Friends
Victims of Nazi racism often faced persecution from people they knew well and trusted—their friends. For many survivors of the Holocaust, sudden betrayals by friends are among their most painful memories. A small number of survivors describe great loyalty from their non-Jewish friends and acts of bravery that saved their lives. What might have motivated non-Jews to sever ties with Jewish friends and even join in the efforts to persecute them?
Background: Beno and Jacob (Gerd) Zwienicki (first and second on the right) pose in front of their father's bicycle shop with a group of non-Jewish children from the neighborhood. Bremen, Germany, 1929.
US Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Jacob G. Wiener
1. A Friend Joins an Anti-Jewish Mob
A Friend Joins an Anti-Jewish Mob
Oral History: Ruth Rack
For years, Ruth Rack’s family was friendly with non-Jewish neighbors. Ruth and her brother, Bob, attended a mostly non-Jewish school in Leipzig, Germany. Bob played sports with non-Jewish neighborhood friends. That all began to change in 1937, when Bob’s non-Jewish playmates threw a rock through the family’s window. The rock bore a note: “Jews get out.”
Not even this attack could have prepared Ruth for the wave of violence known as Kristallnacht. For several days in November 1938, non-Jewish Germans joined Nazi forces in terrorizing and beating Jewish people. Across Germany, they burned synagogues and looted businesses owned by Jews.
During Kristallnacht, as Ruth struggled through crowds harassing her in the street, she saw a familiar face: her friend and neighbor.
USC Shoah Foundation—The Institute for Visual History and Education
Leipzig’s Gottschedstrasse synagogue in 1860. Die Bau und Kunstdenkmäler von Sachsen. Stadt Leipzig. Die Sakralbauten. Deutscher Kunstverlag, München 1995, Bd. 1 S. 792; quote from Jeremy Noakes, Documents on Nazism, 1919–1945
The synagogue after Kristallnacht, shortly before its demolition. Die Bau und Kunstdenkmäler von Sachsen. Stadt Leipzig. Die Sakralbauten. Deutscher Kunstverlag, München 1995, Bd. 1 S. 792; quote from Jeremy Noakes, Documents on Nazism, 1919–1945
A Friend Joins an Anti-Jewish Mob
Gutted by Flames
Ruth Rack was shocked when she saw her synagogue had been set on fire during Kristallnacht. Another observer described crowds of non-Jews in Leipzig gathered around the rubble after the blaze: “the blackened frames [of the synagogue] have been centers of attraction during the past week of terror...” German authorities demolished what remained of the building soon after.
Anyone walking by the burned synagogue likely understood that Jews were now unwelcome in Germany. Jewish people could expect to face violence from their non-Jewish neighbors.
Location: Nazi Germany
Beginning in 1933, Adolf Hitler and the Nazis transformed the country into a dictatorship. New anti-Jewish policies met with support among some Germans. The regime’s economic and foreign policy successes helped many ordinary people accept attacks on Jews. By early 1939, Nazi Germany had annexed Austria and the Czech lands.
Six-year-old Ruth on her first day of school in 1934. USC Shoah Foundation—The Institute for Visual History and Education
A Friend Joins an Anti-Jewish Mob
No Longer Safe
Like thousands of other Jewish men during Kristallnacht, Ruth’s father was arrested by the Gestapo and sent to a concentration camp. When he returned, Ruth’s parents decided it was no longer safe in Germany. They began trying to find a way out for their children.
Ruth and her brother left Germany in May 1939 as part of a rescue mission known as the Kindertransport. Refugee aid committees and the British government arranged for Ruth and Bob, along with about 10,000 other children in Germany, to resettle in the United Kingdom.
Although Ruth would not learn their fates for years, both of her parents were murdered in the Holocaust. Her father died in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in 1940. Her mother was shot after she was discovered in hiding in 1941.
2. Chilling News from an Old Friend
Zwienicki Motorbikes and Bicycles, Jacob’s father’s shop in Bremen, Germany, 1933. US Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Jacob G. Wiener; quote from Jacob Wiener oral history, 1994
Chilling News from an Old Friend
Jews Face Growing Isolation in Germany
Growing up, Jacob Wiener spent afternoons hanging around his father’s bicycle store in the city of Bremen, Germany. He attended a public school with non-Jewish Germans. Both Jewish and non-Jewish friends gathered at the shop after class and took bike trips together.
When Hitler came to power in 1933, Jacob at first noticed only gradual changes: fewer non-Jewish customers came to the shop, his neighbors grew less friendly, and classmates joined pro-Nazi youth organizations.
Of his non-Jewish friends, Jacob later remembered: “Slowly, they stopped talking to us. Then, later on they started to avoid us by walking on the other side of the street.”
Location: Nazi Germany
Beginning in 1933, Adolf Hitler and the Nazis transformed the country into a dictatorship. New anti-Jewish policies met with support among some Germans. The regime’s economic and foreign policy successes helped many ordinary people accept attacks on Jews. By early 1939, Nazi Germany had annexed Austria and the Czech lands.
Chilling News from an Old Friend
A Swift Escalation
Organized by the Nazi leadership, Kristallnacht marked a sharp turn toward violence against Jews in Germany. The days-long wave of attacks had a devastating impact on Jacob’s family.
During Kristallnacht, Nazis shot and killed his mother as they raided the family’s home. Jacob, his father, and his brother soon managed to escape from Germany, joining relatives in Canada.
German emigrants board a ship in the port of Bremen for America, 1936–1939. Courtesy of Rinhart/Getty Images
Beno and Jacob (Gerd) Zwienicki (first on the left and second on the right) pose in front of their father’s bicycle shop with a group of non-Jewish children from the neighborhood. Bremen, Germany, 1929
US Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Jacob G. Wiener
Chilling News from an Old Friend
An Unexpected Letter
Almost 60 years later, Jacob received a letter from an old friend:
3. A Lifeline and a Good Luck Charm
A Lifeline and a Good Luck Charm
Oral History: Frank Ullman
In occupied Amsterdam in 1943, Frank Ullman, his wife, and their young son were facing a dire situation. As German and Dutch authorities deported the city’s Jewish population to camps and killing centers, the family had gone into hiding. They were running out of money and food.
Frank called on an old contact for help. Before the war, he had gotten to know a rug merchant named Kena. Despite their different backgrounds—Kena was a devout Muslim—the two had became friendly. When Frank approached Kena, he agreed to give Frank rugs to sell. Frank was then able to earn enough money to buy food.
The Ullman family survived nearly three years in hiding during the Holocaust. They moved to the United States after the war.
USC Shoah Foundation—The Institute for Visual History and Education
Leo Ullman displays a prayer rug given to his father by a friend in Amsterdam in 1943. Courtesy of The Foote School, New Haven, CT
A Lifeline and a Good Luck Charm
Survivors’ Talisman
Among the rugs Kena gave to Frank was a rug used for prayer in Muslim worship.
Frank and his family treasured the prayer rug as a reminder of Kena’s courage and generosity in the face of extreme danger.
Leo Ullman, who was just a toddler while his family was hiding in Amsterdam, often shows the rug when he speaks about surviving the Holocaust: “[My parents] felt it saved them.”
4. Indifference from Friends, Kindness from Strangers
Indifference from Friends, Kindness from Strangers
Oral History: Norbertas Jokūbauskas
As she was forced to undress and walk toward a mass grave, a young Lithuanian Jewish woman recognized the man guarding her. The two had met and danced together in high school. She begged him to save her from being shot.
The guard was a young Lithuanian man named Norbertas Jokūbauskas. Like many other non-Jewish Lithuanians, he had volunteered in 1941 to fight in Germany’s war against a shared enemy: the Soviet Union. His unit was attached to one of dozens of killing squads that murdered over one million Jewish people in the Soviet Union.
Despite what seems to be a fondness for the young woman, Norbertas claimed that there was nothing he could do to help her.
US Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of the Jeff and Toby Herr Foundation
Ada Gens, age 13, in traditional Lithuanian costume at a dance in 1938–1939. US Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Ada Gens Ustjanauskas
Indifference from Friends, Kindness from Strangers
A Stranger Offers Sanctuary
Jewish and Christian Lithuanians socialized, did business, and attended school together in the years before World War II. Despite rising anti-Jewish sentiment, some became friends, and others even married.
Ada Gens grew up in Kaunas (Kovno), Lithuania. Her mother was Christian. Her father, an officer in the Lithuanian army, was Jewish. Ada studied dance and went to school with both Jewish and Christian students.
Ada was just graduating high school when Nazi Germany invaded Lithuania in 1941. After the Gestapo shot her father, Ada and her mother fled in fear. Boarding a train, another passenger noticed their distress and offered to hide them. Ada and her mother survived for two years in hiding with his help. In 1947, they emigrated to the United States.
Location: Occupied Eastern Europe
Nazi Germany invaded Poland in 1939 and the Soviet Union in 1941. German authorities introduced brutal occupation policies and began isolating, shooting, and deporting Jews. Nazi leaders relied on ordinary people to help carry out their plans to murder all European Jews.
5. A Kind of Homecoming
A Kind of Homecoming
Oral History: Jack Pariser
On the run for almost two years, Jack Pariser’s family had run out of options in 1944. The Parisers had been thrown out of a hiding place with a Polish family. As German forces continued to hunt for Jews in occupied Poland, their helpers feared they would be discovered. The punishment for hiding Jews was death.
Desperate and nearly starving, the Parisers turned to an old friend, a Polish man named Leo Świerczek. He took the Parisers in, hiding them in his barn and feeding them until the end of the war.
German soldiers searched the Świerczeks’ home, but they never found the hidden family. Jack, his sister, and his parents all survived.
USC Shoah Foundation—The Institute for Visual History and Education
Leo Świerczek (center) poses with his sons, Kazimierz (left) and Stanisław (right). Courtesy of Jack Pariser; quote from the film "Testimony of Triumph" (2001)
A Kind of Homecoming
Longstanding Bonds
Leo Świerczek and Jack Pariser’s father, Abraham, had done business together before World War II. Despite their different backgrounds—the Świerczeks were Christian, the Parisers, Jewish—their children had played together at school. The two families became trusted friends.
When German forces invaded Poland in 1939, they began confiscating all Jewish people’s property. Leo Świerczek agreed to hide the Parisers’ belongings as they fled into the woods. He later sold many of these items to provide the Parisers with food.
Jack later recalled that after sleeping outdoors or in underground dugouts for almost two years, staying with the Świerczeks felt like home: “For the first time in over two years, we had a warm meal every day.”
Location: Occupied Eastern Europe
Nazi Germany invaded Poland in 1939 and the Soviet Union in 1941. German authorities introduced brutal occupation policies and began isolating, shooting, and deporting Jews. Nazi leaders relied on ordinary people to help carry out their plans to murder all European Jews.