Jeanette Friedman

David Kranzler: Orthodox Ends, Unorthodox Means, Goldberg Commission Report on American Jews During the Holocaust

This was published by the Goldberg Commission to Examine the Role of American Jews During the Holocaust. David, a dear friend, is now gone, but he should be credited with doing an enormous amount of research into this issue. He also wrote “Thy Brother’s Blood” on the subject, published by Artscroll, and also, The Nazis, Japanese and Jews published by Ktav.

ORTHODOX ENDS, UNORTHODOX MEANS
The Role of the Vaad Hatzalah and Agudath Israel during the Holocaust
By David H. Kranzler

“The Orthodox were flexible in their approach and were thus able to adapt to conditions of ‘total war’ more readily than other Jewish groups…apparently it set the pace for other groups.”1
Professor Aryeh Tartakower (World Jewish Congress)

In this essay, the term “Orthodox” refers to two small Jewish organizations based in the United States: the Agudath Israel (The Agudah) and the Vaad Hatzalah. The Agudah, a branch of World Agudath Israel, began its work on refugee and immigration matters in 1938 in response to requests for rescue from Austria and Germany. It concentrated on obtaining sponsoring affidavits and visas for Orthodox Jews in occupied Europe. But it handled all requests that came its way, including those from the non-Orthodox.2

The Vaad Hatzalah (rescue committee) was formed in September 1939 by the Union of Orthodox Rabbis of the U.S. and Canada following the invasion of Poland by the Nazis. It specialized in raising funds to support Polish Talmudic scholars seeking refuge in then-neutral Vilna, Lithuania. In early 1941, following the Russian occupation of Lithuania, Dutch and Japanese authorities there helped the Vaad rescue 500 of these scholars and transport them to Shanghai, China, via Kobe, Japan. During the war, the Vaad, despite U.S. restrictions, managed to support these scholars and thousands of others who were trapped in Tashkent, Siberia, and other parts of the Soviet Union.3
Both the Agudah and the Vaad were volunteer organizations and shared several leaders in common. Each concentrated on its special area of expertise: the Agudah on obtaining emigration paperwork, the Vaad on raising funds to make the Agudah’s work possible. Each developed relationships with Congress, the State Department, and the Roosevelt Cabinet. By the end of 1943, they had set up a functioning rescue apparatus that spanned Switzerland, Turkey, England, Sweden, Tangiers, and Palestine. During the war, the two groups effected rescue far out of proportion to their size and to their political power.4
Of necessity they learned to make maximum use of minimum resources. Once, in 1940, learning that James G. MacDonald, Chairman of President Roosevelt’s Advisory Committee on Political Refugees, was about to cross the Atlantic, the leaders of both groups chipped in to buy passage for Rabbi Abraham Kalmanowitz of the Vaad—in a first-class cabin next to MacDonald’s. During the trip, Rabbi Kalmanowitz, in his best broken English, stressed to MacDonald the importance of the Talmud as a foundation of Judaism and argued that the loss of Eastern European scholars would be devastating for all Jewry. Soon Talmudic scholars were added to the roster of European intellectuals who were to receive visas under an FDR program that had been inspired by the Jewish Labor Committee earlier that year.5
On Sept. 2, 1942, a cable detailing the deportation and extermination of 100,000 Warsaw Jews was sent by Yitzhak Sternbuch in Switzerland to Jacob Rosenheim in New York via the Polish Embassy’s confidential pouch. Sternbuch, an Agudist, was the head of HIJEFS, a rescue organization he and his wife, Recha, founded in 1941 that became the Swiss rescue channel for the Agudah and the Vaad. Rosenheim was president of World Agudath Israel, an international organization of Orthodox Jews founded in Poland in 1912.6
Warning that the same fate faced Jews throughout the Nazi-occupied countries, Sternbuch described how Jewish bodies were being used to make soap and fertilizer for German industry [later to be proven false] and begged Rosenheim to:

Do whatever you can to cause an American reaction to halt these persecutions STOP Do whatever you can to produce such a reaction stirring up statesmen the press and the community STOP Inform Wise Silver Lubavicer [sic] Einstein Klotzkin Goldmann Mann and others.7 [Those referred to were Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, president of the American and World Jewish Congresses; Abba Hillel Silver, chairman of United Palestine Appeal; J. J. Schneerson, the Hassidic Rebbe of Lubavitch; Albert Einstein; Jacob Klotzkin, philosopher; Nahum Goldmann, Jewish Agency representative in the U.S.; and Thomas Mann, a German novelist and the only non-Jew in the group.]

By 9 p.m. on Sept. 3, the day he received the cable, Rosenheim had sent its details to President Roosevelt and begun to notify the individuals mentioned. He asked Roosevelt to get all netral states to express their moral indignation and proposed retaliatory Allied action against Germany to halt the mass acres. The same day Sternbuch in Switzerland telephoned Rabbi Kalmanowitz of the Vaad in New York with his grim message.8
At Rosenheim’s request, Dr. Isaac Lewin in New York, the Orthodox’s liaison to the Polish government-in-exile in London, asked the Polish Embassy to set up an appointment with Roosevelt through the State Department. But that effort was unsuccessful and Roosevelt never responded to Rosenheim’s cable. He forwarded it to the State Department three weeks later. In late September, Thomas Mann publicized the contents of the Sternbuch cable over the BBC in London. He was the only one mentioned in the cable who followed through on that particular plea for help.9
On Aug. 28, nearly a week before Sternbuch’s message was delivered by cable and phone. Dr. Stephen S. Wise, president of the American and World Jewish Congresses, received a cable from Dr. Gerhardt Riegner, the WJC’s man in Switzerland. Though less graphic and more equivocal than Sternbuch’s, its message was the same:
Received alarming report that in Fuehrer’s headquarters plan…under consideration according to which all Jews in countries…controlled by Germany numbering 3:1/2 – 4 million should after deportation and concentration in the East be exterminated at one blow to resolve once and for all the Jewish question in Europe STOP The action reported planned for autumn methods under discussion Including prussic acid STOP We transmit information with all reservation as exactitude cannot be confirmed STOP Informant stated to have close connections with highest German authorities and his reports generally speaking reliable.10

Dr. Wise did not contact anyone outside his inner circle. He sent the cable to the State Department for confirmation. In fact, the Orthodox did not find out about the Riegner cable until after the war.11
Rabbi Kalmanowitz received a copy of the Sternbuch cable from Rosenheim on Sept. 3 and called Dr. Wise to tell him its message and request a meeting. The next day, Dr. Wise met with Kalmanowitz, Rosenheim, and Rabbis Aaron Kotler and Eliezer Silver, two Vaad leaders, at the Lower East Side office of the Union of Orthodox Rabbis. Also present at that heated debate on priorities were Aryeh Tartakower and Aryeh L. Kubowitski, assistants to Dr. Wise.12
Dr. Wise was finally persuaded, as the foremost leader of American Jewry, to call a meeting of the heads of 34 American Jewish organi­zations. At that meeting, on Sept. 6 at the WJC office in New York, the leadership of the entire American Jewish community was officially made aware for the first time of the charges of Nazi genocide against the Jews. (It was the second such report for the leaders of the major organizations the Bund Report had reached the U.S. three months before. But that report was not generally absorbed.)13
To the assembled leaders Dr. Wise quoted from Sternbuch’s cable, but made no mention of Riegner’s. Over protests, he imposed an oath of silence on those present, to be lifted only if Sternbuch’s report was confirmed by the State Department. Dr. Wise also accused the Orthodox of spreading Greuelmarchen (atrocity tales).14
The Orthodox tried to breach the oath of silence but did not have enough influence. All they could do was vent their frustration in The Yiddishe Shtimme, the Agudah’s house organ. In the November 1942 issue. Dr. Lewin bemoaned his inability to get other Jewish organizations to go public with the news from Europe:

This information which arrived on September 3 demanded unequivocally: Raise a storm, because what is happening now has never been heard of! The first duty of the Jewish leadership was to alarm and publicize. We Jews have no other weapons other than the “Voice of Jacob.” Our history has taught us that the stirring up of the [Jewish] camp has frequently brought about means to halt the catastrophe.15

At the Sept. 6 meeting called by Dr. Wise at the behest of the Orthodox, an ad-hoc committee was formed. By the end of the year, its efforts had yielded the following results:
- At a press conference on Nov. 24, following verification and new information from the State Department, Dr. Wise made the first public announcement of the murder of more than 2 million Jews.
- Dec. 2 was declared a worldwide fast day for Jews by the Chief Rabbi of Palestine, Isaac Halevy Herzog.
- On Dec. 8 the committee met with Roosevelt.
- On Dec. 17 the Allies condemned the Nazis for murdering Jews.
This was the only time during the war that Allied statesmen publicly referred to Jewish victims as Jews and not as political refugees. This condemnation was to become the basis of the “crimes against humanity” charge against-the Nazis at the Nuremburg Trials.16
In Switzerland, the Sternbuchs had kept the documentation coming. Gerhardt Riegner, who had sent the Aug. 28 cable to Dr. Wise, acknowledged two letters from Warsaw addressed to “friends in St. Gallon, Switzerland” as major substantiation of the charges against the Nazis. The State Department also accepted these letters as substantiation and used them to verify the Riegner cable. The “friends” can now be identified as the Sternbuchs.17
Besides notifying the Agudah, the Vaad, and Riegner, the Sternbuchs informed the American ambassador in Berne, Saly Mayer of the Joint Distribution Committee, and other Jewish leaders in Switzerland. Riegner also sent the information he received, and copies of the Sternbuch letters, to the American Embassy for confirmation. A key link in the Sternbuch communications chain was Dr. Julius Kuhl, and Agudist who, as assistant for Jewish Affairs to the Polish ambassador, had access to the Polish confidential pouch.18
After it met with Roosevelt in December, the ad-hoc committee representing the 34 organizations was disbanded by Dr. Wise, over strong protests, on the grounds that it had served its purpose. But the Orthodox, the Jewish Labor Committee, and the American Jewish Committee, continued to press for unity on rescue as atrocity cables kept coming in from Europe. In March they finally prevailed, with the formation of the Joint Emergency Committee on European Jewish Affairs. The JEC consisted of the eight major American Jewish organizations, four Zionist and four non-Zionist, and focused solely on rescue.19
Meanwhile, a parallel series of meetings was going on that sought the unity of American Jewry behind a different goal. They were held in response to David Ben Gurion’s maximalist call for a Jewish state in Palestine. To Ben Gurion, such a state was the ultimate long-range solution to 1,900 years of Jewish persecution and homelessness and its formation took precedence over everything. Rescue was viewed as an “immediate, palliative, philanthropic,” short-term solution. When his Biltmore Resolution, as it came to be called, passed in May of 1942, Ben Gurion had succeeded in swinging American Zionists behind him.20
With that mandate in hand, Ben-Gurion devised a three-step strategy: Achieve American Jewish unity in favor of abrogating the British White Paper that limited Jewish immigration to Palestine (75,000 for a five-year period ending in May 1944); achieve the same unity in favor of a postwar Jewish state; use that unity to gain the support of the U.S. government for both goals.21 Ben-Gurion’s long-range goals proved more appealing than immediate rescue, and it is worth taking a close look at how unity for rescue died.
Pursuant to Ben-Gurion’s strategy, Nahum Goldmann of the Jewish Agency and other Zionist leaders arranged for Henry Monsky of Bnai Brith to call a meeting, in Pittsburgh in January 1943, whose purpose was to plan for a meeting that summer of the major American Jewish organizations. The topics of the main meeting would be postwar reconstruction in Europe and establishment of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Rescue was not on the agenda.22 As Rabbi Lewin recalled it:

…at the Pittsburgh Assembly, which laid the basis for the American Jewish Assembly, I proposed that it should preoccupy itself with rescue work for European Jewry. It was then that the chairman, Monsky, declared that he can’t even permit a vote on this issue, because the assembly was called for a different purpose.23

Being non-Zionist, the American Jewish Committee and the Jewish Labor Committee stayed away from the Pittsburgh session. Thus, the agenda there was heavily weighted toward the Zionists. In fact, as Nahum Goldmann put it: “It was the mistake of their life…because with them absent, we took over the real leadership.”24
Lewin, representing the Orthodox, continued to insist that rescue be on the August agenda and finally prevailed, when it became clear that such a move would bring the AJ Committee and the JLC to the August proceedings. Lewin’s persistence during the drafting of the agenda’s language also helped persuade those two groups to attend. (“Homeland”—the moderate Zionist term—was used Instead of “commonwealth”—the maximalist term.)25 In his report on the Pittsburgh planning session, Rosenheim of the Agudah noted:

…we did our best to urge this Committee [the American Jewish Committee] to participate in the assembly….The chief condition was that no majority-vote of the coming Assembly could bind the Single organizations in the matter of principal [sic]. [Emphasis in original.]26

Judge Proskauer of the American Jewish Committee was chosen co-chairman, along with Dr. Wise and Henry Monsky, of the August meeting. After achieving this support for rescue, however, the Orthodox chose not to take part in August because they were allotted only one fourth the number of delegates they had been promised.27
On Aug. 29, Monsky opened the proceedings in New York of what was now called the American Jewish Conference by stressing unity and citing the prayer: “How good and beautiful it is for brothers to live together.” It was a futile hope. Abba Hillel Silver, head of the United Palestine Appeal and co-chairman of AZEC (American Zionist Emergency Committee), promptly torpedoed the compromise between the non-Zionists, moderates, and maximalists.28 In a speech that night that was not on the agenda, Silver reiterated Ben-Gurion’s philosophy in thundering terms:

The Conference, born at these proceedings, continued to exist as an organization by that name after they ended.
There is but one solution for that national homelessness which is the source…of our national tragedy…that is a national home…. We cannot truly rescue the Jews of Europe unless we have free immigration to Palestine….If we surrender our national and historic claim to Palestine and rely solely on the refugee philanthropic appeal, we shall lose our case, as well as do violence to the historic hopes of our people.29

Silver tackled the unity issue head-on:

I am for unity in Israel, for the realization of the total program of Jewish life: relief, rescue, reconstruction, and the national restoration in Palestine. I am not for unity on a fragment of the program [rescue], for a fragment of the program is a betrayal of the rest of the program and a tragic futility besides.30

One observer wrote that Silver’s speech:

carefully timed and placed…aroused the hall to an emotional delirium such as I have rarely witnessed. The whole audience stood on its feet—yes, all but Rabbis Wise and Heller…the Hatikvah finally brought them to their feet….I venture to say that not one in the audience will ‘return’ [to Zion], including those that did not sing the national American anthem.31

Judge Proskauer of the American Jewish Committee vehemently protested Silver’s speech, accusing him of undermining the unity of the conference.32

Nobody expects a Jewish State now, nobody wants it now…There are those who are not identified with Zionists but who want to help in the building of Palestine, yet they believe that it is a grievous error to ask for statehood now. That is why I say to you, let us have unity.33

So the American Jewish Committee pulled out, and not long after, for ideological reasons, the Jewish Labor Committee did too, leaving the Conference completely Zionist-oriented. The Orthodox then proposed that the non-Zionist organizations establish their own rescue front, but even that attempt at partial unity on the subject was rejected.34
At the conference Dr. Wise tried to get all rescue efforts placed under his own control. He had been forced to form a conference rescue committee, but he did not give it any funding or authority of its own, even preventing it from passing resolutions without approval by the three conference chairmen. Then he tried to bring the Joint Emergency Committee under the new conference committee, but that move was voted down.35
His efforts were reminiscent of his dissolution of the ad-hoc rescue committee in December 1942. They also shed light on his subsequent engineering of a shift to the Zionists within the Joint Emergency Committee, which thereupon went out of business (on Nov. 5, 1943).36 During the debate on dissolving the JEC, he never responded to this question by Isaiah Minkoff of the Jewish Labor Committee:

Why shouldn’t the question of rescue be left with this Committee [the JEC], which includes all the organizations concerned with the problem, instead of creating a special rescue committee? The question should not be whether one must for reasons of principle or prestige support the Conference but what is better for the rescue of European Jews.37

In all these actions, Dr. Wise’s goal was, in his own words, to protect President Roosevelt from the “wild men of the [JEC] Committee” and to maintain Zionist priorities.38
With the demise of the JEC—the last unified rescue front—it became clear to the Orthodox that they could no longer waste time chasing a dream: unity for rescue. In the fall of 1943, prodded by desperate cables from Michael-Ber Weissmandl, an Orthodox rabbi and head of the Jewish underground in Slovakia, they began attempting independent rescue attempts on a broad scale, using their small international network with Rabbi Weissmandl at its center.39 Here are a few examples of their efforts.

A: THE RABBIS’ MARCH ON WASHINGTON
Peter Bergson, a Revisionist Zionist, came to America in 1940 to raise funds for a Jewish army in Palestine. But when he learned of the Nazi exterminations from Wise’s press conference in November 1942, he turned his attention to rescue. The Bergson Group was reviled by almost every segment of American Jewry for their radical approach to rescue. Their provocative advertisements and rhetoric angered the Roosevelt camp and the non-Revisionist Zionists, especially Stephen Wise, who considered them fascists or worse.30
But the Orthodox, now outside the Pale too, joined hands with Bergson to affect rescue. And to pressure the U.S. government into creating a separate agency on rescue, Bergson organized a march of Orthodox rabbis on Washington.41
On Oct. 6, 1943, the day before Yom Kippur eve, 400 Orthodox rabbis, dressed in traditional garb, marched from the Capitol to the White House. To encourage participation in the march, the Yiddishe Shtimme had printed a full-page appeal which said:

The silence of the world when an entire people is being murdered is a crime in which all who tolerate it are equally guilty.42

The march was led by Rabbis Eliezer Silver and Abraham Kalmanowitz of the Vaad and Bergson. Roosevelt absented himself on the advice of his closest Jewish advisers. Wise and Judge Samuel Rosenman.43 As an FDR aide later noted:

…he [Rosenman] had tried—admittedly without success—to keep the horde from storming Washington. [He] said the leading Jews of his acquaintance opposed this march on the capitol.44

That same day, Nahum Goldman of the Jewish Agency and Wise met with Judge Rosenman to discuss abrogation of the White Paper, a move the American Jewish Conference had voted for the previous month. They also complained about Bergson’s newspaper ads.45
The response to the march was strong and gratifying. The Senate sent the rabbis’ petition to a special commission, which resulted in a Senate bill to take immediate steps for rescue. The rabbis met with Vice President Henry Wallace, House Speaker Sam Rayburn, and a delegation from Congress. The result was public hearings on rescue in the House and Senate.46
The hearings focused on Bergson’s proposal for a separate govern­ment agency devoted solely to the rescue of European Jewry. The concept came from a suggestion by Rabbi Solomon Schoenfeld, an Orthodox rescue activist in London.47 All mention of Palestine as a refuge for Jews was omitted. As Rep. Will Rogers Jr., a sponsor of Bergson’s proposal, noted:

This resolution was specifically drawn up to eliminate Palestine. Any time you inject that into the refugee situation, it reacts to the harm of the refugees.48

Dr. Wise testified against the rescue resolution on the grounds that Palestine was the appropriate refuge. “The one thing that arrested our thought,” he said, “was that no provision was made urging England to keep the doors of Palestine open.”49 In contrast, Chief Rabbi Herzog of Palestine sent a cable supporting the Bergson Rescue Resolution in which he prayed “that the greatest success crown you and your colleagues USA supreme effort to rescue the remnant of Israel.” His cable did not mention Palestine.50
Meanwhile, at the direction of Abba Hlllel Silver, the American Jewish Conference was lobbying unsuccessfully for congressional action on its resolution to create a Jewish state as a long-term response to the Holocaust.51
At the hearings on Nov. 26, Breckenridge Long of the State Department’s Immigration and Naturalization Division presented grossly inflated figures on immigration and rescue. The uproar caused by his blatantly distorted testimony added to the pressure on Roosevelt. With an election year looming, the cumulative Impact of the march, the hearings, and the long incident was particularly telling.52
The atmosphere thus created enabled three non-Jewish aides of Morgenthau to prepare—and persuade their boss to submit on Jan. 17, 1944—Morgenthau’s famous Personal Report to the President. The result was the creation, by presidential order, of the War Refugee Board five days later.53 Many leaders of American Jewry called the rabbis’ march a failure, and it is true that the WRB, the march’s primary achievement, had many shortcomings. But as one scholar put it:

The War Refugee Board was a unique case of humanitarian and moral considerations superseding political and utilitarian arguments in the midst of a terrible war.54

Furthermore, the board was the only U.S. government body that did any rescuing. As Prof. David Wyman has pointed out, it was responsible for the rescue of more than 100,000 Jews.55
The War Refugee Board never provided rescue funds; money from American Jewish organizations was channeled through it. During 1944, for example, when Hungarian Jewry was being deported, the giant, broad-spectrum Joint Distribution Committee, still run by the wealthy German-Jewish elite, sent through more than $15 million. The Orthodox, by far the poorest segment of American Jewry, sent through more than $1 million. The Jewish Labor Committee sent through about $300,000, as did the World Jewish Congress. At the same time, the Zionist leadership, headed by Abba Hillel Silver, spent $500,000 lobbying in vain for its Palestine resolution.56

B: VITTEL AND THE LATIN AMERICAN PAPERS
During the war, Vittel, a detention center in France, held 240 Jews who possessed bogus papers issued by Latin American consuls, most of them based in Switzerland. These papers protected their owners from the full thrust of the Nazis. The Nazis ignored the dubious provenance of these papers, since these Jews were a potential bargaining chip in negotiations for Germans in Allied territory. Besides Vittel, there were privileged holding areas at several other concentration camps, including Bergen-Belsen.57 Thousands of these Latin American documents, and many more that were forged, also protected Jews in occupied countries who were not in camps.58
This development came about because Yitzchak Sternbuch discovered in 1941 that a holder of Latin American papers was given special treatment in Warsaw. Through Dr. Kuhl at the Polish Embassy, Sternbuch was able to buy papers from the Paraguayan consul. Hundreds of these reached Jews in occupied lands. Others then began to emulate Sternbuch, among them Abraham Sllvershein, an official of the World Jewish Congress who founded RELICO, a relief organization in Switzerland for Polish Jews.59
The documents cost between 500 and 3,000 Swiss francs each. But in 1942, when George Mandel-Mantello became secretary-general of the Salvadoran consulate in Berne, the price was drastically reduced. Mantello, a Rumanian businessman who was a Revisionist Zionist and an Orthodox Jew, produced Salvadoran citizenship papers gratis by the thousands. They were issued to anyone who could provide an address of a Jew in occupied territory. Later, Mantello sent authorized blank forms behind the lines. As John Winant, the American Ambassador to Britain wrote, “Only the consul of San Salvador has acted from purely humanitarian motives.”60
At the probable initiative of a Jewish informer from Vittel (who had already betrayed Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto), the Swiss authorities were made aware of these dubious papers. As a result, the Germans, through the Swiss embassy in Berlin, threatened to withdraw the protection these papers represented unless the Latin American countries confirmed the documents.61
Desperate pleas from Vittel were sent to Sternbuch, who contacted the Orthodox in America. Rabbis Kalmanowitz and Kotler immediately traveled to Washington, though it was Passover, and met with Secretary of State Cordell Hull and Treasury Secretary Morgenthau to get help in persuading the Latin countries to recognize the papers. At Kalmanowitz’s request, the major American Jewish organizations helped him press this point with the government.62
That effort was successful, but recognition of the documents came too late for most of the Vittel Jews. In May and June of 1944, despite diplomatic efforts, two transports took most of those inmates to Auschwitz, Recha Sternbuch’s parents among them. But thousands of holders of these papers were saved, particularly in Budapest later in 1944, when Raoul Wallenberg of Sweden and Charles Lutz of the Swiss consulate put them into “protected houses.”63
At the behest of Recha Sternbuch, the papal nuncio in Switzerland, Monsignor Fllippo Bemardini, was largely responsible for convincing Latin American and Spanish diplomats there to accept the bogus citizenship papers.
Bemardini, another “Righteous Gentile,” became a pivotal character in the rescue drama. As dean of the diplomatic corps, he wielded a powerful moral influence on the Swiss authorities, and his courier system throughout occupied Europe proved invaluable to the rescue effort. Kuhl and the Sternbuchs brought him together with other Jewish organizations, which made use of his services for rescue.64 Bemardini was the one who, in mid 1944, persuaded the Swiss to halt their policy of refoulement (shipping refugees who had entered illegally back into Nazi hands) on the Italian-Swiss border.65
In contrast, Roswell McClelland, the War Refugee Board’s representative in Switzerland, was unsympathetic to the use of bogus papers. His attitude reinforced the legalistic stance of Saly Mayer, the Joint Distribution Committee’s man in Switzerland, who would have nothing to do with the Vittel affair. And when the Sternbuchs asked McClelland to ask the Swiss to end refoulement on the French-Swiss border, pointing out that Sweden allowed such Jews to stay, McClelland told Recha Sternbuch: “If you don’t like the Swiss laws, why don’t you go to Sweden?”66

C: BOMBING AUSCHWITZ AND THE AUSCHWITZ PROTOCOLS
In April 1944, two escapees from Auschwitz, Rudolph Vrba and Alfred Wetzler, arrived in Slovakia, just after the Nazis moved into Hungary. They had been at Auschwitz since the beginning, working in the administrative offices, which collected data on every aspect of the extermination process. They made their way to the Slovakian Jewish Underground, headed by Rabbi Michael-Ber Weissmandl and Mrs. Gisi Fleischmann.67
Mrs. Fleischmann, a Zionist, was the Joint Distribution Committee’s representative in Slovakia and a relative of the renowned Agudist leader Rabbi David S. Unger. Weissmandl, Unger’s son-in-law, had been involved with relief efforts for Jews since before the war and was the true genius of rescue. The idea of ransoming Jews during the Holocaust was his, as was the idea of bombing the rail lines to Auschwitz and the camp itself.68
In 1942, after the deportation of Slovakian Jews started, Weissmandl ransomed the remaining 20,000 with a $50,000 bribe, all of it from Orthodox Jews. In 1943, he negotiated a deal with Himmler to ransom most of European Jewry for $2 million—the so-called Europa Plan—but U.S. organizations would not give it a chance. They did not care for the concept of ransom and could not believe the plan was feasible—despite the fact that it was set up in stages, with each payment due after each delivery. In mid-1944, Weissmandl’s intermediaries spent six weeks pursuing Adolf Eichmann’s offer of a million Jews for 10,000 trucks, a deal done in by circumstances before its certain unfeasibility could be tested.69
Vrba and Wetzler warned that Auschwitz was being enlarged to accommodate Hungary’s Jews and, under questioning by the underground, provided a 36-page statistical report on the camp’s operations that became known as the Auschwitz Protocols. Weissmandl condensed them and sent out a Hebrew version to all Jewish groups in Hungary and Switzerland. On May 16, the day after the Hun­garian deportations to Auschwitz started, he began sending out his famous plea to bomb the camp, especially the rail lines carrying 12,000 Jews there a day. He pointed out that these rail lines were also being used to transport military personnel and material.70
Among the recipients of Weissmandl’s plea was Dr. Yaakov Griffel, the Agudah representative in the Moetzah, the Jewish Agency rescue committee in Istanbul. Through the U.S. ambassador to Turkey, Griffel notified the War Refugee Board in the U.S. Weissmandl’s message also went to four people in Switzerland: Nathan Schwalb of Hechalutz, a Marxist-Zionist youth organization; Saly Mayor of the JDC; the World Jewish Congress representative; and the Sternbuchs.71
The Sternbuchs, who received the cable and decoded it on May 20, a Friday, traveled to Berne on the Sabbath to see Dr. Kuhl, who went with them late that night to the homes of the military attaches of the American, British, and Russian embassies. The attaches were sympathetic but could not sway their governments. The specific British response was that bombing was done for strategic, not humanitarian, reasons. Sternbuch asked that the message be sent to the Vaad via the U.S. diplomatic pouch.72
Day after day, as desperate cables from Weissmandl reached Sternbuch, he forwarded them to Roswell McClelland of the WRB but never heard from the Vaad. Finally, in mid-June he sent the bombing plea via the Polish diplomatic pouch. It was the first the Vaad had heard of it. From then until October, Rosenheim and Kalmanowitz pleaded with the WRB and the U.S. government to bomb Auschwitz but got nowhere. On June 22, Sternbuch wrote McClelland asking why he had not received a response from the United States. McClelland never answered.73
An early copy of the complete Protocols was given to Rudolph Kasztner, the Jewish Agency representative in Budapest, who had been negotiating with the Nazis on Weissmandl’s plan to ransom Hungarian Jewry. Kasztner was supposed to deliver it to Admiral Horthy, the regent of Hungary, but did not do so.74
On June 19, in contrast, Mantello, the Salvadoran consul-general in Switzerland, received from Budapest a copy of the complete protocols with a report on the deportations from Hungary to date and a plea to do something. Within five days, Mantello arranged with Walter Garrett, a British intelligence officer who was head of the British News Agency, to have the protocols condensed into cables, authenticated by four leading Swiss theologians, and sent to foreign press offices in Switzerland. Within two weeks, the story, spelling out the murder of 1,715,000 Jews, was published in more than 400 newspapers.75
The response was immediate and powerful. On June 26, U.S. Secretary of State Hull issued a warning. King Gustav V of Sweden sent a personal protest to Horthy and dispatched Raoul Wallenberg on his mercy mission to Budapest. The Pope also sent a note to Horthy. For the first time the International Red Cross took an active interest in saving Jews, as did Switzerland.76
Horthy stopped the Hungarian deportations on July 7, despite Nazi pressure. While smaller marches and other methods of extermination occurred thereafter, the Nazis could no longer ship thousands of Jews a day out of Hungary with impunity. Thanks also to the safe houses provided by Sweden’s Wallenberg and Charles Lutz, the Swiss consul in Budapest, more than a hundred thousand people ultimately were spared. But over 400,000 Hungarian Jews died at Auschwitz in the two months between Weissmandl’s plea and Horthy’s action.77

D. THE KASZTNER TRANSPORT
In June of 1944, when Joel Brand was arrested by the British and failed to return from Istanbul, the Nazis were ready to break off the Weissmandl negotiations to ransom more than half a million Hungarian Jews for 10,000 trucks. But Kasztner, who had also been working on that deal, convinced an Eichmann deputy to allow 750 Hungarian Zionists with Palestine certificates to leave by special train for a neutral country. In addition, Kasztner placed several hundred friends and relatives from Cluj on the train.78
Seats were also sold to wealthy Jews and converts to Christianity to defray the cost of the transport. Philip Freudiger, head of the Budapest Orthodox community and the original middleman in Weissmandl’s Hungarian negotiations with the Nazis, paid the Gestapo to get 80 Orthodox aboard—notables and their families—including the rabbis of Satmar and Debrecin and Rabbi Jonathan Steif. In all, 1,684 Jews were on the train, including 450 inmates from a nearby labor camp who climbed aboard.79
Some $2 million was paid to get all 1,684 aboard, but Eichmann was also willing to transfer 18,000-20,000 Jews to Austria to be kept as potential hostages in negotiations with the Allies. And until the Nazis received some positive reaction to the broader deal, they refused to allow the train to leave Budapest.80
At that point, Weissmandl, to keep the negotiations going, let Freudiger know that 250 trucks were available for trade in Switzerland. Since the Nazis had expressed interest in establishing contact with U.S. Jews, the message was signed by Ferdinand Roth, Weissmandl’s fictitious representative of American Jewry. The news of the 250 trucks made a “very favorable impression…with the Gestapo chief in Budapest.” Further, this same Gestapo man declared, “not one of the 40,000 Jews whose emigration to Palestine is now being planned will be allowed to depart from Hungary unless tractors are secured for them.”81
Freudiger contacted Sternbuch and asked for 750,000SF ($187,500) to pay for 40 tractors, not trucks, as a down payment on the 1,684 lives. Sternbuch cabled back that he had only 150,000SF on hand and asked Saly Mayer to provide the balance from JDC funds. Mayer, however, as legalistic as ever, refused to pay ransom.82
Moreover, Mayer informed McClelland that Sternbuch was about to close a deal with the Nazis, and McClelland threatened Hugo Donnebaum with arrest for dealing with the enemy in heavy equipment. Donnebaum, a refugee businessman in Switzerland and an Orthodox Jew, was the Hungarian contact for the Vaad. Sternbuch was warned that if he persisted in violating the Trading With the Enemy Act, he’d be blacklisted by the U.S.83
But Sternbuch was used to harassment by authorities for his rescue activities, even by the Swiss police. Recha Sternbuch had even been arrested in 1939 for illegally helping Jewish refugees across the Swiss border.84 He and Donnebaum went ahead and obtained a letter of credit for 150,000SF to show the Nazis, who agreed, in late July, to continue the negotiations. Meanwhile, the train of 1,684 Jews had been moved from Budapest to Bergen-Belsen in Germany. On Aug. 21, as a result of the letter of credit, 318 of the 1,684 were released and allowed to travel to Switzerland. The names of the 318 were sent to Sternbuch, who sent them on to Saly Mayer.85
A major factor in Mayor’s refusal to pay was his assumption that the train consisted solely of 1,200 Orthodox rabbis and leaders, instead of 1,684 Jews from all walks of life, only a fraction of them Orthodox. Because of one ambiguous cable, others held the same misperception for a while but not so stubbornly. McClelland told the Sternbuchs that Mayor had told him: “Rabbis, like ship captains, have to right to save themselves.”86
At McClelland’s insistence, Mayer replaced Sternbuch in the negotiations with the Nazis on Aug. 21,87 thereby drastically changing the purpose of those talks. Mayer was not interested in release, only in keeping the Nazis talking until the war ended. As a leader of the Jewish community in Switzerland, he was concerned about creating a “Jewish question” there. He didn’t want Jews flooding his country.88
One of the bitterest ironies in the whole rescue picture was that in Switzerland—the most effective rescue channel—McClelland, the man responsible for allocating rescue resources, was on a completely different wave-length from Weissmandl and Sternbuch, agents of the rescue operations that offered the most hope. The rescue documents reveal McClelland’s sarcasm toward them. Here are three examples:
-July 1944: Weissmandl cable: “…prima ware [‘top-grade goods,’ i.e. the so-called 1,200 rabbis to enemy unless letter of credit to bank in 24 hours.” McClelland’s comment in the margin before forwarding it to Mayer: “Teleg. from the Holy Men! Rec’d 7/20/44 Old Pressure Game!”
-July 4, 1944: Weissmandl cable: “Deportations from Hungary to Poland [Auschwitz] irreversable [sic] unless your firm [Mayer] puts up one million Swiss franc letter of credit [for the tractors].” McClelland in margin: “typical.”
-Nov. 28, 1944: WRB message to McClelland urging co-operation with Sternbuch and quoting his plea “that thousands of Jews…could be saved.” McClelland in margin; “typical Sternbuch allegation.”
In a confidential message to the Vaad (7/13/44), Sternbuch wrote:

“…part of the money is used for bribes in order to rescue people. It is impossible for us to discuss such things with McClelland.”89

Constant prodding by the Vaad on the JDC and the WRB in the United States got them to pressure Mayor into paying for the tractors. As Morgenthau noted at the time, “The rabbis put heavy pressure on us because Mayer won’t help rescue 1,200 rabbis.”90
Mayor made several payments between September 1944 and January 1945. At the same time, he and Kasztner were also trying to keep the talks on ransoming all of European Jewry going, at onepoint brandishing a bogus cable claiming that 5 million SF was available for that purpose. The combination of those negotiations and the tractor payments resulted, in December 1944, in the release of the remaining 1,366 transport members at Bergen-Belsen.91
Both Weissmandl and Sternbuch were convinced that had the money been available when Mayer was asked for it, the train would have gone directly to Switzerland without stopping in Bergen-Belsen. In any event, it was Weissmandl’s offer of trucks through Freudiger and Sternbuch that kept those negotiations going.92
In fact, this rescue effort by the Orthodox eventually saved approximately 20,000 Jews. Leiand Harrison, the U.S. minister to Switzerland, spelled it out in a cable to the WRB on Aug. 11:

…the affair of the 40 tractors which Sternbuch brought to our attention…was part of the deal [that Gyula] Link [an Orthodox merchant] with Freudiger of the Orthodox group at Budapest negotiated and relayed to Sternbuch…. on the basis of these offers the Gestapo in Budapest refrained from sending to Auschwitz…the following groups totaling 17,290 souls….1,690 [actually 1,684]…sent later to the camp of Bergen-Belsen, …approximately 15,000 [actually closer to 18,000]…sent to an unknown destination in Austria to be kept “on ice,”…and 600 persons…still confined in Budapest.93

Harrisons’s view was confirmed by Kasztner himself, no friend of the Orthodox.94

F: THE STERNBUCH-MUSY NEGOTIATIONS
The Sternbuch-Musy negotiations lasted more than eight months, from September 1944 until the last days of the war. They stemmed from Recha Sternbuch’s search for the two transports that had been taken out of Vittel. In the process she discovered that Dr. Jean-Marie Musy, a former president of Switzerland, had secured the freedom of a Jewish couple for 10,000SF. Musy, a fascist who published a pro-Nazi newspaper called La Jeune, was also a long­time friend of Himmler’s.95
After several meetings with Musy, Mrs. Sternbuch decided to try for the release of all Jews. Musy cabled Himmler, who agreed to a deal in principle. On Oct. 20, with his son Benoit as driver, Musy, a man in his 70s, traveled to Berlin in a Mercedes bought for him by the Sternbuchs, who also provided 60,000SF in cash, 500.000SF in checks, and 200 liters of precious gasoline.96
Sternbuch’s confidential cable to the Vaad following Musy’s return is instructive on the cross-currents within the rescue forces:

After…negotiations with Himmler our representative notified us of the possibility to evacuate 300,000 Jews…for… 20,000SF STOP Such evacuations could be accomplished in groups of 15,000 monthly… the money to be deposited in Swiss bank in…rates of 1,000,000SF after arranging the evacuation of each group STOP In principle we have accepted this proposi­tion STOP Our representative is a very influential and important personality STOP
We beg you not to demand any collaboration from us with the Joint STOP We did so at your request in the case of Hungarian Jews [the Kasztner transport, most of whose passengers were still in Bergen-Belsen awaiting pay­ment for the tractors] and the result was catastrophic as attested in the sixteen page document from the Neutraer Rav [i.e. Weissmandl] STOP Morbid anti-religious convictions and seeming patriotism of the Swiss representative of the Joint [Mayer] is a hindrance for any collaboration with him STOP The Swiss and American Authorities favor him because he rarely troubles these officials STOP
We confirm you by oath that immediate decision be forthcoming exclusively addressed to us for utilizing this only remaining opportunity for rescue of a great number of Jews STOP At this moment we are in need only of your cable agreement…through the American Embassy…STOP We beg you to dispatch further cables…in the usual fashion [Polish diplomatic pouch].97

Musy was able to reduce the $5 million ransom price (20 million SF) to $1 million. For Himmler, this amount was just a guarantee that Musy and the “rabbi Jews,” as he called the Sternbuchs, were serious. The more important consideration for him, which Musy stressed, was that Germany’s image, badly tarnished by the Auschwitz Protocols four months earlier, be restored—especially since it was losing the war.98
Having already raised more than $1 million in 1944, however, the Vaad could only muster $100,000 this time; so it urged Sternbuch to work with Mayer and pressured the WRB and the JDC in New York to release money for the Sternbuch’s use. But Mayer prferred his own negotiations with the Nazis and refused to have anything to do with Musy’s. In December 1944, when Kasztner, Dr. Joseph Schwartz, head of the European JDC and Mayor’s boss, and Mayer’s Gestapo contacts were all in Switzerland, Sternbuch tried again. Mayer and Schwartz refused.
The Sternbuchs then turned to Kasztner, who was still involved in Mayor’s negotiations. Kasztner admitted that Mayer was just trying to keep the Nazis talking, but he refused to break with him, even when the Sternbuchs offered him use of the Polish diplomatic pouch so he could bypass McClelland and Mayer in telling the United States about Mayor’s stalling.99
The Sternbuchs even offered to turn the entire negotiations over to the JDC if it would stop stalling and bring Jews out. But at best Mayer was willing only to give the money to the International Red Cross and have them take over administration of the concentration camps at the war’s end, thus keeping the inmates in the camps.100
By mid-January 1945, Himmler tired of Mayor’s stalling and his constant refrain that the “rabbis” were powerless and only the JDC had influence with America. So he broke off those talks and concentrated on the ones with Musy, with their promise of improved public relations. One result was the release on Feb. 7 of 1,210 inmates from Theresienstadt, a camp in Czechoslovakia.101
Five days before, the Sternbuchs had cabled the Vaad in New York:

It is imperative following the release of the first train that five or six major American newspapers declare that in this respect Germany was very favorably inclined…. Should you fail, then don’t expect another train.102

Through the efforts of the Vaad and the Agudah, several major papers published the story, including The Times, The Sun, and The Herald Tribune in New York. A similar effort with the Swiss press by Dr. Reuven Hecht, Sternbuch’s colleague, was even more successful.103
The favorable publicity angered Mayer, who told Kurt Becher, his Gestapo liaison with Himmler: “This is eine furchtbare Schweinerei (a horribly filthy thing). The press is full of Himmler-Muesy [sic] and Muesy-Himmler [sic].”104 Soon stories appeared in socialist papers in Switzerland criticizing the ransom of the Theresienstadt group. They gave the old ransom price of 20,000,000SF, assailed Sternbuch for using a fascist (Musy) as his negotiator, and said Musy was involved for personal enrichment. An international radio broadcast at the time also implied that the deal involved asylum for 250 Nazis.105
These stories were picked up by the Swiss office of the Socialist-Zionist PALCOR News Agency, which sent them out to Jewish papers in other countries. PALCOR’s Swiss office was run by Nathan Schwalb, a close friend of Mayer’s and someone McClelland thought highly of.106 One headline read, “We Do Not Want Any Favors From Germany.” In another, it noted, “Himmler is getting a good price for every released Jew.”107
Sternbuch cabled New York, Istanbul, and London for help in getting PALCOR to lay off, but the damage was done. A second transport—1,200 more inmates from Theresienstadt and 800 from Bergen-Belsen—was ready, scheduled to leave two weeks after the first one, but it never did. Gen. Ernst Kaltenbrunner, chief of Reich security, showed Hitler the critical articles from the Swiss socialist press. Kaltenbrunner had gotten them from Becher, Mayer’s Gestapo liaison. Hitler, enraged, ordered that “not a single Jew should be allowed to leave Germany.”108
Musy went to Berlin at Sternbuch’s request to find out why the second transport was delayed. The answer he got was succinct. “It was explained to me in Berlin last week,” he wrote Sternbuch, “if no trains of Jews from the German camps arrived in Switzerland, you have Herr Saly Mayer to thank.”109
In the United States, after the first Theresienstadt transport was released, the Vaad again asked the Joint Distribution Committee to lend it, not give it, the $1 million the Musy-Himmler deal required to ransom the rest of the Jews in the camps. The JDC agreed only after a few important Orthodox donors used their influence.110
But by JDC rules, the money had to be channeled through the War Refugee Board and McClelland, who still refused to pay ransom. Even though 1,210 inmates had just been released, he agreed with Mayer that the Jews should be kept in the camps under the IRC. Yet in May, in the last days of the war, when Sternbuch asked for $200,000 of the JDC million to send food into the camps, McClelland refused on the grounds that the funds were for rescue, not for “food relief during the post-hostilities period in Europe.”111
Still, the Sternbuchs continued their negotiations with Himmler through the Musy’s during the last hellish weeks of the Holocaust. Of major concern was the safe transfer of the concentration camps to the Allies. In October 1944, the Vaad had gotten wind of Nazi plans to exterminate every last Jew. Gen. Eisenhower issued a warning that had some effect, but elements of the Gestapo, especially Kaltenbrunner, regarded killing Jews as the first priority. In the camps there were rumors of troops with flame-throwers standing by outside to destroy all life and all evidence of Nazi crimes.112
Benoit Musy made several trips to Berlin by himself to negotiate the camp transfers with his Himmler contact, Gen. Walter Schellenberg. He also visited the camps at Theresienstadt, Ravensbrook, Mauthausen, Bergen-Belsen, and Buchenwald to assure cooperation. On April 8 in Berlin, Himmler, who had agreed to stop the killing in the camps, demanded assurance that the guards wouldn’t be shot on the spot but would be tried as members of the Wehrmacht as long as they wore Wehrmacht uniforms. At Sternbuch’s request, McClelland sent this message to Washington, which quickly agreed.113
But the Hitler-Kaltenbrunner and Himmler-Schellenberg elements of the Nazi leadership were working at cross-purposes regarding the Jews. Benoit Musy reported seeing a document that called for forced marches by prisoners to keep them away from the advancing Allies. So the senior Musy and Recha Sternbuch crossed into Austria to see their Gestapo contacts and Benoit returned to Berlin. Schellenberg immediately warned all camp commanders, who generally heeded the Hitler-Kaltenbrunner line, not to disobey Himmler’s orders. As a result, a forced march from Buchenwald was halted, and Mauthausen, Bergen-Belsen, Theresienstadt, and Buchenwald, all of which Benoit had visited, were turned over to the Allies relatively intact.114
Musy Sr.’s negotiations with Carl J. Burckhardt of the International Red Cross by the end of Jan. 1945, helped pave the way for the first inspections of the camps by the IRC. It also prepared the ground for the later negotiations with the Nazis by Count Bernadotte of the Swedish Red Cross and Kaltenbrunner’s meeting with IRC In March 1945. Young Musy also negotiated the safe evacuation of Ravensbrook—almost 14,000 women, 2,000 of whom were Jewish. Schellenberg, who’d been in contact with Sweden’s Count Bernadotte since the first Thereisenstadt transport was released Feb. 7, allowed most of them to go to Sweden. Benoit Musy went on to Stockholm to continue negotiations with the help of Felix Kersten, Hitler’s physical therapist, and Hillel Storch and Norbert Masur of the World Jewish Congress.115
Thus, while the release of all inmates was obstructed, one camp was evacuated and four others were handed over to the Allies virtually without incident, thanks to the Sternbuch-Musy efforts. One person rescued through these efforts was Weissmandl, who reached Switzerland in April with 69 other Jews. He had escaped from a train bound for Auschwitz and had been hiding in Slovakian bunkers until the senior Musy negotiated the release of his group. The Vittel deportees Recha Sternbuch had been searching for all died at Auschwitz.116
To assure the broadest and most effective support for rescue, the Orthodox tried to work with other Jewish organizations and shared whatever information they received with them. We have seen how this cooperation worked in the United States in 1942 and 1943. Here is how it worked abroad.
In Switzerland, all information received by the Sternbuchs through Kuhl at the Polish Embassy was delivered to four key Jewish focal points: the Joint Distribution Committee (Saly Mayer), the Jewish Agency (Richard Lichtheim), the World Jewish Congress (Dr. Abraham Silbershein), and the Berne Jewish community (Dr. George Brunschvig). It also went to Sam Woods, commercial attache at the American Embassy. Woods had direct channels to Secretary of State Hull and to Walter Garrett of the British News Agency, the British intelligence officer.117
The Polish Embassy’s value to the rescue effort extended to the ambassador, Alexander Lados. Thanks to Recha Sternbuch, Lados let his name be used in getting others involved in rescue. And when the Agudah leader Chaim Yisroel Eiss and three others asked Kuhl to get the ambassador to persuade Saly Mayor to increase his rescue efforts, Lados did so. Mayor even wrote glowingly to Kuhl about the Lados visit.118
In Istanbul, Dr. Yakov Griffel represented the Agudah in the Moetzah (the rescue committee of the Jewish Agency there) and the Vaad Hatzalah. Griffel was a major conduit of information from Hungary and the Balkans (via Weissmandl and Sternbuch) to the Moetzah. But the reverse wasn’t true. For political reasons, the Moetzah frequently withheld information. Moreover, it accused him of a lack of “realism” for spending money on cables for rescue (for Orthodox or Hashemer Hatzair) when the chances of success were not always too certain.119
Griffel worked closely with Dr. Joseph Klarman, the Revisionist representative, especially when the Moetzah rejected rescue projects as too risky. Klarman was always willing to work outside his organization’s framework. Although a secularist, he became, with Griffel, an official representative of the Vaad.120
In the summer of 1944, with the help if Ira Hirschman (the WRB representative in the Balkans), Klarman and Griffel got permission from Rumanian authorities to transport boatloads of Hungarian Jews in Rumania to Palestine via Turkey. The Hungarian peril was at its greatest. But the Jewish Agency was still confusing rescue with Aliyah. Although a large part of these refugees were Orthodox, the Agency refused to lift its 6% quota for the Agudah on certificates to Palestine. With the support of the WRB and money from the Vaad, Griffel and Klarman tried to lease a separate boat to rescue these Orthodox Jews. But they were stopped by the Jewish Agency, which insisted on retaining its monopoly on Aliyah.121
With some exceptions, notably McClelland, cooperation with the Americans abroad usually worked better. The War Refugee Board was the agency that generally facilitated rescue and gave the Jewish activists cachet if not the actual power to do things. The activists were able to use the speedy, free U.S. diplomatic pouch, except when they wanted to avoid the censors and certain obstructionist officials. American Jewish pressure, a great deal of it exerted by the Orthodox, was the cause of this cooperation or the key to the success of the network that extended throughout Europe and even to the Orient.122
One thread that runs through the story of the U.S. Orthodox role during the Holocaust is the growing influence of the rabbis of the Vaad Hatzalah, this small group of roshei yeshiva and their few lay helpers. From the fall of 1942, when they were cowed by Wise into silence, through the end of 1943, when they turned to independent lines of rescue, until the war’s end, Washington somehow learned to listen to them. One story particularly illustrates that development:
In February 1945, with the help of several important Orthodox donors, Irving Bunim, chairman of the Vaad, had pressured a reluctant Joint Distribution Committee to lend it the million dollars that the Himmler-Musy negotiations required. The 1,210 inmates from Theresienstadt had arrived in Switzerland, and the Nazis had a second trainful ready. All the Vaad needed was a license from the War Refugee Board to transfer the money to Switzerland. The JDC had made the license a condition of providing the funds.123
But the testimony the WRB was hearing to help it reach its decision was hardly favorable. Musy’s reputation, McClelland told the board, was that of “a Naziphile on anti-Communist grounds and a dangerous man” who was “Interested in obtaining compromise peace for Germany.”124 Miss Hodel of the WRB staff cited the McClelland cables and warned: Secretary Morgenthau should be advised that the negotiations referred to…are to be distinguished from the Saly Mayer negotiations of which we have been fully advised. The Musy negotiations have been handled independently by Musy, a former Swiss Councilor, and not under McClelland’s control.125
Control was the key. Mayer could be trusted to keep the money in the hands of relief organizations. With the rabbis, however, whose information came through the secret Polish pouch, the situation was different. As Gen. William O’Dwyer of the WRB noted: We also had information…that there was something about the arrangements between Musy and Himmler that might indicate ransom.126
John Pehle, head of the WRB, went further:

The rabbis aren’t going to be satisfied with this license at all….[It] gets the money in Switzerland, one step nearer release….! would guess that once the money is sent, there would be tremendous pressure for the actual release…so that issue will have to be faced….We are dealing with a guy—Musy—nobody trusts.127

Nevertheless, Pehle agreed to grant the license. “If the money doesn’t go,” he said, “the rabbis are going to tear the town loose.” That was the influence achieved by a few aged Orthodox scholars.128
A lot more people today, certainly, think that rescue should have been the first priority during the Holocaust than thought so at the time—ahead of statehood, bans on trading with the enemy, loyalty to a U.S. president in wartime, or the ideology of those one is willing to work with. But choosing the right priority when worthy priorities conflict, is a challenge of the human condition and always will be. Perhaps it can be said that the Orthodox, for whom Torah values are a way of life, had less trouble with that choice during World War II than any other group in American Jewry.
More than 20 years afterward. Rabbi Eliezer Silver, founder of the Vaad, wrote the following account of a conversation he had back then with a philanthropist who was being asked to give a considerable sum:

He asked me “…With all due respect…it is difficult for me to understand why in…saving Jews in Europe there is no one who can do anything; not one of our famous help organizations…and none of our political leaders—only a handful of Orthodox rabbis. Forgive my frankness, but will some old-fashioned rabbis and inepts succeed in such an undertaking?”
I answered…”When it is a matter of rescuing Jewish lives, we, the rabbis, are forbidden to be inept….By command of our Holy Torah we are prepared to violate many laws…to save lives. We are ready to pay ransom for Jews and deliver them from concentration camps with…forged passports. For this purpose we do not hesitate to deal with counterfeiters and passport thieves. We are ready to smuggle Jewish children over the borders, and to engage expert smugglers for this purpose….We are ready to smuggle money illegally into enemy territory…to bribe…the killers of the Jewish people, those dregs of humanity! We are even ready to send special emissaries to plead with the chief murderers… and try to appease them at any cost!”
“Now I understand…,” said the man and handed me a fine gift.
Yes, we, the rabbis and the Orthodox community…attempted to do many a thing in all these fields. Not all we did was crowned with success, but the success that we had showed us that we were on the right path. And it is precisely because of these limited successes that our hearts ache to this day.129

This paper was adapted from a chapter by the author in the forthcoming Festschrift in honor of Professor Abraham G. Poker.
NOTES

1 Arye Tartakower, “Efforts at Aid and Rescue During the Holocaust,” in Jewish Resistance During the Holocaust (Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1971, p. 438.
2 Interview with Dr. George Gershon Kranzler. Dr. Kranzler was in charge of this division from 1938 to 1942. One example of a non-Agudist would be Mr. Kalman Singer. See interview with Mr. Kalman Singer. Cf. also interview with Rabbi Alex Weisfogel.
3 For a brief journalistic account of Vaad Hatzalah see Vaad Hatzalah (New York: “Vaad Hatzalah” Book Committee, 1957). See also this author’s book entitled. Thy Brother’s Blood: The Orthodox Jewish Response to the Holocaust [Brother’s Blood] (New York: Mesorah Press, 1984, chap. 5. See also there the personality profiles of Rabbis Aaron Kotler, Abraham Kalmanowitz, Eliezer Silver and Mr. Irving Bunim.
For a more scholarly analysis see this author’s forthcoming volume entitled. Stand Not Idly By: Orthodox Jews and the Holocaust. Cf. also Aaron Rakeffet-Rothkoff, The Silver Era: Rabbi Eliezer Silver and His Generation [Silver Era] (New York: Feldheim, 1981), chaps. 7-8. Cf. also Interviews by this author with Mr. Irving Bunim and Rabbi Alex Weisfogel and Mrs. Sarah Schwartzman-Kotler. Mr. Bunim was one of the founders of Vaad Hatzalah and Rabbi Weisfogel was secretary to Rabbi Abraham Kalmanowitz, president of Mirrer Yeshiva and the most prominent of the Vaad’s rabbinic leaders. Mrs. Schwartzman, a doctoral candidate at Columbia in political science, was secretary to her father. Rabbi Aaron Kotler, one of the three chairmen of Vaad Hatzalah.
Rabbi Eliezer Silver, the founder of Vaad Hatzalah, was a leader of the Union of Orthodox Rabbis as well as the first president of Agudath Israel of America. Rabbi Kotler was also the key “advisor” to Agudath Israel and the primary spiritual figure in the postwar growth of Agudath Israel. Both Rabbi Kotler and Rabbi Silver kept a low profile on their official and unofficial ties to Agudath Israel during World War II, in order to avoid the almost inevitable “politics” in the rescue efforts.
For the Shanghai experience see this author’s Japanese, Nazis and Jews: The Jewish Refugee Community of Shanghai 1938-1945 [Kranzler, Shanghai] (New York: Yeshiva U. Press, 1976) chaps. 11-12, 19.
James McDonald first became involved with refugee help for Agudath Israel during the late 1930s through the relationship developed by Mr. Meir Shenkolewski who introduced him to Jacob Rosenheim. Rabbi Eliezer Silver, for example, was helped a great deal in all rescue efforts by his close association with Robert Taft, the Republican Senator from Ohio, Rabbi Silver’s home state. Rabbi Kalmanowitz, on the other hand, had access to Democratic Senator Robert E. Wagner and Congressman Sol Bloom, a member of the West Side Jewish Institute, whose rabbi was Herbert S. Goldstein, an Agudist. See also interview by this author of Meir Shenkolewski, Rabbi Welsfogel and Dr. G. Kranzler.
4 See Thy Brother’s Blood for portraits of the key rescue personalities in this network.
5 Dr. G. Kranzler interview. For the rescue of the endangered intellectual elite, see David Wyman, Paper Walls (Amherst: U. of Mass. Press, 1968), chap. 7. See also this author’s essay on the Jewish Labor Committee.
6 Isaac Lewin, “Attempts at Rescuing European Jews with the Help of Polish Diplomatic Missions During World War II.” Part I [Lewin I] Polish Review Vol. XXII No. 4 (1977) pp. 5-7. Cf. also Isaac Lewin, “The American Jews and the Holocaust” [Lewin “American Jews”] Dos Yiddishe Vort (April, 1982), p. 26; Isaac Lewin, Churban Europa [Churban] (New York: Research Institute for Post-War Problems of Religious Jewry, 1948), pp. 128-34. See also this author’s Heroine of Rescue: The Incredible Story of Recha Sternbuch Who Saved Thousands from the Holocaust. (New York:
Mesorah Press, 1984), chap. 8. Co-authored with Joseph Friederson. For the history of HIFEFS see op. cit. , chap. 5. Recha Sternbuch, whom even the few historians of the Holocaust fail to recognize, was the primary rescue activist in Switzerland, whose husband Isaac (Yitzchok) a businessman became more and more involved personally, though she remained the primary inspiration behind most of the rescue efforts.
Recha had been personally involved in the rescue of over 2,000 German and Austrian refugees during 1938-1942, whom she helped cross the border of Switzerland illegally. While she obtained the assistance of a humanitarian Chief of Police of St. Gallon, named Paul Gruninger, she was opposed by the Swiss Jewish Establishment headed by SalyMayer, who feared “the rise of the Jewish Problem” and antisemitism in Switzerland. Due to a Jewish informer, Recha Sternbuch was arrested for several weeks in a Swiss attempt to make her inform on her illegal network of border smugglers. Gruninger was deposed from his post and was supported mostly by help from the Sternbuchs. Only in 1968 after Yad Vashem publicly honored Paul Gruninger did the Swiss reinstate him. See chap. 4 of Heroine of Rescue for details of Recha Sternbuch’s trial by the Swiss. See also Lewin I, pp. 5-7. See both Kranzler Heroine of Rescue and Thy Brother’s Blood for many examples of the use of the secret Polishcable. No one else to this author’s knowledge, made use of this most useful, albeit illegal, rescue tool other than the Orthodox, whether in Switzerland, Turkey or England. Professor Laqueur also agreed with this view in a phone conversation with the author.
Most, though not all of the cables and messages sent via the Polish cable are found in the papers of Dr. Julius Kuhl. Copies of the entire collection are in the author’s possession, courtesy of Dr. Kuhl. Similarly, microfilm copies of the entire, volumi­nous Sternbuch Papers are in the possession of this author.
7 Lewin I, pp. 5-7; Lewin “American Jews,” p. 26.
8 Ibid. Re the phone call to Kalmanowitz see, Weisfogel interview. See this author’s correspondence with the Bell Company’s historical division which verified the phone connections and the average number of calls from Switzerland at the time of 1 1/2 per month. The phone episode had been related orally to this author by Rabbi Weisfogel already during the 1950’s. Only in 1978-79 did he put this and many other memories of those years on tape during several Interviews with this author.
9 Ibid. Walter Laqueur, Terrible Secret [Secret] (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1980), p. 44. Professor Laqueur seems to be unaware of the source of Mann’s broadcast.
10 Arthur Morse, While Six Million Died [Six Million] (New York: Random House, 1968), p. 8. See also Secret, pp. 79-83.
11 For example. Dr. Lewin, who participated in almost every meeting involving the Orthodox rescue efforts, only found out about the Riegner cable in 1947. See Churban, pp. 228-229.
12 Lewin I, pp. 5-7. Cf. also Churban, p. 129. Cf. also Arye Leon Kubovy [Kubowitzki] “Criminal State vs. Moral Society: Bettelheim to Arendt’s Rescue,” Yad Vashem Bulletin, No. 13 (October 1963), p. 6. Kubowitzki recalled:
We suggested protest meetings, a march on Washington, etc. The rabbis fiercely opposed our programme and expressed this in the harshest terms imaginable: “You are the grave diggers of our people. You have chosen to antagonize Hitler. You proclaimed a boycott against Germany, you published strongly worded resolutions. Hitler is not the first Haman in our history. The experiences of centuries have taught us how to deal with Haman. Stop your provocations! Let us rescue our people through our tested methods.” [Emphasis added]
Kubowitzki’s claim of having demanded public demonstrations and a march on Washington sounds rather ironic in view of the oath of silence imposed—and not protested by him—by Stephen S. Wise, over the protests of the Orthodox. Moreover, his dates are a bit mixed-up. Nor did Wise call upon the rabbis after he had received the alarming news from Europe. Not a word of the Riegner cable went out to other Jewish organizations, let alone the Orthodox rabbis who, at that time, were not even considered sufficiently important to consult on rescue matters. It was only a slow development of the rise in power by the small Orthodox group which made itself felt in the Jewish Establishment. Only as a result of the very strong personal pressure and magnetism of Rabbi Kalmanowitz, following his receipt of the Sternbuch cable, did Rabbi Wise, the acknowledged leader of American Jewry and “friend” of President Roosevelt, consent to come with two aides to see the rabbis. For more detail on the role of the Sternbuch cable see this author’s Thy Brother’s Blood, chap. 3.
13 See the invitation by cable to Rabbi Kalmanowitz. Copies of the Kalmanowitz Papers in this author’s possession, courtesy Mrs. Abraham Kalmanowitz and Rabbi Moshe S. Kalmanowitz. This meeting, of all Jewish organizations, was the first on such a scale concerning the tragedy of European Jewry. This did not take place after the arrival of the Bund Report of June 1942. See Yehuda Bauer, “When Did They Know?” Midstream (April, 1968), pp. 51-58. Cf. also A. Leon Kubowitzki, Survey of the Rescue Activities of the World Jewish Congress 1940-1944 [WJ Cong. Survey] (Unpublished manuscript WJ Cong. Archives. Courtesy Eli Matzozki), p. 18. Kubowitzki notes that the meeting was “called” on the 6th. It actually took place on that day.
14 Churban, pp. 288-289. For the “Greuelmarchen,” see Shenkolewski interview. Mr. Meir Shenkolewski was a participant of this meeting.
15 Yiddishe Shtimme, November, 1942, p. 1. This was the Yiddish language monthly of Agudath Israel.
16 For the news see the New York Times, November 25, 1942, p. 10. See also WJ Cong. Survey, p. 18-20. For the meeting with FDR see Ellyohu Matzozki, “An Episode? Roosevelt and the Mass Killing” [Matz: “FDR”] Midstream (Aug.-Sept. 1980) pp. 17-19; Bernard Wasserstein, Britain and the Jews 1939-1945 [Wasserstein, Britain](London; Institute of Jewish Affairs, 1979), pp. 172-174. For the U.N. condemnation and follow-up see John Fox, “The Jewish Factor in British War Crime Policy in 1942,” English Historical Review (Jan. 1977), pp. 91-92.
17 See Heroine of Rescue, chap. 8. See also letter by this author in Commentary (January 1984), pp. 6-7.
While officially they became representatives of Agudath Israel only in the fall of 1943, after the demise of Yisroel Chaim Eiss, another Agudist rescue activist, the Sternbuchs maintained close connections with Rosenheim from 1942.
18 Interviews by this author with Dr. Julius Kuhl. Dr. Kuhl personally sent these reports to the above-mentioned individuals. See also the Kuhl Papers; Kranzler, Heroine, pp. 67-68.
19 See the Minutes of Joint Emergency Committee on European Jewish Affairs (JEC), especially March 6, 1943. The four Zionist organizations were the American Jewish Congress, B’nai B’rith, American Zionist Emergency Council (AZEC), Synagogue Council of America. The four non-Zionist organizations were Agudath Israel, American Jewish Committee, the”Jewish Labor Committee and the Union of Orthodox Rabbis of America. While Wise attempted to include Hadassah immediately, this was rejected. It was pointed out to him that Hadassah was already represented on two of the eight organizations, the American Jewish Committee and American Jewish Congress. Wise’s ability to eventually maneuver by November 5, 1943, the acceptance of Hadassah, as a fifth overriding vote, enabled him to dissolve JEC. Cf. also Fourth Agudah Report, p. 5; Emanuel Pat, In the Struggle; Jacob Pat and His Generation [Pat, Struggle] (New York: Jacob Pat Family Fund, 1971), pp. 352-353.
For the role of Ambassador Lados, as well as Dr. Ruhl, see Heroine, chaps. 6, 9, et passim.
See interview by this author with Dr. Reuven Hecht. Dr. Hecht, a Revisionist-Zionist was the only non-Orthodox member of the Sternbuch’s rescue team. It was Sam Woods who suggested that Hecht work with the Sternbuchs on rescue matters. See the Sam Woods files in the Hecht Papers. Copies of most of these files were made for the author, courtesy Dr. Hecht. See also Laqueur, Secret, pp. 96-97, re Sam Woods.
Dr. Hecht was particularly active in Sternbuch’s Musy negotiations with Himmler. For detailed scholarly analysis see this author’s Stand Not Idly By, chaps. 12-13.
Cf. also Min. JEC, Sept. 28, 1943, American Jewish Archives. For the dissolution of the ad hoc committee see also M[ax] Gottschalk to [Morris] Waldman, Nov. 27, 1942, American Jewish Archives, courtesy Eli Matzozki. This author’s gratitude to the archivists of those archives for their generous help and permission to microfilm several thousand documents pertaining to the American Jewish Committee and the Holocaust. See also below, note 56A.
20 See especially Samuel Halperin, The Political World of American Zionism [Halperin, Zionism] (Detroit: Wayne State U. Press, 1961) chap. 9, esp. pp. 220-224. Cf. also Monty N. Penkower, “Ben-Gurion, Silver and the 1941 UFA National Conference for Palestine” [Penkower, Ben Gurion] American Jewish History (Sept. 1979), pp. 74-76; Aaron Berman, “American Zionism and the Rescue of European Jewry: An Ideo­logical Perspective” [Berman, “Silver”] American Jewish History (March, 1981), pp. 314-316; Memorandum of the talk by Adolph Held and others with Ben Gurion and the Jewish Labor Committee, April 15, 1942. Jewish Labor Committee Archives.
21 Halperin, Zionism, chap. 9.
22 Ibid., p. 272, and 382, n. 16. Cf. also Melvyn I. Urofsky, We Are One [Urofsky, One] (New York: Anchor Press, 1978), p. 21. Alexander S. Kohansky, ed. The American Jewish Conference: Its Organization and Proceedings of the First Session, August 29, to September 2, 1943. [Kohansky, Conference] (New York: 1944), p. 46. Cf. also Yiddishe Shtimme, November 1943, p., 5; the Invitation to the Pittsburgh Conference which, as Hllberg already pointed out over 25 years ago, never mentioned rescue. Raul Hilberg, The Destruction of European Jewry (Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1967), p. 719; Haskel Lookstein, American Jewry’s Public Response to the Holocaust 1938-1945 [Lookstein, Press] (Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Yeshiva U., 1979), pp. 270-274.
23 Yiddishe Shtimme, Nov. 1943, p. 5. The text is from a stenographic copy of the minutes.
24 Urofsky, One, p. 25.
25 Ibid. Cf. also Halperin, Zionism, p. 224; Fourth Agudah Report, P. &. Also Fifth Agudah Report, pp. 9-10.
26 Fourth Agudah Report, p. 7.
27 Ibid.
28 Halperin, Zionism, pp. 224, 233-36; Urofsky, One, pp. 22-30. The verse from the Daily Prayer is derived from Psalm 133. The original term “assembly” with possible implications of a rump parliament or Jewish government drew the fears by the assimilated American Jews of “dual loyalty” and an “International Jewry.” See Kranzler, Brother’s Blood,chap. 2, for further analysis. The “Conference” as an umbrella organization lasted until 1945.
29 The entire speech is found in Arthur Hertzberg, The Zionist Idea [Hertzberg, Zionist] (New York: Atheneum, 1970), pp. 592-600. The text of Monsky’s speech as well as that of Judge Proskauer is found in the Conference Files of the American Jewish Committee Archives.
30 Hertzberg, Zionist, p. 597
Silver was never even a member of the American Jewish Congress. As Urofsky has shown it was Dr. Emanuel Neuman, another supporter of Ben-Gurion’s maximalist Zionist philosophy, along with Silver, who was behind this amazing political maneuver. One, p. 27.
31 One observer from the American Jewish Committee noted this derision of refugee “humanitarian philanthropic” perspective at least spells out the political phase of Zionism rather than the humanitarian one, which had been popularized earlier. See “My Impressions of the American Jewish Conference” by Dr. Louis Wolsey, pp. 9-10, American Jewish Committee Archives [Wolsley, “Impressions”] Cf. also Halperin, Zionism, p. 222.
32 Proskauer felt particularly grieved about this disavowal of unity by Silver because he had been in touch with Silver for a long time, and as late as May ’43 requested that both look over their respective platforms in order to avoid friction. After an unequivocal oral agreement. Silver later reversed himself. See Memo by Judge Proskauer on “Who Really Destroyed Jewish Unity” Dec. 28, 1943, p. 3, American Jewish Committee Archives. For the description of the impact of Silver’s speech, see Wolsey, “Impressions,” p. 9.
33 Halperin, Political, p. 239.
34 On the Jewish Labor Committee, see this author’s other paper in this volume, “The Jewish Labor Committee and the Holocaust.” For a Zionist point of view on AJ Corn’s pullout, see Urofsky, One, pp. 27-30. The perspective of the members of the AJ Corn is found in the AJ Corn Archives. American Jewish Conference. For Agudah’s attempt to create a non-Zionist Rescue Front, see Rosenheim to Proskauer, 10/28/83, AJ Corn. Archives, Jt. Emerg. Committee.
35 See Minutes of American Jewish Conference Rescue Committee Aug. 31 -Sept. 1-2, 1943 (Unpublished manuscript at the American Jewish Historical Archives. Courtesy Eli Matzozki.)
36 Minutes of JEC, Nov. 5, 1943, the final meeting of JEC.
37 Ibid., pp. 1-2.
38 Wise to Goldmann, 4/23/43. Stephen S. Wise Mss. Box 1001. American Jewish Archives.
39 For example. Rabbi Weissmandl’s cables concerning the possibilities of rescue of Jews fleeing from Poland to then-relatively-peaceful Slovakia, see Hapardes, Jan. 1944, pp. 8-9. That Rabbi Welssmandl, usually labelled an “ultra-Orthodox rabbi,” was the peerless rescue leader was admitted at the time even among the most vehement secularist Marxist anti-Orthodox members of the rescue committee of the Jewish Agency in Jerusalem, in Istanbul, Turkey, as well as in his own underground in Slovakia, which con­tained most secularist Jews. For the latter see this author’s interviews with Andre Steiner (an agnostic) member of Weissmandl’s “Working Group” who did most of Rabbi Weissmandl’s negotiations with Dieter Wisllceny, Eichmann’s assistant, to ransom Slovakian Jewry in the fall of 1942. Steiner noted how, upon first meeting with Weissmandl, inexplicably he immediately fell under his “spell.” It was Weissmandl who provided literally almost all the arguments and even potential counter-arguments that Steiner used in negotia­ting with Wisliceny. For the views of the Jewish Agency’s Moetza in Istanbul, see the unpublished memoirs of Dr. Yaakov Griffel, p. 12. (The memoirs were written in the late 1950’s at the in­stigation of Rabbi Weissmandl. These were given to this author by Mrs. N. Segal.) Cf. also Rudolph Vrba and Alan Bestic. I Cannot Forgive [Vrba, Auschwitz] (London: Sidwick & Jackson, 1963), pp. 258-259.
40 For a brief analysis of the role of the Bergson Group see Eliyohu Matzozki, “An Analysis of a Pressure Group: The Activities of the Bergson Group in the Year 1943” Gesher (Vol. 8, 5741-1981) pp. 185-188. Cf. also Monty N. Penkower, “The Bergson Boys,” American Jewish History (March 1981), p. 308. The full-scale scholarly work on this group has yet to be written.
41 Re the close cooperation between the Orthodox and the Bergson group is manifest in the fact that Rabbi Eliezer Silver was on their board. See letterhead of the “Emergency Committee to Save the Jewish People of Europe.” See also Churban, p. 82.
42 See The Answer, Oct. 15, 1943 (the publication of the Bergson group) for much of the details of this rabbis’ march. The quote is from the Yiddishe Shtimme, October 1943, p. 1. For a detailed description of the rabbis’ march Thy Brother’s Blood, chap. 3. For a deeper analysis, see Stand Not Idly By, chap. 7.
43 Wise’s role is evident from the very sarcastic editorial on the rabbis’ march in the Hebrew journal Bitzaron (edited by Prof. Chaim Tchernowitz known as Rav Za’ir) (Tishri 5704), pp. 67-68. For Rosenman’s remarks see next footnote.
44 William D. Hassett, Off the Record with FDR 1942-1945 (New Brunswick: NJ: Rutgers U. Press, 1958), p. 209.
45 See Memo of Interview with Judge Samuel Rosenman, Oct. 6 1943 (Zionist Archives. Courtesy Eli Matzozki).
46 For some of the steps following the march which led to the creation of the War Refugee Board, see Vaad Hatzalah. pp. 290-293.
47 See the Yiddishe Shtimme, October 1943, p. 1. It lists allithe points. For the origin of the separate agency by Schonfeld, see JTA, Jan. 27, 1943, p. 2. While it attributed the idea to Chief Rabbi Hertz of Britain, it was really that of Rabbi Dr. Schonfeld. He created the Chief Rabbi’s Religious Emergency Council as a one-man rescue committee utilizing (with permission) the name of the Chief Rabbi, his father-in-law. See this author’s Solomon Schonfeld: His Page in History (New York: Judaica Press, 1981), pp. 24-26. Rabbi Schonfeld passed away on his 72nd birthday, Feb. 6, 1984.
48 Hearings. House Resolutions 350 and 352. 78th Congress. 1st Session. [Hearings]. Reprinted in Problems of World War II and Its Aftermath. Vol. II (Washington B.C.: 1976), pp. 187, 245.
49 Ibid., p. 241.
50 Ibid., pp. 243-244.
51 Halperin, Zionism, pp. 239, 272-280. Cf. also Daniel J. Silver, In the Time of Harvest (New York: Macmillan, 1963), pp. 13-17.
52 Feingold, Politics, pp. 230-238, esp. p. 238.
53 Though many historians, especially Lucy Davidowicz, fail to see the relation between the heated political climate of opinion in an election year and the creation of the War Refugee Board, this author has little doubts about it. Davidowicz’s note that the exact text for the government agency was Arthur Cox’s version is quite irrelevant. See Commentary (Sept. 1983), p. 26. It matters little whose version was used. The pressure on FDR during an election year is the real factor, and that was caused primarily by the Bergson-Vaad Hatzalah cooperative actions. See also Cox’s copy of the rescue Hearings, attached to his letter to Morgenthau on Dec. 20, 1943, concerning “a draft of” a proposed Executive Order on the subject” [of a War Refugee Board]. Cox continued, “…getting the Executive Order signed would forestall some of the action on the Hill in connection with the Rogers-Gillette Resolution.” [emph. added] (CPF 3292. Stephen S. Wise FDRL)
54 Yehuda Bauer, The Holocaust in Historical Perspective (Seattle: U. of Washington Press, 1978), p. 83.
55 At a symposium on “Jewish Leadership During the Holocaust,” CUNY Graduate Center.
56 See War Refugee Board. Amounts contributed to the work of the War Refugee Board. WRB History. Relief Programs. Box 53. See also Morse, Six Million, p. 382. See also Jewish Labor Committee Ar­chives. Budget. And Vaad Hatzalah Budget (Irving Bunim Papers) Vaad actually spent over $1,135,000, half of which was transferred via Switzerland. See Vaad Hatzalah, p. 516. For the half million spent by Silver, see Yiddishe Shtimme, Feb. 1945, p. 1.
57 For this episode in brief see Heroine of Rescue, Chap. 9. Cf. also Thy Brother’s Blood, chaps, et passim. Fuller treatment in Stand Not Idly By, chap. 8.
58 Ibid. A large segment-or the Sternbuch Papers revolve about the Vittell affair.
59 Nathan Eck, “The Rescue of Jews With the Aid of Passports and Citizenship Papers of Latin American States,” [Eck, “Passports”] Yad Washem Studies I. pp. 125-152, esp. pp. 128, 135-136, 140. Cf. also Isaac Lewin, Nochem Churban, pp. 162-164, 172-176. Dr. Kuhl interview. See esp. Sternbuch Papers.
60 See WRB Papers. Box 33. The entire cable by Ambassador Winaut read:
The average price of a passport was approximately 700 Swiss francs. Only the consul of San Salvador had acted from purely humanitarian motives. There is little doubt that the German authorities are aware of what has been going on, but for reasons of their own they have hitherto not adopted a set policy of withdrawing passports. Some estimates [of these Salvador Papers are] as high as 10,000. (Winaut to State, June 17, 1943. WRB)
61 Interview with Mrs. Miriam Weingort. She and her husband (Dr. Saul Weingort, a nephew of the Sternbuchs) were the main contact for the entire Vittel affair. The question was really why the Nazis suddenly decided to question the papers. For the details of this sordid affair and the documentation on the likely “informer,” see Stand Not Idly By. chapter 9.
62 See unpublished text of speech on a record by Henry Morgenthau at the dinner given by Rabbi Abraham Kalmanowitz in honor of the War Refugee Board heads, including John Pehle, William O’Dwyer as well as Morgenthau. Bunim Papers in author’s possession, courtesy of Rabbi Amos Bunim. For the “two rabbis,” travelling on Passover, see Dr. John Slawson to Simon Segal, April 20, 1944. AJ Corn. Archives.
63 Ibid. For the Hungarian episode see Randolph A. Braham, The Politics of Genocide: The Holocaust in Hungary [Braham, Hungary] (New York: Columbia University Press, 1981), pp. 780, and chapter 26. Also see interviews by this author of Mr. Samuel Prey and Chaim [Charles] Roth, the first Orthodox Slovakian refugees in Hungary who specialized in forging foreign passports with the help of Raul Wallenberg, the heroic representative of the Swedish Red Cross in Budapest. Roth was head of the Budapest Orthodox Chevra Kadisha (Burial Society) that specialized at the time in caring for the thousands of Polish refugees in Hungary during 1940-1944. Mr. Roth provided the lists to the author of thousands of names of such individuals who received “bogus” Latin American and other papers. Copies of all the Roth Papers in possession of this author. See Pehle to Vaad Hatzalah October 9, 1944 re Roth and Frey. WRB. See Box 46 WRB re the recognition of the Latin American Papers.
64 Heroine of Rescue, Chap. 6. Also Thy Brother’s Blood, see personality portraits of Dr. Julius Kuhl and the Sternbuchs.
65 Sternbuch [Recha] to Roswell McClelland June 22, 1944, p. 1; July 13, 1944, p. 1-2. Sternbuch Papers.
66 For McClelland’s negative reaction to the Sternbuchs in general and the Latin American Papers, see the McClelland Papers in the War Refugee Board. Boxes 56-58. One example should highlight his view re these papers, see McClelland to Czech Ambassador Kopecky, June 21, 1944, War Refugee Board, Box 56. For his critical view of Musy, see for example, his Memo on the “Sternbuch-Musy-Himmler Jewish Affair,” February 6, 1945, pp. 1-7. This was the day before the arrival of the 1200 from the Theresienstadt camp. WRB. Box 56. See also McClelland to HIJEFS (Sternbuch), May 5, 1945.
See especially chapter 8 entitled “If,” in Thy Brother’s Blood on further negative reactions by McClelland. Sternbuch-McClelland, July 13, 1944. (SP) Mr. Mantello told this author how obstruc­tionist McClelland was in regard to the distribution of the Salvador papers. Interview.
Somehow, the Vittel chapter is ignored in the major work by Yehuda Bauer, American Jewry and the Holocaust: the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, 1939-1945 [Bauer, JDC] (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1981).
67 See Randolph Vrba, I Cannot Forgive (New York: Grove Press, 1964), pp. 250-2. See also Erich Kulka, “Five Escapees from Auschwitz” in Yuri Suhl, They Fought Back (New York: Crown, 1965), pp. 206-207. See various versions of the “Protocols” in the papers of the War Refugee Board, Box 61. Also in Yad Vashem.
68 See Livia Rothkirchen, “The Czech and Slovak Jewish Leadership in the Field of Rescue Work in Rescue Attempts During the Holocaust (Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1977), pp. 426-7, 462-3. For a brief glimpse at Rabbi Weissmandl and his rescue activities see Thy Brother’s Blood, chapters 2, 18. For a full analysis of the Europa Plan and his other rescue attempts, see Stand Not Idly By. There this author will present the evidence for the veracity of this rescue scheme. Rabbi Weissmandl’s own legacy of his many rescue attempts is his incomplete, posthumously published work in Hebrew, entitled Min Hametzar (Out of the Depths) (New York; Emunah, 1960). While poorly edited, it is the most profound and accurate memoir from the Holocaust.
69 For the origin of the “Working Group,” see Min Hametzar, pp. 52-53. Cf. also interview with Andre Steiner, the intermediary for Weissmandl to Dieter Wisliceny during the Slovak ransom negotiations. On this negotiation and the obtaining of the $50,000 from Orthodox Jews (Shlomo Stem in Slovakia and Naplitaly Treitel, Philip Frendiger and Yehuda Heilbrun in Budapest) see Min Hametzar, pp. 56-62 Cf. Rothkirchen, Destruction, pp. XXVII; Yehuda Bauer, American Jewry and the Holocaust; The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee [Bauer, Joint] (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1981), pp. 368-369. For the origin of the Europa Plan, see Min Hametzar, pp. 63-64. The rest of the plan is scattered in various parts of the poorly edited volume.
See Bauer, Joint, pp. 370-379; Braham, Genocide, pp. 702-3, 936-938. See also op. cit., for one perspective of the Eichmann negotiations. This author will present a totally different analysis in his forthcoming work Stand Not Idly By.
70 See Min Hametzar, pp. 110-111. His emphasis was on bombing the rail lines not the camp. See also op. cit., pp. 229-252; Livia Rothkirchen, The Destruction of Slovak Jewry [Rothkirchen, Destruction] (Jerusalem: Yad Veshem, 1961), pp. 236-242, especially pp. 239, 242. Vrba, Cannot Forgive, pp. 248-250; Braham, Hungary, pp. 708-716. Braham accepts Krasznyansky’s claim that he attached the plea to bomb Auschwitz to the Protocals, leaving the impression that he rather than Weissmandl was its author. Andre Steiner, whose wife Krasznyansky admits, typed the Protocals, told this author that it was absolutely Weissmandl’s idea not Krasznyansky’s. Steiner interview.
71 See for example copies to War Refugee Board via Sternbuch, June 2, 1944. See especially Sternbuch to McClelland, June 22, 1944. Copy of Sternbuch’s original received from Professor David Wyman, as well as the message of June 12 transmitted via Sternbuch to Rabbi Solomon Schonfeld in London. (SP) He personally pleaded with members of the British Government on behalf of Rabbi Weissmandl’s plea—unsuccessful like all the others. Rabbi Weissmandl had been Schonfeld’s teacher during the early 1930’s. See this author’s book Solomon Schonfeld: His Page in History (New York: Judaica Press, 1982). Among the first is the message in mid-May 1944 by Sternbuch to Vaad Hatzalah (SP). Though the coded message read the “Neutra Rabbi,” meaning Rabbi David S. Ungar the well-known rabbinic personality, it really refers to his son-in-law Rabbi Weissmandl, who used the more famous name for obvious reasons.
See the excellent article on the plea to bomb Auschwitz by Pro­fessor David Wyman, “Why Auschwitz Was Never Bombed” Commentary (May 1978), pp. 37-40. See the cables of May 16 and May 23 in the files of McClelland. WRB. Box 62. Cf. also Martin Gilbert, Auschwitz and the Allies (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Wins ton, 1981), especially pp. 216-7, 236-7, 246-8, 303-6. For Griff el’s efforts re Weissmandl’s plea, see Yaakov Griffel’s untitled, undated memoirs of his rescue activities during 1942-1947 [Griffel, Memoirs]. This was written in theearly 1950’s at the behest of Rabbi Weissmandl. Copy in this author’s possession. For the receipt of Weissmandl’s cable, see pp. 27-8. For the distribution to the others, see Braham, Hungary, pp. 710-711.
72 Herman Landau interview with author. Mr. Landau was the executive secretary of HIJEFS from 1942 to 1948. Verified by Dr. Kuhl. Kuhl interview.
73 See Sternbuch to McClelland, June 12, 22, 1944. (SP); Wyman, “Auschwitz,” p. 40; McClelland to Washington Post. April 27, 1983.
74 Vrba, Cannot Forgive, pp. 248-249. Cf. also Kulka, “Five Escapees,” pp. 205-207; Braham, Hungary, pp. 710-711, 729 n. 81. Kasztner asked George Mantello not to publicize the Protocols, but Mantello refused to listen. Interview with Mantello. Interviews with George Mantello. Mr. Mantellos’s papers are in the possession of this author, courtesy of Mr. Mantello. See also Jeno Levai, Zsidosors Europaban (Budapest: 1948), pp. 68-72. For some odd reason Gilbert mentions Walter Garrett and the press campaign but ignores Mantello, the man behind it. (Auschwitz, pp. 248-249.) See also copy of the Auschwitz Protocols and the letter to Mantello by Moshe Krausz, WRB, Box 61. The figure of 1,715,000 is due to an error on Mantello’s version of the Protocols, in contrast to the figure of 1,765,000 in the other versions. It is Mantello’s figures that show up in the entire Swiss press and in the thousands of copies he had distributed throughout Switzerland.
Mantello sought to help Hungarian Jews by sending 1,000 of his authentic “blank” Salvador Papers to Budapest. He sent these via his colleague Dr. Florian Manoliu, councillor at the Rumanian Legation in Berne at the end of May 1944. These were sent to Moshe Krausz, head of the Budapest office of the Palestina Amt in charge of the distribution of Palestine Certificates to Zionists. Mantello obtained a visitor’s card of introduction from Chaim Posner, Krausz’s counterpart in Switzerland, for Manoliu. When the Rumanian diplomat gave Krausz the Salvador Papers, Krausz presented Manoliu with copies of the Auschwitz Protocol and another report on the deportations of Hungarian Jews (335,000) since the April ’44 date of the Protocols.
Both Posner and Mantello were provided with copies of these two reports. Many others in Switzerland and Palestine, including Mayor, Schwalb, etc., obtained one or more copies. Only Mantello had 25,000 copies (in brief) distributed to all the universities as well as embassies, and only he created the press campaign with the help of Walter Garrett of the British News Agency.
76 See for example, Braham, Hungary, pp. 712-713 and chap. 31. Cf. also Gilbert, Auschwitz, pp. 248-249. The name of the four Swiss Theologians that signed a covering letter to the report sent to the newspapers were Karl Barth, Emil Brunner, W. A. Visser t’Hooft, and Paul Vogt. All were courageous men who fought against the silence of the Holocaust in Switzerland.
Copies of many of the Swiss newspapers which publicized the Protocols in the author’s possession, courtesy Mr. Mantello. See collection of such articles in papers of WRB.
77 See above note especially Braham, Hungary, chap. 31. See also op. cit.. pp. 762-771.
78 See for example Braham, Hungary, pp. 952-957. For the change from 600 Zionists to 750, see “Report on Hungary: March 19-August 9, 1944,” by Philip Freudiger, et al, [“Freudiger Report”] in Randolph Braham, ed. Hungarian-Jewish Studies, vol. 3, p. 118. Cf. also Lewin II, p. 56. The Certificates were given only to “bonifide” Zionists. Moshe Krausz interv.
79 See above note. For the 80 Orthodox provided for by Freudiger, see Braham, Hungary, p. 955.
80 See note 78. See especially letter by Rudolph Kasztner to Nathan Schwalb July 24, 1944. (WRB). In his Bericht, Kasztner no longer acknowledges the Freudiger-Link connection with the tractors, see pp. 155-6. Min Hametzar, pp. 134-136. Weissmandl gives the figure of 250 while Kasztner mentions 300.
81 Ibid. Also Harrison to WKB August 11, 1944 (WRB).
82 Ibid. Also Sternbuch to Vaad Hatzalah, July 21, 1944,Sept. 7, 1944 (SP); Freudiger Report, p. 122; Levin II, p. 58. Among the many cables by Weissmandl warning of the danger to the “train,” unless payment were made for the tractors, see the one sent by Sternbuch to McClelland July 20, 1944, warning, in code, that “the entire train would be sent to Auschwitz unless a letter of credit were established within 24 hours” (WRB).
The Vaad Hatzalah had pressured both the Joint and the WRB to urge Mayor and McClelland to do something about this train.’ In a cable of July 18, to McClelland, Secretary of State Cordell Hull noted that the, “Joint Distribution assumes that Mayor is doing his utmost to prevent the reported deportation.” (Hull to Mc­Clelland 7/18/44. WRB) A copy of this was naturally sent to Mayer. See note by McClelland on this document.
83 Interview with Hugo Donnenbaum. Mr. Donnenbaum was brought to the American Legation where present were McClelland, members of the Swiss police and a representative of Interkommerz, which was to have furnished the tractors. Cf. also McClelland’s negative reply to Sternbuch re the tractors upon appeal by Weissmandl in cables of July 14, 17, 1944. On the 17th McClelland told Recha Sternbuch that “I could not give my approval to this plan.” McClelland memo on the “Tractor Affair” July 21, 1944. WRB.
84 In a confidential cable to Vaad London, of Sternbuch’s Committee complains, “Lately the police investigated Sternbuch. They were well informed about details which should have been known only to the Committee.” Further, Landau told the Vaad, “…because of indiscretions we can no longer rescue people on the French and Italian border in the previous manner.” Lewin II, p. 59. For Recha’s arrest trail, and the role of the Jewish “informer,” see my Heroine of Rescue, chap. 4.
85 See Lewin II, p. 56. Saly Mayer first became involved in the negotiations on August 21, the day the first transport arrived in Switzerland. Moreover,-it was the additional payments for the tractors by Mayer during the next few months as a result of Vaad pressure on both the WRB and the Joint that remained a crucial factor in the Kasztner-Mayer-Becher negotiations. Upon McClelland’s suggestion. Ambassador Harrison suggested Mayor’s name as negotiator. Harrison to WRB August 11, 1944. WRB. (Also found in The Holocaust Vol. 16 Rescue to Switzerland (New York: Garland Publishing, 1982), pp. 94-98.
86 For Mayor’s quote see confidential Sternbuch cable to Vaad August 3, 1944, after Talk with McClelland. (SP) Everybody at the time assumed all the 1200 passengers (really 1684) were Orthodox rabbis. See for example, McClelland to Sternbuch August 18, 1944. Yet by July 5, 1944, Landau in a phone conversation with Mayer, tried to dis­abuse him of this -mistaken notion that only Orthodox were involved. As he noted to Mayer, that this plan originated with Weiss-mandl, who even Mayer understood by then, that he worked for all Jews not merely the Orthodox. Mayer remained unconvinced. (See memo of phone conversation by Landau with Mayer July 5, 1944 (SP).
87 See Harrison to WRB August 11, 1944, p. 3.
88 For Mayor’s fear of flooding Switzerland from the 1930’s on, see my Heroine of Rescue, chap. 3. See also Thy Brother’s Blood, chap. 8, and my forthcoming Stand Not Idly By, for a further analysis of Mayer and his policies.
89 There are but a few in a long collection, all found in the papers of McClelland in the WRB. See this author’s chapter on McClelland in Stand Not Idly By. A shorter ‘popular’ version is found in Thy Brother’s Blood, chap. 10. The remark by McClelland concerning “bribery,”is found in the SP and was sent via the confidential Polish pouch. For the pleading of Sternbuch to McClelland to allow some money to be used, as bribery see Sternbuch to McClelland July 12, ’44. In this letter, which inspired the “bribery” remark, Sternbuch tried to explain that I am the very last person who would want to see those [Nazi] scoundrels get a single cent. But it is an urgent necessity, no matter how hard it is for us…we are in an awful situation and we have to suffer all that, if we care to save the life of people…
90 Morgenthau Diaries V.760 August 1, 1944, p. 3 (FDKL). Cf. also McClelland to Sternbuch 8/18/44 (SP)
91 For the payments that Mayer made to the Sternbuchs, see Sternbuch to Vaad Sept. 25, Oct. 6, 1944 (SP). See also Bauer, “Mayer Negotiations,” p. 34. For the cable by Kasztner see ibid., p. 32. While the negotiations by Kasztner-Mayer-Becker were undoubtedly a major factor in the release of the ‘second’ train from Bergen Belsen, Bauer ignores the role of the ‘real’ payment for ‘Sternbuchs tractors’ that spelled a very practical return for Becher in contrast to the stalling tactics for the 5 million dollars. See esp. Confidential cable Sternbuch to Vaad Oct. 6, 1944; Dec. 5, 1944. (SP)
92 Ibid. See also Sternbuch to Vaad, Nov. 10, 1944.
By October, Sternbuch could tell Vaad Hatzalah, via the Polish cable, that
the Gestapo declared that they were satisfied that the rest of the tractors were placed at their disposal, which had been demanded two months earlier. The Gestapo is preparing to send the rest of the Hungarian Jews on Bergen Belsen transport to Switzerland…
Then came the crucial point:
There are still larger sums…which we deposited for tractors in Swiss banks. We still are unable to inform McClelland about this.
This explains why Mayer, who under pressure by Vaad on JDC and the War Refugee Board, finally provided the money for the tractors to assure that the negotiations continue with the Gestapo. And also why neither Sternbuch nor Mayer could discuss the payment for these crucial tractors to the unsympathetic McClelland. (ST-VH 10/6/44 SP).
93 Harrison to WRB, Aug. 11, 1944 (WKB).
94 Kasztner to Schwalb, July 28, 1944. (WRB Box 56).
95 See Report to the Union of Orthodox Rabbis of the United States and Canada Concerning Action Undertaken Toward the Freeing of Jews Detained in German Concentration Camps, by Dr. Jean-Marie Musey [mid-1945] [Musey, Report] pp. 1-2. Unpublished 32 page report in French on his rescue efforts. For a scholarly analysis of this complicated affair see Stand Not Idly By, chaps. 12-13.
96 Musy, Report, pp. 2-3. (The pagination refers to the English translation.) For the 60,000SF and the half million in checks, see Agreement [between Sterbuch and Musy, Oct. 18, ’44] (SP). For the 200 litres of rationed gasoline see Buchler to Sternbuch, Jan. 17, 1946. (SP)
97 Sternbuch to Vaad, Nov. 21, 1944 (SP). This ransom negotiation like those of Weissmandl’s, involved stages during which releases would precede any payment. At no time in any of these negotiations—so disparaged by some historians as unfeasible, or better, a hoax—were the Jewish negotiators double-crossed on such matters. The real tragedy lies in the inability of the West in general and Western Jewry to accept the feasibility of such methods of dealing with an enemy. See Thy Brother’s Blood, chap. 2 for an analysis! of this problem.
98 Among others, see Musy Report, pp. 6-7. Sternbuch to Vaad Nov. 21, ’44; Musy to Himmler Nov. 18, 1944; Sternbuch to Vaad Feb. 5, 1945; Ruckblick Musy Aktion, p. 1. (SP). Even Kurt Becher on the Kasztner-Mayer negotiating team, who wanted to destroy the Musy mission, noted Himmler’s interest in a good press as the key item. See Holocaust Woes V-16, p. 1. Moreover, Felix Kersten, Himmler’s masseur, who also dealt with him for releasing Jews, is quoted by Herschel Johnson, the American Minister to Sweden that Himmler very interested in good press. (Johnson to Washington 3/8/45, p. 2 Morgenthau Diaries. FDRL.)
99 See Vaad to Sternbuch Oct. 26, 1944. This note also sent to McClelland was handed to Mayer by Sternbuch on Oct. 29, 1944. For the rejection by JDC see Sternbuch’s 13 page written testimony re the so-called Kasztner Trial on Feb. 8, 1954. [Sternbuch Testimony] , pp. 5-8, 10-11. The Sternbuch’s tried to coordinate efforts with Kasztner since August ’44, first upon Gisi Fleischmann’s suggestion. See also Sternbuch’s “Open Letter to Judge [Chaim] Cohen and Holevy. July 9, 1954 (SP) [Open Letter] Another ten page testimony re the so-called Kasztner Trial, p. 8. Even Kasztner in his high unreliable Bericht alludes to Sternbuch’s attempt to cooperate. Bericht, pp. 256-7.
100 Ibid. Only in the later stage of negotiations did Mayer even try to get the Nazis to accept the Red Cross supervision of the camps. See Bauer, Joint, p. 423.
By Jan. 7, 1945 Mayer had obtained a license for $5 million from the War Refugee Board which restricted its use solely as a bargaining chip and which had to be countersigned by McClelland. After that Mayer had no more bargaining chips and his stalling could no longer work. That is why, by January 15, when Musy met Himmler a second time, Himmler decided to work with Musy, who seemed to offer something more concrete. (See Bauer, Musy Report, pp. 6-7; McClelland-Sternbuch, Jan. 17, 1945 (SP) Cf. also Sternbuch to Vaad Hatzalah (Polish cable) Jan. 17, 1945.
After Musy ‘discovered’ the Mayer team’s obstructions in Berlin during his first trip to Berlin in Oct.-Nov. ’44 he refused to go back. Only after Musy received reassurances re the Vaad’s influence and Sternbuch’s designation as the official represen­tative, did he return to Germany in mid-January, 1945. (See Sternbuch Testimony, p. 3. Also Vaad to Sternbuch Feb. 19, 1945, (SP)
101 Musy Report, pp. 10-11. See cable by Sternbuch to Vaad Hatzalah. Sternbuch-Vaad Hatzalah (Polish cable) Feb. 5, 1945 (SP) Bauer, “Mayer,” p. 40. Although Gestapo agent Krell was asked to halt negotiations with Mayer on February 5, it was right after the January 15 meeting with Musy that shifted the negotiations from Mayer to Musy. Sternbuch-Vaad Hatzalah (Polish cable), February 16, 1945 (SP)
102 Ibid., p. 2. Among others see McClelland to WRB Feb. 8, 1945, pp. 1-3. MD, Bk. 818.
103 See the articles in the Sternbuch Papers. Other papers included the St. Louis Star, Detroit News, Chicago News, etc. See for example cable to Vaad Feb. 18, 1945 re Swiss press and radio, which were full of this event. Dr. Hecht was the official representative of the Vaad for the press campaign. See for example, Vaad to Musy Feb. 24, 1945 (SP). Dr. Hecht even hired a clipping service for the numerous Swiss reports.
104 See Testimony by Kurt Becher at Nuremberg June 6, 1948, in Holocaust Does, V. 16, p. 2.
105 Among others, see Sternbuch to Mrs. Musy Feb. 23, 1945; Dr. Reuven Hecht to Benoit Musy Feb. 28, 1945, for some of the leftist press. Also interviews with Dr. Hecht. See also Musy Report, pp. 11; Testimony by Walter Schollenberg June 18, 1948, p. 6. See also Sternbuch’s response to some of negative leftist press, Sternbuch to the editor of one unnamed newspaper, whose article “Merci Monsieur Musy” was particularly vicious. No date (ca. mid-March, 1945) (SP). Also Sternbuch to Mr. Marx, Feb. 8, 1945 (SP)
106 See the (London) Jewish Weekly, March 30, 1945, p. 1, for an editorial on the nasty PALCOR article sent to London from Geneva. Cf. also op. cit., April 13, 20, 1945. See also Sternbuch to Musy, March 5, 1945, re the steady series of nasty cables about the Sternbuch rescue effort sent around the world by “someone who hates us.” These cables include information that stems from the early agreements with Musy (which mentioned payment to Musy and the original ransom price of 20 million SF). (SP) Undoubtedly this reference is to Schwalb, whose PALCOR office sent out such negative reports. See Griffel Memoirs, pp. 51-3, for the effect of PALCOR in Jerusalem. One PALCOR headline.
107 Ibid., p. 53. Jewish Weekly 3/30/45, p. 1.
108 All accounts agree on the role of Kaltenbrunner and his role with the negative press. See for example, Schellenberg Testimony, p. 6; Becher Testimony, p. 3.
109 See copy of this message in the SP. Cf. also Musy Report, p. 12. Even in Sweden, Benoit Musy was made aware of Mayer’s obstructionism. Ibid., p. 23. See also Sternbuch to Vaad, March 3, 1945. (SP)
110 Interview with Irving Bunim. He was the one who arranged for this loan. Bunim finally convinced a very reluctant Joint by threatening to publicize its refusal to help rescue Jews.
111 For the battle to convince a reluctant WRB to grant the license for transferring the million dollars, see Thy Brother’s Blood, chap. 7. For McClelland’s negative role re Musy even after the arrival of the 1210 inmates, see McClelland to WRB, March 23, 1945.
When he calls Musy, “without a shadow of a doubt a warm admirer of the Nazis and all their doings…and a very dangerous individual.” WRB. For his remarks re the money for relief see McClelland to Sternbuch May 5, 1945. WRB.
112 See Heroine of Rescue, chap. 13. Dr. Kuhl notified Saly Mayer of this threat to liquidate all the camps (see letter, p. 140). We are unaware of his response, if any. The Vaad, however acted immediately, p. 141.
113 See Musy Report, pp. 17-23, which contains sections of the report by Benoit incorporated into that of Musy Sr. Benoit spent eleven weeks on his own traveling to and from Berlin as well as to all the camps in order to assure them safe transfer. He also went to Sweden where he again spoke with Schellenberg and paved the way for the Kersten, Masur and Storch last minute negotiations. For the agreements re the protection of the guards, see for example Sternbuch to the Vaad, April 24, 1945; Musy Report, pp. 15-16.
114 Ibid.
115 Musy Report, pp. 12, 20-21. Cf. also Work of the IRC for Civilian Detainees in German Concentration Camps from 1939-1945 (Geneva: IRC, 1975), Part III. Schellenberg Testimony, p. 3.
116 Musy Report, p. 13. While Becher claims credit for this, as well as for the transfer of the camps to the Allies, there is little to support his claim, despite the fact that he might have misled them. At that point, past mid-January, Becher had nothing tangible to offer Himmler, neither the good press, nor later the agreement for the transfer of the guards. This makes dubious Musy’s claim Himmler guaranteed him the release of the 69 (61 in Musy Report) Slovak Jews hiding in the bunkers, including Rabbi Weissmandl. It was Musy’s ScheUeflberg connection that worked both in Germany and in Sweden for last minute attempt releases to provide a good press, or later at least provide a better appearance for Germany, in the West. This was part of his long-time drive to negotiate a better deal’with the West for Himmler—and himself—ever since 1942. See for example, Heinz Hohne, The Order of the Death’s Head (London: Seeker & Warburg, 1969), pp. 521-524. See Stand Not Idly By, chap. 14, for an analysis of the two Nazi Gestapo factions and Himmler’s peace and ransom negotiations.
117 See Heroine of Rescue, pp. 55, 66-68.
118 Ibid., p. 272.
119 Griffel Memoirs, pp. 1-60. For the complaint re the expensive cables for any possible rescue, see p. 8.
120 Ibid., esp. pp. 11-12, 20-23, 49-50, et passim. For their selection as members of the N.Y. Vaad Hatzalah, see pp. 29-31.
121 Ibid., pp. 47-49. Cf. also Minutes of the Operating Committee of Relief Organizations July 17-July 31, 1944 [Min. Operating Committee] Holocaust Documents, vol. 14, p. 34, pp. 47-50. For all the cables by Sternbuch to Vaad re the financial support of this “brat” (i.e., $100,000), see SP, 1944.
122 The use of the U.S. diplomatic pouch was a great boon because of its speed and no expense. When the Polish pouch had to be used it was rather expensive. Landau interview.
123 Bunim interv. Cf. also Memo for Treasury Sec’y Morgenthau, March 13, 1945, p. 1, MD.
124 See for example, McClelland to WKB, March 23, 1945, MD.
125 Miss Hodel to Mr. Luxford, Feb. 10, 1945. MD.
126 Min. WRB. Feb. 28, 1945, pp. 2-3. MD.
127 Ibid., p. 5.
128 Ibid.
129 Vad Hatzalah, pp. 38-39.