Figure 1.--
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Figure 1.-- |
Many of Seyss-Inquart's decrees were inconsequential, but slowly they created thge circumstances that permitted the NAZIs to murder most Dutch Jews. There were several objectives. The primary objective was to sperate the Jews from Dutch Gentile society. The regulations were also designed to steal as much prtoperty as possible from the Jews and to impoverish them as well to locate them so that they could be easily arrested and deported.
Seyss-Inquart took a gradualist appraoch. NAZI officails had not yet worked out precisely what was to be done with the Jews. The stunning success in the West had suprised most. With France defeated, Hitler was master of Europe and he and his inner circle could now proceed with what ever diobolical plans they desired. Immeduate deportation of Dutch Jews was impractical as camps did not yet exist to accomodate or as was soon decided to murder them. The first anti-Jewsish regulation was issued in July. It was inocuous and receiverd little notice. Soon more stringent decreeswere issued. Some academics and clerics protested. This that spoke up too loudly were arrested. Jew wre gradually foced to register and surrender bank accounts, businness, and other property. Accutomed to being good citizens many registered allowing the NAZIs to plan arressts and roundups. Deprived of their property, most Jews found it impossible to go into hiding which could be a very expensive proposition. Then they were required to wear a yellow star to make it easier to identify.
Seyss-Inquart began his anti-Jewish campaign in July 1940, about 2 months after te NAZIs had invaded the Netherlands. The first steps were inocuous, but they gradually increased in importance. Jews were defined as having one or more Jewish grandparents, a stricter definition than in Germany itself. German Jews had to register and move away from the coast. Civil servants were fired. Finally all Jewish buinesses had to register, of course paving the way for the NAZIs to steal them and identifying Jews with assessts.
Seyss-Inquart's first anti-Jewish measure was issued on July 2, 1940. In was an inoquous one, but set the precedent for all the others. It forbidded Jews to serve as volunteer air-raid wardens. Since there were very few Jewish wardens, it had little effect. Seyss-Inquart next in August forbade ritual slaughter, a prohibition that did affect observant Jews following the dietary laws. It was desguised in a group of animal protection measures. [Anderson]
Seyss-Inquart on August 20, began his assault on Jewish employmment. He issued a decree giving himself the authority to dismiss any Dutch civil servant without cause. The Jews were not specifically mentioned, but it gave him the authority to fire Jews as well as Dutch civil servants that were incooperative with the occupation authorities. Next German Jews were told to leave the Hague and all coastal areas and to register with the Aliens' Department. The German Jews having recently arrived were among the most vulnerable with fewer local associates to assist them.
Seyss-Inquart in September decreed that no new Jews could be hired by the Dutch civil service and that Jews currently employed could not be promoted. This was followed by defining a Jew, anyone with at least one Jewish grandparent. This was in fact a more rigorous definition than provide for in the German Nuremburg race laws which defined Jews as having two Jewish granparents. Those with one or two Jewish grandparents were defined as Mischling First and Second class.
October brough new requirements. Seyss-Inquart ordered all 200,000 Dutch civil servants to sign a form attesting that they were Aryans. There were in fact two forms. Aryan filled out the A Form. Non-Aryans filled out the B Form. This process beagan October 18, 1940 and civil servants had to submit the forms within a week. Such forms attesting to a religion were not unknown in the Nerherlands. Religion was a question on Census forms. It was of course the purpose that the NAZIs would put the forms to that was the problem. There was some objections within the Civil Service and some clergymen spoke out. Most civil servants, knowing they wuld be fired if they refused to sign, signed the forms. Many Jews also filled out the B Form. A gentile civil servants refused to sign and resigned their posts. Reichskommissar Seyss-Inquarton October 22 ordered the registration of all Jewish-owned enterprises. He defined a Jewish business as any business where at least one owner or one director was Jewish as well as a variety of other specifics. Those that failed to register faced heavy fines. It was the first step in the NAZI process of stealing Jewish property and denying them their livlihood. It also helped the NAZIs identify Jews with valuable assetts. The NAZIs as a result managed to liquidate about 10,000 Jewish businesses out of 21,000. An additional 8,000 were 'Aryanized' and 3,000 other businesses were placed in 'trusteeship' for future sale. [Yahil, p. 175.]
Seyss-Inquart on the basis of these forms in November demanded that all Jewish civil servants fired. He insisted that the Secretaries-General issue a decree dismissing Jews in the Dutch civil service giving the action the scanction of the Dutch Government. They complied. All 2, 500 Jews were dismissed from the Dutch Civil Service. Included among those dismissed were the Chief Justice of the Dutch Supreme Court, Lodewijk
Visser, and 41 university professors. [Woolfe] There were student protests and one university professor denounced the action. After his speech mimeographed and circulated he was jailed for 8 months. The abuse of prisionors was such that few who were released dared speak out again.
Seyss-Inquart lost no time in 1941 to continue his anti-Jewish campaign. He ordered on January 10 that all Jews register with the Dutch authorities. Of course it was not a mater of religious practice, but parentage--using the criterion of one Jewish grandparent. Jews were ordered to register at the local Census office within 4 weeks. Amsterdam Jews were given 10 weeks to comply, perhaps because of the large number of Jews living there. Each person had to fill out a form providing a derailed personal history. The Jews even had to pay a refistration fee of one guilder. Incredibly almost every Jew in Holland complied, no doubt terified of the authorities and the stiff pinishment for those who did not comply--up to 5 years inprisonment confiscation of one's property. The results gave the NAZIs a tally of 160,000 people. There were 140,000 full Jews, 15,000 half-Jews, and some 5,000 quarter Jews. The NAZIs now knew precisely where all of the Netherland's Jews lived and their businness associations. They also knew of marital assocaitions with gentile families, the most likely to assisst or hide Jews. Seyss-Inquart also required all Durch adults to carry a Dutch Givernment ID card. This was necessary not only for identification, but to obtain the ration coupons needed to buy food. A further decree stipuated that Jews had to have a J placed on their ID cards. [Anderson]
Seyss-Inquart in March prohibited Jews from donating blood. Jewish orhanizations were shut dowm, only the Germans organized Jewish Council was allowed to function.
Seyss-Inquart in April prohibited Jews from entering hotels, restaurants, theaters, public meeting halls and movie theaters. He prohibited Amsterdam Jews after April 10 from moving out the city. He issued a decree April 15 that all Jews turn in their radios within 2 weeks. To discourage vandalism, the radios had to working when turned in or the Jewish owner had tompay to have it repaired. [Anderson]
Seyss-Inquart ordered that after May 1, no Jews could serve on the stock exchange. Also after May 1, Jewish attorneys, doctors, pharmacists, and translators could not work for gentiles. Seyss-Inquart on May 28 issued a decree where requiring any Jewish owned farms to be sold. He prohibited Jews on May 31 from public swiming pools and parks as well as race tracks. [Anderson]
Seyss-Inquart prohibuted Jews from owning pigeons (Decree 140) which may sound inconsequential, but pigeons were a source of unrationed meat. More ominously, Seyss-Inquart began requiring Jews to turn over their bank accounts (Decree 148). The accountswere to be turned over to the firm of Messers, Lipton, Rosenthal & Co., which would "administer" the funds. Seyss-Inquart then establishmed Der Niederländische Grundstücksverwaltung, (the Dutch Estate Management Organization), with the authority to seize Jewish properties--or to authorize non-Jews to do so (Decree 154). [Anderson]
The NAZIs in August ordered Jews deposit cash, securities, stocks, and bank holdings with the Bank of Lippmann, Rosenthal & Company (LiRo). The only exceptions were wedding rings, pocket watches, and dental fillings. This bank had a Jewish name. It was in fact set up by the NAZIs to efficently collect Jewish assets before the Jews were deported. The NAZIs used the name of an established Jewish bank to give the illusion that the assets would be protected. Many were not fooled, specially the German Jews who had fled to the Netherlands. Mamy Dutchs Jews were. Jews were required to open accounts at LiRo and to deposit all other accounts to LiRo. These deposits and proceeds from sales of securities were in fact put at the disposal of an agency of the Reichskommissar, the Office of Property Administration and Pensions. [Aalders PJA and Hilberg, p. 380.] Reports iundicate that German government officials, businesses, and banks virtually converged on the Netherlands o take advantage of thge opportunities created by the decrees. There were imilar opportunities in other occupied countries, but the Netherlnds was close to Germany and the opportunities especially attractive. Records indicate that that anywhere from $0.3-0.5 billion was looted from Dutch Jews based upon their 1940 assetts. The amount of course would be much higher in current dollars. [Marrus and Paxton, p. 696 and Zabludoff, p. 15.]
NAZI measures until August 1941 were directed at adults. Jewish children had largely been spared from the various NAZIs measures, although they were of course affected by these measures taken against their parent. This changed in August. NAZI authorities announced that beginning with the coming school year Jewish children would no longer be allowed to attend school with other Dutch children. Jewish children would have to attend their own separate schools where they would be taught by Jewish teachers. [Anderson] The Germans had taken the same step in Germany in 1935, but many German Jews had already left the German state schools because of the abuse they were receiving. The same was not true in Dutch schools where attacks on Jewish children were virtually unknown. The Jewish Council was given the responsibility for establishing and administering the Jeish schools. (Jewish teachers had already been fired from the Dutch schools. The teachers welcomed the opportunity to work again. They were paid by the Jewish Council which the NAZIs financed by money sized from Jewish bank accounts.) There were about 7,000 Jewish children enrolled in the Jewish schools. Margot Frank and her sister Anne were thus separated from other Dutch children. She had to leave her Montessori School. Together with Margot in September she entered the Jewish Lycee in Amsterdam. [Frank]
Hans Rauter, NAZI Commissioner for Public Security, enacted a variety of anti-Jewish decrees. One of his new measures was "The Proclamation on the Movement of Jews." The decree prohibited Jews from entering concert halls or any sport facilites. They were also prohibited from entering public libraries, art gallerie, and museums. [Anderson]
The NAZIs prohibited non-Jews from working as domestics in Jewish homes (October 2). Here the NAZI interest was a matter of ensuring that no Jew have a position of authority over Aryans. There were also sexual concerns which was a moral issue in the NAZI mindset. Another decree issued October 22 prohibited Jews from working as domestics in Aryan homes (Decree 200). Aryan maids over age 50 were exempted if one of the employers were not Jewish. Jews living outside Amsterdam were prohibited from moving except to Amsterdam where most Dutch Jews were already concentrated. [Anderson] The NAZIs eventually began interning unemployed Jews in labor camps from which in 1942 they were moved to Westerbock.
German auhorities officially on November 25, 1941 revoked the citizenship of all German Jews living abroad. This included the 30,000 German Jews living in the Netherlands.
The NAZI plans of how to kill the Jews in the occupied teritories were finalized in January at the Wannsse Conference. Based in the decisions taken there, Seyss-Inquart and NAZI authorities in other countries began to enact more anti-Jewish regulations that would prepare for the scheduled compleltion of the gas chambers at the Polish death camps in July 1942. Authorities in early 1942 methoidically forced Jews living outside Amsterdam to move to the city. The objective of course was to concentrate the Jews so when the time came they could be more easily tounded for transport to the death camps. The Jewish Council was given the task of housing Jews noving or brought to Amsterdam. The Jewish sections of Amsterdam imcresingly began to look like ghettos. Many Jewish families by 1942 were in desperate straits. Most men had lost their jobs and had no way of supporting their families. Bussinessmen had been stripped of their busniesses and bank accounts had been seized. Doctors, lawyers and other professionals could only accept Jewish clients and fewer and fewer such clints could afford to pay for services. More and more Jews were becoming empoverished. This was not just a matter of cruelty and avarice on the part of the NAZIS, but they were fully aware that empoverished Jews would be much easier to round up when the time came. Beginning in 1942, he NAZIs began forcing Jewish men to perform manual labor in special work camps.
The NAZIS in early 1942 began concentrating Jews into Amsterdam. I'm not sure if there was a sprecufic regulation here. Jews were prohibited from moving, except if it was to Amsterdam. The NAZIs began forced labor camps for Jews in January. The NAZIs in 1942 intensified their efforts to Arayanize Jewish businesses, forcing Jews to sell their businesses to non-Jews or attempting to simply steal them. Some Jews managed to transfer their businesses Dutch assoaciates or friends who held them in trust. Otto Frank did this by turning his jam business over to Henk Gies, the husband of a sympethetic employee. Otto Frank as a German was proactive. Many Dutch Jews not fully understanding how the NAZIs operated did not take steps like taking their money out of the banks and getting assetts out of their own names.
The NAZIs NAZIs introduced the yellow star (early May). Jews were required to wear yellow stars on clothes in public with "Jood" written on them. This was to distinguish them from Aryans so they could be publicly humiliated and make it easier to identify them. Regulations made any infringement of new regulations to have very serious consequences May 21).
The NAZIs used the Jewish Council's Het Joodchse Weekblad (The Jewish Weekly) to publish the anti-Jewish regulations. It was the only newspaper Jews were allowed to publish and of course was censored by the NAZIs.
Jews were prohibited from sexual contact with non-Jews. Interracial marriages was prohibited. The NAZIs also prohibited Blacks from sexual contact with Aryans. The NAZIs also restricted Jews from further areas of employment. This included charity work and jobs in companies operated by non-Jews. NAZI authorities prohibited Jews from riding in cars (March 20, 1942). There were a few exceptions for Jews riding in ambulances and hearsts or involved in war work. Another regulation on prohibited Jews from moving furniture outside of their homes without permission (March 20, 1942). [Anderson] All motor vehicles owned by Jews were seized.
Jews were prohibited from using public telephones, here I am not sure about the date of the regulation, but I believe it was March.
The NAZI in April made the the German Nuremberg race laws applicable to the Netherlands. Gentiles and Jew were prohibited from marrying and sexual intercourse between the two "races" ws made a felony under the law. The NAZIs on April 29 issued the infamous dcree requiring Jews to wear yellow stars (Decree 13). Jews in Poland and Germany were previously required to wear the stars. This made it easy to pubically humiliate them as well as to simplify their identifcation. Th introduction in the Netherlands was cordinated with similar actions taken in Belgiumand France. All Jews when in public no had to wear a yellow star badge with the word Jood (Jew). The star had to be sewn over the left breast of outer clothing, it could not be pinned on which would have allowed it to have been easily taken off and put back on. The star was to be about the size of a palm so it could be easily seen. The Jews had little option as the penalties for being caught without the star were very severe. Jews found without Stars coulfd be sentenced to 6 months inprisonment and/or a 1,000 guilder fine. NAZI authorities gav the Jewish Council nearly 0.6 million Stars and ordered to distribute them within 3 days. The Jewish Council objcted, but of course such protestations ere ignored. Jewish families received a circular informing them of the new decree and where the Stars could be purchased. They cost four Dutch cents each and the purchaser had to use a clothing ration coupon. The initil decree was modified to explain that children under 6 yers six did not
have to wear the badges. (Here the NAZIs knew that such young children need not have to be visually identifgied as they would almost always be under the care of their parents or older siblings.) The badges had to be sewn on the clothes and absolutely could not be pinned. Jews were terrified about this new regulation. Most other Dutch people were apauled. Many tried to show pport. The underground newspaper, De Vonk sureptiously
printed 0.3 million Stars with the script changed to "Jews and Non-Jews are ones." The NAZIs soons discouraged sympathetic Dutch from wearing these stars. The NAZIs arrested 23 students at one school and sent to the Amersfoort concentration camp for 2 weeks. The Stars of course would simplify the roundups that the NAZIs were planning. [Anderson]
The NAZI authorities in May ordered Jews to turn in jewelry, precious metal, and art to LiRo. The collected valuables were mostly seized without compensation by LiRo and the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg (ERR). These entities were supervised by the German General Commissariat for Finance and Economic Affairs. [Hilberg, p. 379 and Simpson, p. 56.] Art dealers were in the possession of large stocks of works. In addition, it was not only rich families who held valuable art works. Since the 17th century, many "moderately prosperous middle class families" possessed art including paintings and ceramics of some value. Jewish families of course were some of those failies. [Van Rappard-Boon] One estimate suggests that about 14,000 pices of art looted by the NAZIs from Dutch Jews. After liberation, many works of art plundered from the Netherlands were repatriated. About 3,500 paintings were recovered from Germany. Only abot 600 were returned to the original owners, in part because few of the owners survived. More than 10,000 are still missing. [Simpson, p. 56.] Efforts to recover looted art continue. [U.S. Holocaust Museum and Van Rappard-Boon] Jewish families were restricted to withdrawing no more than 250 guilders monthy from the funds they had been forced to deposit in special accounts, a family could now draw no more
than 250 guilders a month. The NAZIs prohibited Jews from recieving fishing permits on May 21. They also closed more professions to Jews, including pharmacy, accountancy, and pawn brokers. The NAZIs on May 21 ordered Jews to turn in any bicycles they owned. The only exception were Jewish Council employees. [Anderson]
More regulations were implemented in June. Authorities prohibited Jews from a range of recreational activities, including canoeing, rowing, swimming, fishing, and bicycles (June 14). The modst severe new regulation was a curfew for all Jews.
Jews had to remain in their homes from 8:00 pm until 6:00 am. The NAZIs also prohibited Jews from entering the homes of non-Jewish Dutch people. Jews were only permitted to shop in non-Jewish businesses from 3:00 to 5:00 pm, by which time many food stores would be sold out. (Jews had to shop in non-Jewish shops because by this time the NAZIs had taken most shops ownbed by Jews. The NAZIs were prohibited from frequenting non-Jewish barbers and hairdressers. Another NAZI decree prohibited Jews from using trains or other public transportation. Exceptions were made for Jewish Council employees or Jews doing war work. One of the last NAZI anti-Jewish regulation was a prohibition on Jews using public phones. Authorities disconected the telephones of Jewsish subscribers. This could be done because the NAZIs becaus of the 1941 registration had the addresses of virtually all Jewish families. [Anderson] The most serious action taken by the NAZIs in June was thev beginning of deportations (June 26). The NAZIs desguised the purpose of the deportations as war work in Germany . Jewish men and women who were between the ages of 16 and 40 were first targeted. The NAZIs set a quota of 1,000 Dutch Jews weekly. Ann Frank wrote in her diary on the eve of the deportations wrote, "Our freedom was severely restricted by a series of anti-Jewish decrees; Jews were required to wear a yellow star; Jews were forbidden to use streetcars; Jews were forbidden to ride in cars, even their own; Jews were required to do their shopping between 3 and 5 p.m. Jews were required to frequent only Jewish owned barbershops and beauty parlors; Jews were forbidden to be out on the streets between 8 pm and 6 am.... Jews were forbidden to visit Christians in their homes; Jews were required to attend Jewish schools. You couldn't do this and you couldn't do that. But life went on." (June 29, 1942) [Frank]
The NAZIs began as scheduled to deport Jews to Polish death camps in July. No further anti-Jewish masures were needed. The NAZIs sent out notices for labor service. Most Dutch Jews thought or hoped they were going to do labor service in Germany. Few attmpted to hide, in part because thy did not have the resources to do so and had not started to make plans when it might have been possible. Margot Frank received a notice for labor service. (Many of the German Jews in the Nethelands were the first to receive these notices.) The Franks were German Jews and knew what the NAZIs were like. There father had prepared a plan and the family immediately went into hiding with the Van Daans. [Frank] Dutch Jews did not generally go into hiding. The NAZIs began the transports (July 15). Jews were often rounded up from their homes in the middle of the night, unexpectedly. The NAZIs regularly every Tuesday morning transported 1,000 Dutch Jews. Most of these Jews were sent to Auschwitz. Smaller numbers were sent to Sobibor (34,000), and Bergen-Belsen, and Theresienstadt. The NAZIS succeeded in deporting most Dutch Jews and very few survived the camps.
Dutch Jews soon began to stop reporting for transport. The NAZIs began large scale seizures and transports from Ambsterdam where Jews had been concentrated. More than 2000 Jews were deported from Amsterdam (November 1942). Gone was any pretense of war work. Whole families were rounded up.
NAZI transports continued to take place until after D-Day Allied Armies approached the Netherlands. The last transport was September 17, 1944.
Aalders, Gerard. Department of Research, The Netherlands, State Institute for War Documentation, Amsterdam, Plundering of Jewish Assets During the Second World War, Archival Reports online, June 30, 1999.
Anderson, Anthony E. "Anne Frank was not alone: Holland and the Holocaust" [Online], October 24, 1995.
Frank, Anne. The Diary of A Young Girl.
Hilberg, Raul. The Destruction of the European Jews (Chicago: Quardrangle Books, 1961).
Marrus, Michael R. and Robert O. Paxton, "The Nazis and the Jews in Occupied Western Europe, 1940-1944" in Michael R. Marrus, ed. The Nazi Holocaust: Historical Articles on the Destruction of European Jews (London: Meckler, 1982).
Simpson, Elizabeth, ed. The Spoils of War: World War II and Its Aftermath: the Loss, Reappearance, and Recovery of Cultural Property (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., Publishers, 1997).
U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. Post-war restitution of legal rights in relation to works of art repatriated to the Netherlands from Nazi Germany Unfortunalely the Museum does not source and date this document.
Van Rappard-Boon, Charlotte. "The fate of works of art in the Netherlands during and after World War Two" speech at Holocaust Symposium, Washington Conference on Holocaust Era Assets, December 2, 1998.
Woolf, Linda M. "Survival and Resistance: The Netherlands Under Nazi Occupation," April 6, 1999.
Yahil, Leni. "Methods of Persecution: A Comparison of the 'Final Solution' in Holland and Denmark" in Michael R. Marrus, ed. The Nazi Holocaust: Historical Articles on the Destruction of European Jews (London: Meckler, 1982).
Zabludoff, Sidney Jay. Looted Jewish Assets: Nazi Seizures, New York: World Jewish Congress, June 29, 1998).
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