The Years of Extermination: Nazi Germany and the Jews, 1939-1945 (125 page)

143. Klemperer,
I Will Bear Witness: A Diary of the Nazi Years, 1941–1945
, vol. 2, p. 8.

144. Ibid., p. 9.

145. Ibid., p. 28.

146. Hertha Feiner,
Before Deportation: Letters from a Mother to Her Daughters, January 1939–December 1942
, ed. Karl Heinz Jahnke (Evanston, IL, 1999), p. 102.

147. On this issue see in particular Beate Meyer, “Das unausweichliche Dilemma: Die Reichsvereinigung der Juden in Deutschland, die Deportationen und die untergetauchten Juden,” in
Überleben im Untergrund: Hilfe für Juden in Deutschland
, ed. Beate Kosmala and Claudia Schopmann (Berlin, 2002), pp. 278ff.

148. Ibid., pp. 280–81.

149. Paul Sauer, ed.,
Dokumente über die Verfolgung der jüdischen Bürger in Baden-Württemberg durch das nationalsozialistische Regime 1933–1945
, 2 vols. (Stuttgart: 1966), vol. 2, pp. 317–18.

150. Ibid., pp. 322–23.

151. Ibid.

152. Ruth Andreas-Friedrich and June Barrows Mussey,
Berlin Underground, 1938–1945
(New York, 1947), p. 77.

153. Ibid., p. 78.

154. For the events in Slovakia see mainly Livia Rothkirchen, “The Situation of the Jews in Slovakia between 1939 and 1945,”
Jahrbuch für Antisemitismusforschung
7 (1998), pp. 46ff. and particularly 51ff.

155. Michael Phayer,
The Catholic Church and the Holocaust, 1930–1965
(Bloomington, 2000), p. 88.

156. Ibid., p. 89.

157. Ibid.

158. Ibid., p. 90.

159. Ingrid Krüger-Bulcke and Hans Georg Lehmann, eds.,
Akten zur deutschen auswärtigen Politik, 1918–1945
, Series E,
1941–1945
(Göttingen, 1974), vol. 3, pp. 65–66.

160. Ibid., p. 66 n. 1.

161. Yehuda Bauer,
Jews for Sale? Nazi-Jewish Negotiations, 1933–1945
(New Haven, 1994), pp. 62ff.

162. For the text of Dannecker’s memorandum of June 15, see Serge Klarsfeld,
Vichy-Auschwitz: Le rôle de Vichy dans la solution finale de la question juive en France
(Paris, 1983), vol. 1, pp. 202–3.

163. Ibid., p. 70ff.

164. J. Presser,
Ashes in the Wind: The Destruction of Dutch Jewry
(Detroit, 1988), p. 92.

165. Ibid., pp. 94ff.

166. Ibid., pp. 98ff.

167. Ibid., pp. 100ff.

168. Etty Hillesum,
An Interrupted Life: The Diaries of Etty Hillesum, 1941–1943
(New York, 1983), p. 93.

169. Ibid., p. 107.

170. Ibid., p. 118.

171. Ibid., p. 122.

172. For the chronology of events in France and in the early summer of 1942 most of the relevant documents see mainly Klarsfeld,
Vichy-Auschwitz
, vol. 1 (Paris, 1983).

173. Ibid., vol. 1, p. 236.

174. Ibid., p. 237.

175. For the introduction of the star in Holland, see Bob Moore,
Victims and Survivors: The Nazi Persecution of the Jews in the Netherlands, 1940–1945
(London, 1997), p. 86ff. For France, see Michael R. Marrus and Robert O. Paxton,
Vichy France and the Jews
(New York, 1981), pp. 234ff.

176. Moore,
Victims and Survivors
, pp. 85–89.

177. Presser,
Ashes in the Wind
, pp. 124–26.

178. Michael R. Marrus and Robert O. Paxton,
Vichy et les juifs
(Paris, 1990), pp. 236–37.

179. Renée Poznanski,
Être juif en France pendant la Seconde Guerre mondiale
(Paris, 1994), p. 358.

180. Ibid.

181. Biélinky,
Journal
, p.191.

182. Ibid., p. 209.

183. Ibid., pp. 209–10.

184. Ibid., pp. 214ff.

185. Nuremberg doc. NG-183,
The Ministries Case
, p. 235.

186. Pierre Drieu la Rochelle,
Journal, 1939–1945
, ed. Julien Hervier (Paris, 1992), p. 302.

187. Lucien Rebatet,
Les Décombres
(Paris, 1942), pp. 568–69 (translated in David Carroll,
French Literary Fascism: Nationalism, Anti-Semitism, and the Ideology of Culture
[Princeton, 1995], p. 212).

188. Ibid., p. 605 (Carroll,
French Literary Fascism
, p. 211).

189. Quoted in Frédéric Vitoux,
Céline: A Biography
(New York, 1992), p. 378.

190. Quoted in Carroll,
French Literary Fascism
, p. 121.

191. Ibid., p. 275.

192. See in particular Robert Belot, “Lucien Rebatet, ou L’Antisémitisme comme Événement Littéraire,” in
L’Antisémitisme de plume, 1940–1944: Études et documents
, ed. Pierre-André Taguieff (Paris, 1999), pp. 217ff. See also Robert Belot,
Lucien Rebatet: Un itinéraire fasciste
(Paris, 1994).

193. Pierre Assouline,
Gaston Gallimard: A Half-Century of French Publishing
(San Diego, 1988), p. 279.

194. Richard I. Cohen,
The Burden of Conscience: French Jewish Leadership During the Holocaust
(Bloomington, 1987), pp. 71ff, 116ff.

195. Raymond-Raoul Lambert,
Carnet d’un témoin: 1940–1943
, ed. Richard I. Cohen (Paris, 1985), p. 163. Much of what Lambert writes about the overall attitude of the Consistoire is true; the donations to “l’Amitié Chrétienne,” however, were intended as financial support for Jewish children helped by the organization. See Simon Schwarzfuchs,
Aux Prises avec Vichy: Histoire politique des Juifs de France, 1940–1944
(Paris, 1998), p. 263.

196. Herman Kruk,
The Last Days of the Jerusalem of Lithuania: Chronicles from the Vilna Ghetto and the Camps, 1939–1944
, ed. Benjamin Harshav (New Haven, 2002), pp. 173–74.

197. The report written by G. Jaszunski, head of the cultural department of the council, is reproduced in Lucy S. Dawidowicz, ed.,
A Holocaust Reader
(New York, 1976), pp. 208ff.

198. Avraham Tory,
Surviving the Holocaust: The Kovno Ghetto Diary
, ed. Martin Gilbert and Dina Porat (Cambridge, MA, 1990), p. 67.

199. Ibid.

200. Ibid., p. 72.

201. Quoted in Antony Polonsky, “Beyond Condemnation, Apologetics and Apologies: On the Complexity of Polish Behavior toward the Jews during the Second World War,” in
Holocaust: Critical Concepts in Historical Studies
, vol. 5, ed. David Cesarani (New York, 2004), p. 46.

202. Ibid., p. 47.

203. Ibid.

204. Ibid.

205. Dawid Rubinowicz,
The Diary of Dawid Rubinowicz
(Edmonds, WA, 1982), p. 38.

206. Ibid., p. 43.

207. Ibid., pp. 85–87.

208. Alexandra Zapruder,
Salvaged Pages. Young Writers’ Diaries of the Holocaust
(New Haven, 2002), pp. 322–23.

209. Ibid., p. 325.

210. Ibid., p. 327.

211. Ibid., p. 306.

212. Sierakowiak,
Diary
, p. 149.

213. Ibid., p. 151.

214. Introduction to Lucjan Dobroszycki, ed.,
The Chronicle of the Lódz Ghetto, 1941–1944
(New Haven, 1984), p. xx.

215. Avraham Barkai, “Between East and West: Jews from Germany in the Lodz Ghetto,” in
The Nazi Holocaust: Historical Articles on the Destruction of European Jews
, ed. Michael R. Marrus (Westport, CT, 1989), p. 418.

216. Ibid., p. 420.

217. Ibid., pp. 419ff.

218. Dobroszycki,
The Chronicle
, pp. 163–64.

219. Ibid., pp. 181–182.

220. Ibid., p. 185.

221. Ibid., pp. 193–94.

222. Berenstein,
Faschismus, Getto, Massenmord
, pp. 292–93.

223. Emanuel Ringelblum,
Notes from the Warsaw Ghetto: The Journal of Emanuel Ringelblum
, ed. Jacob Sloan (New York, 1974), p. 251.

224. Chaim Aron Kaplan,
Scroll of Agony: The Warsaw Diary of Chaim A. Kaplan
, ed. Abraham Isaac Katsh (New York, 1965), p. 237.

225. Adam Czerniaków,
The Warsaw Diary of Adam Czerniaków
, ed. Raul Hilberg, Stanislaw Staron, and Josef Kermisz (New York, 1979), p. 328 (at this level the annual mortality rate would have been 14 percent).

226. Ibid., p. 328.

227. Ibid., p. 330.

228. Ibid., p. 339.

229. Ibid.

230. Ibid., p. 342.

231. For the meeting, see Yisrael Gutman,
The Jews of Warsaw, 1939–1943: Ghetto, Underground, Revolt
(Bloomington, 1982), pp. 168ff; Yitzhak Zuckerman,
A Surplus of Memory: Chronicle of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
(Berkeley, 1993), pp. 170ff; Daniel Blatman,
Notre liberté et la vôtre: Le mouvement ouvrier juif Bund en Pologne, 1939–1949
(Paris, 2002), pp. 130ff.

232. Gutman,
The Jews of Warsaw
, p. 168; Zuckerman,
A Surplus of Memory
, p. 174; Blatman,
Notre liberté et la vôtre
, p. 130.

233. One may also argue that the time had not yet come, as there was a collective responsibility for the Jewish population. On that important point see Ruta Sakowska, “Two Forms of Resistance in the Warsaw Ghetto—Two Functions of the Ringelblum Archives,”
Yad Vashem Studies
21 (1991), p. 217.

234. Gutman,
The Jews of Warsaw
, p. 169; Zuckerman,
A Surplus of Memory
, p. 174; Blatman,
Notre liberté et la vôtre
, p. 130.

235. For a history of the Bund in Poland during the war and immediate postwar years and for the Bundist view of a common front with the Zionists, see Blatman,
Notre liberté et la vôtre
, particularly pp. 129ff. In his memoirs Zuckerman describes the Bund’s attitude as seen from the Zionist perspective. See Zuckerman,
A Surplus of Memory
, pp. 170ff.

236. About the publicity given to the Bund report in the British media, see Martin Gilbert,
Auschwitz and the Allies
(New York, 1981), pp. 42–43.

237. Laurel Leff,
Buried by the Times: The Holocaust and America’s Most Important Newspaper
(New York, 2005), p. 139.

238. Czerniaków,
Warsaw Diary
, p. 343.

239. Note in Ibid., p. 344n. The killings took place during the night of the seventeenth to the eighteenth: Czerniakow noted them under the April 17 entry, usually, the April 18 date is referred to.

240. Note in ibid., p. 344 n.

241. Zuckerman,
A Surplus of Memory
, pp. 177ff.

242. See Zuckerman’s indications about the rise and fall of the “Anti-Fascist Bloc” in the late spring of 1942. Ibid., pp. 180ff.

243. Hersch Wasser, “Daily Entries of Hersch Wasser,”
Yad Vashem Studies
15 (1983), pp. 271–72.

244. Almost every study or memoir about the Warsaw ghetto mentions Rubinstein. See in particular Jan Marek Gronski,
Life in Nazi-Occupied Warsaw. Three Ghetto Sketches
(1992), p. 192ff.

245. Yitzhak Perlis, “Final Chapter: Korczak in the Warsaw Ghetto,” in
The Ghetto Diary
, ed. Janusz Korczak (New York, 1978), pp. 78ff.

246. Janusz Korczak,
Ghetto Diary
, ed. Aaron Zeitlin (New York, 1978), p. 192.

247. For details about Lewin see Antony Polonsky, introduction to his edition of Lewin’s diary, Abraham Lewin,
A Cup of Tears: A Diary of the Warsaw Ghetto
, ed. Antony Polonsky (Oxford, 1988).

248. Ibid., p. 80.

249. Quoted in Ruta Sakowska,
Menschen im Ghetto: Die jüdische Bevölkerung im
besetzten Warschau 1939–1943
(Osnabrück, 1999), p. 220. The author assumes that the message was well understood; this cannot be established.

250. Czerniaków,
Warsaw Diary
, pp. 376–77.

Chapter Seven: July 1942–March 1943

1. This report, titled “Observations about the ‘Resettlement of Jews’ in the General Government” (
IfZ
, Munich, doc. ED 81) is reproduced in Raul Hilberg, ed.,
Documents of Destruction: Germany and Jewry, 1933–1945
(Chicago, 1971), pp. 208ff.

2. For the growing crisis and the unfolding military situation, see Ian Kershaw,
Hitler, 1936–45: Nemesis
(New York, 2000), pp. 526ff.

3. Ulrich von Hassell,
Die Hassell-Tagebücher 1938–1944: Aufzeichnungen vom Andern Deutschland
, ed. Klaus Peter Reiss (unter Mitarbeit) and Freiherr Friedrich Hiller von Gaertringen (Berlin, 1988), p. 330.

4. Adolf Hitler,
Hitler: Reden und Proklamationen, 1932–1945: Kommentiert von einem deutschen Zeitgenossen
, ed. Max Domarus, 4 vols., vol. 2, part 1 (Munich, 1965), p. 1920. For an analysis of these sadistic aspects of Hitler’s “prophecy,” see Philippe Burrin,
Ressentiment et Apocalypse. Essai sur l’antisemitisme nazi
(Paris, 2004), pp. 78ff.

5. Mihail Sebastian,
Journal, 1935–1944
, ed. Radu Ioanid (Chicago, 2000), p. 511.

6. Victor Klemperer,
I Will Bear Witness: A Diary of the Nazi Years, 1942–1945
(New York, 1998), p. 150.

7. Joseph Goebbels,
Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels: Sämtliche Fragmente
, ed. Elke Fröhlich (Munich, 1996), part 2, vol. 6, pp. 445–46.

8. Ibid., vol. 5, p. 378.

9. Nuremberg doc. NO-205, in John Mendelsohn and Donald S. Detwiler, eds.,
The Holocaust: Selected Documents in Eighteen Volumes
(New York, 1982), vol. 9, p. 173.

10. See Longerich and Pohl,
Die Ermordung
, p. 371–72.

11. Helmut Heiber, ed.,
Akten der Partei-Kanzlei der NSDAP: Rekonstruktion eines verlorengegangenen Bestandes. Regesten.
, vol. 1, part 2 (München, 1983), abs. no. 26773.

12. Ibid., part 1, vol. 1, abs. no. 16019.

13. Ibid., part 1, vol. 2, abs. no. 26778. The pamphlet
Der Untermensch
(Berlin, 1942) was published by the SS Hauptamt.

14. Rudolf Höss,
Kommandant in Auschwitz: Autobiographische Aufzeichnungen.
, ed. Martin Broszat (Stuttgart, 1958), p. 207; Heinrich Himmler,
Der Dienstkalender Heinrich Himmlers 1941/42
, ed. Peter Witte et al. (Hamburg, 1999), p. 492 n. 70.