Als Juden vor verschlossenen Grenzen standen

In the organizer's words:

Harassed and persecuted in Germany, many Jews desperately tried to escape to safe havens abroad in the years following the National Socialist takeover in 1933. However, potential countries of refuge closed their borders and sealed themselves off more and more with every further German expansion.

The League of Nations and the US government tried unsuccessfully to coordinate refugee policy: At the conference in Évian, France, in July 1938, states and aid organizations discussed the admission of refugees - without result. The Nazis sneered that nobody wanted the Jews. As refugees were denied regular entry, they boarded unseaworthy boats, paid escape helpers and took illegal routes to safety.

Susanne Heim's new book "Die Abschottung der Welt. When Jews stood before closed borders: 1933-1945" will be published in the "Historical Library of the Gerda Henkel Foundation" series in February. It is a fundamental work: never before has international refugee policy and its dramatic failure been so comprehensively described. It is a necessary and distressing read, as the democratic states still seem to have learned very little.

In conversation:

🐾 Susanne Heim is a historian and political scientist. She headed the academic edition "The Persecution and Murder of European Jews by National Socialist Germany 1933-1945", was a visiting professor in Vienna and conducted research in renowned archives and institutions in Europe and the USA.

🐾 Jan Feddersen will moderate this taz Talk, he is taz editor for special assignments and curator of the taz Talks and the taz lab.

The event will take place in the taz Kantine and via livestream. If you would like to attend the event in the taz Kantine, please register via: https://taz.de/taz-Talk-mit-Susanne-Heim/!vn6146234/

Price information:

Participation is only possible with a pre-booked ticket. We therefore ask you to register via the link above. Places are limited, admission is free. Access to the event is barrier-free.