Jewish leaders here plan to petition the Swiss government to erect a monument to the Jewish refugees who died when Switzerland closed its gates to those fleeing Nazi Germany during World War II.
Swiss Jews recently circulated the petition within their community, and will present it to the government May 8, the 50th anniversary of the Allied victory over the Nazis.
During the war, Jewish refugees who crossed the German Border into Switzerland were turned back on the orders of Heinrich Rothmund, then Swiss chief of police.
The police chief was following officials orders. At the time, Rothmund spoke out against the refugees, saying their unrestricted entry would lead to the “Judification of Switzerland.”
Citing the Swiss government’s wartime actions, the Jewish community’s petition read, “As a result of that policy, thousands of innocent Jewish people were turned back at the border, to the mercy of the Nazis, which is most cases meant death in the extermination camps.”
The petition also supported a recent initiative by Helmut Hubacher, the eldest member of the Swiss Parliament. On Feb. 1, he appealed to the government to apologize officially for its wartime policy regarding Jewish refugees.
Last year, the Swiss government for the first time opened portions of its wartime archives to researchers.
Israeli researchers, working alongside Swiss officials, found at the time that some 20,000 to 30,000 Jewish refugees were turned away at the Swiss border during the war. Previous official Swiss figures had put the total at 10,621 Jews.
That period in Swiss history has also prompted a government minister to weigh in against his government’s wartime policy.
Foreign Minister Flavio Cotti, speaking before the Commission on Jewish and Christian Relations, recently apologized for the government’s decision to turn back Jewish refugees at the border.
“It is indispensable to remember the way in which Jews were sent back in the dark days” of World War II, he said, adding that “Switzerland does carry responsibility for this barbarous attitude.”
During his speech, Cotti also mentioned the isolated Swiss officials who refused to follow the policy toward Jewish refugees.
He singled out for praise the efforts of Carl Lutz, then Swiss general consul in Budapest, who saved thousands of Hungarian Jews by issuing fictitious passports.
After the war, Swiss authorities reprimanded Lutz for not following government instructions.
Another high-ranking Swiss official, Minister of Defense Kaspar Villiger, is scheduled to give a speech about the Swiss government’s wartime actions in a May 7 speech in the Bern Cathedral, according to a local newspaper report.
The Swiss government is expected to hold a formal debate on its wartime policies in the near future.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
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.
