J. Boas German-Jewish Internal Politics under Hitler Source: J. Boas, German-Jewish Internal Politics under Hitler 1933-1938", in: Leo Baeck Institute Yearbook , 1984, pp. 3-25. Part A, B, C, D 'They can condemn us to hunger but they cannot condemn us to starvation.' This declaration, capturing all the pathos of the Jewish position in the early days of the Hitler regime, appeared in the 6th April issue of the C.V Zeitung , German Jewry's most widely disseminated newspaper.* Sandwiched between the anti-Jewish boycott of 1st April 1933 and the publication of the non-Aryan laws less than a week later, it came from Ismar Elbogen, the dean of Jewish historians, and ambiguous as Elbogen's sentiment may seem today, in that uncertain era when Jews could hardly believe that the first steps had been taken which were to lead to stripping them of every mark of civilised existence, the strange mixture of resignation and optimism sounded neither naive nor unfounded. As no one knew what the future might bring, it was impossible to determine what end the anti-Jewish Nazi policy might serve. For the moment, the most pessimistic interpretations seemed to have been exaggerated. Following the boycott of the 1st April and the non-Aryan legislation the worst appeared to be over. These two initial stimuli intended to eject Germany's Jews from the national body failed to live up to the expectations of the antisemites. The Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service, for example, was enforced only at the higher levels and did not affect the greater number of Jews (who had already been effectively barred from the higher ranks). One estimate put the number of Jews dismissed over a six-year period at 5,433; these included teachers and university professors, who in Germany were considered part of the civil service 1 . In addition, despite persecution and the Law against the Overcrowding of German Schools (25th April 1933), which introduced a numerus clausus for Jews in the general German school system, a large number of Jews continued to frequent German schools. As late as May 1938, twenty-five percent of all Jewish school children were still attending non-Jewish schools. A year before the percentage had stood at 38.7 2 . And although the Law Regarding Admittance to the Profession of Law threatened non-Aryan lawyers with the loss of their practices, it was not until 27th September 1938 (Fifth Ordinance to the Reich Citizenship Law) that all Jewish lawyers were disbarred and reduced to "consultants". The boycott, like the non-Aryan legislation, failed to deliver on its promise. Not the least among that policy's disabling factors was the consideration that the complete elimination of the Jews from the economy would have spelled disaster, as was well noted by the representatives of big business in Hitler's government. The presence of von Hindenburg and the possible repercussions of foreign opinion were still sufficiently important at the time in soft-pedalling the more restrictive aspects of the campaign.* A notable lack of enthusiasm was actually detectable among the masses, and some opposition was even registered in the press and radio 3 . What is more, some Jewish firms seem to have substantially benefited from the Nazi take over and the restoration of something resembling economic normalcy. Jewish clothing and textile manufacturers were given contracts for supplying the armed services, and at the beginning of 1938 there were nearly 40,000 Jewish-owned firms still doing business in Germany, some with important functions in the rearmament and import trade 4 . A social historian of the Third Reich summed up: 'Despite boycotts many Jewish shopkeepers managed to stay in business until 1938, a year in which some of them were actually beginning to experience boom conditions' 5 . That same year, however, dubbed by Hitler "The Year of Understanding", witnessed a gruelling series of persecutions. From imposed changes of name to the brutal evacuation of Polish Jews residing in Germany,** the persecution mounted in intensity, reaching its peak in the pogrom of the 10th/11th November, the Kristallnacht . Evidently, until the end of 1938, National Socialism had no fixed plans for the Jews 6 . Lacking authoritative direction, the Jewish Question became from the very beginning a popular subject to engage the attention of ambitious Party members. Those Nazis spoiling to widen their influence could point with contempt to the failure of the radicals in carrying through the boycott. At the same time, Hitler's control over Jewish policy would not make itself felt again until after the Kristallnacht 7 , and into this void stepped a less extreme faction - advocates of "dissimulation," i.e., the legal confinement of Jews to their own sphere, backed by such government ministers as Hjalmar Schacht and Count Schwerin von Krosigk, Hitler's Finance Minister; the Nuremberg Laws of September 1935 seemed to bear out the moderate position, even to the significant neglecting to mention economic apartheid. But the period in which a centrally directed Jewish policy was absent came to an end in 1938 when the radicals again seized the initiative. Moderates like Schacht, War Minister von Blomberg and Commander-in-Chief von Fritsch were driven from office, as the regime could confidently boast of a string of victories, not the least of, which was an upsurge in the economy. Goebbels's failure to exploit the November pogrom resulted in a dimming of his image in the Nazi hierarchy, and thus it was into the hands of Goering that were gathered the reins of a sharper, that is, more clearly, more pointedly, co-ordinated Jewish policy 8 . The ambiguous position of German Jewry in the years 1933-1938 was not solely the result of the improvised nature of Nazi Jewish policy. Far more unbalancing was the illusion fostered by this policy that the nation's Jews might be allowed to fill their own place, with a specific autonomy, within the overall German national context. It is impossible to say whether National Socialist leaders ever seriously entertained such plans, but the fact remains that in the period 1933-1938 they did little to demolish the hopes many Jews had placed in its eventuality. Bolstering Jewish optimism were a number of factors tending to underline this belief. For instance, Jews experienced little or no interference with their school system. Besides being responsible for teaching the curriculum in force in German schools, they were allowed to complement the standard courses with their own material; private Jewish schools even continued to receive state subsidies until March 1939 9 . Officially there were no efforts made to prevent Jews from synchronising their occupational patterns with those prevailing in the non-Jewish community 10 . Jews were not hindered in the practice of their religion, nor in the functions of their institutions: when in September 1933 they established the Reichsvertretung der deutschen Juden to represent their interests with the Nazi authorities the procedure involved a simple act of registration with the Ministry of the Interior 11 . Similarly, Jewish cultural work was not only left unmolested but actually received encouragement from the Nazi bureaucracy. On l6th June 1933, the Prussian Ministry of Science, Art and Popular Enlightenment approved the formation of the Kulturbund deutscher Juden - 'because the members of the Jewish race', declared the Ministry's Cultural Adviser Hans Hinkel, 'being foreigners, deserve every opportunity for creative expression' 12 . Two years later, as the arbiter of Jewish cultural affairs in Goebbels's Propaganda Ministry, Hinkel supervised the coordination of Jewish cultural activities in one roof organisation empowered to negotiate Jewish cultural matters, the Reichsverband der juedischen Kulturbuende 13 . The argument for autonomy was two-way. On the Jewish side, it found a skilled dialectician in Robert Weltsch, the editor of the Zionist newspaper, the Juedische Rundschau . Jews no less than Germans, argued Weltsch before the relevant authorities at the Propaganda Ministry, should have the opportunity to express theibeing, an end which could best be served, he suggested, by leaving the Jewish press, the press by and for Jews, relatively undisturbed 14 Whatever his Nazi audience may have thought of Weltsch's line of reasoning, it is certain that during the first five years of Nazi rule Jewish journalism by and large continued to function independently 15 . Which is not to say that it was altogether free from government interference. On the contrary, there was "constant supervision" and Nachzensur - "after-censorship" rather than outright censorship. The editors of the community's publications could never be sure of the ground under their feet. They not only had to select their subject matter with the utmost circumspection, if the message was to clear Nazi check-points it had to be couched in a special language, "the secret language of the persecuted". But as language of this sort, designed to keep the authorities at bay, leaves the field wide open to misinterpretation, the reader, especially today's reader, must approach it greatly forearmed with caution and understanding. The comparatively free hand left to Jews in the conduct of their own affairs also extended to the sphere of intramural politics. Never dormant in the community, politics in the pre-1933 era had steadily been pushing inward from its position at the perimeter of Jewish life towards its centre, particularly in Berlin where political conflict was more pronounced than elsewhere in the Reich 16 . Still, the substance of politics conspired to keep political strife within reasonable bounds. Rarely were Jewish politicians required to break new ground. Politics was an affair of the rich and well-to-do, of those with academic degrees and business pedigrees. As it no longer was "politics as usual" in post-1933 Germany, so it no longer was "politics as usual" in the Jewish community. The problems and issues facing German Jewry in the pre-Hitler era - concerning Jewish schools, vocational training, religion and welfare - burst their conventional mould during the Nazi ascendancy, and resolute leadership to deal with far more serious problems was urgently required. But this question of who should direct and control Jewish life, and by what authority and principles, plunged the community into recurrent political strife - a bitter contest that did not disappear until the community itself had disappeared. The struggle for supremacy in the Jewish community was between two forces: on one side were the advocates of the "German-Jewish way", bent on maintaining the status quo, while on the other were the growing ranks of the Zionist faithful, ideologically committed to a national, i.e. "racial", conception of Jewry and to the creation of a Jewish homeland in the Middle East. In 1933 the Centralverein deutscher (CV) Staatsbuerger juedischen Glaubens , German Jewry's largest organisation, carried the standard of the "German-Jewish way", and the Zionitsische Vereinigung fuer Deutschland (ZVfD), the "general" Zionist organisation, that of the "national" Jews 17 . The former had its uneasy allies in the liberals (liberals both in the Jewish religious sense and in their German political attitudes) of the community administrations, who were everywhere in power; and the latter had its own similarly queasy supporters in these same ruling bodies, though everywhere in the minority. Competition between Zionists and "assimilationists" 18 , Zionism's epithet for Centralverein (CV) followers, harked back to pre-Hitler days, when the Centralverein had easily maintained a dominant position. But with Hitler's victory conditions changed, and in the subsequent German-Jewish political history Zionism claimed for itself an ever greater share of power, basing its demand on the reputed failure of the pre-1933 liberal leaders to prepare Jews for the coming of Nazism. The day after Hitler's appointment the ZVfD's newspaper, Juedische Rundschau , wrote that the struggle for Jewish rights could only be waged by those whose commitment to Jewish Volkstum had always been beyond reproach, to wit, the Zionists 19 . The members of the ruling clique, Zionists asserted, did not even pretend to be devoted to Judaism: money and the claim of being "better Germans" had lifted them to political office 20 . Blinded by their liberal shibboleths, misunderstanding Jewish destiny, they had washed their hands of the Jewish Question. Hopelessly set in their ways, hidebound in their beliefs, they had ridiculed the creative force of nationalism, interfered with the construction of Palestine 21 , and dragged their feet on the problems of Jewish schools and occupational retraining. In short, the Zionist indictment concluded, these leaders were the "ewig Gestrigen" 22 , perennially behind the times, incorrigible purveyors of the old "apologetic-assimilationist dialectic" 23 . Zionists made up for years of being slighted; for the paltry allocations to their schools and Hechaluz 24 , the Zionist instrument which prepared young Jews for a life of labour in Palestine, and for the anti-Zionist resolutions in the Centralverein , (CV) (the last one as late as 1928). Its ranks swollen with the so-called "March Zionists" (meaning those Jews who had hurriedly crossed over to Zionism in the wake of Hitler's election victory in early March), the ZVfD now aspired to complete mastery of the Jewish community. By mid-1935, encouraged by the pro-Zionist bent of Nazi Jewish policy 25 , the ZVfD considered itself the legitimate spokesman for all German Jewry. At its convention held in Berlin during the first week of May it unanimously adopted a resolution which boldly proclaimed: 'The Zionist movement in Germany demands the right to influence decisively the entire Jewish life in Germany' 26 . It would not be Zionism's final bid for power. But the Centralverein , as the dominant political power in the community, not only faced attack from "national" Jews; it also had to contend with "national" German Jews, with assailants to its right. On 30th May 1933 Jewish Berliners' were privy to a strange sight. On large advertising pillars usually cluttered with Nazi propaganda, the membership of the Centralverein was branded for conspiring with the ZVfD to lead German Jewry back to the ghetto 27 . The posters, urging "Join us!", had been put up by the Verband nationaldeutscher Juden , a small band of extreme Jewish German nationalists led by Max Naumann. A Berlin lawyer and a recipient of the Iron Cross First and Second Class, Naumann was wont to indict those Jews whose "Germanness", as he put it, did not 'fill their entire being' 28 . Characteristically, in 1933 his Verband launched the Aktionsausschuss der juedischen Deutschen to defend Germany against "atrocity propaganda" from abroad. The Committee, promoting a resurgent and aggressive national Germany 29 , was joined by three other groups whose perfervid nationalism ranked second to none: the Reichsbund Juedischer Frontsoldaten (R.j.F.), the Deutscher Vortrupp , Gefolgschaft deutscher Juden , and the youth formation Schwarzes Faehnlein 30 . The life of the Aktionsausschuss was unusually short. Two months after its inception in April 1933, a leadership quarrel led to a parting of the ways between the Verband and the numerically far superior Reichsbund . The other groups quickly followed suit, leaving the Naumann association to fend for itself until the end of 1935 when the Gestapo suppressed both the Verband and the Vortrupp . But for Nazi antisemitism, many of the followers of the Verband nationaldeutscher Juden and perhaps all of those in the Deutscher Vortrupp would have made inspired National Socialists. Certainly much less extreme but likewise committed to rescuing Jews from the Scylla of the Centralverein and the Charybdis of the ZVfD was the short-lived Erneuerungsbewegung der juedischen Deutschen . Led by Bruno Woyda, an official of the Berlin Executive and former editor of the Juedisch-Liberale Zeitung , Woyda made use of that paper's 13th November 1933 issue to publicise his movement's program. Appealing for an end to inaction and indecision, the Renewal Movement urged the re-awakening of German-Jewish conscio, which it identified as a cross between the soldierly virtues of the Jewish front-fighter - simplicity and comradeship - and the honesty and spontaneity of the Youth Movement. In closing, the Renewal Movement exhorted all Jews sincere in their devotion to Germany to unite behind a "German-feeling leadership" 31 . The Erneuerungsbewegung found little support among Jews. The Jewish press blamed it for contributing to that very divisiveness its existence was meant to cure 32 , and though the movement continued to exist until 1935, little more was heard of it after December 1933 References: *I want to thank Dr. Arnold Paucker for his helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article; also Alicia K. Wicks for her generous assistance. 1.) G. Warburg, Six Years of Hitler. The Jews under the Nazi Regime , London 1939, p. 59. 2.) S. Adler-Rudel, Juedische Selbsthilfe unter dem Naziregime 1933¯1939 im Spiegel der Berichte der Reichsvertretung der Juden in Deutschland , Tuebingen 1974 (Schriftenreihe wissenschaftlicher Abhandlungen des Leo Baeck Instituts 29), pp. 28, 30. *For foreign reaction ( viz the USA) see the following essay by Deborah E. Lipstadt, The American Press and the Persecution of German Jewry', in this volume of the Year Book¯(Ed.). LBI Year Book XXIX (1984). 3.) See Herbert Freeden, Vom geistigen Widerstand der deutschen Juden. Ein Kapitel juedischer Selbstbehauptung in den Jahren 1933/1938 , Jerusalem 1963, pp. 5¯6. For the economics of the boycott, see Helmut Genschel, Die Verdraengung der Juden aus der Wirtschaft im Dritten Reich , Goettingen 1966, pp. 59, 64, 73¯80. Genschel points out, for example, that Jewish-owned department stores, the butt of so much propaganda, continued doing business; the giant Hermann Tietz concern in June 1933 even received a subsidy of 14.5 million RM. Genschel also noted that many card-carrying Nazis openly flouted Party directives against shopping in "Jewish" department stores. Ibid. , p. 123. 4.) Lucy S. Dawidowicz, The War against the Jews 1933¯1945 , New York 1975, pp. 82, 96. Citing figures furnished by the Frankfurter Zeitung , the newspaper of the Zionistische Vereinigung fuer Deutschland reported at the end of 1935 that ladies' apparel was still about 50% in Jewish hands¯in Berlin, roughly 80%¯while the Jewish share of the capital's market in men's clothing had dropped only about 10% from the pre-Hitler days, from 70% to 60%. 5.) Richard Grunberger, The 12-Year Reich. A Social History of Nazi Germany , New York-Chicago-San Francisco 1971, p. 457. **See the contribution by Sybil Milton, The Expulsion of Polish Jews from Germany: October 1938 to July 1939', in this section of the current volume of the Year Book ¯ (Ed.). LBI Year Book XXIX (1984). 6.) For Nazi Jewish policy, see Karl A. Schleunes, The Twisted Road to Auschwitz. Nazi Policy Towards German Jews 1933¯1939 , London 1970.Uwe Dietrich Adam, Judenpolitik im Dritten Reich , Duesseldorf 1972. 7.) Schleunes, op. cit. , p. 216. 8.) Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of the European Jews , Chicago 1961, p. 23. See also, Ernst Marcus, The German Foreign Office and the Palestine Question in the Period 1933¯1939', Yad Vashem Studies on the European Jewish Catastrophe and Resistance , II (1958) p. 194; and Schleunes: "In the final analysis, the Kristallnacht was the product of the lack of co-ordination which marked Nazi planning on Jewish policy and the result of a last-ditch effort by the radicals to wrest over this policy." Op. cit. , p. 236. 9.) E. C. Helmreich, Jewish Education in the Third Reich', in Journal of Central European Affairs , XV (July 1955), No. 2, pp. 141, 144. For Jewish schools under Hitler, see also Hans Gaertner, Problems of Jewish Schools in Germany during the Hitler Regime (With Special Reference to the Theodor Herzl Schule in Berlin)', in LBI Year Book I (1956) pp. 123¯141. 10.) Though there was no official interference with Jewish efforts at occupational retraining, practical obstacles abounded. German employers, for example, were reluctant to hire Jewish apprentices or labourers, and since Jews could not purchase land, agricultural training was restricted to tiny holdings still in Jewish hands. Hence young Jews often had to go abroad for their agricultural training. 11.) Kurt Jakob Ball-Kaduri, Das Leben der Juden in Deutschland im Jahre 1933 , Frankfurt a. Main 1963, p. 41. There seems to be unanimous agreement that a great deal of real autonomy existed. Interview with Max Gruenewald, 14th October 1974, New York; interview with Herbert A. Strauss, 14th October 1974, New York; see also, K. Y. Ball-Kaduri, Evidence, its Value and Limitations', in Yad Vashem Studies on the European Jewish Catastrophe and Resistance , III (1959), p. 87. 12.) Quoted in Juedische Rundschau , XXXVIII (29th September 1933). 13.) See C.V Zeitung , XIV (9th May 1935). Juedische Rundschau , XXXX (20th August 1935). The Israelitisches Familienblatt , citing figures supplied by Hinkel, asserted that the Kulturbund had 110,000 members and 600 artists. Herbert Freeden noted that Hinkel was not unknown to intercede with the authorities on behalf of his Jewish charges; in the course of time, however, his control became stricter and stricter. Juedisches Theater in Nazideutschland , Tuebingen 1964 (Schriftenreihe wissenschaftlicher Abhandlungen des Leo Baeck Instituts 12), p. 40. What was true of Jewish cultural life was true of "autonomy" in general: it was always under the watchful eye of Gestapo supervision. For example, the Gestapo gradually began to attend the meetings of the decision-making bodies in the community and to demand written reports. Interview with Adolf Leschnitzer, 15th October 1974, New York. The Gestapo, wrote Kurt Tuchler, knew everything that was happening in the community. Erlebnisse und Beobachtungen in den ersten vier Hitlerjahren , 1945, in Yad Vashem Archives, Jerusalem, p. 3. Thus the leaders of the Centralverein deutscher Staatsbuerger juedischen Glaubens decided to discontinue their official meetings because no real work could be done in the presence of the Gestapo; they would meet "unofficially" in a private home instead, usually the Chairman's. Ernst Herzfeld, Meine letzten Jahre in Deutschland, 1933¯1938 , 1945, in: Yad Vashem Archives, Jerusalem, p. 2. 14.) Robert Weltsch , An der Wende des Modernen . Betrachtungenaus fuenf Jahrzehnten , Tuebingen 1972, Veroeffentlichung des Leo Baeck Instituts, p. 48. 15.) "In their relationship to Jewish papers the Nazi authorities were incalculable, and the real motives for their comparatively liberal attitude have not yet been discovered." Robert Weltsch, A Goebbels Speech and a Goebbels Letter', in LBI Year Book X (1965), p. 285. For the Jewish press under Nazism, see Margaret T. Edelheim-Muehsam, The Jewish Press in Germany', in LBI Year Book I (1956), pp. 163¯175 and, by the same author, Reactions of the Jewish Press to the Nazi Challenge', in LBI Year Book V (1960), pp. 309¯329. 16.) See Ernst Herzfeld, Meine letzten Jahre in Deutschland, op. cit. , p. 12. See also, Kurt Loewenstein, Die innerjuedische Reaktion auf die Krise der deutschen Demokratie', in Entscheidungsjahr 1932. Zur Judenfrage in der Endphase der Weimarer Republik , zweite revidierte und erweiterte Auflage. Ein Sammelband herausgegeben von Werner E. Mosse unter Mitwirkung von Arnold Paucker, Tuebingen 1966 (Schriftenreihe wissenschaftlicher Abhandlungen des Leo Baeck 13), pp. 400¯401. This article focuses on Berlin. 17.) "General" Zionists as opposed to the small group known as Staatszionisten in Germany and as Revisionists elsewhere. Revisionism, created in 1925 by Vladimir Jabotinsky, stood to the right of the general Zionism of the ZVfD, which supported Weizmann's policy of co-operation with England. Revisionism, on the other hand, believed in the use of violence to bring about a Jewish Palestine and was virulently anti-British. The leader of the Staatszionisten was Georg Kareski. 18.) Concerning the Jewish press in Germany from 1918 to 1938, Herbert A. Strauss wrote: "Its editorials and news columns reflected the major issues of each period, understanding them in the light of the two options availablto German Jewry in those fateful years, the Zionist and (what we may call for want of a better term) the German-Jewish mainstream' to which the derogatory term assimilationist' would apply only from the point of view of their opponents, not in their own eyes..." The Jewish Press in Germany, 1918¯1938 (1943)', p. 16. Dr. Straus kindly provided me with a rough English translation of this article, which appeared in Hebrew as Haitonuth hayehudit beGermania bishnim 1918¯1939 (1943)', in Itonut Yehudit shehayta , Yehuda Gothelf, ed., Tel-Aviv 1973. 19.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXVIII (31st January 1933). 20.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXVIII (16th June 1933); XXXX (12th February 1935). 21.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXVIII (29th March 1933). 22.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXVIII (21st July 1933); XXXX (12th March 1935). 23.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXVIII (25th July 1933). 24.) For example, in 1932 the liberals in the Berlin Assembly devoted only 2,000 RM for the Hechaluz . Juedische Rundschau , XXXXI (10th October 1936). To save money, in the early thirties these same liberals wanted to dismantle the Jewish elementary schools, which were a "thorn in their side". See Selma Schiratzky, Die Schule Rykestrasse' in Berlin, eine juedische Volksschule in der Hitlerzeit , 1956, in: Yad Vashem Archives, Jerusalem, p. 2. 25.) See below, pp. 19¯20 and notes 85 and 89. 26.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXX (7th May 1935). 27.) See C.V Zeitung , XII (1st June 1933). 28.) Max Naumann, Vom mosaischen und nicht mosaischen Juden , Berlin, 1921, p. 28. 29.) See Juedische Rundschau , XXXVIII (7th April 1933); Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXV (6th April 1933). The full title of the Aktionsausschuss was: Aktionsausschuss der juedischen Deutschen gegen die anti-deutsche Hetze. 30.) According to Hans Joachim Schoeps, founder of the Deutscher Vortrupp , his organisation had about three hundred members. "Bereit fuer Deutschland!" Der Patriotismus deutscher Juden und der Nationalsozialismus. Fruehe Schriften 1930 bis 1939. Eine historische Dokumentation , Berlin 1970, p. 27. "Bereit fuer Deutschland!" was the Vortrupp's official slogan¯ "Was auch geschehe: Bereit fuer Deutschland!" Der Deutsche Vortrupp. Blaetter einer Gefolgschaft Deutscher Juden , No. 1 (October 1933), p. 2. In 1934 the Schwarzes Faehnlein had approximately 1,000 members. George L. Mosse, Germans and Jews. The Right, the Left, and the Search for a Third Force' in Pre-Nazi Germany , New York 1970, p. 104. For a study on the Vortrupp , see Carl J. Rheins, Deutscher Vortrupp, Gefolgschaft deutscher Juden 1933¯1935', in LBI Year Book XXVI (1981), pp. 207¯229. On the Verband nationaldeutscher Juden , see, by the same author, The Verband nationaldeutscher Juden 1921¯1933', in LBI Year Book XXV (1980), pp. 243¯268, and on the Schwarzes Faehnlein , also by Rheins, see The Schwarzes Faehnlein, Jungenschaft, 1932¯1934', in LBI Year Book XXIII (1978), pp. 173¯197. The history of the Reichsbund juedischer Frontsoldaten has been admirably traced by Ulrich Dunker, Der Reichsbund juedischer Frontsoldaten 1919¯1938. Geschichte eines juedischen Abwehrvereins , Duesseldorf 1977. 31.) I am indebted to Dr. Klaus Hermann of Sir George Williams University for making the programme of the Erneuerungsbewegung available to me. 32.) See Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXV (30th November 1933); C.V Zeitung , XII (16th November 1933); Juedische Rundschau , XXXVIII (28th November 1933). Part B One of the signatures on the Renewal Movement's proclamation belonged to Ludwig Freund, the Executive Director of the R.j.F. By far the largest of all conservative groups, the Jewish veterans association also vied for the contested right of representing Germany's Jews. With 30,000 members in sixteen provincial branches, plus 14,000 young people in affiliated youth and sports groups 33 , the R.j.F. considered itself eminently qualified to fill this role. Citing a proven record of sacrifice - 12,000 war dead, according to its own figures - the R.j.F. prided itself both of initiating young Jews into the time-tested ethos of the German soldier and on its pioneering efforts in the areas of physical fitness and occupational retraining 34 . The R.j.F. could point to some modest victories in the struggle for Jewish rights. Because of the immunity of Jewish war veterans from the liabilities of the April 1933 non-Aryan legislation, the R.j.F. leader Leo Loewenstein credited his organisation with having kept thousands of Jews in their jobs. Loewenstein also drew attention to the decree promulgated by the Reich Minister of Labour in August 1933, which entrusted the Reichsbund with the representation of all non-Aryan war casualties vis-a-vis the authorities 35 . It was the Nazi rise to power that allowed the R.j.F. to abandon its former neutrality in Jewish affairs 36 , and the change in the organisation's policy was expressed by Ludwig Freund in his remarks on the future of German Jewry: 'A leader in this struggle [the struggle for equal rights] now can only be that individual who, analogous to the new political type in Germany, is capable of standing up for his convictions with his entire being and life.' 37 Perceiving itself as the chosen instrument to effect this "new political type", the R.j.F. aspired to taking the Jewish community in hand. To begin with, it introduced the Fuehrerprinzip in its own ranks. At the same time it embarked on a vigorous correspondence with the agencies and leaders of the New Order, omitting neither von Hindenburg nor Hitler. Unsolicited, it petitioned, among other things, for Jewish service in the Wehrmacht , the enrolment of all Jewish youths into one organisation and their military training under R.j.F. auspices. It further proposed that the community's current political formations be liquidated and replaced by a central organisation of "absolute loyalty" to the regime, structured along authoritarian lines 38 . Evidently Zionists did not measure up to the "absolute loyalty" standard, for they were told they were no longer welcome in the R.j.F 39 . This rule, which in effect predated 1933 but until then had not been rigidly enforced, cast Zionism as the principal Jewish villain in the German-Jewish drama. Zionism not only was considered "un-German" and therefore an obstacle to the peaceable and honourable understanding between Germans and Jews; worse, Zionism had made light of the R.j.F. figures of Jewish war fatalities, putting their faith instead in those supplied by antisemitic sources 40 . The R.J.F. vied for the leadership of German Jewry as late as February 1936. Its bid came in response to a similar challenge mounted by the Zionists 41 . But by then it had virtually exhausted its store of available sympathy, and its attempt at leadership collapsed. The R.j.F.'s long record of service to the nation and its endless protestations of "absolute faith" in Germany no longer passed current with the authorities. In respect to its brethren, the R.j.F.'s material basis for its claim to leadership had been removed with the "surrender" at Nuremberg in September 1935 of the thousands of Jews it once boasted of having kept in their jobs. The political battle for community control swept across the entire plain of Jewish organisational and institutional life. Nowhere, however, was it more bitterly contested than within, and between, the two principal rivals for power, the Reichsvertretung der deutschen Juden (after the Nuremberg Laws: the Reichsvertretung der Juden in Deutschland and the Juedische Gemeinde zu Berlin . The Reichsvertretung der deutschen Juden was the self-appointed political representative of Germany's Jews vis-a-vis Nazi authorities 42 , though the latter never officially recognised it as such. It was the creation of roughly two dozen prominent German Jews 43 , and an instrument of the three major organisations of German Jewry, the Centralverein , the R.j.F., and the ZVfD. No popular elections preceded its formation and the traditional centres of active Jewish life, the Jewish communities, received only token representation in it. Yet, at its constituent meeting, held in Berlin on l7th September 1933, all major Jewish organisations and institutions, including the communities, were won over to its support. Rabbi Leo Baeck, its newly installed president, terminated the conference with a most fervent appeal to German Jews to close ranks in the face of an assault unmatched for its ferocity in Western Jewry's recent past 44 . Harmony and solidarity - the qualities apostrophised by Baeck in his closing address - proved in short supply during the entire life span of the Reichsvertretung . The R.j.F. opposed co-operation with the ZVfD, which it considered to be less than one hundred percent loyal to Germany 45 ; Zionists, in turn, feared being swamped by anti-Zionist forces 46 . To be sure, the Essen triumvirate credited with initiating the Reichsvertretung - Rabbi Hugo Hahn, the banker Georg Hirschland, and the lawyer Ernst Herzfeld - were staunch supporters of the Centralverein ; indeed, Herzfeld served as its last Director. But these three belonged to the Jewish Agency wing of the Centralverein ; that is to say, they supported the construction of Palestine without, however, sharing the racial conception of Jewry of their Zionist associates in the Agency. In fact, the creation of the Jewish Agency in Germany owed much to the trail-blazing efforts of the two men who filled the top posts in the Reichsvertretung Leo Baeck and Otto Hirsch, respectively its President and Executive Director. Leo Baeck even assumed the presidency of the Keren Hayessod , the principal funding agency for the construction of Palestine. It would be wrong, however, to equate the pro-Palestine sympathies thus manifested with pro-Zionism per se 47 . Among the Centralverein leaders the proposition that the goals of Zionism had little or no bearing on the problems or needs of German Jewry qualified as dogma. The Jews they meant to benefit with their support for the "up-building" of Palestine in pre-Hitler Germany lived to the east of them, the so-called Ostjuden . The attitude that Palestine was not quite the place for a German Jew died hard, even after 1933 48 . The ZVfD nevertheless decided to join the Reichsvertretung , evidently in the hope of furthering its own ambitious plans. However, these expectations soon collided with the solidly resisting force of anti-Zionist sentiment within the Reichsvertretung . As a result, the ZVfD was compelled to settle for co-equal status with non-Zionists, the principle of power-sharing adopted by the Reichsvertretung in August 1936; based on the practice of the "expanded" Jewish Agency, this agreement allocated half of all seats to Zionists and the other half to non-Zionists. By that time, however, the mathematics of shared power was of little consequence, the rout of non-Zionists in the Reichsvertretung being virtually complete 49 . The Zionists, far from seeking the destruction of the Reichsvertretung , were determined simply to recast what was essentially an instrument of the Centralverein in their own image. In their aim they were rather less drastic than the Juedische Gemeinde zu Berlin , which sought the outright destruction of the Reichsvertretung . Jewish Berlin occupied a position within German Jewry analogous to that of Berlin to the Reich as a whole. With one-third of all Jews and another third in t Preussischer Landesverband juedischer Gemeinden , which it dominated, Berlin towered over all the other Jewish communities in Germany. Jews in the German capital contributed the most taxes; they had the biggest budget and the most extensive administrative apparatus. Not surprisingly, Berlin considered itself the most logical candidate for the contested throne of German Jewry. A strong-willed leader was prepared to press the city's claim. He was Heinrich Stahl, formerly a leading figure in the insurance business. Stahl took charge of the city's Jewish community in June 1933 at the age of sixty-five. Prominent in Reichsvertretung affairs, he was invited to Essen, the industrial hub of the Ruhr, to participate in the important final deliberations centring on its actual structure. There Stahl learned to his chagrin that while Berlin was expected to foot a substantial part of the bill for the new creation, it was assigned only a modest participatory role. Realizsng that such negligence was a deliberate attempt to bypass the communities, above all that of Berlin, Stahl gave vent to his pique at the afternoon session, held at the banker Georg Hirschland's villa in Werden an der Ruhr. Upon learning that Leo Baeck and Otto Hirsch were the leading candidates being considered for the top posts in the Reichsvertretung , he took Rabbi Hahn aside and told him: 'Baeck, whom we honour and esteem as a man of great learning, does not have our confidence in political matters, and Otto Hirsch', he added, alluding to the latter's Swabian dialect, 'does not enter the picture because to us Berliners' he speaks a foreign language' 50 Though Stahl's objection to Baeck might have had no other than personal grounds 51 , the real reason for his opposition was of course directly related to the failure to provide Berlin with a substantial role in the Reichsvertretung , one commensurate with its overall standing in the Jewish community. But, by the same token, the original backers of the Reichsvertretung voiced the suspicion that Berlin lacked the foresight and political know-how to steer German Jewry through an uncharted future 52 . Thus they forced Berlin to accept the pre-arranged distribution of power and, without recourse, Stahl grumblingly accepted the promise that he would be given an important post in the Reichsvertretung and that Berlin was to become its permanent seat 53 . While agreeing to these minor concessions, Berlin remained dissatisfied. At a community evening shortly before the founding session of the Reichsvertretung , three thousand Jewish Berliners' heard Bruno Woyda and Moritz Rosenthal, the "enfant terrible" of the liberals, expound all the familiar reasons why Berlin rather than the Reichsvertretung should be first among German Jewry 54 . At the constituent meeting itself, the delegates of the communities, pleased no more than Berlin by the stratagems in Essen, banded together to demand the transfer of all authority to the communities and Berlin. Several influential participants quickly interceded on behalf of the Reichsvertretung , narrowly averting its stillbirth 55 . Two months later, pushing for Berlin 56 , the Erneuerungsbewegung renewed the campaign; again to no avail. With that, the ascendancy of the Reichsvertretung seemed secure. Yet three and a half years later it faced the boldest challenge ever to its authority. This challenge originated with Georg Kareski, the founder and leader of the Staatszionisten (Revisionists). Kareski had a well-deserved reputation as a provocative and disruptive, not to say subversive, influence both in the Berlin Jewish community and the world of German Zionism. A member of the Berlin Executive, which he served as financial director, he had looked on in undisguised disapproval as Stahl, bowing to pressure, endorsed the formation of the Reichsvertretung with Berlin in a subordinate position. A year later, he was scheming to take over the ZVfD-administered Palaestina-Amt , the agency of World Zionism charged with allocating Palestine immigration certificates in Germany. Rebuffed, he struck again in late 1935, mounting a drive, with Gestapo backing, for the leadership of the Reichsverband der juedischen Kulturbuende , and again failing. Undaunted, he resumed the offensive early in 1937, taking aim at the Reichsvertretung itself 57 . That winter Kareski, supported by Stahl and the Preussischer Landesverband , accused the Reichsvertretung of fiscal irresponsibility and of lacking the necessary authority to speak for the community at large 58 . After months of back-and-forth squabbling, the situation came to a head on 15th June, at one of those infrequent sessions of the Reichsvertretung Council, the belated adjunct created in August 1936 to represent the previously slighted communities and provincial associations. A heated debate raged from 10.30 a.m. until 7.00 p.m., while the Gestapo, apprised of the meeting by Stahl four months in advance, quietly took notes 59 . Kareski charged the Reichsvertretung with having been illegitimately founded. Supported by Stahl, he criticised the financial practices of the Reichsvertretung , coupling a demand for a thoroughgoing investigation into those practices with administrative and organisational reforms designed to enhance the influence of the communities at the expense of the ideological formations. For itself Berlin desired a leading role in all the Reichsvertretung committees, and the Kareski-Stahl combination threatened Berlin's withdrawal from that body if it failed to meet these demands. Startled by this resounding condemnation, the majority of the Reichsvertretung Council quickly responded with a vote of confidence for its Presidium, and a committee was set up to deal with the Kareski allegations and the reform proposals 60 . Meanwhile, the Jewish Department of the Gestapo was quietly manoeuvring Leo Baeck to step down as President of the Reichsvertretung so as to make room for its own candidate-Georg Kareski. When Baeck refused to be intimidated by such a move, the Gestapo, with Kareski present, then insisted on the resignation of the entire Presidium, the top decision-making body of the Reichsvertretung . Replying that German Jewry could not be led by "borrowed authority" 62 , Baeck once more resisted. The result of Baeck's stand was that two weeks later Stahl, swallowing his pride, meekly voiced his support for the Reichsvertretung , to the surprise of many Council members 63 . (Incidentally, the fiscal critic Georg Kareski himself was caught tampering with the funds of the Jewish People's Bank ( Iwriah ), resulting in its liquidation, Kareski's outing from the Berlin Executive and his subsequent departure from Germany. 64 ) Berlin's 1937 attempt to destroy the Reichsvertretung was an apt demonstration of political expediency in action. Only a lapse in moral commitment could explain the anomalous case of the liberal Heinrich Stahl who according to one source had spent 40,000 RM of his own money in the 1930 community elections to ensure the defeat of what he then called "Jewish Nazis", to wit, the Zionist opposition 65 , allying himself with the extremist on the right-wing of Zionism, Georg Kareski 66 . The explanation for Stahl's turnabout shows a less opportunistic cast when considered from the standpoint of the different directions within German Zionism. The overwhelming majority of the German Zionists were in the ZVfD, disciples of the so-called "Blumenfeld Method", also known by the shorthand of "Meinekestrasse", after the location of the organisation's Berlin headquarters. Palestine-centred, geared to educational work, progressive, in the mainstream of West European Zionism, the Blumenfeld orientation played down community politics. The reverse held for the majority position in the ZVfD represented by the Juedische Volkspartei . Confined to Berlin, the Juedische Volkspartei took an active part in community politics and none more so than its controversial founding-member, Georg Kareski 67 . References: 33.) Leo Loewenstein, Die Linie des Reichbundes juedischer Frontsoldaten', Wille und Weg des deutschen Judentums , Berlin 1935, pp. 7, 10. 34.) See Dunker, op. cit. , pp. 81¯104. 35.) Loewenstein, loc. cit. , p. 9. 36.) Ibid. , p. 10. 37.) Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXV (24th May 1933). 38.) See Dunker, op. cit. , pp. 132¯144. Conceding that Nazism often required Jews to act and speak in ways which concealed their actual motivations, the laborious efforts of the R.j.F. to curry favour with the authorities and to create a special niche for itself in the New Germany nevertheless seem to have been excessively suppliant. To what extent the R.j.F. leadership reflected the attitude of the rank and file is, of course, difficult to ascertain. Dunker does not address the question. Dr. Arnold Paucker in a letter to the author of this article, suggests that it did not. See also his review of Dunker's book, Jews for the Fatherland', in The Times Literary Supplement , 28th July 1978, p. 869. 39.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXIX (22nd June 1934). 40.) Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXVI (1st March 1934). In June 1934 the ZVfD in turn decided that it could not cooperate with the R.j.F. Describing the latter as an "anti-zionistische[r] Kampfbund", ZVfD members were no longer allowed to participate in the R.j.F. or in its sports groups. At the same time, ZVfD members were also prohibited from belonging to the Staatszionisten . See Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXVI (21st June 1934). 41.) Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXVIII (13th February 1936). A week later the Israelitisches Familienblatt called for the depoliticisation of the R.j.F. 42.) "Paramount, of course, was the task of representing the German Jews before the government of Reich, Laender and the Department chiefs." Max Gruenewald, The Beginning of the "Reichsvertretung"', in LBI Year Book I (1956), p. 61. 43.) See Hugo Hahn, Die Gruendung der Reichsvertretung', in Hans Tramer (ed.), In zwei Welten. Siegfried Moses zum fuenfundsiebzigsten Geburtstag , Tel-Aviv 1962, pp. 97¯105. See also Klaus Drobisch, Rudi Goguel, Werner Mueller (unter Mitwirkung von Horst Dohle), Juden unterm Hakenkreuz, Verfolgung und Ausrottung der deutschen Juden 1933¯1945 , Frankfurt a. Main 1973, p. 116. 44.) Hahn, loc. cit. , pp. 103¯104. Naumann's Verand and Separatist Orthodoxy remained aloof however, though the latter joined the Reichsvertretung on an informal basis in 1936. 45.) See Juedische Rundschau , XXXIX (16th February 1934); Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXVI (1st March 1934). 46.) Zionists had boycotted the preliminary talks centring on the founding of the Reichsvertretung . See Herzfeld, op. cit. , p. 15, and Hahn, loc. cit. , pp. 102, 103. 47.) The Juedische Rundschau , XXXXI (16th June 1936) observed that the warmer non-Zionists waxed toward Palestine, the cooler they acted towards the Zionist organisation. 48.) Thus the C.V Zeitung , XIV (13th October 1935) deplored the "politicisation" of Palestine and the inadequate attention being given to other possible emigration sites. See also, C.V Zeitung , XV (6th February 1936). 49.) The new programme of the Reichsvertretung , adopted after the promulgation of the Nuremberg Laws, included entry into the Keren Hayessod and a statement to the effect that the hope of Jewry now lay with Palestine. See C.V Zeitung , XIV (26th September 1935). 50.) Quoted in Hahn, loc. cit. , p. 102. Werner Cahnmann, a former Centralverein official, attributed considerable importance to these regional differences, pointing out that the leaders of the Centralverein came primarily from Berlin. Being Prussians, their German nationalism was usually somewhat more pronounced than that of, say, South Germans. Interview with Werner Cahnmann, 16th October 1974, New York. 51.) According to Hans Klee, whose father, Alfred Klee, was a prominent member of the Juedische Volkspartei on the Berlin Executive, Stahl was not on the best of terms with Baeck. Hans Klee, Georg Kareski und die Juedische Volkspartei , 1958, in: Yad Vashem Archives, Jerusalem, p. 7. 52.) Ibid. , p. 13. "In taking this line, the initiators of the Reichsvertretung' were also motivated by their desire to counter the claim of the leaders of the Berlin Kehillah [community], who considered themselves as the natural titleholders and demanded for themselves a leading share in the total representation of Jews in Germany". Max Gruenewald, The Beginning of the "Reichsvertretung"', loc. cit. , p. 58. Hans Klee expressed himself rather more strongly: "It was a downright conspiracy against the communities". Op. cit. , p. 5. 53.) Herzefeld, op. cit. , p. 13. Herfeld conceded that Berlin's claim that it had been forced into supporting the Reichsvertretung was not without foundation. Ibid. , p. 22. 54.) See Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXV (14th September 1933). The Israelitisches Familienblatt , a newspaper with no particular ideological affiliation, opposed Berlin's claim to leadership. 55.) See Franz Meyer (in K. Y. Ball-Kaduri), The National Representation of Jews in Germany¯Obstacles and Accomplishments at its Establishment', in Yad Vashem Studies on the European Jewish Catastrophe and Resistance , II (1958), p. 169. 56.) Moritz Rosenthal of the liberals admitted as much. See Juedische Rundschau , XXXVIII (1st December 1933). Though Berlin claimed it had nothing to do with the Erneuerungsbewegung , it provided it with a forum by placing a community evening at its disposal. See Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXV (23rd November 1933). 57.) Kareski's story has been well told by Herbert S. Levine, A Jewish Collaborator in Nazi Germany: The Strange Career of Georg Kareski, 1933¯37', in Central European History , Vol. XIII, No. 3, September 1975, pp. 251¯281. 58.) See Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXIX (21st January 1937); Levine, loc. cit. , p. 273. 59.) Herzfeld, op. cit. , p. 36. 60.) See Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXIX (17th June 1937); Juedische Rundschau , XXXXII (18th June 1937). 61.) See K. Y. Ball-Kaduri, Einige Bermerkungen zum Konflikt zwischen der Reichsvertretung und der Juedischen Gemeinde Berlin , 1944, in Yad Vashem Archives, Jerusalem, p. 1. 62.) Quoted in Gruenewald, The Beginning of the "Reichsvertretung"', loc. cit. , p. 63. 63.) Herzfeld, op. cit. , pp. 37¯38; see also Juedische Rundschau , XXXXII (9th July 1937). Even so, this was not the end of Berlin's power-seeking. In 1939, Stahl submitted a ten-page broadside to the Nazi overseers of Jewish affairs in which he denounced the Reichsvertretung as a hotbed of political intrigue and do-nothing organisation, requesting that its mandate be transferred to Berlin. Soon thereafter, turning a deaf ear to Berlin's entreaties, the authorities supervised the creation of the Reichsvereinigung der Juden in Deuschland , the ill-starred successor to the Reichsvertretung . K. J. Ball-Kaduri, Vor der Katastrophe. Juden in Deutschland 1934¯1939 , Tel-Aviv 1967, pp. 254¯256. In 1939, as in 1937, Berlin did have a case, though it went to extreme lengths to prove it. Through no fault of its own, the Reichsvertretung never performed the very function for which it had been primarily brought into being: the representation of Jews before the authorities. Additionally, the Reichsvertretung was hamstrung because it was to a large extent dependent upon the financial contributions from the communities and upon funds from abroad. For example, in 1937 the Reichsvertretung spent a total of 3.8 million RM, with a deficit of 250,000 RM. Of this money, 2.5 million RM had come from abroad. See Juedische Rundschau , XXXXIII (14th January 1938). That same year, the Berlin budget was 14 million RM. C.V Zeitung , XVI (30th December 1937). A sizeable chunk of the Reichsvertretung budget came from the provincial associations, with Berlin and Prussia contributing the most. The Reichsvertretung , lamented the Juedische Rundschau of 10th August 1934, has remained a "general staff without an army", at the mercy of the large communities and provincial associations. The Reichsvertretung's importance was its connection with the Zentralausschuss fuer Hilfe und Aufbau , the agency which dealt with such diverse programmes as emigration, vocational training, credit assistance, and Jewish schools. In April 1935, the Zentralausschuss was formally incorporated into the Reichsve . See Meyer, loc. cit. , p. 170; see also, G. Lubinsky, ibid. (see note 55), p. 173. 64.) According to Jakob Ball-Kaduri's brother, Fritz Ball, Kareski covered up deficits of the Iwriah Bank, of which he was the founder, by forcing a payment of 50,000 RM from the cashier of the Berlin Jewish community. Kareski apparently had a weakness for speculation; twice before he had been involved with banking institutions which had collapsed. K. Y. Ball-Kaduri, Einige Bemerkungen , p. 2. 65.) Benno Cohn, Soziologische Betrachtungen ueber die Fuehrung des deutschen Judentums vor und nach dem Jahre 1933 , 1944, in Yad Vashem Archives, Jerusalem, p. 2. 66.) Herbert S. Levine suggests a possible additional motive for the Stahl/Kareski axis: Stahl may well have availed himself of Kareski's "talent for fixing things with the police'". Apparently Stahl had "some difficulty with the Gestapo because of his support of Social Democratic anti-Nazi efforts in 1932". Levine, loc. cit. , pp. 264¯265. 67.) See Meyer, loc. cit. , p. 170; Kurt Tuchler, Erlebnisse und Beobachtungen in den ersten vier Hitlerjahren , 1945, in Yad Vashem Archives, Jerusalem, pp. 5¯6; Klee, op. cit. , p. 1. In November 1934, the Juedische Volkspartei changed its name to Juedischer Volksbund . We, however, shall continue to refer to it by its old name. Part C The two elements in the ZVfD did not mesh, and the presence of Kareski further complicated relations 68 . Kareski, for example, had an unseemly habit of collectively branding the ZVfD leadership as "the reds in Meinekestrasse", not infrequently within earshot of Herr Kuchmann, a familiar and durable Nazi prop at many Jewish gatherings of an official nature 69 . Kareski's removal from the mainstream organisation seemed only a matter of time; and it came in August 1933, in the aftermath of an "obscure incident" involving a militant attempt, which he apparently led, to occupy the Jewish welfare office in Berlin. Kareski's refusal to bow to the ZVfD demand that he quit the Berlin Executive was followed by his expulsion from the parent body. The role he had played in the affair at the welfare office, coupled with his espousal of Revisionism, not only deepened the rift between the Juedische Volkspartei and the ZVfD leadership, but also fomented a split within the ranks of the Juedische Volkspartei itself 70 : three of its fourteen members in the Berlin Assembly broke away to form an independent unit known as the Zionistische Fraktion . When two Fraktion members on the Berlin Executive quit that body in the course of 1933 in a show of revulsion against Kareski, his collaborators in the Juedische Volkspartei and Berlin's support of the Erneuerungsbewegung , the road was cleared for the Kareski-dominated Juedische Volkspartei in the Executive 71 . In the revision of the Executive that followed the introduction of representational parity in November 1935, reducing it from twelve to seven members 72 , all three Zionist positions went to the Juedische Volkspartei . A similar struggle took place inside the liberal camp, which was divided into two parts: the Centralverein , which fought discrimination, and the community liberals, who took aim at Zionism and Orthodoxy. However, with the emergence of a younger generation in the Centralverein sympathetic to Palestine, a chasm opened up between the Centralverein leadership and the community liberals. Thus in the last (Berlin) community elections before Hitler, a group of pro-Palestine "young liberals" had opposed "old liberals" like Stahl, Moritz Rosenthal and Wilhelm Kleemann, Stahl's predecessor as Chairman of the Executive. Diverging social backgrounds further breached the gap: academicians, serving with pay, generally held sway in the Centralverein, while well-to-do businessmen, serving without remuneration, dominated the community liberals 73 . The respective struggles within the liberal and Zionist camps produced the 1937 combinations Stahl-Kareski-Berlin versus Centralverein -ZVfD- Reichsvertretung . Precluded from participating in community politics by the Juedische Volkspartei , "Meinekestrasse" Zionists discovered that they had more in common with pro-Palestine Centralverein leaders in the Reichsvertretung than with their ideological brethren in the Berlin Executive. And, conversely, the circle of "Friends of Palestine" in the Centralverein was closer to the general Zionists in the Reichsvertretung than to the community liberals in Berlin 74 . (For these reasons, too, the R.J.F. after 1933 replaced the Centralverein as the political antipode to the ZVfD 75 .) Berlin left no stone unturned in its pursuit of power. But the ZVfD, too, claimed custody of the disputed body of German Jewry, and the two contestants, Berlin and Zionism, inevitably came to bitter blows. Bristling with invective, the Juedische Rundschau told its readers that an anti-Zionist dictatorship of liberals ran Berlin 76 . Berlin, Zionists claimed, was unresponsive to the needs of Jewish schools, particularly Zionist schools 77 , neglected occupational retraining, youth and cultural matters 78 . Of a total budget of 12,000,000 RM, only three to four percent went to "Zionist" departments ¯ i.e. museums, libraries, archives, the community's least important administrative branches 79 . Zionists complained that Berlin was opposed to anything that smacked of change; it put up barriers against Judification 80 , monopolised the community evenings and the newspaper 81 , and stubbornly resisted rejuvenation from the top down 82 . The introduction, however, of equal representation in the Berlin Executive in November 1935 and in the Reichsvertretung in August 1936, and the concurrent virtual elimination of Palestine as a haven for Jewish emigrants 83 , blunted the overall Zionist offensive. Even so, what not so long before had represented only a minor ideological current in the community now virtually ruled the mainstream. Once the despised stepchild of German Jewry, Zionists had lived to see their theories vindicated and their program appropriated piecemeal, even though they never left off bemoaning the dearth of Zionist spirit with which that program was enacted 84 . Two trump cards held by Zionism facilitated its rapid rise. One was Palestine; the other was the "most-favoured-nation treatment" accorded it by a Nazi officialdom appreciative of its unsparing efforts on behalf of Jewish emigration 85 . Of the 138,000 Jews who had left Germany by the summer of 1938, 38,000 had opted for Palestine, the majority with the indirect assistance of the Haavara (Transfer Agreement), the special arrangement worked out in August 1933 between Nazi Germany and the agencies of World Zionism. (The agreement permitted Jews who wished to leave Germany for Palestine to transfer their money in German goods, thus circumventing the prevailing restrictions on the export of capital; they were to be reimbursed in British pounds upon arrival in Palestine 86 .) The idea of a national home for Jews in the Middle East was bound to appeal to a certain type of Nazi-"idealists", scrupulous constructionists of National Socialist glosses on Volk and Raum , who were wont to identify with the national aspirations of the Jewish people 87 . Well aware of this particular current in Nazi thought, the ZVfD in the spring of 1933 commissioned Kurt Tuchler, a member of the Juedische Volkspartei on the Berlin Executive, to fire the imagination of such broad-minded Nazis for the Jewish enterprise in Palestine. Tuchler found an interested party in Baron Leopold Itz von Mildenstein, the Judenreferent in the S.S.; and later that spring the two men, accompanied by their wives, embarked on their Palestinian jaunt. Upon his return the Baron, who also dabbled in journalism, persuaded the editors of Der Angriff, Goebbels's newspaper, to devote a series of illustrated articles to this curious fact-finding journey. Having learned a little Hebrew, von Mildenstein also brought back with him a collection of records from Palestine; to Tuchler's astonishment, strains of familiar Hebrew folk songs greeted him on entering the Baron's office in 1934. To commemorate the voyage of a Nazi to Palestine, Der Angriff even had a medal struck showing the Swastika on one side and the Star of David on the other 88 . Bizarre as this example might seem, in essence it summarised some of the Alice-in-Wonderland quality of the Nazi-Zionist dialogue. It was a fact that in the opening years of the Hitler regime, the Nazi leaders favoured Zionists over non-Zionists 89 , and Zionists themselves proclaimed that of all Jewish groups, only they could approach the Nazis in good faith, as "honest partners" 90 . By making a distinction between race-minded, emigration-conscious Zionists and "assimilationists"-bent, as they said, on destroying National Socialism -powerful Nazis like Reinhard Heydrich, Chief of the Sicherheitsdienst , the intelligence arm of the SS, indirectly backed Zionist attempts to take control of the community. Heydrich echoed the official SS position that the activities of Zionists should be encouraged, those of non-Zionists discouraged. Consequently, Zionists were granted privileges denied to other groups. A police decree of March 1935, for example, instructed officers to be more tolerant of the doings of Zionist youth groups than ofthose non-Zionist ones. As, access to Nazi functionaries generally proved easier for Zionists than for others; and, forbidden to display the national colours, a special provision in the Nuremberg Laws permitted Jews to hoist their own banner, that is to say, the Zionist standard, the current flag of Israel 91 . Needless to say, German Zionism held no brief for National Socialism. If both agitated for a Jewish exodus from Germany, they did so for radically different reasons and purposes. It should hardly need repeating that Zionist principles differed from those of National Socialism as night differs from day. Zionism believed in the existence of different races, but not in the superiority of one race over another. Zionist nationalism, as elaborated by the ZVfD, harked back to an earlier period, the Mazzini-type conception of nationalism as a liberating force leading, ultimately, to the harmonious coexistence of all the world's peoples. And although Zionism, like National Socialism, repudiated individualism, rootlessness and decadence, unlike National Socialism it never lost sight of the individual human being independent of race. Nor did the sanctification of the soil as the mainspring of spiritual and national well-being, preclude Germany's Zionists from advocating the peaceful coexistence of Arab and Jew in a Palestinian bi-national state . Yet much of the idiom through which Zionism expressed its main ideas bore a striking, if superficial, resemblance to the voelkisch ideas of the day 92 . As much may be gathered from the following excerpt of a statement from a ZVfD position paper submitted to the Nazi authorities on 2lst June 1933: 'Zionism believes that a rebirth of a national life, as has occurred in German life through the adherence to Christian and national values, must also become a reality for the Jewish national entity. For Jews, too, racial origins ( Abstammung ), religion, community of fate and consciousness of their special racial nature ( Artbewusstsein ) must exercise the decisive influence on how they shape their life. This requires that they overcome the egoistic individualism of the Liberal Era through community spirit and a willingness to shoulder responsibility.' 93 Zionists were not unaware of the vexing parallelism between their own brand of voelkisch thought and that of National Socialism and went to great lengths to dissociate themselves spiritually from the latter. Nevertheless, at bottom it was this elemental consonance with currently popular voelkisch modes of thought 94 , in addition to the existence of Palestine as a potential haven, which enabled Zionists to gain the upper hand in the prolonged struggle for supremacy in the Jewish community. Even though the Jewish newspapers frequently reminded their readers that humanitarian values must take precedence over those contingent on race and might, such caveats were bound to ring a trifle hollow against a background pulsating with ideas that appeared to carry all before them. The seemingly endless victory parade of National Socialism suggested the hand of Providence, and the temptation for Jews to appropriate for their own use certain aspects of its style, thought, rhetoric, and behaviour was great and not always averted. Warning Jews against the dangers of "brown assimilation", the Executive Director of the Berlin Jewish community, Walter Breslauer, wrote in a 1934 C.V Zeitung leader: 'The National Socialist State excludes Jews from its culture... but it leaves them their freedom in the internal Jewish sphere and in no way expects that within this sphere Jews appropriate and duplicate its store of ideas of totality, leadership principle, the rejection of 'liberal' opinions. A 'brown assimilation' is thus in no way enjoined upon Jews; national Jewish and German-Jewish circles have equal cause to keep their distance from it, which unfortunately does not always happen on either side.' 95 Despite the considerable residual strength of Jewish liberalism - 'the majority of German Jews clung to the principles of liberalism with something like desperation' 96 - the enticements of contemporary ideas proved strong indeed. The proliferation of voelkisch ideas and influences was not entirely absent in the Jewish community, and ran the gamut from political rhetoric to the "one-pot" meals of the Jewish Winter Relief; from teach-ins on leadership to the penchant of Jewish youth formations for flags, emblems and bunting; from the downgrading of intellectual pursuits to the upgrading of physical labour 97 . Significantly, the attraction of the National Socialist "store of ideas" mentioned by Breslauer was particularly glaring in the Israelitisches Familienblatt , the newspaper that up until its final days considered itself the trustee of neutral Jewish opinion. The Familienblatt not only had kind words for Italian fascism 98 ; it also spoke highly of Gleichschaltung and Fuehrerprinzip , exhorting Jews to step up to the times by grafting these principles of modern state craft onto their own unruly body politic 99 . And its leading article of l0th August 1933 rued the fact that so little of the regenerative spirit currently abroad in the "new state" had filtered down to the Jewish community. (In all this, however, it would be well to bear in mind the special conditions, alluded to earlier, under which the Jewish press toiled). The chief casualty of the changing mood in the community was the Centralverein , the stubborn conscience of Jewish liberalism. Already on the defensive before 1933, Hitler's sweep to power dealt it a crushing blow. The "unflinching cultivation of German identity" and the sharp vigil it kept to safeguard the still tender shoots of emancipation, the very heart of the Centralverein programme, shrivelled under the heat of the supercharged illiberal climate of Nazi Germany. At last, concluded a study of the influence of voelkisch ideas on Germany Jewry, albeit too sweepingly, 'the C.V Zeitung found itself the sole spokesman for a liberalism which had been rejected by most Germans and Jews alike' 100 . The Centralverein , in picking over every bit of ideological terrain, yielded but grudgingly. It responded testily to Zionist claims that it had forfeited its right to lead German Jewry by accusing the ZVfD of Schadenfreude 101 . What German Jewry needed least of all, the C.V Zeitung cautioned in December 1933, was a "revolution" of its own 102 . Elsewhere, Jews were reminded that leaders were not made overnight 103 . Lastly, turning vice into virtue, the organisation blandly dismissed charges of ineptitude with the argument that sometimes it took more courage not to act than to act 104 . References: 68.) Meyer, loc. cit. , p. 171. Franz Meyer was a member of the Reichsvertretung and of the Executive of the ZVfD in Breslau. 69.) Levine, loc. cit. , pp. 259¯260. See also, Tuchler, op. cit. , p. 6, though Tuchler does not mention Kareski by name. 70.) The sources are somewhat confusing here. Benno Cohn puts the departure of the two Zionistische Fraktion members (Arthur Rau and Siefried Moses) in the summer of 1933. Op. cit. , p. 1. On the other hand, there is no mention of Siegfried Moses, the Chairman of the ZVfD, leaving the Berlin Executive until November 1933, the reason given being Berlin's support of the Erneuerungsbewegung . See Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXV (23rd November 1933). Nor was I able to find any references in the Jewish press to Rau's departure. The Israelitisches Familienblatt , being closer to the actual events, is more likely to be correct than Cohn. Steering a mid-course, in the text I have combined the reasons. 71.) See Juedische Rundschau , XXXX (12th November 1935). 72.) The original intent was to expand rather than decrease the Executive¯this, to reduce Kareski's influence. Kareski objected, and possibly alerted the Nazi authorities to the existence of a law of 1847 prohibiting such an expansion and, in fact, mandating its reduction. See Levine, loc. cit. , p. 265. Tuchler credits Stahl with bringing about a smooth transition, claiming that Stahl was a "real leader personality" whose achievements have been underrated. Op. cit. , pp. 2¯3. Benno Cohn, at the time the Executive Director of the ZVfD, agreed with this assessment. Op. cit. , p. 1. Not Joachim Prinz, however. Rabbi Prinz, a fervent advocate of emigration, repeatedly preached the need for Jews to leave Germany, which put him in opposition to the established leadership, including Stahl. Stahl happened to be present at one of those sermons, and when a day later Prinz visited him at his expensive undertaking, Prinz reports that Stahl "grew only angrier... He was a rich man, independent and highly respected, and he lived in a splendid villa not far from my house. As I entered the house I saw that his famous collection of Impressionists had been removed from the wall. I enquired about the paintings. He replied that he had sent them to his son in Belgium because they were no longer safe here. I looked at him with great amazement and said: Evidently to save the paintings is more important; to save Jews is not'. I never saw him again. It must be said to his honor that he was a victim of his own convictions. He died in Theresienstadt". Joachim Prinz, A Rabbi under the Hitler Regime', in Gegenwart im Rueckblick. Festgabe fuer die Juedische Gemeinde zu Berlin 25 Jahre nach dem Neubeginn , eds. H. A. Strauss and K. R. Grossman, Heidelberg 1970, pp. 237¯238. 73.) Cohn, op. cit. , pp. 1¯2. 74.) Ibid. , p. 2; Meyer, loc. cit. , p. 170. 75.) Ball-Kaduri, The National Representation', p. 176. 76.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXIV (2nd February 1934); XXXVIII (17th September 1933). 77.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXX (17th May 1935); XXXX (24th May 1935). 78.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXIX (1st May 1934). 79.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXIX (31st May 1934); XXX (14th May 1935). 80.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXIX (2nd February 1934). 81.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXIX (27th April 1934). 82.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXIX (24th April 1943). 83.) Stung by Arab rioting in the spring of 1936, the British launched the Peel Commission to study the Palestine problem. Its 500-page report, which came out in 1937, recommended the tripartition of Palestine into separate Arab and Jewish states, with the third part to remain in British hands. The Commission also recommended the imposition of severe restrictions on Jewish emigration to the area. Only 8,000 Jews, for example, were to be allowed to settle in Palestine during the period August 1937 to March 1938. See C.V Zeitung , XVI (8th July 1937). 84.) See Juedische Rundschau , XXXIX (4th May 1934); Tuchler, op. cit. , p. 3. Berlin claimed to have carried out the Zionist programme better than the Zionists themselves ever could have. See Juedische Rundschau , XXXIX (10th May 1934); XXXXI (10th October 1936). 85.) "Fest steht, dass sich waehrend der ersten Phasen der nationalsozialistischen Judenpolitik nicht selten eine Situation entwickelte, in welcher es den Nationalsozialisten angebracht erschien, eine pro-zionistische Haltung einzunehmen oder vorzugeben". Hans Lamm, UEber die innere und aeussere Entwicklung des deutschen Judentums im Dritten Reich , Ph. D. diss., Univ. of Erlangen 1951, p. 140. Similarly, Eliahu Ben Elissar writes: "Les seuls Juifs avec lesquels, en fin de comte, divers organismes du Troisieme Reich, et particulierement le ministere des Affaires etrangeres et celui de l'Economie, etabliront de veritables relations de travail, seront bel et bien les sionistes et les Juifs palestiniens". La Diplomatie du IIIe Reich et les Juifs , Paris 1969, p. 87. See also, Hannah Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil , rev. and enl. edn., New York 1970, pp. 59¯60. 86.) For the Haavara , see the three lengthy essays (by Werner Feilchenfeld, Dolf Michaelis, and Ludwig Pinner) in Haavara-Transfer nach Palaestina und Einwanderung deutscher Juden 1933¯1939 , Tuebingen 1972 (Schriftenreihe wissenschaftlicher Abhandlungen des Leo Baeck Instituts 26). The 38,000 figure is from Feilchenfeld, Die Durchfuehrung des Haavara-Transfers', pp. 37¯38. Herbert A. Strauss puts the five-year total (1933¯1938) at 43,200. Jewish Emigration from Germany. Nazi Policies and Jewish Responses (II)', in LBI Year Book XXV (1980), pp. 313¯361. For the diplomacy of the Haavara , see Ellisar, op. cit. , pp. 85¯95. 87.) See Arendt, op. cit. , pp. 41¯42. 88.) See Tuchler , op. cit. , pp. 2, 6. For a more detailed treatment of the von Mildenstein-Tuchler voyage to Palestine, see this author's A Nazi Travels to Palestine', in History Today , vol. 30 (January 1980), pp. 33¯38. Von Mildenstein's articles (in which he used the pen name "von Limm") ran in Der Angriff from 24th September until 9th October 1934. 89.) See Schleunes, op. cit. , pp. 178¯181; 193¯194. Herfeld also reports that in the last months of 1936 the Gestapo acted more leniently towards Zionists than towards "assimilationists". Op. cit. , p. 32. The Israelitisches Familienblatt of 21st March 1935 cited authoritative Nazi sources urging favouritism towards pro-emigration groups like the Zionists. See also, Kurt T. Grossmann, Zionists and non-Zionists under Nazi rule in the 1930's, in Herzl Year Book. Essays in Zionist History and Thought , IV (1961¯1962), pp. 329¯344, espeilly the appendices; and Hans Mommsen, Der nationalsozialistische Polizeistaat und die Judenverfolgung vor 1938', in Vierteljahreshefte fuer Zeitgeschichte , Heft 1 (Januar 1962), pp. 68¯87. Of particular interest are the documents, reproduced by Mommsen, from the Bayerische Politische Polizei, pp. 77¯87. 90.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXVIII (7th April 1933). 91.) Paragraph 4 of the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honour stated: "1. Jews are not permitted to display the German flag or the national colours; 2. They are, however, permitted to show the Jewish colours. The exercise of this right is protected by the State". Paragraph 5.3 described the penalty for infringing "1": up to one year's imprisonment plus fine, or one of these. 92.) Benno Cohn summarised the problem faced by Zionism as follows: "Dabei war beim Auftreten vor den juedischen Massen in jenen Jahren stets die Gefahr einer... ideologischen Gleichschaltung mit den Nazis gegeben. Die Zionisten hatten ja die Assimilation immer verurteilt und zur Auswanderung, zur Alija, zur Schaffung eines neuen Volkszentrums aufgerufen. Die zionistischen Sprecher mussten sich daher sehr hueten, in ihren Reden nicht etwa eine Assoziation zu den Parolen der Nazis und ihrer Rassentheorien aufkommen zu lassen". Einige Bemerkungen ueber den deutschen Zionismus nach 1933', in In zwei Welten, op. cit. , p. 46. 93.) Cited in Klaus J. Hermann, Das Dritte Reich und die deutsch-juedischen Organisationen 1933¯1934 , Muenchen 1969, p. 16. 94.) The C.V Zeitung, for example, frequently harped on the similarities between Zionism and the Nazi Weltanschauung. In a May 1934 leader, Eva Reichmann-Jungmann observed that in 1933 the attraction of Zionism was great¯ "tempting and seductive". C.V Zeitung , XIII (31st May 1934). Taking issue with Jewish nationalism Alfred Hirschberg, that paper's Editor-in-Chief, saw it as assimilation to the times. C.V Zeitung , XIII (6th December 1934). 95.) C.V Zeitung , XIII (1st November 1934). 96.) Mosse, op. cit. , p. 103. 97.) "There is little doubt that the existing youth organisations and clubs had for a time substituted symbols, flags, marching songs, etc., for similar forms of expression of the Hitler youth". Solomon Colodner, Jewish Education under National Socialism', Yad Vashem Studies on the European Jewish Catastrophe and Resistance , III (1959), pp. 166¯167. "The Labor Service, the welfare work for the unemployed, the labor camps, the domestic service year, and other such institutions based on collective education were not without influence". Rudolph Stahl, Vocational Retraining of Jews in Nazi Germany 1933¯1938', Jewish Social Studies , 1 (April 1939), No. 2, p. 180. See also, in connection with labour's upgrading, by the author, Germany or Diaspora? German Jewry's Shifting Perceptions in the Nazi Era (1933¯1938)', in LBI Year Book XXVII (1982), pp. 121¯122. 98.) See Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXVI (11th January 1934). Despite its vaunted neutrality in Jewish affairs, the Israelitisches Familie gradually began displaying a marked bias toward Zionism, demanding that it be given more, though not all, power in the community. See Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXVII (6th June 1935); XXXVII (13th June 1935). 99.) See, for example, Arno Herzberg, Anschluss an die Zeit', Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXV (8th June 1933); Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXVI (1st February 1934), praising the fusion of Volk and Staat , as well as the suppression of niggling parliamentary debate; and the 12th April 1934 headline, Wir fordern Gemeindereform an Haupt und Gliedern: Fuehrerprinzip auch bei uns!' 100.) Mosse, op. cit. , p. 102. 101.) The C.V Zeitung , XIV (26th September 1935) spoke of "Siegesfanfaren" and "ill-concealed joy" on the part of Zionism. The Centralverein accused Zionists of a "brutal exploitation of a calamity", said the Juedische Rundschau , XXXX (19th March 1935). Friendly to Zionism, Rabbi Max Gruenewald of the Reichsvertretung wrote in the Juedische Rundschau , XXXX (15th November 1935): "Weder eine voellig palaestinazentrische Einstellung noch die Erbitterung ueber ein jahrelanges Unverstaendnis auf der Seite der verantwortlihen Fuehrung gab das Recht dazu, dass die Judenheit in Deutschland so von fuehrenden Zionisten entbloesst wurde, wie das tatsaechlich geschehen ist". 102.) C.V Zeitung , XII (21st December 1933); XII (18th May 1933). 103.) C.V Zeitung , XII (15th June 1933). 104.) C.V Zeitung , XII (29th June 1933). Part D To the degree that its ideological position crumbled over the years, the Centralverein resorted to stressing pragmatism over ideology, representing itself to the community as the "creative centre of German Jewry" 105 . But with each new piece of anti-Jewish legislation, with every Nazi act of terror and intimidation, insult and slight, the Centralverein lost ground, until, at last, it was compelled to espouse a goodly portion of the Zionist point of view 106 and practically all of its program. The general shift in Jewish socio-political attitudes. The liberal persuasion, with its emphasis on the self-realising individual and the political forms to which it had given rise, was being supplanted by an appreciation of the complex of values - broadly designated as voelkisch - derived from Volkstum. It would be a mistake, however, to interpret this new-fashioned receptivity to voelkisch ideas and ideals as showing nothing more than mimesis. Rather, it must be understood in the sense of furnishing Jews with a powerful heuristic model for exploring and coming to grips with their own collective identity as Jews. As the champion and embodiment of Jewish Volkstum , the ZVfD emerged as the uncontested beneficiary of this changing outlook. There are numerous indications that Zionism provided an attractive alternative to a liberalism that seemed to have passed the point of no return. For instance, the circulation figure of the Juedische Rundschau quadrupled 107 . Financial contributions to Zionism in the period 1933-1936 tripled over those collected during 1931-1932 - and this from a much impoverished base 108 . Indicative, too, of the new outlook in the community was the change in attitude toward Palestine on the part of a number of influential "German-Jewish" spokesmen and organisations. Thus, in 1903 Heinrich Stahl had returned from a trip to Palestine convinced that the place could not be made fit for human habitation; in 1936 he believed that only Palestine could save the Jews 109 . Eva Reichmann-Jungmann likewise returned full of praise for the Jewish settlements after visiting Palestine around the beginning of 1938 110 . And by the end of 1935 even the R.J.F. claimed to be furthering the work there 111 . Zionism made converts prodigiously among Jewish youth also. Already at the end of 1934, the ZVfD claimed that eighty percent of all organised young Jewish men and women were enrolled in Zionist youth groups 112 . In June 1935, the formerly neutral Verband der juedischen Jugendvereine Deutschlands came out in favour of the building-up of Palestine. In March 1936, the Verband reported that it had decided to integrate itself into the Zionist movement 113 . With the erstwhile groundswell rising to a mighty wave, by the end of 1935 Zionism could justly claim that it had gained the confidence of the broad Jewish masses 114 . It is of course impossible to ascertain with any degree of certainty how many German Jews in the first five years of Nazism shifted their allegiance to Zionism or repudiated their former liberal convictions. Whatever the precise dimensions of this re-orientation may have been, there can be little doubt that a shift of some sort took place in those years, and that it was by no means negligible. After 1933, more and more Jews began speaking of themselves as a Volk and of their community as a Volksgemeinde , which is another way of saying that they began seeing themselves as a separate and distinct nationality. The confusion, turmoil and disorientation of the pre-1933 period had prepared the soil for this transformation, but it took Hitler's accession to power to bring it to a head. Hence it was not just the existence of Palestine but the entire sweep of recent German - and beyond that of recent European - history that determined the relative ease with which a large number of Jews slipped from a liberal role into Zionism, an ideology decidedly more attuned to the times. References: 105.) C.V Zeitung , XIII (25th October 1934); XIV (3rd May 1935). 106.) The process by which non-Zionists came to adopt much of the Zionist "line" has been traced back to the period of the Weimar Republic, especially its last year. See Peter M. Baldwin, Zionist and Non-Zionist Jews in the Last Years Before the Nazi Regime', in LBI Year Book XXVII (1982), pp. 87¯108. 107.) Strauss, Jewish Press', loc. cit. , p. 34 (from roughly 10,000 before 1933 to approximately 38,000 by the end of 1933). Robert Weltsch, the editor of the Juedische Rundschau during the Nazi years, fixed his paper's pre-1933 circulation at 5,000 to 7,000 per issue. Lamm, op. cit. , p. 175, note 1. 108.) Arendt, op. cit. , p. 59. 109.) Juedische Rundschau , XXXXI (12th April 1936); XXXXI (8th May 1936). 110.) C.V Zeitung , XVII (24th February 1938). 111.) See Juedische Rundschau , XXXX (10th October 1935). 112.) Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXVI (6th December 1934). 113.) Israelitisches Familienblatt , XXXVII (8th August 1935); XXXVIII (5th March 1936). 114.) See Juedische Rundschau , XXXX (17th December 1935). It should be remembered, though, that the growth of Zionism predated 1933. In 1926, 18,000 Jewish Berliners voted for Zionism; by 1930, their number had risen to 30,000. See Juedische Rundschau , XXXX (17th April 1935). Back to the top