The Jewish quarter of Berlin today, four days after the pogrom, resembles an armed camp. Police armed with machine gunds, hand grenades and rifles are stationed on the street corners and inhabitants of the area may pass the police cordon only after strict investigation. Tanks move about lumberingly, ominously.
Professional thieves were not slow to take advantage of the chaotic conditions produced by the pogrom, and looting of shops, particularly jewelry shops, still continues.
In Charlottenburg, fine residential section which numbers many Jewish residents, was invaded yesterday by a hungry crowd which made
a rush at the restaurants and bakeries, ravenously devouring the food and removing meat and other edibles in handbags for homes that had not seen meat in months.
In the Jewish quarter, ransacked until it looks like a devastated area, hundreds have lost everything. Add to this that many lost not only their possessions but also their means of earning a livelihood, it is impossible to estimate the material damage caused by the systematic rioting.
Harrowing stories of attacks are gradually evolving out of the confusion and chaos of the last few days. There are stories of Jews stripped and pursued through the streets in their undergarments. There are reports even of several who had been flung into the River Spree.
Typical of many other assaults is that made upon Dr. Hugo Bernhardt, a physician and war veteran of four years’ front service, who was severely wounded in battle and who was awarded the Iron Cross as well as First and Second-Class Saxon Knighthood for valor.
“The signal for the attack upon me and several of my friends was a rifle shot. The mob rushed upon us and while we defended ourselves as well as was possible, we sighted an automobile containing a Major and two Schutz-Polezei. They refused our cries for help. A motor lorry carrying a number of Schutz-Polezei, to whom we looked for protection, followed us, rushed us into the infuriated mob, reviled and beat us, finally removing all of us to the barracksin Alexanderstrasse where we were forced to stand in the courtyard with our hands up. It took 200 police to search us, submitting us during the search to unspeakable indignities and maltreatment. In the end my right knuckles were smashed by a rifle blow.”
MOVE TO DEPORT ALL ALIEN JEWS
At the meeting of the Municipality yesterday, Nationalist members introduced an urgent resolution calling on the Prussian central governments to expel all aliens settled since 1914, especially Jews. Internment of the Jews is urged where deportation is impossible.
Herr Crispien, former Socialist Minister, in an editorial in the Vorwaerts declares Berlin had been humiliated by the pogrom. This blot on German history is caused by the Communists and the anti-Jewish press, Herr Crispien charges. The only ones to reap the harvest are the Industrialists and noneare more pleased than Stinnes because the workers were sent to the throats of their Jewish fellow beings.
The first fatality resulting from Monday’s rioting is the death of Herr Zilberberg, the butcher who was severely injured while trying to beat back his assailants.
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.
