Britain and the Jews of Europe, 1939-45 (Oxford paperbacks) Book

This moving book provides the first serious examination of the British government's policy towards the Jews during the Second World War. Drawing on archival sources in Britain, the United States, and Israel, Bernard Wasserstein explores the reasons for the near-total war-time ban on Jewish refugee immigration to Britain, the restrictive immigration policy in Palestine, the internment and deportation of aliens in Britain, and the abortive 1943 Bermuda Conference on refugees. He also examines the reasons behind the failure to aid Jewish resistance in Europe, as well as the rejection of the scheme (supported by Winston Churchill) for the Allied bombing of Auschwitz. Wasserstein's analysis of the official records reveals a lamentable story of bureaucratic complacency, inhumanity, and blindness to the Jewish catastrophe in Europe.Read More