Reference Type: Audiovisual Material
Author: Lea Rosh
Year: 1990
Title: The Death is a Master from Germany: The Murder of the European Jews. Collaboration and Refusal in Europe.
Type: Documentary
Size/Length: 161'
Keywords: Jewish minority, Holocaust, Documentary
Abstract: This film documents the extermination of Jews in about 15 countries in Europe. Description of: extermination camps: Chelmno, Treblinka, Sobibor, Belzec, Majdanek, Auschwitz, concentration camps: Westerbork, Theresienstadt, Mauthausen, Buchenwald, Bergen belsen, Ravensbrueck, Fossoli, La Risura. Footage from the following films: Escape from Sobibor, The garden of Finzi Contini, Transport of Death, The Diary of Anne Frank, Mr Klein. Extermination camps were in Poland because it had the greatest concentration of Jews. Number of Jews killed in Vienna, Germany, Kaunas- Wiiliampoli Fornoi, Riga, Lemberg- Lvov, and Kiev- Babi Yar, Oslo, Rhodosand Cos, Amsterdam, Duckwitz, Cornemont, Drancy, Dorohoi, Bucharest, Iassi, Czernowicz, Odessa, Dalnik, Chelmano 1941, Treblinka, Sobibor, Belzec, Lublin, Majdanek, Auschwitz, Lodz, Rome, Fossoli, Carpi, Tracia and Macedonia, Kustendil, Szeged, Siebenburegen, Budapest, Wallenberg, Lutz, Koized. Number of emigrants and number of survivors from each of these places. Austria: First deportation from Vienna, second from Berlin. Assembly points: old jewish cemetery, Sperrgasse 2 and Schule Kasselitz gasse, from there to Aspang railway station and then to Poland or Theresienstadt. Testimony of survivor Kleinmann: "On Kristallnacht, Jews taken from their homes, beaten, mistreated and made to clean the cobblestones and railway wagons which were later used to deport them." (forced labor) Germany: 75 percent of German Jews exterminated. First pogrom in 1941, first gassing in 1942. History of anti-semitism and racism. Extermination. Lithuania: Lithuanian faschists knew what was coming. The survivors had to clean up the evidence of massacres. S.S and Gestapo shot the Jews of Kaunas in fortress of fornoi. When the war appeared to be lost the Germans wanted to destroy the evidence of their crimes, exhumed the bodies and burned them. Testimony of witness. Latvia: Many German Jewish refugees in Riga. First the yellow star, then the ghettos and then expulsion from there at night at 18 degrees (C) to be driven into forrests to be shot. Children were thrown out the windows. Some of these victims were kept naked and freezing for a week before being shot. Russia: The Russian campaign brought the establishment of ghettos and the killing of Russian Jewry. All Galician Jews were exterminated (taken to Piaski, shot, cporpses burnt and bones strewn on mountains. Others were taken to Belzec). Kiev: on Sept. 1941, Jews were asked to assemble at Babi Yar and to bring their valuables. Had to pass between soldiers, shot, thrown into ravine. survivor: Dina. Book by Akosnezow. 1942 Wannsee conference :Heidrich. Norway: under Quisling. Testimony by Jweish witness, Feinberg. The Jews who were not in hiding and who didn't escape were put on ships to Stettin and then by train to Auschwitz. They had no idea what awaited them there. There was an escape route to Sweden organized by the Norwegian resistance. Rhedosand Cos: Even towards the end of the war (1944) deportations continued Jews from Rhodes to Cos and then by train (cattle cars) to Auschwitz and Mauthausen. Forty-six Jews were saved by the Turkish counsel, among them: witness the Soriano family. Holland: 1939, Holland invaded. Germans established a civil administration under Seyss Inquart in the hope of inventually annexing Holland to Greater Germany. Contrary to common belief, the Dutch cooperated with the Germans. Registration of all Jews, yellow star, removal to ghettos in Amsterdam, (40000 inhabitants). Assembly point: the threater and then to Westerbork concentration camp. Every week there was a train direst from Westerbork to Auschwitz. Testimonies by Dr. Paape and Prof. de Jong to explain the obedien of the Dutch to the German occupants. They simply did not grasp the true nature of Nazism. Later on they understood as expressed by the Dutch dockers who protested against the deportations, 80 of them executed. also footage from the film: "Anne Frank". Denmark: German shipping magnate Duckwitz warned Danish Jews of deportations Jews hidden and were subsequently shipped in fishing boats to Sweden. Belgium: under military occupation. Jews first assembled in barracks in Mecheln where they endured much hardship and humiliation, (women obscenely examined). Belgium resistance fighters had saved many Jews, especially children. The small village of Cornemont hid the largest number of Jewish children. France: Northern France under German military occupation. Southern France under government of Vichy (Petain)- was the first free as was the Italian part. France 's history of anti-semitism (Dreyfus case), and history of defense of human rights. Vichy had an internment camp for Jews while the French Italian zone protected them. French police cooperated with the Germans, took the Jews from their homes, assembled them at Drancy and then sent them to Birkenau to be gassed. Testimony of Serge and Beate Klarsfeld (Book: Vichy Auschwitz): without the active cooperation of the French police, the deportations would no have taken place. it was the French population who did and saved Jews. Footage from the film: "Mr. Klein". Romania: Romanian head of state, Antonescu, had pact with A.H condoning all anti-semitic measures (dissimal from jobs, prohibition of work as self-employed, confiscation of property, plunder culminating in the extermination of Romanian Jewry). There were 3 major progroms: Dorohoi, Bucharest, Iassi. Testimony by Chief Rabbi Rosen: At the funeral of a jewish soldier, 80 people making up the cortege when suddenly attacked and killed. The local population showed the Nazis where Jews were to be found; few were saved. Progrom on Januar 21-23 1941: Jewish homes burned, Rabbi Gutman and his two sons shot in synagogue. Jews slaughtered in slaughter-house and hung with annotation "kosher meat". All these were done by the Germans, the Iron Guard and simple rowdies. Shooting. Witness reports: "mountains of corpses and streets drenched in blood. Deportation. Riots in Transnistria. (Reading from book E. hilsenroth "Nach" descibing life in ghetto.) Closed ghetto, cattle trucks, forced marches, bridge across the Dniestra, shot cruelty of the Romanians, Odessa. Few records, some 19,000 Jews massacred. Survivors marched to Dalnik to be shot. Odessa pogrom caused by partisan actions (exploding Nazi headquarters). Extermination of Jews in Poland: Testimony by local residents: castle, selection, gassing trucks, shot, corpses in pits, stench- witness aware of what was happening. They didn't mind expulsion of Jews but murder "was too much". Inhabitants of Warsaw ghetto were sent to Treblinka (every day around 5,000). 40,000 had died in the ghetto from cold, starvation and disease. Local population knew what was going on. Testimony of single man: The western Jews arrived in regular trains, the eastern Jews in cattle cars. Jews had to undress, taken to "shower rooms". Jews were kept so their noise would drown out the screams of those about to be murdered. In 1943, there was a revolt by the inmates planned by sone 20-40 people. (Footage from film). there were railway tracks into the forest where there stood a barrack. Witness: no Jew ever returned. The mass graves had to be opened and corpses had to be cremated. Lublin Castle was used as a prison. When the Russian liberation army arrived, hundred of corpses were found in the cellar. Majdanek was first a camp for resistance fighters and pows, later for Jews. The Germans had no time to destroy the gas installation before the liberation and so proof still exists. Aushcwitz: Haolf the inhabitants of this little town were Jews. The locals knew what was happening. Prof. Frnzisek Ryszk, (historian), maintains that the Jews were good for Poland, because they contributed to the culture Large Jewish center in Lodz. Italy: Facsism was not anti-semitic. The Italian Jews were fully integrated. Even Mussolini refused to adopt anti-semitic actions as demanded by Hitler. Whatever persecutions they were, were done by the S.S. Eight thousand Jews were deported to Mauthausen. Gauleiter Globotschnik, who had thousand camps in Poland came to Triest, and had 10,000 Jews imprisoned in the local prison and then in La Risura. Quote from The Institute of ontemporary Jewish History in Milano. Jewish witness Storch, the Italians had no "Jewish problem". The long established Jewish ghetto of Rome was to be liquidated. Their Italian neighbors warned them and many managed to escape. Women and children escaped to Monte Vede where they were hidden by local farmers. Those that were caught were taken to camp in Fossoli and then to Auschwitz. Local farmers risked their lives to save Jews (testimony by farmer resistance fighters). The germans complained that the Italian police and population were not cooperative. There is a list of 80 monasteries which hid Jews and provided them with false papers. In the small city of Carpi near Modena there is a monument listing all the names of Italian Jews who perished in the Holocaust. There was a resistance organization in Bologna which provided Jews with false papers. Bulgaria: Tzar Boris of Bulgaria was an ally of Hitler. Yet most Jews were saved except those of Tracia and Macedonia, where 11,000 Jews were put on trucks and trains to reach the port of Lom. There they were put on a ship to Vienna to be deported then to Treblinka. Though the Nuremberg Laws were introduced, the communists, partisans and the Orthodox church protested against the deportations (footage from film "Transport of Death"). Testimony of priest Schwaroff. Many monasteries offered refuge to revolutionnaries. Kustendil: A small township, yet the inhabitants protested so forcefully against the deportations that the Jews were saved. May 24, 1943: Big national protest against deportation. The Tzar, the Metropolite and 10,000 people took part in a protest march. The Jews were evacuated, their possessions confiscated but at least they survived.
URL: http://db.yadvashem.org/films/item.html?language=en&itemId=158763
Access Date: 02.10.2014
Name of Database: The Visual Center - Online Film Database
Database Provider: Yad Vashem
Language: German