Encyclopaedia Judaica
Aid organization: German Jews aid organization
(Hilfsverein der deutschen Juden)
Foundation in 1901 - work in Palestine - help for pogrom victims - emigration work
from: Hilfsverein der deutschen Juden; In: Encyclopaedia Judaica 1971, vol. 8
presented by Michael Palomino (2008)
[Foundation in 1901]
<Hilfsverein der deutschen Juden ("Relief Organization of German Jews"),
German Jewish organization founded in 1901 to improve social and political conditions of Jews in Eastern Europe and Orient. Hilfsverein was planned as a central body for German Jewry on the lines of French *Alliance Israélite Unvierselle, and its establishment was opposed by the Alliance; some of the German members of the latter created the Deutsche Conferenz Gemeinschaft [[German Conference Community]] within the framework of their own organization. On occasions Hilfsverein policy was guided by pro-German political objectives such as the introduction of German language teaching in its schools in the Balkans and Ottoman Empire.
[Work in Palestine - help for pogrom victims]
Hilfsverein established in Palestine a school system from kindergarten to teachers' training college level, with Hebrew as the language of instruction. The attempt to introduce teaching in German at the planned Haifa *Technion in 1913 caused an international furor in Zionist circles.
After Kishinev pogrom, HIlfsverein called the Vienna Conference of 1903 to organize relief of Russian Jewry, and a similar conference in London in 1905. During 1905 revolution in Russia it gave financial help to self-defense groups of Bund and Zionists. From 1905 to 1914 HIlfsverein (col. 479)
published a weekly, Russische Korrespondenz [[Russian Talks]], in German, English, and French, on the position of the Jews and the liberal and revolutionary movements in Russia.
Following a policy of assisting only "organized emigration" of Rumanian Jews, Hilfsverein decided in 1902 not to help those emigrants who were stranded in Germany, but instead to help the Jews in Rumania itself.
Hilfsverein became the agent of Jacob *Schiff's project to help Russian Jews to emigrate to the southern United States (the Galveston plan), but in view of the autocratic nature of the German regime was unwilling and unable to asist Jewish emigration to Germany.
[WW I - collaboration with Joint Distribution Committee]
On the eve of World War I Hilfsverein had over 10,000 members in Germany, and followers in america, Russia, and Palestine. During the war the Hilfsverein assisted in interdenominational relief work in the occupied territories in Eastern Europe and distributed American relief funds. However, the assimilationanist policy of Hilfsverein and its Eastern European agencies provoked sharp conflicts with the Zionists and other anti-assimilationaist groups. As a result the *American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee began to participate to a greater degree in the allocation of funds formally channeled through the Hilfsverein.
[Committees of Hilfsverein helping for emigration - dissolution in 1939 - working until 1941]
After the defeat of Germany, Hilsverein ceased to play a major role in international Jewish matters but joined the Alliance and other non-Zionist organizations, though it refused to take part in the efforts for united Jewish representation at the League of Nations. Through its 290 local committees in Germany (in 1930), HIlfsverein concentrated mainly on helping Jewish emigration from and via Germany (about 350,000 between 1921 and 1936).
After the advent of the Nazi Reich, HIlfsverein (which in 1935 had to change its name to Hilfsverein der Juden in Deutschland, "Relief Organization of Jews in Germany") was unable to continue with relief work abroad. The Hilfsverein initially advised German Jewry to postpone emigration as long as possible but was forced by circumstances to aid those who wished to leave for destinations other than Palestine. It was officially dissolved in 1939 though it continued to exist until 1941 as an emigration section of the *Reichsvertretung der Juden in Deutschland.
Between 1933 and 1941 Hilfsverein assisted over 90,000 persons to emigrate to overseas countries, with the exception of Palestine. Leading personalities of Hilfsverein were James *Simon (president until 1932), Eugen *Landau, Paul *Nathan, and Max M. *Warburg.>
Sources
Encyclopaedia Judaica (1971): German Jews aid organization (Deutscher Hilfsverein der deutschen Juden); vol. 8, col. 479-48
