גרהרד מוריץ ריגנר

Name of Interviewee: Gerhardt Moritz Reigner

Name of Interviewer: Ronit Wilder

Cassette Number: VT-2113

Date: December 25, 1998

Name of Typist: Cheryl Balshayi

Names:

Berlin

Geneva

Paris

Q: 25th of December, 1998. This is an interview with Mr. Gerhardt Riegner. You were born in 1911, Berlin, Germany. Can you tell me something about your background, your family?

A: I belonged to a nice religious Jewish family in Germany. Both my parents were already born in Berlin. My grandparents were born and lived in Magdeburg New, in Brandenburg, in Haver…(?) and in Namslau (sp?).

Q: What was the last name you said?

A: Namslau. It's in Silesia, in Lower Silesia. This is my grandfather from my father's side. He came in the, I would say, '60s or so to Berlin and had a big enterprise in flour, together with a certain Mr. Poise, who was the father of Hugo Poise, the author of the Weimar constitution. My other grandfather came from Magdeburg and was a businessman. Not a very big businessman, but a really fine man, with a great sense of justice. And the parents of my father were dead when I was born, so my family life was more around my mother's family. The head was Max Arnheim, my grandfather, and his wife, Juliana. My father was a lawyer, but he was a particularly cultivated Berlin Jew whose aim was universal education, (German). He was very at home in philosophy and history and literature. He studied law because his father didn't allow him to study art history, which was his real…he was a great artist. They wrote even books about it. When Hitler came to power and then this very universal upheaval (?). This helped me very much in my own development. My father was associated as a lawyer with a member of the Reichstag, with the German parliament, a Socialist, who was a very well-known defense lawyer. My mother was a teacher by profession. She was involved in the women's movement. She became active in politics. She became even a member of the executive of the Democratic Party, with all kinds of trips, elections and so on. So I had the direct input of politics in my youth, but I had, at the same time, a great input of Jewishness in my life.

Q: Were you a religious family?

A: The brother of my great-grandfather was Louis Livandosky (sp?), the composer, the creator of the modern synagogue music. And his son-in-law was the famous philosopher, Herman Cohen. The Cohens had no children. Cohen was the creator of the Bauberger Schuler, philosophical school of neo-cantism. My father was a neo-cant himself. It was his preferred nephew. With him he could discuss. I knew Cohen as a child. I was six or seven years when he died. Every Sunday we ate with my grandparents and for coffee or tea we went to the Cohens who lived around the corner, and this was my great experience of the famous man, who was one of the great personalities of German Jewry at that period. After he left Marburg, he was teaching at the Hochschuler (?), the high school for the science of Judaism in Berlin, and his lectures were later brought together in a very famous book, (?), "Religion of Reasons", which was one of the last classics of German-Jewish philosophy before the Hitler period. So you see, the one political line and the other is the Jewish line, which somehow I inherited both.

Q: Tell me, didn't your father object to your mother's activities?

A: No. No, no, not at all. They were a very fine couple and they practically very rarely (?).

Q: They sound very (?).

A: He was more a contemplative person, my mother was more an active person, so I inherited also both. I am good in analyzing things and theoretical problems, but I always felt in my life, and this explains my activities, that the more you conclude, you know what to do when you analyze a situation.

Q: But it sounds like you lived in a very liberal home.

A: Yes, yes. Very liberal. The younger generation – there were three children – we made the home rather more Jewish than it was. Don't forget, we lived in a terrible period, with aggressive anti-Semitism and a number of anti-Semitic parties. The Nazis were not the only ones. There were three or four. I was following this very much. I read two or three Jewish newspaper apart from the German newspapers, and I was very much informed about these things. My own experience in school – that taught me also, the first anti-Semitic attacks – on my second day going to school somebody called me a “dirty Jew”.

Q: You went to a public school?

A: I went to a public school. This was the first encounter with anti-Semitism. In school I encountered social anti-Semitism. There was one of my classmates who was also the son of a lawyer and we felt a certain solidarity. He came often to my house, I was never invited to their house. It was a real tragedy and I gave them excuses and it took three years until I understood there was a barrier which I could never break. Now, I was a good pupil in school. I finished school in 1929 and then decided to study law.

Q: Before that. You felt anti-Semitism only from the side of the pupils, the students or also the teachers?

A: This was my personal experience, but I followed, of course, the general development. I was quite, what should I say, a lively young fellow. I remember the day when Waternau, the foreign minister of Germany, the Jewish foreign minister, was assassinated, which was a terrible thing for all of us. I was a very young fellow, but I understood. I remember when the first president of the German Republic, the social democrat, Ebert, died, and I went, as a young boy, to the big manifestation in Berlin in his honour to give homage to him. And I followed the elections afterwards, when Hindenburg was elected president of the Reich. And I remember vividly one of the “bet” (?) newspapers, illustrated newspapers, where the republican candidate was on the one side of the covering paper and the marshall on the other side – one small, very simple, black report and the other in the uniform of a field marshall, with the helmet and so on. It showed the two Germanys really. And when he was elected, I felt, already as a young fellow, this may be the end of the German Republic. So I followed politics very much. At home there were very many discussions and we went to all kinds of events which were active in politics.

Q: I understand that you had also non-Jewish friends.

A: We had also non-Jewish friends, but of course the great majority of our friends were Jewish. We lived in a “golden ghetto”, if you want to say, but this was not exclusive. My father, who had a very great social…

Q: Awareness.

A: Yes. Understanding, and was very critical of the behaviour of some of the lawyers who only ran after money and so on – was writing some articles about criticizing his own profession and was then elected with the highest vote by the lawyers in Berlin to the (?), the board of the…

Q: The Chamber of Lawyers.

A: The Chamber of Lawyers, which was the – how else should I say it? – the institution which looked for discipline in the lawyers’ behaviour. And the fact that he was a very modest man and got the largest vote was really remarkable, a great recognition of his integrity and his social beliefs. Now, I studied in three cities. One term, my first term, in (?), where I also tried to follow some lectures of Heideger, who was then already the great philosopher of Freiburg. He became anti-Hitler, the first rector (?). And the next term I spent in Berlin, and the third term I spent in Heidelberg. This was for me perhaps the greatest experience, intellectual experience.

Q: What did you study?

A: I studied law, but I went for all kinds of other lectures because this was really one of the greatest cultural centres in Germany. The spirit of Max Weber, the great theologist (?), was still alive in Heidelberg. His brother was still teaching sociology. Amongst the lawyers, was the Gustav…, socialist, the former minister of justice. Very decent fellow. The commentator of the Weimar (?), Gerhard Anschultz, and so on. And for me, there were not only lawyers. I followed the courses of Galiaspo (sp?), the philosopher, of Tiberius (sp?), who was a theologian, of Gundolf, who was in Roman literature. It was, for me, one of the greatest intellectual experiences in my life. And then, as I was reminded recently, I belonged in my first and second terms to the association of democratic students and I was there in Berlin – which I had completely forgotten. I was reminded by some people who made some research about democratic youth – that I was a secretary of the democratic students in Berlin for the whole year. But what was more important, I took part in the student elections, which existed in (?) Freiburg and Heidelberg. I took an active part and in Prussia, these student elections were already prohibited because the Nazis got everywhere overwhelming majorities. But in the land of Baden, this was not yet the case, and I took part on the republican side, on the democratic side, in these elections and this was for me a very important experience. I saw the Nazis, how they behaved – the brutality, the fanaticism, the absolute belief in the racial concept of the party, their brutality in fighting, and so on and so on. For me, this was really was of the first experiences of Nazism. 1929, 1930. I remember also that when I was studying in Berlin, one day, before Hitler came to power, all the group of Nazi (?), SS came to the university and tried to expel all the Jewish students and the Jewish professors. And they had to jump out of the window in order not to be completely beaten up. So it was very clear in my mind, when Hitler came to power, with whom we had to deal.

Q: Before we reach the time of Hitler, can you say that your family was like many other German Jews, that they were first German and then Jews?

A: They were certainly completely integrated. As I said before, we youngsters, my sister and myself, brought much more Jewishness into the family. We went through the High Holidays, we went through, we observed the Seder and so on. But we were certainly integrated into the German culture. As I said, my mother was even following political game, became a member of the executive Democratic party. This was one of the great parties. My father was not active in politics, but he went to the Democratic club and met there many people, discussed with them, and so on. So we were certainly integrated completely in the German scene. And it was during these years, when you meet the majority of the country, and they are telling you all the time that you don’t belong, that you take some distance. And for me these were the years in which I came not only in much closer to Zionists, which were a very small group. It was not even two (?) percent. And I had a number of friends in the Zionist students’ club. I didn’t join the club, but I traveled with them and I made several excursions, ten days, with them, and became very friendly with a whole group of them. And I, of course, became always more distant from German, belonging to the German people.

Q: Can you tell about your family that it was an assimilated family or just non-religious?

A: No, no. I would say it was…I belonged to a generation which could be considered assimilated. Assimilation had taken place already in the generations before. And we made it again more Jewish. That doesn't mean that we immediately became Zionists, but as I said, this was a process of a number of years in which I separated more and more and became more and more Jewish consciousness, so then Hitler came to power, I was quite sure that this was the end of German Jewry. As a matter of fact…

Q: Why is that? Why were you sure of that?

A: As a matter of fact, the last day which I spent in Germany, there was a celebration of a fiftieth birthday of one of our friends and the whole evening I saw perhaps fifty or sixty of our friends, and that was the last time that I saw them. And I remember that I went – I was twenty-one years – that I went from one older friend to the other and argued with them, "Don't you see that this is the end of German Jewry? Let at least your children go out." Of course I didn't foresee that Hitler would assassinate all the Jews. This was outside of our imagination. But that you couldn't have dignified life as a Jew in this new Germany, this I saw immediately. I saw it very clearly and, as I said, I tried to convince the others to understand it.

Q: And your immediate surrounding, your parents, your uncles, your best friends – did they understand it?

A: Well…

Q: Immediately?

A: They had also illusions. When I left we thought the younger generation should go first and create an existence for them and then let the older people come after. And this was a great illusion too, because what we didn't know was the terrible situation, economic situation in which the whole of Europe found itself. The economic crisis after 1929, the Great Crash in New York, it was terrible, and we were all under the illusion you could work in another country, you could get a job. This was all practically impossible. So we also had a wrong concept of it.

Q: In Germany you didn't have economic problems at that time, your family?

A: We had immediately a problem when Hitler came to power.

Q: But before that?

A: Of course there were periods where life was very difficult, during the war years of the First World…or the inflation period in 1922-23. We had big problems. My father was not very practical in pushing for money and so on. He got usually his fees several months after he had dealt with the legal problem, and several months after it was (?). There were times in which he got money in the morning and in the afternoon it was one-tenth or so. So there were times of course where we had considerable problems. In the worst period my parents were very inventive. As the income of my father was practically melting away and he was a great connoisseur of art, he established with my mother an art salon. And for several years my mother organized the (?) and my father was the artistic mentor. This had very agreeable consequences. We had always wonderful paintings in our house. We had relations with great artists and visited them or they came to us. The Jewish painter, Lesser Uri, for instance, I remember. He was a Jewish painter of quite good (?)

Q: What was his name?

A: Uri. He was very known. His paintings are again in good…they appreciated. I remember even several times on Saturday afternoons we visited his apartment where he had his…

Q: Studio.

A: Studio. And he wanted to paint me as one of his biblical paintings, but he wanted me to be knickered (?)….(not clear) But this whole experience of the art salon was a very fine experience and we learned an enormous amount…to appreciate art, to know artists, to compare them. So you asked me about economic problems. There were from time to time, but when Hitler came to power there was immediately a terrible situation. He came to power on the 30th of January. I had finished my studies. I was a very, in the practical…(?). I was assistant to a judge at the tribunal in Berlin, the (?) Berlin, and I was (?) sentences, I was interrogating witnesses and so on. And on the 1st of April I was suspended – the famous boycott day. (?) I was suspended, my father was suspended as a lawyer, my older sister was suspended as a teacher in a lysée in Frankfurt-am-Main where she lived, and my younger sister, who was ten years younger than I, was thrown out of the school, the basic school. So five people on one day, the situation of four people was completely changed and finished practically. So in such a situation it's not so surprising that I understood that there was no future.

Q: That was in January '33?

A: That was the 1st of April.

Q: Ah, the boycott of April.

A: The famous boycott. You know, when they threw every Jewish business, they threw every medical cabinet, every lawyer, the architects, everything. And apart from this there were terrible manifestations. The ladies who had some relations with Jews or vice versa were (?) the streets and then cut their hair and put big placards on them, denouncing them as a traitor to the race and so on and so on. This was all terrible. After all, we saw what was happening, the manifestations and the day when they took power on the 30th of January, the manifestation of the 1st of April, and so on. When I left Germany I knew that they were responsible for the burning of the Reichstag. I knew the places where they tortured political adversaries, mainly communists, socialists, but already Jews. I knew that there existed the first concentrations camps in Oranienburg and in Sachsenhausen. This was all known and it was in the foreign press. The foreign press, when you read it today, you are astonished how good the reporting was. So I wasn't so very proud that I understood more than others. I understood because the things were really imposing on yourself. You saw it.

Q: But you know, many, many of the German Jews saw the same things that you saw, but they believed that it is temporary and it would pass in no time.

A: Yes, not only German Jews. One of my last conversations in Germany was with one of the most important professors, law professors in the Berlin University. When he heard through a cousin that I am leaving Germany, he asked to see me, that I should come and see him. He was a right-wing nationalist. He was very different from all what I was believing in. He asked me to come and see him and for three hours he tried to dissuade me to leave. (German) "You know I am a German, but we have to be content with the quality of these people." This man, he was convinced that this was an episode which would go by. I was more clever than he. I wasn't embraced by this. In spite of him…and by the way, he was the only German who ever wrote me a letter when I had left Germany. You know, this is one of the chapters that is unbelievable – the lack of courage. When I have left Germany I never got a letter from my comrades in school, from my comrades in university, several organizations to which I belonged. The only one was this fellow, this professor. Why did he? Because as a young fellow, in the second term, I was in his seminar and this seminar was mostly for post-graduates. Why he let me in, I don't know, but he let me in. And I made a communication and the communication was on the development of the notion of the "Nextstadt", the state built on law. In this communication I had found one of the philosophers of the 18th century, before Kant, who he used the term of which I heard probably for the first time. In any case, this was the oldest piece of literature which I found and this was unknown and new and he was very interested in this and he wanted to publish. A Jew couldn't publish any more in Germany, so he wrote me he made enquiries. We could publish it in Austria. It was before '38. Then the answers came and it didn't go anywhere either. But I have never forgotten that this was really the only decent human being who enquired what had become, where I was, and so on. The great majority of the German intelligentsia was afraid, was cowardly and, as I said, nobody ever even asked whether I had become.

Q: Tell me, when you were a student in the university, when you got acquainted with German students, was it so clear from the beginning that you are a Jew? You don't have a Jewish name, I suppose you didn't have a very distinct Jewish appearance. Was it written on your forehead that you are a Jew?

A: Listen, I have also a character. It was not a question for me that I would hide my Jewishness.

Q: Not to hide, but was it so obvious that that was the first thing to mention?

A: When you have a situation and the great majority of students are Jew-haters and you show it every day. That as clear. No, every day I distanced myself more from the German people, which was a normal process because I am still today very fond of many things which I learned in Germany. I am still a member of the "Goethegesund", I am still a member of the "Heinegesund". Heine was Jewish, of course. But my whole constitution is composed of many elements which came from the German culture which I learned. But I took distance from the people.

Q: But before that process, that you took distance of the German people, do you remember a time that you tried to be part of them, to be involved and not separated?

A: When I was a democratic student, of course I didn't pronounce I am a German, but I took part in the game, fighting them. And the basis was, of course, that I was German. There was no doubt. In this period that I became more and more near the Zionist idea, but as I said, they played a very great role when Hitler came to power. I remember one of the newspapers, Zionist newspapers (?). There was this great line (German). "Carry with pride the yellow mark." I remember that Martin Buber played a wonderful role at that time. He became active, responsible for the problems of education and he dealt with the youth and gave them sentiment of pride and helped them to overcome this terrible experience of an outlaw. Built up new Jewish community. I knew Buber in a number of ways later, when he was in exile and he used to make certain political matters. But I must say, I will never forget, that the role which he played and which included me, to give us hope, pride and self-consciousness. This was very important.

Q: When you became, as you said, friendly with the Jewish Zionist groups, did it occur to you at that time that maybe Palestine is the solution, or you didn't reach so far?

A: We discussed it, of course, from morning till evening. You can imagine in such a situation. One of my very good friends stopped already in 1930 his law studies and became a student of agronomy, with the idea to go to Palestine. And he played a good role here (?) sixty, seventy years ago, which made a great impact on me. But you know that Palestine was very different from what is today. You had practically to become, to go to a kibbutz, and this was something which didn't fit with me. I was the one hand a much too indivualistic… (?) very individualistic people. Perhaps even the most individualistic people in the world. I couldn't believe that I would be a good member of a collective group. But on the other hand, it didn't attract me at all to work on the soil. And this what only medical students could come here because you needed doctors. But otherwise, for intellectuals there was nothing.

Q: But what I wanted to ask is if you saw Palestine as a solution for the Jews. Maybe not for you, but for the Jews. Or did you think that it was only a German problem, what was going on with the Jews, and maybe in France and Switzerland, in England, it would be something else?

A: No, no. As I told you, I was quite knowledgeable about the Jewish situation. I knew it was terrible it was in Poland and in some other countries. No, I saw it as one possible solution, but at that time it wasn't attracting me personally. To go into a kibbutz, collective life, and work – this was nothing. And I had two friends who tried and who both didn't succeed, left the country. The economic practices in the country were also not so very correct and so very nice. They were disgusted with some of their experiences. Not saying that this was always, but they tried seriously and didn't succeed. And I didn't try and decided to go to France to continue my law studies. I was a very good lawyer. There is no doubt. I was deeply appreciated by some of the professors and I had one of the best instructions you could have.

Q: Why did you study law first? Why did you begin to study law?

A: Probably I saw a good deal of my father's practice and it probably came from that, that I was attracted. But I was attracted much more to the theoretical problems. What I really wanted to become was a professor of jurisprudence, philosophy of law. This I pursued until I joined the (?). I went to Paris.

Q: Why to Paris?

A: Well, after I had finished my school and made my baccalaureate, I had two months I had nothing. And I went to Nijon and followed not only the courses for foreign students, but I became also involved in French culture and so on. With my first visit to Paris, I will never forget how exciting it was, so I was very attracted by the French culture at the time and I spoke already quite nicely French. In school I went to one of these reform gymnasiums where you start modern languages before you go to Greek and Latin. So it came in the course of my education and development. And I decided to redo my law.

Q: You went alone, without your family at that time?

A: No, no. I went alone. As I said before, the idea was you should go out, the younger generation, and establish an existence and then let the older come after. Unfortunately, that didn't work. The French experience was very attractive. We didn't have to go to the courses. We could present ourselves to all the examinations for second degrees which we had from Germany, and I did it. In the summer of '34 the French parliament passed a law that was really a scandal. The lawyers were so afraid of the few German Jewish lawyers that they took the initiative to pass a law which forbade to forward us the exercise of the legal professions until ten years after naturalization. To become a naturalized Frenchman took from five to seven years, and ten years after that – seventeen years you wouldn't be accepted, which meant that this was a dead end and I left after having finished the examinations. I didn't leave before I had it because, after all, I had worked for it for a year and a half. And at that time there was a visitor in Paris – one of the men whom I deeply admired, one of the greatest legal minds of our century – Hans Kelsen (sp?). He was the author of the Austrian constitution, 1919-20.

Q: You said his name was Kelsen?

A: Kelsen. He suffered already in Austria. He was professor since 1911 there and he left Austria in 1929 when Adenauer created in Cologne a university an hour from Bonn. As it was an hour from Bonn, he had to attract really great people, so he made it a point to invite very famous people. And one of them was Kelsen, who left because of the anti-Semitic atmosphere at the Vienna University, which was unbearable, and he was one of the major targets. And he was in Cologne from 1929 to '33, and in the first list of denaturalized Jews in Germany was his name. He came to Paris just at the moment when this law was passed, and the second of his lectures I took my courage into my hands and approached him. I had had, as a very young student, the "chutzpah" to write him some letters, to which he replied, and he immediately remembered this correspondence. And when I asked him what I should do, he said, "Come to Geneva." Every great man wants to have students around him and I said to him, "That's easily said, but you know, I have no background." At the time I had an uncle in Holland who helped me a little bit, and then I got, in France, the first fellowship from the "Entraide Francaise".

Q: In what?

A: "Entraide". I'll give you (?) to help students. (not clear) And they gave out fellowships. And I got a fellowship which helped me with half of what I needed and the other half I got from my uncle, so I was already very happy that I could go without full support. And then Kelsen said, "Can you last for five months?" I said, "This I will able to do." "So you have a very good institute, so you will not do jurisprudence. You will do the (?). The problems are almost the same. If you can last for five months, you are a young student, very gifted student. After four or five months you will get your fellowship. This will take care of a year."

Q: What do you mean, a "fellowship"? It means a scholarship?

A: Yes. They called it a fellowship. "That will take you a year and after a year it can be prolonged. So for the next two years you haven't to worry." And this was what happened. I went to Geneva where Kelsen taught and I worked there and I got these fellowships, scholarships. It was a very exciting period because of the political scenery - the League of Nations, the Ethiopian-Italian conflict. I saw the (?) period before the League of Nations. And this was in the beginning of '35 and '36, after a year, I was a (?) for Nachum Goldman. Nachum Goldman and (?) had decided to establish the World Jewish Congress. It was much too late. It was an act to respond to the Nazis, to the threat to Jewish existence which the Nazis had started.

Q: When you came to Geneva, till you met Nachum Goldman, you had no contact with the Jewish Congress or Jewish organizations?

A: I didn't see him at that time. I saw him…

Q: Not him. The Jewish organizations in general. You weren't involved till then.

A: He gave one or two lectures in the Zionist organization or some others which I heard and which impressed me, but I was still following another life. I wanted to become a professor of jurisprudence. (end of side)

In the months before, let's say, in the spring of '36, Weiss and Goldman decided to establish the Congress as a permanent organization and the program was very clear - on the one hand, to fight Hitler, and on the other hand, to help support the large Jewish communities in Central and Eastern Europe which lived under the system of the minority treatise. The minority treatise which had been established in Versailles…(not clear) were under the guarantee of the legal (?). And there was a whole procedure in the League of Nations when these treaties were violated. So they needed, apart from fighting Hitler, some specialist in international law who could write briefs and memoranda to the League of Nations and so on. And so they went to three professors in Geneva whether they could recommend a young international lawyer who was interested in Jewish affairs, and all three recommended me. I didn't even know that they were asked. This was Rapprld (sp?), Kelsen and Guggenheim. Rapprld was a member of the Bernards Commission. He was a friend of Ilsen (?). He was responsible for Geneva being selected as the seat of the League of Nations. He was a great friend of the Jews. He was the first director of the mandate division of the League of Nations and later a member of the mandates commission which supervised the exercise of the mandate (?) and took a very strong part on our side when the famous British White Book came out. He was non-Jewish, of course. Was a Protestant. And the others were Kelsen and Guggenheim. Guggenheim was a younger professor who taught also there, a pupil of Max Huber, and he was associate professor in the Institute of Legal Status, International Studies. So all three recommended me. As I told you, I wasn't even looking for a job. I had still fellowships, scholarships for the law, fifteen or eighteen months, so for a refugee to know where to sleep for eighteen months was a situation of paradise. And Goldman couldn't offer me anything because the organization wasn't created, but he wanted to know how I work and he asked me to write a memorandum for him and gave me a file. And then he asked me where I would be in the summer, they may need me. So I went on vacation and vacation was usually in Holland where my parents, who were still in Germany, came on the invitation of my uncle, and that was the only time in the year when we met for two weeks. And I went…(not clear), and then came a cable from Goldman, "Come back immediately. We need you." And when I came back they gave me a whole file on the German refugees and said, "Our Congress will open on Sunday." This was the Sunday before…They need two or three memorandums for the participants. "We want you to write." So I wrote them. And then the Congress opened and it was a very impressive opening, with Weiss and Goldman. It was one of Goldman's great speeches of his life, and was very pessimistic. He said, "For the last century we were fighting for equality. Now it is not a fight for equality. It is a fight for life, a fight for being or not being." So there were about three hundred people. It was not a majority of the Jewish people. It was an active minority who thought that we had to resist and we had to do it. It was ten years too later probably, but nevertheless. And also, as I told you, I had still eighteen-month fellowships. I felt that I couldn't resist this. I couldn't refuse to help these people. And I decided to give them a few years of my life. I thought of three, four, five years and then I would go on with my other hopes. But you see what happened. I never left it and I am today, after sixty-two years, still with them, although the organization is a little bit different from what it was. In any case, I was appointed the legal secretary, dealing with the letters of the…with the legal matters of the discrimination in various countries and represented the Congress before the section of the League of Nations. But you couldn't, of course, in a small office separated the legal things from the other things and I was, from the beginning, involved also in the other part of the activities, which means the fighting against Hitler.

Q: At that time did your family stay in Germany?

A: Still in Germany.

Q: And you had connections with them?

A: Yes. And I tried for the first two years that my name should be kept out of any publications and so on because I had still family there. But as I said, I joined the organization because I considered that fighting against Hitler was the first duty of the Jewish people and that we had to do it with all possible forces. As I said, it was probably much too late that we organized, created the organization. We were at the time a minority of the Jewish people. The great Jewish organizations in the Western countries followed the policy of their governments and the policy of their governments was appeasement - appeasement of Hitler, making concessions, not provoking him. This was a completely wrong policy and the people who met in Geneva for the first assembly, the founding assembly decided to make Hitler's and Germany's life as difficult as possible. We were involved in the boycott movement against Germany at that time, which as all the boycott movements, was not successful, but which damaged after all a good deal the German economy. But the great problem was the attitude of the British and French governments who tried to accommodate Hitler and not to resist him. So the first time the League of Nations had discussed the Jewish problem was in 1933, before I was there. We had difficulties to raise the question because Germany was one country which had not been party to the minority treaties. They were in 1919 limited to the central and eastern European countries. There was a debate and we tried also to arrange debates in the international labour conferences and similar institutions. The Jewish problem came up at the League of Nations, and this was before me, notably on the occasion of the so-called Bernheim Petition. Bernheim was a Jewish citizen of Upper Silesia. When in 1920 the League of Nations ordered a popular vote on Upper Silesia, whether it should belong to Germany or to Poland, the Upper Silesian territory was divided and part of the territory became Polish territory. One very intelligent international lawyer raised the question and said we should defend the rights of the Jews in this territory because Poland and Germany had concluded an international convention in 1922 in which they each conceded to the other side full rights on a non-discriminatory basis. And the preparatory committee of the World Jewish Congress and the old committee on Jewish delegations, which survived still from the time of Versailles, submitted a petition to the League of Nations on the basis of this law and we won the case, to the great astonishment of everybody. It was the Bernheim Petition of a citizen who was originally a leader of this region and the result was that in the district which belonged to the territory to which this convention referred, in this district the whole anti-Jewish legislation by Hitler and his government was not applicable until the international convention expired in 1937. So during four years the Jews who were excluded from all kind of functions continued to be functionaries, continued to be lawyers, continued to be doctors, could take out money and so on and so on. The whole Nazi legislation against the Jews was not applicable in this little district and several thousand Jews saved their lives and could survive (?). There was another instance before me in which the Congress group played an important role. That was the territory of the Czar (?), which was where also an international vote was taken on the international control, whether the Czar should be belong to Germany or to France. It was foreseeable that the vote would go in favour of Germany and then the Congress people had negotiated with Mussolini, who had not made alliance with Hitler, to obtain that one year from the vote, every citizen could leave the country with his property. And this saved several thousand Jews from the Nazi persecution.

Q: Tell me, Dr. Rigner, did you believe at that time that the front really should be the legislated front, that you could fight Hitler through the subject of law? That it would help somehow?

A: No. I don't think we thought this, but we used every opportunity where a legal situation existed which could be used to our advantage, we did this. I think my conviction was that there had to be political resistance by the Western powers and not appeasement. This especially became apparent in 1936 when the Germans reoccupied…to go in west of the Rhineland, which was demilitarized according to the Treaty of Versailles. And the fact that they did this without any resistance was a major political mistake. Of course, we raised other problems in the League of Nations which were to annoy the Germans, particularly the problem of the Jews of Danzig. We considered that as the territory of the city of Danzig was separated from the German state, that established it as an international independent entity, under the guarantee of the League of Nations, this was a territory which was really under international control and we should defend it against the aggression, let's say, of the Germans and fight against anti-Semitic legislation, which we succeeded for a number of years. And we raised again and again the question before the League of Nations, comparing the legislation in Germany and the legislation in Danzig, using this opportunity to attack the German legislation and to bring it to the public opinion jury (?). We succeeded in postponing the final introduction of the anti-Jewish legislation in Danzig by several years, but finally, you know, Danzig was the first object of the Germans in the war which started in '39.

Q: At that time did you have belief in the influence and the power of the League of Nations?

A: Well, we had one great experience and that was the introduction by the Romanian government of Goga (sp?) and Kuza (sp?) in 1938, of all the anti-Jewish laws possible, after the example of the Germans. And this was for us, for me it was my – what should I call it? – my (?), my first great political action in which I participated and which I conceived. And we submitted a great petition against this, protesting (?), and we were in this supported by the British and the French. Both countries had great economic interested in this country and did not want a fascist regime to take the power and to confiscate their economic assets and therefore the French and the English supported us. It was a very important action and we won it. We finally, I think it was in February in 1938, the government, the anti-Semitic government of Romania was forced to resign and the chief of government, in resigning, said, (German), "Jude, you have vanquished." In an anti-Semitic form he admitted that their enemy was the Jews. This was a very important success, but came several weeks after Hitler marched into Austria and the whole world didn't do anything about it and the whole success which we had in overthrowing an anti-Semitic government in Romania was lost. I have nevertheless in my memoirs described very detailed how we conducted this action and really in order to show that even in this situation, it was still possible to have certain political successes, if you found the right allies with whom you could do it. Alone you couldn’t do it. But in politics, this is one of the arts, to find parallel interests and allies who have these parallel interests with whom together you can fight your enemy and then you can succeed.

Q: Did you have at that time, besides the legal side of what happened, did you have knowledge about daily life, daily difficulties that Jews had at that time in Germany?

A: Well, of course we heard. We had very good reports all the time from Germany, but we had to concentrate on the fields where we could have successes. Now then, as I said, the Austrian Anschluss came and then came the Czechoslovakian crisis in ’38 and in all this we could do very little. And it was, of course, Munchen was the symbol of the appeasement policy. It was one of the great mistakes of the Western powers. Whether we could have stopped Hitler still then, many believe it. Many believe that the defenses of Czechoslovakia were very important and could have helped the Western Allies to resist the Germans, but I don’t think it was possible. We cannot say. The opinions are divided. And so we are nearing the war of 1939.

Q: After the Kristallnacht your family was still in Berlin?

A: No, my family came out…my family, my father declared already in January ’38 that “It is impossible to stay here. The atmosphere is such that you cannot live here.”

Q: Till ’38 he thought that it is still temporary and it will pass, or he didn’t have where else to go?

A: In ’38, as I said, my father said, “We cannot stay here.”

Q: But till ’38 he thought that it is still a temporary phenomenon?

A: I told you. The idea was that the younger people would go and create an existence so that they could support the others, but we were not able to do this, so this idea was impossible. In the beginning of ’38, my father, “We cannot stay here,” and he registered for America, immigration for America. Thanks G-d that he did it because he was in advance of the great mass which registered only after the pogroms and this made it possible that after having lived a year and a half in Holland with my uncle, they could still leave Europe and Holland specifically six weeks before the Germans moved into Holland. This has been very important for me, that my immediate family was saved.

Q: Your parents and both your sisters.

A: My parents and my sisters, which was the immediate family. And I think it helped me a great deal to do what I did during the war because I had not this personal problem all the time as many others. That doesn’t mean that I hadn’t many members of my family who were not victims of the attacks, but the immediate family at least was saved. So near the outbreak of the war in 1939…

Q: The breaking of the war came as a surprise to you, or you knew it was coming?

A: On the contrary. We were in a terrible situation. We knew on the one hand that the German system, the Nazi system would exist unless there would be a war. The war was the only chance to do it away. On the other hand, when one thought of the consequences of a war, I was frightened. I remember that in (?) 1939 I had a visit of a Jewish leader from Danzig and we made an excursion, a whole day, and we discussed the situation and at one moment we discussed what would happen when a war would break out. And he, with a prophetic eye, exposed how he saw what the war would bring about to Jews, with an imagination which I have never forgotten. That you don’t know how terrible it will be for the Jews. This cost us millions of lives and even not be able to resist. And he described in his imagination what would happen. He spoke out what we never dared to speak out. We knew that we were hesitating even to concretize the….(not clear). I never forgot this conversation, and when I heard the story of the Final Solution, first in my mind the whole time what my Danzig friend had foreseen and pronounced. Now when the war broke out, we knew that we were in a terrible difficulty. A few days after the war broke out I got in touch with the International Red Cross and told them that we wanted to collaborate with them, that we had established a special small committee in Geneva because under the name of the World Jewish Congress we couldn’t do any risky work. The Germans knew that we were their great enemy and so we had to have another “firma”, another name. We established a special committee under which we did all this work during the war. The situation became very tough already during the Polish war. There are white books, yellow books about what happened in this period of the war against Poland and this was never done again with the stories about anti-Jewish pogroms and mass killings that were reported at that time. In Bromberg and in Pozen, in the first days of the Polish war, five thousand Jews were killed, and my friend from Danzig was one of the them who was killed there, which was, of course, another reason why I always had this on my mind.

Q: From whom did you get the reports then?

A: Still from the Jews. The Jewish leadership came out. They went first to Romania and then to Paris and then partly to America and partly to England. We succeeded in having reports from the Jewish communities very long periods. And when the communities didn’t work, some of the leaders usually took upon themselves to continue sending us reports on their responsibility. It is astonishing how much we got. They smuggled it out. They found all kinds of ways in which… Now, the great new development, of course, starts with the downfall of France in June 1940. And while we had before tried to help some of the Jews in the Baltic states and the eastern European states, we had great long lists of refugees, names and we communicated them to the relatives and so on. But the whole situation was completely different from the moment when France fell down. Goldman had left Geneva in May 1940 – he foresaw that France wouldn’t be able to resist – and went to America. I think it was an absolute right decision for a political leader who wanted to have influence on the high players in the various governments. I remained.

Q: You were sure at that time that Switzerland would remain neutral?

A: I wasn’t sure at all. I considered that it was my duty to remain, that we had to stay as long as we could and try to help as long as we could.

Q: Duty to whom did you feel it was?

A: I was one of the first who got an emergency visa for America from Stephen Weiss and I took it in my passport and I decided to stay. I think this was probably one of the most important decisions I took.

Q: But can you explain to me why did you decide to stay in Geneva?

A: So I said. I believed that there would be possibilities from anywhere to be in touch still with all the communities and that we may be able to do certain help from Geneva for them. Running away would be giving up completely the fight. And I think, as a matter of fact, there was amongst the Jewish organizations panic after the downfall of France. In Switzerland the people went from Geneva to Zurich and from Zurich to Geneva because they were not sure whether the Germans wouldn’t come in and where they would come in. I decided when the panic broke out to leave Geneva and go on a vacation in the mountains in order not to be affected by this panic. And this friend of mine, was one of my colleagues, we went, I don’t remember, to (?), was for two or three weeks and when we came back some of the most panic-stricken and we created a more calmer atmosphere. Now, from this moment on, my major function was to report to the Western Jewish communities, the great communities in Britain and America, what was going on on the continent. We understood that we were completely surrounded by the Nazis. Maybe we didn’t have a full knowledge of the situation. We didn’t think that we could take basic decisions that you should do in the free countries where you could take into consideration all the factors while we were surrounded by Nazis completely. We could make suggestions, but the decisions would have to be taken in America (?). And I was in very close contact with America and Britain during the whole period. As I said, my sources were very great variety. We still maintained our relationship with the communities as long as it could be. And when they ceased to exist or couldn’t do it, usually some older members of the community or some former leaders continued to send us reports or to arrange that we should get the news. And then we followed, of course, everything which we could get in the writing. We followed all the Jewish newspapers which existed still and the underground newspapers which we got. And we subscribed to the legal gazettes of the countries in which the anti-Jewish laws and so were published. I had a whole connection with, I don’t know, sixteen countries and some had more than a hundred numbers of anti-Jewish decrees and so on. Certain legal gazettes which I couldn’t get, I got through the library of the League of Nations, where there was a librarian who was very sympathetic to us and helped me to copy what usually wasn’t available, especially the legislation in the countries which were under military rule. These gazettes were not obtainable.

Q: So at that time your main source was the local newspapers?

A: Reports, letters from the local newspapers, local Jewish newspapers, legal newspapers and the legal gazettes, but also personal witnesses. There were people – in extraordinary times there appear extraordinary people. There were people – I remember in particular, two. One young man was a Dutch youngster, tall fellows, who tried to organize the Jewish youths in Holland, Belgium and France. And for him there existed no frontier. He somehow managed to get through and he came to our offices, reported what was he doing, asked for help, asked for advice and disappeared and went back. Finally the Germans caught him and executed him. A wonderful young Dutchman who lived in Belgium. There was another fellow, very strange, who came, he came from Denmark. One didn’t know how he came and how he disappeared, but he came and brought very interesting and important news. I remember that he brought us, for instance, the news. He had been into the community in Berlin and he told us that the community in Berlin had received from the Reichband (sp?), administration of the trains in Germany, the bills for the deportation of the Berlin Jews to the east. I thought this was the sum of “chutzpah”, to ask the community to pay for the transport in these terrible wagons, so he was extremely useful from the point of view of information. It was only after the war that I found out about his personality. He was a man, a German Jew who had immigrated to Denmark, opened up a business, was very successful, and at the end of the First World War, the German ambassador asked him to help some soldiers who were in trouble. And he helped one of them and he gave him a room where he could live and gave him some money and when he left he told him that he would always be ready to help him if he was in any difficulties. And the name of this officer was Hermann Goering. When the Germans, the Nazis came to power, he got in touch with Goering and he obtained that the whole family of his in Germany was given passports and let out and so on. And he used his relationship in order to help other Jews. I don’t think he was successful, but he could travel and he could bring us all kinds of news. He went to Switzerland, he went to Lisbon, he went to other places. He had a very tragic end because at the end, they made a trial against him for cooperation with the enemy. He was liberated, but he died very soon afterwards because this had broken him completely. But, as I said, these were astonishing personalities who suddenly appeared and there were some several of them.

Q: Could you distinguish, could you separate between the people that were reliable to you and not reliable, because you didn’t have other sources?

A: You know, having been assistant to a judge and having been questioned in all kinds of private (?), you get a technique and you find out. I think we knew quite well whom we could trust and who not. In any case, we were really extremely well informed. When you read the papers today which I sent, and there are dozens and dozens, you are absolutely amazed how well we were informed. We followed events at the Polish development very closely and the ghettos were established when they hung diets (?) imposed for the Jewish population and so on. All this was known to us and we reported it to the Western Allies. Now, the decisive moment came when the Germans attacked the Soviet Russia. That is really from then on that the Final Solution was implemented and (?) even a little earlier because in the last moment the Yugoslavs changed the camp. You remember that they tried to get out of the German domination and wanted to join the Allies and they started the war between German and the Yugoslavs and they were, of course, beaten by the Germans and the terrible anti-Jewish campaign was followed. And this is really the first place where the extermination of the Jews took place systematically before the Russian war started. What is very interesting and very important, that this was done not by the Gestapo, not by the police authorities, but by the German army themselves. There is even a declaration after a year, when the German general declares very proudly that Serbia has been made “Judenfrei”. It’s the first country in which… Now, as soon as the Russian war started and we heard the terrible news from the east, also mostly by individual or reports, they found the ways to inform us. And this is what Anders Koppen (sp?) did. One day they killed five thousand there and another day ten thousand and another place and then twenty thousand. It was absolutely terrible. In October 1941, that means about three months after the war started, I wrote a letter to Nachum Goldman in New York in which I said “The situation and the news is so terrible that if this continue, I do not know how many Jews will survive the war.” Three months after it started. Of course, we didn’t know about the order of Hitler to kill all the Jews, but we saw the reality.

Q: In the United States, it is so far away from everything in Europe. Didn’t anyone think that you are a lunatic to write such things?

A: No, no, but we followed it, we saw it, we heard it. As I said, we got all kinds of information which Jews smuggled out and then sent out. It’s remarkable that in October it was already something that you could have said at the end of ’45. As a matter of fact, Goldman was the only one and the first one who, in the Wigmore (?) Conference – you know, who proclaimed the Jewish Congress as Ben Gurion, who gave a lecture about…. And he was the first who described, probably on the basis of what he had heard from me and maybe also from others, and prepared the people to say that probably very few Jews would survive the war and we cannot stop it. In March 1942 Lichstein who was a representative of the Jewish Agency. Richard Lichstein. He was much older than I. He was already 1920 on the executive of the Jewish Agency in London and he was in the First World War together with Jacobson in Istanbul. A representative and tried to help Jacobson. Anyhow, he was the top representative of the Jewish Agency in Geneva and we together went to see the Papal Nuncia. This is in March ’42. This is six weeks after the famous Wannsee Conference. The Wannsee Conference was not the beginning of the furor. It was the mobilization of all administrations in the German Reich, of all ministries and other administration to implement the Final Solution. So six weeks after the Wannsee Conference, of which we didn’t know anything, we went to the Papal Nuncia.

Q: Where did you go?

A: To the Papal Nuncia, in Bern. Appealing to the Vatican to stop this process at least in the Catholic countries, in the countries where they had influence. There were countries like Slovakia where the head of state was a priest. In Croatia, where the Church had an enormous influence. Or in some of the other countries like southern France, where you could perhaps influence the situation. And the man whom we met, Philip Bernardini, as one sees today, was one of the best diplomats of the Vatican diplomacy. He was, as one sees from the documents, used by the Vatican for many communications to the Western powers which they didn’t want to send from Rome because the Fascists controlled all this. So they used to send some special messages to Bern and sent the messages from there. He was quite friendly and asked us to submit a memorandum, which we did. And this memorandum – we didn’t know about Hitler’s order of the Final Solution, to each country by country, ten different countries, and reports commenced, what was happening there and while we don’t speak of the Final Solution and not of total extermination, we several times, we say that the purpose of this policy is the total liquidation of the Jewish community, which comes to the same certainly in other terminology. Strangely, this memorandum was not published in the famous document, eleven volumes of documents of the Vatican after the war, which I attacked recently very strongly. (end of side)

I also mentioned that in the Hungarian provinces, including Transylvania at the time, there were about four hundred thousand Jews, of which about a hundred thousand Jewish children. And I told him when the war was over we found eight children. That was all. He was deeply moved by it and then he argued, "The people emigrated." So where could they emigrate? In the whole of Europe you couldn't go from one country to the other. You couldn't emigrate. If some Hungarian Jews went perhaps over the mountains to Romania, could be a few hundred and not masses. So I saw how he understood for the first time what six million dead meant. Now, he was number two or three in the Vatican. A personality in this position never understood that the six million Jews who were dead included a million and a half children. This means that he never thought of it. He never really understood what this figure of six million meant.

Q: And if I ask you when did you first realize what are the masses of executions and liquidations in Europe?

A: I would say we followed this very clearly and we had… As a matter of fact, every year we made a kind of generally overview how the situation was. And the last was in November 1944, when the Atlantic City conference took place in America, the conference which mapped up out the post-war program for the Jewish people. And in the statistics which this report contained, we showed that we really knew exactly what the situation was. Either we knew the figures or we estimated the figures in accordance with developments I other places. It was so clear that when I came to London in 1945 in August – that means four or five months after the war was over – I met the High Commissioner for refugees, Sir Herbert Emerson. He had been in November '44 in my office and I gave him the statistics as we saw them. When I saw him in August '45 in London, he said, "Ah, you are the fellow with the figures." And then he asked me. "How is it possible that you figured the things so clearly as practically the same figures now show up after the war is over fro the various communities?" And I said, "Well, we were very, very well informed. We followed this from year to year, from day to day." You have also intuition, how the things got.

Q: But tell me, maybe logically you could accept it. Could you understand emotionally what was really going on?

A: Yes, sure. Now, I haven't told you the story after the memorandum to the Vatican. In the last days of July 1942 came a German industrialist to Switzerland. He came from time to time, he had business interests and business friends in Zurich.

Q: You mean Scholter.

A: Yes. And he was at the head of a mining concern, which occupied thirty or thirty-five thousand people for the war effort. And because of this he had access to the highest authority and apparently also to the Hitler headquarters. And he came out in order to save his conscience. He had heard at Hitler's headquarters that there was a plan to assemble all the Jews of Europe, three and a half million, four million, to transport them to the east and to exterminate them there. He didn't know exactly when this would be done. He said that the program for (?), it should be done until the end of the year. He didn't know with what methods it could be done. He only heard that they would do it with prussic acid, which nobody understood then. And we know today that prussic acid was the major element of the gas.

Q: Cyclon B.

A: The gas with which the assassination took place. He spoke something which I couldn’t understand.

Q: You met him personally?

A: No. I will tell you. He came to his business friends and asked that it should be said to the Jews and to the Allies. These business friends were very well known Jewish firm, the Rosenstein concern in Zurich. Rosenstein himself was in America during the war and the man who administered his interests in Zurich was Mr. Israel Kopelman. Now, Kopelman knew one prominent Jew in Switzerland. That was Binyamin Sokolovich, the head of the class (?) of the Swiss union of communities, Jewish communities.

Q: But Mr. Scholter wasn't a regular informer. He came this time and told what he heard. It's not that he was…he didn't do it on a regular basis.

A: He came, as I said, in order to get it out and to calm his conscience. He was an anti-Nazi and he was terribly upset by this and the Jews had to be informed. It is interesting that he had relations with the Allied powers the whole war, during the whole war, but he had before relations with the Polish Consul, and probably – I don't know. I asked myself, "Why didn't he tell it to the Polish Consul?" Probably he knew about the Polish anti-Semitism and didn't trust them too much about this and so he came especially to tell us. Sokolovich, as I said, was a (?) of the press office in Zurich, of the "Gemandebund" (sp?). He was in constant contact with me. he fought anti-Semitism in Switzerland as I fought it on the world scene. He saw immediately that this was nothing for Switzerland, that this was much more important, and he telephoned me practically immediately and said, "We have to see each other." And we met two days later in Lucerne and he told me the story.

Q: What was your first, very first reaction?

A: It took me two days to accept the story. In spite of the fact that we knew, he and I knew much more than the man in the street.

Q: Anyway, the first minute that you heard it, how did you react?

A: The first minute I heard it I thought of the story of the Danzig Jew with whom I had this excursion in winter 1939, when he warned us that millions of Jews would be sacrificed. This didn't leave me alone. So I was prepared for it. I knew much more. I knew that this process was in full action. I had written to the Vatican, I had written to Goldman about how many Jews were being killed and so on. But still, when one tells you they can kill three and a half million, for me this is something which doesn't go into a head. Today we know that it happened, but then, you have to…

Q: I'm sure you couldn't believe it. I'm sure that at that time you couldn't believe it. It was about only imagination.

A: I'll tell you. I'll tell you very clearly. I'll tell you why I believed it and when I believed it. First of all, Sokolovich and I went, I think, for six hours along the lake of Geneva and discussed if this is possible, is this a provocation. You know, Switzerland was a place with all kinds of espionage and so on. Is this something to provoke you? And finally, the following three points were decisive, that I believed in. And I say that we were in constant contact when we left each other. The first point was, Hitler had announced it. The famous speeches which he made usually on the 30th of January, the day of the taking of power. The first time on the 30th of January in '39, before the war, he accused the Jews, that they were pushing the world into a war, and then he announced if this would happen, this would end with the end of European Jewry. Not of the German people, but with the Jewry. This he had repeated several times, as I said, usually on the 30th of January. I was, as I said, involved in a group of journalists and young diplomats in Geneva and whenever Hitler made his speech they asked me to translate it while he was speaking and I did it, and so I knew very well Hitler's speeches because they commented on it. So this was the first point he said. Nobody took seriously "Mein Kampf" and there is all what he has done.

Q: But you know, all of that is theoretical. In fact, when you hear such things as the "Final Solution" and what are the implications of that, is it possible to believe it? Even though you knew the background and you knew Hitler's speeches and theories and all that?

A: Listen. What Hitler wrote in "Mein Kamp" was also not so easy to believe and people didn't believe it and I said to Sokolovich, "We shouldn't make this same mistake the second time." The second was that fifteen years before, there had been a large action of arrests of tens of thousands of Jews in all the Western major cities, on the 14th, 15th of July. Nobody understood it. It happened in Amsterdam and Antwerp, in Brussels, in Paris, in Marseille, in Lyon. In all the major of the West. And nobody understood why. We knew deportations en masse from Berlin, from Vienna, from Prague, not yet from Warsaw, because this was five days earlier the (?). This we knew a little later. But was happening? Everybody asked themselves. And sure they gave the reply. If this is really total European extermination, then of course.

Q: What could you do about it, after you decided that it was reliable and it was the truth?

A: The third was my own experience in Germany, from which I judged that they were capable of doing it. Now, what you could do? You had to inform those who had the power to do something, and this we were…the Western allies. I couldn't do anything myself, so I had to inform those who could react. And this was the reason why I went to the Americans and to the British.

Q: Do you really believe that they had no idea about it at that time, the Allies?

A: Yes. And they played that they had no idea.

Q: Yes, but I think what do you believe?

A: Listen. We had no idea. We knew more than anybody else what was going on and nobody ever told us that behind all these things was a plan and an order.

Q: Yes, but we know today that the American army had photographs from the air about…that they saw the concentration camps and all that.

A: The British had even broken the code and knew the internal reports. But nobody told us that they knew anything. They played… There was such departmentalization in the armed forces that it is probably true that only one part of it knew. But Churchill knew it and Churchill had given some speeches which show that with an enormously broad language he knew what he was talking about, but nobody of the British ever said. I know, for instance – one of my things which came later was the report on the extermination of the Jews in Riga. Now, I know that the British had similar reports – they never did this. They never said, "You are right. We have similar reports." Now, what happened was that I went to the Americans and to the British and said, "Inform your government. Check it."

Q: You went to your colleagues from the Jewish Congress in America and in Britain.

A: I went to the American Consulate in Geneva and to the British Consulate in Geneva. The consuls were not there and the vice-consuls were there. The vice-consul was a young man, a very nice young man, and the first reaction was, "Fantastic. How can we…?" And I told them, "When I heard it first I had the same reaction as you." And then I told them why I believed it. And it made obviously an impression because he gave it, he forwarded it to the American delegation in Bern and it is interesting to read the report on me. It said I was nervous, but I was a serious person and he was convinced that I was believing in my sources and in the reliability of the source and the accuracy of the fact. And Yehuda Bauer once said… In the (?) there is one phrase about reservations which was put in by Guggenheim as the only one to whom I showed it and he was very careful Swiss layer.

Q: That there are little hesitations, that you are not sure it is completely true.

A: He insisted that I put it in. But I took the whole thing to the consulate and I told them what I believed, which was a complete denial of what this sentence meant. But I gave in. I don't know why. Of course we couldn't guarantee it, but what I had done, I had been to Zurich with Kopelman and I had a long discussion with Kopelman about Scholter – Who is he? What he has reported before? Why he is reliable? What position he has? He didn't give me his name immediately. The name I found later. But at least he gave me the impression that he was a very serious man and that the thing is reliable and that he had predicted on other occasions also things which happened. For instance, the date of the attack on the Soviet Russia, the German attack, which of course couldn't be ignored. So I really became convinced that especially knowing what was happening now in the whole of Europe, that it was true and there was a terrible danger and the only people who could stop something were the Americans and the British. So I went to the American and asked him to inform the government to check it. They have secret services. I don't. And to send a cable which I had written to Weiss. And the same with Silverman. Silverman was a very well known…

Q: Silverman?

A: Silverman. Silverman was a very well known member of the Labour Party, a very good debater. He often debated with Churchill who respected him very much as a debater. Belonging to the left circle of the Labour people at the time. A very good lawyer.

Q: And Jewish, of course.

A: Of course, yes. He was the chairman of the Congress section in Britain. There was really a wedding (?) and the one was consolidated and went with Labour. It is interesting. The texts were absolutely equal, but in the text to Silverman I added, "Inform and consult New York", which indicates that I wasn't sure that the American cable would go through, but I was sure that British Parliament would not allow that a prominent parliamentarian wouldn't get such a message. And it happened exactly so. The Americans never got the cable and the British played around for ten days until they gave it to Silverman finally when the Parliament was on vacation and so they found him in his normal apartment in Liverpool. And he wanted, he tried then to telephone to Weiss and the British authority didn’t allow him to telephone. One doesn't know in peacetime what in wartime the authorities allow themselves. Finally the war department sent a cable to the British embassy in Washington and so I got the thing through this. It's not the cable which is always published because this, of course, we don't have, so they made another (?). When it came, Sumner words (?), with the undersecretary of the State Department, forbids Weiss to publish it and so obviously they don't believe it. They don't tell them that they are having a war (?) already for two weeks, but they didn't give it, but somebody will check it through other sources. And they checked through the Red Cross and through the Vatican, and both replied in a very vague manner, "Yes, we know also that there are bad things happening with the Jews, but we have no knowledge about a plan of total extermination." In Rome, the men were the assistants of Myron Taylor. Myron Taylor was the personal representative of Roosevelt to the Pope. Taylor was not in the room and the assistant was Mr. Titman. Titman was the consul whom I knew, by the way, because he was before consul in Geneva. And he was permanently in Rome at the time. And when Taylor wasn't there, he replaced him. The report of Taylor is very interesting. Of Titman - is very interesting. He goes several times to the Secretary of State in (?) and apparently also once to Pious XIIth and Pious XIIth, in one of the conversations says, "How can I condemn the Germans without condemning the Russians?" This was a very interesting remark. Well, they gave wishy-washy answer on me (?) because the Vatican knew very well and the documents in the series of published documents of the Vatican show that there were several people who reported about millions of Jews killed and so on. I quote all this in my publications. There is a statement in Cincinnati in '83, I think, where I gave a detailed report and I put it now in my book. In my opinion, the Vatican knew very much, knew much more than probably we knew. There are witnesses who say that all over Europe people came from various countries and left reports in Rome and Rome was probably better informed than we were, but they didn't pay any attention to this. Now, I saw that I am not believed. Nothing happening. This was really the worst period of my life. Every day I get other terrible reports and the only people who can do something about it outside. I got a telegram from Easterman (?), from the office in London, impressed by my reporting, and said, "We have it. We got it." And they tried a lot, but… They tried, for instance, in London to obtain a declaration of the Pope, condemning this and in relation with a number of embassies, and a number of them made representations in Rome. The Pope had said one sentence in the Christmas message of 1942, in which he simply expressed sympathy for the hundreds of thousands of people who, by no guilt of themselves, only because of their nationality or origin, are exposed to death. He was convinced that that was all the extent. He even didn't say 'Jews'. He said 'persons'. There were a number of political interventions with the Pope from the British, from several in South American, from the Poles in exile, that he should condemn it, but he didn't do it.

Q: What did you think at that time that should be the proper action to stop what was going on? You didn't know that it already began, but…

A: Our opinion, my opinion was this has to be decided by those who are living in free countries. We are surrounded by the Nazis. Maybe we don't know enough. At this stage, we didn't make any proposals. We relied on their judgments, but they didn't know anything. These were the most terrible months of my life.

Q: Did you understand at that time that the real sad fact is that the Jews don't interest the world? That they are not one of the interests of the Free World.

A: No, we had illusions of this. We did not how… I will come to it, why we didn't succeed. We had certainly the conviction that the Allies would do something to stop it and, of course, exaggerated trust. Nevertheless, I say it was terrible. For months and months I waited for something and nothing happened and I decided they don't believe me. I have to convince them. And I was trying to collect other facts and witnesses and testimonies and there I was quite successful. The first was the reports coming from Warsaw about the deportation of the Warsaw Jews in two letters to the "Aguda" in Bern, Lucerne, I think. The second was a witness from Riga, a young man who had escaped from Riga and reported to us the extermination of the Jews of Riga in two nights in November and December, 1941, of which we had, nobody had anything heard, including Dubnov. And he had escaped and had spent several months in Stetin as a non-Jewish student, helping in a (?), hospital, and finally got to Switzerland where he had some family relations. And I interrogated him for six or eight hours and he told the whole story, which was very impressive. Number three – one day I got a telephone call from the hospital in Geneva and the lady doctor, who was a good friend of mine, called me and said, "I have here somebody. I don't understand him, but you will. Come immediately. I cannot tell you more." Why couldn't she tell me more? Because the man was under police surveillance and she was not allowed to show him to me and so on. And this was man who had been through the whole procedure of deportation. It was a young man arrested in (?), but I don't remember exactly, and had been sent to the east and was working in the fortifications near Stalingrad. There was a German officer who needed a driver and asked the people who cane drive and he was taken by him. And the German officer who had the nerve after the war, where he had lost already two brothers, decided to save this Jew and put him on a train which came practically from Stalingrad to Paris. And he gave him food, money and all this. And he, who had been with the German officer for two weeks, driving with him, I asked him what happened with these people, with those people, and he explained to me. And the German officer told him in three sentences, "Those who are sent for work are taken to work, mostly on the fortification. Those who are unfit for work are suppressed and those who are not anymore fit for work are suppressed too." There you had the whole tragedy in three sentences. And he came in September 1942 and told us this story. That was very impressive and also made a point and so on (?). And the last personal thing which was probably decisive – when we heard the story about the "Final Solution" I told Guggenheim, who was our legal advisor, "We have to find out whether the Red Cross doesn't know something." Guggenheim was teaching in the institute where Burkhardt was teaching also, and I told him the best thing is to ask Burkhardt in the professors' room in the institute. And he did and in fact Burkhardt confirmed – this is also very strange – he confirmed that he knew, that he heard the story from two different sources, one military and one diplomatic. He used a language – it was very clear he knew. Very strange that he never told his colleagues. (?) was seen in all the papers. Maintains that there is not a piece of paper in writing in which this is conveyed. But in October, and each time when I was called to the American minister in Bern, and Weiss asked us to put everything on the table, that he could see everything. And in this occasion two things happened, which were very important. One was that I gave the minister in a closed envelope the name of Scholter, the name and title. I had finally got it from the Sokolovich, who didn't want to give it, but he finally gave. So I said this was a decisive moment – either they believe us or they don't believe us. We have to put everything and they came. And the same I did with the story of Burkhardt. That young guy (?) wasn't happy about it. When I said, "This is a very important witness. Either we put it on the table or not, I believe this is a decisive point." And this is what happened. And we had prepared a document of about thirty pages. When all this arrived in Washington they believed us. This was the decisive moment. So we convinced them. And they could rise and said, "Now you can publish it. Unfortunately your worst fears are true." Now they started pushing forward – declaration of the Right (?) government. I must say that a year ago I had made such a proposal already. One should have it, should (?) know in October, 1942 I had already in one of my letters of October, September, '41 suggested a collective statement of the Allied government. And finally we get it, the declaration of the 17th of December, 1942, which is published simultaneously in Moscow, Washington and London. In London, the Declaration of Eden replied to a question of Silverman and the House raises for two minutes and it was one of the most moving reactions and Lloyd George, in his long career he had never left (?) such a thing. And now everybody expects that something happens. And nothing happens. And finally (?), they agreed to meet at a conference in the Bermudas, the British and the Americans, in this place where there is no access for individuals without title. And they discuss what could be done and everything is a great secret and the great secret is that they decided to do nothing. This is the worst moment in the story of the Shoah. One of the finest men in the Jewish Agency writes a famous article, "Bankrupt". This was really "Bankrupt". And I sit in Geneva and wait and wait and wait.

Q: So what were you doing during '43, '44, till the end of the war in '45?

A: I asked myself, when I saw that nothing was happening and all my work was for nothing, I asked myself. "Is it worthwhile doing it? Should I cease?" And I decided to continue reporting. It should not be the fact that I was avoiding doing my duty that nothing happens. And this was the right policy because in '43 – now, I sent a number of very important reports which particularly describe all kinds of situations and in April '43 I got a report from Romania through the Red Cross. By the way, I haven't spoken about the Red Cross. This we have to do still. Through the Red Cross, saying that there is some change in the attitude of Antonescu (sp?) and perhaps we can get now that the Jews in Transnistria can be transferred to Palestine. This will have to paid, of course, but it can be paid on blocked accounts and will not have to be paid out until the end of the war. Quite interesting new idea. And on the other hand, I contacted these groups in France where the youth groups have organized themselves and they asked us to help them and to finance the evacuation of youngsters and children to Switzerland and to Spain, but they need money and they need arms and so on and so on.

Q: All the time you are under the title of the Jewish World Congress?

A: Yes, yes. I am the head of the office in Geneva.

Q: Because there were also a community in Kushta (sp?), in Switzerland. You had cooperation at that time with other Jewish organizations?

A: It was not very good. It was not very good. There was terrible competition and…

Q: Even at that time?

A: And some personal competition and party competition.

Q: Even during the war?

A: Even during the war. But I don't think…it was terribly disgusting, the lack of cooperation and that everybody wanted to be the first. I kept out of these things and did my duty. I worked together with Lichtstein, who also was a regular statesman. He was thirty years older than I was! What was I telling? About Romania. There was a letter from Silverman and Tiso (?) – the leadership of the Romanian Jews – telling in a letter could wait so the international committee of the Red Cross, they believe that Antonescu had changed his mind and can perhaps now buy the transfer of the fifty thousand Jews – there were a hundred thousand and half of them were dead already – to Palestine. And the other thing was the use, proposals in the West. I sent telegrams to the American delegation and for the first time, I find some problems about my transferring the message to America. What has happened, which we know now, is that the American delegation and Bernhard received an instruction from the State Department not to transmit any more messages from private persons or private institutions. And when you look at this telegram, the reference is a reference to the last report which the embassy transferred from me. One of my last reports, the reference. So this telegram was directly directed against me. They thought when we cut of the source, then the pressure of the Jewish organization in Washington will be lessening and will cease. In Bern, they see that the telegram was very important, had a very interesting and important content, and for several days they don't know what to do. And finally they decided, they asked me whether I would pay for the telegram! Which I found very funny. First of all, when you send a coded telegram you haven't the slightest idea what this can cost, and apart from this, this was a very long telegram of two, three pages. Well, I immediately said, "Yes, I will pay it." It was, as I said, the most expensive telegram I ever sent in my life, but the result was such that it was not really very expensive when you see what it brought about. It cost about a month's salary of my income.

Q: By the way, you got your salary at that time from the Jewish Congress?

A: Yes, yes. I didn't get a very high salary, but nevertheless, a month's salary. Okay. Now, this was then transferred and it took time. They went to Roosevelt with it and they went to Morgenthau with it and nothing happened. This was April. Now, in July there was…(not clear), "What the hell is this? Why is nothing happening?" And Morgenthau writes him back, "But we have already agreed already for several months." And then Morgenthau asked two of his assistants to enquire why nothing has happened. And this is the famous story of the two assistants, Mr. Parer (?) and Mr. Dubois, who find out that there is a real saboteur in the State Department, and that the man who is sabotaging is Mr. Brackovich Long (?). (not clear) one of the highest officials in the State Department. It is now know that he opposed the whole policy to help the Jews. When we were told all the time that the visa quotas were closed, there was no space, now it turns out that they were never closed, never finished. They always falsified it. That Weiss didn't get the telegram, it was he who prevented it. And so on and so on. He was responsible probably for the telegram, that no messages from my side. And the two people write a long report and their report…(?), on the acquiescence of this government in the mass murder of the Jews. Now this was dynamite and this goes to Morgenthau and Morgenthau takes off the title and quotes this report to the President, but let's leave everything as unclear (?). But he of course understood this is dynamite and may cause an outcry in the Jewish community. (end of side)

But Roosevelt doesn't take only the report of the two assistants and Morgenthau doesn't only take the report of the two assistants to Roosevelt, but also another project – a project to establish a special agency to help rescue the victims of the Nazis. The special agency which is proposed, it is the establishment of the War Refugee Board, an agency composed of representatives of the State Department, the Treasury and the War Department, which has representatives in all the American delegations and embassies in all the neutral countries and which has the task to help the victims, to rescue the victims. This is a very important step. From this moment on, we have really the full cooperation of the American government and all the branches of government in the rescue effort. From January 1944 to May 1945, the end of the war, twenty million dollars, Jewish money, were used by the War Refugee Board for all kinds of rescue attempts.

Q: What is your part in the preparation?

A: I personally had a part in three major actions. The first was, I couldn't do anything anymore in Romania because in the meantime, the situation had again changed and it wasn't anymore possible. On the other hand, the rescue activity to rescue children and youngsters from France, Belgium and Holland was possible and was executed, and there were several thousand people rescued in this way. And there was the financing of the action, including the military protection, and the fabrication of tens of thousands of false documents was made possible, documents of any kind which helped many thousands of people. The second action was the action in favour of Hungary. When you study my archives you will see that in March 1944 I warned the Americans that the Germans were preparing the occupation of Hungary, and I gave all kinds of advice what should be done to warn the Jews in Hungary and so on and so on. That was ignored, but when the Germans invaded Hungary, there was for several months a lack of communications, and from March to June the Germans deported four hundred thousand Jews, Hungarian Jews to Auschwitz in a very rapid and brutal action. And we heard only in June what has happened. At this time, there was a great outcry and great effort to rescue at least the remnant. In this action the King of Sweden was the first to intervene on the request of our Swedish section in Congress. The second was the Pope. This was the only time that the Pope really intervened with the Horti, and not only the Pope. Also the Nuncio and the conference of Hungarian bishops became very active in the rescue action, so this was the only time that the Catholic Church really became an active partner of one of these efforts.

Q: So you said that during '44 you were active in trying to rescue what was left of the Hungarian Jews. And after that?

A: This was successful. This was a terrible day-to-day fight in which I was deeply involved, pushing the international committee of the Red Cross. I spoke of the King of Sweden, of the Pope, of the International Red Cross, and finally the major actor was the American government which, contrary to all normal behaviour, sent diplomatic notes to the Hungarian government through the Swiss government, which is extraordinary in times of war. You don't communicate with the enemy. But in which they sent also a message from Roosevelt in which he threatened the Hungarians that if they continued the deportations. All these efforts together helped to rescue at least the Jews of Budapest and some others, about two hundred thousand Jews were so rescued and preserved. The last action in which I was involved and practically was initiated by me was the protection of the Jews who were still in the camps. October 1944 I had a terrible fear. I feared that a going-under of the Nazis would destroy also all the Jews and the other inmates in the camps. This was not only a fear. Himmler had announced it several times himself that he would do it, and the question was, could you stop it and how can you stop it? I got in touch with the Czechoslovakian representative in Geneva, Kopetsky (sp?) and asked him to invite all the governments of the Allied side to come together. And I approached him and told him we are all in the same boat, everybody has political prisoners, everybody has hostages, everybody has Jewish prisoners, Jewish inmates and so on. We have to make a major effort to rescue the people and prevent that the threats of Himmler would be implemented. The representatives in Geneva agreed, reported to their governments. We tried to establish also a meeting in London, where all the governments sat, but it never came together, and we continued in Geneva. And the question was, through whom should we act? The Vatican, should we act through the Red Cross, should we act through the protective powers? And finally we agreed on the Red Cross. We agreed that all the fifteen governments, fourteen or fifteen, should write, should deposit a letter on a certain date at that office of the President of the International Committee of the Red Cross, in which we asked that he should contact the highest authorities in Germany in order to prevent that the inmates in the camps would be massacred. This happened on a certain date. I was writing the memorandum which altogether was a "shtickle" Jew who took the initiative, but they all followed, they all cooperated, including the American government and the British government. And this went to the visit of Burkhardt, who was meantime President of the Red Cross, to a meeting with Kuttenbone (sp?), in which he represented our request. At the same time, I was in touch with our friends in Sweden - (?) was a representative. And he was in touch not only with the President of the Swedish Red Cross, Bernadotte, but also with the help of Palme, the later Prime Minister, with the Finnish doctor of Himmler, Mr. Kirstens. Kirstens had been active in the liberating. Whenever Himmler had his, how do you call it? Stomach…

Q: Ulcus?

A: He had a certain stomach cramps, and the doctor was a kind of hypnotic fellow. Each time this happened he had obtained the liberation of some Norwegian or then some other prisoners. And Storche (?) obtained from him that he would do the same for the Jews, and in fact, this man obtained the promise from Himmler not to touch the people. He even arranged that a representative of the Jewish Congress would be received by Himmler in Germany.

Q: It seems that after you were so disappointed and pessimistic in '42 and '43, that the Allies didn't do anything, now in '44 and '45 you begin to be more optimistic about it.

A: But since the establishment of the War Refugee Board, they helped. There is not doubt about it. In various ways. I mean, there are the smaller ways in which the Kastner negotiation took place for the people to bring them to Switzerland. There was the "Muse" affair – thousand or fifteen hundred people from Theresienstadt, through bibery (?) and so on. But the action to save the Hungarian Jews and the action to maintain alive the people in the camps was a very important action, and I think, together with the activities of the Swedish Red Cross, the activities of the International Red Cross, and I was the coordinator to a certain degree – they had no direct relations. I was in touch with Storche in all kinds of ways to coordinate these two efforts together – have probably saved three or four hundred thousand people in the camps. I think this is, after all, of course not the greatest success, but a great success, that this was obtained. Of course, the German leaders were all afraid what would happen to them and so on and in the last moment, tried to have a better record in these matters, but whatever. It is not important what they thought. Important is the result that we have kept alive several hundred thousand people, and I think the two initiatives, mine and this (?), were essential toward this success.

Q: I want now to put a little emphasis on your activities after the war. You were very active in the Jewish World Congress in Geneva. Several years you were the Secretary-General of the organization. Can you tell me something about your activities in the Jewish Congress after the war?

A: Well, I will tell you. I cannot tell you about my activities. I was involved in every Jewish field. I was visiting all the communities. I helped to reorganize communities after the war. But I think I should say a few words about two major things. On the one hand, I continued the action of the Jewish communities in the United Nations. I was there forty years representative of the Congress in the Human Rights Commission, and I participated in all efforts of codification of the human rights. This was, after all, after the war one of the major topics. We had to establish a new world where such things as the Holocaust, as the Shoah, couldn't happen again. And the basic request was to establish a system of protection of human rights in which this would be impossible. And so I participated in this…

Q: The Geneva Convention, for instance?

A: In all these efforts. I participated in the writing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Congress influenced five articles of the twenty-six or seven, which they completely changed with our intervention. I participated in the drafting of the covenants on human rights, on the Convention on Racism and Racial Discrimination. I participated in the discussion of the new humanitarian rights, the new humanitarian law, the Red Cross conventions in Geneva and thirty years later, twenty-five years later, when the additional protocols were elaborated in several international conferences. I participated. I even was the chairman of a commission of non-governmental organizations which made an input in these discussions. We elaborated a memorandum which was signed by fifty international organizations, the most, greatest diversity.

Q: You participated in all these activities as an expert to international law, or as a Jewish representative?

A: No, no. Both. Everybody knew that I was Jewish and that I was made the chairman of such a thing at a time when Israel was always cut out from everything, was quite a positive thing. Another aspect of my activities, which is a lasting contribution, is the relations with the Christian churches, which I decided during the war, when we were so completely isolated, so completely alone, that never again the Jews should be in such a position. We had to establish relations with other countries, with other religions groups and so on. And I did this very systematically, with the Catholic Church, with the World Council of Churches, and then with the various churches who belonged to the World Council of Churches, the various denominations, the Anglicans, the Lutherans, the Orthodox Christians. And what we have obtained in these activities is a completely new formulation of Christian theology and Jewish interaction, a complete rejection of all kinds of anti-Semitic, racial positions. For instance, the Lutheran World Federation rejected – and this was on our initiative – Luther's anti-Semitic utterances which, in the Second World War, played a great role in the Nazi propaganda. This was from the largest body of the Lutheran Churches rejected and I think it is very important progress in this (?). Now, I'm not saying that everything is alright, but we have made very great progress in this and I think we can take a great part of the credit for this development. Now, this is by far not the only things that we have done. I have been dealing practically with everything else. I have participating in the fight for the Jews in the Arab lands after the establishment of the State of Israel. I have participated from 1936 to 1990 in the fight for Soviet Jewry. I was at the founding assembly of the World Jewish Congress in '36 where for the first time a text was adopted on this, and I followed this through until the Russian Jewry became an affiliated community of the World Jewish Congress in 1990 or 1991. You see, it is an enormous variety things in which I have been active and I am still a voluntary for the Congress and I am still directly a god deal with the inter-religious activities. I think that these activities have to be followed and pursued and as long as I am active in this, I will do my best to bring it up, to get results.

Q: I want to thank you very, very much, Dr. Reigner.