Until today there are many people
- not only in Germany - who can't reduce the terms Jew , home
country, army, bravery and patriotism to a common denominator.
Many Germans (including people living in Bavaria) can't imagine
that today Jews serve as "normal soldiers" in the "Bundeswehr".
But also many Jews can't cope with the fact that Jews have to or
chose to serve in an army the predecessor of which was connected
with the murder of six million innocent Jewish people.
The Jewish-German soldiers had to suffer bitter injustice - they
were even murdered - by their non-jewish comrades. They lost
their rank, decoration, had to suffer incredible humiliations
and harassments, were violated in body and soul in concentration
camps, lost their family members through murder and in the end
lost their own lives. Authorities in the "Third Reich" even went
as far as to remove the graves of the fallen Jewish soldiers (e.g.
in France). Their gravestones with the star of David were
replaced by crosses with the inscription "unknown soldier".
The extremly anti-semitic propaganda was very successful. After
a long period of indoctrination, a large part of the German
population believed (and still believes today) that Jews were
responsible for World War I (and II), that they were war
profiteers who took advantage of this world-wide suffering. They
imagine the Jews as they were shown by nazi-propaganda: cowardly,
underhand, mean... until today - with a large part of the German
population - this view hasn't changed.
At the same time people living in Germany and Bavaria can find
proof in their closest surroundingfor the fact that Jews (as
courageous soldiers) not only risked their lives for this
country, but actually sacrificied themselves. They will find
this proof in Jewish cemeteries , on commemorative plaques in or
outside of cemetery buildings, in synagogues or former
synagogues just as on the existing public war memorials in many
Bavarian cities and villages. The following documentation wants
to contribute to the development of awareness.
The reasons for this documentation are multiple. On the one hand
people in Germany, especially Bavaria, should realise that until
the "Third Reich" (some of them even until their death before or
after 1945) - Jews considered themselves to be patriotic Germans
or Bavarians, and that they fought and died for their country -
just as their non-jewish compatriots. This fact is widely
unknown to a majority of the population and especially young
people should become aware of this.
A large part of the German armed forces - until 1945 and much
longer, some of them even until today - did consider the Jews as
shirkers, cowards and war profiteers, who forced a war upon
Germany out of sheer greed for profit. This idiotic belief still
exists in many minds - as you can see from an anonymous letter
from Hamburg, dated from 26th of september 1995. Soldiers of the
"Bundeswehr" - the democratic army of a reunified Germany -
should, with the aid of this documentation, become aware of the
fact that until 1933 Jewish-German soldiers were their comrades.
Few of the Jewish members of the "Bundeswehr" see themselves as
part of a military tradition that goes back for centuries - a
tradition that represents more than the period between 1933 and
1945, with its terrible events that defiled the German name and
military honour. Maybe units of the "Bundeswehr" could be
responsible for single graves of Jewish soldiers and thus save
them from being difiled.
If people in Bavaria and maybe even Germany (especially young
people) should through the aid of this documentation come to
know more facts about the role of the Jewish-German soldiers,
and thus gain a more objective view of these brave, patriotic
men who were willing to sacrifice their lives, but who were not
honoured by their country for this sacrifice - the aim of this
book would be achieved.
ISRAEL SCHWIERZ
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