Posted on 07/09/2008 5:20:04 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson
Claims that the occupation of Austria is a “peaceful” process or that the humiliations inflicted on the Jews were excesses of irresponsible Nazis during the first few days of the new regime fell to the ground before a series of articles by Vincent Sheean in The Herald Tribune describing the systematic terrorization that has been going on for nearly four months in Vienna and is going on today on a scale and with a ferocity that Germany itself never knew. The story Mr. Sheean tells as a result of ten days’ investigation in Vienna is the story of a war, relentless and methodical, against elements of the population who are disliked for any reason by their conquerors. The victims are not all Jews. Catholics, old aristocrats, intellectuals and professors of all shades of opinion account for the majority of the 50,000 estimated to be in jails, concentration camps or other forms of “protective custody.”
For the Jews, however, are reserved the ultimate refinements of a deliberate policy of “spoliation and expulsion.” The account of the cold pogrom conducted in the Jewish community in Vienna would be beyond belief if it were not confirmed by facts known to every American who attempts to rescue one of these unfortunate citizens. Jews, says Mr. Sheean, have no rights and no laws apply to them. They are subject to arrest without charge and their houses are searched without warrant. Their jewelry and money are confiscated as a matter of course. They are forced to sign papers “voluntarily” presenting their property to the State or local municipalities and “voluntarily” offering to leave the country. Their jobs are taken away from them and their businesses are “administered” by inexperienced Nazi commissars. Thousands are saved from starvation by soup kitchens maintained out of the dwindling resources of Jews not yet completely despoiled.
These are the people who wait in suspense on the decisions of the refugee conference at Evian. They are in the same position as 400 Burgenland Jews afloat in a barge on the Danube who are not permitted to land anywhere. If a door of escape is not opened to them, only one alternative remains.
They wait in suspense and also in vain.
what’s a progrom? is that systematic acts of kindness towards a certain group of people? /sarc
POGROM....I guess they didn’t have spelchuck back then.
www.humboldt.edu
Mr. moderator, any chance of removing the extra "r" in the title?
No worries Homer...spelchuck is my close buddy.
At least the story was not about pron...;)
I don't even think the author could even comprehend at the time what that "alternative" would be.
Does any one understand what, exactly, the author intended by this sentence, and how his readers would understand it?
Did the author mean to suggest that Jews might be sent to an amusement park for their entertainment? < /sarc>
Or was he referring to some "evil whose name must not be spoken"?
Seriously, were those folks afraid to say the words?
If so, why?
When I was transcribing this editorial I double-checked my photocopy to make sure I wasn’t missing the ending. But ‘only one alternative remains,’ was really the end. It’s like they were looking down a dark stairwell and knew there was something scary at the bottom but they didn’t really want to think about what the scary thing might be.
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