The persecution of the Jews in photographs the Netherlands 1940-1945

The Persecution of the Jews in Photographs. The Netherlands 1940-1945 is the first book of photographs about the persecution and deportation of the Jews in the Netherlands. A remarkable number of photographs have survived of the process from the initial isolation to the final extermination of the Jews. Both the professional photographers commissioned by the occupying forces, and amateurs, took moving photographs. Ordinary Dutch citizens recorded razzias, in some cases secretly. They also photographed the introduction of the Star of David, the Jews who went into hiding, and the role of perpetrators and bystanders.

On 10 May 1940, the day of the German invasion, there were 140,000 Jewish inhabitants living in the Netherlands. In addition, there were more than 20,000 German-Jewish refugees in the country. The German occupying forces gradually introduced antiJewish measures, step by step. The first train left for the Westerbork transit camp on 14 July 1942, followed up by the deportations to the Auschwitz extermination camp. 107,000 Jews were deported from the Netherlands. The full extent of their terrible fate only became known after the war: at least 102,000 were murdered, died of mistreatment or were worked to death in the Nazi camps. This tragedy has had a profound effect on Dutch society.

Rene Kok and Erik Somers are historians who work at the NIOD and previously published: Stad in oorlog, Amsterdam 1940-1945 in foto’s Het Grote 40-45 Boek

THE NETHERLANDS 1940-1945 RENÉ KOK AND ERIK SOMERS

Photographic archives and private collections were consulted in the Netherlands and abroad. Extensive background data was researched, which means that the moving pictures have an even greater force of expression. The result is an overwhelming collection of almost 400 photographs, accompanied by detailed captions. This book reflects the memory of the persecution of the Jews in photographs.

THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS

Testimonies of the persecution of the Jews in photographs in the Netherlands

THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS THE NETHERLANDS

1940-1945

RENÉ KOK AND ERIK SOMERS

CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 6

1. JEWISH LIFE AND REFUGEES

13

2. INTIMIDATION

29

3. “FORBIDDEN FOR JEWS”

55

4. THE YELLOW STAR OF DAVID

77

5. JEWISH WORK CAMPS

99

6. THE JEWISH COUNCIL

115

7. PERPETRATORS

139

8. DEPORTATIONS

167

9. GOING INTO HIDING

197

10. WESTERBORK

235

11. EXTERMINATION

265

12. RETURN

281

LITERATURE 301 CHRONOLOGY 302 COLOPHON 304

INTRO­ DUCTION

This is a remarkable photograph. “January 1943” – the date has been written on the edge of the photograph. Ralph Polak, aged 19 and Miep Krant, only 15 years old at the time, appear to be walking across the Dam square in Amsterdam without a care in the world. A photographer who is photographing passers-by and offering the prints for sale, is taking the photo. The couple are in love. The two of them are making plans together for the time when the war will be over. However, the deportations of Jews to transit camp Westerbork in Drenthe are in full swing, and many of their friends and neighbours have already been taken away. The compulsory Stars of David on their coats symbolises the constant threat, but they will not allow some of their happy moments together to be taken away.

Miep had lived in Amsterdam since 1942. She was forced to move to the capital from her home in Bussum, and went to live in the Rapenburgerstraat, where she got to know Ralph, the boy next door.

Shortly after this photograph was taken, Miep was taken from her home during a razzia; she had always taken into account the possibility that this would happen and had a rucksack full of clothes ready by the door. She waited to be transported to the camp in Westerbork in the assembly area in the Hollandsche Schouwburg. Just before she left, Ralph, who worked for the Jewish Council in the Expositur department and was therefore in a good position to help, cleverly managed to get her released.

Miep, her parents and her sister, went into hiding in Baarn, but the conditions in their hiding place soon deteriorated. At one point there were eleven people in hiding, all crowded together in a small attic. There was not enough food available, not enough ration coupons for food, and Miep became visibly weaker. She almost died of starvation and appendicitis, but as a Jewish person in hiding it was not possible for her to be admitted to a hospital. The Resistance provided her with a new identity and false documents so that she was able to receive medical treatment in the emergency hospital in Baarn. Ralph was caught during the last big razzia in Amsterdam on 29 September 1943. His exemption from being deported because he worked for the Jewish Council was no longer any use to him.

On his way to Westerbork, he jumped from the train and went into hiding.

Ralph and Miep survived the war and married after the liberation. They set up a successful textile business in Baarn.

The photograph is intriguing because of its striking contrast. It shows a boy and a girl walking across the Dam square – an everyday scene. The decor has not changed, even today. At the same time, the yellow Star of David, which Jews had to wear from 3 May 1942, does give the photograph a rather ominous feel. From a post-war perspective the photograph is not only an expression of the German persecution and terror, but also implies mass murder. Initially, nothing was known about the photograph or who the two young people shown were, other than the location, which is easy to identify, and at a glance the handwritten date can also be erroneously read as “1942”. The photograph was undoubtedly of great value to the couple in love. Its protective cover is virtually worn out because it was regularly taken out, and the picture itself has been visibly damaged. When Ralph and Miep were separated for more than two years while they were in hiding, the photograph was the only tangible proof of their love.

When the background details came to light, it made the photograph even more meaningful. An investigation in the archive of images at the Jewish Historical Museum in Amsterdam produced the photograph by chance.

The search that was made in different archives, by consulting online files and by asking all sorts of questions resulted in the reconstruction of this story. There are many of these stories, and the many apparently everyday photographs dating from the years of occupation and persecution form the starting point of The Persecution of the Jews in Photographs. The Netherlands 1940-1945.

< Amsterdam, January 1943.

Ralph Polak and Miep Krant on the Dam square. They were able to survive the war by going into hiding.

Collection of the Jewish Historical Museum

An image engraved on the memory A striking number of photographs have survived illustrating the persecution of the Jews in the Netherlands, certainly when seen from an international perspective. There is no other country that was occupied by THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS - INTRODUCTION

7

Nazi Germany in Western Europe where so many photographs relating to the persecution of the Jews have survived.

Over the years, numerous works have been published on the persecution of the Jews in the Netherlands, with or without photographs. The images almost always serve to support or to illustrate historical accounts. The photographs themselves are not the center of attention. This is striking, because these images are in fact largely responsible for the way we remember the period of the occupation. The photographs of the razzia on the Jonas Daniël Meijerplein in Amsterdam, the deportations from camp Westerbork, as well as the photographic portraits of Anne Frank, are etched into our minds. How we remember or imagine the past, and in particular the persecution of the Jews, is determined to a great extent by impressive and moving photographs. Images contribute to a historical awareness and are an important factor in the creation of a collective memory. Vivian Uria, historian of photography and chief curator of Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, expressed this as follows in 2018: “Visual documentation is one of the most important factors in shaping our historical awareness of the Holocaust. Alongside the archival documentation of the period’s events, and the research on these records, visual documentation has contributed significantly towards knowledge of the Holocaust, influenced the manner in which it has been analyzed and understood, and affected the way it has been engraved on the collective memory.”

Visual history and research This book presents a visual history of the persecution of the Jews in the Netherlands for the first time. When choosing the images, our familiar principle was a guiding factor: an image had to appeal, evoke feelings, be disquieting, raise awareness and stir the conscience. It became clear that to an even greater extent than for other themes relating to the Second World War, the tragedy of the persecution of the Jews is 8

THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS - INTRODUCTION

expressed in photographs which conceal a personal story. Photographs, in combination with the information which has been gleaned about the fate of the people depicted, provide histories with a real impact.

Therefore the photographs in this book virtually only show people: victims and survivors, perpetrators, helpers and bystanders. This book is based on intensive visual research in which numerous archives and private collections, both in the Netherlands and abroad, were consulted.

As far as possible attempts were made to discover the identities and the histories of the people who are photographed. Many of the photographs were taken in Amsterdam. This is not surprising: by far the largest number of Jews lived in the capital (more than 80,000), also the persecution was concentrated there. Nevertheless, it is striking that no photographs were taken or have survived of the transportation of Jews from other large cities such as Rotterdam, Utrecht, The Hague, Groningen, and Enschede.

Inevitably the compilation and selection of the photographs is based on subjective, personal interpretations and considerations. Writing history is a subjective matter and this applies to an even great extent for a visual history. A great deal depends on the interpretation and the choices which give added value to the photographs. A photograph as a factual representation is also linked to an interpretation of the past. In this respect, photography has its limitations: after all, photographs as such do not give any explanations for historical events and processes, nor can they shed any light on the background of what is shown in the image. Photographs as a historical source are simply too limited to do this. A photograph is always a record of a moment, which – no matter how penetrating and convincing it may often be – is not able to tell the historical story itself.

It is not only the compilation of the visual material that is a subjective matter – taking the photograph is in itself also subjective. No matter how faithful a representation may be to the truth, it is always the personal choice of the photographer to focus the lens and close the

< Amsterdam, 10 February 1941.

Disturbances in the Jewish district of Amsterdam between Jews and Dutch National Socialists (NSB).

The German press photographer and owner of the Amsterdam photographic press agency Stapf Bilderdienst, Franz Stapf, who was working in the Netherlands, hurried to document the commotion with his Leica camera.

Stapf Bilderdienst, NIOD

> Westerbork, 1943. Life in camp Westerbork was extensively photographed and filmed during the war. This was the work of the photographer and filmmaker Rudolf Breslauer, a German Jewish refugee.

Wim Loeb, one of Breslauer’s colleagues, is touching up a photograph of the camp commandant Gemmeker in the photographic studio of camp Westerbork.

Rudolf Werner Breslauer, NIOD

shutter at a certain moment. It is the way in which the photographer sees the picture. The photography is based on personal and sometimes on moral considerations, whether the photograph was taken by a press photographer or by an amateur. The historian and lecturer in ethics Gie van den Berghe described this process as follows: “When you record something, you take it from a larger whole. You select, frame and impose limitations on space and time. Photography means assigning significance, giving meaning, choosing sides (…). Every photograph is the record of a particular moment, the result of a choice and decision. Even if these take place in the blink of an eye or intuitively, they determine and define what is recorded and communicated. Photographs are fragments of reality. When this is done well, they provide a fragment of reality in such a powerful and symbolic way that it is expressed more clearly than it is in reality.”

The way in which photographs are created and the way in which the images are then used and the context in which they are shown reveal “one” reality of the past. They form a visual historical record that requires a critical approach. Like historical documents, photographs of historical events should be subjected to a critical source analysis. It is essential to examine the background of a photograph and to place it in a historical context to explore the motivation for taking it, and above all to look at the interests it serves.

In the service of the occupying forces During the German occupation of the Netherlands, the medium of photography was used to propagate National Socialism, who worked for the occupiers or performed incidental assignments. Photographers, contributed to this. Many press photographers tried to continue making a living as far as possible and worked as they had in the past, but they were not given much room for using their own initiative in this respect. During

the years of the occupation, press photography was carefully monitored and there was censorship. Guidelines were issued to determine what could and what could not be photographed. The result was that press photographers avoided recording things which were unpopular with the occupying forces. In this respect it should be noted that the occupying forces had forbidden the press, which had been forced into line, to publish any images of Jews or of “people of partial Jewish blood”. As a result of that measure Het Joodse Weekblad (the Jewish weekly newspaper which was published under the auspices of the Jewish Council) never contained contemporaneous photographs either. The only photographs which were published during the occupation referring to aspects of the persecution were published in antisemitic brochures or in explicitly national socialist newspapers. That too rarely happened.

Furthermore, photography was (and is) never sufficient as an independent means of propaganda; its significance lies above all in its connection with other means of propaganda. In this way photography can make a contribution to certain views, or as the American essayist Susan Sontag wrote: “Photographs cannot create a moral position, but they can reinforce one – and can help build a nascent one.” During the first stage of the occupation, the German propagandists wished to make a powerful impression by disseminating antisemitic propaganda. In the first place, it should be clear that Jews were not Dutch and were not considered as such by the occupying forces, or as the Reichskommissar Seyss-Inquart said in the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam on 12 March 1941: “The Jews are not Dutch citizens in our view. They are enemies with whom we can neither achieve a truce or peace. We will strike the Jews wherever we can.” Photographs with antisemitic captions were used that year in the brochure De Joden in Nederland (The Jews in the Netherlands), amongst other places. This brochure, which “aimed to speak through its photographs”, was distributed amongst the population with an enormous circulation. Without any nuance it compared Dutch Jews to so-called THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS - INTRODUCTION

9

< Amsterdam, 1943. During the war numerous portraits were made by professional photographers. It later became clear that these were the last, and in some cases the only photographs which survived of victims of the Holocaust. Hans and Ruth Abraham survived the war by going into hiding. A photograph was taken of the children just before they went into hiding.

Foto Raaij, collection of the Jewish Historical Museum

> Amsterdam, 1941. Entrance to the Jewish district in Amsterdam. During a day in Amsterdam the Van Vliet family from Haarlem pose under the signs reading Joodsche Wijk (Jewish district) and “Für Wehrmacht Verboten” (no entry for the Wehrmacht), which were like a tourist attraction. The man on the right is carrying his camera case.

Van Vliet album, NIOD

hideous “Untermenschen” and concluded that there was not a great deal of photographer Rudolf Werner Breslauer to record life in the camp. In doing so, Breslauer also captured the deportations to ‘the East’ (see chapter difference from the Polish Jews in the ghettos.

10). With their impact the photographs referred to above contributed However, the antisemitic scope of the propaganda achieved little, because to an important extent to the post-war image of the persecution of the Jews in the Netherlands. In addition, they served as proof. Events which the Dutch population did not prove to be receptive to its banality. Even for many of the Dutch sympathizers of National Socialism, this unrealistic are known to have taken place because there are reports or witness approach to the Jews went too far. It resulted in a change of direction. The statements of them only appear to be truly proven when they have been recorded in photographs. Some of the most extreme examples of the antisemitic propaganda became less vehement and more sophisticated. camera as a witness include the photographs taken by Alberto Errera in It soon became painfully clear that the occupiers did not actually need the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp at great risk to his own life the propaganda to execute its plan of persecution and the ultimate (pp. 268-272). This Greek-Jewish prisoner worked in the Sonderkommando, deportation of the Jews. a group of prisoners who were forced to work in and around the gas chambers. While the Nazis did everything they could to erase all traces Witnesses of the mass extermination at the end of the war, these photographs are clear proof that Jews were murdered in Auschwitz. They are out of focus The occupiers commissioned both German and Dutch photographers and were clearly taken in great haste, but show a cremation in the open to represent a number of the essential aspects of the persecution of air: the crematoria were no longer able to deal with the number of bodies. the Jews. These photographs have been kept for a range of different One photograph shows naked women who had to wait outside before reasons, although that was often not the commissioners’ intention. For being taken to the gas chambers, the fate which was also suffered by the example, the Aussenstelle der Sicherheitspolizei und des Sicherheitsdienstes tens of thousands of Jews deported to the camp from the Netherlands. in Amsterdam commissioned the Dutch National Socialist photographic The negatives were smuggled out of the camp in a tube of toothpaste journalists Herman Heukels and Bart de Kok to photograph Jews who with the aim of bearing witness to what had happened. The photographs reported themselves in Amsterdam, before they were deported to Judendurchgangslager Westerbork on respectively 25 May 1943 and 20 June were intended to make the outside world realize what was happening in Auschwitz on a daily basis. However, they only became public after the 1943 (see chapter 8). A number of photographs of the first event were war. published in the magazine Storm SS accompanied agonising texts. As late as 2010, 250 photographs by the photographer and NSB member Bart de Private life Kok, which had been lost up to then, came to light during the conversion of a house in Amsterdam (pp. 70, 74 and 144).

During the German occupation, many photographs were taken by It was certainly not the intention that some of the most iconic photographs of the persecution of the Jews in the Netherlands – the arrest “ordinary” Dutch citizens who had a sense of history and decided to of hundreds of Jewish men on the Jonas Daniël Meijerplein in Amsterdam record events in photographs. Many of these photographs have survived and have been placed in the archives. In the relatively prosperous 1930s on 22 and 23 February 1941, accompanied by a great deal of intimidation and humiliation – should ever be published. A Dutch laboratory technician in the Netherlands, Dutch citizens took more and more photographs, and within a short space of time owning a camera became possible for large secretly produced an extra set of prints of those Nazi photographs groups of Dutch people. They took snapshots for the family photo album and kept them as proof of the barbaric German behaviour (see pages and to send to members of their family in other places, particularly to 46-50). Another remarkable series of photographs with a strong visual the many Dutch people who were living in the colonies in the East and documentary character are the photographs which were taken in camp West. Many citizens used a simple box camera, while the more advanced Westerbork itself. The German camp commander Gemmeker personally amateur photographers dug into their deep pockets to buy the latest commissioned the German-Jewish prisoner and former professional 10

THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS - INTRODUCTION

cameras suitable for 35mm rolls of film. The photographic business, as well as the possibility of developing and printing photographs, increased enormously. Later, during the occupation, the increasing scarcity of materials such as rolls of film and photographic paper became an inhibitory factor. Nevertheless, many amateur photographers still had a roll of film in stock. They were forced to take photographs more selectively and the photographs were often only developed and printed after the war.

The persecution of the Jews, the process from their isolation to extermination, was also recorded by amateur photographers. Admittedly there was no official prohibition on taking photographs until 20 November 1944, but taking photographs of things which the occupying forces didn’t like entailed many risks. For example, it was dangerous to take photos of the razzias. Nevertheless this happened, sometimes hastily from a porch or secretly through a living room window between the net curtains pulled slightly to one side. Technically these were not perfect, but they remain convincing and of historical value because of the way in which they were directly recorded.

Family photographs, which were often collected in photo albums, have their own specific emotional importance. This applies particularly when the photographs are silent witnesses of Jews who were murdered in the extermination camps: records of people, both young and old, looking into the camera without a worry in the world and not knowing what was in store for them. Sometimes the photographs testify to a painful awareness of the impending doom, like the photograph with the text on the back: “A last photograph of us all together before going into hiding” (page 198).

Or the photograph showing parents with their new born child. The words on the border read: “Henriëtte, 6 weeks, 5 minutes before she goes into hiding from the Germans on 24-10-1942” (page 213).

The NIOD (formerly the RIOD) attached enormous value to amateur photography in the Second World War from its very beginning. As soon as

the institute was established during the days of the liberation in 1945, it appealed to the population to help document the years of the war and the occupation. It expressly also asked for photographs. In this way, thousands of amateur photos found their way into the rapidly growing photo archive of the National Institute for War Documentation at the time. The Jewish Historical Museum in Amsterdam also took the initiative to collect photographs of citizens and in this way built up a valuable collection.

Photographs of private individuals are still emerging from time to time today. Sometimes they have been cherished for decades because of their emotional importance, but equally often they are forgotten records in a shoebox which come to light when an attic is emptied, or an inheritance is left or a house is cleared.

The Persecution of the Jews in Photographs. The Netherlands 1940-1945 The Persecution of the Jews in Photographs. The Netherlands 1940-1945 reveals a carefully considered selection of photographs which provide a visual history of the persecution, seen in a certain context. On 10 May 1940, the day that Nazi Germany marched into the Netherlands, there were 160,000 Jews living in the Netherlands, including the GermanJewish refugees. The German occupying forces introduced anti-Jewish measures very gradually. In the space of two years, a development took place in the Netherlands which had taken eight years in Germany itself.

The first train with 800 Jews left Amsterdam for camp Westerbork on 14 July 1942 and from there the deportations took place to the concentration and extermination camps. Altogether 107,000 Jews were transported from the Netherlands. 102,000 were murdered in the Nazi camps; 75% of the Jewish population, the highest ratio of Jewish victims in the countries occupied by Germany in Western Europe. It is a tragedy which has left profound traces in Dutch society. This book shows the visual testimonies.

THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS - INTRODUCTION

11

Fun on the beach Scheveningen, May 1933. A Whit weekend of fun at the Scheveningen seaside resort. In Germany Adolf Hitler had become chancellor and increased his power at enormous speed. The war seemed to be a long way away. The photo from this family album shows Ru Adelaar from Deventer, his wife Willy and their daughters Paultje, Emy and Loes. Ru

Adelaar (sitting at the front of the photo) owned an agency business.

During the occupation he worked for the department of travel permits of the Jewish Council in the town where he lived. At the beginning of 1943, Adelaar, his wife and youngest daughter were forced to move to the east of Amsterdam. During the big razzia on 20 June 1943 they were rounded up there and transported

> Jewish market Amsterdam, 1940. There was a market every Sunday morning in the Nieuwe Uilenburgerstraat, situated in the “Jewish corner”. This market, which was also popular among non-Jews, sold second-hand goods, fish and other foodstuffs, including the very popular “Jewish sour”.

As a result of the economic crisis unemployment rose in the 1930s, and consequently there was a strong increase in the number of Jewish market traders and pedlars. Because of the great poverty amongst the potential clients and the extreme competition amongst the market traders, the income was very low.

16

to camp Westerbork. The couple and Paultje, who was then ten years old, were then transported to Auschwitz, where they were murdered immediately upon arrival.

Loes and Emy, who were adults by then, survived the war by going into hiding.

The Ghetto Fighters’ House, Israel / The Photo Archive

The Nieuwe Uilenburgerstraat had been created in the 1920s when the slums of the Jewish district were cleaned up. According to the health committee, a large number of the houses had become uninhabitable and could no longer be rebuilt. The City council commissioned the establishment of a block of flats,

THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS JEWISH LIFE AND REFUGEES

considered very modern for that time, to the west of this street. This photo was taken in a side street of the Nieuwe Uilenburgerstraat, the Nieuwe Batavierstraat.

Stapf, Bilderdienst, NIOD

THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS - JEWISH LIFE AND REFUGEES

17

A day out Amsterdam, summer 1942. Jewish children are playing at going on a trip. This photograph was taken in the Jekerstraat, not far from the house where Anne Frank lived before she went into hiding. All children over the age of six had to wear a Star of David. The photo came from Fred Lessing, third on the left, who had just reached that age. Separated from his parents, he went into hiding at a later date and managed to get through the war safely. His mother was rounded up, but survived until the liberation of Bergen-Belsen. His father was actively involved in the Resistance as a Jew who had gone into hiding.

At the end of the occupation he joined the Binnenlandse Strijdkrachten (BS) (Dutch Internal Army). Three years after the liberation, the Lessing family emigrated to the United States and started a new life.

The two children on the left in the photo are brother and sister: Tjepke Peter Kroon and Marjoke Kroon.

Both are non-Jewish. The older boy in the middle, Alex Smaal, is also non-Jewish. No data was found for the two Jewish boys on the right.

Yad Vashem

97

In broad daylight Amsterdam, 17 March 1943. Barges on the Lijnbaansgracht loaded up with household articles from the houses of Jews who had been deported. The bystanders are very interested in these articles. Jews who obeyed the call to register and Jews rounded up during razzias had to hand over their house keys when they registered. Their house 180

would then be sealed and emptied later. The removal firm of the NSB member Abraham Puls was often used by the Hausraterfassungsstelle.

When so many houses were emptied in broad daylight, the general public must have realized that there was no intention that the Jews would ever return.

J.D. Noske, ANP, National Archive

THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS - DEPORTATIONS

Registration Amsterdam, 25 May 1943. Seven thousand Jews who until then had been exempted from deportation by the Jewish Council had to register at the Polderweg in Amsterdam-Oost to be transported to Westerbork (also see next page) on the orders of the Zentralstelle für jüdische Auswanderung.

Approximately 1,600 of them obeyed this order and went to the collection point of their own accord. Although they were given something to eat and drink by Jewish Council employees, adults and children, as well as elderly

people, had to wait for hours. In the end the group started moving; it was a few hundred metres walk from the Polderweg to the Muiderpoort station. One of the photographs shows them climbing up the station stairs, carrying all their luggage. The trains of the Dutch Railway were waiting there to leave for camp Westerbork.

Bart de Kok recorded these events for the Storm SS, the weekly newspaper of the German SS in the Netherlands.

The fact that only a few people obeyed the call irritated the occupying forces enormously.

However, they anticipated this. That night, Amsterdam police officers hermetically sealed the Jewish district in the centre of the city and the Ordnungspolizei and officers of the Police Battalion Amsterdam went through the district with a fine toothcomb. The following day another 3,300 Jews were transported to Westerbork.

The girl in the photo with the bow in her hair is Rebecca Oznowicz. She was taken to Polderweg with her parents and her 3-year-old brother.

The father and mother, however, had a “Sperre” (exemption), possibly because of their work in the Dutch

Israelite Hospital (NIZ). Employees of the Jewish Council then removed them from the waiting group. The family immediately went into hiding and found a place in the NIZ building. This hospital was evacuated by the Germans on 13 August 1943, after which members of the resistance managed to take them to hiding places in Limburg.

The Oznowicz family survived the war as a result of going into hiding.

Bart de Kok, NIOD

THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS - DEPORTATIONS

181

COLOPHON

exhibition in the National Holocaust Museum

© 2019 WBOOKS ZWOLLE/ THE AUTHORS

/ Jewish Cultural Quarter in Amsterdam from

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Many of the photographs and much of the background information was provided by private individuals to whom we are very grateful. In particular we would like to mention: the

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TEXT AND COMPOSITION

By the same authors

René Kok and Erik Somers

Het 40-45 Boek (978 90 400 8741 7)

colleagues in the images archive: Maria Somers, Harco Gijsbers, Calvin Krancher, Jet Baruch and

Het Grote 40-45 Boek (978 94 625 8171 5)

Willem Swager for their essential support in this project.

TEXT EDITOR

Stad in oorlog. Amsterdam 1940-1945 in foto’s

Finally, we are grateful to the staff of the NIOD, the Jewish Cultural Quarter and Topographie

Nanny Maat

(978 94 625 8191 3)

TRANSLATION

Edited by the authors

Tony Langham & Plym Peters

De oorlog in kleur (978 94 625 8005 3)

des Terrors in Berlin for their help with the exhibition, The Persecution of the Jews in Photographs, the Netherlands 1940-1945, which we compiled in connection with the research for this book.

René Kok and Erik Somers

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Arnhem 40-45 (978 94 625 8038 1)

VORMGEVING

Delft 40-45 (978 94 625 8096 5)

Lori Lenssinck, DOORLORI

Den Haag 40-45 (978 94 625 8070 1) Dordrecht 40-45 (978 94 625 8037 4)

René Kok and Erik Somers are historians and authors of a large number of publications about the history of the Second World War and publications of historical photographs. In addition

The Persecution of the Jews in Photographs, the

Drenthe 40-45 (978 94 625 8049 7)

they have put together a number of exhibitions and museum presentations.

Netherlands 1940-1945 was also supported by

Groningen 40-45 (978 94 625 8081 7)

René Kok is a researcher in images with the NIOD and specializes in research of photographs

generous contributions from the following:

Kennemerland 40-45 (978 94 625 8144 9)

and film covering the period 1940-1945.

Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds

Leeuwarden 40-45 (978 94 625 8065 7)

Erik Somers, a researcher with the NIOD, gained his doctorate in 2014 in the field of memorial

Lexhanna Stichting

Leiden 40-45 (978 94 625 8068 8)

culture. He researched how the Dutch war and resistance museums and memorial centres

P.W. Janssen's Friesche Stichting

Noord-Brabant 40-45 (978 94 625 8035 0)

have presented memories of the Second World War and what present and future war

Stichting Maatschappij tot Nut der Israëlieten

Rivierenland 40-45 (978 94 625 812 7)

museums will look like.

in Nederland

Rotterdam 40-45 (978 94 625 8001 5) -

WW2 IMAGE BANK

The eponymous exhibition has been made

Twente 40-45 (978 94 625 8075 6)

Photographs of the persecution of the Jews in the Netherlands can be found on www.

possible by the financial support of: Ministry of

Utrecht 40-45 (978 94 625 8066 4)

beeldbankwo2.nl. This online database contains photographs belonging to thirty other Dutch

Health, Welfare and Sport,

Zeeland 40-45 (978 94 625 8050 3)

institutions, as well as the photographs of the NIOD.

Auswärtiges Amt, Germany,

Zwolle 40-45 (978 94 625 8036 7)

sold out

Holocaust Memorial Day.

CAPTION TO THE COVER PHOTOGRAPH Ralph Polak and Miep Krant on the Dam in Amsterdam, January 1943.

Collection of the Jewish Historical Museum

The Persecution of the Jews in Photographs. The Netherlands 1940-1945 is the first book of photographs about the persecution and deportation of the Jews in the Netherlands. A remarkable number of photographs have survived of the process from the initial isolation to the final extermination of the Jews. Both the professional photographers commissioned by the occupying forces, and amateurs, took moving photographs. Ordinary Dutch citizens recorded razzias, in some cases secretly. They also photographed the introduction of the Star of David, the Jews who went into hiding, and the role of perpetrators and bystanders.

On 10 May 1940, the day of the German invasion, there were 140,000 Jewish inhabitants living in the Netherlands. In addition, there were more than 20,000 German-Jewish refugees in the country. The German occupying forces gradually introduced antiJewish measures, step by step. The first train left for the Westerbork transit camp on 14 July 1942, followed up by the deportations to the Auschwitz extermination camp. 107,000 Jews were deported from the Netherlands. The full extent of their terrible fate only became known after the war: at least 102,000 were murdered, died of mistreatment or were worked to death in the Nazi camps. This tragedy has had a profound effect on Dutch society.

Rene Kok and Erik Somers are historians who work at the NIOD and previously published: Stad in oorlog, Amsterdam 1940-1945 in foto’s Het Grote 40-45 Boek

THE NETHERLANDS 1940-1945 RENÉ KOK AND ERIK SOMERS

Photographic archives and private collections were consulted in the Netherlands and abroad. Extensive background data was researched, which means that the moving pictures have an even greater force of expression. The result is an overwhelming collection of almost 400 photographs, accompanied by detailed captions. This book reflects the memory of the persecution of the Jews in photographs.

THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS

Testimonies of the persecution of the Jews in photographs in the Netherlands

THE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS IN PHOTOGRAPHS THE NETHERLANDS

1940-1945

RENÉ KOK AND ERIK SOMERS