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Authors: Bruce F. Pauley

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From Prejudice to Persecution: A History of Austrian Anti-Semitism (61 page)

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Page 273

German Jewish poet, Heinrich Heine, was removed from an apartment house in Vienna on the orders of Mayor Richard Schmitz.

44

By the beginning of 1938 the status of the Jews of Austria was in some respects similar to that of the Jews in Nazi Germany. To be sure, there were no headline-catching denunciations of Jews from the highest government offices, no Jewish books were burned, and no physical assaults on Jews were permitted, let alone encouraged by the government. However, the government did tolerate verbal abuse of Jews by newspapers and private organizations such as the Antisemitenbund, which, as we saw in Chapter 12, experienced a real renaissance in the last year or two of the First Republic. Many Jews, especially physicians, lost their jobs, and most others found themselves more socially isolated than ever. The Fatherland Front segregated Jewish children in the Jungfront, some schools were at least partially segregated, and even the Boy Scouts had separate sections for Jews.
45
An important difference in the treatment of German and Austrian Jews after 1934 is that discrimination in Austria was quieter and did not attract much worldwide attention. The Austrian Jews themselves referred to it as ''rubbersoled antiSemitism."
46
The Austrian government and economy, unlike the Nazi regime in Berlin, was not nearly strong enough to defy world public opinion or a boycott. However, an even greater distinction with Nazi Germany was that in Austria there was no systematic attempt by the government to pauperize the country's entire Jewish population or to force its emigration.
The governments of Engelbert Dollfuss and Kurt von Schuschnigg inherited the inconsistent Jewish policies of both the Christian Social Party and the Roman Catholic church. Racial antiSemitism was officially
verboten
, but not economic and social antiSemitism. The two chancellors apparently hoped to appease both domestic and foreign Jews, who would consider their policy enlightened in comparison with Germany, while at the same time satisfying the prejudices of Austrian antiSemites and the German government. As it turned out, this middle-of-theroad antiSemitism was moderate enough to retain the fervent loyalty of Austria's Jews to the very last day of the First Austrian Republic. However, it was not nearly radical enough to pacify the extremists among Austrian or German antiSemites.

 

 

Page 275
PART V
DEPORTATION, DEATH, AND DELIVERANCE
The night of 1112 March 1938 marked the dramatic end of a thousand years of Austro-Jewish history. On Friday, 11 March, all the Jewish newspapers of Vienna published their usual weekly editions. By the next day their offices and those of other Jewish organizations had been seized by Nazis. Within a matter of days, or at most a few months, nearly all Austrian Jews had lost their means of livelihood and in many cases their homes as well. By 1942 almost all of the country's 220,000 Jews (using the Nazis' own definition) had either been forced to emigrate or had been deported to work and extermination camps in Poland. By the end of the war, 65,000 of them had lost their lives.
AntiSemites, especially the hard-core, racial variety, regarded Jews as having a completely corruptive and injurious influence on Austria's politics, culture, and economy. In fact Austria's well-being and that of its Jewish population have nearly always coincided. The golden age of Viennese Jewry between 1867 and 1914 occurred at a time when Viennese growth, prosperity, and cultural creativity as a whole reached a peak. Jews and Austrians in general shared in the calamity of the late war years and the early years of the First Republic. When a modicum of prosperity returned in the mid-and late 1920S Jews and gentiles alike benefited, and both suffered again from the Great Depression.
This pattern seemed to change immediately after the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany. The year and a half between the Anschluss and the outbreak of the Second World War saw unemployment in Austria rapidly disappear at the very time when Austria's Jews were suffering an almost unimaginable disaster. The apparent difference in fate, however, was only momentary and illusory. By 1941, hundreds of thousands of Austrians were freezing and dying on the Russian front. By 1944 American and British bombs were being dropped on Vienna, Linz, and Wiener Neustadt. By April 1945 the once-mighty Third

 

Page 276
Reich was in ruins and the eastern third of Austria was overrun by Russian troops.
The common fate of Austria and its Jewish population to a limited extent resumed after 1945. Austrian independence (though not yet sovereignty) and the Jewish community of Austria were both reborn. This time, however, Austria's Jewish community was too small to make a significant contribution to what, by the 1960s, was a prosperity unprecedented in the country's entire history. But if the Second Republic has proved that the welfare of its economy is not dependent on Jewish businessmen, the same cannot be said of Austria's academic, cultural, and scientific creativity, which to date has shown little of the brilliance of the First Republic (although Austria continues to be a world leader in the performing arts).
Austrian antiSemitism has not vanished with the virtual disappearance of the country's Jewish community. Ancient stereotypes have survived to the present, but one can no longer speak of an anti-Semitic "movement" and few if any Austrians would suggest that any important problem could be solved if only the "Jewish problem" were solved.

 

Page 277
19
From the Anschluss to Extermination
Jewish Optimism in the Last Days of Austrian Independence

In the last six weeks of the First Austrian Republic two Jewish attitudes remained constant: support for Chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg, and confidence that Austria would remain independent. Even the most ominous news never shook these beliefs for long. Stefan Zweig was shocked to discover, on his last trip to Austria in November 1937, that his friends were not worried about a Nazi takeover. The family of Hans Thalberg, a postWorld War II Austrian diplomat, never considered emigration, not even in the last days before the Anschluss.

1

Although Adolf Hitler had made it absolutely clear on the first page of
Mein Kampf
that his ultimate goal was to annex Austria, the practical realities of German military weakness and the strong opposition to any such move by Britain, France, Italy, and Czechoslovakia induced Hitler to scale back his ambition vis-à-vis Austria to an interim policy
of Gleichschaltung
, or coordination. Austria was to have a Nazi government that would fully cooperate with the Reich in political, military, social, and economic affairs until a full-fledged annexation could be safely consummated. Hitler apparently saw that time rapidly approaching when he called his famous "Hossbach Conference" in November 1937 and discussed possible foreign policy options with the top military and political leaders of the Third Reich. One option the Führer specifically mentioned was the takeover of Austria.
The first indication of an impending aggressive foreign policy came in late January and early February 1938. On 26 January Hitler dismissed his war minister, General Werner von Blomberg, on the pretext that he had recently married a prostitute. Then on 4 February the Führer announced the resignation of the commander in chief of the German army, Werner von Fritsch, and Foreign Minister Konstantin von Neurath, both of whom, like von Blomberg,

 

Page 278
had been outspoken opponents of Hitler's expansionist plans discussed at the Hossbach Conference. Hitler now became the supreme commander of all the German armed forces, and the ardent Nazi Joachim von Ribbentrop became the new foreign minister.

Although the Hossbach Conference was ultrasecret, the dismissal of the conservative nationalists, who had helped the Führer come to power, was completely public. Because Jews had long been counting on these conservative politicians and military leaders to restrain Hitler, if not overthrow him, one might assume that they would have been alarmed by these changes. Not necessarily. George Clare's Uncle Paul, the family's highly respected political pundit, probably typified the almost inexhaustible optimism of Austrian Jews in being convinced that the conservative nationalists, now freed from political responsibility, would get rid of Hitler within months if not weeks.

2

The Clare family was not alone in clinging to these illusions. The
Jüdische Presse
, while admitting that the ministerial changes represented a turning point, thought it was possible that these events would have a favorable result by causing world public opinion to realize the increased danger to peace. In any event, Austrian Jews needed to rally around Schuschnigg. The
Jüdische Presse
was even less alarmed by the meeting at Berchtesgaden between Hitler and Schuschnigg at which the Austrian chancellor was forced to make a number of concessions to the Austrian Nazi Party. Fears of a "Trojan Horse" arising from the meeting were highly exaggerated, according to the mouthpiece of Austrian Orthodox Jewry. The same fears had existed after the July Agreement in 1936, but the aftermath proved that these fears were unjustified. The new pro-Nazis in the cabinet were friends of Schuschnigg; patriots had no reason to distrust the Austrian chancellor. A week later the
Jüdische Presse
commented that Austria had overcome greater crises in the past than the present one. Any anti-Jewish measures the government might take would only hurt the Austrian economy. As long as Schuschnigg was in charge, the Jews were in no danger.
Die Wahrheit
thought that the only purpose of the Berchtesgaden meeting was to restore peace between Germany and Austria. The Germans had assured Schuschnigg that they would not intervene in Austrian affairs and would not support the Austrian Nazis.
3
Schuschnigg himself sought to quiet Jewish fears by telling a group of Jewish industrialists that there would be no further changes in the Austrian government.
4
More alarming to Austrian Jews was the increase in Austrian Nazi activity following the Berchtesgaden meeting, and especially after Hitler's speech to the Reichstag in which he mentioned the sufferings of ten million "Germans" in Austria and Czechoslovakia, but failed to make any assurances regarding Aus-

 

Page 279

trian independence.
Die Neue Welt
was concerned by the increased aggressiveness of the Austrian Nazis, but thought that Austrian independence could best be served by the Jews remaining quiet and unprovocative. The Clare family believed Austrian newspapers, which said that Hitler had not mentioned Austrian independence in his Reichstag speech because the Berchtesgaden agreement had reaffirmed the July Agreement of 1936, which had guaranteed the independence of Austria. The seventeen-year-old George Clare even thought that the demonstrations by Austrian Nazis in late February and early March 1938 were more exciting than threatening.

5

Never were the Austrian Jews more solidly behind the Austrian government and never were they more united than after Schuschnigg announced on 9 March that a plebiscite on the question of Austrian independence would be held four days later. Following the meeting at Berchtesgaden, Schuschnigg was far more forthright with Dr. Desider Friedmann, the president of the Israelitische Kultusgemeinde, than he was with the press or with foreign diplomats. The chancellor described in detail Hitler's ravings and threats. Schuschnigg asked Friedmann to travel abroad and do what he could to bolster the sagging Austrian schilling. Then on 10 and 11 March, Dr. Friedmann presented Schuschnigg with two checks worth a total of 800,000 schillings, or about $120,000 in the currency of that time. After the Anschluss the Nazis ransacked the headquarters of the IKG and discovered a list of contributors to this fund. The Jewish community was fined a sum equal to this amount and Friedmann and other IKG officials were arrested.
6
Arrests and "Aryanization"
The fate of the officials of the Kultusgemeinde was representative of the plight of thousands of Austrian Jews immediately after the German invasion and annexation of Austria, beginning on 12 March 1938. The optimism that most Jews clung to in the last years and months of Austria's independence nearly vanished, although wishful thinking never entirely disappeared. The Clare family knew at once that their life in Austria was over as soon as the Anschluss occurred. On the other hand, Hans Thalberg's father thought that things might not be too bad for Jews. Perhaps they would merely have to work harder and their economic status would be lowered. Many other Jews tried to console each other with rumors that Hitler had throat cancer and was expected to die any day.
7
The change in the political atmosphere from the Schuschnigg regime to
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