War in the Middle East
Kindertransport survivor: Difficult situation for Germany
“Germany is in trouble because it doesn’t want to undo the positive things it has achieved,” says Alfred Dubs. photo
© Christoph Meyer/dpa
About 10,000 mostly Jewish children were evacuated from Germany and occupied neighboring countries on the eve of World War II. Today marks the 85th anniversary of the first Kindertransport.
One of the most prominent survivors saved from the Holocaust with a so-called Kindertransport, Alfred (Alf) Dubs, sees Germany is in a difficult situation due to the Gaza war.
Because of its history, Germany cannot take on a diplomatic leadership role in the current situation, said Lord Dubs, who sits for the Labor Party in the British House of Lords, to the German Press Agency on the 85th anniversary of the first Kindertransport on December 2nd.
Coming to terms with the Holocaust in Germany
With the Kindertransport, around 10,000 mostly Jewish children from Germany, Austria, Poland and Czechoslovakia were evacuated to Great Britain on the eve of the Second World War and mostly placed with foster families. Many of them never saw their parents again. The rescue operation was launched after the violent attacks on Jews during the pogroms in November 1938 in Germany. They ended with the beginning of the war.
Dubs praised the efforts to come to terms with the Holocaust in Germany as profound and fundamental. That’s precisely why the current situation is so complicated. “Germany is in trouble because it doesn’t want to undo the positive things it has achieved,” said the 90-year-old. Berlin can neither afford to be perceived as too pro-Palestinian nor too pro-Israel. The responsibility to take a leadership role in mediating between Israelis and Palestinians therefore lies with other nations such as the USA and Great Britain.
Cheering on the train
Dubs came to Great Britain from Prague in 1939 as the son of a Jewish father. The father had already managed to escape to England. Dubs and his mother initially stayed behind. “We had to take a picture of the Czechoslovak president from our textbook and stick a picture of Hitler in it,” Dubs recalled.
Because his mother initially did not receive an exit permit, she put him on a children’s transport when he was six years old. When the train reached the Dutch border – and was therefore out of reach of the Germans – there was cheering among the older children on the train. “The younger ones of us knew it was significant, but we didn’t know why,” Dubs said.