The Jews And Germans In Hamburg

Toward the end of the 19th century, Hamburg Jews were deeply embedded within the society of the city, proud of its liberal spirit; they contributed greatly to its wealth and considered themselves Germans. Relates the story of the Jewish community, interspersed with stories of many Jewish and mixed families, as well as of some non-Jewish bystanders. Although even in pre-1914 Hamburg there were barriers between Jews and Christians on the private level, and anti-Jewish prejudices persisted, it was the growing common preoccupation with race and eugenics that spelled real danger for the Jews. In Hamburg of 1919-32 the Nazis were still an insignificant force, but it did not need Nazis to establish growing anti-Jewish sentiments. Describes Nazi policies toward the Jews of Hamburg, the "Kristallnacht" pogrom, concentration of the city's Jews in "Jewish houses", and then the deportations to Minsk, Riga, and Theresienstadt in 1941-42, as well as Jewish reactions to all of these. 7,500 Jews were in Hamburg in July 1941; only 674 Jews, 631 of them in mixed marriages, remained on 30 April 1945. Believes that the Germans knew much about the mass killing of Jews in the "East", in particular because many business people of Hamburg visited the "East" and could see it. The Holocaust of the Hamburg Jews was facilitated by the overall indifference of the city's population. It was not just a Jewish civilization that the Nazis destroyed in Germany, but German civilization, of which it was a part.

Based on more than thirty years archival research, this history of the Jewish and German-Jewish community of Hamburg is a unique and vivid piece of work by one of the leading historians of the twentieth century. The history of the Holocaust here is fully integrated into the full history of the Jewish community in Hamburg from the late eighteenth century onwards. J.A.S. Grenville draws on a vast quantity of diaries, letters and records to provide a macro level history of Hamburg interspersed with many personal stories that bring it vividly to life. In the concluding chapter the discussion is widened to talk about Hamburg as a case study in the wider world. This book will be a key work in European history, charting and explaining the complexities of how a long established and well integrated German-Jewish community became, within the space of a generation, victims of the Nazi Holocaust.

Published to wide acclaim in its original edition, this book shows how many ordinary Germans became involved in what they saw as a legally sanctioned process of ridding Germany and Europe of their Jews.

In 1939 all German Jews had to become members of a newly founded Reich Association. The Jewish functionaries of this organization were faced with circumstances and events that forced them to walk a fine line between responsible action and collaboration. They had hoped to support mass emigration, mitigate the consequences of the anti-Jewish measures, and take care of the remaining community. When the Nazis forbade emigration and started mass deportations in 1941, the functionaries decided to cooperate to prevent the "worst." In choosing to cooperate, they came into direct opposition with the interests of their members, who were then deported. In June 1943 all unprotected Jews were deported along with their representatives, and the so-called intermediaries supplied the rest of the community, which consisted of Jews living in mixed marriages. The study deals with the tasks of these men, the fate of the Jews in mixed marriages, and what happened to the survivors after the war.

Among the many narratives about the atrocities committed against Jews in the Holocaust, the story about the Jews who lived in the eye of the storm—the German Jews—has received little attention. Germans against Germans: The Fate of the Jews, 1938–1945, tells this story—how Germans declared war against other Germans, that is, against German Jews. Author Moshe Zimmermann explores questions of what made such a war possible? How could such a radical process of exclusion take place in a highly civilized, modern society? What were the societal mechanisms that paved the way for legal discrimination, isolation, deportation, and eventual extermination of the individuals who were previously part and parcel of German society? Germans against Germans demonstrates how the combination of antisemitism, racism, bureaucracy, cynicism, and imposed collaboration culminated in "the final solution."

Now available in paperback, this book delivers a comprehensive one-volume account of the political history of Jews as a significant minority within Imperial Germany.

Featuring essays by scholars of history, literature, television, and sociology, Rebuilding Jewish Life in Germany illuminates important aspects of Jewish life in Germany since 1949, including institution building, the internal dynamics and changing demographics of the Jewish community, and the central role of Jewish writers and public intellectuals.

From the Pulitzer Prize–winning bestselling author of Alexander Hamilton, the inspiration for the hit Broadway musical, comes this definitive biography of the Warburgs, one of the great German-Jewish banking families of the twentieth century. Bankers, philanthropists, scholars, socialites, artists, and politicians, the Warburgs stood at the pinnacle of German (and, later, of German-American) Jewry. They forged economic dynasties, built mansions and estates, assembled libraries, endowed charities, and advised a German kaiser and two American presidents. But their very success made the Warburgs lightning rods for anti-Semitism, and their sense of patriotism became increasingly dangerous in a Germany that had declared Jews the enemy. Ron Chernow's hugely fascinating history is a group portrait of a clan whose members were renowned for their brilliance, culture, and personal energy yet tragically vulnerable to the dark and irrational currents of the twentieth century.