The Unknown Safe Haven

Frank Shapiro investigates the options open to Jews who wanted to leave Nazi Germany prior to the outbreak of the Second World War, and considers why one possible route to safety was abandoned.

Before the outbreak of the Second World War, Nazi policy against the Jews included disenfranchisement of their civil rights and enforced emigration (judenrein). From Hitler’s installation in power in January 1933 and up to November 9th, 1938, the expulsion of the Jews was conducted in a relatively ordered manner. But the pogrom of Kristallnacht caused this orderly emigration to break down and panic erupted as Jewish leaders, among 30,000 Jews, were rounded up for the concentration camps. Hundreds of thousands of Jews now sought asylum abroad.         

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