The Story of Jewish Vienna During the Holocaust

Doron Rabinovici. Eichmann's Jews: The Jewish Administration of Holocaust Vienna, 1938-1945. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2011. x + 260 pp. $25.00, cloth, ISBN 978-0-7456-4682-4. Reviewed by Anton Pelinka Published on H-Judaic (May, 2013) Commissioned by Jason Kalman (Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion) When Doron Rabinovici published the Ger‐ “good” and “evil.” And, of course, according to Ra‐ man version of this book in 2000, the topic and binovici, it is the story of an evil without prece‐ the way the author dealt with it touched a very dent. But the roles of the good victims and evil sensitive aspect of Jewish and Austrian history: perpetrators are more complex. the behavior and the fate of the Jews who were When Hannah Arendt published her book on condemned to cooperate (collaborate?) with the Eichmann, she provoked a painful debate within Nazis--specifically with Adolf Eichmann who in the Jewish communities all over the world. Would 1938 started the process leading to the extermina‐ the Holocaust have succeeded without the naïve tion in Vienna; with Baldur von Schirach, who (as policy of Jewish institutions to cooperate with the “Gauleiter” of Vienna) was extremely proud to murderers in SS or police uniforms? Arendt ar‐ present his city as “free of Jews” (which, by the gued that the Jewish cooperation of the Jewish way, was not completely true); and with all the Councils and Elders, especially in the ghettos, was bigger and smaller wheels that the Nazi regime necessary for the efficiency of the Holocaust. The had established to delegitimize and expel all the Holocaust, noted Arendt, would have (of course) Jews of Vienna, about 10 percent of the city’s pop‐ happened without that kind of cooperation. But a ulation. More than a decade later, the English ver‐ policy of strict noncooperation would have pre‐ sion of the book may feel less provocative. The vented the illusions that Jews (understandably) facts of Jewish cooperation with the Nazis has be‐ nourished until the very end; would have come a lesser taboo. strengthened the militant resistance; and would Rabinovici describes and explains a story that have alarmed the Jewish masses at a time when seems to be as simple as it is catastrophic: the sto‐ flight would have still be an option for many of ry of pogroms, “aryanizations,” and deportations. the victims. It is a story that on the surface is the story of H-Net Reviews Rabinovici discusses the Austrian version of assist with the deportations to ghettos and exter‐ the debate started by Arendt half a century ago. mination camps. The specific Austrian sensitivity concerning Jews Rabinovici, in his extremely well-researched cooperating with the Nazi killing machine has one and well-documented book, does not portray name: Benjamin Murmelstein. Murmelstein was a Murmelstein as a hero of resistance. He tells the leading representative of the Jewish self-adminis‐ story of Murmelstein as an authoritarian person, tration in Vienna and, until the very end of Nazi much feared by the Jews under his command. He rule, served as the elder of the Terezin concentra‐ underlines the functionality of Murmelstein’s tion camp. Years after the liberation of the small (and others’) willingness to cooperate. Without number of survivors, Murmelstein was treated as this cooperation, the Holocaust would have a traitor by his own people, a criminal almost worked diferently. But it would have worked any‐ comparable to Eichmann. For Rabinovici, this way. Active, armed Jewish resistance in Vienna, completely negative view of Murmelstein is an after 1938, was (as Rabinovici argues convincing‐ oversimplification. Over and over, Rabinovici ly) no realistic option--and neither was it in presents evidence that Murmelstein tried to save Terezin. Jewish life whenever he saw a chance to do it. To Schirach’s claim that he had made Vienna be able to do it, Murmelstein made himself “func‐ free of Jews was never completely true. Jews sur‐ tional” for the machinery of extermination. He vived in Vienna, in small numbers, in the under‐ helped the Nazis to select Jews for deportation to ground, as “U-boats”; openly, in “privileged” mar‐ the killing felds in the East or directly to the gas riages; and within still existing Jewish institu‐ chambers. But by selecting some Jews, he tried to tions--like Murmelstein, who survived in Terezin. save others--for example, the younger generation, to preserve a future for Jewish identity in Europe. Rabinovici does not justify the behavior of Jews who decided to cooperate with the Nazis in a Murmelstein may have been influenced by moralistic way. But he tries to understand. “The the desire to save himself, but if so, his self-inter‐ Jewish functionaries saw no alternative. Coopera‐ est had clear limits. When he saw an opportunity tion with the Nazis appeared to be the lesser evil. to escape to London, between Austria’s incorpora‐ Again and again they cherished the hope of being tion in the Nazi empire and the beginning of able to rescue some of the community.... They had World War II, he decided to stay in Vienna. He no power of their own, they were authorities saw himself responsible to moderate the impact without power. Even retrospectively, there ap‐ of the Nazi policy, which--in 1939--could not yet be pears to have been no alternative way out of the seen in its mass-murderous intention. Until 1941, dilemma” (pp. 202-203). when the beginning of the war against the Soviet Union put an end to any concept of deporting all as such Jews from Europe and the extermination of all Jews became the goal of Nazi policy, Murmelstein T tried his best: “In those years until November u 1941, Murmelstein helped to enable some 128,000 Jews to leave Austria” (p. 76). But beginning with in person the fall of 1941, Murmelstein, and others in a simi‐ , 1938 lar position in all Jewish communities, had to for‐ - get about organizing Jewish emigration. He and to the whole Jewish administration in Vienna had to : 2 H-Net Reviews in the meantime , which to of did , : of he ; Baldur von which -- . , in an extremely small number, the u is : : - , so - , a policy of strict non-cooperation , Doron the E - : , ed e f e.g. intention f the the s Murmelstein -- 3 H-Net Reviews If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the network, at https://networks.h-net.org/h-judaic Citation: Anton Pelinka. Review of Rabinovici, Doron. Eichmann's Jews: The Jewish Administration of Holocaust Vienna, 1938-1945. H-Judaic, H-Net Reviews. May, 2013. URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=35122 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. 4.

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