![[Table of Contents]](../icons/toc.gif){kind=icon}
![[Previous]](../icons/back.gif){kind=icon}
![[Next]](../icons/next.gif){kind=icon}
![[HMK Home]](../icons/home.gif){kind=icon}
|
HUNGARY IN THE MIRROR OF THE WESTERN WORLD |
THE POLITICS OF GENOCIDE
THE HOLOCAUST IN HUNGARY
(BOOK REPORT)
Author:
Professor R. Braham
The entire text under this heading is a book report. The title of the book is "The Politics of Genocide," subtitled, The Holocaust in Hungary, by Professor Randolph Braham; published by Columbia University Press, August, 1981. Professor Braham has published more than 20 studies on different aspects of the subject.
Although no summary can replace an actual reading of this detailed text, regarded by many historians as the most complete account of its kind, the following is an overview of the people and events described by Professor Braham.
There were always people of the Jewish faith living in Hungary. In the 17th century the number of Israelites was just a little over 4,000; their number had increased by 1735 to 11,621; by 1781 there were 80,775. The largest migration of the Jewish people into Hungary took place after southern Poland became a part of the Hapsburg monarchy.
By 1805 Jews numbered 126,620 (1.8% of the total population). By 1850 the number had reached 339,816 (3.7%) and by 1880, 624,826 (4.4%). Greater Hungary"s Jewish population reached its peak in 1910 when it numbered 911,227, or 5.0% of the total population of nearly 21,000,000.
Especially during the years between 1860 and 1914 life was very good for the Jewish people in Hungary. They moved, worked and lived freely in any part of the country. The rapid increase in their number was partly the result of ongoing migration from southern Poland and partly due to the fact that most families had many children. By the late 1800s a symbiotic relationship had evolved between the Jews and the Hungarians. All the newly arrived Jews declared themselves to be "Hungarian," so that by the time they comprised about 5% of the population of pre-World War I Hungary, their numbers helped the Hungarians to maintain a numerical majority against the total sum of Romanians, Slovaks and Serbs.
Hungary, in the first part of the 19th century, was a very backward nation. The entire economy was based on agriculture alone and, serfdom being outlawed only in 1848, the upward mobility of children of the serfs was very difficult. When, during the second part of the 19th century, industry and commerce began to develop, the Jews played a large role in furthering this process and becoming a part of it. Those Hungarian families who were rich were basically landholders and lived the life of the landlord. Generally, even those who fell from the upper classes because of economic changes tried to obtain employment in civil service and looked down on jobs in commerce and banking. Therefore, those areas were even more open to the Jews.
At the beginning of the first World War the symbiotic relationship between the Jews and the Hungarians existed for the benefit of both. Whatever happened during the first World War, and especially at the end of the War, changed the situation completely. The old political regime fell and was, at first, succeeded by a regime which was trying to cooperate with the victors. Because the cooperation was not reciprocated by the Western Allies, the regime fell and a Communist regime took over. The new regime promised the help of Lenin, but the Russians did not come to help Hungary.
The Hungarian Communist regime outlawed private ownership and suppressed religious and individual freedoms. Therefore, by the time the Communists fell, they were universally hated. Unfortunately, many radical Jewish intellectuals were in the upper echelon of the Communist Party. By inference, the Jewish masses became labeled as partners in the Communist regime.
During these fateful months and years Hungary lost more than half of its territories and more than 4,000,000 Hungarians became subjects of the newly created Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and Greater Romania. In the case of national tragedy there is always a tendency to look for an explanation and place the blame on individuals and groups. Because the Jews were viewed as being part of the Communist regime they became enemies for many of the politicians. The result was that the first anti-Jewish law in Europe was enacted by the Hungarian Parliament in the year 1920, under the leadership of Prime Minister Pal Teleki and Head of State, Miklos Horthy. This was the socalled "Numerus Clausus" law, which limited the admission of Jewish students to the universities to 5%, which was tied to their representation in the total population.
After the fall of the Communists, restoration of the old order took place. Admiral Horthy became the Head of State and Prime Minister Istvan Bethlen the architect of the reconstruction of the old order. During this period of consolidation at least some of the leading Jewish individuals became well accepted but anti-Semitic feelings remained. The prevailing stereotype of the Jewish merchant or banker belied the fact that, though the Jews were represented in these fields beyond their makeup in the general population, the Hungarian gentry was neither interested in nor willing to seek employment in these areas. The upper class Jewish population was also blamed because of their relationship with the aristocratic, antireform Hungarians.
The anti-Semitic propaganda made much of the facts that, for example, Jews constituted 55.2% of physicians; 49.2% of lawyers; 30.4% of engineers; 31.7% of scientists and writers; 14.7% of painters; 25% of musicians and 26.7% of actors.
In industry and commerce the percentages were: independent commercial establishments, 51.3%; industrial establishments, 11.0%; agents, 75.1%; bank employees and officials, 59.4%.
The right wing dominance began with the ascendancy of Julius Gombos to the post of Prime Minister. However, the change in the legal status of the Jews occurred during the term of his successor, Prime Minister Kalman Daranyi. He was aided in this effort not only by the generally anti-Semitic feeling of the population but also by the attitude of the Roman Catholic Church. Daranyi enacted the socalled First Jewish Law in 1938. The Church was instrumental in fostering anti-Semitic propaganda by condoning the equation of Jews with Bolshevism and of National Socialism with Christianity. This law limited the number of Jews to the professions and stated that of the doctors, teachers, lawyers, etc., a maximum of 25% of the participants could be of the Jewish faith. Because this number was higher than the percentage of the Jewish people in the nation, the Jewish leadership accepted it positively in the hope that this would bring the question to rest. However, this did not happen and under German influence the Second Jewish Law was enacted by the Hungarian Government in the year 1939. This Law was modeled on the Nuremberg Laws and defined who should be counted as a Jew. Anyone with one of two Jewish parents or two of four Jewish grandparents was automatically identified as a Jew. The same law restricted the Jewish participation in the professions to 5%, which was tied to their total numbers in the population.
On November 2, 1938, prior to the outbreak of the Second World War, Hungary achieved a peaceful border correction with Czechoslovakia when the southern part of the province (Felvidek) was returned to Hungary. Because of this agreement, more than one million people, mainly Hungarians, became part of Hungary.
The second border correction was not peaceful. On March 14-18, 1939, Hungary annexed the easternmost part of Czechoslovakia, which was called Ruthenia, after the Czech forces had withdrawn.
The third border correction, again peaceful, between Romania and Hungary, took place on August 30, 1940, when northern Transylvania, with a majority of Hungarian population, was returned to Hungary.
On April 11, 1941, Hungary joined the Third Reich in the war against Yugoslavia and acquired Bacska, formerly a part of Hungary, which had a population with a Hungarian majority.
Between 1938 and 1941, with these border corrections, the population of Hungary grew from 9.3 million to almost 15 million. The Jewish population grew accordingly to more than 5% of this expanded population.
On all these border corrections the Italians and Germans were very helpful which, in return, increased the influence of Germany in Hungarian politics. The extent of this influence became evident when Hungary officially joined the war by participating in the attack on Russia.
Hungary had managed to remain neutral until the war broke out between Germany and the Soviet Union in 1941.
As the Soviet front became longer and longer a new Hungarian Army was raised and sent to the eastern front in the Fall of 1942. This army consisted of 200,000 Hungarian soldiers and 50,000 Jewish workers. Between Christmas and the end of January 1943, a great Russian offensive took place and within a threeweek period nearly the entire Hungarian Army was destroyed. The dead numbered over 100,000 soldiers of the Hungarian Army and close to 20,000 of the Jewish workers. Often Hungarian officers and enlisted men who were in charge of the Jewish labor groups were unnecessarily brutal and cruel to the labor servicemen.
A law providing a basis for the introduction of the Labor Service System was promulgated on March 11, 1939, under Prime Minister Pal Teleki.
This law was designed to supply the military and the war industry with the necessary number of workers. Certain provisions of the law made possible the creation of Jewish Worker Units, called "Zsido Munkaszolgalat." Based on the implementation of this law, when Hungary entered the war in 1941 the Army units which took part in the beginning of the war against the Russians included 14,413 Jews as members of the Labor Service Units.
After the occupation of Yugoslavia the Germans took over the management of the copper mines in Bor, Serbia, which were operated by Siemens and Organization TODT, and supplied 40% of the copper to Germany. The Germans requested 10,000 and de facto received about 6,000-7,000 Jewish laborers to work in the copper mines from 1943 to 1944. As the front reached Hungary the withdrawal of those laborers was almost a death march conducted by the SS.
The political result of the military losses was the replacement of Prime Minister Laszlo Bardossy by Miklos Kallay on March 9, 1942. Kallay's goal was to extract Hungary from the war. He was strongly anti-Communist, anti-Russian, pro-British, pro-American and sympathetic to the plight of the Jewish population. During his tenure, Hungary was the safest place on the continent for the Jewish people. However, his efforts were fruitless and brought about the German occupation of Hungary in March 1944.
Hitler invited Horthy, the Minister of Defense and the head of the Hungarian Army to Austria for a meeting. While these three leaders were out of the country the German occupation took place. In the absence of all parties who could order resistance, no resistance occurred against this German move. Based on Hitler"s demand, Kallay was removed but Horthy remained as Head of State. The SS wanted Laszlo Baky and Fidel Palffy to head the new government; the German ambassador, Edmund Veesenmayer, wanted Bela Imredy, but none of them were acceptable to Horthy. They all compromised on Dome Sztojay, who was formerly the Hungarian Ambassador to Germany.
As soon as the new government took office, all Jews were ordered to wear the yellow star of David on their clothing. The government called in 80,000 Jewish men to the Labor Service. By decree, they began with the ghettoization nationwide. In Budapest, instead of a single ghetto, individual residences were designated Yellow Star Houses whenever the majority of the occupants were Jews. The movements of Yellow Star designated persons were restricted to a few hours during the day.
In the Hitler-Horthy meetings Hitler demanded workers for the German war industry and Horthy agreed to deliver 100,000 Jews for that purpose. Later, this number was multiplied when the families of workers were permitted to accompany them to Germany.
By ministerial decree all Jews had to be registered in the locality where they lived. After the registration was completed they were ordered to move into designated ghettos. Often the designated ghetto was a large brickyard or a large factory building close to a railroad station. This made the transportation technically much easier.
The registration, ghettoization and deportation of the Hungarian Jews was organized and executed by the Minister of the Interior, Jaross, along with Secretaries Laszlo Baky and Laszlo Endre. For the ghettoization and deportation the gendarmerie were used. The instructions came from the head of the "Sonder Commando," Adolf Eichmann, the execution from Baky and Endre.
After registration was complete, the gendarmerie and police forces began searching for valuables. This procedure was intended to demoralize the people even before they were in the ghetto. The entire process was not executed at the same time for the entire country but began in Carpatho-Ruthenia, followed by northern Transylvania and the territories reclaimed from Yugoslavia. It was implemented finally in the area which had comprised post-World War I Hungary. The result was the removal of the Jewish population from the outskirts of the metropolitan area, including places like Ujpest and Kispest.
The registration process was performed by the local authorities. The ghettoization and the transportation were performed by the gendarmerie, usually in a brutal way. The transportation itself was inhumane. The people were packed into freight cars supplied by the Germans and were equipped with two pails per car; one for water, one for human waste. The cars were locked from outside and opened only at the place of destination. The destination was Auschwitz. In rapid succession the ghettos were emptied and the occupants deported.
In March 1944 in Trianon Hungary, according to the author, the number of Jews and converts was 490,621. The number of Jews in Northern Transylvania, Northern Hungary, CarpathoRuthenia and the areas ceded from Yugoslavia totaled 334,386, for a grand total of 825,007. By the time the deportation was stopped by order of Horthy, the entire Jewish population, except for those residing in the City of Budapest and those in the Labor Units, had been deported.
The Germans produced the propaganda film showing Hungarian Gendarmerie brutality in marching the deportees from Nagyvarad, contrasted with the humane actions by German nurses caring for the injured when the trains were taken over by the German officials.
The Hungarian press and radio were silent about the deportation. At the same time, ministers of the Cabinet gave speeches stating that in the treatment of the Jews, nothing would happen which would be unworthy of Hungarians. Other officials pointed out that the black market had ceased to exist and that food prices had dropped when the Jews were removed. At the same time, punishment was threatened to anyone who interfered with the deportation.
The brutality of the process and the fact that the Jews who were converted to the Christian faith were included in the process produced repeated intervention from leading church figures. The Catholic Bishop of Gyor, Bishop Apor; the Catholic Bishop of Kolozsvar, Marton Aron; the Catholic Bishop of Csanad, Endre Hamvas and the Presbyterian Bishop of Budapest, L. Ravasz, registered their objections with the local authorities. The Primate of Hungary, Cardinal Seredi, intervened with Sztojay in favor of the Jews who were converts to Christianity, but failed to speak up for the rest of the Jews, thus making it easier for Sztojay to move against the non-Christian Jews.
Because of the intervention of the government, Cardinal Seredi's pastoral letter did not reach most of the Catholic priests. Subsequently, a very mild, short text was read from the pulpits, which did not influence the situation in any way.
The leaders of the Protestant churches tried to intervene, not only for the converts but basically for the humanity of the deportation process. Unfortunately, the government was successful in preventing the churches from informing their congregations.
The mayor of Debrecen also opposed the ghettoization and was removed from office. All the above described actions took place when the Hungarians were not aware that Auschwitz was a death camp. (It is very important to learn when the truth about Auschwitz became known and by whom.)
According to M. Arnothy-Jungerth, Minister of State, there were 164,000 Jews registered in Budapest"s Yellow Star houses, of whom 20,000 were converts and 10,000 scheduled for emigration. The population in most instances was passive. Sympathy arose whenever a prior human relationship had existed between the Christians and Jews. This was especially evident in Budapest where many Yellow Star houses were shared by both Christians and Jews. Because of the restrictive curfew that limited the mobility of the Jews, many Christians did the shopping for their Jewish neighbors in the buildings.
In 1944, according to the author, Slovak escapees from Auschwitz contacted the Jewish leaders in Bratislava and told them the truth, that Auschwitz was a death camp. The information was delivered to the leadership of the Hungarian Jewry, but for incomprehensible reasons they withheld the information from the Jewish masses. They also failed to contact the Hungarian authorities.
After receiving the text of the Auschwitz Protocol from Swiss channels, Minister of State, Arnothy Jungerth, the first Hungarian to learn of it, reported the information to the Council of Ministers. His statements were not believed and the Minister of Interior, Jaross, won the day by assuring all his colleagues that these rumors were unfounded.
When the existence of the Auschwitz Protocol was made known to the Vatican, Pope Pius XII sent a Cardinal to Bratislava to meet the originator of the report. The Cardinal became convinced that the escapees were telling the truth and reported this to the Pope. The Pope delivered a message to Horthy, informing him about what was going on in Auschwitz, and demanding a stop to the deportations. The same news, through Swiss channels, reached Roosevelt and the Swedish King, Gustav V. Only at this point would the Hungarian Jewish leaders forward the same information to Horthy, using as a contact person, Horthy's son, Miklos Horthy, on June 22, 1944. When Horthy received this information he stopped the deportations on July 7, 1944.
The Jewish leaders of Hungary and Slovakia requested Allied bombings of the railroad lines to Auschwitz or of the crematorium itself. The request was forwarded by Jerusalem and Switzerland. Although by that time the Allies had absolute supremacy in the air over Europe, no area bombing was ever ordered on the requested targets. The excuse that they did not really know the exact location of the death camp cannot be accepted seriously, because they did have very exact aerial photographs of the camp. Meanwhile, in Auschwitz, about 12,000 Jews were killed on a daily basis.
On the Russian side, no official public declarations condemning the termination of the Jews were ever issued. In September 1948 the Soviet Union launched its campaign against Zionism and cosmopolitanism, a euphemism often identified with the Jewish people.
During December 1942 and early in 1943, Marshal Antonescu made it known that he would allow 75,000-80,000 Jews to emigrate to Palestine in return for a payment by the Jews of approximately $1,335.00 per emigrant. The German authorities exposed the deal but the Western Allies were not interested in intervening because England was afraid of the problems created by a sudden influx of that number of Jews into Palestine.
In the summer of 1944 the Sztojay government made an offer to allow about 40,000 people to leave the country peacefully and emigrate to Palestine. This offer, labeled the "Horthy Offer," was offered to the Allies. Both the English and American governments discussed the offer but because the USA was not willing to change its immigration policies and the British opposed the influx of Jewish emigrants into Palestine, no action was taken.
The Germans completed their plan for the socalled "Final Solution" of the Jewish question in Wannsee in January, 1942, under the chairmanship of SS Obergruppenfuhrer Reinhard Heydrich. Those plans were kept secret. The plans concerning Hungarian Jewry did not take effect until the German occupation of March 1944.
Slovakia The Jews of Slovakia were among the first to be subjected to the Final Solution program following the Wannsee Conference. The deportations began in March 1942, and by the end of October close to 58,000 Jews 75% of the Jewish Community were deported. Then the deportation was stopped temporarily. Between March 1944 and July 1944 the situation in Slovakia was better than in Hungary for the Jewish population. As a result of a partisan uprising in Slovakia, new German units moved in and, with the blessing of the Slovak government, subsequently rounded up and deported about 19,000 Jews, some of whom were escapees from Hungary, to Auschwitz.
Romania In Jassy the estimate of Jews killed in the pogroms of June 29-30, 1941, was 4,000 to 8,000.
In Odessa Romanians massacred 60,000 to 80,000 Jews.
185,000 Jews from Romania were deported into the Romanian held portion of the Ukraine. (According to Matatias Carp author of "Cartea Neagra" Bucuresti, 1946, close to 400.000 Rumanian Jews were killed by the "Iron Guard" and the Rumanian authorities and the during the war years. Altough the Rumanian governments vehently denied these allegations ever since, in 1997 the Rumanian head of state Mr. Constantinescu admitted the guilt of the Rumanians and offered apollogies. )
Of all the Jewish leaders Dr. R. Kasztner, from Kolozsvar, Transylvania, formerly a newspaperman, subsequently became one of the leaders of the Zionist Movement in Hungary. He was the only successful person who, with the cooperation of Adolf Eichmann, the leader of the Sondercommando, de facto saved Jewish lives.
Kasztner"s negotiation with Eichmann first allowed 300 Jewish leaders from Kolozsvar to move to Budapest, where they were housed under SS protection. On the second round of negotiations, Eichmann agreed, with the promise of future payments, to deport 30,000 Jews to Austria. They were used as laborers and 75% of them survived the war.
Kasztner, in the third round of negotiations with the SS, and with a cash payment in Swiss francs, managed to save 1,600 Hungarian Jews, including the Kolozsvar group, who were brought to the Bergen-Belsen Camp in two transports but were subsequently permitted to enter Switzerland. The first transfer from Bergen-Belsen included 388, the second 1300.
Horthy named General Geza Lakatos to head the new government on August 29, 1944. Under the Lakatos government no deportations took place, but on September 7, 1944, new recruitment for defense labor took place regarding the remaining Jews in Budapest.
On that day, using Radio Budapest, the Head of the Hungarian State, Horthy, called on the Hungarian Army to drop their resistance to the advancing Red Army and lay down their arms. The public was unprepared and the Army did not follow the orders. Within hours Horthy"s call to the Army was countermanded by the Head of the General Staff, General Janos Voros. The only radio station in Budapest was captured by the Nyilas and within a short period of time the head of the Arrow-Cross Party, Ferenc Szalasi, was propelled into power. During the following days Horthy signed two documents. In one, he retracted his order to the Army and in the second, he transferred power to Ferenc Szalasi. Subsequently, Horthy was taken into protective German custody and brought to Bavaria, where he stayed until the end of the war.
The only people who reacted favorably to Horthy"s announcement were the people living in the Yellow Star houses or those in the Jewish Labor Service. For them it meant the end of the war and the end of their oppression. But the Nyilas response was swift and cruel. The atrocities occurred at Nepszinhaz St. 31 and 4 Teleki Square. Some labor servicemen from Obuda were herded to the Danube and shot into the river from Margit Bridge and the Chain (Lanc) Bridge.
The change of regime brought new German pressure to bring about the "solution of the Jewish question." Eichmann was ordered back to Budapest on October 17. Another German specialist, Theodor Grell, was also dispatched to Budapest. A German memorandum was delivered to the new Minister of State, Gabor Kemeny, in which the Germans offered safe passage for all Jews with passports from neutral countries and the safe emigration of 1,000 Jewish children in return for resumption of the deportation. Eichmann demanded 50,000 Jewish workers for the Reich and proposed a march by foot from Budapest to the German border.
Due to an increased lack of central control, self-appointed Nyilas gangs invaded Yellow-Star houses and the quarters of the Jewish Council. The only member of the Jewish Council in the office at that time was Miksa Domonkos. By pretending to be talking to the authorities on the telephone he was able to convince the Nyilas to withdraw.
In an unsuccessful attempt to control events, the new Minister of the Interior, Gabor Vajna, proclaimed that the solution of the Jewish question was the job of the State and that no individual had the right to judge or act against Jews. The proclamation did not restore order.
A large-scale, unauthorized Nyilas action was the herding of a few thousand Jews, including the Chief Rabbi Hevesi, into the synagogues on Rumbach Sebestyen and Dohany Streets. But quick action by the neutral states resulted in their being set free the same night.
On October 21, in the midst of this chaos, the Papal Nuncio, Angelo Rotta, had a personal audience with Szalasi in which Szalasi stated that the deportations would not resume nor would the elimination of the Jews continue, but that ablebodied Jews would be put to work for the Hungarian State until the end of the war.
In the meantime, the chaos was increased by a declaration from the Minister of the Interior, Vajna, who stated that he would not acknowledge any safe conduct paper or passport from any neutral state. The neutral states, through the new Minister of State, Baron Kemeny, forced the cancellation of that statement.
The author states that on October 15, 1944, there were about 150,000 Jewish men in the labor battalions under the control of the Hungarian Army and about 150,000 to 160,000 Jews, composed of both sexes and all ages, living in Budapest.
On October 20 there began the recruitment of new Jewish labor units. Two days later, on October 22, all men between the ages of 16 and 60 and all women between 18 and 40 years of age were officially called on to register for labor service. Altogether about 25,000 males and 10,000 females were recruited.
The newly formed labor units were ordered to the Pest side of the Danube to dig trenches and build fortifications. On November 3rd a Russian offensive reached the outskirts of Pest and the labor units were ordered to march back to the Buda side. When the Russian offensive stalled they were ordered to work on the Pest side again, only to be withdrawn again as a result of a new Russian offensive. Many of these labor service men and women perished during this period, especially when they were marching across the bridges of the Danube. The guards of these units, composed of Gendarmerie and Nyilas, shot the weak and the stragglers into the Danube River. After the second withdrawal from the Pest side the majority were ordered to the brickyard at Obuda, from where they were marched to the German border to build the so-called East Wall for the defense of Germany.
The march to Hegyeshalom began officially on November 8. The route was through Piliscsaba, Dorog, Sutto, Szony, Gonyu, Dunaszeg and Mosonmagyarovar. The 200-220 kilometer march took 78 days. The marchers were divided into groups of 2,000. The arrangements for the march were the responsibility of the Minister of the Interior. The escorts were a combination of gendarmerie, police, Nyilas and SS. At the resting stations food and shelter were supposed to be prepared but in many instances there were none. Food was very scarce and instead of lodging, the rest was largely under the skies. The condition of the marchers and the treatment by the guards were reprehensible enough that even a German Colonel of the Waffen SS, Juttner, registered his complaints. The delegations of the neutral states and the Red Cross, with the cooperation of the Swedish delegate, Raul Wallenberg, tried to save as many as they could by distributing safe conduct papers at the resting places on the route and even at the border at Hegyeshalom. Based on their activities many were saved and returned to Budapest.
On November 17, Szalasi issued a new document, with copies given to the neutral states, in which he described the following categories:
1. Jews holding foreign protective passes;
2. Jews to be loaned to the German Government. These were socalled "Loan Jews," who were to work abroad for the Hungarian nation under the supervision of a Hungarian Commission, which would include a delegate representing the International Red Cross and interested foreign legations. They would keep track of all Jews transferred to Germany after October 16.
3. Jews awaiting departure from Hungary. They were to be placed into ghettos.
4. Jews holding exemption certificates issued by Hungarian authorities.
5. Clerics.
6. Jews of foreign citizenship.
As a result of the above document about 15,600 Jews with protective papers from the neutral governments were relocated in the socalled International Ghetto, located in the Pozsonyi Road and Szent Istvan Park. Unfortunately, these protected Jews did not have any more security than the unprotected Jews because they were thought to be financially better off than the others and therefore became the targets of many attacks by gangs trying to get their money and possessions.
Because of all these attacks, after the large ghetto was established, many of the people living in the international ghetto were transferred to the walled-in ghetto.
On November 18 the Minister of the Interior notified the Jewish Council about the creation of a ghetto for all Jews compelled to wear the yellow star. The boundaries of the ghetto were: Dohany, Nagyatadi, Szabo Istvan, Kiraly, Csinyi and Rumbach-Sebestyen Streets, Madach Imre Road, Madach Imre Square and Karoly ring-road in District VII.
The non-Jewish population (about 16,000 people) was moved out from the ghetto and the Jews were moved in. When the ghetto was established the population was a little more than 30,000. The population increased, and by January reached 70,000. Following the example of the Warsaw ghetto, a wall was built around the perimeter, with only a few entrances. The population of the ghetto grew with the addition of transfers from the international ghetto, Jews discovered in hiding and rounded up by the Nyilas gang, and Jews who came into the ghetto voluntarily.
The ghetto existed under the jurisdiction of the Jewish Council. A well-functioning organization was created based on 10 precincts divided by block and house leaderships. A ghetto police force was created and food distribution through communal kitchens was established.
The Minister of the Interior, Vajna, estimated that there were about 37,000 falsified documents, safe passage or passports, in the hands of Jews in Budapest. It became a patriotic duty of the Nyilas to locate those Jews in hiding and bring them into the ghetto On December 26 the encircling of Budapest by the Russian forces was accomplished and the siege of Budapest began. The front itself moved into the city. A siege mentality took place with many unreasonable activities which could not be imagined during peaceful times. Frenzied gangs committed many crimes, the worst including attacks on the two Jewish hospitals which were located outside of the ghetto.
Even though the ghetto was walled in, gangs invaded and caused terror. At the request of the Jewish Council, Vajna (no relation to the Minister of the Interior) ordered extra police assigned to the ghetto. As a result of this move further illegal entry was stopped.
Before Pest fell to the Red Army, rumors circulated about the immediate liquidation of the ghetto. One plan almost came to fruition but was successfully prevented by a Nyilas named "Szalai", who was the official Nyilas contact to the police force. He learned that a force of 500 SS men, 200 policemen and 22 Nyilas were assembled to move into the ghetto with machine guns, going from house to house to kill the Jews. Szalai convinced a German General named Schmidthuber, Commander of the SS Feldherrenhall Armored Division, to stop the action. Because of this intervention, after the war, when he was tried as a war criminal, Szalai was set free.
At the end of 1945 there remained 255,500 Jews in the territories which had been controlled by Hungary in 1941, of whom 190,000 lived in the Trianon part of the country including 144,000 in Budapest, still by far the largest Jewish community in postwar Europe. Of Budapest residents, 119,000 Jews had been liberated in the city: 69,000 in the ghetto; 25,000 in the protected houses of the international ghetto; and 25,000 who had been in hiding (most with false Aryan papers). The returnees to Budapest included 5,000 liberated from labor service and 20,000 from concentration camps.
The survival rate in the Jewish labor units was higher than among the deportees. This rate is demonstrated most dramatically in the deportations completed in the countryside. In 1946 in the countryside of Hungary, there were 24,604 male survivors and 22,520 female survivors. In the vital 20 to 60 age group, the number of males (19,619) exceeded that of females (16,685) by 2,934. The exact ratio varied from community to community.
In the war crimes trials of the Nyilas gangs accused of atrocities against the Jews in Budapest, the Nyilas gang, headed by Denes Bokor, was charged with the murder of 1,500 Jews; the gang of Andras Kun, a Mennonite monk, was held responsible for the execution of 500 Jews; and gangs controlled by Janos Traum, Jozsef Monos, Peter Pal Katona and Endre Kovacs, were each accused and convicted of responsibility for the deaths of hundreds of Jews.
During these trials all the leading Hungarian figures of the years between 1941 and 1945 were tried and executed.
The people"s tribunal continued its activities for several years, handling cases of progressively less importance. By March 1, 1948, criminal procedures had been initiated against 39,514 persons, and 31,472 cases had been processed. Of these, 5,954 were dismissed and 9,245 ended with "not guilty" verdicts.
Many of those who tried to save Jewish lives met with a tragic end.
The Swedish diplomat, Raul Wallenberg, who, without any question, saved thousands of lives (after the liberation of Pest) went to congratulate the commanding Soviet Marshal, Malinovsky. Wallenberg never returned and his disappearance remains an unsolved mystery.
Bishop Vilmos Apor, who was the strongest opponent of the inhuman activities against the Jewish population, was killed while defending a group of nuns from being raped by drunken Russian soldiers after the war.
The Jewish hero, Dr. Kastner, was shot to death by a Jewish fanatic in Jerusalem because he "cooperated with the devil."
|
HUNGARY IN THE MIRROR OF THE WESTERN WORLD |