Replying editorially to an anti-Semitic speech delivered at Aix-la-Chapelle District Leader Grohe, The Juedische Rundschau, German Zionist organ, writes that “we German Jews have no influence, and apologetics will not help, but the best Germans would not understand us if we did not raise our voice in defense of our honor.” In his speech, made before a gathering of thousands of Fascist youths, Grohe attacked the Jews as being members of an inferior race.
In accordance with its belief that “German Jews must defend their honor against attacks such as Grohe’s,” the Juedische Rundschau lifts its editorial voice to declare that “the Jewish people naturally cannot accept the conception that it is inferior.”
The editorial writer points out that it is of the utmost importance for German Jews to know how Jewry is depicted before a meeting of hundreds of thousands of young people.
DOUBTS HATRED OF YOUTH
“Surely some of these young people take a glance at history and at the life round about them. Many a thinking young man must get in that way quite a different picture of the Jews and their historic achievements, and he will realize also that his Jewish neighbors, though different in kind, are just as good or bad as individuals as any others,” the editorial continues.
According to the Zionist organ, which acknowledges a high conception of the German nation, there are sufficient grounds for believing that the German youth has other ideas and other aims than to fight Jews and Judaism.
“We cannot believe that the German nation and its men of authority take the view that people should feel ashamed of it if they look in a friendly way at a Jew,” the paper adds. “Our conception and the conception of numerous Christians is that it is not a shame to look in a friendly way at even the humblest creature. And if the Reich Government in enacting its ‘Aryan’ legislation left Jews free to practice, as doctors and lawyers, and in particular to engage in trade, it was obviously not its intention to proclaim that everyone who has anything to do with these Jews besmirches German honor.
“On the contrary, it is always emphasized in authoritative quarters that those Jews who quietly get on with their professions enjoy every protection.”
JEWS’ STATUS ‘DELICATE’
Then follows the direct reference to Grohe’s speech, which, the writer states, put “us Jews into a very difficult situation, for we know that we have no influence, and we know that apologetics are useless.”
In concluding the editorial describes the position of Jews in present-day Germany as “specific and delicate.” Explaining this “delicate” position, it points out that Jews are excluded from national life as a distinct racial group and that they live under a separate status.
“For this very reason, however, we believe that we have a claim to have applied to us the fundamentals which are often enunciated by authoritative men, and most lately by Dr. Gross, with regard to the respect that is due to those of foreign race,” the Juedische Rundschau argues.
“We believe that this conception should be applied also to us Jews, since the Jews are the only large alien race-group with which National Socialism has to deal inside the country,” the editorial asserts as a final appeal.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
