Holocaust: The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews Peter Longerich (grave mercy .TXT) 📖

a tear-gas grenade was thrown into the synagogue

in Ansbach; 58

^ in October the interior of the synagogue in Langen (Hesse) was

destroyed; 59

^ on 1 November an arson attack was carried out on the synagogue in

Konstanz; 60

^ in Zirndorf near Nuremberg a synagogue was destroyed on the night of

4/5 Nov. 61

In many places windows were smashed and Jews violently attacked. 62

The further radicalization of the persecution of the Jews was expressed in the

expulsion of Jewish families, some of long standing, from their homes. Particularly

in the Gaus of Franconia and Württemberg, according to an SD report for the

month of October, 63 ‘the Jews of individual towns and villages were forced by the population to leave their homes immediately, taking with them only bare necessities. Most of these actions encouraged by [Party] local branches or district

leaders and carried out by the Party formations [SA and SS] were mostly purely

local in character.’

The anti-Jewish riots in Vienna were also particularly violent. On the night of

5 October, in various districts of Vienna the Jews living there were forced to clear

their homes immediately. It was hoped that this threat, which was later with-

drawn, would unleash a panic-stricken flight of the Jews. 64

Towards the end of October the riots directed against the Jews were concen-

trated particularly in Franconia, where the Gauleiter Julius Streicher, according to

information from the SD, had declared as early as July, with reference to the

‘Jewish question’, ‘that the Anschluss has brought the problem to a stage in which

fundamental decisions can no longer be ignored. The question could now no

longer be addressed by propagandistic means.’65

At the end of October, SD regional headquarters South reported that a few days

previously all Jews had been registered on file on Streicher’s orders: ‘The political

leaders are expecting a major operation against the Jews within the next few days.’

On 24 October 1938, the deputy Gauleiter, Karl Holz, was said to have declared at a

local Nazi rally in Nuremberg that it would ‘even have been desirable if the exodus

of the Jews had been encouraged a little more quickly in Nuremberg as well’. 66

In response to an enquiry from SD regional headquarters South on 22 October,

asking whether the instigators of individual actions ‘should still be treated

ruthlessly’, the Jewish Department of the SD observed on 3 November ‘that a

Deprivation of Rights and Forced Emigration, late 1937–9

109

general ruling cannot be given, as no decision has yet been received from C (¼

Heydrich)’. 67

The Pogrom of 9/10 November 1938: Reichskristallnacht

While the Party activists were, with their violent actions, exerting an even stronger

‘pressure to emigrate’ both on Jews living in Germany and on countries outside

Germany, increasingly alarmed by terrifying reports from Germany, the regime

decided in the course of October to strengthen its Judenpolitik still further.

On the one hand the government considered itself compelled by the inter-

national situation—considerably worsened as a result of its own policies—to

undertake greater efforts to rearm, for which in turn the remaining assets of the

Jews were urgently needed, as Goering made plain at a meeting of the General

Council of the Four-Year Plan on 14 October. Goering declared that he was ‘under

instruction from the Führer to increase armaments to an abnormal degree . . . He

faced unimaginable difficulties. The coffers were empty, manufacturing capacity

was full to the brim with contracts for years ahead . . . He would turn the economy

around, with violent means if necessary, to achieve that goal.’ Above all the ‘Jewish

question’ must now ‘be addressed with all possible means, because they must now

leave the economy’.

‘Aryanization’ was not to be seen, however, as it had been in Austria, ‘as a

welfare system for inadequate Party members . . . It was entirely a matter for the

state. But he could not make foreign currency available for the evacuation of the

Jews. If necessary, ghettos would have to be set up in the individual cities.’68

A note by the leader of Main Department IV of the Reich Economics Ministry

reveals that Goering had, on 14 October, also ordered the ‘Aryanization’ of the

entire Jewish bank, stock-exchange, and insurance system, and after 1 January

prohibited any kind of bank deals by Jews. 69

In October the regime also found itself confronted by a second problem: it was

feared that the Polish government might anticipate the deportation of Polish Jews

from the Reich by expatriating that group. It therefore decided on a major

deportation of this group. This enterprise was enforced with extraordinary bru-

tality at the end of October, and marks the transition from anti-Jewish actions

emanating from the Party base to a centrally directed campaign that was to lead

on to the November pogrom.

With its new State Citizenship Law, which came into force on 31 March 1938,

the Polish government had created the possibility of withdrawing state citizenship

from Polish citizens living abroad for a long period of time. From the point of view

of the Nazi regime, this produced the prospect of the 70,000 Polish Jews living in

Germany (and many of whom had been born there) becoming stateless people. 70

Consequently, since May deportations from Poland had been occurring on a

larger scale and in August the Decree regarding the Special Police Department for

110

Racial Persecution, 1933–1939

Foreign Nationals was tightened, unambiguously focusing on Jews. When the

Polish Minister of the Interior decreed on 6 October that henceforth admission

would be granted only to Poles from abroad who were able to show a special note

in their passports, but that this could be withheld by the consulates if there were

reasons to deny state citizenship, at the end of October the German police

launched the operation to deport all Polish Jews, which had already been in

preparation for some time. On the evening of 27 October and the two days that

followed, Polish Jews were arrested all over the Reich, brought to collection points

and transported under inhuman conditions in sealed and strictly guarded special

trains to the border with Poland. The trains stopped just before the Polish border,

which had been closed since the run-up to the action and their passengers were

driven over the border. After the Polish side had initially turned these people away

and thousands of them were wandering back and forth in no-man’s-land, intern-

ment camps were set up in Polish border towns. The