Mars Michelet asks the important questions

We appreciate that Marte Michelet asked the questions that we have not dared to ask.

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This is a discussion post. Opinions in the text are the responsibility of the writer.

For several decades after World War II, historians of our occupation hardly ever mentioned the deportation of Jews from Norway in 1942-1943. Even after Oskars Mendelsohn’s reference work The history of Jews in Norway over 300 years, Bjarte Brulands Holocaust in Norway and more than 100 other works on Norwegian Jewish history, few knew that Norwegians participated in the Nazi attempt to exterminate the Jews living in Norway.

With the two books of Mars Michelet, The biggest crime Y What did the home front know? Has this permanently changed? Through its distinctive combination of historical method and critical journalism, the treatment of Jews in Norway during World War II is becoming part of the collective understanding of history.

It gives Michelet the right in the case

Michelet asks questions that many Norwegian Jews have long felt they couldn’t ask: Were there anti-Semitic attitudes among some on the home front as well? Were there cases of extortion in the transport of refugees? Michelet answers with an unconditional yes to both questions. We perceive that today this is not very controversial.

In his mention of Report of a review of What Did the Home Front Know? Authors Elise Barring Berggren, Bjarte Bruland and Mats Tangestuen wrote in Aftenposten on November 21 that “A reader of our book will quickly discover that we do not reject economic motives in some parts of refugee transport. And there is consensus that there were cases of anti-Semitism in the resistance movement.

The authors agree with Michelet, but believe that “Michelet takes the wrong people.”

Several critical questions must be asked

It is not our job to assess whether Michelet can document well enough by pointing out the correct ones. The task of Norwegian Jews is to tell their stories of the Holocaust over and over again. This is in keeping with the Jewish tradition of “telling your children.” We are concerned that more critical questions will be asked about the Holocaust in Norway and that more research will be conducted. Because just take off:

• Why were the five Norwegian Jews who had survived Auschwitz left behind when the white buses picked up the Norwegian prisoners?

• Why were the two who went to help the Feldmann couple flee to Sweden, but instead killed them, were they acquitted of murder?

• Why should we not believe Gunnar Sønsteby’s statement that parts of the home front knew the Jews would be deported several months before the actions took place?

• Why were no specific actions taken to save the Jews prior to the transport of the Danube on November 26, 1942?

• Weren’t Nazi propaganda, the registration of Jews from early 1942, and the mass arrest of Jewish men in October 1942 clear enough signs of the coming catastrophe?

• What did the Norwegian government know in London and what was the basis for its priorities during the occupation?

We appreciate that Marte Michelet asked the questions that we have not dared to ask.

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