AJR ^orma tio n Volume LV No. 5 May 2000 £3 (to non-members) Don't m/ss... Irving - skinhead in The penitent pontiff scholar's robes Richard Grunberger P3 n Brecht's Galileo there is a scene which depicts reconciliation. He visited Auschwitz, set foot inside Deportations the ceremonial dressing of a Pope in his robes of a synagogue (a historical Papal first!), established from Cologne office. At the start of the scene the pontiff comes diplomatic relations with Israel, stigmatised anti­ Ralph Rlumenou p4 I on stage as an ordinary individual; when it ends he semitism as a 'sin against God', dubbed Judaism Soup of the evening stands before the audience as an institution. It is 'Christianity's elder brother' and asked God's pardon Matthew Engel p 16 from the split perspective of a man who is also an for the Church's century long 'sins against the Jews'. institution that we must view John Paul the Second's A truly inspiring record! However, it still leaves Way beyond pilgrimage to Jerusalem. the divergence between the Pope as a person and Karel Woytila was reared in the matrix of Polish as an institution unresolved. The Church's 'sins his Icen Catholicism where church and nation overlapped to­ against the Jews' in living memory include the ayoral tally and Jews were viewed as enemy aliens. In the Pellotine Brothers' operation of an escape route for candidate 1930s, while Germany was gearing up for war Nazi murderers to South America, French monas­ M Livingstone against his country. Cardinal Hlond preached an teries giving shelter to the fugitive war criminal not only feels an anti-Jewish boycott. An exemplary martyr figure of Touvier, and Central American bishops procuring obsessive need for the Polish Church, Maximilian Kolbe, who died to asylum for Baltic Fascists expelled from the USA. making ludicrously save another prisoner in a Nazi camp, had edited a The Church needs to unfrock the clerics involved, inept comparisons, Jew-baiting Catholic tabloid newspaper before the but above all it must acknowledge one fact: when but also shares war. Even during the postwar Kielce pogrom the lo­ Europe's Jewry underwent unprecedented suffering the late Alan cal bishop refused to intervene on the grounds that Pius XII, unlike the Good Samaritan, 'passed by on Clark's unhealthy Jews were agents of the Soviet takeover of the the other side'. His excuse for silence - namely that preoccupation country. a public protest would only have intensified Nazi ^ith Hider. This is the background from which the personal persecution - was sheer casuistry, since nothing He has described philosemitic outlook of the man who was Bishop of could have been worse than what the Nazis were Anglo-Irish history Cracow till 1978 stands out in stark relief. In that already doing D as a slowed year he assumed leadership of a universal church down version of many of whose national constituents - most notably the Holocaust, in Slovakia, Croatia and Lithuania, but also in France ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING Compared Tony and Germany - were tainted by wartime collabora­ of the Blair's constitutional tion. ASSOCIATION OF plan for the And this was only part of the picture. He was heir London Mayoralty to a tradition stretching back two millennia to the JEWISH REFUGEES to Hitler's scheme Judeophobic gospel writers - a tradition which had will be held at the for "Vichy France, spawned such lethal myths as Jewish deicide, des­ Paul Balint AJR Day Centre, 15 Cleve Road, NW6 3RL and bracketed ecration of the host (Hostienschandung) and the at 3pm on SUNDAY 25 JUNE 2000 capitalism with blood libel. Nazism as a killer The Church had therefore entered the post-Holo­ AGENDA: of millions. While caust era under a pressing moral obligation to Annual report for 1999 Sach consecutive examine, and atone for, its past. Astonishingly - or Hon.Treasurer's Report Discussion statement plumbs not so astonishingly, seeing that the pontificate of Election of Committee greater depths of the culpably silent wartime Pope only ended in of Management illogicality than the 1958 - nothing happened for seventeen years. In last, all betray a 1962 John XXIII convened the Second "Vatican Coun­ Guest Speaker: Dr Elisabeth Maxwell Executive Chairman, Remembering For The Future 2000 blanket insensitivity cil (which absolved Jews of the charge of deicide) ^o how such but his pontificate was too short to advance the All questions for the Chair should be submitted by S June trivialisations may process much further. to the Head of Administration at strike Hitler"s chief John Paul II has over the last twenty years taken a I Hampstead Gate, I a Frognal, London NWS 6AL Victims D series of decisive steps towards Christian-Jewish AJR INFORMATION MA^ 2000 1981, the year in which she completed Profile her doctoral thesis. In the period inter­ vening between the completion of her thesis and its acceptance, she decided to Holocaust ambassador research her husband's family tree and orn in 1921 in provincial France, discovered the scale of the destruction of Elisabeth Maxwell is one of two his family by the Nazis. Bdaughters of a Protestant father of Sometimes accompanying her husband long-established Huguenot descent and a on his speaking engagements Dr Maxwell Catholic mother. Her relatively privileged found herself, on occasion, finishing his and protected family life ended after the speech for him when he broke down in economic crash in 1929, when her tears while referring to his family's fate in father's business went into liquidation. the Holocaust. The family moved to Lyon in 1932 and In 1988, her organisation, RpTF Elisabeth was sent to join her sister at a (Remembering for the Future), arranged convent school in Birmingham. In 1939 its first academic conference for Holo­ (her studies were interrupted by the caust historians in London. A second outbreak of war) she attended the conference, this time in Berlin, followed Sorbonne where she started studying law; in 1994. The third conference, now in concurrently she took a Cordon Bleu preparation, takes place in July this year Elisabeth Maxwell cookery course, a Red Cross first aid (see separate item). Dr Maxwell literally course and singing lessons. The ability to family, running a large family home with lives with RFTF2000, of which she is the combine a number of differing activities little help and regularly playing hostess to executive chairman. Her buzzing Belgravia became a characteristic of her way of life. her husband's many business contacts, flat is both her home and a busy office, It was in Paris in 1944 that she had her Elisabeth Maxwell graduated from Oxford where, assisted by a small team, E-mails> first encounter with Robert Maxwell University with a BA in French. Ten years faxes and telephone calls arrive from all whom she married in March 1945. It later, she gained a doctorate, again from over the world. proved to be a tempestuous marriage. the University of Oxford. Resident in London and in France, this Between 1946 and 1962, nine children Elisabeth made her first visit to energetic but unassuming lady travels ex­ were born to the Maxwells, seven of Auschwitz with her husband in 1959- She tensively in Europe and America, meeting whom have survived to adulthood and recalls that she felt very much an outsider with scholars and schoolchildren in her two of whom worked in their father's and attributes this to the fact that she had drive to ensure that the Holocaust wil publishing empire. yet to learn about the Holocaust. Her in­ not be forgotten. At the age of 50, bringing up a growing terest in the Holocaust dates back to n Marion Koebnet ment OSHA's unique approach to our OSHA and Jewish Care special residents, the majority of whom Survivors' gathering arrived in this country as victims of Nazi roviding a unique opportunity t merger proposals persecution". international scholars to see merger between the Otto Schiff Malcolm Dagul, Chairman of Jewish Pguidance from Holocaust survivors, Housing Association (OSHA) and Care, commented: "I am looking forward the 'Remembering For the Future 200 A Jewish Care is under active con­ to using Jewish Care's professional exper­ conference will take place in London an sideration by the two organisations. tise to work with another caring Oxford between l6 and 23 July this ye^"- Following an agreement in principle, organisation in the planning and manag­ The conference opens with a gathering OSHA's Council and Jewish Care's Super­ ing of our community's future needs, thus the Imperial War Museum on Sunday visory Board are engaged in detailed reducing overheads and directing our July at which the organisers hope discussions aimed at bringing about a communal resources to where they bring together survivors, their desce merger of the two organisations in order belong. The development of lay leaders dants and scholars. Throughout to secure the continuing welfare of resi­ across both organisations will also be following week, there will be a v/arieta y o' don dents in OSHA homes. In the meanwhile, highly beneficial". cultural and educational events in Lon' Jewish Care has agreed to second staff to The Trustees of the AJR Charitable whilst, between 17 and 20 July, Oxfon at OSHA to assist with any transitional ar­ Trust, having been informed of these pro­ will be host to an academic conference fof rangements. posals, are fully supportive of them and which a limited number of places Ashley Mitchell, OSHA's Chairman, said: are looking forward to achieving close survivors has been reserved. "I am absolutely delighted at the prospect co-operation with the new management For further information or to regi^ ' of forging a strong partnership which will when it is established D contact Judy Trotter, RFTF2000, PO ^^.