The Holocaust, the French, and the Jewsø Many recent books have documented the collaboration of the French authorities with the anti-Jewish German policies of World War II. Yet about 76 percent of France?s Jews survived?more than in almost any other country in Western Europe. How do we explain this phenomenon? Certainly not by looking at official French policy, for the Vichy government began preparing racial laws even before the German occupiers had decreed such laws. To provide a full answer to the question of how so many French Jews survived, Susan Zuccotti examines the response of the French people to the Holocaust. Drawing on memoirs, government documents, and personal interviews with survivors, she tells the stories of ordinary and extraordinary French men and women. Zuccotti argues that the French reaction to the Holocaust was not as reprehensible as it has been portrayed. |
Contents
Jews in France before the War | 7 |
War Begins 19391940 | 31 |
Racial Laws 19401941 | 51 |
Internment Camps in the Unoccupied Zone | 65 |
Roundups and Deportations | 81 |
The July Roundup Paris 1942 | 103 |
Expulsions from the Unoccupied Zone | 118 |
Attitudes toward the Jews 1942 | 138 |
Arrests of Foreign Jews | 157 |
No Holds Barred JanuaryDecember 1943 | 172 |
The Final Abandonment 1944 | 190 |
Jewish Rescue Organizations | 210 |
Survival and NonJewish Rescuers | 227 |
Crossing Frontiers | 247 |
Jews in the Armed Resistance | 260 |
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Common terms and phrases
adults Annette anti-Semitism arrested arrived August Auschwitz Beaune-la-Rolande Catholic CDJC Centre Chambon chap clandestine Communist Compiègne convoy Denise deported to Auschwitz documents Drancy Éditions escape Father February foreign Jewish foreign Jews French Jewish French Jews French police FTP-MOI Garel German Gestapo Gourfinkel Gurs hiding Holocaust homes Ibid immigrants internment camps interview Italian zone Izieu Jacques Jewish Jewish children Jews in France Juifs juive July June knew later Laval Le Chambon Le Vernet Léon Poliakov Les Milles lived Lyon Marseille Maurice Rajsfus mother Nazis Nice non-Jewish non-Jews November occupied October parents Paris Pastor percent Pétain Pierre Pithiviers political prisoners Protestant Rabbi racial laws raid refugees regional prefect René residence Resistance Rivesaltes Röthke roundup sent September Serge Klarsfeld social workers survived Témoignage testimony tion Toulouse train UGIF unoccupied zone Vénissieux Vichy officials Vichy regime Vichy-Auschwitz village women wrote Yad Vashem York young