimes in Hebrew and on other occasions in French, but with the local volunteers with whom he was in contact he would use yet another pseudonym, this time a French one. During his training at internships in Israel or in Paris, the emissary was known by an additional pseudonym in Hebrew and in the documents of the Mossad one or the other of those pseudonyms was used randomly, either the emissary’s real first name or the initials of his original or Hebraized name. This is how Eliezer Shoshani usually referred to the emissaries. But considering the profusion of emissaries, even the initials of the real name did not make the identification process any easier, even with the help of Misgeret heads such as Ephraïm Ronel and others. Besides these pseudonyms, when Shmuel Segev published his book he had to make up new ones in order not to reveal their identities. But he sometimes used pseudonyms The Historiographical Problems 205 we can quite precisely reconstruct innumerable talks and contacts established by leaders of each of the three axes that constitute tripartite relationships. These reports can be classified into two categories: the first one deals with the political, social, economic, and military status of Morocco and its Jewish community; the second one reproduces the talks of Jewish or Israeli emissaries with Moroccan leaders. The first category includes the reports prepared by the WJC, the AJC, Bnai Brith, and the HIAS as well as reports of visits to Morocco by those organizations, by the leaders of the Mossad in Paris, and by the heads of Misgeret in Morocco. The second category contains details of interviews of Alexander Easterman, Gerhart Riegner, André Jabes, Aqiva Lewinsky, André Chouraqui, Yaaqov Caroz, Marcel Franco, and others with important Moroccan political personalities, as well as some from the opposition. Despite the extensive amount of written sources, we must stress their sub- jectivity. Obviously, diverse opinions and subjects of controversy can be found in those documents. Still, those sources only reflect one of the poles of the triangle constituted by the contacts between Israel, Morocco, and its Jewish community. Written sources from Morocco are very few and of minor importance. They consist mainly of press articles reflecting different political tendencies, in Arabic and in French, and of official declarations by the leaders of the time. While Israeli agents generally report the speeches of senior officials, they must be treated carefully because they have gone through a filter relative to their destination. The lack of sources from Moroccan archives is not just the consequence of negligence. However, we can assume that such archives are partially inexistent for two reasons: the first is that, after Morocco’s independence, the Jewish community, the State of Israel, and international Judaism played an insignificant role in the issues that preoccupied the leadership of the young state of Morocco. The second reason is that interviews of heads of the state with international Jewish delegates and undercover emissaries from Israel constituted a delicate matter; therefore, the Moroccans had better not leave written traces that could later cause them much trouble in their internal political struggles and their relationships with other Arab countries. Furthermore, even though there are some written testimonies of those interviews in the archives, presumably from the Moroccan secret services, it is obvious that Morocco does not have, until today, any interest in unveiling them to the public. This being the case, post-Hassan II Morocco is presently experiencing a thirst and a need for transparency that questions those ‘leaden years’.

used by volunteers, which adds to the confusion. That is why there are still many pseudonyms that have not yet been deciphered, especially of people belonging to the ‘Public Support’ or in connection with the Moroccan authorities. 206 Bin-Nun

It is likely that some new Moroccan historians and journalists, at times defying censorship, will undertake treatment of the sensitive details of the agreement concerning the departure of the Jews of Morocco.416 Despite such a quantity of documents, the most crucial events concerning the relationship between the two countries still remain in the shade because of the secrecy that Israel continues to maintain about them. Concerning some of those files, we do not know what they contain.417 Most of all, this documentation relates to the ‘Compromise Agreement’ (sometimes called the Gatmon– Benjelloun agreement) by which Israel paid a sum in damages to King Hassan II from August 1961. Other reports that are still top secret are those on visits of some Moroccan personalities to Israel and the documents concerning the ‘parallel branch’ that the Mossad created in Morocco which was responsible for the support Israel tendered to the king, his army, and his secret services. As long as those files are not declassified as state secrets, we will continue to

416 Benjamin Stora, “Maroc, le traitement des histoires proches,” Esprit, Aug. 2000, 88–102; “Regards sur un Maroc en alternance,” Esprit, Feb. 2002, 56–68. 417 In the Israel State Archives (ISA), in the files of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Israeli embassy in Paris, and the Prime Minister’s Cabinet, the following files are found, always designated by the same letter S (secret), at least until October 2000. Here are some examples: ‘Max’, “North-African subjects, 1957–1958,” file 3753/10; “The situation of the Jews of Northern Africa—political documents 1958–1959,” files 209/8, 9, 10; “Political relationships between Israel and Morocco 1960–1961,” file 934/32; “Yossef Golan 1960– 1961,” file 936/9; “Golan 1962–1963,” file 947/4 “Jo Golan, Nahum Goldmann,” January 1960 to December 1966, four files: 4332/9, 10, 11, 12; “The relationships of Israel with Iraq and Morocco,” May 1959 to April 1960, the Prime Minister’s Cabinet, file 7225/16; “Correspondence with the Mossad,” June 1962, file 4315/20; “The activities of the Mossad 1964–1964,” file 4326/25 “Morocco—the relationship with Israel, with pictures of the king,” file 3622/5; “Aherdan”, January–June, 1961, file 3766/9; “Ben Barka,” October 1962, file 3774/39; “Ali Benjelloun,” February–September 1962, file 3767/22; “Chouraqui A.2,” undated, file 3774/39; “Chouraqui Mission,” 1963,file 4326/2; “Report of Rabbi Kaspar on Morocco,” December 1960, file 4317/7; “Theo Ben-Nahum,” March 1961–July 1964, file 2784/21; “Morocco—The relationship at government level, the Bul affair,” file 4042/28. Apart from these secret files, there are in the archives supplementary files with unde- cipherable code names of which some must have a connection with our topic. To this archival documentation should be added the archives of the Mossad of which only part of its documents have been published in the limited diffusion report of Eliezer Shoshani. In most cases, this correspondence has as letterhead the following level of classification: ‘Personal’, ‘recipient only’, ‘secret’, ‘top secret’, ‘coded telegram’, and other designation combinations of this kind. However, the level of secrecy can hardly be understood based on these categories. The name of Ben Barka is generally transcribed by the initials B.B. and the Mossad’s emissaries designated by their first names or by pseudonyms. The Historiographical Problems 207 have only an incomplete fragment of the events, history being, anyway, not the account of all that happened in the past but only the little, if any, that came randomly to our knowledge. More research would be necessary if those files were ever opened to the public. The testimonies of personalities who played an active role in the events of that time constitute a particularly sensitive source. Contrary to what one might assume, this problem is not linked to the natural weakening of memory but rather to the later interpretation of the events. It is necessary to establish a distinction between the attitude, the words, and the acts of these witnesses at the time and their judgment or appreciations many years later, when they gave their testimonies. In several cases some changes can be discerned in their judgments, which should be taken into account. Besides, because of the secrecy and wall of silence surrounding the events, it is obvious that these witnesses did not have a global view of what was going on. Most of them could only testify about their own experiences or on some events to which they were directly connected. It seems also that the division between regular and secret services did not exist only within the Misgeret network, but was also at the core of Moroccan Jewish society. From this point of view, a historical work presenting a global perspective of the time would certainly be a revelation and an innovation for several actors in these events and definitely for the great mass of emigrants from Morocco in their respective diasporas. As for Moroccan historians, they hardly dared write about the period that followed the independence of their country. They preferred to deal with colonial and pre-colonial times, but were afraid to drift into the contemporary history of independent Morocco because of political squabbles that might force them to express opinions which could harm them.418 There are few French

418 Nevertheless, some examples of works written by Moroccans, most of whom reside in France, about the period under discussion can be mentioned. Maâti Monjib, La monarchie marocaine et la lutte pour le pouvoir: Hassan II face à l’opposition nationale de l’indépen- dance à l’état d’exception (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1992); Zakya Daoud and Maâti Monjib, Ben Barka (Paris: Éditions Michalon, 1996); Abderrahim Ouardighi, Les énigmes historiques du Maroc indépendant, 1956–1961: de l’indépendance à la mort de Mohammed V (Rabat: A. Ouardighi, 1979); id., Le Maroc de la mort de Mohammed V à la guerre des sables 1961– 1963 (Rabat: A. Ouardighi, 1981). Ouardighi does not give his sources and in general his works are favorable towards the palace, unlike the two works cited above by M. Monjib who is an opposition supporter. Moumen Diouri, A qui appartient le Maroc? foreword by Ahmed Rami (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1992: id., La mémoire d’un people: chronique de la résis- tance au Maroc 1631–1993 (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1993); id., Réalité marocaines: la dynastie alaouite de l’usurpation à l’impasse (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1987); Kamal Eddine Mourad, Le Maroc à la recherche d’une révolution (Paris: Sindbad, 1972); Hassan II, La mémoire d’un roi, 208 Bin-Nun historians of this period and their research is usually subjective. It ranges, in general, from praise of colonialism to an unconditional support to the left wing opposition.419 As for Israel’s diplomatic relations with the Moroccan authorities, no Moroccan documentation is accessible on this matter, at least because no one has written any account of these talks. The delicate nature of these contacts and the fact that the personalities who took part in them, such as Mehdi Ben Barka, Mohammed Oufkir, and Ahmed Dlimi, later became taboo in Morocco where they are practically not mentioned anymore because of the development their relationships with the palace, leave no room for hope that documents on the

entretiens avec Eric Laurent (Paris: Plon, 1993); id., Le défi (Paris: A. Michel, 1976); Fatéma Oufkir, Les jardins du roi: Oufkir, Hassan II et nous, témoignage (Neuilly-sur-Seine: Michel Lafon, 2000); Abderrahim Lamchichi, Islam et contestations au Maroc (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1990); Abdallah Laroui, La crise des intellectuels arabes: traditionalisme ou historicisme? (Paris: F. Maspero, 1974); Édouard Moha, Histoire des relations franco-marocaines ou les aléas d’une amitié (Paris: J. Picollec, 1995); Penseurs maghrébins contemporains, ed. Abdou Filali-Ansary and Mohamed Tozy (Casablanca: Éditions EDDIF, 1993); De Gaulle et le Maroc, ed. Mustapha Sehimi (Paris: Publisud, 1990); Mustapha Sehimi, Guédira: fidélité et engagement (Rabat: Okad, 1996); Omar Bendourou, Le pouvoir exécutif au Maroc depuis l’indépendance (Paris: Publisud, 1986); Ali Benhaddou, Maroc—Les élites du royaume: essai sur l’organisation du pouvoir au Maroc (Paris: L’Haramattan, 1997); Abdelkhaleq Berramdane, Le Maroc et l’occident, 1800–1974 (Paris: Karthala, 1987); Abdallah Laroui, Le Maroc et Hassan II: un témoignage (Québec: Les Presses Inter Universitaires ; Casablanca: Le Centre Culturel Arabe, 2005). 419 As examples, I will only mention the most important ones: John Waterbury, The Commander of the Faithful: The Moroccan Political Elite—A Study in Segmented Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970, translated to French); Le Maroc actuel: une modernisation au miroir de la tradition, ed. Jean-Claude Santucci (Paris: Éditions du CNRS, 1992); Rémy Leveau, Le Fellah marocain, défenseur du trône, 2d rev ed. (Paris: Presses de la Fondation nationale des sciences politiques, 1985); Charles-André Julien, Le Maroc face aux impérialismes, 1415–1856 (Paris: Éditions J.A., 1978); Jean and Simmone Lacouture, Le Maroc à l’épreuve (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1958); Claude Palazzoli, Le Maroc politique: de l’indépendence à 1973 (Paris: Sindbad, 1974); Gilles Perrault, Notre ami, le roi (Paris: Gallimard, 1990); Attili Gaudio, Allal el Fassi ou l’histoire de l’Istiqlal (Paris: Alain Moreau, 1972); Stephen O. Hughes, Morocco under King Hassan (Reading: Ithaca Press, 2001); Jean-Pierre Tuquoi, Le dernier roi: crépuscule d’une dynastie (Paris: Grasset, 2001); Pierre Vermeren, Le Maroc en transition, La découverte, (Paris: La Découverte, 2001); id., Le Maroc de Mohammed VI: La transition inachevée, Cahiers libres (Paris: La Découverte, 2009); Ignace Dalle, Le règne de Hassan II, 1961–1999: une espérance brisée (Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose; Casablanca: Tarik Editions, 2001); id., Les trois rois: La monarchie marocaine de l‘indépendance à nos jours (Paris: Fayard, 2004); id., Hassan II entre tradition et absolutisme (Paris: Fayard, 2011). The Historiographical Problems 209 subject will be found. The Jewish community and the movements of the DEJJ have not kept any archives, and some even had to burn their archives after the episode of the Israeli flier and the collapse of the Misgeret network that followed the sinking of the Egoz.420 Despite what the title of this article might suggest, there is no parallel treatment of Morocco and Israel. It is actually about a system of contacts established between the two countries that had recently achieved independence, but the starting point is rather the history of Morocco and of its Jewish community, and contacts with the Israeli emissaries who operated in its territory are not treated extensively. Consequently, the focus of the article is entirely on what took place on Moroccan soil. French rule over Morocco ended on 3 March 1956, and one month later, on 7 April, Franco’s Spain in turn, granted independence to Spanish Morocco.421 After independence, Moroccan Jewry accounted for about 230,000 persons out of a total population of around ten million inhabitants. Most of the Jews were living in big cities, especially Casablanca. From the beginning of the French Protectorate in Morocco, a small stream of Jewish emigrants had left the country to go to France, Spain, and mostly to Israel. Jewish emigration from Morocco is usually divided into three big periods. The first, called ‘Qadima’, began after the creation of the State of Israel in 1948 and continued until Morocco’s independence in 1956.422 The second is the period of the clandestine emigration organized by Misgeret (from the beginning of 1957 to November 1961), and the third is the period of ‘Operation Yakhin’ in which emigration took place in accord with the Moroccan authorities, using collective passports (1961–1966). The history of the Jewish community during the early years of Moroccan independence is one of constant anxiety regarding an unclear future and the

420 Nevertheless, Salomom Azoulay claims that he is in contact with someone, whose identity he does not reveal, who possesses archives about the Jewish community, and that he expected to have them at his disposal; interview with Salomon Azoulay, Paris, 11 June 2001 421 The international city of Tangiers only modified its legal status and was formally annexed to Morocco as late as October 1958, while the Peseta continued to be the legal currency in the old Spanish Protectorate until January 1959. 422 Qadima is the name of the Zionist organization in Morocco. After a while this name was identified with the Department of Immigration of the Jewish Agency. The name was also often associated with transit camp for immigrants, located 26 km from Eljadida, because the Jewish Agency operated it. For the authorities of Morocco, this name represented the Zionist organization in Morocco after independence. See Yigal Bin-Nun, “Jo Golan—Un destin marocain,” Brit [Ashdod] 29 (2010): 78–85; id., “La quête d’un compromis pour l’évacuation des Juifs du Maroc,” Pardès 34 (2003): 75–98; id., “La négociation de l’évacua- tion en masse.” 210 Bin-Nun possibility of impending disaster. During this period the Jewish community was forced to address several critical questions, which would ultimately determine the future of Moroccan Jewry as well as the future of individual Jews in the community. While the struggle for independence had been waged without much involvement on the part of the Jewish community, the withdrawal from colonialism presented each Moroccan Jew with fateful options: whether to seek personal and communal success within a democratic progressive country or to flee the country out of fear of a possible disaster.423 A conviction that disaster was imminent after the French left Morocco and independence was obtained was what motivated the policies adopted by Israel’s leaders and the activities of its emissaries. Many Jews in Morocco also feared an apocalyptical event that would harm their status and their future in the country. There was no disaster, but fear of it took its toll. Those who had foreseen only negative developments and were convinced that the disaster had only been delayed for a limited time and that it would undoubtedly still take place were later forced to acknowledge that independence had not hurt the Jews but had only opened a new era for them that reminded some of the golden age in the relations between Jews and Muslims. Among the educated classes, euphoria was predominant.424 The mistakes of the Israeli government and its emissaries burst this bubble and ended the social-political-economic flowering from which all the Jews were beginning to benefit. The Jewish community of Morocco was comforted by the fact that even though Israel had unintentionally upset their social advancement in the short run, it gave them a sense of security in the long-term and a clearer sense of their future. This history of the three-way relationship between Israel, the Moroccan government, and Moroccan Jewry could be entitled “the catastrophe that didn’t happen.” Carlos de Nesry put it well:

The Jews of this country bring to mind the person who was saved from an explosion and is afterwards surprised to discover that he is healthy and whole. During the days of the protectorate, it seemed to them that independence would be a dramatic revolution with unpredictable results.

423 Mark Tessler, “Morocco’s Next Political Generation,” in Alienation or Integration of Arab Youth: Between Family, State, and Street, ed. Roel Meijer (Richmond, Surrey: Curzon Press, 2000), 1–26; id., “Islam and Democracy in the Middle East: The Impact of Religious Orientations on Attitudes toward Democracy in Four Arab Countries,” Comparative Politics 34 (2002): 337–54. 424 Yigal Bin-Nun, “Between Euphoria and Disappointment: The Moroccan Jewish Community after Independence,” Gesher 148 (2004): 45–59 (Hebrew). The Historiographical Problems 211

In the end, they saw it as a sort of apocalypse in which the peace and quiet, which they knew under the French government, could be destroyed forever. The severity of the omens justified this fatalistic fear. When independence was achieved, they learned that it was not all that terrible.425

The departure of the Jews from Morocco to more attractive locations that promised, in the long run, an improved quality of life was thus a part of an internal demographic process that grew in strength with the passage of time. The migration to Israel, France, Canada, and South America should thus be seen in this historical demographic perspective which itself took place as part of the process of educational and cultural development which France had brought to the Jews of Morocco. Within a relatively short time, the Jewish community had absorbed the advantages of French civilization to such a degree that a large gap was created between them and their Arab-Muslim geo-social environment, a fact that motivated them to continue the migration process toward new horizons. The relative backwardness of Moroccan society would sooner or later have pushed the Jews out of independent Morocco. It was an inevitable process for the country’s Jews, who sought to improve their social status and be concerned about their children’s cultural future.

425 Carlos de Nesry, Les Israélites marocains à l’heure du choix (Tanger: Éditions Internatio nales, 1958), 18. Not Just a Language Barrier: Israel’s Media and Communication with New Immigrants in the 1950s

Rafi Mann

There are countless standpoints from which one can study the different ways groups of immigrants were integrated into a society. One of them is through the prism of the media. Media studies in general, and media history specifically, can provide valuable insights on the societies in which media organizations operate.426 The study of the channels of mass communication between Israel’s absorbing political elite and the new immigrants from Europe and the Middle East, presented here, has been a part of a wider project focused on the Israeli media in the first post-independence years and various aspects of the relations between the government and the media.427 Researchers who studied the issue of media for immigrants have differentiated between media launched and operated for immigrants by the absorbing community, and media operated by immigrants themselves.428 In the case of the mass immigration after Israel’s independence, the majority of the media organizations were for immigrants, operated by the government or by various political parties. They included, at that time, daily newspapers, weeklies, and magazines, as well as radio broadcasts (Israeli television broadcasts were launched only in 1966). Of the large number of media organizations, this paper will focus mainly on radio broadcasts, which were under direct government control,429 and newspapers published by the ruling party in those years, Mapai.430 The research questions are: which languages were used and which were not, what were the reasons for those linguistic choices, and what can one learn from those choices.

426 Tasha G. Oren, Demon in the Box: Jews, Arabs, Politics, and Culture in the Making of Israeli Television (New Brunswick, NJ and London: Rutgers University Press, 2004), 2. 427 Rafi Mann, The Leader and the Media: David Ben-Gurion and the Struggle over Israel’s Public Sphere, 1948–1963 (Tel Aviv: Am Oved, 2012) (Hebrew). 428 Dan Caspi and Nelly Elias, “Don’t Patronize Me: Media-by and Media-for Minorities,” Ethnic and Racial Studies 34, 1 (2011): 62–82. 429 Dan Caspi and Yehiel Limor, The In/Outsiders: The Media in Israel (Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press, 1999), 130–31. 430 Mann, The Leader and the Media, 224–27.

Language-wise, the political and cultural elites gave first priority to Hebrew. Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion said in 1952: “The tribes of the Diaspora are now being fused into one people, united and unique. For the renewed Jewish nation, Hebrew is the cultural cement, as the land is the material cement and independence the political one.”431 Teaching Hebrew to the new immigrants was considered a crucial component of the melting pot, but command of the national language was an urgent practical need as well. First and foremost in the army, where every soldier, as Ben-Gurion put it, must know “the name of each part of the rifle, the machine gun, the bomb, and the airplane.”432 Children of new immigrants studied Hebrew in schools, while young soldiers went through language crash courses as part of their basic training in the army. But how did the absorbing society communicate with newcomers who were not students or soldiers, and could not understand Hebrew, whether orally or by reading? Radio was considered the main channel for such communication by the state authorities for two reasons. First, potentially, it could reach most of the population, even the illiterate. Secondly, as a state monopoly the content of the broadcasts over The Voice of Israel (Kol Israel) could easily be controlled by the government. The majority of Kol Israel’s programs were in Hebrew, but shortly after the independence of Israel it began broadcasting special programs for new immigrants in their own languages. This was done in a framework called ‘Ulpan La‘oleh’, a studio [intensive language instruction] for the new immigrant.433 When it was inaugurated, Yiddish was chosen as the first language; later the new immigrants could hear programs in Ladino (Judeo-Spanish) and French as well.434 The choice of Yiddish as the first language was logical at the time, since in mid-1948 the large majority of the newcomers were Jews from eastern Europe, most of them Holocaust survivors. But broadcasting in Yiddish on the government radio might be surprising as well, since Ben-Gurion, from the first days of his political career in the early twentieth century, had been launching

431 Quoted in Eyal Chowers, The Political Philosophy of Zionism: Trading Jewish Words for an Hebraic Land (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 153. 432 Remarks by Ben-Gurion at a meeting of The Hebrew Language Committee (Va‘ad halashon ha‘ivrit), 3 January 1949, Speeches and articles, Ben-Gurion Archives, Sede Boqer (hereafter BGA) (Hebrew). 433 Ulpan translates literally as ‘studio’ but is also used to designate a framework for the intensive learning of Hebrew. 434 Izi Mann, This Is the Voice of Israel Broadcasting from Jerusalem . . . : A Nation behind the Microphone (Jerusalem: Israel Broadcasting Authority, 2008), 142 (Hebrew). 214 mann a ‘cultural war’ against this language. For him Yiddish was the symbol of Diaspora life that should be abandoned by the modern state of Israel.435 It is not clear if anybody had consulted with Ben-Gurion before beginning to broadcast in Yiddish. But it is clear that those officials who made the program- ming decisions were mostly eastern European Jews who themselves knew the language or had relatives who spoke Yiddish. Many of them did not share Ben- Gurion’s attitude to Yiddish, as it was ‘mame loshen’—their mother tongue. For most of the senior officials in the government and in Mapai, Yiddish was not a foreign language but rather ‘the Jewish language’, in the words of Zalman Aranne, Mapai’s secretary-general in those days.436 But even the first prime minister, who was not only a statesman but also a practical politician, understood the need for Yiddish. In 1949, shortly before the elections to the first Knesset (Israel’s parliament) he gave a speech in this language to new immigrants at a political rally in Jaffa.437 Moreover, on the personal level he admitted in 1963 that he was still calculating and reading numbers not in Hebrew, but in Yiddish.438 In 1951 another language was added to the radio programs for new immigrants: Yemenite. These broadcasts began after some 45,000 immigrants arrived from Yemen. Of the Oriental Jews, those who arrived from countries in the Middle East and North Africa, the Yemenites were treated somewhat differently. The immigration of Yemenite Jews had begun much earlier, in the 1880s. They were part of the Yishuv, the Jewish community in Eretz Israel under the British Mandate before the independence of Israel. Mapai maintained a special department for Yemenites, and one of them, Israel Yeshaiahu, was on the party list for the elections to the first Knesset, becoming a member of the Knesset in 1951. Ben-Gurion repeatedly spoke of his dream to see “a Yemenite Chief of Staff for the army” as the future clear sign of the success of his melting pot policy.439 His vision called for a Yemenite general, not an Iraqi or a Moroccan one. With all the absorption problems that the Yemenites had to endure, they had their connections to the establishment.

435 Rachel Rojanski, “The Final Chapter in the Struggle for Cultural Autonomy: Palestine, Israel, and Yiddish Writers in the Diaspora, 1946–1951,” Journal of Modern Jewish Studies 6, 2 (2007): 185–204. 436 Ben-Gurion to Zalman Aranne, 13 August 1954, Correspondence, BGA (Hebrew). 437 Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 22 January 1949 (BGA) (Hebrew). 438 Meeting with the Editors Committee, 31 March 1963, Israel State Archives, Record Group 434/14, file A-7224/39 (Hebrew). 439 Zvi Zameret, The Melting Pot in Israel: The Commission of Inquiry Concerning the Education of Immigrant Children during the Early Years of the State (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2002), 57. Not Just a Language Barrier 215

This was not the case with most of the immigrants who arrived in Israel in the early fifties from other Middle Eastern countries, among them 120,000 Jews from Iraq and 17,000 from Egypt. They were Arabic speakers, but this language was never part of the ‘Ulpan La‘oleh’ broadcasts. Actually, those immigrants could listen to Arabic on Israeli radio, but the programs in this language were not part of the absorption process into Israeli society. These programs, which later developed into a separate unit—the Arabic Radio Service, were propaganda broadcasts, aimed first and foremost at the neighboring countries, the Arab world, with a secondary audience— the Palestinians within Israel. The content of the Arabic programs had purposes and contexts that differed from the broadcasts to the new immigrants. The radio programs for new immigrants, in Yiddish, Ladino, French, Yemenite, Bulgarian, and many other languages that were added later, were all part of the major social engineering project, the melting pot.440 Their content was intended to assist the listeners to become absorbed into the new society. Although often paternalistic, it was meant to be inclusive, all-embracing. It was part of the Israeli public sphere. The Arabic language broadcasts, on the contrary, were transmitted to the state’s enemies, beyond the parameters of the Israeli-Zionist society. The editors and broadcasters in Arabic received their instructions from the Prime Minister’s Office and the Foreign Ministry. Their mission was to fight the propaganda war, not to educate newly arrived citizens.441 Only in 1958, ten years after independence, did Ben-Gurion declare in the Knesset that the Arabic broadcasts of the Voice of Israel were not only hasbarah (propaganda or public diplomacy) broadcasts to the Arab world, but were aimed at Arabic-speaking Jews within Israel as well.442 He made this statement after receiving a report from the director general of his office, Teddy Kollek, indicating that many new immigrants were listening to Voice of Israel broadcasts in Arabic. The Arabic Radio Service thus created a unique kind of ‘acoustic sphere’ combining three different kinds of audiences, with dissimilar needs: citizens of Arab countries, Palestinians residing within Israel, and Arabic-speaking Jewish new immigrants. All of them received the same messages, originally tailored by government officials for publics that were not intended to be part of the Zionist revolution.

440 “Voice of Israel for New Immigrants,” Davar, 7 July 1950: 27 (Hebrew). 441 Interview with Shaul Bar-Chaim, Director of the Arabic Radio Service, 1948–1960, 14 November 2010. 442 Divrei Haknesset (Knesset Debates), 27 March 1958 (Hebrew). 216 mann

In order to understand the attitudes that were behind such decisions not to broadcast in Arabic for new immigrants, one should look at what happened in another medium—the press—at roughly the same time. Mapai was making efforts in the early fifties to communicate with Arabic speaking new immigrants. The party published a weekly magazine in Arabic, El Watan (The Homeland), in order to address them. El Watan had a very limited circulation, just a few thousand copies, and in 1953, due to budgetary problems, the party was about to close it down. Party officials needed money spent on El Watan for publishing a magazine in Bulgarian, primarily because there was a quite strong representation of immigrants from Bulgaria among the Mapai membership. When the issue was raised in the Mapai secretariat, one of the suggestions raised to save El Watan was to join forces with the ‘Shin Bet’ (Security Services). The idea was to widen the target audience, so it would encompass both new immigrants and Israeli Arabs.443 The difficulty of the absorbing elite to recognize, understand, and appreciate the needs of this group of new immigrants was apparent in the words of Moshe Kitron, the party official in charge of dealing with the Oriental new immigrants in Mapai:

I was thrown into the rough and murky sea, that of ethnic groups and tribes. I have no one to consult with. This is a dangerous and stormy sea, but most of our comrades don’t take the time to think about this problem. There are positive processes of integration into the society, but the majority is negative . . . We brought 120,000 from Iraq. The basic fact about those people from Babylon is that these Jews are Arabs. There is an intelligentsia among them—doctors, engineers, teachers . . . but from the point of view of language, lifestyle, mentality—they are Arabs.444

Kitron’s words were clear testimony to the depth of the rift between the absorbing elite and the Oriental new immigrants. Not only the words he used—“they are Arabs”—but the picture he portrayed. He felt alone in the mission he was given, as most of the senior members of the state’s biggest party were not involved, even not interested, in ways to accommodate the needs of the new immigrants, who were almost strangers to them. Such problems of communication were apparent, therefore, in the Arabic radio programs. Shaul Bar-Chaim, director of the Arabic Radio Service of the

443 Mapai secretariat committee, 5 May 1952 and 23 January 1953, The Labor Party Archives, Beit Berl (hereafter LPA) (Hebrew). 444 Mapai secretariat committee, 8 August 1952, LPA (Hebrew). Not Just a Language Barrier 217

Voice of Israel, testified that they had known all along that the new immigrants were listening to their programs, despite the fact that they were never instructed to address them. All the programs were planned for and aimed at Arabs, not Jews, mainly across the borders. Bar-Chaim, who was born in Iraq and immigrated to Israel in the early forties, was asked why there were never special radio programs for Arabic speaking Jewish new immigrants. He replied with words that echoed what is found in Mapai documents: “They thought that we were Arabs.”445 It is evident that communication with new immigrants is probably one of the basic components of absorbing them in their new country. The fact that the absorbing elite ignored the communication needs of Arabic speaking Jews who immigrated to Israel goes far beyond the language barrier. It was another symptom of the Eurocentric paternalistic approach towards immigrants from the Middle East and reflected something much deeper in the feelings and thoughts of many in the establishment towards those immigrants. If Yiddish was the mame loshen of the elite, Arabic was considered, in many cases, as the language of the enemy. Other tensions surrounded the use of new immigrants’ European languages in the media. While it was understood that the Jews who came from eastern Europe had to be addressed either in Yiddish or in their own languages, there was certainly uneasiness about it, as well as difficulties. The major political force at the time, Mapai, encountered many problems in communicating through the press with new immigrants from Europe. From 1948 until the mid-fifties—exactly the years of mass immigration—the party was not able to establish and maintain channels of communication with most of the newcomers in their languages. Weeklies were established and closed down, and could hardly compete with newspapers and magazines of other parties. It should be borne in mind that most of the newspapers of the time, both in Hebrew and in other languages, were affiliated with various political parties. This was another indication of how many in the absorbing society, particularly in the political arena, saw the immigrants: mainly as voters, masses of voters, who must be induced to put the right vote in the ballot box. Looking through the media prism, this can be seen even more clearly. Left wing parties, such as Maki (Israel Communist Party) and Mapam, were seen as more successful than Mapai with newspapers in Polish, in Bulgarian, and even in Yiddish. “Everything which appears in Yiddish is against our party and anti-government,” complained Zalman Aranne in 1950.446 Mapai wasn’t

445 Interview with Shaul Bar-Chaim. 446 26 April 1950, Archives of Zalman Aranne, LPA, file 4-7-20-1945 (Hebrew). 218 mann able to recruit writers and editors with the necessary dual qualifications: jour- nalistic professionalism and loyalty to the party. We have a “foreign legion” in our Polish newspaper, Aranne complained, not people who are loyal to the party.447 In addition, there was constant duality concerning foreign language newspapers, both in Mapai and in the government. In order to accelerate the study of Hebrew, as part of the absorption process, there were many who opposed the existence of such newspapers or tried to curtail them. This opposition had two major motives. One was based on the argument that the existence of such publications was a clear disincentive to the study of Hebrew and therefore slowed down the process of integration. The other was commercial: the proliferation of foreign language newspapers was considered serious competition with the Hebrew press. The publishers of the Hebrew newspapers therefore joined forces in order to persuade the government not to issue permits for new foreign language publications, which were necessary under the Press Ordinance enacted by the British in 1933. Publicly, Ben-Gurion and some of his senior colleagues were altogether opposed to the publication of foreign language papers. But they also faced a dilemma: Mapai, like other parties, had an urgent political need to communicate with the new immigrants in order to get their votes. As practical politicians they resolved the dilemma easily. As one of Mapai’s officials said: “The non-Hebrew press is a severe and damaging problem. But if other parties do it, especially when it comes to election matters, we have to do the same.”448 And so they did, or at least tried to do. While Mapai officials tried to promote publishing newspapers and magazines in almost every language, government officials, even from the same party, attempted to block many of those initiatives. The reasoning they raised was economic: there was a severe foreign currency shortage, and the newsprint had to be imported. They also wanted to encourage the new immigrants to learn Hebrew. Only in 1955, seven years after the beginning of the mass immigration, was Mapai able to consolidate its control over the foreign language press in almost every European language. One language was still missing: Arabic. In order to reach the immigrants from North Africa, especially from Morocco, Mapai published a newspaper in French. But, as party officials reported in 1959, L’information d’Israel was popular mostly among foreign diplomats and tourists, but it failed to penetrate into the Jewish Moroccan immigrant community.

447 HaDor Review, 1-41954, General Chronological Documentation, BGA (Hebrew). 448 Mapai secretariat committee, 30 Jan. 1953, LPA (Hebrew). Not Just a Language Barrier 219

This was just another example of the severe problems faced by the absorbing elite in the efforts to reach out to the Oriental immigrants.

In conclusion, the absorbing elite was not able, at least during the first years after independence, to build effective mass communication channels with the new immigrants as a whole. But it did display much more willingness to at least try to maintain channels to European Jews. The result was that the great majority of Oriental Jews, those who spoke Arabic, were left without an effective communication channel. There is reason to conclude that such a state of dis-communication both reflected the gaps between the absorbing elites and the Oriental Jews, and simultaneously exacerbated the relations between them.

Index

Agamben Giorgio 102 convention relating to the Status of Refugees Algeria 35, 40, 194 38–40 aliyah 8, 58, 139, 140, 147, 187, 196 Czechoslovakia 15, 18–20, 22, 47, 61–96, 130 American Jewish Distribution Committee CKŻP 67, 68, 70, 73–75 120, 138, 156 American Zone of Occupation 5, 51, 53, Dachau 48 124–25, 138 death marches 48, 49, 107 Jews at 48, 118 dhimmi 190–94 antisemitism 1, 9, 74, 79, 80, 115, 119, 121, Diaspora(s) 13, 25, 33, 41, 78, 89, 90, 183, 191, 123, 151–56, 168, 174, 175, 177, 178, 182, 196, 197–99, 207, 213, 214 198 Displaced Persons (DPs) 15, 17, 19, 20, 46, Arendt, Hannah 38, 102 113 Ashkenazi 157, 182, 166, 186, 187, 191 American Jewish chaplains and 112–36 Auschwitz-Birkenau 49, 51, 66, 81, 85, 99, camps of 137 103, 106, 107, 131, 151, 152 defined 114–15 Austria 15, 18, 46–59, 82, 114, 124, 128, 180 emigration to the Netherlands 169 Avrid, Eud 76, 77, 91, 95 links to past 109 passage to civil society 110 Balfour Declaration 89, 121 status of 49 Ben-Gurion, David 34, 41–43, 213–15, 218 Bergen-Belsen 99, 151, 12, 163 Ebensee 48 Bohemia 6, 64n94, 68, 69, 79, 81, 82 emigration 15, 18, 24, 3`, 65, 73, 86–96, 113, Brichah 50, 53, 54, 114, 122, 123, 123n234, 114n211, 132, 140, 160, 163 124 Arab Muslim people and 190–92 Buchenwald 99, 100, 101, 104, 106–10 chaplains and 122–28 Bund/Bundists 69, 69–70n10, 79 from Morocco 196–211 from Poland 173–82 Carpathian Ruthenia 6, 63, 64, 66, 73, 74, 81 Eretz Israel 47, 50, 56, 57, 124, 125, 214 Central Committee for Displaced Persons Ethiopia 118–19 Jews in 27 Communism/Communists 48, 63, 67, European Judaism 68, 70–73, 75, 76, 78, 79, 87, 89–96, 106, described 188–89 146–48, 174, 177–79, 205, 217 See also PCF Föhrenwald 113, 132 concentration camps France camp experiences 100–103 Jews in 137–49 child survivors 99–111 Paris 120, 135, 137, 129–30, 135, 138–48, education at 108–11 200, 205 ex-Communist countries 29–31 French Judaism 147 games and songs at 107–8 Freud, Anna 99 lawlessness in 102–3 Frischer, Arnost 81, 82, 84, 86–90 leaving 111 parents 101–2 Germany 13–20, 41, 55, 58, 72, 92, 103, 114, post-Liberation 103–4 119, 122, 124, 131, 139, 149 rebuilding lives and 104–7 DP camps in 64, 68, 89, 120, 131

Nazi 193, 194 population distribution 25–31 occupied 53, 54, 78, 118, 125, 138, 139, 144 repatriation 63 persecution in 36 self-help committee 116–17 postwar 47 Silesian 65, 70 Gunskirchen 48 trades of 142 JMW (Jewish Social Organization) 156– halakhah 44 57, 161 Hatikvah 85 Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) 48, 50, Hebrew 52–59, 67, 68, 123, 130, 132, 134, 138, 144, songs 68 156, 183, 204 teaching of 70, 109, 122, 212, 218 Herzl, Theodor 192 Klausner, Rabbi Abraham 116–28, 120, 133, Holocaust 66, 68, 71, 76, 119, 127, 133, 135, 134 138, 143, 147, 148, 15, 154, 166, 167, 217 health care for survivors of 46–59 Law of Return 34, 35 Hungary 15–20, 22, 47–49, 51, 66, 131 Israeli perspective on 194 medical rules of 43 IGCR (Intergovernmental Committee on Livazer, Hersh 113, 121–22, 125–30, 134, 135 Refugees) 139 Lower Silesia 65, 68, 70, 72, 73, 176, 176, 178 International Committee 50–52 International law 34–45 Masaryk, Jan 78, 83 IRO (International Refugee Mauthausen 48, 49 Organization) 33, 48, 115 media and communications 212–19 Islam 190 Misgeret 196–97n399, 200n406, 201, 203–5, Islamic countries 207, 209 Jews in 18, 24, 190 Moravia 64n94, 68, 69, 79, 81, 82 Israel Morocco 35, 196–211, 218 emigration to 18, 24 Mossad 139, 199, 199n403, 204–6 and the Law of Return 41 Muft, the 194 State of 30, 32, 37, 39, 41, 3, 44, 47, 49, 76–78, 113, 129, 181, 185–91, 194, 195, 198, Nadich, Rabbi Judah 120, 128 199, 205, 209, 214 National Jewish Welfare Board 112 Netherlands, the Jewish Agency 56–59, 122, 124, 139, 201, 204 Community organization 156–57 Jewish communal life Dutch wartime behavior 152–53 In Rheims and Paris 125–28 education in 160–61 JCC (Jewish Coordination Committee) 156, and migration 162 157, 161 orphans in 157–58 Jews postwar renewal in 150–66 in border regions 72–74 postwar years 155–56 Carpathiam 64–66, 68, 69 rabbis in 160 Czechoslovakian 61–96 and restitution 164–65 legal position 63 return of the Jews 154–55 migration system 21–25 social problems 161–62 Moroccan 196–211 war criminals 165–66 Polish 49, 53, 61–63, 65, 67, 138, 139, 142, 172, 174, 183 oleh 41–44 population change 15–21 olim 139 index 223

ORT (Organization for Rehabilitation and Universal Declaration of Human Training 143, 144 Rights 36–38, 45 OSE (Œuvre de Secours aux UJRE (Union des Juifs pour la résistance et Enfants) 106n201 l’entr’aide) 146 UNRRA (United Nations Relief and Palestine 30, 31, 39, 47, 57, 76, 78, 79, 82–84, Rehabilitation Administration) 46, 48, 88–92, 106, 113, 119, 121, 122, 124, 129, 131, 49, 54, 55, 115–18, 124 134, 138–441, 145, 148, 157, 163, 190, 196 PCE (Parti communiste français) 146 Vida, George 130–33 pogroms 65, 60, 62, 119, 134 Wiesel, Elie 102, 103, 109, 111 refugees 15, 34–38, 40‑45, 47, 50–57, 63, 65, Wolken, Dr. Otto 51, 52 66, 72, 74, 78, 82–84, 95, 115, 122, 123, 129, WJC (World Jewish Congress) 197, 204 130, 134, 135, 137–49, 185, 189, 190 Rivesaltes 105, 109 (YVA) Yad Vashem Archives 49 RŽNO 79, 82–96 Yiddish language 65–72, 74, 75, 107, 122, 146, Saïd, Edward 189–90 213–15, 217 Sephardi 185–87, 190, 191, 194 life 148 she’erit hapletah 46, 47, 53, 115, 117, 133 press 148 Shoah 13–15, 18, 20, 21, 33, 105, 150, 155, 157, songs 68 159, 186–89 stage 148 Six-Day War 15, 45 writers 71 Sobibor 101 Yiddisher Yishuv 72, 73, 145 Soviet Union/USSR/FSO 18, 21, 27, 29, 53, Yishuv 47, 57, 72, 121, 145, 214 63–67, 71–73, 78, 84, 91–96, 113, 114, 138, 143, 146, 179, 180 Zielsheim 131 Zionism/Zionist movement/Zionists 40, Teichholz, Bronislav 50, 51n60 42, 56, 70, 78, 79, 81, 84–88, 90, 106, 107, Terezin 99 118, 123, 123n239, 124, 147, 157, 163, 180, Theresienstadt 50, 85, 151 181, 183–85, 187, 189, 190–94, 199, 209n422, TSKŻ 68, 74, 175 215 Tunisia 35, 40, 194