Rabbi Chaim Michael Dov Weissmandl (1903-1957) became famous for his tireless efforts to the save the Jews of Slovakia from extermination at Nazi hands during the European Holocaust. In some books his name is spelled Weissmandel.

Early life

Weissmandl was born in Hungary but soon moved to the region which today is Slovakia. In 1931 he moved to Nitra to study under Rabbi Samuel David Ungar, whose daughter he married. During the period of WWII, Weissmandl was an unofficial leader of the Working Group of Bratislava (see the next section). In 1944, Weissmandl and his family were put on a train headed for Auschwitz, but he managed to escape from the train and hid in a secret bunker in suburban Bratislava. In the final days of the war he was evacuated by a transport organized by Rudolf Kastner with German permission. Later he moved to the United States, where together with those students of the original Nitra Yeshiva who were fortunate enough to survive the Holocaust, he established the Yeshiva Farm Settlement at Mount Kisco, New York. The Yeshiva was modeled on Talmudic accounts of agricultural settlements where a man was expected to study the Torah continuously up until the age suitable for marriage, and then after being wed and starting a family he would assist in supporting his community by farming the land during the day and confining his studies to the evenings.

The Working Group

When the Nazis, aided by members of the puppet Slovak government, began its moves against the Slovakian Jews in 1942, a group of Jews calling themselves the Working Group began a campaign of opposition. Their main activity was to pay large bribes to German and Slovak officials. The transportation of Jews was in fact halted for a long time after they began to bribe the Nazi official Dieter Wisliceny. However, some historians, notably Yehuda Bauer, believe that the transportation was delayed for other reasons and that the bribes had little actual effect. The Working Group was also responsible for the ambitious but ill-fated Europa Plan which would have seen large numbers of European Jews "bought" from their Nazi captors.

Controversies

Since the business of the Working Group required a continuous supply of large sums of money, they turned to the international Jewish organizations for help, via their representatives in Switzerland. Here lies the root of a bitter and continuing debate. Weissmandl claimed that too little money was provided too late and that this was due to the indifference of those he asked. Specifically, he accused the Zionist organizations of refusing to assist in saving Jews unless they were to go to Palestine (a condition the Nazis were unwilling to accept). Weissmandl supported his allegations by quoting letters from memory, but the original letters have never been found and some historians such as Bauer doubt the accuracy of his memory. Weissmandl's own summary of the charges is his Ten Questions to the Zionists, while the most learned rebuttal is in the book of Bauer cited below.

Books

Two of Weissmandl's books were published posthumously.

Torath Chemed (Mt. Kisco, 1958) is a book of religious writings that includes many commentaries and homilies, as well as hermeneutic material of a kaballistic nature. Included in this book are the observations that led to the so-called Torah Codes.
Min HaMetzar (Jerusalem, 1960) is a book that describes Weissmandl's war-time experiences. The title consists of the first two words of Psalm 118:5, meaning "from the depths of despair", literally "From the Straits". This is the main publication in which Weissmandl's accusations against the Jewish organizations appear.

References

A. Fuchs, The Unheeded Cry (Messorah Publications, 1984).
Y. Bauer, Jews for Sale? Nazi-Jewish Negotiations, 1933-1945 (Yale University Press, 1994).
Among Blind Fools, a documentary film by VERAFilm (some extracts can be viewed here)
G. Fatran, The "Working Group", Holocaust and Genocide Studies, 8:2 (1994:Fall) 164-201; also see correspondence in issue 9:2 (1995:Fall) 269-276.

External links

The Holocaust Rescue efforts of Rabbi Chaim Michael Dov Weissmandl

Comments

Calling the payments "bribes" is a misnomer since these were negotiated agreements originated by Rabbi Weissmandl and they received approval of high Nazi officials in Germany.

In early 1942, while most of the six million murdered Jews were still alive, the Germans were apparently willing to stop the transports from Slovakia for $50,000 (now maybe worth $500,000). It is also noteworthy that the modern Jewish/Zionist establishment, especially the JOINT representative in Switzerland, Sally Mayer, refused to provide the funds - in part due to then fashionable alienation from "Oesten Jude" (Jews from Eastern Europe), who were looked down upon by "more enlightened Jews" in the "West".

After much difficulty, and also betrayal, Rabbi Weissmandl obtained the funds as a loan. The transports stopped.

The Europa Plan was even more ambitious and important. The Germans agreed to stop all transports except from Germany and Poland. The cost was reportedly $2 million and a 10% down payment was required. Once again the establishment was unwilling to help, in part because it was single minded and focused on the goal of establishing after the war in the Middle-East a model socialist utopian state, based on the concept of a New Jew. This and other factors explain why the establishment often obstructed major rescue opportunities, why the Holocaust was treated as back page news in British Mandate Palestine and why there were no major protests in "Palestine" (noteworthy that there were major protests in countries like Switzerland, which was against Swiss censorship and other laws).

Rabbi Weissmandl was one of the authors of the "Auschwitz Report" - based on Spring 1944 debriefing of two Auschwitz escapees: Wetzler and Rosenberg (later called Vrba). The Report was widely circulated by the Working Group to establishment leadership in free parts of Europe and Palestine. The "leadership's" action was restricted to filing the Report. (Puzzling and telling that it is not easy to find copies of the Report in major Israeli archives). Only one man, George Mantello (Mandel Gyuri) in Switzerland chose to act - immediately after he received a copy via Budapest in mid 1944 - after start of the Hungarian transports to Auschwitz. He immediately publicized the report, which led to an unprecedented Swiss press campaign, street protests and intense, concerned and indignant masses in Swiss churches demanding an immediate stop the Holocaust. (This was clearly documented already in 1948 in a book by Mr. Jeno Levai)

Rabbi Weissmandl was very bitter about the Jewish establishment's apathy and obstruction of rescue. Like other major rescuers he felt that many many many ... more Jews could have been saved. After the war he voiced his criticism in a book called "Min Ha Metzar", which was reportedly made at best unpopular in Israel.

Regretfully major Jewish rescuers like Rabbi Weissmandl, George Mantello, Gizi Fleischmann, Hillel Kook (alias Peter Bergson), Recha Sternbuch and Rabbi Solomon Schonfeld were never duly "recognized" by the establishment Holocaust enterprises. The government of Israel declines to issue stamps and coins in their memory, and aside from a small alley in Gizi Fleischmann's name there are no public places in their memory in spite of the large number of lives which were saved. Israel's Parliament (Knesset), its Chief Rabbi, Ministers, Jerusalem's mayor, ... and especially Yad Vashem and the Washington Holocaust Memorial Museum refuse to appropriately address this important matter - despite their skillfully crafted statements of self-praise.

Regretfully and characteristically this is tantamount to denial of an important part of Holocaust history, which is a crime in some countries, perhaps also in Israel.

Professor Bauer's views about Rabbi Weissmandl and the Bratislava Working Group and other rescue efforts are problematic. Since they are highly biased (perhaps due to human nature - noted below) his views on this subject may well be irrelevant for historical analysis.

In one of his books he is astounded that Rabbi Weissmandl would suggest bombing the railroads leading to Auschwitz. To Professor Bauer it was incredible that an "ultra-religious" Jew like Rabbi Weissmandl could even think of such an activist and pragmatic idea. In one interview Professor Bauer stated that people must come to Yad Vashem to learn "the right way" of looking at the Holocaust. Thus he feels there is only one way of looking at complex historical events. In contrast, Judaism abhors one opinion, has no "Pope", and the Talmud teaches by example the value of truth seeking "multi-mentalism" - as opposed to centrally controlled, carefully crafted and generally sterile and often wrong and irrelevant "mono-mentalism" (fundamentalism).

Professor Bauer also exclaimed that the amazing and important rescue activism by one of the major rescuers, Hillel Kook, "didn't save anyone". In contrast other historians feel that Hillel Kook's inspired activism resulted not only in establishment of the Roosevelt administration War Refugee Board (and consequent Wallenberg mission to Budapest), but rescue of over 200,000 people. (In Hillel Kook's case distorted historic perceptions are most likely tightly coupled with unsavory aspects of Israeli politics: Professor Bauer was (and is?) apparently from Israel's Far-Left and Hillel Kook was a "Revisionist", whom the Israeli "Left" vehemently hated. (Much of this hatred peaked after Hillel Kook's rescue group found financing for the ship Altalena carrying weapons for the Independence War. The Altalena was sunk in Tel Aviv's shores under Ben-Gurion's orders who had extreme hatred for Begin who was on board. Many Jews on board and in the sea were shot - apparently under young Rabin's command - and Hillel Kook was imprisoned.)

Another factor for Professor Bauer downplaying Rabbi Weissmandl and the important role of the Working Group is that Israel's Far-Left had/has a historic contempt for religious Jews. It has few "hero stories" to tell relating to its own rescue efforts since the focus was elsewhere and there was much alienation from the then despised "primitively religious" and "burgeouise" "Diaspora Jews" who didn't fit the carefully crafted "New Jew" image. Once can speculate that this is also the reason why Professor Bauer consistently downplays Rabbi Weissmandl's rescue activism. One can only further speculate that Professor Bauer has a need to deny the Bratislava Working Group's activism since it is tainted in his eyes by its co-leadership by the ultra-orthodox Rabbi Weissmandl - and also because war time "leaders" of the socialist Zionist movement and the JOINT (apparently Professor Bauer was the JOINT's historian) at best pale next to Rabbi Weissmandl and other major Jewish rescuers. It is unlikely that with Professor Bauer's background and loyalties he can be an objective historian about this important aspect of the Holocaust.

A Czech documentary called "Among Blind Fools" places the Working Group and Rabbi Weissmandl in perspective, where the establishment leadership was called "blind fools". History shows they were far worse.

It is telling that whereas Yad Vashem is now is proud to be Jerusalem's Number One Tourist Spot, its opulent Tourist Shop does not carry the major historical books about George Mantello, Gizi Fleischmann, Hillel Kook (alias Peter Bergson), Rabbi Michael Ber Weissmandl, Recha Sternbuch and Rabbi Solomon Schonfeld - and the English version of "Among Blind Fools" can't be found in the Yad Vashem library.

Every concerned Jew who speaks and writes about these matters faces a dilemma. At the extremes one must either tell the truth (as much as one can glimpse of it) or to be part of a conspiracy of silence and historical distortion. Telling the truth about major failures within the Jewish community during the Holocaust may provide ammunition to antisemitism, which is regretfully sharply on the rise - often thinly disguised under terms like "human rights (e.g. at the UN Durban event)and highly distorted, unbalanced anti-Israeli views. Perhaps the Torah is a good guide. It contains unabridged and damning stories about its major heroes - like King David - this teaches thru example the required approach to history.

One can ask what is the value of Holocaust centers if we use them to distort this important aspect of history? Without incessant search for truth we can't learn important lessons about the tragic past and seem to be repeating a pattern of destructive past "mistakes". Rabbi Weissmandl and Hillel Kook and probably all major rescuers would argue for facing the truth - even if at times it is disconcerting and politically incorrect.

References

Dr. Abraham Fuchs, The Unheeded Cry (also in Hebrew as "Karati ve ein oneh")

Ben Hecht, Perfidy (also in Hebrew - as Kachas)

Prof. David Kranzler, Thy Brother's Blood

Prof. David Kranzler, The Man who Stopped the Trains to Auschwitz: George Mantello, El Salvador's and Switzerland's finest hour

Prof. David Kranzler, Holocaust Hero: Solomon Shoenfeld - The Untold Story of an Extraordinary British Rabbi who Rescued 4000 during the Holocaust

Jenö Lévai, Zsidósors Európában (published in 1948 in Hungarian, about George Mantello and the major Swiss grass roots protests against the Holocaust)

Rabbi Michael Ber Weissmandl, Min HaMetzar (From the Straights), in Hebrew

David Wyman and Rafael Medoff, A Race Against Death - Peter Bergson, America and the Holocaust

VERAfilm, "Among Blind Fools" (documentary video)