Polish-Jewish Relations: 1,300 Keyword-Phrase-Indexed Book Reviews (by Jan Peczkis)

Roads to Extinction: Essays on the Holocaust, by Philip Friedman. 1980. Jewish Publication Society of America, Philadelphia

Judenrat Autonomy: A Fulfillment of Jewish Separatist Dreams. Ewa Kurek Right

This is a collection of scholarly articles written between 1945 and 1960 by Philip Friedman, a Polish Jew and Holocaust survivor. I focus on a few issues. Historian Ewa Kurek got a lot of flak for telling the truth about Jews collaborating with the new Nazi German conquerors of Poland in exchange for extensive autonomy and quasi-separatism, but she was right. Let us see how.

THE NAZI AUTHORITIES, IN CREATING THE JUDENRAT, TOOK ADVANTAGE OF THE JEWISH DESIRE FOR SELF-IMPOSED APARTHEID

Jewish separatism has a very long history. For example, Jews had striven to obtain de facto separate-nation status, as through the so-called Minorities Treaty that was imposed internationally upon post-WWI resurrected Poland.

Fast forward to WWII. Friedman describes how the Nazis exploited the Jewish drive for effective separate-nation status, “A number of problems pertaining to the Nazi policy on the Judenrat have not yet been properly investigated…I suspect that in everything pertaining to the internal organization of the Judenrat the source of the Nazis’ inspiration was their own JUDENWISSENSCHAFT. They possessed a number of ‘Jewish experts,’ such as Peter-Heinz Seraphim, Wilhelm Grau, Joseph Sommerfeldt, and others, whose knowledge they utilized for their nefarious purposes and to deceive the Jews. We have certain evidence that they were adept in exploiting the idea of Jewish autonomy. Knowing that many Jews venerated the idea of self-government, they used it to hoodwink them. Many Jews, both in the ghettos and in the free countries, welcomed the fact that Jewish communities enjoyed internal autonomy. It was regarded as a great thing! The Jews received at the hands of the Nazis a degree of self-government that they had never before enjoyed. The dream of full autonomy had taken on flesh and sinew–in Theresienstadt and elsewhere.” (p. 541).

One must not let history run backwards and must appreciate the fact that the Germans formed the Judenrat over two years before they began exterminating the Jews. And, in spite of the generally poor living conditions in the German-made ghettos, Jews were grateful to the Germans for the separatism that had been granted. See:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2019/11/04/jewish-collaboration-sought-jewish-autonomy-katzenelson/

THE JUDENRAT WAS THE (INITIALLY PLAUSIBLE) FULFILLMENT OF JEWISH SEPARATIST AMBITIONS

Let us elaborate. Friedman writes, “Within its original jurisdiction, the Judenrat was autonomous. This fact gave rise to optimism in certain circles, both among naïve people inside the ghettos and among far-away observers in neutral or Allied countries, who were not aware of the realities of the situation. The naïve reasoning behind the interpretation was as follows: With the ghettoization and isolation, the Jews were granted powers that they never before had…The only authority within the borders of the ghetto was the Judenrat and its militia, with a Jewish commander and Jewish officers. Never before had the Jews enjoyed so great a measure of self-government. During the Middle Ages they had exercised jurisdiction in civil law, but their authority in capital cases had never been unrestricted. Now, in many of the Nazi ghettos, they exercised full, untrammeled jurisdiction, even in capital cases.” (p. 550).

All this drove Poles and Jews further apart and forced Poles to be less sympathetic to the fate of the Jews. The Poles realized that the Jews had made their own modus vivendi with the German conquerors and rulers of Poland and were not really interested in backing Poland. The Jewish-German closeness also induced the Poles not to take too seriously the later Jewish claims of wanting to fight the Germans, thus making Poles less inclined to fully support the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising or to accept more Jews into Polish guerrilla units. There was also the long history of Jewish Germanophilia that animated these considerations.

The Germans usually granted considerable Jewish autonomy as to which Jews would serve the Germans in the Judenrat. See:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2025/07/16/judenrat-jewish-agency-remarkably-proven-here/

Finally, in some situations, such as the Kovno ghetto, it was the Jews that took the initiative and they, not the Germans, formed the Judenrat and the Jewish ghetto police. See:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2025/03/14/instructive-schindler-self-service-kovno-judenrat-official-jewish-creation/

THE JUDENRAT DECIDED WHICH JEWS WILL LIVE AND WHICH JEWS WILL DIE

The author continues, “The real powers of the Judenrat was actually much greater. By preparing various lists for the Nazis, such as the list of candidates for UBERSIEDLUNG (deportation), the Judenrat had the power to decide who should live and who should die.” (p. 550). Once again, Ewa Kurek is correct, and her critics are wrong.

Friedman examines this issue, “The moral dilemma of whether to sacrifice a part of the population in order to save the more valuable, younger, stronger individuals or to require all to perish together was the ultimate decision. In some of the ghettos, the Judenrat turned to a rabbinical court for advice. In many cities, the discussion centered around the famous ruling of Maimonides, which was interpreted to mean that one should not deliver for destruction even one Jewish soul, not even to save the whole community.” (p. 147).

The author adds that, “In some ghettos this question, known in certain localities as the ‘Maimonides debate’…was hotly disputed.” (p. 553). “The rabbis did not approve Rumkowski’s moral principle of sacrificing some Jews to save others. Rumkowski, in turn, did not protect all rabbis.” (p. 346). “Rabbi Oshri discusses whether one is permitted to save oneself by the death of a fellow human being, and answers in the negative, citing the passage in the Mishneh Torah of Rambam; Rabbi Oshri notes that Maimonides proved his contention with a statement from the Jerusalem Talmud–namely, that it is forbidden to give up one single life in Israel.” (p. 364). For more on this centuries-old Jewish debate, see:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2022/07/20/rabbinic-law-ewa-kurek-correct-jews-decide-which-jews-will-live-and-which-jews-will-die-long-debated-jewish-considerations-daube/

THE JEWISH ZEAL FOR A “MINIATURE JEWISH STATE” BACKFIRED

The Germans offered the bait, and the Jews took it. The author comments, “As is well known, the Germans ostensibly broadened the authority of the Jewish communities, giving them economic, administrative, and judicial self-rule, to make the Jews partners in their own destruction.” (p. 334).

In conclusion, Friedman comments, “Finally, it became clear to all that the ‘miniature Jewish state’ established under the German authorities was a terrible delusion–a malicious caricature of independent rule, designed entirely to serve the Germans.” (p. 257).

THE MALEVOLENCE OF THE JEWISH GHETTO POLICE

There is more than just the Judenrat. With regards to the Vilna [Vilnius] ghetto, Friedman writes, “When a Jew hesitated, [Jacob] Gens, infuriated, would pull out his revolver and kill him. The Jewish police lost all restraint, brutally shooting deportees with guns provided by the Germans. The action ended ‘successfully’: 5,000 Jews were sent to the camps in Estonia.” (p. 377).

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NOT ALL JEWS IN NAZI GERMAN CAPTIVITY WERE PUT TO DEATH

Fast forward to the end of the German-made Holocaust. Consider just two camps. Friedman writes:

“There were never more than 40,000 to 50,000 Jews in Theresienstadt [Terezin] at any time. The place was primarily a ‘transit ghetto,’ and in time became a transit camp from which Jews were sent to Auschwitz and other extermination centers; only some 17,320 Jews remained there at the moment of liberation.” (p. 65).

“Only 5,000 Jewish inmates at Auschwitz survived to the end of the war…” (p. 233).

Obviously, and contrary to the Holocaust unprecedented talking points, the Nazis were not out to kill every single Jew within their grasp.

POLES WERE ALSO TARGETED FOR EXTERMINATION

Philip Friedman briefly departs from the usual Judeocentric approach of Holocaust writings. He puts the Shoah within the broader context of the Nazi revolution and its radical German imperialism. Nazism was not just a radically anti-Semitic movement; it was also a radically anti-Slavic movement. He comments, “The destruction of the Jews in Poland was for the Nazis only the first experiment in a particularly radical solution to obstacles confronting German imperialism, however, Jews were the first obstacle to be removed, and this experiment was very successful. As the fate of Soviet prisoners-of-war and of hundreds of thousands [actually millions] of Russian and Polish civilians murdered by the German authorities shows, the Poles and the Russians, as ethnic elements posing a threat to German expansion in the east, were the next candidates for mass extinction. Setting aside all moral and ethical principles…” (p. 238).