Episodes

  • #0 Introduction. Looking at the International Dimensions of the Holocaust

    #0 Introduction. Looking at the International Dimensions of the Holocaust
    Jan 17 2024
    The men at the Wannsee Conference planned to extend mass murder to all of Europe. In the protocol of the conference, Jewish populations were reduced to columns of numbers and estimates. We want to challenge this perspective by looking more closely at the specific situations in the different countries and communities that were targeted by the Nazi criminals.
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    7 mins
  • #1 Germany. Leo Baeck – Leading the Jewish Community in Troubled Times

    #1 Germany. Leo Baeck – Leading the Jewish Community in Troubled Times
    Jan 19 2024
    Rabbi Leo Baeck was one of the leading scholars of liberal Judaism in his time. When the Nazis came to power, he became the chairman of the newly formed Representative Council of German Jews. He led the Jewish community until his own deportation to the Theresienstadt ghetto. Judith and Jakob speak with Michael A. Meyer, who has written a new biography on Baeck’s fascinating life. Michael was a professor at the Hebrew Union College and published widely on Jewish history and liberal Judaism. He was the editor of the four-volume “German-Jewish History in Modern Times” and edited the last volume of Baeck’s collected works.
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    50 mins
  • #2 Belgium. The Committee for the Defense of the Jews (CDJ)

    #2 Belgium. The Committee for the Defense of the Jews (CDJ)
    Feb 28 2024
    We speak with the archivist and historian Dorien Styven – our colleague from the Belgian Holocaust Memorial "Kazerne Dossin" – about the Committee for the Defense of the Jews (CDJ). This organization's main goal was to save as many Jews as possible from being murdered by the Nazis. Founded by young communists, the Committee brought together very different Jewish groups. It succeeded in creating a vast network that helped about 3,000 children hide in private families and child care institutions. Partisans close to the Committee also carried out the only known attack on a deportation train to have taken place during the Holocaust. 
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    58 mins
  • #3 Poland. Polish Mayors during the Holocaust

    #3 Poland. Polish Mayors during the Holocaust
    Mar 27 2024
    Poland had the largest Jewish community in Europe before the war. Most of the more than 3 million Jews living in Poland were murdered in the Holocaust. In our first episode on Poland, we talk with historian Grzegorz Rossoliński-Liebe about the role played by Polish mayors in the German-occupied General Government during the Holocaust. As part of the occupation, the Germans dismantled the Polish central state. On the local level, however, Polish officials were often allowed to remain in office. It was primarily the mayors who represented the population’s interests to the occupying power.
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    50 mins
  • #4 Poland. Jewish Perspective and the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

    #4 Poland. Jewish Perspective and the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
    Apr 29 2024
    "The Holocaust was not a metaphor…as historians we must be aware of metaphors, and we must explain exactly the horrific things that happened during the Holocaust." (Havi Dreifuss) - 81 years ago, on April 19, 1943, the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising began. In our second episode on Poland, we spoke with historian Havi Dreifuss about the Jewish experience of the Holocaust in Poland and her last book "Ghetto Warsaw. The End". In her research, she uses diaries, letters, and other contemporary documents – letting Jews themselves describe the horrific reality of the ghetto. We talked about Jewish-Polish relations, the origins of the Jewish resistance in Warsaw, and how to write about the Holocaust when most of the survivors are no longer with us.
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    1 hr and 13 mins
  • #5 France. Vichy, the Resistance and the "Jewish Question"

    #5 France. Vichy, the Resistance and the "Jewish Question"
    May 30 2024
    France was one of the victors of World War I and a safe haven for many political and Jewish refugees in the 1930s. The Germans attacked and defeated the French in 1940. Anti-Semitism became a core element not only of German policy and propaganda, but also of the collaborationist government under Marshal Pétain. We talk with historian Renée Poznanski about how the anti-Semitic idea of a "Jewish question" influenced how Jews were persecuted in France and how the country remembered the occupation after the war.
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    57 mins
  • #6 Turkey. The Country of Refuge that wasn’t

    #6 Turkey. The Country of Refuge that wasn’t
    Aug 29 2024
    Turkey remained neutral during the war. But the Nazis also planned to murder Turkey's Jews, as the list on page six of the Wannsee Protocol shows. We speak with Corry Guttstadt about Turkey's Jews, the country's role for Jewish refugees, and how the history of the Holocaust was dealt with after the war.
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    1 hr and 5 mins
  • #7 Greece. Salonika - The Destruction of the Largest Jewish community on the Balkans

    #7 Greece. Salonika - The Destruction of the Largest Jewish community on the Balkans
    Sep 29 2024
    Before the Second World War, the largest Jewish community in Greece and in the Balkans lived in Thessaloniki. In 1900 they made up half of the city's population. During the Nazi occupation, the German persecution of the Jewish community was astonishingly swift and brutal. In this episode we speak with historian Maria Vassilikou about the case of Thessaloniki, the authoritarian regime under Ioannis Metaxas that dealt with anti-Semitism differently than others, and how the public discourse about the Holocaust was shaped after the war.
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    1 hr and 4 mins