Abstract
Despite a long history of democracy and religious toleration, the Jews of the Netherlands experienced one of the highest victimization rates in Western Europe (67%). Despite higher levels of antisemitism and the notorious collaboration of the Vichy regime, France lost only 25% of its Jewish population to the Holocaust. In this chapter, Hollander explains that the Jews of France did not survive despite Vichy collaboration, but because of it. By helping Nazi Germany in military and economic affairs, Vichy France could negotiate for assurances that foreign Jews would be deported first, and Jews with French citizenship, temporarily spared. After refusing to negotiate with Germany, the Dutch government was powerless to stop the imposition of a very direct form of German hierarchy, one that allowed Germany to implement the Final Solution in that country without limits. Hollander also explains Belgium’s ‘moderate’ victimization rate (53%) compared to the Netherlands and France.
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Hollander, E.J. (2017). Western Europe: The Politics of Judgment. In: Hegemony and the Holocaust. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-39802-0_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-39802-0_3
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