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Judenfrei

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Judenfrei

The German words judenfrei (lit: "free of Jews") and judenrein (lit: "clean of Jews") are Nazi terms to designate an area that was "cleansed" of Jews during The Holocaust.

Contents

While judenfrei referred merely to "freeing" an area of all of its Jewish inhabitants, the term judenrein (literally "clean of Jews") was also used. This had the stronger connotation that any trace of Jewish blood had been removed as an impurity.

Locations declared judenfrei

Establishments, villages, cities, and regions were declared judenfrei or judenrein after they were cleansed of Jews.

  • Gelnhausen, Germany – reported judenfrei on November 1, 1938, by propaganda newspaper Kinzigwacht after its synagogue was closed and remaining local Jews forced to leave the town.
  • German-occupied Bydgoszcz (Poland) – reported judenfrei in December 1939.
  • German-annexed Alsace - reported judenrein by Robert Heinrich Wagner in July 1940.
  • Banat, German-occupied territory of Serbia - reported judenfrei on 19 August 1941 in Völkische Beobachter. On 20 August 1941 Banat was declared judenfrei by its German administrators.
  • German-occupied Luxembourg – reported judenfrei by the press on October 17, 1941.
  • German-occupied Estonia – December 1941. Reported as judenfrei at the Wannsee Conference on January 20, 1942.
  • German-occupied territory of Serbia – May 1942, reported in the SS-Standartenführer Emanuel Schäfer cable sent to the Reich Main Security Office in Berlin; Schäfer was the Der Bafehlshaber der SIPO und des SD head that time in Belgrade.
  • Vienna – reported judenfrei by Alois Brunner on October 9, 1942.
  • Berlin, Germany – May 19, 1943.
  • Erlangen, Germany was declared judenfrei in 1944.

    • Usage in Israeli–Palestinian conflict

    In the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a fear among many Israelis which has been reflected by Israeli government officials such as Benjamin Netanyahu is that the proposed removal of Israeli Jewish settlements in the West Bank according to the wishes of Palestinian officials is tantamount to rendering these areas Judenrein, or clean of Jews.

    On July 9, 2009, Benjamin Netanyahu, in a discussion with the German foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier is reported to have said, using the Israeli terms of the area, "Judea and Samaria cannot be judenrein."

    In 1952 Pesach Lev, first mayor of Lod after it was resettled by Israelis, said that Lod was transformed from 'a neglected Arab town that was judenrein to a "Hebraic city."'

    References

    Judenfrei Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA