The Central Council of Jews in Germany announced today that it would create a bureau to register and investigate all anti-Semitic developments reported in West Germany.
The recent anti-Semitic wave, the Council said, had not brought about any basic changes in the general situation. The political factors involved in the situation had repeatedly been pointed out by the Council, the Council noted. To overcome these factors, it continued, would require not only additional legislation by an educational program in schools, universities and in the press and on the radio. Both children and adults must be made aware of the facts of Nazi persecution of the Jews, it stressed.
The Minister of the Interior of North Rhine-Westphalia, Dr. W. Dufhues, announced today that he had set up a special police unit to study anti-Jewish excesses. He added that provincial Ministers of the Interior were unanimous in demanding strong measures to suppress anti-Semitic outbursts.
However, Dr. Dufhues denied that the anti-Semitism of the postwar era was in any sense organized. He said some of it was very likely the work of right-wing ultra-nationalist groups, but they were relatively unimportant, Noting that the chief suspect in the recent desecration of the Dusseldorf synagogue was a member of the Communist Party, he said that it was possible “certain forces are trying to discredit the West German Republic abroad by stirring up anti-Semitism here.”
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.
