Arnost Frischer

"By reconstructing the life of a little known Czechoslovak Jewish activist Arnošt Frischer, the author contributes to our knowledge about Zionist diaspora politics before, during and after the Holocaust. Appointed by the Czechoslovak president-in-exile Edvard Beneš to the State Council in London, Frischer tried to translate Zionist Gegenwartsarbeit into rescue of Czechoslovak Jews. After the liberation, he wished to reconstruct Jewish communities against the background of ethnic homogenization and the impeding Communist take-over. For students and the general public, the book offers a helpful biographical introduction to Czechoslovakian Jewish history over the course of the first half of the twentieth century."