[Page 45]

With the end of the war, Czechoslovak Jews begin to return to their former homes. In the Slovakian part of Czechoslovakia, the reception was cold and hostile. Anti–Semitism was deeply embedded amongst the population. The Czech areas were more receptive and friendlier to the Jewish survivors, who needed all the help they could get to re–start their lives. The government permitted local Jewish organizations to reopen their doors. The Jewish community was re–established, notably in Prague by Jewish survivors and some Jewish activists like Imre Rosenberg who returned to Czechoslovakia with the return of the Czech Government in Exile to Prague. Even the Jewish community of Sobrance began a revival. The Czech Government in Exile represented the national spectrum of Czech political life. It had the support of the Soviet Union, since the Czech Communists controlled several important ministries, namely the Ministry of Interior headed by Vaclav Nosek that included the secret service headed by Toman. The Czechoslovak Communist Party reorganized itself rapidly since it had pre–war party cadres that were now reactivated. The Soviet Union exercised overall control of Czechoslovakia but let the Czech government administer the country. The Soviet army presence was reduced to a minimum in the country. This differed from all other East European countries where the Soviet Army and secret service were present in large numbers.

Some Czech Holocaust survivors soon experienced terrible nightmares when they were informed that they would be deported to Germany like all other German residents of Czechoslovakia in accordance with the “Benes Decrees”^[1]. The decree stated that all Germans of Czech descent would be deported to Germany. The final definition of who was a German was determined by examining the pre–war records of the language census conducted by the Czechoslovak government prior to World War Two. The census asked the Czechoslovak citizens what language they used at home and what was their favorite cultural adherence. Some Jews stated that their language was German and German culture was their milieu. The census classified them as Germans in spite of the fact that they were just liberated from concentration camps with tattoo numbers from Auschwitz– Birkenau. The affected Jews protested to the Jewish community that protested to the Ministry of Interior. Negotiations resulted between the Jewish officials and the Interior Ministry. Even the JDC intervened on behalf of the affected Jewish families. Exceptions were made for Jews but thousands of former Czech residents of German origin were deported. The same problem took place in Slovakia where some Jews had stated that they spoke Hungarian and adhered to Hungarian culture. Here too the Jewish community had to intervene and stop the deportation of Slovak Jewish families, while Slovaks who claimed to use the Hungarian language were deported to Hungary. The Interior Ministry, especially the secret service headed by Toman controlled the deportations and border crossings. No Jewish family was deported to Germany or Hungary.

The Jewish community in Czechoslovakia needed help to cope with all the social problems following the Holocaust. The AJDC (American Joint Distribution Committee) or JDC or “Joint” for short soon sent a representative, Harold Trobe, to Prague, to open an office. The JDC office opened on September 13, 1945 in the old city of Prague at 7 Josefova Street.

The organization rented warehouses, and trains with food, medicines and clothing began arriving from the Joint warehouses in France. The Czech Interior Ministry granted permits for all these activities. The Joint opened branch offices, opened and supported old age homes, temporary hostels, and provided direct support to the many Holocaust survivors that frequented the Joint offices. Of course, Toman had his men everywhere and knew what was going on but kept a distance. He gave the JDC a free hand in Czechoslovakia and enabled Joseph Schwartz to mount a minor “Marshal Plan” on behalf of Jewish refugees that crossed the country as well as the Jews that stayed in Czechoslovakia.

The JDC was founded in 1914 in New York City by a group of Jewish philanthropists to alleviate the distress of Jewish communities in Europe

Joseph Schwartz, Director of European joint operations. Dressed in a military uniform

Joseph Schwartz was appointed director of the European Joint in 1940, and was director of JDC's overseas operations from 1942–1950. Hundreds of thousands of Jews now in Israel literally owe their lives to him. Ralph Goldman, former head of the JDC, called Schwartz “A real hero.” Immediately after the liberation of France, Schwartz re–established his headquarters in Paris and began to organize JDC programs that would help to rebuild life for Europe's 1.4 million surviving Jews. But the American government also turned to Schwartz for assistance. In 1945, Schwartz accompanied Earl Harrison, who had been recruited by President Truman to investigate the conditions of the Jewish displaced person camps in the American zones of Germany and Austria^[2]. Their findings and ultimate report resulted in the improvement of living conditions in these camps. The Allied victory offered no guarantee that the tens of thousands of newly liberated Jews would survive to enjoy the fruits of freedom. To stave off mass starvation, JDC marshalled its resources, instituting an ambitious purchasing and shipping program to provide urgent necessities for Holocaust survivors facing critical local shortages. More than 227 million pounds of food, medicine, clothing, and other supplies were shipped to Europe from U.S. ports^[3].

By late 1945, 75,000 Jewish survivors of the Nazi horrors had crowded into hastily set up displaced person camps throughout Germany, Austria and Italy. Conditions were terrible, according to William Leibner, a resident of one of the camps^[4]. Earl Harrison, Dean of the University of Pennsylvania Law School, asked Schwartz to accompany him on his official tour of the camps. His landmark report called for separate Jewish camps and for United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) participation in administering them–with JDC's help. In response, Schwartz virtually re–created JDC, putting together a field organization that covered Europe and later North Africa, designing a more proactive operational strategy.

Supplementing the relief supplied by the army, by UNRRA, and by UNRRA's successor agency – the International Refugee Organization or IRO, JDC distributed emergency aid, but also fed the educational and cultural needs of the displaced, providing typewriters, books, Torah scrolls, ritual articles, and holiday provisions. JDC funds were directed at restoring a sense of community and normalcy in the camps with new medical facilities, schools, synagogues, and cultural activities.

Over the next two years, the influx of refugees from all over Central and Eastern Europe would more than triple the number of Jews in the DP camps. Their number included Polish Jews who had returned from their wartime refuge in the Soviet Union only to flee once again westward, from renewed anti–Semitism and the July 1946 Kielce pogrom.

At the same time, JDC was helping sustain tens of thousands of Jews who remained in Eastern Europe, as well as thousands of others living in the West outside the DP camps in Jewish communities also receiving reconstruction assistance from JDC^[5].

In 1946, an estimated 120,000 Jews were in Hungary, 65,000 in Poland, and more than half of Romania's 380,000 Jews depended on JDC for food and other basic needs. By 1947, JDC was supporting 380 medical facilities across the continent, and some 137,000 Jewish children were receiving some form of JDC aid. Falling victim to Cold War tensions, the JDC was expelled from Romania, Poland and Bulgaria in 1949, from Czechoslovakia in 1950, and from Hungary in 1953.

Joseph Schwartz was a brilliant and exceptional man. Known as “Packy” to those close to him, he was born in Ukraine and moved to Baltimore at an early age. A distinguished educator and scholar and an authority on Semitics and Semitic literature, Schwartz received his doctorate from Yale, following his graduation from the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Seminary of Yeshiva University. Schwartz taught at the American University in Cairo and at Long Island University and then served as Director of the Federation of Jewish Charities in Brooklyn. He served the JDC from 1939–1950, and then went on to become the Executive Vice–Chairman of the United Jewish Appeal and later the Vice President of Israel Bonds. Schwartz died in 1975.

With the collapse of France in WWII, Schwartz moved his offices to Lisbon. He also had an office in Istanbul. With the liberation of Paris he returned there and directed all Joint operations in liberated Europe until 1949. Over the years the JDC became one of the most effective agencies in the world overtly or covertly helping Jewish communities in need. Paris was the center office of the European Joint operation that provided food, medical, financial and spiritual needs of the Jewish survivors in liberated Europe. Schwartz was directly responsible to the board of governors of the Joint organization in New York.

The UNRRA (United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration) and the Red Cross were also busy helping the thousands of war refugees that were heading home. They all criss–crossed Czechoslovakia where things began to function and the Administration controlled matters. Huge refugee camps were set up by the Czechs where the refugees rested before their journey back home. Many Jewish Holocaust survivors also took advantage of these facilities on their way to their former homes. The survivors in Western Europe slowly rebuilt their lives and resumed their pre–war activities with some help of the Joint and the local governments. In Eastern Europe, especially Poland, Slovakia, Romania, Hungary and Carpatho–Ruthenia the returning survivors found hostility. The local population despised them and frequently abused them physically; some areas experienced anti–Jewish pogroms notably in Slovakia and Poland^[6]. The Jewish survivors began to take inventory of their situation. They were sole survivors of large families surrounded by hostility. They could not stay in their native areas and gravitated to the larger cities, but they were restless and rootless. They sat on their suitcases waiting for something to happen. Some began to journey to Romania hoping to reach Palestine, still others headed back to the camps in Germany and Austria from which most of them had been recently liberated. At first they were individual Jews and later small groups. This decision was highly encouraged by a secret Jewish organization known as the “Brichah”–or escape movement. The organization started in Poland or prewar Polish areas and spread throughout liberated Eastern Europe.

The organization's aim was to evacuate the surviving Jews from Europe and bring them all “home” to Palestine. Most of the Brichah members were young Zionists who had survived the Holocaust. Some were discharged Jewish soldiers from the Polish and Russian armies, others partisans and concentration camp survivors. The Brichah founders and early leaders were Eliezer Lidowsky, Abba Kovner, Shmuel Amarant and Itzhak Tzuckerman^[7]. They were Zionist–oriented Holocaust survivors who dreamt of heading to Palestine. But this was much easier said than done. To accomplish their goal, the Brichah leaders began to clandestinely organize in small groups, exploring safe southern routes to Romania, where they hoped to board ships and head to Palestine. The task was arduous and fraught with danger. The Russian security forces were on their trail. The Soviets were not interested in giving Jews the idea that they could leave the growing Soviet Union. Like theater owners the Soviets wanted to keep the theater full with the exit doors sealed.

The original Brichah group managed to reach Bucharest, the capital of Romania, where the Jewish emissaries had recently arrived from Palestine to help them organize.^[8] The hope was that these homeless people would be brought to Palestine where they would find a safe home. These contacts between the Brichah and the Palestinian emissaries in Romania resulted in the establishment of a regular route through some newly acquired Soviet areas as well as through Communist controlled Romania. As the weeks and months went by the stops along this route became more defined and varied in order to elude the Russian police. The numbers of people joining the groups led by Brichah grew exponentially with the increased demand for passage to Palestine.^[9] To meet the demand for illegal passage, the Brichah expanded their operations westward into Poland. Krakow, Galicia became the center of operations. The transports left Krakow and headed south to Krosno, Dukla and Nowy Sacz, all located in Galicia, Poland, facing the Czechoslovakian border. According to Salomon or Salek Berger, a native of Krosno

Map of Eastern Europe drawn according to the borders established by the Allied powers in 1945. Notice the Brichah route that starts in Wilno, Lithuania and reaches Czernowitz on the Romanian border and then the Black Sea. Illegal Bricha centers existed in Wilno, Rovno, Lwow and Czernowitz (Cernauti)

It wasn't long before Romania stopped being a way station to Palestine for several reasons: the impossible terrain, the Romanian authorities tightened the border crossings, the Russian secret police took more control of the borders and in Czernowitz even managed to arrest several Bricha groups. A further reason was the shortage of ships, as all Romanian and Bulgarian ships were nationalized by the Communist governments. The most serious problem, however, was what to do with the refugees once they reached Romania? How to get them to Palestine? The Brichah had access to only a few ships willing to risk sailing to Palestine. British government agents had warned ship owners that their vessels would be confiscated and crews jailed if the ships were caught near Palestine.

This made it very difficult for the Brichah to purchase or lease vessels to transport the refugees to Palestine. The situation was exacerbated by the fact that the Brichah continued illegally bringing Jewish refugees into Romania. With no alternative the Brichah began the search for other possible routes to get these Jewish refugees out of Eastern Europe. Such contacts were found in Western Europe, notably in Italy.

Most of Italy was liberated by the British 8^th Army under the leadership of Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery. Many of his soldiers were Palestinian Jews. The Jewish community in Palestine had volunteered to fight the Nazis as early as 1940. Over 5,000 Jewish volunteers from Palestine were organized into three infantry battalions. The “Jewish Brigade” was established in late 1944, and was officially named the Jewish Infantry Brigade Group, under the command of a career Jewish army officer, Brigadier Ernest F. Benjamin. The Haganah, the Jewish underground army in Palestine, ordered many Haganah men to volunteer for this brigade. These “volunteers” formed Haganah cells within the brigade, and took orders directly from Haganah headquarters in Palestine.

The Jewish Brigade was deployed in Italy. One of the main Haganah officers in the Jewish Brigade was Captain Aaron Ishai Hooter; another was Sergeant Mordecai Surkiss. As the troops marched through Italy, these two men instructed their Haganah cells to be on the lookout for Italian Jewish survivors. These survivors, seeing the Star of David on the Jewish Brigade soldiers' shoulders, came out of hiding, ragged, hungry, desperate. Hooter and Surkiss helped organize support systems for these survivors, everything from small dispensaries to soup kitchens, all using British supplies and facilities. As mentioned earlier, the Brichah movement was primarily interested in moving the Jews out of Europe to Palestine by any and all means. The Jewish brigade and the Brichah began to work closely together to get Jews to Palestine. These two organizations were soon joined by another organization called the “Mossad”.

Shaul Avigur, head of the “Mossad” or illegal aliyah to Palestine

Mossad representative in Italy Yehuda Arazi

Shimshon Lang in the British uniform

These detentions did not deter Arazi from continuing to send Jewish refugees to Palestine. The Mossad office in Italy greatly expanded its activities. To do so Arazi relied heavily on the Jewish Brigade, and Jewish soldiers in the British Army like Shimshon Lang, one of the 300 drivers in the 462^nd General Transport Battalion of the British 8th army.

Lang's story was typical of the Palestinian Jews. Lang had escaped Poland for Palestine in 1939 on an illegal ship^[14]. The ship was stopped by the British navy and Lang was given a choice, spend the next few years in an internment camp or join the British Army. He chose the latter, and served until 1945. In an interview, Shimshon Lang said, “My unit delivered supplies to the army units from the coastal areas in Southern Italy, and on the return journey loaded the trucks with refugees^[15]. I spoke to the young skeletal survivors in Yiddish and saw myself as one of them that happened to have escaped Hitler's death squad nets just in time. They represented to me the survivors of my family that perished in the Holocaust. No British army rule could stop me from extending help to my surviving brethren. I was not alone with these thoughts, others felt the same way. We translated the ideas into reality by transporting the surviving Jews from Austrian and German D.P. camps to Italy and then to Palestine. We used empty shipping containers or extra military uniforms to hide the refugees at border crossings.” According to Lang, not only trucking units were involved in this movement of Jewish refugees. Ambulances and maintenance vehicles were also used to smuggle survivors from the concentration camps in Austria and Germany into Italy. Most of the Jewish volunteers for the British forces in Palestine were similar to Shimon Lang; born in Europe and barely escaped to Palestine.

The war's end found many of these Jewish soldiers stationed at Treviso, near the triangle of Italy, Yugoslavia and Austria. As they received passes to travel through the surrounding countries, they encountered more survivors, and for many, were faced for the first time with the harsh truth of the Nazi horrors in the concentration camps. Some of the soldiers, if they could, smuggled individual survivors to the Brigade camp. There, in Yiddish, these survivors told their tragic tales, shocking their fellow Jews with news of

the Nazi atrocities. The details of the locations of the concentration camps were passed onto the Haganah. Captain Aaron Ishai Hooter and his staff then set out from the British camp in Treviso in search of the survivors in the concentration camps, in Austria and the British sector of Germany. Hooter and his men soon found Jewish survivors at Bergen Belsen, Mauthausen and other liberated concentration camps now D.P. camps run by UNRRA.

Once Hooter and his associates reported back to Arazi that survivors existed in the concentration camps, Arazi notified his home office in Jerusalem. He was then quickly ordered to remove any survivors he could and bring them to Italy. This order was carried out surreptitiously, using British army trucks and transports. Leo Rosner, a Jewish survivor of Mauthausen, said, “We were several hundred Jewish survivors in the camp of Mauthausen with no place to go^[16]. Suddenly an army truck appeared with a Star of David marking. At first we did not believe our eyes. We were certain that we were the only Jews left and suddenly we see other Jews and fighting Jews. The truck was immediately surrounded by Jewish survivors; they kissed and hugged the soldiers. They exchanged greetings and stories. Most of the Jewish soldiers spoke Yiddish as well as the survivors, so communication was easily established. A few days later, more Jewish soldiers appeared. About two weeks later, a convoy of trucks arrived near the camp at night and we were instructed to leave the camp one at a time so as not to arouse suspicion. Most of the Jewish survivors left the Mauthausen concentration camp and headed to the large convoy of trucks. Once we were loaded on the trucks, Jewish soldiers placed empty oil barrels and boxes of ammunition to block the view of the inside of the trucks. The soldiers then pulled tarpaulins over the open areas of the trucks. Finally, the order was given to move out. The trucks traveled towards the Italian border for several hours, crossing the border escorted by military police, also from the Jewish Brigade. The convoy ultimately reached the headquarters of the Jewish Brigade in Treviso, Italy^[17]. We rested until we were smuggled into the nearby Modene, Italy D. P. camp.”^[18] This large and complex operation was not Arazi's only activity in Italy on behalf of the Mossad.

Similar operations, rescuing Jews from Austria and Germany, were constantly carried out. Jewish Brigade soldiers provided the backbone of these operations aided by Jewish partisans and discharged Jewish soldiers from the Polish and Russian armies. Large illegal ships with Jewish survivors soon headed to the shores of Palestine. The British applied heavy pressure in Italy to stop the entry of Jews through the northern border and to control the shores to prevent illegal ships from leaving Italy with Jewish refugees. Arazi's Italian operations were widespread with echoes reaching all the way to London.

As a direct result of all these activities, in July 1945, the British Government decided to relocate most of the Jewish Brigade units to Belgium and the Netherlands. However, the rescues continued.

Soon, British agents picked up the news that a large convoy of Jewish refugees would be heading to the small port of La Spezia in Italy where they were to board two illegal ships, the Fede and the Fenice heading to Palestine. The British purposefully misinformed the Italian police that a large group of Italian fascists would be heading to the La Spezia port to board the ships. The Italians were told the ships would then head for Spain where the supposed Italian fascists could not be touched by Italian justice. Italian police and security forces were rushed to the entrance of the small port city.

On April 4, 1946, a convoy of 38 British army trucks appeared.^[19] The Italian police stopped the convoy and began to search the trucks. Most of the drivers were soldiers of the Jewish Brigade, or other Palestinian units within the British army. Two of the Jewish Brigade soldiers, dressed in their military uniforms, stepped forward and surrendered on condition that the waiting Holocaust survivors be permitted to board the ship since they had no other place to stay. The Italian police quickly realized that they had been set up and permitted the Jewish refugees to board the vessels. Immediately, the Jews renamed the ships. The Fede was renamed the Dov Hoz as 675 Jewish refugees boarded. The Fenice was renamed the Eliyahu Golomb as 339 refugees came aboard. These two illegal vessels were left moored to the pier, guarded by Italian police.

The next day Josef de Paz presented himself to the police of La Spezia and asked to join the Jewish survivors heading to Palestine. The request was granted. Of course, most of the Mossad and Brichah agents aboard the ships recognized de Paz as the Mossad's Italian chief Yehuda Arazi who immediately took command of the boats. Arazi began to broadcast appeals for help. The appeals were picked up by the Italian press and the news soon made international headlines. The Jewish passengers aboard the two ships went on a hunger strike and threatened to sink the ship if anyone attempted to board the vessel. Meanwhile, embarrassed by the events, the British insisted that the Italians remove the Jews. But the Italians refused. The struggle lasted nearly thirty days, until May 8, 1946 when the Jewish refugees were finally permitted to sail for Palestine.

Unnoticed by the Italians and the British, Arazi managed to slip off the ship before it sailed, disappearing quickly into the Italian countryside. The Jewish Brigade drivers who had been caught by the Italians faced military court proceedings. Shimshon Lang's trucking battalion was dismantled completely and he was shipped back to Palestine. In an audacious move some of the Jewish Brigade soldiers gave their uniforms to illegal Jewish refugees, who were then unknowingly sent to Palestine as part of the British army units. Other Jewish Brigade soldiers who were mustered out of the British army in Europe joined the Mossad or the Brichah and played a vital role helping Jewish refugees reach Palestine.

Arazi's activities in Italy irritated Reuven Resnik, the JDC director in Rome, who insisted on doing everything legally. Basically, Resnik believed that the JDC's only function was to help the local Jewish community re–establish itself. However, history was making new demands of the JDC. Italy had Jewish Italians who had survived the Holocaust, but also now had thousands of illegal Jewish refugees who wanted to go to Palestine. Their number constantly increased. And Italy could only offer these non–Italians temporary residence in UNRRA supported D.P. camps with no permanent solution to their residency problems. Arazi insisted that the JDC not only support the Italian Jewish community but also help Jewish refugees get into and out of Italy, as they moved on their way to Palestine. To accomplish this, Arazi resorted to illegal activities that Resnik could not abide. Arazi used false documents, bribes, and other shady tactics to facilitate the movement of these Jewish refugees. Resnik refused to cooperate. This created tension between the two men, and their organizations. Protests to Arazi were ignored. Arazi turned to the Jewish ‘powers that be in Palestine' “to get Resnik off my back”. In turn, the Jewish Agency pressured the JDC headquarters in New York to remove Resnik from his position in Rome. Even Jewish leaders from the D.P. camps pressured the JDC to remove Resnik.

Resnik tried to ride out the wave of discontent, but the problems grew daily. Soon he was faced with lack of cooperation on many fronts. Even Resnik's assistant, Gaynor Israel Jacobson resigned. Schwartz accepted the resignation and sent Jacobson to Greece to help organize the JDC activities there. The JDC finally eased Resnik out of the Rome office. This enabled JDC European head Schwartz to effectively take over the Rome office and work with the various organizations in Italy to get Jewish survivors to Palestine.

Italy with its long coastal shores and many ports offered an ideal place to hide illegal ships until boarded by the Jewish refugees who were brought from the nearby Italian Jewish D.P. camps. Similar camps also existed in France notably around the port of Marseilles and vicinity. The Brichah, the Mossad, and the Jewish Brigade cooperated in moving Jews to Palestine.

With the availability of ports and ships in the Mediterranean Sea to transport Jews to Palestine, the Brichah and Mossad had a destination for the thousands of Jewish Holocaust survivors that wanted to leave Eastern and Central Europe. They decided to direct the flow of Jews to Czechoslovakia and hence to Germany, Austria and Italy. Czechoslovakia was chosen as a transit place since most Jewish organizations had offices in Prague. Prague was also very sympathetic to the plight of Jews. Furthermore, Czechoslovakia was administrated by a government that controlled the country and had the support of the country. The country was also sympathetic to the plight of Jews.

Footnotes

1. The so–called “Benes Decrees” depriving all Czech citizens of German descent of their citizenship. The Sudeten Germans did the same with the Czech citizens in 1938. Return
2. Kochavi, Arieh, Post Holocaust Politics, The University of North Carolina Press, USA . P.36 Return
3. Szulc, Alliance p.154 Return
4. Larry Price interview with William Leibner Return
5. Bauer. Ashes, p.132 Return
6. Bauer, Yehuda, Ashes. The pogrom in Topolcany Slovakia on September 24^th 1945 and the pogrom in Krakow, Poland on August 11^th 1945. Pogroms and anti–Jewish events continued to spread throughout Poland and reached its zenith with the Kielce pogrom where 42 surviving Jews were killed. P.105 Return
7. Bauer, Ashes p.2. Return
8. The Palestinian emissaries disguised themselves as journalists. They were Moshe Auerbach, David Tzimend, and Yossef Kelerman. Return
9. The founders and leaders of Brichah were Eliezer Lidowsky, Abba Kovner, Shmuel Amarant, and Itzhak Tzuckerman. Return
10. William Leibner interview with Salomon or Salek Berger Return
11. Zertal, Idit, From Catastrophe to Power: The Holocaust Survivors and the Emergence of Israel, Cambridge Univ. Press 1998. pp.40–49. Return
12. Szulc, Alliance. Pp.90–91 Return
13. Szulc, Alliance ,p.91 Return
14. William Leibner interview with Shimshon Lang Return
15. Ibid., Return
16. Rosner, Leo The Holocaust Remembered, USA 1998,Pp.97–100 Return
17. Ibid., Return
18. Ibid., Return
19. Zertal, Holocaust,p.28 Return

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