zionism and anti-semitism in nazi...

Zionism and Anti-Semitism in Nazi Germany

This is a study of the ideological and political relationship between

Zionism and anti-Semitism in modern Germany from the nineteenth

century through the Third Reich, focusing on the Nazi years between

1933 and 1942. It considers this topic within the context of three

contentious issues in post-Holocaust historiography and debate: the

nature of modern German anti-Semitism, the decision-making process

leading to the Nazi mass murder of the Jews of Europe, and the nature

and role of German Zionism in German-Jewish history before the

Shoah. This study examines the assault of German anti-Semitism and

Nazi Jewish policy on the Jews of Germany, as well as the ideological

and political responses of some German Jews, the Zionists, to that

assault. It concludes that the approaches of German anti-Semitism and

National Socialism to Zionism and the Zionist movement in Germany

reflect a relatively consistent ideology that was applied in an inconsis-

tent and often contradictory manner, one that in the end undermined

the efforts of German Zionism to achieve fundamental Zionist goals.

Francis R. Nicosia is Professor of History at Saint Michael’s College. He

is the co-author of The Columbia Guide to the Holocaust (2000) and

author of The Third Reich and the Palestine Question (1985 and 2000),

and he has co-edited several books, including Medicine and Medical

Ethics in Nazi Germany (2002) and Business and Industry in Nazi

Germany (2004). He has edited two volumes on the Central Zionist

Archives, Jerusalem, in the series “Archives of the Holocaust” (1990).

He was also a Senior Fullbright Research Scholar in Berlin from 1992 to

1993 and 2006 to 2007, and he was named the Carnegie Foundation’s

Vermont Professor of the Year in 2000.

© Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org

Cambridge University Press978-0-521-88392-4 - Zionism and Anti-Semitism in Nazi GermanyFrancis R. NicosiaFrontmatterMore information

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Zionism and Anti-Semitism

in Nazi Germany

FRANCIS R . NICOSIA

Saint Michael’s College






C AM B R I D G E U N I V E R S I T Y P R E S S

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Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Nicosia, Francis R.

Zionism and anti-semitism in Nazi Germany / Francis R. Nicosia.

p. cm.Includes bibliographical references and index.

isbn 978-0-521-88392-4 (hardback)

1. Zionism – Germany – History – 20th century. 2. Jews – Germany – Politics and

government – 20th century. 3. Jews – Government policy – Germany – History –20th century. 4. Antisemitism – Germany – History – 20th century. 5. Germany –

Ethnic regulations – History – 20th century. 6. Germany – Politics and

government – 1933–1945. 7. National socialism and Zionism. I. Title.ds149.5.g3n53 2008

320.54095694–dc22 2007030617

isbn 978-0-521-88392-4 hardback

Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or

accuracy of urls for external or third-party Internet Web sites referred to

in this publication, and does not guarantee that any content on suchWeb sites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.






For Ellen, Tim, and Alex






Wir haben beide uns unser Volk nicht auserlesen. Sind wir unser Volk?Was heibt denn Volk? Sind Christ und Jude eher Christ und Jude, alsMensch?

(Neither of us has chosen his people. Are we our people? What does“people” mean? Are Christians and Jews more Christians and Jews thanhumans?)

Nathan to the young Knight Templar, from act 2, scene 5 ofGotthold Ephraim Lessing’s Nathan der Weise: Ein dramatischesGedicht in funf Aufzugen (Stuttgart: Phillip Reclam, 1990), 50

Schmeibt hinaus die ganze Judenbande,Schmeibt sie ‘naus, schmeibt sie ‘naus, aus unserm Vaterlande,Schickt sie wieder nach Jerusalem,Dann sind sie wieder unter sich bei ihrem Stamme Sem.Schmeib hinaus die ganze Judenblase,Schmeibt sie ‘naus mit ihrer krummen Nase,Schickt sie wieder nach Jerusalem,Dann sind sie wieder unter sich bei ihrem Stamme Sem.

(Throw out the entire band of Jews,Throw them out, throw them out, out of our fatherland,Send them back to Jerusalem,Where they will again be among themselves and their tribe.Throw out the entire gang of Jews,Throw them out with their hooked noses,Send them back to Jerusalem,Where they will again be among themselves and their tribe.)

“Lied der Nationalsozialisten”; BArch: R1501, 26053,Reichsinnenministerium, 1931

Die Antisemiten haben recht behalten. Gonnen wir es ihnen, denn auchwir werden glucklich.

(The anti-Semites are right. If we grant them that, then we too will behappy.)

Theodor Herzl’s Diaries, Book I, 17 June 1895; Theodor Herzl,Theodor Herzls Tagebucher, Vol. 1 (Berlin: JudischerVerlag,1922), 209






Contents

List of Illustrations page ix

Acknowledgments xi

Abbreviations xiii

Introduction 1

1 The Age of Emancipation in Imperial Germany 13Zionism in Anti-Semitic Thought 13

Anti-Semitism in Zionist Thought 31

2 The Weimar Years 45German Zionism and the First World War 45

German Zionism and the Nazi Threat 48

Early Nazi Views on Zionism 63

3 1933: Nazi Confusion, Zionist Illusion 74In Search of Policy 74

Haavara 78

Between Illusion and Reality 90

4 Zionism in Nazi Jewish Policy, 1934–1938 106State Agencies and Zionism 106

The Police and Zionism 111

A Jewish State 126

The SS and Zionism, 1938 134

5 German Zionism, 1934–1938: Confrontation with Reality 145Optimism and Expansion 145

Economic Decline 156

Communal Relations 163

Disintegration and Isolation 174

vii






6 Revisionist Zionism in Germany, 1934–1938 181Unity Shattered 181

The State Zionist Organization 185

State Zionists, the ZVfD, and the Nazi Regime 189

7 Zionist Occupational Retraining and Nazi Jewish Policy 207Jewish Occupational Retraining Programs 207

Nazi Policy and Jewish Occupational Retraining 228

8 From Dissolution to Final Solution 2451938: Radicalization and Continuity 245

Emigration Continued 257

Zionism and Palestine 265

Resettlement, Emigration, Genocide 278

Conclusions 283

Bibliography 293

Index 309

Contentsviii






List of Illustrations

3.1 Heinrich Wolff, German Consul General in Jerusalem,1932–1935 page 81

3.2 Kurt Blumenfeld, President of the Zionist Federation ofGermany, 1924–1933 97

4.1 Germans dressed as orthodox Jews ride through the streetsof Marburg on a float depicting Jews leaving for Palestinein 1936 141

4.2 An anti-Semitic float in the 1934 Shrove Tuesday parade inSingen features Germans dressed as stereotypical Jews ridingin a passenger railway car labeled “From Berlin to Palestine” 142

4.3 An anti-Jewish propaganda float alleging German Jewry’sallegiance to the United States and Palestine moves alongthe Rosenmontag parade route in Mainz in 1939 143

5.1 Prospective immigrants to Palestine seeking information inthe waiting room of the Palestine Office, Meinecke Strasse 10,Berlin, 1935 147

5.2 “A Journey without a Certificate to Palestine,” 1935, JudischeKunstler-Spiele, Vienna 154

5.3 Robert Weltsch, editor of the Judische Rundschau, 1919–1938 176

6.1 Georg Kareski, president of the State Zionist Organizationin Germany, 1934–1937 187

7.1 Zionist youths instructed in the use of agricultural machineryat an occupational retraining (hachschara) camp in Germanyin 1935 213

7.2 A Jewish youth in agricultural training in 1933, preparing foremigration from Germany to Palestine 214

ix






7.3 Young German-Jewish women tend the chickens onhachschara “Ellgut” as part of their agricultural trainingin 1940 for life in Palestine 215

7.4 Members of the Habonim [Zionist youth] hachschara groupin Nuremberg, at Beit Halutz on Lindenast Strasse 6 in 1936 216

7.5 Jewish Gymnasium graduates train as carpenters under theauspices of the Jewish community in Berlin in 1936 217

7.6 Jewish youths prepare for emigration by training as locksmithsunder the auspices of the Jewish community in Berlin in 1936 218

8.1 Arthur Ruppin’s last visit to Germany, seated in a synagoguewith Heinrich Stahl, Leo Baeck, Alfred Klee, and JosefSchneidel, in 1938 247

8.2 Reinhard Heydrich, SS-Obergruppenfuhrer, Reich Protectorof Bohemia and Moravia, Head of the Reich Security MainOffice (RSHA), 1938–May 1942 253

8.3 Adolf Eichmann, SS-Obersturmbannfuhrer, Head of theCentral Office for Jewish Emigration in Vienna beginningin 1938 255

8.4 At the Interior Ministry in Vienna, Adolf Eichmann andthe SS prepare for a raid on the offices of the Jewishcommunity in Vienna, 18 March 1938 256

8.5 Prospective Jewish emigrants line up at the Palestine Officeof the Jewish Agency for Palestine in Prague in 1939 269

8.6 The steamship Tiger Hill carrying illegal refugees lands onTel Aviv shore, 1939 273

List of Illustrationsx






Acknowledgments

I wish to express my appreciation for the support of the scholars, archivists,librarians, and support staffs of the many research and archival institutionsat which I was able to do the research for this book. These institutions inGermany, the United States, Israel, the United Kingdom, and Canada wereindispensable in the long process of preparing this study. I am also particularlygrateful to the librarians and support staffs of the libraries at the Center forAdvanced Holocaust Studies of the United States Holocaust MemorialMuseum in Washington, D.C.; the Center for Research on Anti-Semitism atthe Technical University of Berlin; McGill University in Montreal; and SaintMichael’s College, the University of Vermont, and Middlebury College inVermont for their kind assistance. My special thanks also go to Shallom andCarol Lewin of Burlington, Vermont, for their help in translating documents inHebrew from the Haganah Archives in Tel Aviv.

But these institutions and individuals would not have been in a position tohelp had it not been for the generous financial support I received for thisproject from a variety of granting bodies in the United States and Germany.I am indebted to the Council for the International Exchange of Scholars inWashington, D.C., and the Fulbright-Kommission, formerly in Bonn, now inBerlin, for a sabbatical year of research in Berlin and at various state archivesthroughout the Federal Republic. The American Philosophical Society inPhiladelphia provided financial support for a brief research trip to Moscow toexamine captured German records at the Osobyi Special Archive in Moscow.The Charles Revson Foundation and the Center for Advanced HolocaustStudies of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington,D.C., generously supported me during a semester of research into its microfilmcollection of the German files housed in their original form at the OsobyiSpecial Archive in Moscow. Finally, the Faculty Development Fund at SaintMichael’s College provided generous financial support for several researchtrips to the archives in Israel that I was able to use and for other technicalaspects involved in the preparation of this book.

xi






To friends and colleagues at all of these institutions, I am deeply grateful. Ialso wish to thank the anonymous readers of this manuscript for the manyhelpful and constructive suggestions they provided during the review process.Finally, I am indebted to my wife, Ellen Oxfeld, an anthropologist, whoprovided me with useful perspectives and constructive suggestions during theprocess of manuscript revision.

For whatever may be positive about this study, all of these people deserve alarge share of the credit; for its shortcomings, the responsibility must restentirely with me.

Francis R. Nicosia

Middlebury, Vermont

Acknowledgmentsxii






Abbreviations

ADAP Akten zur Deutschen Auswartigen Politik, 1918–1945(Documents on German Foreign Policy 1918–1945)

AJC American Jewish CommitteeBArch Bundesarchiv (Federal Archives), BerlinBArch/D-H Bundesarchiv (Federal Archives), Dahlwitz-HoppegartenBHStA Bayerisches Hauptstaatsarchiv (Bavarian Main State

Archives), MunichBLHA Brandenburgisches Landeshauptarchiv (Brandenburg Main

State Archives), PotsdamCAHJP Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People,

JerusalemCJA Centrum Judaicum Archiv – Stiftung Neue Synagoge (Archives

of the Judaica Center – New Synagogue Foundation), BerlinCU Concordia University, MontrealCV Centralverein deutscher Staatsburger judischen Glaubens/

Centralverein der Juden in Deutschland (CentralAssociation of German Citizens of the Jewish Faith/CentralAssociation of Jews in Germany)

CZA Central Zionist Archives, JerusalemHA Haganah Archives, Tel AvivHdJ Hilfsverein der deutschen Juden (Help Association of

German Jews)HOG Hitachduth Olej Germania (Association of Immigrants from

Germany)ICA Jewish Colonization AssociationIf Z Institut fur Zeitgeschichte (Institute for Contemporary

History), MunichISA Israel State Archives, JerusalemJI Jabotinsky Institute, Tel AvivJVP Judische Volkspartei (Jewish Peoples Party)

xiii






LAB Landesarchiv (State Archives), BerlinLBI Leo Baeck Institute, New YorkLHSA Landeshauptarchiv Sachsen-Anhalt (Main State Archives

Saxony-Anhalt), MagdeburgLZRD Landesverband der Zionisten-Revisionisten in Deutschland

(State Association of Zionists-Revisionists in Germany)NARA National Archives and Records Administration, Washington,

D.C.NZO New Zionist OrganizationNHStA Niedersachsisches Hauptstaatsarchiv (Lower Saxony Main

State Archives), HannoverNStA Niedersachisches Staatsarchiv (Lower Saxony State

Archives), WolfenbuttelOsb Osobyi Special Archive, MoscowPA Politisches Archiv des Auswartigen Amts (Political Archives

of the Foreign Ministry), BerlinPRO Public Record Office, LondonRjF Reichsbund judischer Frontsoldaten (Reich League of Jewish

War Veterans)RSHA Reichssicherheitshauptamt (Reich Security Main Office)RVt Reichsvertretung der deutschen Juden/Reichsvertretung der

Juden in Deutschland (Reich Representation of GermanJews/Reich Representation of Jews in Germany)

RVe Reichsvereinigung der Juden in Deutschland (ReichAssociation of Jews in Germany)

SD Sicherheitsdienst (Security Service)SStA Sachsisches Staatsarchiv (Saxon State Archives), LeipzigStAH Staatsarchiv (State Archives), HamburgUSHMM United StatesHolocaustMemorialMuseum,Washington,D.C.VdZR Verband deutscher Zionisten-Revisionisten (Association of

German Zionists-Revisionists)VnJ Verband nationaldeutscher Juden (Association of National-

German Jews)VrJ Vereinigung fur das religios-liberale Judentum (Association

of Religious-Liberal Jewry)WZO World Zionist OrganizationZJHA Zentralausschuss der deutschen Juden fur Hilfe und Aufbau

(Central Committee of German Jews for Assistance andConstruction)

ZjW Zentralstelle fur judische Wirtschaftshilfe (Central Office forJewish Economic Assistance)

ZVfD Zionistische Vereinigung fur Deutschland (ZionistFederation for Germany)

Abbreviationsxiv






Zionism and Anti-Semitism in Nazi Germany




