Trudy Gold
The Allied Declaration of 17th December 1942
Trudy Gold - The Allied Declaration of December 17th, 1942
- Hello?
Oh, the weather looks beautiful there.
You know what? I’m going into the desert to have a look at some art installations and-
[Trudy] Fantastic.
So very lucky that the weather is not too hot.
Right? Oh, that’s superb. We’re beginning to start living a little again in London, I think.
Well, thank God.
Thank God. Hopefully, I’ve had two jabs now. Most of my friends have had the two jabs, so our age group is done.
Oh, good. Good. So I want to say that I just, and I’m sorry, I’m just jumping to the gala, which was so incredible and it was such a beautiful surprise. And honestly, it’s all thanks to you and to Dennis and Patrick. And you know, the team, David.
Why don’t we say, it was an incredible effort of a bunch of people came together a with a meeting of minds-
Alan.
And we all, and Alan was wonderful, and we just brought them together.
Alan. Oh my goodness.
He pulled it off, didn’t he? The question’s going to be, how does one top that for next year?
I just think of just such a beautiful memory of, you know.
It was a lovely, it was lovely. And what I loved was the whole range of cultural expressions from Africa, from Israel. It was quite extraordinary. It also showed you how global, and I thought the Soweto Choir went magnificent. I don’t want to single anyone out, I mean it was just-
Yeah, it was just all amazing.
[Trudy] And I thought-
Next time will-
It was just, everything was amazing, depending on your taste. Everything was amazing.
Exactly. So because we had to limit it to two, you know, we discussed this two hours was a long time actually.
Yeah.
So we didn’t add the Americas at all. The USA but next year, we will, we’ll focus on America too and add that.
Yes. Yeah.
[Wendy] You know.
We could do American popular music.
My other life, my other life, the very demanding, challenging life at the moment. It’s certainly the cultural arena. Oh my goodness. What’s going on.
It’s wonderful. I mean, I think the group are pushing us as well, which is good. It’s good for the spirit.
Yeah, I agree.
It’s going to be fascinating when our grandchildren ask us and ask them, “What did you do during lockdown, Grandma?”
Well, you know what? After the show yesterday, my little granddaughter, five years old, she said, she ran to me. She said, “YaYa, why were you crying? Why were you crying?” Very worried that I was crying.
Oh, bless. Oh, bless. Did you tell her you can cry with happiness too?
Oh.
That’s lovely.
Taps. My dad always used to call me “Taps”. I’m always emotional. There goes Taps, every family, every movie, every occasion. I’m always crying. Anyway, so, so-
No last night was very emotional, I think for a lot of people. I felt-
Very, very special. And it was lucky that Alan’s video jammed, because at least I was able to laugh. I was weeping. And then when I heard him swearing, that’s sort of just like, that’s it. That set me off and I was able to contain myself, anyway.
Oh, it was very funny.
[Wendy] Alright.
Should we go now?
It was fabulous.
A blind to the dark. You tell me when you’re ready for me to start.
[Wendy] Yeah, I think-
Give us one more minute.
Jude, what do you think?
[Jude] Lets go, we have over 1,300 online, and it’s just two minutes past the half hour.
I’ll start then, okay.
So, all right, just one more thing before you start. I want to just thank the team behind it all as well. It was amazing people.
[Trudy] Oh yeah.
Everyone worked so hard to make this, Shauna and Linnea and Judy and Kylie and you know, a whole team of people who helped, and Alan, and just to say to, Alan mentioned that, you know, yeah. Just, there was just so many people.
It was so many people involved with their own expertise and it pulled together wonderfully, Wendy, just shows you what we can do with human spirit, doesn’t it?
[Wendy] Absolutely. Absolutely.
That’s what we’ve got. That’s the message last night for me.
[Wendy] Absolutely. So just also, you know, whoever’s listening and who was part of, I just wanted to say very, very, very big thank you. And Galia Bakhal, you know, in New York, who I know is based in New York, you know, she was absolutely incredible. She really came to the party. So I just wanted to say thank you very much.
Oh, that’s wonderful.
[Wendy] And it’s been fun. This has been my most fun project, honestly. Bridge and Lockdown University has been incredible. It has been seamless. I haven’t had one headache. It’s been wonderful to work with an unbelievable team. And I look forward to every meeting and it’s just been so much fun.
And we have fun with the programming, don’t we?
[Wendy] I love it, I love it.
And don’t forget, you’ve become a vice chancellor. Now, that’s important.
[Wendy] And oh, I always love to be able to do it.
We recreated the universe.
[Wendy] I’m always lucky, I always love being academic. And also all our participants, a very big thank you for being loyal, for tuning in, for joining us. And now I’m going to hand over to you. Thank you. Thanks to you, over to you.
God bless, thank you so much, Wendy.
Thanks, good, thank you Lawrence. Thanks to Lauren.
[Trudy] God bless.
Thanks Lauren Abramson, send you both of you, huge, huge hugs, you and Karen.
God bless, Wendy.
[Wendy] Bye.
God bless you, bye.
[Wendy] Thanks.
Video clips play throughout the lecture.
- And welcome everyone, and again, I hope you all enjoyed last night. I thought it was a tremendous effort and everyone involved. I’ve had quite a few emails from people who’ve joined the Lockdown University, ‘cause remember we’ve been going a year and asking questions that we’ve covered in the previous few months. So what I’d like to suggest to you is this, once the website is up, you’ll be able to get past lectures. But in the meantime, through Dorring Brown and a few other people culminating in the incredible work of The Kirsh Foundation, we were allowed to put together five to seven minute videos, on DVDs, I should say, I’m so in the past, on various areas of Jewish history, it was primarily made for kids who were going up to university who didn’t know how to deal with anti-Semitism and eventually how to deal with the Arab-Israeli conflict. And it’s still a work in progress. But the point is, if you go to trudygold.com, you will find these DVDs and they might be useful to answer some of your questions. And my other thought, one of the issues that Wendy and I were talking about is it’s down to the grandparents to teach their children and grandchildren, particularly the grandchildren, so that when they got up to university, they have been in a better position to deal with a lot of the, I’m going to call it garbage that is thrown at Jewish students today.
And I happen to believe that knowledge is one of our greatest strengths. So I hope that would help you. So it’s trudygold.com, again, courtesy of the amazing Kirsh Foundation. So, now the area that I’m looking at today, I’m going to be talking about the Allied Declaration. I know the past few weeks have been very, very tough and I’ve also been alert, of course, I know that tomorrow is the day, Yom Haatzmaut, when we celebrate Israel’s birthday. And what I’ve said to people who’ve been phoning, who’ve been contacting me, is I felt very strongly that we need to go very, very slowly through the years '45 to '48, particularly '45 to '48, because it’s absolutely critical to any understanding of the Jewish world today. So of course we will honour, we keep on honouring, and I think the best way we can honour is to tell the story, tell that extraordinary story. And of course, last week I was talking about one of the most harrowing aspects of the story when, and I know it was continued with Dennis and David, the whole issue of the Wannsee House when government departments came together under the auspices of Heydrich. And remember Hitler called him “the man with the iron heart.”
And what was the purpose of that meeting? It wasn’t to create the final solution, it was to clear up all the difficulties between departments. So it was a bureaucratic conference, it was over in 90 minutes, they had a wonderful meal. And at the end of the conference, Heydrich, Eichmann and Müller, the head of the Gestapo, sat down and had some wonderful drink. And they also listened to beautiful music. So this is what I believe, what the psychologist called disassociation. And when we talk about the issue of how the Nazis dehumanised the Jews, what I really think happened is these were the people who were dehumanised, the bureaucracy, the fact that the trains had to run on time. The fact that individuals were called in to establish factories of death, modern technology, this is what makes the show art unique. And this is an absolute warning for us, when we begin to dehumanise, we’re really on the road to hell. There’s that poem of Leonard Cohen’s about Eichmann, where he says, “Colour of hair, brown. Colour of eyes, brown. Build, medium. What did you expect? Horns and talons?”
We’re talking about the human condition. And I want to say from the outset, I don’t want you to go away thinking that everyone who was a member of the Nazi party was a psychopath. They weren’t. What we need to try and understand, and I’ve said to you, one of the reasons we do go to the heart of darkness is to honour our dead. But it’s also to try and come up with some sort of explanation just as at a very, very unbelievably painful time, the Emanuel Ringelblum Archives, you have doctors monitoring the effect of starvation on themselves, which is used to this day. That’s the human spirit at its best. That somehow, if we can take one of the darkest episodes in the history of the world, which many philosophers think is the nadir of Western civilization, I haven’t said that likely by the way, then just maybe, maybe we can come out of that horror story with some sort of idea of can the human condition, can we do something about the human condition? Einstein called us “wonderful monsters”, and I believe he was totally right. But now we come to another area that is very interesting.
I’ve had so many fascinating correspondence from many of you, and I had a very interesting question on a debate. It was from a chap who wrote, “Is it possible to be a patriotic Englishman and loyal to Israel?” Now it’s a very, very interesting debate, and it’s really at the nub of Jewish identity because what I’m looking at now is a very, very painful, difficult subject. And it’s this, was it possible to rescue the Jews of Europe? Was it possible that the allies could have intervened to stop the murders? Remember the murders themselves, the final solution is going to go on from the invasion of Russia until 1945. Europe is porous. What I’m going to look at today is how the news came through and how it was received. And I’m going to show you extracts from one of the most extraordinary films I’ve ever had the privilege to watch. It was made a long time ago. Martin Gilbert wrote a book called “Auschwitz and the Allies”. Rex Bloomstein, who’s a brilliant British filmmaker, he filmed, and I’m going to show you extracts from the film.
One of the reasons it’s such an important film is that he made it in the 80’s and people were still around who had positions of power in the British and the American government at the time. So you are going to get some startling information. And of course, if you want to understand the state of Israel and Yom HaShoah, and then Yom Haatzmaut, please don’t forget that these events are going to seal themselves on the soul of Israel. And in fact, in order to answer that question, I’m going to read you an article that Ben-Gurion wrote. Beg your pardon. It was actually, it was a speech he gave on November the 29th, 1942. Important to remember that the Jews of Hungary, and in the end it was nearly 900,000 of them because others had came into Hungary. They were not attacked until April '44. Now this is Ben-Gurion on November the 29th, 1942. This is to the Yishuv National Council. “We do not know exactly what goes on in the Nazi valley of death or how many Jews have already been slaughtered, murdered, burnt, and buried alive, and how many others are doomed to annihilation.
Only from time to time does news of atrocities breakthrough to us. The screams of women and children mutated and crushed. But we do know what Hitler had in store for our people and what he wrote in Mein Kampf and what he has done, what he’s doing to us before the war, during the war. We do not know that the victory of democracy and freedom and justice will not find Europe a vast Jewish cemetery in which the bones of our people are scattered. And our bleeding nation cause the conscience of humanity to trial before the judgement of history.” That is a very important phrase. “Our bleeding nation cause the conscience of humanity to trial before the judgement of history. We are the only people in the world whose blood as a nation is allowed to be shed. Only our children, our women, our brothers, and our aged are satisfied for special treatment to be burnt alive, in graves dug by them, to be cremated in crematoriums, to be strangled, to be murdered by machine guns for but for one sin. Because the Jews have no state, no army, no independence and no homeland. We demand the rights to a homeland in independence. What happened to us in Poland, what God forbid will happen to us in the future. All our innocent victims, all the tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, and perhaps millions, are the sacrifices of a people without a homeland. Let us tell our dear brothers, martyred and tortured in the Nazi ghettos, your tragedy is our tragedy.
Your blood is our blood. We shall have no rest until we redeem you both from the Nazi hell and from the debilitating exile and bring you to the land we are building and redeeming to our land, your land.” So that was Ben-Gurion in November, 1942. Now it’s important to remember that Nazi policy against the Jews formulated over a very long period. Yehuda bar believes that the decision to exterminate was not taken until about March, 1941 when orders read the treatment of civilian populations in Russia were issued. Those of you who know their history, will know that the world had been stunned in August, 1939 when the Soviets and the Nazis, sworn blood enemies made a pact that Hitler would invade from the West, Stalin from the East. But of course, Hitler had no intention of keeping that pact. He kept it for two years. And then of course he’s going to go again. He’s going to go against the Soviets, Jewish Bolshevism. And of course, Slavs in that evil of race theory are unto mention, they’re expendable. And the mass murders begin on June the 22nd, 1941 with the Einsatzgruppen and who I’ve already talked about following the German army into battle. Now, before that, if you think about it, between 1933 and 1939, as far as the Jews of Germany and Austria are concerned, Austria after the Anschluss, it was a policy of what? Of legal, social and economic horror to push them out of Germany. And also venality. Forced to take away as much Jewish property as possible.
Now, could the allies have done anything between '33 and '39? What is certainly true as far as the German population is concerned, remember 44% of the Germans voted Hitler into power democratically. And then with a group of other right wing parties, he took 50% of the vote. Once you’ve got 50% of the vote, you take over parliament and you outlaw every other state. He said after his failed Putsch of 1923, “I’m going to do it through democracy, it’s going to be slower, but I’m going to do it that way too. The fools.” Now the other point I think is some, I’ve had lots of questions. Did Hitler use antisemitism or was it at the core? Important to remember, Jew hatred is absolutely at the core of the Nazi inner circle and Adolf Hitler. He really believed the Jews were the other great power in the world, the two chosen people, the Germans and the Jews. I mean, I don’t want to go today into tortuous race history. We’ve looked at it many times and you will see it on the small films I’ve made, but it’s very important that you understand this. What I don’t believe is that the majority of people who voted for Hitler hated Jews. I think there was enough antisemitism around that because they believed that Hitler would be good for Germany, they got rid of their sensibilities. So there was opposition before '33.
There could be opposition before '33, but after that, between '33 and '39, you had to be unbelievably brave in order to oppose the state. Look, Hitler did a deal with the churches. He did a deal with the great organs of power. So important to remember, between '33 and '39, the only help could have come from outside. And I’ve already illustrated just how much was shown in the press. Look, Goebbels was Minister of Propaganda. Every foreign important newspaper had journalists in Berlin under the auspices of Goebbels, he wined them, he dined them. Those of you who are interested, there are many books full of how the events in Nazi Germany are reported. I’ve only worked with the English language press, but it’s the same with the French press, the Belgian press, the right wing, many of them supported Hitler because he was coming with order into Germany at a time of great chaos in Europe. So basically, it’s really summed up at the Évian Conference. By 1938, there are enough good people in America, in Britain to put so much pressure on the League of Nations and on Roosevelt, that was a Commissioner Évian. 32 countries come together to decide what to do about the Jews. Would they relieve the quotas? They decide not to. The Dutch and the Danes take a few extra. The Dominican Republic made an offer, but it was never taken up because it was too late.
So basically, and they all went off and played golf. Lord Winterton, the British delegate, actually apologised to the German ambassador in London for the unwarranted interference in the affairs of a sovereign state. So what I’m saying to you is quite simple. They couldn’t, between '33 and '39, they could have done something. Those of you who are interested in foreign policy, which William has covered so brilliantly, it’s push-pull. Hitler would see how far he could go. But of course, after the first World War, there is an argument for appeasement. So what then happens is the Nazis set up an immigration bureau under Adolf Heitmann, the expert on Jewish affairs. He’d learnt both Hebrew and Yiddish, in fact, visited Palestine in 1937, clandestinely. So basically these immigration bureaus are to squeeze as much money as possible out of the Jews to get them out of the country. And there were some amazing people. There were some amazing, there were amazing consulates. If you look at the British Consulate, there were Pete Foley, there was also in Austria, an incredible guy, Kendrick. There was the Chinese delegation in the Chinese delegation in Vienna, man called Manli Ho. I can go on and on and on. There were many diplomats who did everything they could, but it’s without the approval of their governments. The point is, there were marvellous people.
There were marvellous rescuers. The great Wilfrid Israel who had Anglo German citizenship and a huge department store chain in Germany. He got out so many thousands of Jews. And I’ll be talking more about the good because what really interests me is what is their psychology. Now the problem, now we come to the real problem, the obvious destination for Jews in trouble by 1939. Look, the British took in 70,000, the Americans took in over 100,000 in the end. But what about those who were trapped behind? And after Kristallnacht, everybody wanted to get out, but you need an entry visa. And that was the big problem. And it was actually Palestine. And this is where you come to the issue of Britain and Palestine because in May, 1939, as many of you know, the British issue the White Paper on Palestine cutting back Jewish immigration. They restrict it to 15,000 a year for five years. And whoever has the majority has the state.
So basically they slammed the door on any real rescue. The Nazis still came up with other plans. They talked about Madagascar, which I’ve already mentioned to you. They talked about selling the remaining Jews or they thought about selling the remaining Jews. Let me give you an example of venality. After the Anschluss, the Nazis actually arrested Baron Louis de Rothschild in Vienna. And they held him to ransom for his steelworks, which they paid for with check currency. And Rothschild was passed over the Swiss border. It’s an extraordinary story and he had managed to get most of the money out, but it shows you what they really want was money. Now also, the Polish government, the anti-Semitic Polish government, was allowing Jews to travel to Palestine for a holiday. They were refugees being organised in groups of 700. The Hamburg America Line was advertising illegally for passengers. One route they would go by train to Athens and ships from Piraeus on the Danube.
And we know that in Constance, that in Varna, local Jews organised welfare groups to give refugees food. Some members of the Gestapo even sold documents for huge profits. Unfortunately, many of these boats were unsanitary and quite often unseaworthy. One captain that we know of, he refused to give passengers water unless they paid more money. Later, the same technique was applied to food. So you really did have some of the most appalling behaviour. And some of those ships tragically were sunk. In Romania, The Salvador was sunk in the sea of Marmara and lost 200 lives. May, 1940, 1,700 refugees landed in Haifa without British permits. They were deported. They’re put back on the Patria, which exploded in the harbour. So in the nine months following the Anschluss, Heydrich squeezed enough foreign exchange out of rich German and Austrian Jews to finance the exodus of another 45,000 Jews. It was in 1939 that Schacht, the head of the Reichsbank had travelled to London for a meeting with Earl Winterton and George Arthur Ruble, who was an American lawyer who worked for Roosevelt on the Intergovernmental Committee for Refugees. They came up with the plan to sell the Jews of Europe, but it was overtaken by the war.
The other point to remember is that during the war, there was a naval blockade on Palestine. So my question. Were the allies in any way guilty? Now it’s a very, very complicated question. And to quote Nahum Goldmann, he said, “You’d need the soul of a poet. The soul of a Dante to imagine the inferno.” They were careless about refugees, to put it incredibly mildly. There was enough anti-Semitism at government level. And I’ll be talking about that later on. And the British had made a pragmatic decision over Palestine. Frankly, if you had been in the foreign office in 1939, and you knew a war was coming, and you had the Mufti of Jerusalem, who I’m going to spend a whole session on, who wasn’t even allowed back into Palestine because of his terrorist activities, planning to work with the Nazis and saying that if you let any more Jews into Palestine, we will act in a way contrary to your interest. What on earth would you have done? I mean, Chamberlain actually said it. “If we have to offend one side, let us offend the Jews.” And remember what Ben-Gurion said about the White Paper. “We fight the White Paper as if there’s no Hitler. We fight Hitler as if there is no White Paper.” But even before the invasion of Russia, evidence begins to get out about the situation in the Warsaw ghetto and in Poland.
The most active group in bringing the information to the West were in fact the Polish government in exile. As the countries fell, there were nine allied governments in exile. Now let me give you a few examples of the information that comes through. This is after the invasion of Russia, on November the 22nd, 1941, a young no beg upon, I’m going to go back, yes, I’m going back to this. I’m going back to May the 3rd, 1941. “The Polish government in exile sent a formal note to the governments of the Allied Powers describing how tens of thousands of Polish citizens are incarcerated in camps.” They actually named that camp the Mauthausen. So we don’t have the picture yet, but this is a letter from the Polish government in exile. There is a holy Polish home army, and they’re sending back information. And please don’t forget that the Vatican had an unbelievable supply of information. Why? Because particularly in Catholic Poland, every village had a priest. Now this is the 16th of November. This is, oh, in the Polish note, I should mention contained 200 eyewitness accounts.
This is the 16th of November, 1941. The British minister to neutral Sweden, Victor Mallet spoke to a Swedish economic advisor who just returned from Germany. The Swedes got very rich in the war with steel, by the way. He reported, “That many Germans were disgusted by the way Jews were being deported from Germany to the ghettos of Poland.” This is how information comes through. The 19th of November, 1941. A member of the British Delegation in Switzerland, David Kelly reported from Byrne on a conversation with a Polish diplomat who told him that about a million Jews were living in Eastern Europe and mainly Russian, and they had simply disappeared. And at the same time, a Dutch minister informed him that the treatment of Dutch Jews was appalling. And then on November the 22nd, '41, a junior Brazilian diplomat, Carlos de Masodo from the Brazilian embassy in Berlin, arrived in neutral Portugal to Lisbon for an eight day visit. During his visit, he and his wife spoke to a British embassy official, who forwarded the following to London.
This is verbatim. “The treatment of Jews is getting more and more appalling every day. Thousands of the impact in open lorries are being sent to Poland overnight. The Brazilian ads that even pro German Portuguese diplomats were so horrified that they arranged for the marriage of six Jews for money to the Portuguese to save them.” Now the Zionists, of course, weren’t privy to these kinds of diplomatic communiques, but they did have their own sources. The World Jewish Congress in Switzerland, Gerhart Riegner, who was working out of their office, he wrote a letter on the 27th of October telling, of the horror of the deportations and 2000 cases of typhus in Warsaw ghetto. The report is sent to Jerusalem. This is the 27th of November '41. This is all before the Wannsee Conference. This is during the Einsatzgruppen actions, and this is the note he sent. “With regards to the Jews, it seems no place whatsoever has been allocated to the Jews in Hitler’s Europe. And the remnants who escape the massacres, starvation and oppression are no doubt to be sent overseas.” Now then we have the Russians. This is the killing fields now. This is Molotov, the foreign Minister. He sends a note to the allies. He actually gives details of the killings in the Ukraine. 6,000 in Lviv, 8,000 Odesa, 7,000 Kerch, 3000 Mariupol, 10,500 in Dnipropetrovska Troits'ke.
And this is his note. “Many old men, women, and children, all of whom were robbed and stripped before execution.” The note is made public on the 7th of January, 1942, in the Soviet city of Kuvichev, which was handed to all the foreign diplomats in the city, to which the diplomatic corp have withdrawn because of the German advance. And it’s at this stage, January the 15th, 1942, that representatives of nine occupied governments in exile, I’m going to tell you who they are, Poland, Belgium, Czech, France, Greece, Yugoslavia, Luxembourg, Holland, and Norway. They actually constitute themselves into the inter-allied conference on war crimes and issue a declaration condemning German across cities. And one of the groups pressing for the declaration was the World Jewish Conference Congress, they don’t mention the word Jews, but what they say is, “One of the war aims was the punishment of those guilty for those crimes.” Now, as more and more comes through, this is in October 41, the Jewish Chronicle in London reported the thousands had died in pogroms in Ukraine.
In November, it reported that one third of all the Jews in Bessarabia had been killed. In January, it published a report that poison gas experience being conducted at Mauthausen. Now much of this information comes through whom? It comes through an extraordinary man called Jerek through Jan Karski. Now, what I’m going to do, because I realise as ever Wendy always says to me, “Go slowly, go slowly.” I have much too much information for you. So I’m going to continue with this next week, next session, because I think it’s very, very important. Look, the world Jewish Congress is going to be one of the most active organisations giving the information. And it had actually been established as a reaction to the rise of Nazism. And it’s the organisation, Stephen Wise was chairman. He’s an American rabbi, Reform rabbi, and quite a controversial figure. And Nahum Goldmann is the sort of chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee. Now on the 27th of November 41, I’ve already mentioned, Gerhart Riegner sends one report.
So more and more and more is coming through. November the 23rd, 1942. This is the headline in the Palestine Post. “Slaughter of European jury, subheading, annihilation of all communities.” And the Jewish Agency, this is when Ben-Gurion made that extraordinary speech I’ve already read to you. The Jewish Agency declares four days of mourning, culminating in a fast day of December the 2nd, 1942. Now, it also, in America leads to the Biltmore Conference where all the Zionists come together to demand statehood now, but I’ll be picking that up later because from a Zionist point of view, what has a Zionist always said? That anti-Semitism was a psychic aberration. It was a 2000 year old disease. You could never do anything about it. And basically Jews had to accept the fact that they were a nation.
And as far as the Zionists were concerned, what’s happening in Europe is tragically for them a vindication. Now then we have the Wannsee conference. And ironically, the Wannsee document was actually leaked. It was leaked to Gerhart Riegner. Now, Gerhart Riegner, we now know that it was actually leaked by a huge industrious called Schultz. And he informs Riegner in July, 1942. And the Gestapo were already after this man. So he and his wife fled to Switzerland. You know, you talk about righteous people. His son still had to serve in the Wehrmacht, but he leaked the information. And on the 10th of August, 1942, Riegner’s telegram reached the foreign office and it said, “There’s a plan to exterminate the Jews at one blow.” Now, can we see the first of the bits of footage, if you don’t mind, Judy. This is remembered from our, I have not-
Allies wanted to help if they would’ve bombed those god damn concentration camps. If they had to die, let them at least die from our bombs. And not like they did. And if they would’ve tried to do, I mean, they could have disrupted the train, the derail road. They would, they done a hundred of things. And I’m sure the Nazis would’ve reacted differently if they would’ve seen that somebody is trying to do something. As it is, they knew that the whole world didn’t care. It was only Jews to help with it. They knew it. I, for one, will never forgive, never forgive. I know that things could have been done. I know we could have helped. I know we could have saved. We had no means. That’s it. No more.
[Narrator] The Poles in London alone.
[Judy] This is the Yiddish Government in exile. Have we got sound, Trudy?
Video clip plays.
[Narrator] Their appeals were always rejected by the British. But this did not stop Count Raczyński, the Polish Foreign Minister making this statement.
Extermination of Jews is a definite policy of Germany being carried out now. According to official reports, in the hands of my government, more than one third of the Poli-Jews out of a total of 3,130,000 have already been exterminated. And also hundreds of thousands of Jews who have been transplanted to Poland from other countries. Imagine entire population of large cities, all taken out and shot, exterminated in cold blood. That will give you the idea of what is happening to the Jews in Poland.
[Narrator] This is the original film. It was never used by the usual companies. An example of the widespread reluctance among the allies to publicise the facts of genocide. Schnol Ziegelbeim was another member of the Polish National for the first eight months of 1942.
Judy, Judy.
[Narrator] In Europe was still a secret.
Yes can you stop there and go onto the other film and we use that again next week, please. Thank you. Now you have British foreign office officials. This is fascinating, actually explaining how they felt about the news that’s coming through from various sources. And the Riegner telegram, this is Lord Hankey.
Well, it was a terrible dilemma, absolutely appalling dilemma. But you’ll see, the pressures of wartime are such that you have to put first things first. And if by being kind to those people, we’d lost the Middle East, we wouldn’t have beaten Hitler. And rarely you just had to put that first. And you see, human sympathy was entirely on their side. We, all of us had many Jewish friends and they were all of us worried. They were all of them worried about it. And we were all worried about it. But you just couldn’t settle it the Palestine way. And what else could you do with them? We had to try to get them accommodated somewhere. We couldn’t do it in a way which would’ve lost the war. If it had been possible to do more for the Jews at that time, Churchill as a Zionist supporter would’ve been the very first to insist on it. But he knew it wasn’t possible. And Anthony Eden would certainly have gone along with that as long as it didn’t really upset the apricot. But Churchill wasn’t going to upset the apricot either. So you’ll see, you’ll get cabinet agreement that way. And that’s the policy that comes down. You can have any human sympathies you like. But in the civil service, we all had to take the orders of ministers. It was the ministers who had to carry the can of responsibility. And we had to respect that.
[Narrator] Muigler’s message was that three and a half to four millions would after deportation and concentration in the East, be it one blow exterminated in order to resolve once and for all the Jewish question in Europe, the telegram reached the foreign office on the 10th of August, 1942. It was the first news of a mass extermination policy to be officially received in Britain.
[Interviewer] When the Telegram by Gerhart Riegner eventually reached the-
Oh yes.
Foreign office. It spoke for the first time of a mass extermination plan.
Yeah.
[Interviewer] To kill the Jews of Europe.
That’s right.
[Interviewer] So wait, how did you react to that?
Well, there, I mean, let’s face it, we were surprised and sceptical and I was surprised and sceptical too, not at information that the Nazis were murdering and killing and behaving in the most abominable manner. Because indeed we’d had plenty of evidence of that really from that really, I mean the Nazi behaviour really changed two stages. I mean, after the occupation of Poland in 1940, there was not yet an extermination policy, but there was a policy of putting Jews into ghettos and where they often died and had diseases. And we heard all this and accepted that. And then, because of course they were no longer dealing with their own nationals in Germany, it was a different problem. And then of course, things got even worse when they invaded Russia in July, 1941. And as we now know, and indeed at the time, even reports were coming in, the SS were actually taking Jews out of villages and shooting them. But none of this, what really we were surprised about was that there should be a plan for the complete extermination of all Jews within what I think was called the German sphere of influence. And I think the phrase was “at one blow” when we just spoke to know that this is too much. They were fighting a war after all. I mean, could they give the an indeed it was an immense effort on the part of the Germans.
[Interviewer] As chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee, when did you first hear of the atrocities against the Jewish populations in Europe?
I can’t remember the exact date. My impression is that it was 1943. And what I remember there was report from the Polish underground near Lublin, there at a camp near Lublin, they were there literally exterminating Jewish prisoners, and they were gassing them, getting them with gas. Well, one remembered during, I remembered during the first war, all sorts of stories were put out and we believed them. We used them in propaganda, and then they were completely untrue. And that propaganda might say, rebounded on us. So I was a bit sceptical, but there was no doubt about it. The German Nazis were out to exterminate the Jews and didn’t want them to exist in Germany.
[Interviewer] But when you look at your memorandum now, you wrote at the time, “In my opinion, it is incorrect to describe information regarding German atrocities as "trustworthy”. The Poles, and to a far greater extent the Jews, tend to exaggerate German atrocities in order to stoke us up.“
Well, that is what I believed at the time, and it was only natural they should do so.
[Interviewer] So you felt there was no substance in these reports?
I didn’t think, I thought, I don’t say that. I thought there was no substance in these reports, but I thought they were exaggerated at the time.
[Interviewer] Why did you think the Jews exaggerated more than the Poles?
Well, because I think that they had very, perhaps stronger feelings, far stronger feelings than the Poles. And they had, and I think Jewish people have a vivid imagination. Read into them too perhaps, yeah, it can be right. I mean, I was wrong. Yes, I admit it. But one has to try and be sceptical and balanced. I mean, during the war, I had to be sceptical very often.
[Reporter] The civil service response as seen in minutes and memorandum circulating through White Hall with a mixture of confusion and irritation stemming from antipathy towards Jewish groups and Jews in general.
[Host] What is disturbing is the apparent readiness of the new colonial secretary to take Jewish agency’s sub staff at its face value. Why should the Jews be spared distress and humiliation when they have earned it? The allies rather resent the suggestion that Jews in particular have been more heroic or long suffering than other nationals of occupied countries. In my opinion, a disproportionate amount of the time of the office is wasted on dealing with these wailing Jews.
[Reporter] Officials did not recognise that the Jews had a separate identity. They were regarded as allied nationals or as enemy aliens. No international agreement like the Hague or Geneva Conventions applied to them. The International Red Cross would not extend its protection to Jews in concentration camps. Official Jewish bodies lacked in governmental status. Behind the walls of the foreign office, such opinions circulated in secret.
Now, I mean, bureaucrats are always supposed to be dealing with paper, but my God, it is what we have to do. And a vast amount of documents flowing in and out all that time, officially dent minute each document with an eye to the historian of the future and to whether they will appear to have been sympathetic or unsympathetic. They’re objectively dealing with how this matter should be handled. And I think probably people reading them afterwards wouldn’t quite realise that.
Thanks, Judy. Right. So this is the kind of atmosphere. And then on December 1st, 1942, the British section of the world Jewish Congress issued a three page report, "Annihilation of European Jury”. This is the headline, “Hitler’s Policy of Total Destruction”. And it was based on the final report of an extraordinary man called Jan Karski, who is known as the Courier From Warsaw. And I’ll be talking about him in a separate section. He explained how almost the entire population of the Baltic states have been exterminated. He talked about the murders in Transnistria. He talked about the scores of German, French, Belgian and Dutch, Czech and Slovakian Jews, which have been deported for mass slaughter. So it’s there. And also mentions three death camps. He actually smuggles himself to the edge of a death camp. And, but as I said, I’ll talk more about him later. Now, I don’t want you to think that there weren’t heroes. Of course, they’re the extraordinary heroes of the Warsaw ghetto, and we’re going to talk about the parachutes. But there were other heroes and such a man was a Jewish member of parliament called Sydney Silverman. Another such hero was Barnett Janner. They worried and they worried, and of course, Weitzman was often in London.
They would nag and nag and nag. Now his background, he came from a poor immigrant family, brilliant young man, studied law, was a conscientious subjector in the first World War. But because of the rise of Nazism changes his mind. He works his way up through local government, Liverpool City Council, becomes the MP for Liverpool and so he screams out as a Jew, a member of the British Parliament for Jewish Rights worldwide. And he is the one who worries away and worries away. Ironically, there is going to be support from Churchill, but I’ll talk about that later. Just to finish his story up, he became a very fervent opponent of capital punishment. And it was because of him that the bill was passed in parliament outlawing capital punishment. Now, as a response to Jan Karski’s report, which you’ve already seen, was publicised by the Polish government in exile. Two extraordinary men, both the foreign minister and the prime minister. And I’ll be talking more about them as well, because they were the heroes. And Silverman suggests that the great powers issue a declaration.
And on December 2nd, Eden saw the Soviet Ambassador, who’s Jewish, actually, Ivan Maisky, who gave his personal approval. And December 3rd to put more pressure on, Silverman announces that he would ask a question in the house. And there’s an article in The Times on December 4th, the Nazi war on the Jews. And it refers to the Swedish report. And that by December 1st, 1942, the general government in Poland would be Jew free. “Only the remnant of the Warsaw ghetto will remain,” I’m quoting. December 5th, another hero, William Temple, the Archbishop of Canterbury, wrote a letter to The Times praising the paper for publishing the appalling facts. The headline of Temple’s letter, “The Nazi War on the Jews, the New Barbarism, the response of the civilised world.” And he expressed indignation as a Christian.
December the 11th, there was a major article in the Spectator magazine. So pressure, pressure, pressure is on. And as a result of that, Silverman makes two suggestions. That the great powers make a declaration of the extermination plan. And also that it must be broadcasted. Still, there was a lot of hesitation, still the British government didn’t want to go public. And it’s the Poles led by Cal Rosinski, the foreign minister, who put pressure on them. And as a response to this pressure, they issue the Allied Declaration. And it is going to go on the radio. It’s never televised, but it goes on the radio. It was to be, they’d hoped it would be shown, not televised, that it would be shown in cinemas. And this is the Allied Declaration. It’s read by Anthony Eden. “The attention of the Belgian, Czechoslovak, Greek, Yugoslav, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norwegian, Polish, Soviet, British, and American governments, and also of the French National Committee, have been drawn to the numerous reports from Europe that the German authorities not content with denying to persons of Jewish race in all the territories over which their Barber’s rule has been extended. The most elementary human rights are now carrying into effect Hitler’s off repeated intention to exterminate the Jewish people in Europe.
From all occupied countries, Jews are being transported in conditions of appalling horror and brutality to Eastern Europe. In Poland, which has been made the principle Nazi slaughterhouse, the ghettos established by the German invader are being systematically emptied of all Jews, except for few highly skilled workers required for industries, none of those taken away are ever seen again. The infirm are left to die of exposure and starvation are deliberately massacred in mass executions. The number of victims of these bloody cruelties is reckoned in many hundreds of thousands. The above mentioned government and the French National Committee condemn in the strongest possible terms, this bestial policy of cold-blooded extermination. They declare that such events can only strengthen the resolve of all freedom loving peoples to overthrow the Barber’s Hitler like tyranny. They reaffirm their solemn resolution to ensure that those responsible for these crimes shall not escape retribution and to depress with all necessary practical measures to this end. So that is the Declaration.
Silverman called for a minute silence in the House of Commons, December the 17th, 1942. And for many years, Martin Gilbert, who unfortunately died a few years ago, would give a lecture in the house on this particular issue. And of course it was Martin who wrote the book that Rex’s film was based on. So there are so many areas that I’ve brought up here, and I want to be very, very, very, very careful. That the allies and the other governments are not the perpetrators. The question that many people who created Israel, particularly those of the right, Jabotinsky of course had fought, died in 1940. But his followers, they believed that by blocking the gates to Palestine, the allies were actually complicit. They weren’t bystanders, they were complicit. So it’s such a complicated, deep and dark issue, but what it does illustrate is Jewish powerlessness. I said this at the time of the Warsaw ghetto uprising. Even then, the left and the right couldn’t come together. Here you have a desperate people, and here you have the response for desperate people.
And it’s no accident that 1942 is when the Zionists come together to call for statehood. What I intend to do when I see you again on Thursday, tomorrow, we have a very special presentation with Rabbi David Rosen, Jeremy’s brother. He’s going to be talking about the role of the Vatican Post Shua, on Thursday, I am going to look at rescue, but the following Monday, I will come back to continue with this issue. But I want to leave it because of course, things changed dramatically in 1944 because that is in many ways what my mother, may she rest in peace called the greatest shundra of all. Because Hungarian Jewry, as I said right at the beginning, were not attacked until April, 1944, by which time, it wasn’t even an open secret, you know? And there’s a lot of very, very tragic information that we have to deal with. But as I said right at the beginning, information makes us stronger. So I think I’ll stop there and let’s have a look at the questions, right?
Q&A and Comments:
There’s some lovely and nice to go back to the positive. There’s some wonderful positive event comments about the gala. Yes, Ev, I think so many people thought it was wonderful. You see, that’s the human condition. We can also really enjoy the wonders.
And this is from Devor. Please tell Wendy she has any number of excellent bridge partners who’ll be thrilled to play with you.
Okay. Banality of evil. This is Sandy Lando referring of course to David and Dennis, right? It’s trudygold.com. It does work. It’s "trudygold”, one word, Arlene.
The film I’m showing clips from is Auschwitz and the Allies.
Q: Evie Simon, “Will there be any discussion of Jews fleeing into Russia who put into slave labour?”
A: Yes, of course there will be Evie.
Yes, now Graham Perry, “I just wanted to point out the Évian conference, the Chinese issued visa.” Yes, we will be doing a whole session on Shanghai. Graham, one of the problems I face is that it’s very complicated. And in order to make it as understandable as possible, I’m trying to stick to chronology and also geography.
This is from Eddie Straus. “Are you familiar with the fate of the ship, Mckwanza, a friend of mine was a teenager, showed her life to Elena Roosevelt’s intervention.” Yes, it’s interesting. Elena Roosevelt was on the side of the angels.
This is from Joan Lessen. “My maternal grandmother made an explorer trip to Palestine in 1937. Shortly after that, they went to Belgium and then to America.”
Now, this is Judy. “PBS has a show called "My Grandparents’ War”, when they featured Helen Bonham Carter, whose grandfather provided visa to Spain, although told not to do so.“ Yes, there were incredible diplomats. About 30 years ago, I actually hosted an exhibition of 18 diplomats and the countries they came from who saved Jews. They were always the good people. They’re the ones we have to study. Now, let me see.
Q: Anthony Eden, "When interviewed for the world at war, was asked could Britain have intervened in Poland to bring an end to the killings? He replied that when the question had been discussed, the conclusion was the death camps were out of range. And many of the concentration clamps for Pio Bau. So not be bombed.”
A: Catherine, you’re going to have to give me the flexibility of discussing that carefully and long with you. Because basically the order was given by Churchill to bomb the camps, to bomb the railway lines leading to Auschwitz. Let me be very careful to bomb the railway lines. And this is all in Martin’s book. And what is wonderful is that they interviewed Bomber Harris who said, we never received the order. And if we had received the order, we could have done it. And they were bombing, bombs did fall on Auschwitz. They were bombing the oil refinery not far away. And don’t forget, Auschwitz was also a prisoner of war. It was also a labour camp for IG Farbin. They were bombing the factories. So yes, they had the bombs, they could have done it. They didn’t. And as I said, the mystery is Churchill gave the order. Martin found the letter. They didn’t have very effective shredding machines. And he did the most unbelievable, he and Rex did the most incredible research. That’s why even though it’s an old book and an old film, they got the interviews. That’s the point. They interviewed people who were alive.
Yes, this is Peter Rhodes. “There was another interview with an RAF commander who said it could have been done with difficulty, but the high command did not want to divert efforts from bombing Germany.” Well, but according to Bomber Harris, they weren’t asked. Bomber command were not asked who is, you see, this is the problem. Who is telling the truth?
“The Nazis used resentment against harsh terms of World War I. Hyperinflation and Liebestraum reverted into power. But horrifying thought that Hitler’s real motive for going to war in Europe was his due hatred. And the only way to achieve a final solution was in condition of war and occupation.” Stephen, I wouldn’t go that far. I think the Nazis fought two wars. One was a war for the living space. You know, Hitler didn’t want war with the British, by the way. He wanted the British to keep their empire. Your trouble is you’re looking into a nutter, you’re looking into the mind of a maniac. Except that’s too simple. We can’t just say that. But once the war is underway, then killing Jews becomes as important as the other aim.
Q: “Didn’t Hitler make a deal with the Vatican to collect tithes from German Catholics, which supported the Vatican financially?”
A: Anita, I’m going to do a whole session on Pius XII. I promise you it’s very, very complicated. And again, it all came to the fore when there was a move to beatify him. You know, when a pope, or when a person, one of the greatest things that can happen to a Catholic is that they become a saint. Because then in Catholic theology, they immediately ascend to heaven. Now, in order to become a saint, you have to first be Beatified and your deeds are accounted by somebody in the Vatican called the Devil’s Advocate. Now, there was so much protests about Pius XII that it was stalled. He’s a very controversial figure. So I’m going to do a whole session on him. Yes.
This is from Sheila. She remembers reading in micro fician in the Palestine post details in massacres in the Boltine in October ‘41. Yes. Yes. This is the point.
Again, people thanking for the gala.
“And still the allies declined to bond the railway lines to impede the deportations from Miri.” You know, there are some historians who say, “It wouldn’t have made any difference.” It’s a huge debate actually. But the man I showed you at the beginning, and there are other people, he was in Auschwitz and he basically said, “It would’ve been better for us to die that way.” And, “Professor Deborah Lipstadt, Mrs. Germano, wrote a book about manipulations of the US government to prevent information to be published in US newspapers.” I haven’t even begun to look at America, I’m afraid, Anna, but I will.
“Ruben Duffner from Joan was a very special person. His story about parachuting into Yugoslavia was amazing.” Yes, you see, they did allow some Palestinian Jews to get involved in rescue missions, but parachute chops and tragically most of them were killed.
Q: This is from Eli. “If all this got out, why were the Hungarian Jews so incredibly complacent and didn’t flee thinking Horthy would protect them?”
A: Ellie, what can I say to you? Is it complacency? Where are they going to flee to? There’s a war on, there are 900,000 of them. Trudy, may I, you know Eddie, as we said, we did not know.
Yeah.
He said that over and over and over again. We did not know.
Yeah. I think this is the point. We are not talking very good. Important to say that, Wendy. Look what I’m telling you is what the allies received, the information allies received I’m not talking, look, the people in the Warsaw ghetto. You did have Jan Karski coming in and there were reports about what happens in the East, but were Hungarian jury alerted? That is one of the problems. You know, at the Eichmann trial, the leader of Hungarian jury, Philip Freudigatt, was sent information. He refused to hand it on because he thought there’d be a terrible panic. You know, I always remember what Anita Lascavalvish says to me, “When you are in hell, don’t judge. Judge the perpetrators, judge the collaborators.” You know, when I said this to you a couple of weeks ago, when do you really take on that someone hates you well enough to murder the things you love most? I mean, it’s beyond it. It’s a time beyond imagination.
Q: Beryl, “And what should we do about the rise of the hatred of Jews?”
A: Okay, what do we do about anti-Semitism? Arm ourselves, study our history, learn, you know, I do not believe every Gentile is an anti-Semite, by the way, but I think you’ve got a 2000 year old history of negativity that has to be countered. And let me just be a little bit more positive. It is only in the world of monotheism, this kind of hatred. You do not find it in China. You do not find it in Hindu India. And up until the modern period, it was never as dark in the Muslim world, by the way.
This is, “In fact, my mother said that in Hungary port, that the hysterical Jews were exaggerating.” That was in Budapest.
This is from Maine. “Alan Dallas of the CIA and Europe knew about Wannsee saying, withheld the information from Roosevelt. He also instructed the American Embassy to say there was no quota for Jews. Even when this was exposed in the book, the Devil’s Chess Game.” A lot of people.
Q: Leslie is asking, “Who is the interviewer?”
A: It’s Rex Bloomstein. He’s a brilliant filmmaker.
“The calmness and the excuses of the British made me shutter.” They are brilliant interviews, aren’t they?
They were just, the films, they both, Lucy, they both of these films, they’re both extracts from a two hour documentary called “Auschwitz and the Allies”. I don’t know if it’s available. It was only shown once. I’m pretty sure it was the first documentary on the shower to be shown in this country. I’ll get in touch with Rex and find out if it’s possible what we can, I’ll talk to Wendy.
“Vivid imagination.” Yes, I know Jillian, it’s very difficult to take that.
This is from Phil, “Truly the British upper class, which populated government were absolutely appalling. Their lack of empathy for people other than their class is clearly evident.” Phil, but then think about Churchill. They weren’t all like that. You know, people are people. I don’t think we should stereotype them. And you know, somebody like Josiah Wedgwood, for example, hammering away in Parliament, unfortunately died in '43. There were, Philosemitism is also a British issue. I could teach a whole class on people who loved Jews and wanted to, yeah, the problem is, and I mean read Norman Lebrecht in his book, “Genius and Anxiety.” The problem is we are central to Western civilization. You know, it’s based on the Judaic law. If you think about Western civilization, it’s based on what? The Jews and the Greeks, those two combative types.
Q: You are Sarah, “Are we Jews expendable?”
A: What I think it did in terms of Israel, I think it made us incredibly militant. I think it was never again, and also characters like Abba Kovner saying, “We will never again go like sheep to the slaughter.” I really want to shatter that because they didn’t. They really, really didn’t. There were so many acts of, look, the first Civil Act of actual resistance was the Warsaw ghetto and there was so many other acts of resistance. Ali Goldberg is talking about President Roosevelt “Got a lot of briefing from Joe Kennedy, and an antisemite,” well, Kennedy, no, Kennedy left Britain, but no, Kennedy himself was an antisemite. Roosevelt’s a very complicated character and I’m leaving William Tyler to talk about Roosevelt, Stalin and Churchill, their personalities.
“Can the films be downloaded?” I don’t think so, Steven. That’s the problem. And I should like to mention that I’ve got all these extracts because when I ran LJCC, a student of mine of blessed memory, Stuart Lipson, he was crazy about film and I have about 500 films of documentaries and he cut them and he clipped them for teaching.
Q: And this is from Leonard saying “What has happened? Is there any relief from the genocide in China? Maya Mar, Tibet, Syria.”
A: You see, this is the problem. Go back to Einstein. We are wonderful monsters. We haven’t, well, that’s why I still believe that a kind of education is the key. Not a great academic education. I think that the Nazis destroyed that for all time. This notion that if you educate people, they’re going to be civilised. The problem is the Enlightenment got it wrong, but we have to think of a new kind of enlightenment.
Yes. This is from Alison. “My father was saved by a very senior civil servant. He and his wife saved him in Bachwich.” Yet what made that man risk his life? You see, that’s what’s interesting, isn’t it Alison?
Q: “Who was the British official who wrote the letter about the wailing Jews and to whom was it written?”
A: It was an intergovernmental memo. I think it was to Frank Roberts.
Q: This is from Lawrence. “Can we say that the British responses in the film are typical of the class of their stereotyping of Jews who have overactive imaginations? What is aggravating and unacceptable is those in power have no shame in saying they believe the Jews of people were very imaginative people.”
A: Look, they were in a corner. When they were giving those interviews. You know, I have absolutely no sympathy for them whatsoever. He was squirming on a hook, wasn’t he, during that interview? Yes. What he said was, I believe, antisemitic.
This is from Melvin, “The debacle Évian was more or less repeated in Bermuda.” Yeah. The Bermuda Conference is going on at the time of the Warsaw ghetto uprising and they won’t negotiate.
Stephen Paul, “I’m reminded by the comment of a security agent after 9/11. It was not a failure of intelligence, but a failure of imagination.” Yeah. This is the Red Cross.
Q: Tony is asking, “Were they biased?”
A: The problem was they didn’t see the Jews as a separate category. It’s complicated. They actually went into Teratian stat and they were fooled by the films the Germans made. So that’s another issue that we have to deal with separately.
Q: “I thought the Hungarian invasion was marched the 19th.”
A: Yes, Vido, you are completely correct, but Eichmann didn’t start working on the Jews for another month. It was in April that he called in two young Jews.
Q: Brandon Katzner. “If the Gates to Palestine had not been closed, what would the consequences have been and called? How could the allies have dealt with that?”
A: Well, that’s a very interesting one, isn’t it? The Zionists would say that the Jews of Germany and Austria could certainly have been saved. Would it have meant that the Arabs would rise up against the British? Well, they did actually. There was an uprising in Iraq, an uprising in Syria. There was an uprising in Egypt. No, there wasn’t, sorry was, French was Vishy, but there was lots of actions in Syria. Vishy, Diane lost an eye fighting for the British and David Rati, the head of the Irgun was killed fighting for the British. In the end, they did. They, you know, in the end they had no choice but to fight with the British.
This is from Edward Seidler. “All it is good for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing,”
Edmund Burke. “Allied indifference to what they knew is hard to comprehend.”
“Isn’t it ironic that Fritz Harber, a German of Jewish ancestry and Nobel Prize winner devised the gas that killed even members of his own family?” Yes. Yeah.
Q: Deanna, “What was the reason that the allies gave for not bombing the rail lines?”
A: And they couldn’t. Churchill gave the order and it was never carried out. You could then ask why didn’t he carry follow it up. There’s lots more, Wendy, on how much people enjoyed the gala. So it’s great, isn’t it? We can still have the wonders.
And this is from David. “It would be nice to have electronic Hugo Boss.” Yes. There is so many things we can do. Anyway, Wendy, I think I should leave it there, yes?
Endorse that. I like to endorse that on Hugo Bass. Absolutely. Trudy, make a note of that.
Yes. I have.
I’d just like to thank everybody for their warm and wonderful comments. I’m unfortunately, as you can see, in a car now, so I have not been able to see them, but I certainly will when I get back to LA. So once again, very big thank you to all of you and thank you Trudy, for an outstanding presentation. Actually quite horrifying. And I think that we should, you know, to be very interesting to have a look at the traits that unified the people, all of those individuals who were ready to step up to the plate.
What I’m going to do on Thursday, I’m actually going to look at a village called Novogródek, which was the home of Jack Kagan and some of the people who helped there. And then I’ll go back to this. I think we need to look at the heroes as well. So definitely Wendy.
[Wendy] Thank you very much.
God bless everyone and keep safe, huh. Bye Wendy. Thanks a lot.
[Wendy] Thank you very much. Bye-bye everyone. Thanks. Bye.