A German court here sent a Jewish DP to prison for nine months and handed down three suspended jail sentences against other Jewish displaced persons accused of having disturbed the peace and participated in a riot in early 1952, when several hundred German police and customs officials, armed with rifles and clubs, accompanied by police dogs and an ambulance, swooped down on the last Jewish DP camp in Germany, Foehrenwald.
After surrounding the camp, the uniformed Germans advanced into its streets. They found the progress of their vehicles blocked by the inhabitants, whose memories of similar raids by Nazi troops on East European ghettos are still vivid. A scuffle ensued, with heads being bloodied on both sides. The policemen, who were overheard uttering anti-Semitic remarks, also fired into the air.
The 1952 episode occurred soon after the Germans took over the camp administration. It had almost been forgotten when the public prosecutor stirred it up again last Fall by indicting six of the Foehrenwald residents involved.
Two of them were acquitted–one as falling under last year’s amnesty and the other on mental grounds–three were given terms of imprisonment of six, seven and eight months, respectively, the sentences being suspended pending good behavior for three years. Gedalya Bines, 29, was refused probation because of a record of previous minor offenses and was committed to a German jail for nine months. All four will appeal.
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.
