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The Zionist's Golem, by Buddy Silver

Often in Ashkenazi Hasidic lore,the golem would come to life and serve his creators by doing tasks assigned tohim. The most well-known story of the golem is connected to Rabbi Judah Loewben Bezalel, the Maharal of Prague (1513-1609).It was said that he created a golem out of clay to protect the Jewish communityfrom Blood Libel andto help out doing physical labor, since golems are very strong. Another versionsays it was close to Easter, in the spring of 1580 and a Jew-hating priest wastrying to incite the Christians against the Jews. So the golem protected thecommunity during the Easter season. Both versions recall the golem running amokand threatening innocent lives, so Rabbi Loew removed the Divine Name,rendering the golem lifeless. A separate account has the golem going mad andrunning away. Several sources attribute the story to Rabbi Elijah of Chelm,saying Rabbi Loew, one of the most outstanding Jewish scholars of the sixteenthcentury who wrote numerous books on Jewish law, philosophy, and morality, wouldhave actually opposed the creation of a golem.

 

HITLER'S JEWISH PSYCHIC

Born to a familycalled Steinschneider, Erik Jan Hanussen arrived in decadent Berlin, and becamethe prophet of the Third Reich

BY MEL GORDON

Historiansdigging into the archives to reconstruct the chronicle of the twentieth centurywill have to deal with this strange phenomenon of Hanussen, born HerschmannSteinschneider in the humble home of a poor Jewish actor in Vienna. It will be their task to unravel acomplex maze of reality and legend, myth and romance, to reach the core of thetrue personality of Steinschneider, alias Hanussen, and his influence on one ofthe most significant chapters of European history, the ascent and reign ofAdolf Hitler.
— Pierre van Paassen, Redbook, May 1942

 

The idea thatZionism and the State of “Israel” is the protector of Jews is probably thegreatest hoax ever perpetrated on the Jewish People. Indeed, where else since1945 have Jews been in such physical danger as in the Zionist state?!

Jews areenjoined by their religious laws to be loyal to the country of which they arecitizens. Ever since the destruction of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem and theexile of the Jewish People some two thousand years ago, Jews have been enjoinedto be scrupulously loyal to the countries they reside in. One of their biblicalprophets, Jeremiah, in chapter 29 of his book proclaimed God's message to allthe exiled; verse seven reads,

 "Seek out the welfare ofthe city to which I have exiled you and pray for it to the Almighty, forthrough its welfare will you have welfare."

Thishas been a cornerstone of Jewish morality throughout Jewish history to thisvery day.

Torah-trueJews are supposed  to live in peace andharmony with their neighbors in every country among the community of nations,including in historic Palestine. It is deplorable that some Jews carried out actsof violence by misusing the name of Israel, and have substituted the ideal ofchauvinist nationalism for the eternal values of the Torah.

Ithas been the age-old intention of Zionism to intentionally stir upanti-Semitism anywhere possible, and even more commonly, to take advantage ofany Jewish suffering anywhere in order to enhance its cause Indeed, hatred ofJews and Jewish suffering is the oxygen of the Zionist movement, and from thevery beginning has been to deliberately incite hatred of the Jew and then, infeigned horror, use it to justify the existence of the Zionist state – this is,of course, Machiavellianism raised to the highest degree. Thus, the Zioniststhrive on hatred and suffering of Jews, and seek to benefit thereby throughkeeping Jews in perpetual fear, causing them to ignore the true nature ofZionism, and instead to consider the Zionist state is their salvation.


ANTI-SEMITISM BYPOLITICAL ZIONISM
AlthoughZionists and others dispute it, the undeniable fact is that revolutionarysecular and apostate elements in the Jewish community in Europe contributedgreatly to hostility towards Jews after World War I. This aroused hatred ofJews in general among many non-Jews. While a prisoner in 1924 in the fortressof Lansberg on the River Lech, Hitler wrote his Mein Kampf. When he becameChancellor of Germany in 1933, he was assisted by Goebbels, Roseberg andStreicher. From them came the declarations,

“TheJews of Germany caused the defeat of Germany in the 1914-1918 war; the Jews ofGermany were responsible for the terrible conditions in Germany that followedthe war; the Jews of Germany are foreigners and they wish to remain foreigners;they have no loyalty to the country of their birth; they are not human; theyare filthy dogs; they have no right to intrude into Germany’s affairs; thereare too many Jews in Germany”.

As far asZionism is concerned, the founder of Zionism and apostate, Theodor Herzl,sought to intensify hatred of the Jew in order to enhance the cause ofpolitical Zionism. Here are some of his “pearls”:

"Itwould be an excellent idea to call in respectable, accredited anti-Semites asliquidators of property. To the people they would vouch for the fact that we donot wish to bring about the impoverishment of the countries that we leave. Atfirst they must not be given large fees for this; otherwise we shall spoil ourinstruments and make them despicable as 'stooges of the Jews.' Later their feeswill increase, and in the end we shall have only Gentile officials in thecountries from which we have emigrated. The anti-Semites will become our mostdependable friends, the anti-Semitic countries our allies."

(The CompleteDiaries of Theodor Herzl. Vol. 1, edited by Raphael Patai, translated by HarryZohn, page 83-84)”.

Additional wordsfrom the vivid imagination of this dreamer, from p. 68 of Part I of his Diary.

"Soanti-Semitism, which is a deeply imbedded force in the subconscious mind of themasses, will not harm the Jews. I actually find it to be advantageous tobuilding the Jewish character, education by the masses that will lead toassimilation. This education can only happen through suffering, and the Jewswill adapt."

Hateful views ofJews as being subhuman did not have to be invented by Nazi theorists such asHitler, Goebbels, Rosenberg and Streicher. This ideology was simply adaptedfrom statements of political Zionists such as those found in the writings ofthe Zionist Yehezkel Kaufman in 1933.

In 1920 therewere statements hostile to Jews expressed at Heidelberg University. Thesestatements, arguing that Jews of Germany had caused the turmoil that followedthe war; that the Jews of Germany had nothing in common with Germans, and thatGermans had the right to prevent the Jews of Germany from intruding into theaffairs of their volk were NOT made by Adolf Hitler in Mein Kampf, but by Nahum Goldmann, who went in to become the President of the WorldZionist Organization and head of the World Jewish Congress, and, indisputably,the most influential political Zionist in the world, second only to the PrimeMinister of the State of Israel.

In 1921, Germansin Germany were told that:

“WeJews are aliens… a foreign people in your midst and we… wish to stay that way.A Jew can never be a loyal German; whoever calls the foreign land hisFatherland is a traitor to the Jewish people“.

Who spoke these vile words?

It was Jacob Klatzkin, the second of two political Zionist ideologists inGermany at the time, where the Jews of Germany were enjoying full political andcivil rights. It was he who had advocated undermining Jewish communities as theone certain way of acquiring a state.

“Theyhad no qualms concerning tearing down the existing Jewish communities.”

Who spoke in apublic address at a political Zionist meeting in Berlin and declared that:

“Germany…has too many Jews”?

Was it Hitler orGoebbels?

No, it was Chaim Weizman, later to become the first President of the State ofIsrael. This address was published in 1920, and, thus, four years before Hitlerhad even written Mein Kampf.

How many ZionistJews know of this vicious treachery uttered by these senior political Zionistleaders, these apostates from the Jewish People? At the Nuremberg Trials ofMajor War Criminals, Nazi propagandist Julius Streicher testified:

“Idid no more than echo what the leading Zionists had been saying”.

It isclear that he had told the truth.

In addition toHitler, Rosenberg, Goebbels and Streicher, many other Nazi leaders usedstatements from Zionists to validate their charges against the Jews of Germany.Such are the efforts of Zionist leaders to this very day to maintain a highdegree of anti-Semitism in order to enable them, in feigned horror, to then pointto anti-Semitism to support their idolatrous and anti-Jewish cause.

In 1963, MosheSharett, then Chairman of the Jewish Agency, told the 38th Annual Congress ofthe Scandinavian Youth Federation that the freedom enjoyed by the majority ofJews imperilled Zionism, and at the 26th World Zionist Congress, the delegateswere told that the Jew is endangered by the easing of anti-Semitism in theUnited States “We are endangered by freedom”he declared.

As we statedearlier, Zionism thrives on anti-Semitism. Ben Gurion declared,

“…not always and not everywhere do Ioppose anti-Semitism”. Zionists regularly pull out their handy “anti-Semite” racecard against anyone, Jew or non-Jew, who dares to speak out against thewickedness of Zionism.

During World WarII, the Lehi organization, an offshoot of Begin’s Irgun that was headed byYitzchak Shamir sought an alliance with Nazis! The following is a quote fromthe writings of the Lehi in their contact with the Nazis:

"Theestablishment of the historical Jewish state on a national and totalitarianbasis and bound by a treaty with the German Reich would be in the interests ofstrengthening the future German position of power in the Near East ... The NMOin Palestine offers to take an active part in the war on Germany's side ... Thecooperation of the Israeli freedom movement would also be in line with one ofthe recent speeches of the German Reich Chancellor, in which Herr Hitlerstressed that any combination and any alliance would be entered into in orderto isolate England and defeat it."

To those whoassume that Zionists have been on the side of freedom and equality, these wordsseem strange. However, to those who understand the root of Zionism, which isthe transformation and eradication of the concept of the traditional Jew andJudaism, these statements are not strange at all. They are to be expected.

The Zionistsagreed with Nazism in general, even prior to the advent of Nazism. Theybelieved that Jews could not, and should not, live in harmony in any other societyin the world, and that should be removed from those societies for the benefitof those societies. They believed that the new Jewish existence in its ownState would remake the image of Jews as “useless” and“parasites.” Theseideas existed long before Adolf Hitler!

There is a hugeamount of literature describing how the Zionists made it very difficult to saveJews during and after World War II. As various individuals and organizationswere trying to arrange departures of Jews to western countries, the Zionistsworked overtime to prevent this from happening. They expressed the opinion thatbuilding up the Jewish population of Palestine was more important than enablingJews to go to third countries, and they insisted to western powers that Jewsshould not be accepted anywhere other than Palestine. Indeed, YitzhakGruenbaum, a famous Zionist, proclaimed that:

 “one cow in Palestine was worth more than all the Jews in Poland.”

The infamousDavid Ben-Gurion said in 1938:

"IfI knew it was possible to save all the children in Germany by taking them toEngland, and only half of the children by taking them to Eretz Israel, I wouldchoose the second solution. For we must take into account not only the lives ofthese children but also the history of the people of Israel."

Afterthe war, a Zionist “religious” leader, Rabbi Klaussner, who was in charge ofdisplaced persons presented a report before the Jewish American Conference onMay 2nd, 1948 :

"Iam convinced people must be forced to go to Palestine...For them, an Americandollar appears as the highest of goals. By the word "force", I amsuggesting a programme. It served for the evacuation of the Jews in Poland, andin the history of the 'Exodus'... To apply this programme we must, instead ofproviding 'displaced persons' with comfort, create the greatest possiblediscomfort for them...At a second stage, a procedure calling upon the Haganahto harass the Jews."

It is ironicthat the Zionists proclaim their State as the safe haven for the Jewish People,when since World War II no place on earth has been as dangerous for Jews, bothspiritually and physically, as the Zionist state.

The Zionistsworked relentlessly to create fear among Jews in the Arab countries after theZionist state was established. Their tactic work most successfully in Yemen,Morocco, Iraq, Algeria, Libya, and Tunisia.

It is common knowledge among Iraqi Jews that during1949-1950 the famous Zionist, Mordechai ben Porat, who had the nickname ofMorad Abu al-Knabel (Mordechai Bomber), was instrumental in seeking to bribeIraqi officials after the creation of the Zionist state to pass laws toencourage Jews to leave Iraq. This was enhanced by the Zionists planting bombsin synagogues in Baghdad in March 1950. Information about this is readily availableon the internet.

The writings ofMr. Naim Giladi document in detail what the Zionists did in Baghdad in 1950 toprovoke the departure of the Jews to the Zionist state. The Zionists do notcare what effect their policies have on the Jewish communities of any country.When they accuse European nations of every sin under the sun, do the Zionistscare that this will produce hostility towards Jews? No! Not a bit. On thecontrary, as we have discussed, they thrive on such circumstances, clinging tothe vain hope that these Jewish communities will rush for the “salvation” ofthe “safe haven” of the Zionist Paradise where Jews are in constant danger asthe Zionist regime undertakes every form of cruel provocation against non-Jews.

HorrifyingAccusations of Violence and Intimidation

Inmore recent times the Zionists have sought every opportunity to encourage Jewsto leave their home countries. Anytime there is even the smallest event ofhostility toward Jews on the heels of Zionist policy, or if there are signs ofeconomic distress and dislocation, the Zionists magnify it a thousand times,seek to ruthlessly humiliate the nations involved, and agitate for Jews to goto the Zionist state, the so-called “natural home” ofthe Jewish People. This has been the case in countries such as France,Argentina, Uruguay, the former Soviet Union and Egypt.

Sources:
■Guardian Volume two Issue 7
■Satmar Grand Rebbe Joel Teitelbaum
■The Jews of Batna, Aleria: A Study of Identity and Colonialism by ElizabethFriedman.
■The Jewish Communities of Morocco and the AIU by M. Laskier, State University,Albany, N.Y.
■The Impact of Western European Education on the Jewish Millet of Baghdad byMaurice Sawdayee.
■Outcaste Jewish Life in Southern Iran by Laurence D. Loeb. Gordon and Breach.
■The Last Arab Jews. The Communities of Jerba, Tunisia by Abraham Udovitch andLucette Valensi. Harwood Academic Publishers.



HITLER'S JEWISH PSYCHIC

Born to a familycalled Steinschneider, Erik Jan Hanussen arrived in decadent Berlin, and becamethe prophet of the Third Reich

BY MEL GORDON

Historiansdigging into the archives to reconstruct the chronicle of the twentieth centurywill have to deal with this strange phenomenon of Hanussen, born HerschmannSteinschneider in the humble home of a poor Jewish actor in Vienna. It will be their task to unravel acomplex maze of reality and legend, myth and romance, to reach the core of thetrue personality of Steinschneider, alias Hanussen, and his influence on one ofthe most significant chapters of European history, the ascent and reign ofAdolf Hitler.
— Pierre van Paassen, Redbook, May 1942

The story of Erik Jan Hanussen, the Viennese-Jewish psychic whobefriended Adolf Hitler and became known as the “Prophet of the Third Reich,”is one of the most peculiar in modern European history. Few twentieth-centuryhistorians have acknowledged Hanussen as a factor in the dissolution of the Weimar Republic.That the Führer had engaged a wily Jewish clairvoyant might seem the stuff ofmocking political fantasy or occult make-believe — but the story is true.

When Pierre van Paassen, the prominent Dutch author and foreigncorrespondent, wrote the above passage in the American periodical Redbook,the amazing exploits of Erik Jan Hanussen were still hot international copy. Atleast fourteen stories on Hitler’s Jewish astrologer and clairvoyant hadappeared in the American press alone beginning in 1937. Several exposés werepenned by Germany’sgreatest journalists, then in exile — acclaimed writers such as Bella Fromm,Egon Erwin Kisch, and Arthur Koestler.

But after September 1942, the name Erik Jan Hanussen disappeared from publicdiscourse. The strange tale of “Hitler’s Pal” (as Hanussen was tagged inAmerican true crime periodicals) was stricken from the record, only appearingin secret wartime Office of Strategic Services memos related to the characteranalysis and psycho­pathology of the Führer. By the time the American homefront had geared up for total war, the very notion of European Jews as anythingless than the targets of Fascist genocide could be viewed in Washington as aform of fifth columnism.

The story of aJewish mystic who helped usher in the era of the Third Reich and then becameone of its first victims was buried — and with it, one of the most bizarre chaptersin the history of the Second World War

Erik Jan Hanussen arrived in Berlin in 1930. He had already achievedfame and notoriety as a stage clairvoyant and mentalist in Austria and Czechoslovakia. In Germany, hehoped to transform a decent living into a fortune and, possibly, an empire.

A metropolis of four million,inter-war Berlin was Europe’s largest and most dynamic city. It was theinternational center of finance, graphic art, publishing, fashion, modernarchitecture, avant-garde cinema, and musical theatre. But more important forHanussen, it boasted a nightlife unlike any city before or since — withthousands of restaurants, risqué dance emporiums (the erotic subculture of Weimar Berlinincluded exactly 120 registered gay and lesbian lounges and dance halls),cabarets, and honky-tonks.
In 1930, fewer than onepercent of Berlin’s cosmopolitan citizens attended traditional church services.Faith in modern political ideologies, the occult, or old superstitious beliefsreplaced them. Berlin alone was estimated to have some 20,000 fortune-tellers,astrologers, tarot readers, hypnotists, crystal-ball gazers, fakirs,hollow-earth theorists, faith healers, stigmatics, yogic masters, palmists, andbizarrely costumed leaders of mystic brotherhoods and doomsday cults.

A Jewish cottage industry ofconjurers, mentalists, and the like was flourishing. The Hebraic origins ofthese entertainers were often masked in Gypsy greasepaint or in eastern turbansand flowing robes. Some pretended to be Slavic wonder-healing mystics, othersChinese monks, American Indian shamans, or scions of Scandinavian aristocracy.

Hanussen’s cover was that he was an itinerant Danish nobleman with exceptionalsupernatural powers, a history suggested to him by one of his longtime promotersat the Vienna Konzerthaus, and thoroughlyentrenched by the time Hanussen reached Berlin.In truth, Hanussen was born Herschmann-Chaim Steinschneider to a family ofunsuccessful cabaret performers and raised in his father’s native village of Prossnitz, a sleepy market town at theedge of the expiring Austro-Hungarian Empire. In 1903, he pawned his barmitzvah watch and joined a traveling circus. By 1910, he was writing cabaretjingles and tabloid journalism in Vienna.It was while researching the secrets of telepathy for an exposé on Leo Rubini,a reigning Jewish stage magician, that he discovered he could perform Rubini’stricks better than the master. During World War I, Hanussen dazzled audienceswith a telepathy-and-circus-show routine. By 1918 he was filling the Vienna Konzerthaus night after night, where he was billedas Europe’s greatest clairvoyant.”

Hanussen was also possibly Europe’s best-known soothsayer by the time he sethimself up in the freewheeling Berlin.On stylish Kurfürstendamm Avenue,he opened a private consultation parlor, which was instantly successful. Hisfees were exorbitant by any standard, but Hanussen’s reputation, and hiswealthy clients, allowed for it. He also performed in Berlin’s most gildedvenues, and soon counted among his inner circle the cultural elite of the city:singer and stage impresario Leo Slezak, opera great Richard Tauber, filmstarlet Lilian Harvey, expressionist playwright Ernst Toller, and theup-and-coming Jewish-Hungarian actor Peter Lorre.

Hanussen became a multimillionaire in Germany. He soon procured asanatorium where a panoply of occult cures was offered (including a hormonalcream he invented to increase male virility and female desire). His new wealthalso secured him an absurdly decadent lifestyle. He had several luxury cars,seven apartments, and a yacht larger than any a Rockefeller might ponder, whichhe named the Ursel IV. For his forays into the nocturnal demiworld of Berlin, Hanussenenlisted a menacing retinue of six pistol-toting bodyguards, and was alsoimmediately recognized by the bevy of stunning actresses always at his side,each swathed in a net of jewels and attired in revealing dresses that themaster himself designed.

Hanussen’s yacht was the scene oflavish feasts, where drugs were offered that even sophisticated Berliners — whowere quite familiar with the enchantments of cocaine — didn’t know about. Nakedwomen and exotic boys performed shocking revues. Sometimes, after midnight,Hanussen demonstrated one of his specialties: his ability to hypnotize womeninto sexual frenzy and then sustained orgasm. A Swedish baroness, Barbara vanSwieten, otherwise known on the nightclub circuit as La Jana, often hostedthese events and sometimes acted as a willing participant. Even for a Berlin accustomed todebauched nighttime displays, Hanussen’s were considered phenomenal, over thetop.

A debate over the veracity of Hanussen’s omnipotent powers was on everyfashionable Berliner’s lips. But still he capitalized on public interest bypurchasing a Breslau printing firm in 1931,and then launching an occult journal, Hanussen Magazin, and a biweeklytabloid, Bunte Wochenschau. Prominent writers and artists such asGerhart Hauptmann, Hanns Ewers, and Conrad Veidt furnished pieces on theirexperiences with the paranormal. Thomas Mann, the leading novelist of the day,was a regular contributor. Subscribers were encouraged to apply for membershipsin the Hanussen Society, where tickets to his stage productions were offered ata fifty percent discount. Clairvoyant workshops and discussion groups formedaround the magazine, and its circulation rose into the hundreds of thousands.But as the psychic’s fortunes grew, Germany’s fell.

In 1931, the Great Depression had not eased in Central Europe.Long-established banks closed their doors permanently, and bankruptcies amongthe middle class and landowners were soaring. Shaken Ruhrindustrialists slowed production, and, most threatening to the already weakenedsocial fabric, unemployment rates tripled. Eight million Germans were out ofwork.

The political process stalemated. At the national Reichstag and in theprovincial assemblies, the traditional parties offered few lasting solutions.Their patrician bickering seemed to cancel out whatever short-term bromideswere concocted. Coalition party cabinets shifted by the month and votes ofno-confidence in the Reichstag became the norm. The common ground had fallenaway.

The German public responded to the deadlock in various ways. Big-citythrill-seekers intensified their pursuit of back-alley pleasures; those grounddown materially and spiritually by the endless civic chaos gravitatedperilously into the beckoning arms of religious fanatics and “kohlrabi”prophets like Josef Weissenberg and Therese Neumann; and tens of millionsenlisted in or began supporting extremist parties on the political fringe.

More than three million militant workers swelled the ranks of the GermanCommunist Party. And stunning the political pundits, Adolf Hitler’s National Socialists— the radical Nazi movement — had increased its electoral might by a factor ofnine, or by seven and a half million new votes, by 1930. Heavily armed militiasfrom rival Communist and Nazi factions roamed Germany’s streets at will. Riotsand murderous violence followed them everywhere they appeared. Municipal policeservices, like the national politicians, seemed helpless against the throngs —the army continually threatened to apply extraordinary measures, butcontinually failed to re-establish order.

In this chaos,support for the Nazis fell. In 1932, the electorate was having second thoughtsabout Hitler’s campaign of nonstop terror, and Nazi party coffers wereeffectively depleted by February of that year. Hitler’s uncompromising bid tobe appointed chancellor was openly challenged by the Nazi movement’s innercouncil. Talk of replacing Hitler as the party’s figurehead gained momentum.The future certainly did not look bright for the Nazis — but it could not havelooked bleaker for the Führer himself.

Like many other Berliners at the time, Hanussen had more than a passinginterest in the unstable political scene. And, though he had fame and money, helonged for respectability. His magazines usually skewed toward articles aboutmagnetic healing or how to achieve marital bliss through hypnotic suggestion.But he wanted to be known as an intellectual — not merely a clairvoyant andpopular showman but a real social thinker. On March 25, 1932, Hanussenissued his first electoral premonition. He could not have been prepared for thefallout.

The headline in HanussenMagazin read HANUSSEN IN TRANCE PREDICTS HITLER’S FUTURE. The cover storyproclaimed, in breathless prose, that Adolf Hitler, the Austrian housepainterstill without German citizenship papers, would be appointed Reich chancellor inexactly one year’s time. Furthermore, according to Hanussen’s ecstatic vision,it would be Hitler’s deadly foes, Hindenburg and his Nationalist allies, whowould point the Nazi Führer to the exalted chair at the head of the ReichChancellery.

In March of ’32,Hanussen’s prediction was a deranged and comical assault on conventionalpolitical thought. Sophisticated Berliners viewed Hitler as a hysterical,Chaplinesque figure and his Nazi zealots as little more than thuggish losers,hawking a senseless racist ideology, adorned with swastika-laced trinkets. Fewtook Hanussen’s portent seriously — except, notably, the Führer himself, whowas then barricaded in the Hotel Kaiserhof with a few remaining politicalallies.

Hitler was seen by many Germans, even then, as an extremely troubled andneurotic individual. But his firm belief in his historical mission and overallmegalomania probably had much to do with his seductive appeal. Hitler sustainedhis personal convictions, often against all objective reality.

He was known to rely heavily on otherworldly omens and Southern German folksuperstitions. So someone like Hanussen was of interest to the Führer. The Nazipress ran with the story of Hanussen’s premonition under the heading hanussen,the man who is never wrong! And while Hitler lost the next presidentialelection to Hindenburg by six million votes, the psychic was nonethelesswelcomed into the Nazi fold as someone who might be of great use to themovement.

Count Wolf Helldorf, a Naziinsider and unrepentant libertine, was the first National Socialist to meetwith the seer. On the Ursel IV, Helldorf partied and had his fortunetold. At one orgy, it was reported, Helldorf flagellated a naked boy sostrenuously that the youngster fainted from pain. Other Nazi officers in Berlin soon joinedHelldorf on visits to Hanussen’s yacht. Later many of them complained to theCount about Hanussen’s large circle of Jewish friends and nearly all-Jewishstaff.

In June of 1932, Helldorf offered to introduce Hanussen to the Führer, who hadbeen meaning to extend his warm gratitude to the clairvoyant. Hanussen agreedenthusiastically — finally, someone was taking his thoughts seriously. Hanussenthen gave a huge donation to the SA fund and showed up at Helldorf’s bank toquietly pay off the Count’s enormous overdrafts, which had accumulated from hisnighttime activities and gambling.

Hitler and Hanussen, soon to be nicknamed the two “H’s,” had much in common.Just as Hitler brought prophecy into politics, Hanussen blended politics withprophecy. They were born within weeks of one another, and both were raised inGerman-speaking villages on the outskirts of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Aschildren, they suffered from neglect and ran away to Vienna, where they hoped to make theirfortunes as artists. On Vienna’sPraterstrasse, they may have dawdled over coffee and Sacher tortes in the samedives. They loved amusement parks and served as lance corporals in a commoncause during the Great War. And finally they came to Germany,to Berlin,propelled into the great city by the fuel of ambition.

But Hitler, who railedunceasingly against the existence of the Jewish people in Europe,didn’t know Hanussen was actually Herschmann Steinschneider, a Jew, born ofJewish parents, and by then married three times in traditional Jewishceremonies. Hanussen told Hitler that he was the son of an aristocratic Danishfamily, and was fortunate that no one in Hitler’s circle ever asked him toutter a word in Danish, in which he knew not even how to say “thank you.”

Run ragged withelectioneering in the summer of 1932, Hitler began to take regular sessionswith the great magician. Hanussen charted the Führer’s horoscope, taught himthe proper use of the mandrake root, and improved Hitler’s manic body languageand patterns of speech for better public effect. In exchange, the Führerpromised Hanussen high office and the directorship of an Aryan Collegeof the Occult Arts.

While Hanussen was becoming closer to Hitler, the Communist popularpress became obsessed with the clairvoyant, running more than twenty-eightfeatures on Hanussen in 1932. Bruno Frei, the editor of Berlin am Morgen,and soon a particularly destructive enemy to Hanussen, launched a vitriolicseries entitled A CHARLATAN CONQUERS BERLIN:WE EXPOSE THE SWINDLER-CLAIRVOYANT ERIK JAN HANUSSEN. In it, Hanussen wasvilified as the “Prophet of the Third Reich” and “Hitler’s Spiritual Father.”If Hanussen had kept his public persona relatively free of politicalpartisanship until then, and his dealings with Nazis fairly private andafter-dark, now he found himself — as did, by association, the readers of hispublications — pushed squarely into the Hitler camp. The SA, who took care oftheir kind, replaced Hanussen’s private bodyguards. In return, the psychicbegan to incorporate Nazi symbolism into his tabloid.

Of course, it wasn’t long before Frei and his digging reportersunearthed the truth about Hanussen’s Jewish background. Rumors had beenfloating — somechorus girls couldn’t keep it to themselves that the Aryan prophet had acircumcised penis. Frei couldn’t haveinvented a better story for his newspaper’s series:

Hitler,the defender of the German nation against the international Jewish conspiracy,was himself under the spell of a duplicitous Jew.

An exposé of Hanussen’s origins ran on August 14, and then, to add fuelto fire, Frei sent a personal letter to Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi propagandachief, stating that Hanussen was a full-blooded Jew, the nephew of a rabbi fromthe Austrian ghetto of Pressburg. The allegation appeared in a December issueof Goebbels’s daily sheet, Der Angriff, where Hanussen was described asa “Czech Jew.”

Count Helldorf, now the titular head of Berlin’s SA, was appalled and evenfrightened by the news. Could his leading benefactor and valued eveningcompanion be an impostor named Steinschneider? Helldorf visited Hanussen’sprivate office on the Kurfürstendamm, where the psychic fabricated a moredetailed personal history for himself. Yes, he said, the Czech passport wasauthentic, but the newspaper stories were not. Hanussen explained that hisparents were young Danish nobles, who died in a mountain-climbing accident in Moravia. Hanussen saidhe was then adopted by a kindly Jewish couple in the nearby village ofProssnitz — which is why, he explained, he spoke a smattering of Yiddish andhad a special affinity for Jewish people.

Hanussen then produced forged adoption papers from a drawer. Convinced,Helldorf informed a disbelieving Goebbels of his discovery. Der Angriffissued a short retraction on December 13: Erik Jan Hanussen was no Jew.

Of course, the noose was tightening around Hanussen nonetheless. Againstodds that had seemed unsurpassable only months before, Hitler was coming topower. Hanussen’s Jewish staff were leaving Berlin — taking extended wintervacations in Paris, Vienna, Prague, or Budapest.Some transferred German bank accounts to secure firms in Switzerland.But Hanussen took the opposite tack. As Hitler edged toward the victory line,Hanussen expanded his Berlinoperations. He bought a mansion on Lietzenburgstrasse, which he then convertedinto a gilded venue called the Palace of the Occult.

The place was pure extravagance: gold leaf and Carrara marble covered nearly every surface,and inscribed on the palace’s doors and passageways were mystic andastrological signs from the ancient Egyptian and Babylonian pantheon. Blue-eyedattendants in diaphanous garments of white and pale green floated through maze-likehallways, leading visitors into inner sanctums, like the Room of Silence, wherea throne rested on a platform that could hoist Hanussen thirty feet in the air.In the centermost chamber of the palace, under a massive domed ceiling, stood acolossal bronze sculpture of the master, dressed in a toga, with his left armraised in the Nazi gesture of victory.

And for the Nazis there was a victory. Hanussen’s mad premonition from 1932 hadcome true. On January 30, 1933, Hitler accepted the title of Reich chancellorof Germany.President Hindenburg, no lover of the Nazis, believed that stability could beachieved by placing Hitler in high office, that this would both stunt thegrowth of Communism and appease the Führer’s lunatic hordes.

SA and SS storm troopers took to the streets in glorious celebration. Hanussenbecame ever more desperate to ingratiate himself with Hitler and Goebbels.Conspiracy theorists have it that it was then he became involved in a plan thatwould propel Hitler from appointed leader of Germany to its absolute dictator,no longer subject to constitutional restraints or checks from unsympatheticcommanders of the army — something that would forever keep Hanussen in Hitler’sgood books.

The strategy was simple:destroy the Reichstag building through arson, and then place the blame at thefeet of the Communists. Hitler could then rule by extraordinary decree. Apatsy, the person who would light the fire, was needed. He is said to have beenfound in a down-and-out Berlinpub. Marinus van der Lubbe was a drifter from the Netherlands, a Communist Partymember, and mentally impaired. Whether or not he was hypnotized by Hanussenremains the subject of rumor, but in any case, van der Lubbe was shownblueprints of the Reichstag and taught how to use specially designed incendiarydevices.

Which Nazis were involvedin the plot is still open to question as well. It is more than probable thatCount Helldorf and a few of his aides participated in its history-shatteringexecution. What we do know is that three days before the planned arson,Hanussen ran an article in his occult magazine predicting the Reichstag’s fierydemise. And at a séance in his Palace of the Occult, before Helldorf and a slewof invited reporters, Hanussen ranted about a fire that would engulf the Germannation. He saw it clearly, he said: the conflagration would take place in thecenter of Berlin.

The Reichstag fire broke out twenty hours later. The Berlin police caught van der Lubbe, whoconfessed to the criminal deed and his membership in the Communist Party. Inthe two international trials that followed, it was remarked that the Dutchmandidn’t seem crazed as much as under some kind of hypnotic trance. Hitler usedthe Reichstag fire to outlaw the Communist Party and then issued a series oflaws that in March 1933 would shock Germany and the world. The dreadedThird Reich officially commenced.


In its first days, Hanussen felt secure. He was booked for a few Berlin shows, his tabloid was one of two publicationsissued to prisoners in the newly created concentration camp at Dachau, and Nazi bigwigs continued tofrequent the Palace of the Occult.

But his grand complicityin the Reichstag plot, the huge amount of money owed to him by Helldorf and hisSA underlings, as well as films of Nazi orgies recorded on the Ursel IV,were all capital liabilities. Hanussen, who may have had faith in blackmail asa way out, forgot that blackmail was very poor protection against those quitecomfortable with murder.

Goebbels was still smoldering from the Angriff retraction, which hedidn’t believe anyway. Hanussen was a Jew. He was a Jewish pest. He was nolonger useful to the movement, and his embarrassing proximity to the Führerneeded to be excised from German history.
SA officers in Hanussen’s circle were suddenly reassigned or demoted. On March20, 1933, Count Helldorf, who had been appointed high police commissioner of Berlin in February, wassummarily dismissed from his post. Nazi Minister of the Interior HermannGoering informed him that his new position was that of chief commissioner ofPotsdam, where one of his prime functions involved the breeding of horses.

Then, on the evening of March 24, a squadron of SA men showed up at Hanussen’sapartment. The Prophet of the Third Reich was about to depart for a nineo’clock performance. When informed that he was under arrest, Hanussen laughedit off as a practical joke. The commanding officer then demanded that all ofthe loan receipts Hanussen had collected from his SA debtors be turned over immediately.Hanussen was driven to Gestapo headquarters on General-Pape Strasse, where hefaced charges of complicity with Communists and of submitting a phony Aryancertificate in order to gain admittance to the Nazi party. A few hours laterHanussen was executed with three pistol shots. Two struck him in the head. Hiscorpse was robbed of everything except thirty marks in bills, and he was dumpedin a field north of Berlin.

When Hanussen’s disfigured body was discovered by a farmer two weeks later,Hanussen’s relatives were asked to come to the morgue and identify it. By thenthe Palace of the Occult and Hanussen’s seven apartments had been thoroughlylooted.

Marinus van der Lubbe was beheaded at the conclusion of the Reichstag arsontrial in 1934. From exile in Prague, Paris, and Mexico City, Bruno Frei continued his journalistic crusadeagainst Hanussen and Nazism long after the seer’s demise and after the manymaterials linking Hanussen to the Führer were thought to have been destroyed.Count Helldorf, in July 1944, assisted in a Wehrmacht conspiracy to assassinateHitler at the Führer’s Wolfsschanze retreat. This Nazi plot failed. After asixteen-day investigation, Helldorf and seven other staff officers were foundguilty of high treason. They were hung from meat hooks and left to die by slowasphyxiation.

In the end, theHanussen-Hitler saga proved to be an embarrassment for everyone involved: Nazihistorians — as well as their Allied counterparts — attempted to destroy orconceal all materials linking the two “H’s.” The relationship was bad for theNational Socialists and bad for the Jews. For post-war America,exposure of the complicity of any Jews in Hitler’s coup and the Nazi policiesthat followed was, at the very least, an exercise in poor political taste. Themost famous clairvoyant in Europe wasconsigned to the dustbin of history, with only traces left to tell hisextraordinary story.



THESECULAR ZIONIST AGENDA FOR A JEWISH STATE

RabbiDr. Chaim Simons

P.O.B.1775, Kiryat Arba

90100,Israel

teland fax: 02-9961252 (within Israel),

972 29961252 (from outside Israel)

e-mail:chaimsimons@gmail.com

August2007

INTRODUCTION

In an article in the English edition of "Mishpacha" in January2005 appeared the following:

"The Left is still loyal to the State of Israel in varying levels offaithfulness, but it hates Eretz Yisrael. The difference between these two isclear: Eretz Yisrael is a reminder of the Left's Jewish past, which it wishesto forget. ... The Left's disconnection from the Jewish nation has reached thepoint where they are prepared for settlers to be killed during the evacuationeffort [Gaza area and North Shomron]. Spokesmen of the Left have already announced that thiswill not be a war of brother against brother since 'the settlers are not ourbrothers'." (1)

Unfortunately this is not a new phenomenon. It has always been anintegral part of the secular Zionist agenda. They wanted a Jewish State(according to some of them, even if it were to be in Ugandaor Argentina)but it had to be administered according to their programme and perception forthe "New Jew."

***********************************************

NOTE

Although much of the material appearing in this paper can be found inother books or articles, the material is often brought down as secondary oreven tertiary sources. In addition, the primary sources are on a number ofoccasions incorrectly quoted and there are even cases where the quotationsgiven do not occur in the sources given. Therefore the only quotations ofstatements made by secular Zionists brought in this paper are those which theauthor of this paper has a photocopy from in the original in his possession.Due to limitations in the disc space, facsimiles of these documents cannotappear in this online copy. In many cases the original documents are no longerextant or could not be located, despite extensive searching. In such cases theinformation alleged to be contained in them has been completely omitted fromthis paper.

In the English quotes, Palestineusually appears when referring to Eretz Yisrael and it has of course be left asit appears in the original.

The following words appearing in the Hebrew quotes have not beentranslated:

Aliyah -- Jewish immigration to Eretz Yisrael

Hachshara -- Training given to people in preparation for Aliyah

Shlichim - Jewish emissaries sent abroad to Jewish communities

Yishuv - Jewish community of Eretz Yisrael

*************************************************

SELECTIVITY -- THE SECULAR ZIONIST WAY

Eretz Yisrael was Divinely given to the Jewish people (2) and every Jewhas an equal right to live there. However as we shall see, the secular Zioniststhought otherwise.

At the eighteenth Zionist Congress held in Prague in August 1933, Ben-Gurion said

"Eretz Yisrael today needs not ordinary immigrants, but pioneers.The difference between them is simple -- an immigrant comes to take from theland, whereas a pioneer comes to give to the land. Therefore we demand priorityfor Aliyah to pioneers."(3) (emphasis in original)

The question here is how would Ben-Gurion define an "ordinaryimmigrant" and how a "pioneer"? From his speech, it is obviousthat a person working the land on a kibbutz is a pioneer. However, it wouldalmost certainly appear that an old person coming to spend his last years inthe Holy Land or even a Yeshiva student would be classed as a mere"ordinary immigrant"!(4)

A few months later in mid-October 1933 a meeting took place between,amongst others, the High Commissioner for Palestine,David Ben-Gurion and Moshe Shertok (Sharett). The Minutes of the meeting werewritten up by Shertok.

During the course of this meeting Ben-Gurion spoke about the threemillion Jews then living in Poland and stated that:

"Palestine offered no solution for allPolish Jews. Immigration into Palestine was necessarily limited, therefore ithad to and could be a selected immigration. Zionism was not a philanthropicenterprise, they really wanted here the best type of Jew to develop the Jewish NationalHome, but they had to be given sufficient scope to bring over people of whomthe country was in need."(5)

The question which remains is who would decide who was"the best type of Jew"? As will soon be seen, such a Jew was someonewho was a secular Zionist!

It was a few years later at the 20th Zionist Congress held in Zurich in August 1937,that Weizmann spelled out more specifically what was meant by "selectiveAliyah."

 

"I told the members of the Royal [Peel]Commission that six million Jews want to go on Aliyah. One of the members askedme ' Do you think you could bring all of them to Eretz Yisrael?' On this Ianswered ... that two million young people... we want to save. The old peoplewill pass. They will bear their fate or they will not. They have already becomelike dust, economic and moral dust in this cruel world."(6)

A similar rejection of elderly Jews to go on Aliyah was made by HenryMontor, the Executive Vice-Chairman of the United Jewish Appeal for Refugeestowards the beginning of 1940. A ship full of refugees not certified by theZionist organisations, were on the high seas. Many of the passengers wereelderly. The captain of the ship required money to bring them to Eretz Yisrael.Rabbi Baruch Rabinowitz of Marylandtook the matter in hand and tried to get the necessary money from Montor to paythe captain. In his long rambling letter of reply, Montor wrote about theJewish Agency's policy of "selectivity" -- "the choice ofyoung men and women who are trained in Europe for productive purposes either inagriculture or industry."

With regard to the elderly Jews on board this ship, Montor wrote:

"There could be no more deadly ammunitionprovided to the enemies of Zionism, whether they be in the ranks of the BritishGovernment or the Arabs, or even in the ranks of the Jewish people, ifPalestine were to be flooded with very old people or with undesirables whowould make impossible the conditions of life in Palestine and destroy theprospect of creating such economic circumstances as would insure a continuityof immigration."(7)

Maybe it would have been appropriate for him to have renamed hisorganisation "United Jewish Appeal for SelectedRefugees"! At least the donorswould then have had a better idea of what they were giving money for.

The secular Zionists were not even ashamed to put out a memorandum inwhich they quite openly had a section "Who tosave". This memorandum (ofApril/May 1943) was headed that its distribution was "intendedfor Zionist functionaries only" andit included instructions "not to pass iton to non-Zionist groups who participate in the Working Committee."(8)Although it came out under the name of A. [Apolinary] Hartglas, it has beensuggested that in fact it was Yitzchak Gruenbaum who actually wrote it.(9)

Under this section, he wrote

".... to my sorrow we have to say that ifwe are able to save only ten thousand people and we need to save fifty thousand[those chosen] should be of use in building up the land and the revival of thenation.... First and foremost one must rescue children since they are the bestmaterial for the Yishuv. One must rescue the pioneering youth, especially thosewho have had training and are idealistically qualified for Zionist work. Oneshould rescue the Zionist functionaries since they deserve something from theZionist movement for their work.... Pure philanthropic rescue, for example,saving the Jews of Germany, if carried out in an indiscriminate manner, couldfrom a Zionist prospective only cause harm."(10)

As can be seen, just as with both Weizmann and Montor,Hartglas was not interested in old people coming to Eretz Yisrael. Even amongstthe younger generation, he was only interested in those who would work the land- Yeshivah students were of no use to him.

Further exclusions to Aliyah by the secular Zionists were people whowere not members of the Zionist camp. Some Jews who succeeded in arriving inEretz Yisrael in the second half of 1944 gave evidence on this question.

Pinchas Gross who had been one of the public workers of Agudat Yisraelin Rumania stated:

"The first principle of the Zionist AliyahCommittee in Bucharest was not to allow members of Agudat Yisrael to go onAliyah to Eretz Yisrael. This was despite the agreement which had been madebefore the war between Agudat Yisrael and the Jewish Agency on the Aliyahquotas for members of Agudat Yisrael... Shlichim from the [Aliyah] Committee inBucharest arrived in Transylvania with large sums of money in order to transferhundreds of pioneers to Bucharest for the purpose of Aliyah. We also asked forour members the possibility of Aliyah but we were rudely rejected."(11)

One might think that this money was "Zionistmoney" and therefore it wasproper to reject such a request. However, this was shown not to be the casejust a few weeks later when Weissberg who was a member of the Aliyah Committeein Bucharest, gave evidence before the RescueCommittee in Jerusalem.During this evidence he stated

"It is true that the Agudah was notgranted equal rights with regards to receiving money for assistance in Rumania.We did not know that the money which arrived from Eretz Yisrael was money fromthe Rescue Committee in which all the Yishuv participated. We thought that themoney was Jewish Agency money.... I must inform you that help was not given tothe pioneers and youth of Agudat Yisrael. We did not know that Agudah is apartner in matters of rescue and in particular in matters of Aliyah. Alsoregarding the Aliyah of the pioneers of Agudah, we did not know that they wereentitled to go on Aliyah, until we arrived in Eretz Yisrael."(12)

We can thus see that the secular Zionists did nothing to even inform theAgudah what they were entitled to, let alone implement such an entitlement.

There were also others who had been misled in believing that the moneywas "Zionist money". For example,the Vishnitzer Rebbe, Rabbi Eliezer Hager, testified that when he asked why theultra-Orthodox were not receiving any money, received the answer, "This money is Zionist and it is set aside solelyfor Zionists."(13)

Pinchas Gross further stated:

"The ultra-Orthodox youth were not at allconsidered for this [financial] assistance either in their home town or for thepossibility of Aliyah. We applied... for assistance for our youth who beforethe war did a period of Hachshara and were no less fit for Aliyah than otherpioneers -- but we did not even receive an answer. The excuse was that themoney was Zionist money and was solely for them."(14)

This attitude of the secular Zionists in their use of public money fortheir kith and kin and of their "priorities" did not pass without comment, even from non-Orthodoxsources.

Dr. Judah Leon Magnes in addressing a meeting of the Rescue Committee inJuly 1944 was very critical of those who wanted:

"first of all to save the Zionists, andafterwards, if possible -- also the others, but above all the Zionists. I spoketo somebody.... The man said... we will save our men.... I said to him ... theothers are also Jews. He said: It is so, they are Jews, but this is a universalargument, a perpetual argument and we will not give in on this."(15)

Magnes' comments on the necessity for non-selectivity when doing rescuework are illustrated by the work performed during the Second World War by RechaSternbuch, who succeeded in rescuing thousands of Jews from the Nazis. Rechawas associated with the strictly Orthodox Agudat Yisrael party. However, unlikethe secular Zionists, she rescued Jews (and even some non-Jews) regardless oftheir level of religious observance or Zionist party affiliation.(16)

ZIONISM -- AND ONLY THEN JEWISH LIVES

A few months after the beginning of the Second World War the Zionistsreceived entry visas to Eretz Yisrael for 2,900 German Jews. It was necessaryto have a meeting with the British Colonial Secretary, Malcolm MacDonald, inconnection with these visas and in November 1939, David Ben-Gurion and MosheShertok met to discuss this question. Ben-Gurion strongly opposed such ameeting with MacDonald and he told Shertok that

"our political future is more importantthan saving 2,900 Jews." Shertok, who completely disagreed with Ben-Gurion,commented in his diary, "he [Ben-Gurion]was prepared to forgo them [the 2,900 Jews]."(17)

Even in July 1944, which was towards the end of this war, when the Holocaustwas still in full progress and its implementation was already well known,Ben-Gurion still had the same attitude. A meeting of the Executive of theJewish Agency was held in Jerusalemat the beginning of July 1944. On its agenda was the subject of the rescue ofJews.

Rabbi Baruch Yehoshua Yerachmiel Rabinowicz, the Munkaczer Rebbe in Hungary, wasinvolved in this rescue effort and the question of a meeting with him wasmentioned at this Jewish Agency meeting. In answer Ben-Gurion stated that hedid not oppose such a meeting,

"We must do everything in this matter [ofrescue] including things which seem fantastic."

Had Ben-Gurion said no more, it would have been praiseworthy, but hethen continued,

"But there is one condition: the work willnot cause damage to Zionism."(18)

In a letter to the Israeli daily newspaper "Ha'aretz" in 1983,the historian Professor Yigal Eilam confirmed that this was the attitude of theZionist leaders during the period of the Holocaust. He wrote:

"The policy of the Zionists during thelong period of the Holocaust gave priority to the building up of the land andthe establishment of a State, over the saving of Jews.... One already needs totell these things in a open and direct manner. The Zionists did very little in thesaving of Jews, not because they were unable to do more, but because they wereconcentrating on the Zionist enterprise."(19)

In a similar vein, in an article by the historian Dina Porat whichappeared in "Ha'aretz" in 1991, she wrote

"From the moment that the State became theprimary objective, the life of a Jew became secondary in accordance with theprincipal 'the State of Israel is above everything'".(20)

The shortsightedness of the secular Zionist leaders in this matter waswritten about in 1984 by Rabbi Morris Sherer, the President of Agudat Yisrael,in his comments on the report by Professor Seymour Maxwell Finger entitled"American Jewry during the Holocaust."

Rabbi Sherer commented:

"Alas, they [the secular Zionist leaders]did not perceive how utterly ridiculous and heartless it was for Jewish leadersto concentrate on a postwar homeland, when the people for whom they wereseeking this home were being slaughtered like sheep!" (21)

Unlike Ben-Gurion who put Zionism first, and Jewish lives just in secondplace, the Rabbis of the period immediately put "Pikuach Nefesh" (thesaving of lives) first. Sabbath observance is one of the fundamentals of Jewishobservance, with the most stringent of punishments for their non-observance,yet despite this, Pikuach Nefesh overrides the Sabbath.(22) In order to savelives during the Holocaust, two leading British Rabbis, Rabbi Solomon Schonfeldand Rabbi Isadore Grunfeld, who were occupied in forging passports to saveJews, continued their work on the Sabbath.(23) Rabbis Boruch Kaplan and RabbiAlexander Linchner rode around Brooklyn in New York in a car on the Sabbathfrom house to house collecting money to save Jews.(24) (These actions arenormally forbidden on the Sabbath.)

IF NOT ALIYAH, LET THEM PERISH

In 1933, Hitler rose to power and during the subsequent years, more andmore draconian measures, such as the Nuremberglaws were enacted against the Jews. In 1938 Hitler marched into Austria to thecheers of the non-Jewish population.

The situation for the Jews under Hitler's domination became unbearableand places of refuge became a grave necessity. It was thus at this period thatPresident Franklin Roosevelt convened a conference of thirty-two nations at theFrench resort town of Evian to try and find places of refuge for Jews wantingto flee from Hitler.

One would naturally have thought that the Zionist leaders of the timewould make the most of this opportunity and devote all their time and energy toensure that successful results would emerge from this Conference. But sadlythis was not to be.

Already in mid-June 1938, before the opening of the Conference, Dr.Georg Landauer wrote to Dr. Stephen Wise, who was head of the ZionistOrganization of America.In it he wrote:

"I am writing this letter to you at therequest of Dr. Weizmann, as we are very much concerned in case the issue ispresented at the [Evian] Conference in a manner which may harm the work forPalestine. Even if the Conference will not place countries other than Palestinein the front for Jewish immigration, there will certainly be public appealswhich will tend to overshadow the importance of Palestine.... We feel all themore concern as it may bind Jewish organisations to collect large sums of moneyfor assisting Jewish refugees, and these collections are likely to interferewith our own campaigns."(25)

Two weeks later the Jewish Agency Executive met in Jerusalem and opposition to the planned EvianConference was openly stated.

Yitzchak Gruenbaum said:

"The Evian Conference can be expected tocause us grave damage - Eretz Yisrael could be eliminated as a country forJewish immigration ... [we are] very apprehensive that in this Conference, itcould be relegated to the end of the line. We have to prevent this damage...There is the danger that whilst searching for a destination country, some newterritory will be found to which Jewish immigration will be directed. We mustdefend our principle that Jewish settlement can only succeed in Eretz Yisraeland that no other settlement can come into the calculation."(26)

Menachem Ussishkin then addressed the meeting in a similar vein. TheEvian Conference very much worried him and he supported the words of Gruenbaum.

"Mr. Gruenbaum is right when he says thatthere is the danger that Eretz Yisrael will be removed from the agenda even bythe Jews and one should see this as a tremendous blow to us."(27)

Of course the ideal solution was for Jews to go to Eretz Yisrael.However in view of the then political situation, immigration there was not afeasible proposition. Surely the only question then should have been how tosave and help as many Jews as possible. It was this fact that should have beenthe only concern of the speakers at that Jewish Agency Executive meeting -- butit wasn't!

A few weeks later, Weizmann wrote to Stephen Wise. Towards the beginningof his letter he wrote:

"I made arrangements, before leaving formy holiday, to put in a few days at Evian."(28)

If one thinks for a moment about this sentence, one can see that it ishorrific. Surely, if there was even the slightest opportunity of saving evenone Jew, Weizmann who was the President of the Zionist Organization should haveimmediately cancelled his personal holiday arrangements and spent all his timeat Evian trying to lobby the various delegates to accept Jews in theircountries. But what do we see? -- he will just before going on holiday"put in a few days at Evian."

In fact he was later persuaded by his friends not to even "put in a few days" there, to which advice he followed.(29) Thereason was stated by Dr. Arthur Ruppin at a meeting of the Jewish AgencyExecutive on 21 August. Ruppin stated:

 "we then decided that it would not be to our prestige for Dr.Weizmann to appear in Evian"(30)

-- the reason being that he would only have been allowed to speak in asub-committee! Jewish lives were at stake and to worry about prestige!!

One can immediately contrast this attitude with that of the Jewishreligious leaders of the time. Rabbi Aharon Kotler had come under some criticismfor meeting in the course of his rescue work with Stephen Wise, a leader of theReform movement. He shrugged such reprobation saying,

"I would prostrate myself before the Popeif I knew it would help to save even the fingernail of one Jewish child."(31)

Unfortunately nothing concrete came out of the Evian Conference. Thesituation of the Jews in Germanygot even worse and on 9 November 1938 there was the infamous Kristallnacht.

A few days later, Weizmann heard that there was a scheme to resettleGerman Jews in a country other than Eretz Yisrael. This he did not like and heimmediately sent off a telegram to stop any financial backing for such ascheme. This telegram was sent to Samuel Vandenbergh in Wassemar.

"Understand you are embarking large financialeffort for settlement German Jews. Beg of you to be careful not disperse anddissipate energies which can nowhere be applied with greater effectiveness bothimmediately and lasting than in Palestine."(32)

Since at that period emigration to Eretz Yisrael wasunfortunately not a practical proposition, Weizmann is effectively saying thatrather than immigrate to another country, the Jews must remain in Nazi Germany.

We can see that also Ben-Gurion thought on these same lines as the othersecular Zionist leaders. It was at this period that Ben-Gurion addressed theMapai Central Committee. He realised the seriousness of the situation and said:

"On these awesome days at the start of thethreatened destruction of European Jewry.... If I would know that it would bepossible to save all the German [Jewish] children by bringing them over toEngland and only half of them by transporting them to Eretz Yisrael, I wouldchoose the second option -- since before us is not just these children but thehistory of the Jewish people."(33)

At this period, the Germans had already established concentration campsand were sending Jews to them. In order to pre-empt this, it was necessary tofind the means of arranging their emigration from Germany. Ben-Gurion, however, feltthis could cause a diversion of resources and endanger Zionism. A few daysafter his above quoted speech to the Mapai Central Committee, he addressed theExecutive of the Jewish Agency:

"Zionism now stands in danger.... If theJews will have to choose on the one hand the refugee question,[namely] savingJews from concentration camps and on the other hand assisting a national museumin Eretz Yisrael, mercy would decide the matter and all the energy of the[Jewish] people would be diverted to saving Jews in the various countries.Zionism would be struck off the agenda, not only in world opinion in Englandand America, but also in Jewish public opinion. The existence of Zionism wouldbe at risk if we allow a separation between the refugee problem and the Eretz Yisraelproblem."(34)


NOT ONE PENNY, NOT ONE CENT

The mass extermination of the Jews of Europewas already well known by the end of 1942. Saving Jews could and should havebeen top priority. But in order to save large numbers of people fromextermination costs money -- whether normal expenses or money for bribery.Needless to say, the money has to come from somewhere. All the time money wasdonated by world Jewry to funds such as the Keren Hayesod, the JNF, and so on.It is true that this money had been specifically donated for Eretz Yisrael, buthere was a case of Pikuach Nefesh and it would have been quite legitimate,indeed mandatory, to have utilised this money for the saving of Jewish lives.The Jews then living in Eretz Yisrael were even saying so.

However Yitzchak Gruenbaum, who was head of the Rescue Committee of theJewish Agency thought otherwise. In a speech to the Zionist Smaller ActionsCommittee in January 1943 he expressed his views:

"Meanwhile a mood has begun to sweep overEretz Yisrael which I think is very dangerous to Zionism.... How is it possiblethat such a thing can occur in Eretz Yisrael, that in a meeting they will callout to me, 'If you don't have any money [for rescuing European Jewry] take themoney of the Keren Hayesod, take the money from the bank -- there, there ismoney, in the Keren Hayedod there is money.' ... These days in Eretz Yisrael itis being said, 'don't put Eretz Yisrael at the top of your priorities at thisdifficult time, at the period of a Holocaust and destruction of EuropeanJewry,' .... I don't accept such a thing. And when they asked me to give moneyof the Keren Hayesod to save Diaspora Jewry, I said no and I again said no....I am not going to defend myself, in the same way that I will not justify or defendmyself if they accuse me of murdering my mother .... But I think it isnecessary to say here: Zionism is above everything."(35)

The only consolation from reading Gruenbaum's speech, is that the Jewsliving in Eretz Yisrael were demanding the diverting of Keren Hayesod money torescue efforts, even though this meant that less money would arrive in EretzYisrael and could accordingly affect their living standards. In contrastGruenbaum commented "Zionism is aboveeverything" even though this meant not rescuing EuropeanJewry from the Holocaust.

In his book "Perfidy", Ben Hecht quoted how Gruenbaum said "No" to the giving of money for rescue activities.(36) Ina critical "Analysis" of this book by the American Section of theExecutive of the Jewish Agency, they write that this quoted sentence by BenHecht:

 "has been most viciously torn out of context. The writer of thisAnalysis then tries to prove, quoting other parts of Gruenbaum's speech that hewanted to do everything to save European Jewry.(37)

However he conveniently omitted one crucial part of the speech: "Zionism is above everything" --namely we will certainly do everything to save European Jewry provided that itis not at the expense of Zionism!

One might add that in 1961, Gruenbaum gave an interview to the paper"Etgar" from the comfort of his house in Gan Shmuel, in which herepeated these statements he made during the war, without even hinting he hadbeen wrong.

"Interviewer:

Was there then no money in the kitty of theJewish Agency, the JNF, the Keren Hayesod?

Gruenbaum:

Yes. Even then the argument went: Isn't thereany money? Take it from the JNF. I said: No! They did not want to forgive mefor this and until this day, there are murmurings about this. The money wasneeded for Zionism.

Interviewer:

What is the meaning of "for Zionism"when the saving of lives is at stake? Does Zionism want Jews alive or dead?

Gruenbaum:

The saving of life does not override Zion. ForJews, the State is essential. Therefore, in accordance with my manner I saidthe truth -- that is No!"(38)

Gruenbaum went on to say that he then went to South Africa to raise money forrescue purposes. However we all know that the raising of money, especially whenone has to travel to another continent takes time and every day taken meantmore Jews were being sent to the gas chambers. Surely the correct thing was toimmediately take money from these Zionist kitties and if at a later date onesucceeded in raising money, one could return it to the Zionist funds.

Even before the war, when Jews were already being persecuted in Germany and Austria, it was widely acceptedthat money to save Jewish lives came before money for Zionism. In was in lateOctober 1938 that the treasurer of the American Jewish Joint DistributionCommittee (JDC) said

"The upbuilding of Palestine was all verywell, but Jews in Europe were starving and persecuted -- and they, JDC felt,had first claim on whatever funds were available."(39)

 

ALSO THE BRITISH SECULAR ZIONISTS

Placing Zionism above the saving the lives of Jews was also a phenomenonof the British secular Zionists. Towards the end of 1942, when the Naziextermination plans became known, British Jewry decided to make representationsto the British Government. At a meeting of the British section of the JewishAgency held in December 1942, the "Nazi Extermination Policy" was onthe agenda. Here is an extract from the official minutes of this meeting whendiscussing this item:

"Dr. Brodetsky ... made it quite clearthat if Palestine was not properly mentioned then he would not be a member ofthe Delegation to Mr. Eden....

Lord Melchett said it would be disastrous forany body of Jews to go to Mr. Eden and not put Palestine in the forefront oftheir plans. Such a body would not represent the views of the Jews either hereor elsewhere.....

Mr. Marks said he fully agreed, and if thiscondition was not satisfied, then he would not be a member of the delegation.Unless Palestine was properly dealt with, they should criticise the delegationup and down the country and cause a revolution inside the Board of Deputies....The dignity of the Jewish people was at stake and it was only in Palestine thatthe Jews could get their dignity back."(40)

As we well see, the above British secular Zionists would only attend ameeting with British Government officials to save Jews from the "Nazi Extermination Policy" if Eretz Yisrael was to be given a prominent place atthese meetings. Furthermore it was Jewish lives which were "at stake"and it was no time to worry about "dignity" being "atstake".

It was at the same period that the British secular Zionists sabotagednegotiations that Rabbi Dr. Solomon Schonfeld was making with the BritishGovernment for the rescue of the endangered Jews in Nazi Europe.Such rescue of Jews was not a new thing with Rabbi Schonfeld. Just before theSecond World War, he had organised Kindertransports and brought over to England from Germanyand Austriathousands of children.(41) To accommodate some of them he even utilized his ownhouse with him sleeping in the attic.(42)

Towards the end of 1942, Rabbi Schonfeld organised steps to rescue Jewsfrom Nazi Europe. To this end he workedexceptionally hard to organise wide support for a Motion to be tabled in theBritish Parliament for the British Government to be prepared to find temporaryrefuge in its territories or territories under its control for those endangeredby the Nazis. Within two weeks he amassed a total of 277 Parliamentarysignatures of all parties for this Motion.(43)

One would have thought that the British secular Zionists would havewelcomed and co-operated in such an initiative. Sadly this was not the case. Ina letter to the "Jewish Chronicle" at that period, Rabbi Schonfeldwrote:

"This effort was met by a persistentattempt on the part of Professor Brodetsky [President of the Board of Deputiesof British Jews] and some of his colleagues to sabotage the entire move.Without even full knowledge of the details, he and his collaborators askedMembers of the House [of Parliament] to desist from supporting the neweffort."(44)

Rabbi Schonfeld further elaborated on this in a letter to "TheTimes" of Londonat the time of the Eichmann trial in 1961.

"Already while the Parliamentary motionwas gathering momentum voices of dissent were heard from Zionist quarters: 'Whynot Palestine?' The obvious answers that the most urgent concern washumanitarian and not political, that the Mufti-Nazi alliance ruled outPalestine for the immediate saving of lives....When the next steps were beingenergetically pursued by over 100 M.Ps [Members of Parliament] and Lords, aspokesman for the Zionists announced that the Jews would oppose the motion onthe grounds of its omitting to refer to Palestine .... and thereafter themotion was dead."(45)

Rabbi Schonfeld's initiative came up at a meeting of the BritishExecutive of the Jewish Agency in January 1943. At this meeting, Berl Lockersaid that he and two of his colleagues:

"had asked him [Rabbi Schonfeld] topostpone the meeting in the House of Commons and not to continue working offhis own bat. They had also pointed out that the resolution which he hadproposed did not mention Palestine.... Mr. Locker wondered whether it would bea good thing for him or Dr. Brodetsky to write a letter to the Chief Rabbi, whomight be able to do something to stop this mischief."(46)

What was this "mischief" ofRabbi Dr. Schonfeld's that these British secular Zionists wanted "stopped"? This "mischief" washis trying to save the lives of Jews who were in Nazi Europe!!

 

EPILOGUE

In an interview given by someone who worked with the late KlausenbergerRebbe for half a century, he said in answer to a question on the Holocaust,

"When the Sabra and Shatila affair rockedthe nation, and hundreds of thousands of Israelis demonstrated in Tel Aviv,demanding a commission of inquiry into the government's lack of response to themassacre of Palestinians by Phalangist militants in Lebanon, the Rebbe couldn'trestrain himself. During a Shiur he delivered in Bnei Brak, he asked pointedly whythere was no call for a commission of inquiry into the lack of response of theZionist leaders in Eretz Yisrael during the murder of millions of Jews in theNazi-occupied lands. They had ignored the matter completely."(47)

 

REFERENCES

1) Rabbi Moshe Grylak, "How do they "know" it all?"Mishpacha (English edition), (Monsey, NY: Tikshoret VeChinuchDati-Yehudi), 12 January 2005, pp.6-7.

2) e.g. Genesis chap.12 verse 7.

3) Stenographisches Protokoll XVIII Zionistenkongresses, [OfficialMinutes of the 18th Zionist Congress], (London:Zentralbureau der Zionistischen Organisation), p.219.

4) David Kranzler, Thy Brother's Blood, (New York: Mesorah Publications,1987), pp.61-62, 241, 244.

5) Minutes of Interview with His Excellency the High Commissioner, 17October 1933, pp.4-5 (Labour Archives -- Lavon Institute IV-104-49-2-64. Thereis also a copy in Ben-Gurion Archives). At a later date Ben-Gurion wrote upthese minutes (in Hebrew) in his memoirs without any suggestion that they werenot what he had said at this meeting, (David Ben-Gurion, Memoirs, vol.1, (TelAviv: Am Oved, 1971), p.672).

6) Official Minutes of the 20th Zionist Congress, (Jerusalem: Executive of the ZionistOrganisation and the Jewish Agency), pp.32-33.

7) Montor to Rabinowitz, 1 February 1940, pp.2, 4, (Jabotinsky Archives,HT-10/16).

8) A. Hartglas, Comments concerning assistance and rescue, (April/May1943 -- possibly 24 April 1943), p.1, (CZA S26/1306 [previous no. S26/1232]).

9) Aryeh Morgenstern, "Vaad hahatzalah hameuchad ....," YalkutMoreshet, (Tel Aviv: Moreshet), vol.13, June 1971, p.95 fn.67.

10) Hartglas, op. cit., p.3.

11) Evidence of Pinchas Gross, a public worker of Agudat Yisrael of Rumania, givenin Tel Aviv on 27 July 1944, p.2, (CZA S26/1189 [previous no. S26/1079]).

12) Minutes, Presidium of the Rescue Committee, Jerusalem, 25 August 1944, (CZA S26/1189[previous no. S26/1079]).

13) Evidence of Vishnitzer Rebbe taken in Tel Aviv in April 1944, p.1,(CZA S26/1189 [previous no, S26/1079]).

14) Pinchas Gross, op. cit.

15) Minutes, Rescue Committee, Jerusalem,14 July 1944, p.7, (CZA S26/1327 [previous no. S26/1238aleph]).

16) Kranzler, op. cit., pp194-95.

17) Moshe Shertok Handwritten diary, 13 November 1939, p.66, (CZAS25/198/3. [Shertok also made a handwritten copy of his own diary CZA A245/14]

18) Minutes, Jewish Agency Executive. Jerusalem, 2 July 1944. p.8, (CZA).

19) Yigal Eilam, Letters to the Editor, Haaretz, (Tel Aviv), 15 April1983, p.24.

20) Dina Porat, "Manipulatzit Haadmorim," Haaretz, (Tel Aviv),12 April 1991, p.3b.

21) SeymourMaxwell Finger, American Jewry during the Holocaust, (New York: Holmes andMeier Publishers, second printing May 1984), Comment by Rabbi Morris Sherer,p.16.

22) Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim, chap.328, para.2.

23) S. Fordsham, Inbox, Mishpacha (English edition), op. cit., 9 May2007, p.10

24) Kranzler, op. cit., p.6.

25) Landauer to Wise, 13 June 1938, p.1, (CZA S53/1552aleph).

26) Minutes, Jewish Agency Executive, Jerusalem, 26 June 1938, p.6, (CZA)

27) Ibid., p.7.

28) Weizmann to Wise. 14 July 1938, p.1, (CZA Z4/17198).

29) Ibid., p.2.

30) Minutes, Jewish Agency Executive, Jerusalem, 21 August 1938, p.7. (CZA).

31) Kranzler, op. cit., p.146.

32) Telegram, Weizmann to Vandenburgh, 16 November 1938, (CZA Z4/17335).

33) Minutes, Mapai Central Committee, 7 December 1938, p.41, (LabourParty Archives -- Bet Berl 2-23-1938-21 bet).

34) Minutes, Jewish Agency Executive, Jerusalem, 11 December 1938, p.4, (CZA)

35) Minutes, Zionist Smaller Actions Committee, 18 January 1943,pp.12-13, (CZA).

36) Ben Hecht, Perfidy, (New York: Julian Messner, 1962), p.50.

37) The American Section of the Executive of the World ZionistOrganization and the Jewish Agency. Ben Hecht's 'Perfidy' - An analysis of hisrewriting of history, (New York: [s.n.], 1962), p.9.

38) "Mi asham b'hafkara," conversation with YitzchakGruenbaum, Etgar, (Tel Aviv: Mercaz Hapeula Hashemit), no.8, 29 June 1961, p.5.

39) Yehuda Bauer, My Brother's Keeper, (Philadelphia: The JewishPublication Society of America, 1974), p.255.

40) Minutes, Jewish Agency Executive, London, 21 December 1942, pp.2-3. (CZAZ4/302/26).

41) e.g. David Kranzler. Holocaust Hero, (New Jersey: Ktav, 2004).

42) Ibid., pp.38-39.

43) Solomon Schonfeld, Letters to the Editor, The Times, (London), 6 June 1961,p.13.

44) Solomon Schonfeld, Letters to the Editor, The Jewish Chronicle, (London), 29 January 1943,p.5.

45) Schonfeld, The Times, op. cit.

46) Minutes, Jewish Agency Executive, London, 21 January 1943, (CZA Z4/302/26).

47) "A strength beyond nature," Mishpacha (English edition),op. cit., 20 June 2007, p.16.