During the War, Switzerland Turned Away Jewish Refugees from Nazi Germany - It Even Insisted that the Nazis Put ‘J' on the Passports of German
Jews
The
kidnapping of Ali Abunimah on the streets of Zurich by the Swiss Gestapo is no
surprise. Switzerland has a history of authoritarianism. In Europe today
freedom of speech is under attack in a way not seen since before World War II.
Ali
described what happened in an article he wrote on the plane to Istanbul:
I
was abducted off the street around 1:30pm on Saturday while on my way to the
Palestine teach-in by undercover agents, handcuffed, forced into an unmarked
car and sped straight to the prison. My “crime”? Being a journalist who speaks
up for Palestine and against Israel’s genocide and settler-colonial savagery
and those who aid and abet it.
As
Ali says:
Speaking
out for Palestine is not a crime! Standing against racist genocidal Zionism is
not a crime! Say it with me ‘From the River to the Sea Palestine Will Be Free!’
I’m free! I wrote this on the plane and I’m posting it just after landing at Istanbul. On Monday evening I was brought to Zurich airport in handcuffs, in a small metal cage inside a windowless prison van and led all the way to the plane by police. This is after three days and two… pic.twitter.com/S4BF2eEYYQ
It
is a little known fact that even the Nazis hesitated to mark the passports of German
Jews. It was Heinrich Rothmund, the Head of the Swiss Police, who insisted
that the Nazis mark the passports of Jews with a ‘J'. After all how could the
Swiss immigration authorities tell who was a Jew and who wasn’t when it came to
turning back refugees from Germany?What
the good burghers of the Alpine country didn’t want was an influx of German Jewish
refugees.
Switzerland
was an ostensibly neutral country, the only one apart from Sweden that wasn’t
invaded, but in practice it was pro-Nazi and performed many valuable financial
tasks for the Nazi state. Swiss banks were happy to accept the deposits of German
Jewish citizens as well as much of the loot that the Nazis stole from their
victims, but they were less keen to disgorge their ill-gotten gains after the
war.
Switzerland
served as a repository for Jewish capital smuggled out of Nazi Germany and the
states threatened by it, and also for vast quantities of gold and other
valuables plundered from Jews and others all over Europe. Right up until the
end of the war, Switzerland laundered hundreds of millions of dollars in stolen
assets, including gold taken from the central banks of German-occupied Europe.
At the war's end Switzerland successfully resisted Allied calls to restitute
these funds, and in the Washington Agreement of 1946 the Allies contented
themselves with acceptance of a mere 12% of the stolen gold. Holocaust
survivors and the heirs of those who perished met an implacable wall of
bureaucracy and only a handful managed to reclaim their assets.
The Electronic Intifada's executive director @AliAbunimah was deported by Switzerland on Monday after spending two nights in jail. https://t.co/Mg4gJC6wc0
A
report by an independent inquiry into Switzerland's second world war history
concludes that Swiss officials "helped the Nazi regime achieve its
goals" by closing the country's borders to thousands of Jewish refugees,
effectively sending them back to near certain death.
The
findings of the multinational Independent Commission of Experts, led by a Swiss
historian, Jean-François Bergier, and established by the Swiss parliament three
years ago, have shaken Switzerland's prim view of itself as an unsullied,
neutral, safe-haven that resisted Nazi oppression.
The
report concludes that the authorities knew by the summer of 1942 that Jewish
refugees arriving at the country's borders faced almost certain death when they
were turned back.
"Even
after they were informed about the unbelievable and unimaginable events taking
place, the federal authorities - like the governments of most other states -
made few changes in their policies regarding refugees. Most frequently, neutral
states demonstrated indifference and passivity or attempted to accommodate the
Nazi system."
Raul Hilberg's description in Destruction of the European Jews of the Swiss role in German Jews Having Their Passports Stamped with a 'J'
I
wrote in my book about how the International Committee of the Red Cross refused
to provide any protection for Jews since they had accepted the Nazi designation
of them as stateless and common criminals. The official history of the War Refugee Board
noted that;
The Board also
appealed to the International Committee of the Red Cross time and again to take
direct and aggressive action to obtain humanitarian treatment for the helpless
minorities being persecuted so viciously by the Germans. For many months,
however, request after request from the Board met with the answer that the
Germans would not permit the proposed action.
According
to ICRCPresident Max Huberthey could not be seen to be ‘intruding into the domestic policy’ of the
Nazis.’
There were
discussions throughout August 1942 about the murder of Jewish civilians yet at
the ICRCexecutive of 14 October 1942 the pro-Nazi
former foreign minister of Switzerland,
Philip Etter,
‘opposed even the anodyne Huberdraft’ calling for the humane treatment of
civilians, not even Jews, ‘arguing that it could be interpreted as a violation
of neutrality.’ Etter’s view
prevailed.
In the
Netherlands the Dutch Red Crossmade no effort to communicate with deported
Jews ‘although it did send a fully equipped ambulance to the Eastern front ‘to
comfort the Dutch Waffen-SSvolunteers fighting there.’
The
Dutch historian, Louis de Jong,condemned the ICRCfor its ‘almost total lack of concern for the
Jews’ disasters.’
Money intended for the
victims of Israel’s merciless bombing of Gaza is being stolen and given to Israel’s
racist
Magen David Adom
UPDATE-
VICTORY
I am
pleased to announce that the school authorities have totally backed down now
and the money will go, as originally intended, to a Palestinian charity,
probably Medical Aid for Palestinians see here
for school statement
The students of
Stretford High School decided that they would get together to raise funds for
the Palestinian victims of Israel’s genocidal bombing of Gaza. The Head
Teacher, Nicola Doward decided otherwise. The funds would be split between those
who murdered and those who were killed.
Nicola Doward - Headteacher at Stretford High
Let us recall what started
the attack on Gaza. It began in Sheikh Jarrar in East Jerusalem. Palestinian
refugees who have lived there since 1948, for 73 years, found that they were
subject to legal proceedings under the Legal
and Administrative Matters Law 1970 to evict them because the properties
were originally owned by Jews who fled to Israel when Jerusalem was
partitioned.
However the 45,000
Palestinians who fled West Jerusalem cannot evict the Jews who took over their
homes. Why? Because Israel is a Jewish state and it is also why it is a racist
state.
Israeli Police have
since been laying siege to Sheik Jarrar and acting with vicious brutality. On
Saturday the veteran Al Jazeera reporter, Givara
Budeiri, was arrested
for the crime of reporting. During her arrest she was kicked and beaten and suffered
a broken arm.
Stretford High School
There
was the attack
on worshippers at Al Aqsa mosque. There was no equivalent invasion of a Jewish
synagogue by Palestinian protestors. This was totally one sided and relates to the continuous
attempts by Jewish settlers to encroach on Al Aqsa Mosque. Their desire is
to demolish
the mosque and build a Third Temple on the site.
Imagine
if Iranian police, firing stun grenades and sponge-tipped bullets, which have
taken the eyes of 3 Palestinians out, were to invade a Jewish synagogue in
Tehran. The cries of ‘anti-Semitism’ would resound far and wide. Yet the White
House, Keir Starmer et al said nothing.
This
is the background to the firing of rockets from Gaza, though most of them are just
fire crackers. Just 12 Israelis died, of whom 2 were Israeli Arabs and two Thai
workers. Jews have air raid shelters in Israel unlike non-Jews. At least 265
Palestinians were murdered by ‘precision’ bombings, including 67
children. 22 Palestinians were murdered
in the West Bank where there has been a reign of terror.
This
is the background to Doward’s decision to steal money collected for the
Palestinians. Doward has explained
her actions on Facebook and on the school’s website.
She says it is untrue:
This
is dishonest. The Red Cross itself says that it is
‘supporting the work of the International Committee of the
Red Cross and our partner organisations the Palestine Red Crescent, and Magen David Adom in Israel.’
In
other words it is going to support both the Palestinians and their killers.
Israel does not need assistance. None of its hospitals were bombed. Israeli
bombing deliberately
targeted Palestinian hospitals, schools
and clinics in Gaza. This included Gaza’s only COVID testing clinic. The one
hospital they did not bomb Al Shifa had the roads
to it destroyed preventing ambulances reaching it. Israel took care to kill
as many doctors as possible. Dr Ayman Abu al-Auf, Shifa head of internal
medicine and head of its coronavirus response.
ii.Nicola
Doward says that ‘people who want to sow
seeds of hate will not deter us.’ The only hateful person is Ms Doward. The
Israeli charity Magen David Adom, the Israeli Red Cross, is a thoroughly racist
organisation. It has a history, when attending to the shooting of Palestinian
‘terrorists’ i.e. civilians who resist the occupation of only attending to the Israeli wounded not Palestinians. This includes Palestinian children.
Amazingly in 2012 MDA set up a
religious ethics committee headed by Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu, Chief Rabbi of
Safed. Eliyahu is a vicious racist who in 2010 issued
an edict forbidding Jews in Safed to rent homes to Arabs. Even worse he stated
that MDA must refuse to treat wounded ‘terrorists’ (for which read
Palestinians) and if necessary should poison their food in prison. Rabbi
Eliyahu also advocated the hanging
of Palestinian children yet MDA saw fit to appoint him nonetheless.
iii.Jonathan
Cook, a former Guardian Reporter and winner of the Martha Gelhorn award, reported
that:
There is mounting evidence that Israeli ambulance crews are
withholding treatment from Palestinians injured during a wave of attacks over
the past six months, according to rights groups.
Physicians for Human Rights in Israel, a medical watchdog
group, found that wounded Palestinians had been left untreated for as long as
two hours.
In some cases, medical teams are suspected of failing to
tend to the injuries of suspected attackers as revenge, in the expectation that
they will die from their wounds….
Physicians for Human Rights (an Israeli
body) accused Israel’s leading medical bodies – the Israeli Medical
Association, which lays down ethical codes, and Magen David Adom, which supervises ambulance services – of ignoring
the evidence it has collected of such abuses.
Ha'aretz, a
liberal Israeli paper askedWhy Wasn't the Hurt Palestinian Assailant Treated?it went on to say that
‘Footage of terror attacks show Israeli medical staff standing by as
Palestinian assailants lie wounded on the ground; the incidents put the
national rescue service, which officially isn't meant to operate in the
territories, in an embarrassing position.’ As one Israeli medic said on Twitter
‘“To all who
ask, when I got to the scene today in Jaffa Gate, I helped the wounded
[Israelis], but not the hateful terrorist, although he suffered more critical
wounds.”
All
Palestinians who resist the occupation are routinely called ‘terrorists’.
Dr. Tslil Regev writing
in Israel’s +972 Magazine described how:
The video
clip released Thursday of an Israeli soldier shooting in the head an
incapacitated Palestinian man, who had stabbed and wounded a separate soldier,
doesn’t leave much room for speculation. Maybe it’s because I’m a doctor, but
when I watched the video I couldn’t take my eyes off the Magen David Adom (MDA)
medical team at the scene — treating the wounded soldier, completely ignoring
the man lying wounded on the street, evacuating the soldier in an ambulance,
and then boom. A murder.
The appeal will help provide medical and humanitarian
assistance in Israel, Gaza and the West Bank including East Jerusalem,
supporting the work of the International Committee of the Red Cross and our
partner organisations the Palestine Red Crescent, and Magen David Adom in
Israel.
Ms Doward equates the Israeli
superpower with its victims who have been under occupation for over 70 years
(including Israeli Palestinians). Doward goes on to say that the ‘Red Cross is a 'neutral,
impartial, independent humanitarian Movement' who 'respond when people need us, no matter who or where they are.’
This is nonsense. The
Red Cross was set up to provide help for imprisoned soldiers, not civilians. It refuses to condemn
the racism of MDA and Israeli soldiers who, according to Medical Aid for
Palestine deliberately
delay Palestinian ambulances at check points.
The Red Cross never reveals information about human rights abuses which is why
the Americans uniquely
allowed them access to Guantanamo on condition they remain silent. The Red
Cross is trusted by the most brutal regimes for this reason.
Ms Doward is guilty of
‘bothsidism’. Treating the oppressed and oppressor as equals. As Paulo Freire, the famous
Brazilian educator and philosopher wrote:
‘Washing one’s hands of the conflict
between the powerful and the powerless means to side with the powerful, not to
be neutral.”
Desmond Tutu, a Nobel Peace Prize
winner, Archbishop of Johannesburg and hero of the anti-apartheid wrote:
“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have
chosen the side of the oppressor”
That is precisely what Doward has done.
She has chosen the side of the oppressed, donating money to a racist Israeli
organisation which, unlike the Palestinian Red Crescent, is overburdened with
money.
Elie Wiesel, an Auschwitz survivor in
his speech
accepting the Nobel Peace Prize conveyed the same message:
“We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never
the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented”
And if Doward is hard of hearing
perhaps the words
of Martin Luther King Jr. will resonate:
“The hottest place in Hell is reserved for those who remain
neutral in times of great moral conflict…[an individual] who accepts evil
without protesting against it is really cooperating with it” –
In her smug and self-righteous
statement Doward said that ‘people who want to sow seeds of hate will not deter us.’ In
subverting the desire of her students to help the Palestinians, who are the
real victims in favour of a bogus neutrality, it is she who is guilty of
hatred. Her liberal piety is neutrality in the face of injustice. Doward has
projected her own hate onto others.
For more about how Palestinians
in Israel are subject to lynchings and racist attacks as the Police look on see
Zion Square assault
Doward’s
students may be younger than her but they are wiser.
The International Committee of the Red
Cross
As someone who is
Jewish I have never given a penny to the Red Cross and never will.Why? Because during the Holocaust it refused
to give any aid or comfort to the victims of the Nazis until the very end, in
Hungary in late 1944. Indeed it was worse than that. It conducted
visits to the Thereisenstadt and Auschwitz concentration camps and then gave
them a clean bill of health.
The
ICRC refused to provide any protection for Jews since they accepted the Nazi
designation of them as stateless criminals.[i]
According to its President Max Huber they could not be seen to be ‘intruding into the domestic policy’ of
the Nazis.
There
were discussions throughout August 1942 about the murder of Jewish civilians
yet at the ICRC executive of 14th October 1942 the pro-Nazi former foreign
minister of Switzerland, Philip Etter, ‘opposed
even the anodyne Huber draft’ calling for the humane treatment of
civilians, not even Jews, arguing that it
could be interpreted as a violation of neutrality.’ Etter’s view prevailed.[ii]
The Dutch Red Cross made no effort to communicate with deported Jews although
they did send an ambulance to the Eastern front ‘to comfort the Dutch Waffen-SS volunteers.’ [iii]
The
ICRC attitude changed only at the very end of the war. Louis de Jong condemned
the IHRC for its ‘almost total lack of
concern for the Jews’ disasters.’[iv]
As
the US Holocaust Museum details
the ICRC allowed itself to be taken in by ‘beautification’ of Thereisenstadt.
Just before their visit most inmates were deported to Auschwitz and after the
visit more were deported. The ICRC made no attempt to document the names of the
inmates or to ensure that those they spoke to were protected.
As
Samuel Moyne wrote
in the Wall Street Journal Carl Jacob Burckhardt, the effective head of the ICRC,
harbored a
traditional anti-Semitism and such hatred of communism that he regarded German
Nazism as a bulwark of civilization and a necessary evil. As early as April
1933, the ICRC was receiving desperate letters from inmates of German
concentration camps, including one from Dachau pleading: “‘I beg you again in
the name of the prisoners—Help! Help!’” Yet ... during this period Burckhardt
was given an inspection tour “and
officially lauded the commandant of Dachau for his discipline and decency.”
It wasn’t just
willfully repeating the Germans’ propaganda that stained the ICRC. Nor was it
only the fact that, knowing the Nazis had confirmed their policy of mass
extermination of the Jews at the 1942 Wannsee Conference, the ICRC did nothing
to intervene. What was more difficult to defend was Burckhardt’s sympathies
with and efforts on behalf of Nazi actors after Germany’s defeat. He opposed
the Nuremberg trials, labeling them “Jewish revenge.” ... After the Holocaust,
the ICRC—by then helmed by Burckhardt—even abetted the flight of Nazis such as
Adolf Eichmann and Josef Mengele by providing them with travel papers.
