Dr Manfred Gerstenfeld: Antisemitism integral to European culture

First published by Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, reproduced by HAFANZ with permission

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: For about 20 years, the EU has been largely inactive, incompetent, negligent, and at times even evil in the battle against antisemitism. During that period, Jew- and Israel hatred has greatly increased in the EU. The EU Commission has announced that in 2021 it will present a comprehensive strategy on combating antisemitism. No such strategy can succeed without a detailed explication of the lengthy history of antisemitism in Europe. If the strategy does not explicitly admit that antisemitism is integral to European culture, it will fail.

The EU Commission has stated that in the coming year, it plans to tackle the issue of antisemitic incitement. Its program for 2021 states: “Given the rise in antisemitic violence and hate crime, the Commission will present a comprehensive strategy on combating antisemitism to complement and support member states’ efforts.” The EU also intends to adopt a declaration against antisemitism at its December summit.

Europe’s lengthy history of antisemitism, which has lasted well over a thousand years, had its origins even before the notion of Europe existed. No EU strategy against antisemitism can be effective without a detailed explication of the history of Europe’s millenarian antisemitism. This will require, first of all, a focus on the Roman Catholic Church, but will also have to involve attention to individual figures like Erasmus, Martin Luther, Voltaire, nineteenth century early French socialists, and Karl Marx.

The EU document will have to explain how vile and rabid Christian antisemitism laid part of the basis for the second major wave of this hatred, national ethnic antisemitism, and its most extreme genocidal expression: Nazism.

In the years since WWII, a third mode of antisemitism gradually took form: anti-Israelism. The EU and a number of its member states have participated in this version of antisemitism from time to time. All this has to be detailed and illustrated; otherwise, the ultimate document will be invalid.

An important milestone in the distortion of the EU reality of antisemitism occurred in 2003, when the Center for Research on Antisemitism (CRA) at the Technical University in Berlin was asked by the European Monitoring Center for Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC) to analyze the data and summarize the findings on antisemitism that the European organization had collected.

American scholar Amy Elman detailed this failure in her 2015 book, The European Union, Antisemitism and the Politics of Denial. In an interview she said: 

The CRA completed its document in October 2003. It found that violent attacks against Jews often rose from virulent anti-Zionism across the political spectrum. Moreover, it specifically identified young Muslims of Arab descent as the main perpetrators of physical attacks against Jews and the desecration and destruction of synagogues. Many were victims of racism and social exclusion themselves.

The EUMC did not publish the study and insisted that the one month period covered in the CRA investigation was too short. It also claimed the report was never intended for publication. The CRA researchers commented that their focus on Muslim perpetrators of antisemitism and anti-Zionist attacks unsettled the EUMC. They stated that this EU Agency had repeatedly asked them to alter their ‘divisive’ findings. After the researchers refused this revisionism, the EUMC shelved their report in November 2003.

Gradually, studies began to be published on the extreme antisemitism of various European countries, but the EU did very little. One critical event was the publication of a study in 2011 by the University of Bielefeld that was conducted on behalf of the German Social Democratic foundation Friedrich Ebert Stiftung. It found that at least 150 million citizens of the EU aged 16 and older held the view that Israel is demonic.

The study was undertaken in seven European countries. Researchers polled 1,000 people per country over the age of 16 in the fall of 2008. One question was whether the respondent agreed with the assertion that Israel is carrying out a war of extermination against the Palestinians. The lowest percentages of those who agreed were in Italy and the Netherlands, at 38% and 39%, respectively. Other percentages were Hungary 41%, the UK 42%, Germany 48%, and Portugal 49%. In Poland the figure was 63%.

The European Commission should have been shocked by these findings. They showed that a “new Europe” only exists in part, while the old Europe of Jew-hatred and antisemitic incitement is very much alive. The EU should have also looked at the consequences of its own contribution to this problem in terms of its one-sided criticism of Israel and willingness to look away from the majority support of the Palestinian electorate for the genocidal Hamas movement, as well as its financial support for the Palestinian Authority (PA). The PA is controlled by the second-largest Palestinian movement, Fatah, which financially rewards terrorists who murder Jews. (If the terrorist is killed, their families receive the cash.) The culture of glorification of death is very prominent in the Palestinian worldview, but the EU has nothing to say on the matter.

The EU also donates money to Palestinian NGOs that incite against Israel. NGO Monitor has pointed out that several of these NGOs are terror-linked. The EU also supports the biased UN Special Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA). There is no valid reason for the existence of this agency outside the regular UN refugee assistance system.

In several EU member countries, antisemitism flourishes without any response from the EU. Sweden is one such case. Its third-largest city, Malmö, was the capital of antisemitism in Europe for a long time. This was mainly due to segments of its large Muslim population. It was made possible by inaction and sometimes even active participation in antisemitic propaganda by the local social democratic administration led by Mayor Elmar Reepalu. Malmö was gradually overtaken as Europe’s antisemitism capital by the much bigger Berlin. Another scandalous event in Europe (and a unique one, at least so far) was the closure of the Jewish community in the Swedish town Umea due to harassment by local Nazis.

Spain is another country where antisemitism is embedded at the highest level. The Podemos party denies Israel’s right to exist. Podemos is the junior partner in the Spanish Socialist Worker (PSOE)-dominated government of PM Pedro Sánchez. Any serious plan for an EU strategy against antisemitism should lead to the resignation or expulsion of the Commission’s High Representative for Foreign Policy and Security, Josep Borrell, a Spaniard, who told Politico, “Iran wants to wipe out Israel; nothing new about that. You have to live with it.” This is the worst type of appeasement. A man like that should not have a place in an EU Commission that claims to have a strategy against antisemitism.

The EU appointed its first European Commission Coordinator on combating antisemitism, Katharina von Schnurbein, in 2015. She does her utmost in the field. The facts that she is not high in the EU hierarchy and has very little staff are yet more indications of the EU’s negligence in the battle against antisemitism.

In past years, a variety of studies have been published about the spread of antisemitism in a number of EU countries as well as the perceptions and experiences of Jews living there. The relative importance of perpetrators differs between countries. Overall, Muslim antisemitism is dominant, but in Germany, right-wing antisemitism is more prevalent. The latter is also increasing overall. Left-wing antisemitism largely expresses itself in extreme hatred of Israel.

It is important that well before work starts on the study, a detailed outline that includes the items that must be covered in it is presented to the EU Commission. The question is, who can or will do this? The Israeli government has many vested interests in interactions with the EU and is unlikely to do so. This is all the more so due to its own incompetence and neglect in the field.

This leaves the issue wide open for major Jewish organizations, but they are usually unfamiliar with a strategic overall view of European antisemitism.

As the EU Commission has committed to this study, this is a unique opportunity to confront Europe and press it to finally come up with a worthwhile strategic document that addresses the battle against antisemitism, the continent’s antisemitic past, and the EU’s own huge failures in the field.

Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld (Ph.D. Amsterdam University) is former Chairman of the Steering Committee of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs. He specializes in Israeli-Western Europe relations, antisemitism, and anti-Zionism.

Lithuania's Hidden Holocaust

It was our pleasure to interview Dr Efraim Zuroff about his latest book, Our People: Discovering Lithuania’s Hidden Holocaust, co-authored with Rūta Vanagaitė.

The book is a ‘collaboration between a Jewish Nazi-hunter named for a victim of the Holocaust in Lithuania and a renowned Lithuanian writer who descends from perpetrators of Holocaust crimes’.

The interview addresses the problem of Holocaust distortion and the double genocide theory i.e. the equivalency between Nazi and Communist crimes. It traverses history, politics and covers a very personal story of a journey through the land to uncover Lithuania’s involvement in the Holocaust.

Press Release: Nazi Hunter joins NZ Holocaust Foundation's International Council

Dr Efraim Zuroff, has joined the Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation, Aotearoa New Zealand, as a member of its International Council. 

Zuroff’s recent comments on the “local hero” status of Mt Hutt’s former Waffen-SS soldier Willi Huber have been widely reported in NZ and international media. 

Zuroff is the Coordinator of Nazi war crimes research for the Simon Wiesenthal Center, and the Director of the Center’s Israel Office and Eastern European Affairs. For the past four decades, he has played a leading role in helping to facilitate the prosecution of Holocaust perpetrators all over the world, and is the person who revealed the immigration to New Zealand of dozens of suspected Nazi war criminals. A distinguished historian, he was among the first to identify the phenomenon of Holocaust distortion in post-Communist Eastern Europe, and is extremely active in combatting this dangerous problem.

The recipient of many awards and honours, Zuroff was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2008.

Perry Trotter, founder of the Holocaust Foundation said, “Holocaust memory is under threat and antisemitism is rising. We are delighted to have such an internationally well respected authority join us at such a time. Dr Zuroff will greatly strengthen our work.”

Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation, Aotearoa New Zealand is an educational charitable trust dedicated to preserving and protecting Holocaust memory, and communicating the Holocaust to a general audience, particularly through its acclaimed exhibitions. 

The Foundation’s latest exhibition is entitled “Auschwitz. Now.” and will be staged in Auckland in October, in partnership with AUT University. “Auschwitz. Now.” will be open to the public 6-13 October, 9am-9pm. Admission is free.

Guest Post: A controversial “legacy”

This year has seen the world taking a fresh look at notable “personalities” from the past and what they represent in a broader, historical context. In New Zealand, statues of colonial figures are being reassessed amidst discussion of how to better address the injustices of the country’s past.

In addition to the colonial era, New Zealand’s post-war policies around immigration and the response of successive governments to the presence of Nazi war criminals in the country have long been the subject of criticism from the Jewish community. 

A recent controversy over the legacy of a post-war Austrian émigré, who died on August 9, has brought these issues to the fore again. 

Willi Huber immigrated to New Zealand in 1953. He made a name for himself on the ski-fields and is considered one of the “founding fathers” of Canterbury’s Mt Hutt ski area. The mountain features a lasting memorial to him in the form of the Huber’s Run trail, a plaque and a café.

There is more to Huber’s past than his endeavours on the ski-fields, though. At 17, Huber volunteered for the Waffen-SS, where he served as a machine-gunner, earning two Iron Cross medals on the eastern front. After the war, he was held as a prisoner of war for 16 months.

Despite this, Huber has been the subject of several laudatory media stories, including a controversial TVNZ programme in 2017, which was heavily criticised for glossing over and minimising his Nazi past. 

Huber denied knowledge of any atrocities by the Waffen-SS and never expressed any remorse for his wartime activities.

Shortly after Huber’s death, Mt. Hutt Ski Area manager James McKenzie told the media the Huber’s Run ski trail would keep his name; “He made a new life and a new start here and tried to put that behind him. We are happy to respect his legacy. The context of what he went through in the war, nobody knows for sure what people did way back then.”

This comment ignited a maelstrom of criticism. Zionist Federation of NZ President Rob Berg started a petition calling for the removal of the “honouring legacy” for Huber from Mt Hutt, while community leaders like NZ Jewish Council spokesperson Juliet Moses wrote impassioned columns asking why New Zealand was intent on honouring the legacy of an unrepentant Nazi.

The Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation contacted the renowned Nazi hunter Dr Efraim Zuroff, director of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre’s office in Jerusalem. He said he could “state unequivocally that serving in a Waffen-SS unit on the eastern front, there is no way that Mr Huber could possibly not have been aware of the massive atrocities carried out by the SS… If we add the fact that he volunteered for the SS, and his comments that Hitler was ‘very clever,’ and …‘offered [Austrians] a way out’ of the hardships after World War I, it’s clear that Mr. Huber was an unrepentant Nazi, who doesn’t deserve any sympathy or recognition.”

For the Holocaust Centre of New Zealand’s chief executive, Chris Harris, there’s no doubt that Huber was aware of what was going on in the Waffen-SS. “Even if he didn’t participate in it, he was aware of it. For us that means that he should not be honoured and paid homage to.

“So we would love Mt Hutt to reconsider the renaming of that area… They can say he made a new life and so on. But that wasn’t possible for the millions of victims of the Nazis who never got that chance.”

The Huber controversy has also reignited niggling questions about exactly who was allowed into New Zealand after World War II and the lack of a satisfactory government response to post-war arrivals subsequently identified as war criminals.

Harris says that between 40 and 46 Nazi war criminals are known to have migrated to New Zealand after the war.  “They committed horrors, so how did they get in? You have to ask how was Immigration NZ assessing refugees? Were they just saying ‘oh, well you fought on the other side but it’s over now so you can come in’?”

In fact, New Zealand was the only Anglo-Saxon country that chose not to attempt any legal action against alleged Nazi war criminals within its borders, a reality described as “an embarrassment” by Zuroff.

Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation Aotearoa New Zealand co-founder Sheree Trotter says that it is difficult to explain the government’s lack of response on identified war criminals – especially as it was so out-of-step with allies. 

“The specific case of Willi Huber could be explained by a number of factors. Many New Zealanders struggle to face our own colonial past where injustices and crimes were perpetrated by our forebears. It’s easier to take the view that we should just move on. That type of attitude, combined with lack of education and an easy-going-accept-people-at-face-value attitude, could explain how Huber managed to ingratiate himself into the local community.”

In both Harris and Trotter’s view, there is a great need for more research into New Zealand’s relationship with the Holocaust, as well as education on the Holocaust, to better address these issues. 

First published by AIJAC here.

Dane Giraud: The Strange Case of Herr Huber

“Watch me kill Nazis, Dad”.

That was my youngest son, probably about 8 or 9 years old at the time, desperately wanting his old man to witness his gaming prowess and thinking the fact he was mowing down Nazis might sweeten the deal. I gave in and watched, and it was a virtual bloodbath alright, but I felt I had to curb his enthusiasm with a reminder that in our not too distant past the Third Reich had been anything but a game. He waved me away with an assurance he’d absorbed my numerous lessons on WW2, upped his health and recommenced shooting.

A few months pass and I am in Auckland on business.  I call home and my oldest son picks up. I ask him what everyone had been up to.

“Oh, ________ watched The Pianist”.

“The Pianist” was the 2003 best picture winner, directed by Roman Polanski and based on the Holocaust memoir by the Polish-Jewish pianist and composer Wladyslaw Szpilman. Polanski, himself a survivor, had made an unflinching film from source material, and when I asked to speak to my young son, I got someone decidedly more subdued than the exuberant gamer. He was far too young to watch a film so graphic, so harrowing, but it couldn’t now be unseen. He wanted to talk about it. I could tell he was trying to grasp not only how such evil could exist, but why it would specifically target him. It had brought him face-to-face with evil in a way my words couldn’t, which in turn meant coming face-to-face with his Jewishness.

In a recent obituary for Austrian/ New Zealander Willi Huber, a founding father of Canterbury’s Mt. Hutt ski area back in the 70’s, Area manager James McKenzie said that “Huber’s Run” would keep its name, regardless of Huber’s time in the Waffen-SS.

“The context of what he went through in the war, nobody knows for sure what people did way back then.”

In truth, no mystery shrouds the activities of the SS, beyond a cloak of ignorance, which it appears had been regulation attire on the slopes Huber worked on.

Willi Huber was no “grunt” (a private in the regular army) but a committed fascist. The group that he had volunteered for (that’s right, volunteered), was the paramilitary wing of the Nazi party; Hitler’s agency of security, surveillance, and terror within Germany and German-occupied Europe. The SS were the “ideological warriors”, whose hearts and minds were fully committed to the Hitler’s vision of racial supremacism and his war of extermination against peoples considered subhuman. A third of the make-up of mobile killing squads responsible for untold mass murders, were Waffen-SS recruits. At the Nuremberg Trials (where, contrary to Mr. Mackenzie’s claim, what people did way back then was often made devastatingly clear) the SS were judged to be a criminal organisation on account of its being a branch of the Nazi party, and for its carrying out of countless atrocities. Comparing Huber to an ISIS fighter would be completely apt.

McKenzie can be forgiven to an extent (though a decision to defend Huber should’ve warranted picking up a single book), but members of our media have no excuse. In an agonizingly tone-deaf 2017 segment for current affairs show “Sunday”, veteran journalist Cameron Bennett oversaw a what he clearly viewed as a fluff-piece on a cuddly old man who started life as a Germanic Tom Sawyer “off to see the world” and who, after a “Boy’s Own Adventure” ended up sprinkling joy and happiness across the Southern Alps.

“I give it to Hitler”, Huber beams at one point in the segment, “He was very clever. He brought Austria out of its dump; you know”.

In this piece, Huber proudly shows off his war medals, accolades earned supporting a homicidal maniac’s putrid ambition to render Europe, and parts of the East, an open-air abattoir. These medals (which we can assume made their appearances at Huber’s prompting) feature in all the pieces on Huber I’ve read online. In a profile from 2014 entitled “Heartland Heroes”, there is a revealing paragraph in which Huber speaks of finding himself offside with fellow countrymen upon returning to Austria, who ended up dobbing him into the Americans.

I wonder what on earth could’ve possessed them to do that, Herr Huber?

The term “fascist” must be in the running for most overused word of our age, and one that rarely bears any resemblance to its targets. Yet, when the real deal dies – a fascist who fulfilled his dreadful potential in willingly offering his services to one of the most blood-drenched racist projects in world history, the usual suspects have nothing to say. Meanwhile, on the Right, we often hear it said that minority groups (Jews, Maori most definitely) live in the past to the detriment of their, and even our collective present. But, as the strange case of Willi Huber proves, being tethered to the past in such a way, is to be tethered to the truth. And to allow one’s conscience to be unshackled from the past (a liberty my son, in that screening, realized he just doesn’t have) is to nod, smile and take another sip of cocoa when an SS soldier tells you he is a hero.  

It’s a cliché, but I’ll say it: To know your past is to know your present. Or, in a new version crafted especially for the passing of Herr Huber “To know the past is an imperative, if there’s to be any hope of seeing the monsters walking among us”.

• Dane Giraud is the creator of “Find Me A Maori Bride”, a spokesperson for the Free Speech Coalition and a long-standing member of Temple Sinai, Wellington.

Guest Post: Antisemitism in the black community

By Juliet Moses | First published in Spectator

It has been the perennial Jewish condition since Jesus’ death - our cross to bear, if you will - to be blamed for and inserted into crises, causes and momentous world events that don’t seem to have any specific connection to us.  The Jews are the answer, whatever the question.  For those with a particular kind of cognitive impairment, there is presumably comfort in the certainty that as much as the world changes, some things stay the same.     

Recently Louis Farrakhan, the bow-tied leader of the Nation of Islam (labelled a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center), has been in the limelight. Farrakhan publicly calls Jews “termites” and praises Hitler as a “great man”. In his July 4 speech this year, he referred to Jews as “Satan’ and urged his audience to “fight Satan the arch deceiver [and] the imposter Jews who are worthy of the chastisement of God”. As of 15 July, the speech had garnered over 1.2 million views on YouTube.    

This brand of antisemitism – singling out Jews as oppressors of Black people and advancing a kind of replacement theology - can be murderous. It appears to have at least partially motivated two fatal New York State attacks in December last year – one on a Chanukah gathering in Monsey in which five people were stabbed and one ultimately died, and one shooting spree that ended in a Jersey City kosher shop, with four dead.

A white supremacist ideology visits the perceived sins of non-white people on the Jews. Farrakhan’s ideology visits the perceived sins of white people on the Jews, so that Jews (at least those with white skin) are charged with not only being complicit in systemic racism like all white people, but with orchestrating and profiting off it.  In both cases, Jews are believed to wield outsized, occult power and privilege, supplanting people and manipulating events to advance their evil agenda.   

Most right thinking people (or perhaps, non-far right thinking people) identify white supremacy as a toxic, racist ideology. Its proponents like David Duke are shunned from mainstream society and deprived of platforms. Last month he was banned from Twitter permanently. 

What makes Farrakhan (who is also homophobic) arguably the most dangerous antisemite in America, is that far from being ostracised and “cancelled”, he is embraced and promoted by celebrities and those who profess to be progressives and anti-racists. He sat upfront onstage at Aretha Franklin’s funeral alongside Bill Clinton. The Women’s March became mired in controversy in 2018 because one of its leaders, Tamika Mallory, was a dedicated follower (once calling Farrakhan “GOAT”) and refused to denounce him.   

Since George Floyd’s abhorrent death, a number of confirmed Farrakhan fanboys - Black people with big platforms and blue checkmarks  - have apparently concluded that combatting racial hatred and uplifting the Black community requires rolling out a medley of Farrakhan’s greatest hits of antisemitic tropes, stereotypes and conspiracy theories.  

It began with rapper Ice Cube. He tweeted a slew of antisemitic images and conspiracy theories to his more than 5 million followers, all on the theme of you-know-who exploiting Black people.   

In case that wasn’t enough Kool Aid with your Ice Cube, next up was DeSean Jackson, of the Philadelphia Eagles, who took to Instagram to (mistakenly) quote Hitler that Black Americans are “the real Children of Israel” and “white Jews” will extort America to advance “their plan for world domination”.  Former NBA player Stephen Jackson defended DeSean, adding that the Rothschilds own all the banks. 

Then Nick Cannon, a TV host, talked on his Youtube podcast about how Jews control the media and Black people are the “true Hebrews”. 

Across the Atlantic, British rapper Wiley went on an antisemitic bender on social media, likening Jews to the KKK and indulging in countless canards about Jewish money and power.  He follows Farrakhan on social media, although when it was suggested he was parroting him, took offence at the perceived slight on his originality.  

There have been some consequences for the offenders; DeSean was fined by the Eagles, Wiley was banned from social media platforms, and ViacomCBS cut ties with Cannon. The merits of such consequences can be debated elsewhere, but they have been interpreted by some as confirmation that the Jews are indeed omnipotent. All except Ice Cube have apologised to some degree; Cannon appears to be genuinely remorseful, and keen to learn. That should be encouraged.

Antisemitism may not be any more prevalent in the Black community than it is among white people or in any other community. Certainly, other Black people with significant platforms have condemned the offenders including Pittsburgh Steeler Zach Banner, rapper Zuby, actor and TV host Whoopi Goldberg, former NBA stars Charles Barkley and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, sports journalist Jemele Hill and ESPN anchors Sage Steele and Michael Wilbon. They serve as a good reminder not to make hasty or collective judgements about a community based on the unpalatable statements of some of its individuals.

Theoretically, we should hold those individuals to account in the same way as we would if they were not Black, and condemn the double standard that sees Farrakhan lionised amidst a climate of cancellation.  But in identity politics, minorities are collectivized, pitted against one another, and ranked according to victimhood status. There is also an historical context. While Black people and Jews both have histories of oppression and have been allies, most notably in the civil rights movement, their relationship has sometimes been fractious, and their experiences of oppression are very different. Indeed, there are good reasons for the Nation of Islam’s popularity that have nothing to do with antisemitism; the group organises social service programmes in low-income Black areas and teaches self-reliance. But history tells us, and what we observe now, is that bigotry is not readily compartmentalised. Under cover of good policies and deeds, it becomes normalised, not neutralised. 

None of this is to say that racism should be excused, or that Black people do not deserve the empathy and solidarity of Jewish people. Quite the contrary. The great shame is that antisemitism has become a distraction and a cause of division within the Black community, at a time when they – and Jews – should be united in their fight for racial justice. With the death of Congressman John Lewis recently, a civil rights leader who spurned Farrakhan because of his “divisive and bigoted” statements, and built a close relationship with the Jewish community, it would be timely to embrace his legacy.         

---

Nazi Hunter Reacts To Death Of Local “Hero” SS-Waffen Soldier

Former Nazi Waffen-SS soldier Willi Huber died recently, aged 96. Having lived in New Zealand since 1953, Huber made a name for himself as one of the ‘founding fathers’ of Canterbury’s Mt Hutt ski area. Hailed as a ‘heartland hero’, locals have appeared willing to ignore his Nazi past. 

In a 2017 TVNZ interview, Huber denied knowledge of the war crimes committed by the Waffen SS or German forces, or of the Nazi murder of about six million European Jews and millions of others, many of whom died in concentration camps run by the SS.

Speaking to the Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation from Jerusalem this week, renowned Nazi Hunter and Director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center office in Jerusalem, Dr Efraim Zuroff commented:

As a historian, I can state unequivocally that serving in a Waffen-SS unit on the Eastern front, there is no way that Mr Huber could possibly not have been aware of the massive atrocities carried out by the SS and the Wehrmacht in the territories of the Soviet Union, where 1,500,000 "enemies of the Reich," primarily Jews, were murdered individually during the years 1941-1943.

Huber's statements ring incredibly hollow in the face of the historical record of the Holocaust on the Eastern front. If we add the fact that he volunteered for the SS, and his comments that Hitler was "very clever," and that he “offered [Austrians] a way out"  of the hardships after World War I, it's clear that Mr. Huber was an unrepentant Nazi, who doesn't deserve any sympathy or recognition.

In the early 1990s Zuroff pushed for the New Zealand government to investigate approximately forty suspected Nazi war criminals who found refuge in New Zealand after World War II. In 1991 New Zealand set up a two-person unit to investigate the allegations, but the government was unwilling to take legal action against suspected Nazis. 

An Interview With The Last Nazi Hunter: Part I from Perry Trotter on Vimeo.

In a 2018 interview, Zuroff stated that ‘New Zealand was the only Anglo-Saxon country, (out of Great Britain, United States, Canada and Australia - South Africa was not open to immigration at that time), that chose not to take legal action after a governmental inquiry into the presence of Nazis in New Zealand’.

"There was absolutely no political will to take legal action against the Nazi war criminals who emigrated to New Zealand in the late 1940s and early 1950s, posing as refugees fleeing communism.”

New Zealand’s historical willingness to grant entry and then turn a blind eye to suspected Nazi war criminals was accompanied by a reluctance to receive Jewish refugees. Obstacles faced by Jews seeking refuge in New Zealand are well documented. 

Huber has been granted a lasting legacy on Mount Hutt with a ski run named in his honour along with a plaque. He was also awarded a medal by the Austrian Government in 2002 for services to skiing and to Austria.

New Zealand has a legacy too - one of shame.

---

Disturbing Phenomenon of Antisemitism Amongst Children

Image: Ben Wicks

The Australian Jewish press recently reported disturbing incidents of antisemitic bullying of school children from as young as five years old, in both public and private schools in Victoria and New South Wales. 

The abuse included: 

• taunting with names like, “Jewboy”, “the Jew”, “You cooked-up Jew”, “worthless Jewish rodent”

• being told to “get in my oven” 

• drawings of swastikas and Nazi flags being displayed or thrown at students 

• students performing Nazi salutes 

• the drawing of Nazi doctor Josef Mengele and talk of “dissecting Jews” 

• classmates throwing coins on the ground, and saying, “Look, the Jew will pick it up” 

• a Kippah being ripped from a boy’s head, thrown around “like a frisbee” and stomped on the ground 

• dirt thrown at a boy accompanied by the taunt, “Look, I found your ancestors. I found your grandma” 

• physical abuse 

• bullies following a boy into the bathrooms and commenting on his genitalia 

• a teacher comparing Palestinian terrorism to Jewish resistance during the Holocaust 

• a teacher delegitimising the children’s Israeli identity by instead labelling the boys as “Palestinian”

• cyberbullying and threats of stalking

Incidents of antisemitic hatred amongst such young children surely raise serious questions. Where do young people get such toxic ideas about a tragic event that occurred 75 years ago? 

The social media platform Tik Tok, which particularly targets youngsters, was recently exposed for promoting antisemitic videos. The combined ‘memes’ featured on Tik Tok gained over 6.5 million views. This might go some way to explaining antisemitism amongst children and young people.

More shocking, however,  is the behaviour of the teachers, who one would expect to know better. Teachers at the centre of the school dispute not only minimized the experiences of the students, one teacher erased the identity of the student by referring to him as a Palestinian. The imposition of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict onto individual Jews is one reason why the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance has formulated a definition of antisemitism which highlights the connection between anti-Israel sentiment and antisemitism. 

The IRHA definition affirms the idea that criticism of Israel can be legitimate, just as it is for any other state, however, when it crosses certain boundaries, it becomes antisemitic. 

The IHRA definition states that when criticism of Israel:

• is couched in terms which employ or appeal to negative stereotypes of Jewish people generally;

• or denies the Jewish people their right to self-determination;

• or applies double standards by requiring of Israel standards of behaviour not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation;

• or holds Jews collectively responsible for actions of the State of Israel;

then the line has been crossed. It’s antisemitism.

Indeed, Dane Giraud has argued regarding the IHRA definition, that:

…as an educational tool, it could be an effective map to reorientate people after an onslaught in recent years that’s normalized anti-Jewish tropes to the point some just cannot tell what is and what isn’t antisemitic anymore. Creating a standard to raise awareness as to what the tropes certain groups are using truly represent is a positive if you, like me, view education as being a far better solution to racism than outright banning speech.

It is difficult to know how widespread antisemitic bullying is in New Zealand schools. Anecdotal evidence suggests that similar types of bullying occurs, but it tends not to be publicised. Indeed, HAFANZ was invited to a school last year, to teach on the Holocaust, directly in response to an antisemitic incident. The school, to its credit, acted upon the complaint by organising lessons on the Holocaust. 

This suggests that antisemitism may not be such a problem in New Zealand, however recent history shows that our country is not immune from this global trend in antisemitism; from the proliferation of antisemitic tropes on social media to mail-box drops, periodic bouts of antisemitic graffiti, anti-Israel rhetoric from some politicians, anti-Jewish speeches from certain Muslim groups and individuals to the fact that New Zealand’s only Jewish school requires security guards.

The recently launched ‘Shifting Jewry 2019 (Gen19) survey’ found a significant increase in the number of Jewish New Zealanders concerned about antisemitism. Whereas in the previous such survey in 2008, 84% thought that antisemitism was not a serious issue in New Zealand, the most recent survey showed that 44% of respondents viewed antisemitism as either a “very big” or a “fairly big” problem.

While the global community has in recent times been preoccupied by questions over racism, equal concern over Jew hatred has seldom been evident. Rather, BLM protests have often been accompanied by the destruction of Jewish shops and vandalising of synagogues, along with placards reading “Israel, laboratory of police violence”, “Who is the terrorist?” and mass chants of “Dirty Jews”.

From BLM protests to Australian schools, we see and hear the same messages and tropes, underlining the need for ongoing education. 

Peter Wertheim of The Executive Council of Australian Jewry in addressing the Inquiry into Anti-Vilification Protections conducted by The Legal And Social Issues Committee of the Legislative Assembly Of Victoria pointed to the need for education, and specifically education on antisemitism.

It seems that generic education against racism will not address this problem, because many younger people fail to see antisemitism as a form of racism. They see Jews as part of the privileged, white elite who are immune from racism, a misperception which provides a disturbing insight into the appalling ignorance of history of many younger people.

Wertheim is correct to identify the need for specific education for young people on antisemitism, however, the problem is widespread and affects adults as well.

In October 2019, UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief Ahmed Shaheed, also affirmed the need for education and the importance of engaging the younger generation. ‘An increase in antisemitic incidents is being reported internationally - including violence, discrimination and expressions of hostility - and the problem is being boosted by the internet, with online antisemitism hate speech prevalent,’ he said. ‘Antisemitism is the canary in the coalmine of global hatred’.

Winona Ryder, Antisemitism and the Holocaust

Screenshot from The Plot Against America , HBO

My first memory of Winona Ryder was in the film Little Women, an adaptation of one of my favourite childhood novels of the same name. Ryder played the feisty tom-boyish character, Jo, who bucked the conventions of the day when it came to expectations for women. Ryder had already made a mark by acting in films like Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands, and has, since then, appeared in a string of movies. She has never been far from the news, having gone through a bad-girl phase, which included being arrested for shop-lifting, struggled with mental health and drug addiction, and had a few high profile relationships, such as her first with Johnny Depp, whom she met at the tender age of 17.

More recently Ryder’s Jewish background has been the focus of publicity. Daughter of authors Cynthia Palmer and Michael D. Horowitz, Ryder’s real name is Winona Laura Horowitz. Her godfather is psychedelic guru, Dr Timothy Leary. Her father’s family emigrated from Russia and Romania and many family members died in the concentration camps. 

In a recent interview the actress told of overhearing stories about the camps and the fears those stories invoked. She worried that ‘someone would knock on the door and drag them off to be murdered’ and often slept in the doorway of her parent’s bedroom, terrified that they might somehow be taken away.

Ryder’s experience of antisemitism within the movie industry ranged from being passed over for a period piece, because she looked too Jewish to be caste in a ‘blue-blooded’ family, to, at other times, being told she was too pretty to be Jewish. A spat with actor Mel Gibson also resurfaced when Ryder revealed that he had once asked her if she was an ‘oven dodger’. 

Screenshot from The Plot Against America, HBO

Ryder featured in the recently premiered HBO mini-series, The Plot against America. Based on the Philip Roth novel, this series presents a counterfactual history that imagines what might have happened to America’s Jews had the antisemitic aviation hero Charles Lindbergh become President in 1940. Ryder plays Evelyn Finkel who becomes the wife of a southern rabbi and avid Lindbergh supporter, Lionel Bengelsdorf. The rabbi rises to power within the party’s administration, whitewashes Lindburgh’s campaign and intentions, and uses his influence to persuade fellow Jews to put their trust in the Nazi-sympathising president. 

The story is centered on a traditional, but not overly religious Jewish working-class family living in an urban Jewish enclave in Newark, New Jersey. The responses of the various characters to the rise of a popular antisemitic leader are explored; from the teenage boy who admires Lindberg’s wartime exploits, to the passionate street-wise father who sees through it all, and the protective, perceptive mother who manages the fraught and conflicting relationships in her extended family. It is compelling viewing that’s hard not to binge watch. The parallels with Jewish responses in 1930s Europe are obvious; those who lived in denial, those who appeased and those who understood.

In speaking of the message of the series, Ryder remarked that it was ‘uncannily relevant amid the rise of political hate-speak’.

“It’s a very personal story… If you are a grandchild or a child of European Jews, it’s hard not to be untouched by it… It’s also a taste of what we’re living in now and what we might possibly be heading into in the future...”

If you haven’t seen the mini-series, it is recommended viewing. It’s power, for those familiar with the events of the 30s and 40s, is that it is all too believable

"I survived the war living as a Nazi"

We had just viewed the 1990 feature film ‘Europa Europa’ and were fascinated to meet its main character. In September of 2019 Perry and I, along with friends Shifra Horn and Peter Bolot, met Shlomo Perl in his Givat Ayim home. What we heard was not only an incredible tale of survival but also a fitting tribute to the establishment of the state of Israel. After the war Shlomo travelled from Munich to Jerusalem, joining the Haganah and fighting in the War of Independence. His story was also a compelling example of difficult choices made in complex and perilous times.

After a happy childhood in Germany, Shlomo’s family moved in 1935 to Lodz, Poland, following Hitler’s rise to power. He was fourteen when World War Two began. A few short months into the German occupation of Poland, Jews were forced into ghettos. Shlomo’s parents decided that he and his older brother Isaac would not enter the ghetto but would try to escape to Grodno in Eastern Poland, then ruled by the Soviets. There he lived in a Soviet orphanage.

Shlomo tells of a pivotal ‘life or death’ moment where his instinct for survival took over:

I was in the orphanage from 1939 until 1941. There was a selecting process there. The Germans gathered all of us and selected the Jews and told us where to go. They had orders not to take any Jews as war prisoners. The Jews were taken to the forest and shot. This was in Minsk.

I stood in one of the queues, where there were many thousands of Jews. I chose the longest line in order to gain some time. In the mean time I buried all of my Jewish documents. I walked step by step. My mind stopped working. My instincts were very vivid. I was sure that I would die any second.

All of a sudden I heard a German order, ‘hands up!’ - I lifted my hands. I shivered all over. I said, ‘Mummy, daddy, I don’t want to die!’ The German soldier asked me, ‘Are you a Jew?’. I remembered the farewell words of my father to me before I left home. My father said to me after praying, ‘Whatever will happen, stay Jewish and continue believing in God and God will keep you. Don’t forget who you are.’ But my mother said to me, ‘Shlomo, you have to live’.

And I recalled those memories when I stood there. To stay Jewish all the time otherwise God would desert you.

If I told him that I was Jewish, the German would shoot me. I had to choose a very fateful decision. Deciding between life and death. Deciding between the words of my father and my mother. I could choose only one. I knew I was going to die. I heard my mother’s voice, ‘Shlomo, you have to live!’ and the fear left me. I felt very secure and sure. And I said to the German, ‘I’m not a Jew. I’m an ethnic German’. He believed me.

Having convinced the Germans that he was a Russian-born German, Shlomo became a translator for a German Army unit. They gave him the nick-name Yoop. The commander adopted him as his son and Shlomo returned to Germany for training at a Hitler Youth barracks.

For three and a half years he was indoctrinated with Nazi theories which seeped into his being. He described his situation as a type of schizophrenia. ‘It was as if I was a traitor and a victim in one body’. In order to survive he had to forget that he was a Jew and he became an enthusiastic member of Hitler Youth.

He lived with the continual fear of being discovered because of his circumcision. On one occasion a German doctor who was a homosexual tried to rape him but was shocked to discover that Shlomo was Jewish. He didn’t disclose Shlomo’s secret because the revelation of his own secret would have led to certain death. They became friends.

Towards the end of the war Shlomo was mobilised to the army and sent to the war front. He became a prisoner of war to the Americans but was freed at the end of the war. He was reunited with his brother who had been in Dachau. His parents died in Lodz Ghetto and his sister died on a death march.

In Munich, an office had opened to recruit Jews for for the Haganah. Shlomo signed up. He arrived in Tel Aviv a few days after Ben Gurion’s 14 May 1948 Declaration of Statehood. He took the dusty and dangerous supply road to Jerusalem, which was under siege by the Jordanians and there fought in the War of Independence.

Many years later, Shlomo re-established contact with some of his Nazi Youth friends. He revealed that even now, when he sees the Nazi swastika and flag something of his Hitler Youth remains in him. ‘At that moment I put Shlomo aside and I become Yoop’.

Shlomo 4k50.mp4 from Perry Trotter on Vimeo.

From AIJAC: Poignancy and controversy in Holocaust commemorations

Originally published by AIJAC’s Australia/Israel Review

Six candles, each one representing a million of the Jewish people who perished in the Holocaust. Six young people, each one the grandchild of a survivor lighting a candle each. Around them, a 400 strong crowd watched in silence. 

It was a poignant, highly evocative moment. And it was this moment that New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern referred to as she began her address to those gathered at this year’s UN International Holocaust Remembrance Day event in Auckland on Jan. 27.

The fact that each of those candles represents one million lives lost is unfathomable, Ardern said. “It’s a horrific reminder of what happens when extremist ideology is unchecked and shows us what humans, unfortunately, are capable of when left unchecked.”

In a heartfelt speech, she emphasised that antisemitism is an assault against our shared humanity and has no place in our global society. “And yet we find ourselves in a world that seems to have forgotten the horrors of history.”

Ardern pointed to the defacing of Wellington’s Temple Sinai with antisemitic graffiti just a week before Holocaust Remembrance Day as an example. “This is not the legacy of a nation or the legacy of a world that has learnt and understands fully the impact of the Holocaust.”

For that reason, it is critical that work to educate and inform about the Holocaust continues both in New Zealand and overseas. Ardern said the work of the Holocaust Centre of New Zealand and Holocaust survivors “helps us to become the nation that we aspire to be”.

MP Alfred Ngaro speaking at the Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation’s UN International Holocaust Remembrance Day event in Bethlehem, Tauranga.

The Prime Minister’s presence at the event represented a stepping up in the official commemoration of Holocaust Remembrance Day this year. While former prime minister John Key launched the “Shadows of the Shoah” exhibition on Holocaust Remembrance Day in 2013, government representation at subsequent commemorations has been sparse. 

However, this year the day also marked the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz and, as such, was more widely recognised around New Zealand.

Besides Ardern, a number of government ministers attended commemorations. Minister of Ethnic Communities Jenny Salesa went to the Auckland event, Finance Minister Grant Robertson hosted an event at Parliament, and Minister of Housing Megan Woods attended the Christchurch event. 

Additionally, National MP Alfred Ngaro, the chairman of the Israeli-NZ Parliamentary friendship group, attended several events, and various local government politicians turned out around the country.

While the improved recognition of the day was notable, the lead-up to the day also saw the Government hit by criticism for failing to send any representative to the Fifth World Holocaust Forum in Israel, one of the few Western nations not to do so (although New Zealand’s Governor-General Dame Patsy Reddy did send an official message to the forum which will be included in the commemorative publication). 

Opposition MP Gerry Brownlee of the National Party described the non-attendance as disgraceful, while National Party leader Simon Bridges asked whether antisemitism was behind New Zealand’s absence.

Foreign Minister Winston Peters told the media that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFAT) had advised him of the invitation just a week out from the event. Efforts were then made to send the Parliamentary Speaker, Trevor Mallard, but ultimately it was not possible to do so, he said.

MFAT confirmed that Peters’ office was not advised of the invitation until Jan. 16, despite the invitation having actually been received in September last year. 

Dr David Cumin at the UNIHRD event in Bethlehem, Tauranga.

Israel Institute of New Zealand co-director David Cumin said the delay played a large role in New Zealand’s conspicuous absence. He also suggested it was, unfortunately, just the latest in a concerning pattern of behaviour from MFAT officials which puts New Zealand out of step with its traditional allies in regard to its relationship with Israel.

Holocaust & Antisemitism Foundation Aotearoa New Zealand co-founder Sheree Trotter said not sending an official representative showed poor judgement, but was also indicative of the broader issue of New Zealand’s problematic historical relationship with the Holocaust. Among the historical issues she cited was Wellington’s unwillingness to take significant numbers of Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi Germany, its decision not to prosecute suspected Nazi war criminals residing in New Zealand and the fact that one of New Zealand’s major universities holds a Holocaust denial thesis in its library. 

Sheree Trotter, Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation, Aotearoa New Zealand

She also added, “In recent years New Zealand has taken a hostile attitude towards Israel. Co-sponsoring UN Resolution 2334, which led to the withdrawal of the ambassador for several months, is just one example. We have no Embassy in Israel and the relationship continues to be uneasy. It’s hard not see a link between the attitude towards Israel and the lack of appreciation of the Holocaust.”

“The memory of the Holocaust is under attack from many quarters – from deniers to those who would distort the history through re-writing, relativising and universalising,” Trotter said. “In an age of increasing extremism, New Zealand needs to grapple with the meaning and significance of the Holocaust – the prime example of what can happen when toxic ideas gain a foothold in a nation’s psyche.”

From J-Wire: MP's challenged at "Auschwitz. Now." opening at NZ Parliament

First published on J Wire

Seventeen MP’s from across New Zealand’s political spectrum attended the official opening of the new exhibition “Auschwitz. Now.” at Parliament on Tuesday. 

Hon Alfred Ngaro, host of the event

Host MP Hon Alfred Ngaro addressed the gathering as did exhibition creators Perry and Sheree Trotter, founders of Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation, Aotearoa New Zealand (formerly Shadows of Shoah Trust). MP’s in attendance included Green Co-leader Marama Davidson who described “Auschwitz. Now.” as “A powerful exhibition. An important statement.” 

Hon Kanwal Singh Bakshi, Dr Itzhak Gerberg, Israeli Ambassador to New Zealand, Moka Ngaro, Hon Alfred Ngaro, Perry Trotter, Sheree Trotter, Hon Jenny Salesa, David Zwartz, Dane Giraud

Sheree Trotter spoke of NZ’s troubled relationship to the Holocaust, and related issues. She recounted NZ's response to the plight of Jews, from the pogroms in Russian at the end of the nineteenth century, to the refugee crisis of the 1930’s and 40’s. While expressions of sympathy were many, little concrete action was taken to help those fleeing persecution. In addition, when up to forty-six Nazi war criminals were suspected of having found refuge in New Zealand, despite a two-year investigation by a government-formed two-man taskforce in the early 1990s, none of the suspects was brought before a court of law.

Photographer Perry Trotter challenged MP’s in attendance to consider not only the events of the Holocaust but the broader historical context of pervasive and persistent antisemitism: “Antisemitism is an equal opportunities evil: it adapts equally well to German high culture, the medieval barbarism of many of Israel’s neighbours, ostensibly evangelical Christian theology, and the BDS-supporting intersectional left,” he said.

Perry Trotter, Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation, Aotearoa New Zealand founder

The Trotters visited Auschwitz-Birkenau in September 2019 and “Auschwitz. Now.” includes images captured at that time. The exhibition also includes large black and white portraits of Holocaust survivors along with three minute Shadows of Shoah survivor stories. “Auschwitz. Now.” was launched in January to an audience of 500 at a UN International Holocaust Remembrance Day event in Bethlehem, Tauranga. The exhibition will remain at the NZ Parliament until 26 March and will then tour nationally.

“Auschwitz. Now.” to open in NZ Parliament

The Holocaust Foundation’s latest exhibition “Auschwitz. Now.” will open in Parliament next week. Sponsored by Hon Alfred Ngaro MP, the staging will be held in the Bowen House exhibition space.

An invitation-only event will be held on 2 March, attended by MPs and dignataries. Thereafter, public viewing will be possible Wednesdays and Thursdays 10am-3pm through the month of March. Group bookings at other times may be possible. Please enquire.

“Auschwitz. Now.” consists of images of Auschwitz shot in 2019, black and white survivor portraits, and three minute Holocaust survivor stories. 500 attended the exhibition’s January launch at an event commemorating the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.

The exhibition includes stories not only from those who experienced Auschwitz but also from those who survived elsewhere, whether it be France, Serbia, or Tunisia. And, of course, many of the stories featured are from those who settled in New Zealand.

From Newsroom: NZ's Troubled Relationship With The Holocaust

First published on Newsroom

The dust is settling after a flurry of commemorative events and articles, locally and internationally, marking the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. In the days leading up to UN International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27), the hashtag #WeRemember circulated on social media, with encouragement to contemplate that horrific period of history.

UN Holocaust Remembrance Day falls at the height of New Zealand’s summer holiday season, when sun and surf are uppermost in many Kiwi minds. So it’s hardly surprising that Holocaust commemoration commands relatively little attention. Of greater concern, however, is that according to a poll undertaken in July 2019, New Zealand appears to suffer Holocaust amnesia. The multi-choice survey revealed that only 43 percent of respondents knew that approximately six million Jews were killed in the Holocaust, 20 percent thought fewer were killed, 37 percent were unsure, and worryingly, 30 percent were unsure whether the Holocaust had been exaggerated or was a myth.

Holocaust education is not compulsory in our schools - this may contribute to the knowledge gap. However, New Zealand’s failure to send a representative to the recent World Holocaust Forum in Jerusalem suggests a problematic relationship to the Holocaust. Indeed, our history vis-à-vis the Holocaust makes for grim reading.

As Hitler’s programme of isolation, discrimination, and dispossession of Jews took hold in the 1930s, our local Jewish community undertook many desperate measures to bring family members to safety in New Zealand. Numerous statements of sympathy from the government, the churches, community groups and individuals were heard. Some groups showed great commitment to the Jewish people. The Christadelphians wrote letters and sent funds to the Jewish community. A Ngapuhi elder told me of his forbears travelling to Wellington to offer the government land for the Jewish refugees. They were told, “go back to your hovels”. The government did little to help refugees fleeing Europe.

In the period between 1933 and 1939 a paltry 1100 Jews were permitted into New Zealand - and those, under the most stringent requirements, as historian Ann Beaglehole describes in her book, A Small Price to Pay: Refugees From Hitler in New Zealand. Little consideration was given to their plight as refugees in a deadly predicament. Indeed, Auckland’s Rabbi Astor, writing to Mark Fagan, Acting Minister of Customs in 1939 on behalf of refugees seeking asylum in New Zealand, sought a waiver for one applicant who was unable to sign the form because he was in a concentration camp. The sponsoring relatives were required to declare that they would seek no further help for relatives or friends. New Zealand’s policy at that time was harsh and punitive.

Fortunately, New Zealand’s immigration policies no longer exhibit the xenophobia of yesteryear. More recent incidents, however, suggest there is still progress to be made in dealing properly with the Holocaust. Dr Efraim Zuroff of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, also known as The Last Nazi Hunter, has spent much of his life tracking Nazi war criminals and bringing them to trial. Up to 46 Nazi war criminals are believed to have fled to New Zealand after World War II. Despite a two-year investigation by a government-formed, two-man taskforce in the early 1990s, none of the suspects was brought before a court of law.

Dr Efraim Zuroff was interviewed in Jerusalem by Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation, Aotearoa New Zealand

In a 2018 interview, Zuroff stated that ‘New Zealand was the only Anglo-Saxon country, (out of Great Britain, United States, Canada and Australia - South Africa was not open to immigration at that time), that chose not to take legal action after a governmental inquiry into the presence of Nazis in New Zealand’.

Government policy and actions are not the only areas in which New Zealand has been found wanting. Our nation has the dubious distinction of being the only Western country in which a tertiary institution holds a thesis denying the Holocaust. In addition, New Zealand is also one of the few western-style liberal democratic nations that has not joined the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, which promotes education, commemoration and research.

If we are to be a nation that gives ‘nothing to racism’, we must grapple with the Holocaust, its causes and our relationship thereto.

The antisemitism that drove the genocide of the Jews was not new - it had festered for millennia. However, the efficiency and drive of the Germanic version honed the process of killing. Murder was industrialised on a grand scale. Unfortunately, antisemitism continues to fester and we are now witness to a surge in antisemitic attacks around the world, on individuals and groups.

New Zealand is not immune to this phenomenon. In the past few weeks, there have been several incidences of swastikas painted in public places. News sites that reported the recent incident outside Temple Sinai in Wellington received comments such as the following:

You would be surprised at who did it…

Check the rabbis garage for fluro paint.

These attacks always end out being zionists going after the sympathy note. Amoral scumbags.

The vile comments, frequently seen on social media, prompted Race Relations Commissioner Susan Devoy to comment in 2018 that “If Facebook were around during the Third Reich these posts would’ve fitted right in…".

Antisemitism has an uncanny ability to change its form to suit the season. One of the most prevalent forms of Jew-hatred today comes in the form of anti-Zionism. The International Holocaust Remembrance Association has formulated a definition of antisemitism explicitly connecting anti-Zionism with antisemitism. The IRHA definition states:

“Manifestations might include the targeting of the state of Israel, conceived as a Jewish collectivity’ with the proviso, ‘However, criticism of Israel similar to that levelled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic.”

In addition to the alarming rise in antisemitism, we are also witnessing the re-writing of history in a number of European nations, in an attempt to create distance from the genocide that occurred on their soil. The Holocaust may have happened in distant lands but its reverberations continue in our own. If New Zealand holds to the values of justice and standing against racism, it is incumbent on us to examine our own history in relation to the Holocaust and to step up efforts to ensure that antisemitism is given no ground.

Dr Sheree Trotter, Co-founder Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation, Aotearoa New Zealand (formerly Shadows of Shoah Trust)

The Ritchie Boys: The Jews who Escaped the Nazis and Returned to Fight Hitler

Guest Post: Book Review by Dr Norman Simms

Bruce Henderson. The Ritchie Boys: The Jews who Escaped the Nazis and Returned to Fight Hitler. London: William Collins, 2018. Originally entitled Sons and Soldiers, 2017. xii + 428 pp. + numerous black and white photographs.

A small group of several hundred Jewish teen-age boys who had managed to escape from Nazi Germany before the Holocaust began, eagerly sought an opportunity of fighting against Hitler when the United States entered the Second World War at the end of 1941. Leaving parents, siblings and other relatives and friends behind in Europe, they suffered the further trauma of dislocation and learning a new language and culture, and they burned to take revenge on the nation that had betrayed them. Once they reached the appropriate age to volunteer, yet unable as enemy nationals to be accepted, they waited to be drafted. Not soon enough, their talents and determination were noted, and they were granted citizenship.

The first part of this historical work weaves together brief biographical backgrounds in Germany, France and Holland of a selected number of these adolescents, their lives before and during Nazi rule, the desperate efforts by their parents to send them out of harm’s way, and their initial experiences in the New World. In the examples given by Henderson, these adolescents grew up in ordinary households, were not rigidly religious, and seemed no different than the children they went to school with and played on the streets, that is, until Nazi racial laws came along.

The second part advances their experiences in America. It begins with the difficulties of assimilating into new families and communities, where well-intentioned relatives struggled in the Depression to accommodate them and an uncomprehending and often unsympathetic society grumbled about their presence, and then to the training they received at Camp Ritchie, Maryland, following a period of months or years of being considered enemy aliens and therefore either unfit altogether for military service or given limited non-combat training and assignments. While these limitations and exclusions were frustrating and disappointing to the young men eager to make war on Nazi Germany, the conditions never approached the harshness or cruelty they had already undergone in their homelands in Europe.

The third part takes the narrative into the war. Trained to be interrogators of German prisoners of war and act as liaison with the French civilians once the invasion of Europe began, the boys found that reality did not always match with intentions—and that combat is a very messy and brutal business; that parachutes don’t land where they are supposed to; and that following the laws of engagement is something to be set aside in the heat of battle. They also discovered that Europeans did not all want to be liberated from the Nazis, certainly not by Americans or Jews. Yet eventually the Ritchie Boys were able to do the jobs they were sent over to perform, and they did them very well. Even when they themselves were captured by the Germans, their well-learned lessons in how to deal with the enemy came in handy and helped to save many American lives.

The Ritchie Boys came into their own during the D-Day landings in Normandy, the securing of beachheads and advancement to liberate France, and then enter Germany. Henderson continues to focus on a few of these German-Americans and their work alongside the American and British forces, sometimes bringing one or two of the boys together in the same actions. Much as the narrative gives a personal touch—the emotions felt by this soldier and that, the thoughts of their families still caught in Nazi territory and their hopes for a better life after the defeat of Hitler—to the description of battles in France, Belgium, Luxembourg and Germany the traumatic effects of the war are superficially touched on.

If captured, there was an extra liability in being a Ritchie Boy, that is, a German-Jew with an American uniform, so that sometimes a rabid Nazi officer would pull them out of a group of POWs for special treatment, that is, summary execution. The closer the Allies came to the heart of the Third Reich and the entry into the death camps of the Nazi regime, the more the professionalism of the German-Jewish American soldiers was tested. Just before the start of the third section of the book, the author speaks most explicitly of the conflicted emotional state of the young men:

Like other Ritchie Boys, Stephen [Lewy] had been trained to detach himself from any personal or emotional aspects of interrogation. But as he faced the SS major that day, he could not shake the sense of haunting danger such men had instilled in him most of his life. Stephan realized that the closer he came to returning to Nazi Germany, the more pent-up resentment, anger even rage he was feeling. (p. 321)

It is tempting here to translate this rather superficial description into a more incisive psychohistorical statement more apt to the traumatic memories that came flooding back into the consciousness of this young man. Out of an unconscious memory, where the unbearable and unspeakable pains and humiliations had repressed, but where they continued to build up an energy by the almost daily experiences of separation from family, fear of the death of all whom he loved, and the knowledge that people he thought he could understand and trust were likely to be beyond comprehension and incapable of sympathy or empathy: these unimaginable truths were on the verge of breaking through into his rational and controllable part of his mind and overwhelming his normal self.

It was not just that the war was a personal way of coping with the confusions in their youth, but that they saw the Holocaust in a personal way that non-Jews couldn’t, even when fellow enlisted men and officers wept at the scenes of so much suffering. The Boys visited German homes, spoke to inhabitants, and came away feeling angry and sickened by the callousness and indifference and the denial of knowledge or complicity. Clearly the full larders, the warm clothing and the smug complaints against Allied bombing indicated that ordinary Germans profited by the robbing and murder of the Jews; and resented being forced to confront their outright or even tacit collusion. When forced to walk through the concentration camps and help with cleaning up the mess, “They watched the proceedings without showing any sympathy or remorse.” As one of the Ritchie Boys said, “It was a nation that would have to pay for its crimes for years to come.”

Throughout most of these war years (and for the German Jewish boys the Second World War began on 1 September, 1939, not with Pearl Harbour on 6 December 1941) the Ritchie Boys felt deep regrets about losing touch with their families and not being able to know whether or not their parents, siblings and other relatives were still alive. It was something always at least at the back of their minds. It was difficult for them to understand American isolationism, racism and poor educations. They had not grown up in very religious homes and assumed they were Germans before they were Jews, but Hitler made them acutely aware of who and what they were, and they wished to punish the Nazis for what they were doing and to make Germany the land pay for the crimes committed against Jews. More than that, the Ritchie Boys looked forward to a more liberal, just and cultured world, and they came to hope that they could help America become such a nation.

Most of the Ritchie Boys were separated from their birth families at a young age, and had experienced seeing friends, neighbours and relatives beaten or killed before their very eyes. Eventually they would understand why parents sent them away or why schoolmates turned on them after the Nazis came to power, but as youngsters these were confusing, frightening and traumatic events. The journeys to America were also fraught with dangers and fears for what lay ahead, and even the landing in the United States was a shock, especially when those into whose care they were given were not up to the task, either because their own families were suffering in the Depression, they lacked the emotional sympathy or stamina to deal with traumatized children and whose stories and backgrounds seemed incomprehensible to them. Henderson tells us about the successes, when the boys were able to fend for themselves, do well in school and take on small paying jobs to help the host families. We can only guess that not every child from Germany was able to cope or had the inner resources to gain top marks at Camp Ritchie and earn promotions during service overseas. Nor do we know how many young men grew up resentful of both their own and their foster parents, raged at a society that displayed anti-Semitism and xenophobia, and eventually slid into life-long mental illness.

Four final sections round out the book. There is a list of the nearly two thousand young German Jews who went through Camp Ritchie. A series of acknowledgments on all who aided the writer in compiling his data also serves as a guide to further reading and investigation. There is also a brief account of what happened to the main actors in this book after they returned to America, how they completed their educations, started families and pursued various careers, most having long and prosperous careers. Yet, as noted above, these success stories seem too neat and pat and gloss over what were surely other Ritchie Boys who could not adjust and aspects of the lives which seem so normal which could not all have avoided deep psychological injuries. In addition there is an Index, mostly of personal names, relevant places and key actions.

Images of UNIHRD Event, 25 January, Bethlehem

It was heartwarming to see so many act on the phrase #WeRemember, by attending the Holocaust Remembrance event held in Bethlehem, Tauranga on Saturday 25 January.

500 turned up to the beautiful Performing Arts Centre at Bethlehem College on a sweltering evening, with many other events competing for attention.

In a Powhiri earlier in the day Kaumatua Huikakahu Kawe welcomed dignitaries and Jewish guests and blessed the proceedings. Kaumatua Tony Wihapi opened the evening event with a karakia. We were treated to a thought-provoking array of speeches from Dame Lesley Max, National MP Hon Alfred Ngaro, Ron Matsen from Koinonia House and Perry Trotter. Dr. David Cumin ably MC’d the evening which finished with a stirring blowing of the shofar by Joel van Ameringen, followed by the Israeli and New Zealand Anthems - expertly accompanied by violinist Joel van Ameringen and pianist Chris Archer. HAFANZ express its gratitude to Graham Preston and his wonderful team of assistants, Christian Education Trust and Bethlehem College and all those who helped to make the evening a great success.

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

View fullsize

Guest Post: The Train

It was winter as I made my way by train from Berlin, across the Polish landscape toward Krakow. I was going to Auschwitz.

The train slowed as it entered Poland as there was dispute as to who was going to make good the length of rail in this strip of the journey. The carriage was warm and I was accompanied by a young German woman who was going to work at a German speaking newspaper in Poland. It was a reasonably pleasant trip, polite conversation about her job and the town, which had a large pre-war German History. The journalist disembarked at her stop and I journeyed on.

Once I arrived in Krakow I found the backpackers I was booked in and settled in before heading out to a hearty meal of potato dumplings served in a vegetable soup. Two days after I was on a little bus heading toward Auschwitz I. I could feel my stomach trembling. I was alone and anonymous. As the bus pulled up to the entrance I could feel the weight of winter, the cold was chewing into my bones and the foreboding entrance stood above us. I paid my fee, this act alone causing the bile to leap in my gullet, feeling like a tourist in a museum.

I began my tour through the clean brick buildings and grounds all kept spick and span for the modern visitor to admire. The saddening and deeply sickening aspect of Auschwitz I was the rooms filled with glasses, with suitcases. Rooms dedicated to some thing, hair brushes, shoes, shaving brushes. Glass windows staring into these rooms. These were possessions that belonged to someone, to thousands of someone, to millions.

After some time walking around the wooden floors resounding with footsteps of viewing customers I made my way to the transport which would take me to Auschwitz 2, Birkenau. I had to stop for a moment and let those images become part of me, to let them insinuate my cells so I would not forget them and not cease to understand this aspect of humanity. I lit a cigarette and watched the smoke drift across the winter air, disbanding into nothing like souls turning to vapour.

By the time the transporter had stopped outside the gates of Birkenau I was beginning to slow down, like I was in a dream, staring out at a vast landscape. And there were the train tracks, the rails upon which so many rattling wagons deposited people, like stock, into the clutches of death. As I walked through the gates my breath was taken away, there was a silence of order, a majesty of precision that one could not avoid, the brilliance of human endeavour to construct something so exquisitely perfect in its function. And then the disturbing force of horror and tragedy as to what that purpose was, an attempt at utter destruction, a genocide so well conceived. These two qualities of humanity colliding in me to leave me frozen on those tracks. As I looked up at the crows flying about the walls, I thought to myself, “your ancestors ate my ancestors, those fields beyond the walls grew food upon the ashes of the dead taken from the crematoriums of this dreaded place”.

They say it takes seven generations for healing to mend, for cells to change, for people to forget. I am not sure if the Jewish civilisation can heal from this atrocity yet, can let it pass into history in order to build a more whole and undefended persona. No matter what intent, such an event will stay buried in the collective psyche for years.

The Shoah caused many Jews to flee their community, to change names, identities, to find places far reaching to hide away from prying eyes, to become non-Jews, to quietly get on with their lives so they can survive. Others travelled far away, where people would accept them, to build Jewish communities, safely in suburbs that resembled the shteltls of Europe, not in construction, rather in closeness of population. There, synagogues emerged, kosher butchers, schools and bakeries, delicatessens developed in a proud yet cautious showing of survival. The diaspora spread.

Others were determined to build a Jewish state, to create a land that Jews can call home, a place where one did not have to run or hide, to make good what is Jewish in the world. A place where a people can be a people. Where stereotypes don’t exist, and the full dimension of Jewish life can flourish. Has the Jewish nation achieved this, has Israel become a place of nourishment for it’s people? Perhaps the Shoah split the Jewish civilisation up into so many fragments that it will take years for it to find a central place once more and the land of Israel will not achieve it alone. Perhaps we need to take hold of our spiritual practice, to find ways to grow amongst ourselves and to participate in the world, undefended and proud in new ways.

In Berlin there is a platform with brass plaques along the edge, recording every group of people that was being sent toward a camp. Let us hope and pray that we can find new destinations, new ways of travel in order to restore the Jewish people.

Phillip Gordon

Phillip grew up in Wellington New Zealand. He has had a career in film, television and theatre. It was not until later in life that Phillip embraced his Jewish heritage and began to explore the religion, culture and identity of being a Jew. Trying to understand the spiritual and political implications, not only in his country of birth, but also in a global environment. After many years of travel he now lives  on 10 acres north of Auckland, where he is developing a permaculture property.  He is an active member of the Beth Shalom progressive Jewish community in Auckland.

From NZ Herald - Auschwitz: A Personal Reflection

First published on NZ Herald

Twelve years ago I began interviewing Holocaust survivors. I have spent countless hours listening to stories of hell on earth. With reluctance, I realised it was time to visit the place where many of these incomprehensible events occurred - Auschwitz.

The books, the films, the first-hand stories of survivors, all rendered the scenes I witnessed eerily familiar - the entrance with the cynical sign Arbeit Macht Frei (Work Makes Free), the railway tracks, watchtowers, electric fences, crematoria and gas chambers, the displays of tonnes of human hair, thousands of spectacles and shoes of all sizes.

Stepping through the dark and dank barracks I was reminded of the accounts of bodies packed into three-tiered wooden bunks, like sardines.

One survivor spoke of so many bodies lying side by side, that when one person had to turn, everyone turned. Another recounted her efforts to ensure she slept on the bunk above her mother to protect her. With so many women suffering dysentry and chronic illness, and the inadequate toilet facilities, many accidents occurred.

More than the remnants of the infrastructure of annihilation, I wanted to know what had become of the remains of the victims. The guide led me to a pond where tonnes of ashes had been dumped. While I understood the thinking of those who determined that things should be preserved largely untouched, it was difficult to accept that the remains of thousands upon thousands lay before me in a sump hole, exposed to the elements.

Visiting Auschwitz was as horrendous as I expected. What I had not anticipated was the sense of normalcy that surrounded this camp. I was shocked that our accommodation was a two-minute walk from Auschwitz and that the town of Oświęcim was immediately adjacent. Why were the townspeople laughing, smiling and behaving as if it were normal to have a death camp on one's door-step? Didn't they know what happened here?

Even more disturbing was the advertising in tourist shops in nearby beautiful Krakow, promoting Auschwitz like any other major tourist attraction. Indeed, our guide informed us of the 8000 daily visitors, and Auschwitz's importance to the local economy.

Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum certainly takes seriously its responsibility to educate and inform the public. Preservation, restoration and documentation efforts are extensive and laudable. However, we left Europe with a distinct sense that many there have not truly taken ownership of the genocide that occurred on their soil, a short 75 years ago.

I am yet to shake off the discomfort that accompanied my visit to Auschwitz. However, our next stop in Ben Gurion airport provided a much-needed contrast. The vitality and energy of the people, many of whom are descendants of survivors, facing enormous challenges and yet thriving, was refreshing. Attending a joyful wedding was a fitting antidote to my angst.

While in Jerusalem, we visited 92-year-old Auschwitz survivor Dr Giselle (Gita) Cycowicz, a great-grandmother and still practising psychologist. Over four hours, Gita shared the story of what happened to her family - how they were rounded up into ghettos, sent by train to Auschwitz, subjected to the selection process, humiliated by being forced to strip and having all hair shaved. They lived in inhumane conditions, hungry, thirsty, battling cold and disease.

After five months, Gita was sent to a labour camp, until she was finally set free at the end of the war. She described that moment: "We just stood there - terribly, terribly tired and exhausted in every way and manner. Physically, spiritually and emotionally. And we couldn't smile when told we are free and can go wherever we want, because there is no place we want to go. We don't know why we would be going home. We don't want to go home. To the non-Jews. Who never embraced us and never said a word to try to spare us."

Gita, like so many survivors, did go on to live a full and fruitful life.

My visit to Auschwitz was as profound as it was disturbing, a sense made more acute by awareness of the resurgence of antisemitism across much of Europe.

If Holocaust memory were only facing simple neglect the matter might be easier to address. But the greater challenge is that the history of those events is being denied, distorted and universalised.

In 2005, the United Nations designated the day of the liberation of Auschwitz as International Holocaust remembrance Day. Seventy-five years on, remembering is more important than ever. To mark the occasion, the Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation Aotearoa New Zealand will launch a new exhibition entitled Auschwitz. Now. A memorial event and launch will be held in Bethlehem, Tauranga on January 25.

• Sheree Trotter is a co-founder of the Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation Aotearoa New Zealand and has worked with Holocaust survivors for the past 12 years.

Bethlehem Remembers Auschwitz

Originally published on Times of Israel

At least twenty-eight locations around the world carry the name Bethlehem. Best known of these is, of course, the birthplace of Jesus, twenty minutes drive from Jerusalem. 

The Bethlehem most distant from Jerusalem can be found in Tauranga, New Zealand – adjacent to a suburb named Judea.

The original Bethlehem has become symbolic of evangelicalism’s drift toward anti-Zionism, being host of the notorious Christ At The Checkpointconferences. New Zealand’s evangelical community has hardly been immune to the drift. Anti-Zionist Rev Dr Stephen Sizer, whose name was cited in recent months as evidence that Jeremy Corbyn is indeed an antisemite (Corbyn defended Sizer’s antisemitic postings), was an honoured guest at New Zealand’s largest ostensibly evangelical institution in 2012. 

New Zealand’s Bethlehem College has apparently bucked the anti-Zionist trend, however. A thriving Christian school with a roll now exceeding 2,000, was founded in the 1980’s with a pro-Israel position in its charter.  When approached by the Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation, Aotearoa New Zealand, the college enthusiastically embraced the opportunity to host a UN International Holocaust Remembrance Day event in its upmarket 550 seat auditorium.

The event will be held Saturday 25 January, two days prior to the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. Guest speakers include Member of Parliament Alfred Ngaro, Dame Lesley Max, and Dr David Cumin, Israel Institute of New Zealand.

The event will also launch the national tour of our new exhibition “Auschwitz. Now.” Large exhibition prints of images shot last year at Auschwitz-Birkenau will be displayed along with survivor portraits and Shadows of Shoah stories.

Auschwitz survivor, the late Alexander Lowy.

Auschwitz, being best known of the Nazi death camps, has come to function as a kind of metonym for the entire Holocaust. We have chosen to include not only Auschwitz survivor stories but also stories from those who survived elsewhere, whether it be France, Serbia, or Tunisia. 

“Auschwitz. Now.” has been curated to provide a well rounded introduction, mindful as we are of the quickly diminishing general knowledge of the Shoah. Equally problematic is the trend toward universalisation. Holocaust memorialisation, where it does take place, is too frequently diluted in service of other causes. These are trends to which “Auschwitz. Now.” and the broader work of the Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation will give no ground.

Seventy five years after the liberation of Auschwitz, the incomprehensible events of the Shoah, in all their particularity, will be remembered in the uttermost parts of the earth, in Bethlehem, Tauranga.

Information on the event can be viewed at www.25january2020.com

Two Holocaust Foundation Trustees Honoured

Chairman Robert Narev (left) and Trustee John Barnett (right)

Two of our Holocaust Foundation board members have been awarded special honours in the New Year honours list.

Our chairman, Robert Narev, has been made Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for his services to the community and education. In 1999, he was made a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit.

Robert was born in Germany and is a survivor of Theresienstadt Concentration Camp.

Trustee John Barnett has been made a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to film and television. John is a prolific film producer and has produced or executive produced many of NZ's most successful works including Whale Rider, Sione's Wedding, Footrot Flats and What Becomes Of The Broken Hearted.

We take this opportunity to offer our congratulations to Bob and John and to thank them for their service to the Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation, Aotearoa New Zealand.