Ústredňa Židov
Arpad Sebestyen |
The Ústredňa Židov (ÚŽ; English: Jewish Center) was the
Background
On 14 March 1939, the
In a process overseen by the Central Economic Office (led by Slovak official
Establishment
In response to the anti-Jewish measures, Zionist and Neolog leaders set up an umbrella organization called the ŽÚÚ (Židovská Ústredná Úradovna pre krajinu Slovenska) in late 1939. The ŽÚÚ attempted to negotiate with the Slovak government to ease anti-Jewish measures, as well as help Jews to emigrate and provide education and welfare. They tried to convince the Orthodox Jews to join the organization, to no avail; the lack of cooperation caused the ŽÚÚ to collapse.[11][12]
In September 1940, Dieter Wisliceny, representing Adolf Eichmann, director of the Jewish section of the Reich Security Main Office, arrived in Bratislava as the Judenberater for Slovakia.[13][14] His aim was to impoverish the Jewish community so that it became a burden on gentile Slovaks, who would then agree to deport them.[14][15] On the basis of the Slovak Government Decree 234, passed 26 September, all Jewish community organizations were closed down and the Jews forced to form the Ústredňa Židov (Jewish Center, ÚŽ).[11][13][16] The first Judenrat outside the Reich and German-occupied Poland, ÚŽ was the only secular Jewish organization allowed to exist in Slovakia;[17] it inherited the property of the disbanded Jewish organizations.[18] It operated under the direct control of the Central Economic Office[19] and all Jews were required to be members.[17][20] Its offices were located at multiple addresses in central Bratislava.[19][21]
Leaders of the Jewish community were divided on how to react to this development. Some refused to associate with the ÚŽ in the belief that it would be used to implement anti-Jewish measures, but more saw participating in the ÚŽ as a way to help their fellow Jews by delaying the implementation of such measures. As a result, the ÚŽ was initially dominated by Jews who refused to collaborate and focused on charitable projects (such as soup kitchens) to help those impoverished by the anti-Jewish measures.[22][23]
The first leader of the ÚŽ was
Departments
Emigration
The ÚŽ's emigration department was headed by Gisi Fleischmann, a prewar Zionist leader known for her connections to international Jewish organizations.[24][30] Through the embassies and consulates of neutral countries in Bratislava and Budapest, the department attempted to help Jews immigrate to other countries. The obstacles to immigration were rarely surmounted but a few Jews did manage to immigrate; the last group of 82 Jews left for Mandatory Palestine in April 1941.[31]
Welfare
The ÚŽ's main challenge was to provide social welfare to Jews who had been deprived of their livelihoods, using the dwindling resources of the Jewish community.[32][33] By April 1941, 24,767 Jews had lost their jobs (76% of those employed in 1939). By August, the ÚŽ was providing welfare to 23,877 Jews with 1,500 welfare applications to be considered; this consisted of about 3 Slovak koruna (Ks) daily per adult and 2 Ks per child.[b] In addition, the ÚŽ established soup kitchens that fed more than 35,000 people. The organization also funded a hospital, orphanages, and homes for the elderly.[35] It funded healthcare for Jews, establishing free clinics where Jewish doctors practiced.[33]
This money came from resources inherited from Jewish organizations that had been dissolved as well as international organizations, especially the
Education and Culture
The education and culture department succeeded at keeping most children in school due to an arrangement with
The department also published the only Jewish newspaper allowed, which was called the Vestník Ústredne Židov (Gazette of the Jewish Center), distributed to every Jewish household.[45] In this gazette, the ÚŽ called for calm and discipline for all Jews, in fear that a lack of cooperation would cause reprisals for the entire Jewish community, and held out the promise of immigration to Palestine, an increasingly unrealistic proposition. Kamenec notes that this absolute cooperation and suppression of resistance was exactly what the Slovak State sought to impose on the Jews.[46]
Non-Israelites
The department for Jews who had converted to Christianity was largely unsuccessful in exempting converts from anti-Jewish measures. It argued that being forced to wear the Star of David would have "severe consequences from the psychological, educational, family and religious points of view".[33]
Special Affairs
Wisliceny set up a department for "Special Affairs" or "Special Tasks" on 11 June 1941[29][47][48] to ensure the prompt implementation of Nazi decrees, appointing an ambitious, unprincipled Viennese Jew named Karol Hochberg as its director.[24][29][49] The main task of the department was collecting statistical data to be used in future forced relocations.[48] On 4 October 1941, the Slovak government ordered 11,466 Jews from Bratislava—those not employed or intermarried—to relocate to fourteen smaller towns: Zvolen, Bardejov, Prešov, Humenné, Liptovský Mikuláš, Michalovce, Nové Mesto nad Váhom, Nitra, Žilina, Stropkov, Topoľčany, Trnava, Vrbové and Spišská Nová Ves.[50] The ÚŽ was forced to pay for their relocation,[51] which Hochberg's office supervised.[52] To be more efficient, he reorganized the department into six subdivisions, for registering Jews, tracking down those who did not report for deportation, keeping track of stolen property, and so forth.[53] More than 160,000 Ks in property was confiscated, despite the fact that the affected Jews were poorer than average.[54] Hochberg personally embezzled some of the confiscated furniture to bribe Wisliceny.[52] According to the official statistics, 5,679 people had been relocated by the beginning of December, and a total of 6,720 had been moved to the towns by the end of March. This did not include some who had been imprisoned in labor camps.[55]
Due to Sebestyen's ineffectuality, Hochberg's department came to dominate the operations of the ÚŽ.
Retraining and labor camps
As an outgrowth of the work of the welfare department,
In a further step to reduce unemployment, the ÚŽ established labor camps and centers, an activity approved by an April 1941 decree. Although this effort was connected to the discriminatory conscription of all Jewish men aged 18–60 for labor, it had a beneficial effect for unemployed Jews. The first center was established at Strážke in spring 1941;[67] by September, about 5,500 Jews were working at 80 sites. The companies employing the Jews enjoyed cheap labor, but the ÚŽ had to subsidize their wages to meet the legal minimum. By the end of the year, most of these centers were dissolved, officially due to the harsh weather conditions.[2][68] According to Slovak historian Ivan Kamenec, the real reason was that the Slovak State was planning to deport the Jewish workers.[68] Instead, three larger camps were established at Sereď, Nováky, and Vyhne.[2] The ÚŽ financed the construction of these camps in the fall of 1941; however, the government began to discourage construction (because it planned to deport Jews instead) in the fall of 1941.[69]
During the deportations, the welfare department provided aid to Jews forced into concentration centers for deportation, providing blankets and other supplies to indigent Jews to take with them. However, its efforts were inadequate to alleviate the poor housing, food, and sanitary conditions.[70] During the deportations, the desperate Slovak Jewish leadership tried to use the camps as a way to save the Jews imprisoned there. Alois Pecuch, the director of the camps, and others were bribed to prevent the deportation of the Jews working in the camps, but many local commanders ignored their instructions to this effect. Sereď and Nováky were used as concentration centers and their workers targeted for deportation on the last trains of autumn 1942.[71] Jews deported from Slovakia had to sign a declaration surrendering their remaining property to the ÚŽ.[72] 2,500 Jews, out of the 18,945 legally present, were living in these three camps at the end of 1942.[2]
In March 1943, the Central Office for Jewish Labor Camps (Ústredná kancelária pre pracovné tábory Židov) was established in order to increase production in the labor camps.[73][74] The Central Office also improved conditions in the camps by constructing new buildings and staging cultural activities for prisoners.[74] Bribery of labor-camp guards continued, in order to ease life for the inmates.[73]
Appeals
During the 1942 deportations a Department of Appeals, led by Tibor Kováč, was formed in order to ensure that exemptions from deportation would be honored. The department also helped Jews apply for exemptions.[75] The workers in this department went to great lengths to save Jews; some were arrested and deported while attempting to obtain the release of Jews from detention centers.[76] There is little information on how much success it had.[75]
Illegal resistance
In summer 1941, several ÚŽ members dissatisfied with the Department of Special Affairs gathered around Gisi Fleischmann, who began holding meetings for the nascent resistance group in her office. In 1942, this group was eventually formalized into an underground organization known as the "Working Group".[24][29] It was an alliance of the ideological factions in the UŽ, led by Fleischmann and the anti-Zionist Orthodox rabbi Michael Dov Weissmandl. Other members included Oskar Neumann, assimilationist Tibor Kováč, Neolog rabbi Armin Frieder, and the apolitical architect Andrej Steiner.[77][78][79] Israeli historian Livia Rothkirchen emphasizes that the members of the Working Group operated in dual capacities as resistance members and official representatives, coordinating legal and illegal activities, which makes it difficult to draw a distinction between the two groups' activities.[80] She also notes that the successes of the Working Group were due in large part to the official standing of the ÚŽ.[81]
Censorship of correspondence and this newsletter intensified in early 1942 during the deportations, in order to prevent the ÚŽ from warning the Jewish population. After news of forthcoming deportations was leaked on 3 March 1942, many Jews came to the ÚŽ offices in Bratislava to confirm the rumors.[82] Several ÚŽ officials signed a petition detailing the economic arguments for retaining Jews in Slovakia and mailed it illegally to Tiso.[78] The chairman of the ÚŽ, Arpad Sebestyen, also wrote a petition arguing that the Jews could serve as a source of cheap labor in Slovakia, to the profit of Slovak companies, and sent it illegally to the Slovak parliament.[83] These efforts failed to halt or delay the deportations.[84] Despite censorship, the ÚŽ managed to insert covert warnings into the official circulars.[52]
Later, the Working Group attempted to prevent the deportation of Jews by bribing German and Slovak officials.[73] Sebestyen was aware of the activities of the Working Group and made no effort to stop them; neither did he report them to the authorities.[85] In December 1943, a reorganization of the Slovak government caused Sebestyen to be let go. The Jewish community was allowed to choose his successor and the Working Group voted unanimously for Oskar Neumann, one of its members, effectively taking over the ÚŽ.[86][87] Neumann focused on restoring the reputation of the ÚŽ in the Jewish community.[88] The Working Group activists even distributed information about rescue operations in official ÚŽ messages.[86][87]
Dissolution
Because of Germany's imminent military defeat, much of the Slovak populace and the leadership of the army switched its allegiance to the Allies. Increasing partisan activity in the mountains caused a dilemma for Jews and the leadership in particular.[89] The Slovak government ordered the removal of Jews from eastern Slovakia; the ÚŽ leadership was able to avoid their resettlement in camps.[81] On 29 August 1944, Germany invaded Slovakia in response to the increase in partisan sabotage. The same day, the Slovak National Uprising was launched, but it was crushed by the end of October.[89] The Jews, who fought with the partisans in substantial numbers, were blamed for the uprising,[90][91] providing the Germans with an excuse to implement the Final Solution.[92] Eichmann sent SS-Hauptsturmführer Alois Brunner to Bratislava to oversee the deportation and murder of some 25,000 surviving Jews in Slovakia.[93][94] Immediately after the German invasion, Neumann disbanded the ÚŽ and told its members to go into hiding or flee.[92] The ÚŽ employees suffered the same fate as the remaining Slovak Jews; most were deported to concentration camps.[81] Among prominent UŽ members, Hochberg was executed as a collaborator by Jewish partisans during the uprising,[49][95][96] Fleischmann was killed in Auschwitz concentration camp, and Neumann survived in Theresienstadt. Frieder, Steiner, and Kováč were able to avoid deportation.[97] Frieder died in 1946 of a heart condition,[98] Steiner emigrated to the United States,[99] and Kováč killed himself in 1952 after suffering harassment from the secret police.[100]
References
Notes
Citations
- ^ Rajcan, Vadkerty & Hlavinka 2018, p. 843.
- ^ a b c d Rajcan, Vadkerty & Hlavinka 2018, p. 844.
- ^ Fatran 2002, pp. 141–142.
- ^ a b Rajcan, Vadkerty & Hlavinka 2018, pp. 844–845.
- ^ Rajcan, Vadkerty & Hlavinka 2018, pp. 842–843.
- ^ Kamenec 2002, pp. 111–112.
- ^ a b c Rothkirchen 2001, p. 597.
- ^ Rajcan, Vadkerty & Hlavinka 2018, p. 846.
- ^ Fatran 2002, p. 144.
- ^ a b Bauer 2017, 15: Slovakia: Can One Ransom Jews?
- ^ a b c Bauer 1994, p. 64.
- ^ Bauer 2002, p. 175.
- ^ a b Fatran 1994, p. 165.
- ^ a b Kamenec 2002, p. 114.
- ^ Ward 2013, p. 215.
- ^ Hradská 2004, p. 152.
- ^ a b c Bauer 2002, p. 176.
- ^ Hradská 2004, p. 153.
- ^ a b c Rothkirchen 1979, p. 220.
- ^ Rajcan, Vadkerty & Hlavinka 2018, p. 845.
- ^ Hradská 2008, p. 231.
- ^ Fatran 2002, pp. 143–144.
- ^ Rothkirchen 1979, pp. 220, 222.
- ^ a b c d e f Fatran 1994, p. 166.
- ^ Bauer 1994, pp. 83–84.
- ^ Bauer 2002, p. 172.
- ^ Campion 1987, p. 47.
- ^ Fatran 2002, pp. 144–145.
- ^ a b c d e f Bauer 1994, p. 70.
- ^ Bauer 2002, pp. 174, 178–179, 185.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 173.
- ^ Bauer 1994, p. 73.
- ^ a b c Kamenec 2007, p. 176.
- ^ Mackworth 1942, p. 46.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 172.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, pp. 172–173.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, pp. 176–177.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 200.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 313.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 173–174.
- ^ Rothkirchen 2001, p. 599.
- ^ Bauer 1994, p. 97.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 174.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 193.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 129.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, pp. 174, 176.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, pp. 176, 182.
- ^ a b Hradská 2016, p. 317.
- ^ a b Bauer 2006, p. 710.
- ^ Hradská 2016, pp. 315, 318.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, pp. 187, 191.
- ^ a b c Kamenec 2007, p. 192.
- ^ Hradská 2016, pp. 319–320.
- ^ Hradská 2016, p. 319.
- ^ Hradská 2016, pp. 320–321.
- ^ Rothkirchen 1998, p. 638.
- ^ Bauer 1994, pp. 70–71.
- ^ Fatran 1994, pp. 185–186.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, pp. 216–217.
- ^ Bauer 1994, p. 80.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 182.
- ^ Hradská 2016, p. 318.
- ^ Fatran 2002, p. 146.
- ^ Hradská 2016, p. 324.
- ^ a b c Kamenec 2007, p. 177.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 178.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, pp. 178–179, 189.
- ^ a b Kamenec 2007, p. 180.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, pp. 189–190.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, pp. 216, 228.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, pp. 314–315.
- ^ Rothkirchen 1979, p. 219.
- ^ a b c Rajcan, Vadkerty & Hlavinka 2018, p. 848.
- ^ a b Rothkirchen 1979, p. 224.
- ^ a b Fatran 2002, p. 153.
- ^ Rothkirchen 1979, p. 222.
- ^ Bauer 2002, p. 178.
- ^ a b Fatran 1994, p. 167.
- ^ Bauer 1994, p. 74.
- ^ Rothkirchen 1979, p. 221.
- ^ a b c Rothkirchen 1979, p. 226.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 204.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 211.
- ^ Kamenec 2007, p. 229.
- ^ Fatran 1994, p. 187.
- ^ a b Fatran 1994, pp. 187–188.
- ^ a b Bauer 2002, p. 182.
- ^ Putík 2015, p. 30.
- ^ a b Fatran 1994, pp. 188–189.
- ^ Rothkirchen 1998, p. 641.
- ^ Fatran 1996, pp. 99–100.
- ^ a b Fatran 1994, p. 189.
- ^ Fatran 1996, p. 119.
- ^ Bauer 2002, p. 183.
- ^ Fatran 1994, p. 195.
- ^ Bauer 1994, p. 91.
- ^ Fatran 1994, pp. 192, 200–201.
- ^ Gály 2006, p. 242.
- ^ Fatran 1994, p. 201.
- ^ Wyman & Rosenzveig 1996, p. 186.
Bibliography
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- Bauer, Yehuda (2006). "Rudolf Vrba und die Auschwitz-Protokolle: Eine Antwort auf John S. Conway" [Rudolf Vrba and the Auschwitz Protocols: an answer to S2CID 143806992.
- Bauer, Yehuda (2017) [1981]. American Jewry and the Holocaust: The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, 1939–1945. Detroit: ISBN 978-0-8143-4347-0.
- Campion, Joan (1987). In the Lion's Mouth: Gisi Fleischmann and the Jewish Fight for Survival. Lanham: ISBN 978-0-8191-6522-0.
- Fatran, Gila (1994). "The "Working Group"". Holocaust and Genocide Studies. 8 (2). Translated by Greenwood, Naftali: 164–201. ISSN 8756-6583.
- Fatran, Gila (1996). "Die Deportation der Juden aus der Slowakei 1944–1945" [The deportation of the Jews from Slovakia 1944–45]. Bohemia: Zeitschrift für Geschichte und Kultur der Böhmischen Länder (in German) (37): 98–119.
- Fatran, Gila (2002) [1992]. "The Struggle for Jewish Survival during the Holocaust". In Długoborski, Wacław; Tóth, Dezider; Teresa, Świebocka; Mensfelt, Jarek (eds.). The Tragedy of the Jews of Slovakia 1938–1945: Slovakia and the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question". Translated by Mensfeld, Jarek. Oświęcim and Banská Bystrica: ISBN 83-88526-15-4.
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- Hradská, Katarína (2008). Židovská Bratislava [Jewish Bratislava] (PDF). Bratislava: Marenčin PT. ISBN 978-80-89218-80-6.
- Hradská, Katarína (2016). "Dislokácie Židov z Bratislavy na jeseň 1941" (PDF). Adepti moci a úspechu. Etablovanie elít v moderných dejinách (in Slovak). The Displacement of Jews from Bratislava in Autumn 1941: 315–324. ISBN 978-80-224-1503-3.)
{{cite journal}}
: CS1 maint: location (link - ISBN 83-88526-15-4.
- Kamenec, Ivan (2007). On the Trail of Tragedy: The Holocaust in Slovakia. Translated by Styan, Martin. Bratislava: Hajko & Hajková. ISBN 9788088700685.
- OCLC 186891369.
- Putík, Daniel (2015). Slovenští Židé v Terezíně, Sachsenhausenu, Ravensbrücku a Bergen-Belsenu, 1944/1945 [Slovak Jews in Theresienstadt, Sachsenhausen, Ravensbrück and Bergen-Belsen, 1944/1945] (PhD thesis) (in Czech). Prague: Charles University.
- Rajcan, Vanda; Vadkerty, Madeline; Hlavinka, Ján (2018). "Slovakia". In ISBN 978-0-253-02373-5.
- OCLC 7008242.
- Rothkirchen, Livia (1998). "Czech and Slovak Wartime Jewish Leadership". In ISBN 978-0-253-33374-2.
- Rothkirchen, Livia (2001). "Slovakia". In Laqueur, Walter; Baumel, Judith Tydor (eds.). Holocaust Encyclopedia. New Haven: Yale University Press. pp. 595–600. ISBN 978-0-300-08432-0.
- Ward, James Mace (2013). Priest, Politician, Collaborator: Jozef Tiso and the Making of Fascist Slovakia. Ithaka: Cornell University Press. ISBN 978-0-8014-6812-4.
- ISBN 978-0-8018-4969-5.
Further reading
- Fatran, Gila (1988). Bauer, Yehuda (ed.). מרכז היהודים ה-או"ז'-Ústredňa Židov (ÚŽ): ארגון משתפי פעולה או ארגון הצלה יהודי סלובאקיה, 1938-1944 [The Jewish Center, an Organization of Collaboration or Rescue: the Jews of Slovakia 1938-1944] (PhD thesis) (in Hebrew). OCLC 741082058.
- Hradská, Katarína Mešková (2019). "Vznik a činnosť Židovskej ústrednej úradovne". Forum Historiae. 13 (1): 116–130. .
- Nešťáková, Denisa (2019). "The Jewish Centre and Labour Camps in Slovakia". In Georg, Karoline; Meier, Verena; Oppermann, Paula A. (eds.). Between Collaboration and Resistance. Papers from the 21st Workshop on the History and Memory of National Socialist Camps and Extermination Sites. Berlin: Metropol. pp. 117–145. ISBN 978-3-86331-503-0.
- Nešťáková, Denisa (2019). "Jewish Reactions to the anti-Semitic policies in Slovakia on the pages of the Gazette of the Jewish Center (1941 – 1944)". Judaica et Holocaustica. 9: 25–54.