|
|
NEWS
Belgian Historians Conclude the Country Actively
Cooperated With Nazis
by Yated Ne'eman Staff
After Germany and France admitted their involvement in the
process of exterminating the Jewish people in the Holocaust,
a group of experts from the Centre for Historical Research
and Documentation of War and Contemporary Society has
published a comprehensive report commissioned by the Belgian
Senate. The study concludes that in the 1930s and during
World War II Belgian authorities collaborated with the Nazis
in persecuting Jews, both foreign Jews and Belgian citizens,
by segregating them from the general population, persecuting
them and confiscating their property.
According to the report, Belgium was inundated with German-
Jewish refugees during the 1930s, and with the right's rise
to power following an economic recession and the influx of
Jewish refugees, extreme antisemitism took root. After the
Nazi invasion in May 1940 the Belgium government went into
exile in London, where it issued instructions permitting
public employees to cooperate with the Nazis in order to keep
businesses open and prevent economic collapse. In many cases
this cooperation led to persecution of Jews. In 1940 Belgian
officials agreed to draw up an orderly list of Jews,
deportation documents, a certificate with the word "Jew"
stamped on it and yellow badges, and even arrested 1,243 Jews
to hand them over to the Nazis.
The study is the first document to provide details on conduct
at the national level in Belgium during the war. Prime
Minister Guy Verhofstadt, who apologized to the country's
Jewish community in 2002 for Belgium's part in the Holocaust,
acknowledged the report's conclusions and said the findings
must be included in the country's textbooks. "The report is a
mirror before us," said the Senate Chairwoman, who condemned
the cowardice of the government during the War.
The Jewish community in Belgium sees the publication of the
report as a positive step. Philippe Markiewicz, president of
the Coordination Committee of Jewish Organizations of
Belgium, said, "The report is a milestone and a victory for
enlightened democracy," noting many Belgians put their own
lives in great danger to save Jews. The report drew wide
coverage in the French press, while the Flemish press buried
it on the inner pages and sometimes overlooked it
completely.
Titled "Docile Belgium," the 1,114-page report, which took
over three years to produce, is highly critical of the fact
after the liberation of the camps in 1945 Belgian's
complicity in deporting the Jews to the camps was not
addressed because the issue was too "delicate."
The report also notes the exceptional cases in which the City
of Brussels refused to force the Jews to wear the yellow
badge.
Half of the 50,000 Jews living in Belgium before World War II
were killed in the Holocaust.
|
