Nazism

No ‘Nazis’ allowed at family event

Jonathan Kalmus — Fri, 17 May 2013 14:10:44 +0100

The organisers of a family event celebrating wartime Britain have been forced to hire security staff to eject anyone who attends dressed in Nazi uniform.

East Lancashire Railway, based in Bury, has been criticised by Holocaust survivors and MPs over the past decade for failing to prevent participants wearing full Nazi regalia attending its annual spring bank holiday 1940s weekend. Bans and warning signs at stations have been largely ignored.

Following talks with police, the Community Security Trust and local Jewish community leaders, ELR chairman Peter Duncan said new measures will include the vetting of all participants and the presence of security guards.

He said: “I was appalled when those who broke the rules last year were not challenged. This year, there are security staff to back up our own staff if we have a difficulty with someone who had been legitimately asked to leave. Trusting people in the past hasn’t worked.”

CST spokesperson Mark Gardner said the steps were “proportionate and worthwhile”.

l A Christmas card signed by Hitler and four paintings by him are to be sold by a Shropshire auction house next week. Mullock’s, of Church Stretton, expect the letter to fetch £5,000

Greeks plan law to hit neo-Nazis

JCReporter — Fri, 17 May 2013 13:00:28 +0100

Greek Deputy Minister of Justice Costas Karagounis has tabled a bill designed to outlaw racial, religious, ethnic and homophobic incitement.

The move comes in the wake of a recent Holocaust commemoration event in Thessaloniki where World Jewish Congress members raised the issue of antisemitism with Greek government officials.

If passed, the proposed bill will make racial or religious incitement punishable with jail terms of up to six years, or fines of up to 20,000 euros. The same punishments would apply to those who deny the Holocaust or make Nazi salutes.

The neo-Nazi Greek Golden Dawn party is now the third largest in parliament and maintains a 10-12 per cent approval rating in opinion polls.

The proposed bill does not give immunity to members of parliament.

‘Auschwitz cook’ arrested on war crimes charges

Zoe Winograd — Tue, 07 May 2013 14:25:41 +0100

A 93-year-old alleged SS member was arrested in Germany last night.

Hans Lipshis, who was taken into custody from his care home near Stuttgart, was accused of taking part in murder and genocide at Auschwitz.

The accused has admitted to working at the camp from 1941-1945 but has denied any knowledge of the killings that took place. He told reporters that he was a “cook for the entire time.”

Mr Lipshis was allegedly a member of the SS-Totenkopf Sturbann, which guarded the camp. He fled to the US in 1956 but was deported to Germany in 1983 after being accused of being a Nazi war criminal. The Lithuanian-born man was added to the Simon Wiesenthal Centre's list of wanted Nazis a few weeks ago.

Director of the Simone Wiesenthal Centre in Jerusalem Efraim Zuroff said: “We welcome the arrest. I hope this will only be the first of many arrests, trials and convictions of death camp guards.”

Karen Pollock, Chief Executive of the Holocaust Educational Trust, commented: “More than anything, the arrest of Hans Lipschis sends out a clear message that old age and the passage of time are no barrier to the prosecution of alleged Nazi war criminals – that is exactly as it must be.”

British saw 1948 Jewish fighters as 'like those of Nazi Germany'

Jennifer Lipman — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 09:16:12 +0100

The High Commissioner of Palestine viewed the behaviour of Jewish fighters as comparable to that of the Nazis, according to an intelligence report issued two weeks before statehood was declared.

On April 30 1948, Sir Alan Cunningham wrote to his superiors that as the Jews celebrated military successes their “broadcasts, both in content and in manner of delivery, are remarkably like those of Nazi Germany”.

In another report, he said that the Jews were prepared for statehood and an “all-out offensive” with “all the equipment of a totalitarian regime”.

Colonial administration records released by the National Archives in London this week reveal that as little as a week before the British departure from Mandate Palestine, the High Commissioner mistakenly believed that “all the ingredients of a successful truce were present”.

The documents detail increasing tension between Jews and Arabs in spring 1948, and the opposing reactions to the United Nation’s partition plan of November 1947 — “received with jubilation by the Yishuv”, but prompting “a mood of bitterness and universal suspicion” among the Arabs.

The papers show the contempt the British had for the Jews, who were deemed willing “to go to almost any lengths to achieve their aim”, and the collapse of any trust in the British by both Jews and Arabs.

Atrocities on both sides are detailed, with frequent references to Jewish “terrorists”, and graphic descriptions of violent attacks on each other or the British forces.

In one dispatch, an account is given of the massacre at the Palestinian village of Deir Yassin, the facts of which are still debated today.

Although it is unclear where his information came from, Sir Alan wrote that 250 people were killed, with the attack “accompanied by every circumstance of savagery. Women and children were stripped, lined up, photographed and then slaughtered”.

The dispatch added that the attack was too much for “the strong stomach of the Yishuv” and noted condemnations by the Jewish press and the chief rabbinate. It also recorded the Arab revenge attack on the Hadassah Hospital convoy.

The intelligence reports also show the British view that while the Jews were organised, if “not without internal dissension”, the local Arabs were poorly served by their leaders and by neighbouring countries, despite “extravagant claims of victories”.

Sir Alan wrote on April 30 that the Arabs’ “much vaunted liberation army” was “poorly equipped and badly led”.

He continued: “In almost every engagement the Jews have proved their superiority in organisation, training and tactics.”

He noted that “the foreign Arab guerilla bands… having successfully stirred up the Jews (and incidentally provided them with the excuse that they are merely defending themselves against Arab aggression) are now proving quite unable to protect the local Arabs.”

Dispute over Nazi marches

Anna Sheinman — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 14:10:38 +0100

The Minister for Europe has refused to back critics of marches in Latvia and Lithuania that honour Nazi collaborators. Tory MP David Lidington said in a letter that condemnation of the marches, which honour the Waffen SS and the Lithuanian Activist Front, was "a matter for the respective governments".

However, the stand put Britain at odds with the Council of Europe, the body responsible for the European Declaration of Human Rights, which has condemned the marches and says they should be banned.

Mr Lidington wrote in response to Defending History, a campaign group and website that aims to preserve the history of the Holocaust.

The website's editor, Dovid Katz, who is a former professor of Yiddish in Lithuania, said: "When it comes to Nazism, it is the minimum moral requirement of western nations to condemn any effort to sanitise and glorify the Nazis and their allies. We didn't join the EU to say 'It's none of my business'."

A spokesperson for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office said: "The UK is second to no one in its condemnation of Nazism in all its forms."

Innocent honesty inside an Aryan exterior

Thu, 11 Apr 2013 11:54:10 +0100

Let Me Tell You A Story
Renata Calverley

In 1942, while her father was away with the Polish army, six-year-old Renata Calverley was sent with her mother and grandmother into the Przemysl Ghetto. From there, in an overcrowded room with a bucket in the middle, the child began a hazardous journey that would start with the traumatic loss of all the familiar comforts of childhood and end with a new life in England four years later.

Obvious challenges arise when writing as an adult from the point of view of your six-year-old-self. Not all events and conversations can be recalled and dialogue needs to be written to suit an adult readership. The result here is that the little girl’s speech tends to sound oddly mature. That said, it is impossible not to be moved by the plight of this child, who lost her mother and grandmother and was then smuggled from the ghetto by her beloved nanny and passed straight into hiding with a volatile couple who were obsessed with the cash payments that came with hiding a Jew.

At one point, Calverley ended up in a grim, state orphanage “similar to the one I had imagined Oliver Twist lived in.” She had been born with blonde hair and blue eyes and, for this reason, was considered for adoption from the orphanage by a German family who might have pushed her towards recruitment into the Hitler Youth.

Despite her Aryan appearance, her little girl’s innocent tongue often threatened to betray her origins, as it nearly did when she told the director of the orphanage that her mother had been “taken away in a lorry to a camp”.

A cousin turned up to remove her just in time and members of Calverley’s extended family gave her temporary shelter. It was not until 1946 that she was reunited with her father in London.

As a tale of a young child being hidden and passed around, rather than an adult actively engaged in fleeing peril, this is a tenderly moving rather than an overtly dramatic tale. It would be difficult not to warm to Calverley, honest enough to portray her young self as often wilful and stubborn.

But, for illuminating one way in which a small number of Jewish children managed to survive the horrors of the Second World War in Europe, hers is a worthy addition to the Holocaust memoir genre.

Honour for rabbi who saved hundreds of children from Nazis

Simon Rocker — Thu, 11 Apr 2013 10:14:45 +0100

An Orthodox rabbi who rescued hundreds of children from Nazi Europe is to be posthumously honoured as one of the British heroes of the Holocaust.

Rabbi Solomon Schonfeld will be one of those recognised at a ceremony at the Department for Communities on Monday.

The awards were established in 2009 to commemorate extraordinary humanitarian efforts. Past recipients have included Sir Nicholas Winton and Prince Philip’s mother, Princess Alice.

Rabbi Schonfeld, the founder of the Hasmonean schools, who died aged 72 in 1984, was one of the leading lights in what became the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations. After the Anschluss — the Nazi takeover of Austria — in 1938, he went on several missions to bring around 300 Jewish children out of Europe to Britain.

“Before the war, he risked his life going to Germany and Austria even though the Foreign Office told him not to go,” his son, Dr Jeremy Schonfeld, recalled.

Rabbi Schonfeld also arranged for more than 1,000 other Jews to find refuge, including yeshivah students and rabbis.

During the war, as head of the Chief Rabbi’s Religious Emergency Council, he secured visas for Hungarian Jews to get to Mauritius. But another plan to help beleaguered European Jews reach safety in British dominion territories foundered.

“It was scotched by the Zionist Federation and Board of Deputies because my father didn’t include Palestine,” Dr Schonfeld said.

Monday’s ceremony will be “the first official recognition of my father’s work,” he added.

“He felt he had done what any decent person would do.”

Fury over failure to ban German neo-Nazi party

Toby Axelrod — Thu, 28 Mar 2013 23:30:00 +0000

Germany’s top Jewish leader is furious at the government for failing to go the extra mile to ban the country’s biggest neo-Nazi party.

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government will not submit a petition to the Supreme Court supporting proceedings to ban the extreme-right National Democratic Party of Germany, it was announced this week.

For the time being, this leaves the Bundestag alone in its efforts to ban the NPD, an anti-foreigner, antisemitic party that has some 5,800 members, according to recent estimates.

The membership numbers belie the fact that the NPD tries to influence a broad swathe of the population — especially disaffected youth — with its patriotic rhetoric. While some say court proceedings would only bring more attention to the neo-Nazis, others — like Dieter Graumann, head of the Central Council of Jews in Germany - insist that the authorities must show brawn against anti-democratic movements like the NPD.

“The decision of the Federal Government is disappointing and politically completely wrong,” Mr Graumann said. “They chose hesitation and procrastination over courage and determination.”

Some lawmakers from opposition parties are now trying to gather enough support in the Bundestag to have a ban voted in, joining the Bundesrat, which decided in favour of a ban in December.

What irks many is the fact that the NPD, by virtue of having representatives two state legislatures, gets taxpayer cash. In 2011 they received about 1.32 million euros.

In 2003, the Supreme Court cancelled a probe aimed at banning the NPD after finding that government informants themselves had incited many of the illegal acts being investigated. Observers today warn that another failure would be devastating.

World Jewish Congress compares Golden Dawn to the Nazis

Anna Sheinman — Thu, 28 Mar 2013 18:08:49 +0000

The World Jewish Congress has compared a boycott of Jewish cosmetic firms by Greek neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn to actions of the German Nazi government, further escalating a spat between the two organisations.

The fight began at the recent WJC Executive Committee meeting in Thessaloniki in northern Greece attended by Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, where WJC President Ronald Lauder said that Golden Dawn was a “a threat to democracy” and called them the “new Nazis”.

A motion was passed at the meeting calling on Greece to “consider banning political parties, such as the Golden Dawn movement, which pose a serious danger to liberal democracy”.

In response, a post on Golden Dawn’s New York-based blog ‘Xaameriki’ called for a boycott of a list of cosmetic companies owned by Estee Lauder, which is owned by the Lauder family of which Ronald Lauder is a member.

Included were Estee Lauder, Mac, Clinique, Bobbi Brown and Israeli company Aveda. Many of the companies listed, including Estee Lauder, are Jewish owned.

Maram Stern, deputy secretary-general of the WJC, said: “To announce a boycott of ‘Jewish’ companies a few days before the 80th anniversary of the first organised boycott of Jewish businesses in Germany by the Nazi government, on 1 April 1933, shows the true face of Golden Dawn. Both in words and in actions these fanatics behave like the Nazis did 80 years ago.

“Once again, this is a reminder that they need to be opposed vigorously by all democratic forces, not just in Greece but everywhere they operate. Together with the Greek Jewish Community, the World Jewish Congress will continue to speak out against Golden Dawn. We are not afraid of them.”

A spokesperson for Golden Dawn said: “We are not encouraging the boycott of Estee Lauder because it is owned by Jews, if there was a Chinese, Armenian, or Martian international institution that was attempting to undermine freedom and democracy in Greece, we would boycott them too. Our boycott is peaceful, and in the name of Greek freedom and self-determination to choose its own path.”

Greek premier pledges anti-Nazi laws

Anshel Pfeffer — Thu, 21 Mar 2013 19:00:00 +0000

The prime minister of Greece, Antonis Samaras, promised Jewish leaders who gathered last weekend in Saloniki to mark the 70th year since the start of deportations to the death camps from the city, that his government would enact new laws to proscribe neo-Nazi parties.

Only 1,500 Jews live in Saloniki today but the port city in northern Greece has a Jewish history going back 2,200 years, and for hundreds of years it was the location of the largest Jewish community in Europe. Over 90 per cent of the 53,000 Jews who lived in Saloniki on the eve of the Second World War were murdered by the Germans in the death camps, and the events this weekend were the first-ever large-scale commemoration of the deportations to take place in Greece.

Mr Samaras made the first visit to a synagogue by a serving Greek prime minister when he attended a memorial service at Saloniki’s Monastiriotes Synagogue. He said at the service that “Greek society has been infected by voices that seek to resurrect racism” and that “neo-Nazis have reappeared once again in Europe”. Despite promising his government would “continue to legislate towards complete intolerance of violence and racism,” Mr Samaras refrained from directly referring to the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party which won seven per cent of votes in the last Greek election.

Many of those involved in the commemoration events acknowledged, however, that they were taking place partly in reaction to the rise of Golden Dawn.

It was unclear what the new laws being proposed by Mr Samaras would look like. The leaders of the World Jewish Congress (WJC), who held an executive committee meeting in Saloniki in a display of support for Greece’s Jews, demanded a law barring Holocaust-denying parties such as Golden Dawn from running in the elections. But it did not seem that Mr Samaras was prepared to go that far. In a closed meeting with WJC representatives and leaders of the local Jewish community, Mr Samaras made more detailed commitments to push through legislation against Golden Dawn, but one of the meeting’s participants said: “I am still not convinced he has the political willpower for an effective law to be enacted.”

In his speech at the memorial service, WJC President Ronald Lauder was the only speaker to mention Golden Dawn by name, saying that “they think like Nazis, they speak like Nazis, they act like Nazis. They are Nazis.”

Golden Dawn has so far pursued a mainly anti-immigrant agenda and president of the Jewish community in Saloniki, David Saltiel, said this week that “they are not at present physically attacking Jews, but we must see every attack on immigrants as if it is an attack on Jews and demand the government does everything to prevent them”.