Susanne Rolinek. Jüdische Lebenswelten 1945-1955: Flüchtlinge in der amerikanischen Zone Österreichs. Innsbruck: StudienVerlag, 2007. 216 S. EUR 26.90 (paper), ISBN 978-3-7065-1924-3.

Reviewed by Jonathan Kwan (School of History, University of Nottingham)
Published on H-German (July, 2008)

Rebuilding Jewish Lives after the Holocaust

This book is a sober, descriptive account of Jewish refugees passing through Austria's American zone in the immediate aftermath of war. Nearly all refugees (Susanne Rolinek uses the administrative term, "displaced persons") were in transit, eventually moving on to rebuild their lives and homes in other countries--principally Israel and the United States. In her introduction, Rolinek outlines two interrelated concepts at the basis of the book: social networks and identity. Indeed, the book offers the reader a great deal about individual and collective identity, the search for a new homeland and the reconstruction of an intermediate society; however, Rolinek's skills lie in the analysis of discrete issues rather than the tracing of personal narratives and experiences. Rarely are people's stories followed through in the depth required to enter the particular world of a Holocaust survivor coping with everyday life in a generally hostile, unsympathetic Austria. Of course, a multitude of memoirs from Holocaust survivors and their lives afterwards are available--for example, Fred Wander's recently translated The Seventh Well (1971; translated 2008)--but in a book on social networks and identity, more detail on individual experience and stories would have been welcome. Dealing with such a subject, of course, requires a delicate balance between bringing out the individual voices of the refugees and explaining the framework for those experiences. Rolinek provides a solidly researched, often incisive account of discrete aspects of Jewish refugee life without attempting a broader synthesis or any tracing through of individual narratives.

In an enlightening foreword to the book, Thomas Albrich states that three hundred thousand Jewish refugees passed through Austria until 1950, with presumably only a small number afterwards.[1] As Rolinek makes clear, these refugees were not a homogeneous group, though Zionism was a generally prevalent sentiment among them. Her study relies on archival work in Austria, America, and Israel. Much of the material has only recently been collected, since, as one survivor recounts: "[d]igging in the past is a monumental task. Reviving war memories is painful" (p. 27). Rolinek's book is divided into five sections: the introduction; a perceptive background chapter on the administration of the camps; sections on the search for home and identity (1945-47) and loyalty to Israel and alternatives (1948-1955); and, finally, a cursory concluding chapter about integration and the evolving historiography.

The second section describes the overlapping authorities and organizations that pushed their varying viewpoints, all operating in chaotic, constantly changing circumstances. Rolinek is particularly good at untangling the complex web of American, Allied, Jewish, Austrian, and international authorities and organizations that competed and negotiated over the sensitive, difficult issue of Jewish refugees. Of particular interest is the Zionist group, Brichach, which facilitated the illegal migration of Jews to Palestine in the period before the formation of the Israeli state. The normal route led over the Alps to Italy and then on to Palestine. (Ironically, the route over the Alps was also commonly used by escaping ex-Nazis.) U.S. authorities in general ignored these illegal activities, though other Jewish organizations such as the Zentralkomitee der befreiten Juden in der US-Amerikanischen Besatzungszone (Zentralkomitee) and the Jewish Agency were often in conflict with Brichach.

The situation fundamentally changed with the proclamation of an Israeli state on May 14, 1948. Brichach stressed the need for able-bodied fighters in support of Israel, while other Jewish organizations were torn between loyalty to the new state and responsibility towards the Jewish refugees in general, whatever their final destination. Understandably, family interests often came before political convictions and America, the "golden country," presented security and a chance for a new life. Some of this narrative is covered early in the book, while the rest appears much later. Rolinek's decision to divide the book into separate discrete sections--the second section on authorities and camp life covers 1945-55 while the third and fourth sections follow the time periods 1945-47 and then 1948-55--sometimes makes it difficult to piece together events and developments.

For the U.S. Army, the successive waves of refugees presented "a tremendous task requiring a great expenditure of [the army's] efforts and money" (p. 38). The largest wave surged upon liberation of the concentration camps in 1945 (between forty and fifty thousand Jews were held in Austria, mostly at the Mauthausen complex near Linz, while others came from camps further east). Another wave hit in July 1946, following the Kielce pogrom (Poland), and yet another in 1947, when Romanian Jews fled famine. In addition, an almost continuous flow of refugees came from Hungary. The vast majority in the Jewish camps came from Poland, like the young Simon Wiesenthal, who appears throughout the book as chairman of the Zentralkomittee. Wiesenthal played a key role in liaising with the U.S. Army once the Jewish refugees were allocated their own camps and allowed representation (they were originally categorized according to their prewar citizenship, leading to a damning assessment in the Harrison Report of August 1945). As Rolinek notes, representation and self-administration were important in creating an integrated community, since all refugees had arrived stateless and without family.

On a personal level, relations with the U.S. Army were generally good. Many refugees regarded the Americans as "our protectors" (p. 33). U.S. Army Jewish chaplains facilitated the transmission of letters and romances occurred between GIs and survivors; in short, a semblance of everyday life was gradually constructed within the camps. Marriages and births, as Rolinek points out, were particularly numerous in the immediate postwar period. Above all, an obvious need for stability and normality prevailed. Rolinek's comments on the Jewish experience in the camps are insightful. She conveys the difficulty of many who were torn between coping with the past and living for the future, between survivors' guilt and a determination to continue. Along with the difficulties came a search for orientation. For many this search involved an affirmation of their Jewish identity and, following the prevalence of Zionism in their thinking, a desire to build a Jewish state in Palestine. For others, the groupings of Marxists, socialists, and revisionists, among others, proved more attractive. Rolinek effectively traces the slow task of rebuilding Jewish lives, her discussion ranging from chess clubs to basic education to vocational training. While Austria was going through its own process of rebuilding, an even more arduous and miraculous transformation was occurring among the refugees. Not that the Austrians were concerned. Rolinek's descriptions of Austrian attitudes to the Jewish refugees do not paint the local population in a favorable light.

The third section focuses on the period from the declaration of the state of Israel (May 1948) to the Austrian Staatsvertrag (May 1955). Many refugees had already emigrated--the majority to Palestine to face an uncertain future, the rest mainly to America, the land of opportunity. With a new Jewish state, the choice remained the same yet had become starker: participate in the building of Israel or immigrate to the United States. Family interests normally outweighed political convictions, though the choice was often hard. Rolinek presents some interesting case studies of conflicts within families, which only makes it more regrettable that some selected individual accounts are not used to tie the book together and to highlight the interaction of forces weighing on the refugees.

The book has no real conclusion. Rolinek ends with some general comments on the integration of Jewish refugees in their destination countries and the changing historiography. Unfortunately, no summary of the major themes or general schematization helps focus the book. Some comparative perspective would also have been instructive. Was Salzburg special because of the U.S. presence? Or was the situation throughout Austria quite similar? What about the situation in Germany? In sum, Rolinek is good on specific issues but does not provide any real underpinning argument or a sense of individual narratives. Instead, the reader is offered isolated shafts of insight on a transitional period in the long, extraordinary odyssey of central European Jewry.

Note

[1]. For general background, see Thomas Albrich, Exodus durch Österreich: Die jüdischen Flüchtlinge 1945-48 (Innsbruck: Haymon Verlag, 1987); and Thomas Albrich and Ronald Zweig, eds., Escape through Austria: Jewish Refugees and the Austrian Route to Palestine (London: Frank Cass Publishers, 2002).

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Citation: Jonathan Kwan. Review of Rolinek, Susanne, Jüdische Lebenswelten 1945-1955: Flüchtlinge in der amerikanischen Zone Österreichs. H-German, H-Net Reviews. July, 2008.
URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=14755

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