If you know your history, Neville Chamberlain will ring a bell. If you don't, let me share with you a story.
How the Allies responded to the persecution of the Jews and what might they have done differently...
The response of the Allies to the persecution and destruction of European Jewry was inadequate. Only in January 1944 was an agency, the War Refugee Board, established for the express purpose of saving the victims of Nazi persecution. Prior to that date, little action was taken. On December 17, 1942, the Allies issued a condemnation of Nazi atrocities against the Jews, but this was the only such declaration made prior to 1944.
Moreover, no attempt was made to call upon the local population in Europe to refrain from assisting the Nazis in their systematic murder of the Jews. Even following the establishment of the War Refugee Board and the initiation of various rescue efforts, the Allies refused to bomb the death camp of Auschwitz and/or the railway lines leading to that camp, despite the fact that Allied bombers were at that time engaged in bombing factories very close to the camp and were well aware of its existence and function.
Other practical measures which were not taken concerned the refugee problem. Tens of thousands of Jews sought to enter the United States, but they were barred from doing so by the stringent American immigration policy. Even the relatively small quotas of visas which existed were often not filled, although the number of applicants was usually many times the number of available places. Conferences held in Evian, France (1938) and Bermuda (1943) to solve the refugee problem did not contribute to a solution. At the former, the countries invited by the United States and Great Britain were told that no country would be asked to change its immigration laws. Moreover, the British agreed to participate only if Palestine were not considered. At Bermuda, the delegates did not deal with the fate of those still in Nazi hands, but rather with those who had already escaped to neutral lands. Practical measures which could have aided in the rescue of Jews included the following:
- Permission for temporary admission of refugees
- Relaxation of stringent entry requirements
- Frequent and unequivocal warnings to Germany and local populations all over Europe that those participating in the annihilation of Jews would be held strictly accountable
- Bombing the death camp at Auschwitz
You see, Neville is best known for his 'appeasement foreign policy', specifically for his signing of the Munich Agreement in 1938 conceding the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia to Adolf Hitler's Germany. And so, even if you don't know Neville, you are surely aware how this story ended.
Yesterday Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke before a joint session of congress pleading for America to understand the dangers of its current appeasement foreign policy, specifically with Iran. And what was our governments response? Nancy Pelosi summed up the Obama administrations feelings when she stated it was "insulting to the intelligence of the United States". Well, she might be right, at least with regards to the part of the US around San Francisco, CA. where banning impulse buys to protect goldfish is a sign of advanced intelligence. For the rest of us, not so much.
You remember Iran. Whose Supreme Leader (really?) Ayatollah Ali Khamenei recently tweeted "Increasing global hatred of #Israel is a sign of divine help", and just this past November sent the following message:
Khamenei.ir@Khamenei
"This barbaric, wolflike & infanticidal regime of #Israel which spares no crime has no cure but to be annihilated." 7/23/14
#HandsOffAlAqsa
6:15 AM - 8 Nov 2014
