Pogroms and Riots: German Press Responses to Anti-Jewish Violence in Germany and Russia (1881-1882)The years 1881-82 witnessed almost simultaneous waves of pogroms in eastern Germany (western Prussia, Pomerania, and Posen) and southern Russia; in both countries, the pogroms followed periods of reforms that improved in some way the situation of the Jews. Examines the responses of four mainstream newspapers - the conservative Protestant "Neue Preussische Zeitung" (known as the "Kreuzzeitung"), the Catholic "Germania", the semi-official "Norddeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung", and the Jewish "Allgemeine Zeitung des Judentums". With the exception of the "AZJ", the papers indirectly justified and decriminalized the violence, which was a type of covert expression of opposition to Jewish emancipation and to the growing role of Jews in society. The "AZJ" tended to depict the pogroms, both in Russia and Germany, as planned and organized from above rather than as spontaneous popular outbreaks. The conservative non-Jewish papers, while deploring collective violence, discussed the extermination of the Jews as a possible option for the solution of the "Jewish question". Thus, they prepared the transformation of the seemingly "civilized" pre-1918 antisemitism into the post-1918 antisemitism that included violence both in word and deed. |
Contents
Acknowledgments | 9 |
The Framework | 21 |
Catholic Ambivalences | 95 |
Nihilists Poles and East European Jewsa Hidden Government | 145 |
Assimilation and the Pain of Rejection | 183 |
Conclusion | 209 |
Common terms and phrases
According Adolf Stöcker allegation Allgemeine Zeitung anti anti-Jewish disorders anti-Jewish riots anti-Jewish violence anti-Semitic agitation anti-Semitic movement argued argument Aronson attack attitude August Berlin Bismarck blame Blaschke cause Centre Party Christian Church claimed Conservative Party culture debate East European Jews economic election Elisavetgrad emphasised ethnic violence example exploitation expulsion German anti-Semitic German Conservative German Jewish German Jews German press Germania Geschichte hatred Hereafter Hoffmann Horowitz Ibid incitement issue January Jewish emancipation Jewish Question Judaism Juden Judeophobia judeophobic June Katholizismus Klier Kreuzzeitung Kulturkampf liberal press newspapers Nihilism Nihilists Norddeutsche organised outbreak paper reported peasants persecution Philippson pogroms pogroms in Russia Poles political Pomerania population Protestant racialist refugees Reichstag religious response restrictions revolutionary rhetoric rioters riots in Germany Russian government Russian Jewish Russian Jews Russian Judeophobia Russian press Semitism September 1881 social Stöcker Talmud target group tion Treitschke Tsar Ultramontanes usury Warsaw West Prussia whilst