Historical Overview of the Italian Occupation of Southeast France
(November 1942 – September 1943)
Source: © Nancy Lefenfeld
Following the armistice between France and Germany, signed on June 22, 1940, the German army occupied the northern half of France and the area extending along the Atlantic coast.[1] The French government, headquartered in Vichy, administered the southern part of the country, which was referred to as the “Unoccupied Zone” or the “Free Zone;” and it worked in conjunction with German military and civilian officials in Paris to administer the German zone of occupation (i.e., the “Occupied Zone”). The Occupied and Unoccupied Zones were divided by a 1,200-kilometer (roughly 750-mile) line of demarcation. Checkpoints were set up along major north-south routes and, in order to cross the line of demarcation legally, one needed proper authorization. This situation remained essentially unchanged for more than two years.
On November 8, 1942, Allied forces landed in North Africa. Three days later, on November 11, German troops occupied most of the southern part of France, while ceding the southeasternmost part of the country to their Axis partner Italy.
The Italian Occupation Zone encompassed all of seven departments (the Alpes Maritimes, Var, Haute-Alpes, Basses-Alpes[2], Drome, Savoie, Haute Savoie) as well as part of three others (Isère, Vaucluse, and Ain).[3] In determining the precise line of demarcation between the respective zones of occupation, the German army placed cities of strategic importance – notably, Marseilles, Avignon, and Aix-en-Provence – under its own control.
Throughout the summer and fall of 1942, French police, French administrative officials on all levels, and German military personnel and diplomatic officials had worked in coordination to locate, seize, intern, and deport individuals whom they deemed Jewish.[4] By the time German and Italian soldiers took up positions in their respective zones, in November 1942, 42,000 Jewish men, women, and children had been sent from the Drancy internment camp just north of Paris to Auschwitz. German and French authorities fully expected that the Italian occupying force, the Fourth Army, would serve as a reliable third partner in this effort. This did not happen, however.
What did happen in the Italian Occupation Zone of France surprised nearly everyone. In accordance with decisions made at the highest levels of government, Italian military authorities in France did not arrest Jews or turn them over to French or German authorities. Moreover, the Italians stepped in to prevent French government officials from implementing their own measures against Jews.
Despite the fact that eighty years have elapsed since the end of the war, the history of the Italian Occupation Zone in France is not well known. This section seeks to provide a brief overview of what transpired during that unusual historical interlude.
Source: © Nancy Lefenfeld
FOOTNOTES
[1] Germany annexed a part of the Alsace-Lorraine region (departments of the Moselle, Bas-Rhin, and Haut-Rhin), and it placed the departments of the Nord and the Pas de Calais under the administration of its military authorities in Belgium.
[2] This is the former name of the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence.
[3] Carpi, Daniel, Between Mussolini and Hitler: The Jews and the Italian Authorities in France and Tunisia. (Hanover, New Hampshire: Brandeis University Press, 1994). Sources differ somewhat in terms of their description of the territory included in the Italian Occupation Zone. The definition cited here is that used by Carpi on page 80. More specifically, he notes that the departments of the Isère and the Vaucluse were almost entirely included and that only a small part of the department of the Ain was included.
[4] During this early period of terror, it was mainly – although not exclusively – foreign nationals and stateless persons who were targeted. Because whole families were seized, many French-born children also ended up in the hands of their oppressors were deported and murdered.
Throughout the ten months of the Italian occupation of southeast France, German, French, and Italian officials stationed in Paris, Berlin, Rome, and Nice and elsewhere sent a multitude of telegrams, notes, and other forms of written communication to one another in an attempt to obtain information, express dissatisfaction and outrage, and assert their own prerogatives regarding the fate of Jews residing in southeast France. Many of these documents have survived and are to found in French, Italian, and German archives, including the Mémorial de la Shoah in Paris. Certain of these documents have, over the years, been reproduced, in whole or in part, in secondary sources.
The predecessor to the Mémorial de la Shoah, the Centre de documentation juive contemporaine (Center for Contemporary Jewish Documentation; CDJC) was founded by Isaac Schneersohn in 1943 to preserve documentary evidence of the Shoah in France. One year after the Second World War ended, the CDJC published Léon Poliakov’s La condition des juifs en France sous l’occupation italienne.[5] This collection of key documents from the period and its accompanying, brief commentary served to provide an early foothold towards understanding the history. The book was translated into English and published, in 1955, as Jews Under the Italian Occupation. Four decades later, in 1994, the subject was made more readily accessible to English readers when Brandeis University Press published Daniel Carpi’s insightful analysis entitled Between Mussolini and Hitler: The Jews and the Italian Authorities in France and Tunisia. This excellent work drew extensively from the archives of the Italian Foreign Ministry and the Italian Army as well as those of the CDJC.
FOOTNOTES
[5] Poliakov, Léon, La condition des juifs en France sous l’occupation italienne. (Paris: Éditions du Centre, 1946); and Poliakov, Léon, and Sabille, Jacques, Jews Under the Italian Occupation. (Éditions du Centre: 1955). Although Jews Under the Italian Occupation is generally referred to as a translation of La condition des juifs en France sous l’occupation italienne, the two volumes differ somewhat in terms of content.
Sequence of Key Events:
DECEMBER 1942 – FEBRUARY 1943
The word “sovereignty” can be defined as the supreme power or authority of a state to govern itself, free from outside interference. In early December 1942, the French government in Vichy issued three new measures pertaining to the treatment of Jews. This action had an untended effect: it thrust to the fore the question of who held sovereignty over Jews living in southeast France, in the Italian Occupation Zone.
The most egregious of the new measures instructed prefects of departments on the Mediterranean to remove a specific category of foreign Jews – those who had entered the country after January 1, 1938 – from territory situated within 30 kilometers of the coast.[6] Those removed were to be relocated to the departments of the Ardèche and the Drôme. The Ardèche was in the German Occupation Zone; the Drôme was in the Italian Occupation Zone but bordered the German zone. On December 20, Marcel Ribière, the prefect of the Alpes-Maritimes, ordered that all foreign Jews to whom the directive applied must prepare for evacuation within 72 hours.
It should be noted here that only two departments in the Italian Occupation Zone – the Alpes-Maritimes and the Var – bordered the Mediterranean. Of the two, the Alpes-Maritimes is most relevant to this discussion. The great majority of Jewish refugees who made their way to the Italian zone settled in or around Nice, in the department of the Alpes-Maritimes. The city’s cosmopolitan nature, numerous hotels, and Jewish institutions and aide organizations were among the factors that drew Jewish refugees to Nice.
Prefect Ribière’s order of December 20 was immediately perceived by Italian authorities not only as an existential threat to the large number of foreign Jews living in their occupation zone but also as a usurpation of their sovereign authority. The Italian consul general in Nice, Alberto Calisse, was one of several Italian officials who raised the alarm with his superiors in Rome. On the thirtieth of December, the head of operations for the Italian Fourth Army, General Trabucchi, ordered Italian troops to resist any efforts on the part of French authorities and police to seize and intern Jews living in departments within their zone of occupation. The general’s orders were also conveyed to the French government in Vichy, which ordered Prefect Ribière to postpone implementation of his directive.[7]
The other two measures issued by the French government in early December warrant brief mention. One required that foreign Jewish men of working age (i.e., 18 to 55) be conscripted into foreign labor battalions. The other stated that all Jews, foreign or French, must report to local police departments, to have the word “Juif” (Jew) stamped on identity documents.
The issuance of the three measures, which differed somewhat in terms of the categories of Jews targeted, had what appears to have been an unintended effect: they provoked Italian officials at the highest levels to assert their near-complete sovereignty over Jews living in their zone of occupation. On the second of January, Italian Foreign Minister Ciano communicated this assertion to all key Italian officials stationed in France. Following that communication, Count Calisse issued a series of written instructions to Prefect Ribière, interdicting the implementation of either the labor conscription order or the stamping of identity cards.
Throughout the ten months that the Italian army occupied southeast France, Nazi Germany did not seek to contravene, by use of force, any actions taken by the Italians to protect the lives of Jews.[8] Numerous German security and diplomatic officials did, however, spend an astounding amount of time communicating with one another and with French and Italian officials about the situation. Even today, eighty years after the end of the war, one can be startled to read the names of individuals that appear on telegrams and reports and to understand that even the highest-ranking German officials in Paris and Berlin were consumed with the issue. Of numerous documents originating at the time and preserved in various archives, a few are mentioned and excerpted here, to give some insight as to what was transpiring at the time.[9]
On February 2, 1943, S. S. Standartenfuehrer Helmut Knochen, the head of the Nazi security police (SiPO) and the intelligence service (SD) in Paris, forwarded to the Gestapo Chief S. S. Gruppenführer Heinrich Mueller the report he had received from Marcel Ribière, the Prefect of the Alpes-Maritimes. Knochen asked him to have the report translated and forwarded to Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler. Knochen states that the report describes in detail “the manner in which the Italian services in the Department of the Alpes-Maritimes have taken the Jews under their protection.” He notes that “it throws a strange and conclusive light on the attitude of the Italians in regard to the Jewish question.”[10] Around the same time, Ernst Achenbach, the head of the political section of the German Embassy in Paris, sent a communiqué to S. S. Obersturmführer Heinz Röthke, head of the Jewish section of the Gestapo, regarding the treatment of Jews in the Italian Occupation Zone. He attached to the report the text of an article that appeared in the New York Times on January 21, 1943. The article, headlined “Jews’ Badges in France: Vichy Order Cancelled by Italians.,” includes the following:
Last week in the Italian -occupied departments of the Savoie, Haute-Savoie, Basses-Alpes, Hautes-Alpes, Alpes-Maritimes, and Var, the Italian commanding Generals notified the prefects that it was irreconcilable with the dignity of the Italian army that in territories occupied by Italians Jews should be compelled to appear in public with this stigmatizing badge, and consequently notified the prefects that Vichy’s orders were to be cancelled.”[11]
In addition to growing frustrated and angry with their inability to eliminate Jews living in southwest France, German officials feared that the recalcitrance – indeed, resistance – maintained by the Italians was having, and would continue to have, have unwanted repercussions within and outside of France. On the twelfth of February, Knochen once again wrote to Mueller. Listed below the subject line of the long memo (“Final solution of the Jewish Question in France”) is a reference line that reads, “Conversation with S. S. Obersturmbannführer Eichmann in Paris.”[12] Eichmann had expressed to Knochen his dissatisfaction with the fact that the French government in Vichy had not yet agreed to the German demand that all Jews – including those of French nationality – be subject to deportation.[13] Knochen’s purpose in writing to Mueller was to “state the [French] position on this question briefly and to draw your attention to the conditions which could in this siuation make the least difficulties for us with the French government.”[14] He then enumerates, in this lengthy communication, the possible political ramifications that might result from the rounding up of French Jews. While raising the question of “whether Pétain – as Chief of State – can still serve the interests of Germany,” he stresses that Prime Minister Pierre Laval would “swallow the anti-Jewish laws if he gets a political guarantee, whatever its form may be” and that he [Laval] would guarantee the cooperation of the French police in rounding up Jews. He characterizes France as a country on the brink: uncertain as to whether Nazi Germany or the Allies will be victorious, they have adopted a cautious “wait and see” attitude. (According to Knochen, the Americans had already made certain promises to the French about territories that would be restored to them after the war, while Germany had made no such promises.) “Basing themselves on this ‘waiting position,’ the French people will resist new anti-Jewish legislation, so as to show the Americans that France will not subject herself to German orders.” Integral to the entire exposition is the Italians’ treatment of the Jews living in southeast France.
They [the French] draw arguments against Germany from the Italian attitude. They say – and these are facts, pointed out and underlined by all S. D. services and all other German services – that the Italians are everywhere east of the Rhône intervening in favour of the Jews.
The best of harmony prevails between the Italian troops and the Jewish population. The Italians live in the homes of the Jews. The Jews invite them out and pay for them. The German and Italian conceptions seem here to be completely at variance. We are informed on the French side that Jewish influence has already given birth to pacifist and communist rot in the mind of the Italian soldiers, even creating a pro-American tendency. They say that French and Italians, both Latin peoples, understand each other much better than French and Germans or Germans and Italians.
The communication concludes with the following statement: “The first condition for the application of the anti-Jewish measures throughout France is that they must be applied in the Italian zone. If not, the influx of Jews into this zone – an influx which is only at its beginning – will be only half-measures.”
A final standoff between French and Italian authorities warrants brief mention. Deportations of Jews from Drancy to Auschwitz had been halted for a three-month period of time, between early November 1942 and early February 1943. Upon their resumption, the Germans, eager to fill the deportation trains, pressured Vichy officials to instigate widespread manhunts of Jews throughout former Unoccupied Zone, including three departments that were under the jurisdiction of the Italians (the Savoie, Haute-Savoie, and Drôme). In the third week of February, Italian soldiers were dispatched to a few locations – notably Annecy, in the department of the Haute-Savoie – to cordon off local police stations and thereby prevent the transfer of Jews who had been seized and were awaiting deportation.
It is important to note here that, in the early months of 1943, Italian officials in Rome were receiving detailed reports, from reliable sources, describing the nature of atrocities being carried out against Jews, in various countries, by the Nazi regime. These very credible and detailed reports could not be dismissed.
FOOTNOTES
[6] The ostensible reason for requiring the removal was that the presence of these foreigners posed a security risk.
[7] In Between Hitler and Mussolini (pages 87 to 89), Carpi presents an excellent discussion of the events described here.
[8] By that point in the war (early 1943), the German army had suffered major setbacks. German and Italian forces were locked in combat with Allied forces in North Africa. An Allied invasion from Britain was seen as inevitable. Germany needed to preserve the Axis for as long as possible. .
[9] In Between Hitler and Mussolini (page 106), Carpi writes that, “The days of the end of January and beginning of February 1943 were days of untiring, almost incredible activity on the part of German and Italian diplomats and military officials on the question of coordinating policy toward the Jews between two Axis partners.” He notes, for example, on page 108, that, in the course of three days, S.S. Standartenfuehrer Knochen sent four memoranda to various German colleagues describing the “incomprehensible and potentially dangerous attitude taken by the Italian authorities in France.”
[10] Poliakov and Sabille, Jews Under the Italian Occupation, page 56.
[11] Ibid., page 58.
[12] Ibid., pages 60 – 63.
[13] As noted earlier, many children of foreign-born Jews, who were indeed French citizens, had already been arrested and deported.
[14] Ibid., page 60. At times, French officials showed a willingness to acquiesce to this demand, but they refused to take definitive action.
MARCH – JULY 1943
Frustrated by the events that had transpired to date, German officials sought to force the issue of how the “Jewish problem” in the Italian Occupation Zone would be handled. On March 17, the German ambassador to Rome, von Mackensen, met with Il Duce (Mussolini) to lay out three options as to how the Italians might handle matters regarding the treatment of Jews living in their occupation zone. The first option was to place such matters in the hands of the French police. The second was to place them in the hands of the Italian police (i.e., instead of the Italian army). The third was to look to the SS-Reischsführer, who would work in conjunction with the French police. At the meeting, Mussolini indicated to the ambassador that he was leaning towards the first option.
The following day, influential advisors, most notably the new Italian Foreign Minister, Giuseppe Bastianini, persuaded Mussolini to select the second option instead of the first. On March 19, Mussolini transferred responsibility for overseeing matters related to Jews in southeast France from the army to the police. That same day, he appointed Police Inspector General Guido Lospinoso to oversee all necessary operations. The Inspector General left Rome immediately. Within three days’ time, he had established his headquarters in Nice, having made a stop, along the way, in Menton, France, to consult with members of the Italian Fourth Army Command.
Lospinoso was charged with removing Jews from coastal areas situated within the Italian Occupation Zone. The Jews removed from coastal areas were to be relocated to towns and villages at least 100 kilometers (62 miles) inland. Upon establishing his headquarters in Nice, the police Inspector General immediately set out to secure accommodations that would be suitable and available. In the neighboring towns of Saint-Gervais and Megève (department of the Haute-Savoie), in the French Alps, he negotiated with local officials and the owners of hotels, pensions (guest houses), and similar accommodations that had been largely vacant during the war. These two towns, which are quite distant from the coast (about 250 kilometers or 150 miles), were designated to receive the largest numbers of resettled refugees.[15] Lospinso also worked in cooperation with Jewish leaders in Nice, to “recruit” Jews who were willing to be relocated and to schedule and carry out orderly departures of buses that had been chartered for that purpose.
In April and May, as the resettlement program was at its peak, German officials made repeated efforts to contact and meet with Lospinoso. That the Inspector General felt no compunction to respond to any German inquiries is amply documented. A selection of telegrams reproduced in Jews Under the Italian Occupation attests to the man’s elusiveness.
A telegram dated April 5, sent by Knochen to Mueller states: “We tried to get full details from the Italian services in Paris about the journey of Inspector General Lospinoso of the Italian Police. In reply to an enquiry in Menton, we are told that so far nothing is known of his journey.”[16] In a telegram dated April 7, Mueller replies to Knochen: “…before I address myself to the Chief of the Italian Police, I would ask you to make sure whether Lospinoso is really in France. As I have already informed you, the Chief of the Italian Police declared to me recently that Lospinoso has been in France for some days.”[17] On May 12, Roethke sent a telegram addressed to “To the Commando of the Security Police in Dijon and of the S.D. and to the Commandos of Lyon and Marseille” requesting their help: “We ask you to inform us and to send us all observations concerning the use of the Italian police for regulating the Jewish question; we are particularly interested to know the exact date on which the measures were applied, and the methods used by the Italian police in the different regions.”[18]
Telegram sent from Paris on May 12, 1943, by Heinz Roethke to the Commando of the Security Police in Dijon and the S.D. and to the Commandos of Lyon and Marseille. Source: Mémorial de la Shoah, I-46.
On May 24, Roethke sent a note to Knochen with the following: “The S. S. Chief Sturmfuehrer Gudekunst has been in touch with Lieutenant Malfatti about the visit we were told to expect from Inspector General Lospinoso of the Italian Police. Malfatti stated that the Italian Embassy had no visit during this time from Lospinoso, and was not aware of this projected journey.”[19] That same day, Knochen sent a lengthy communication to Mueller. After complaining that “Inspector General Lospinoso of the Italian police has still not come to see me, and that we know nothing of his possible presence in the Italian zone,” he offers his blunt assessment: “These facts only confirm my suspicion that certain Italian services are not at all interested in the solution of the Jewish question in France, and that they are applying in this regard – as far as possible – a delaying tactic.”[20]
Telegrams and other forms of written communication sent by German officials in June and July continued to express much of the same confusion, uncertainty, and frustration as that cited above. In a summary report dated July 21, Roethke addressed “the Present State of the Jewish Question in France.” Under the subheading “Numerical Situation,” he sets forth estimates of the numbers of Jews living in various cities in France (Paris , 60,000; Lyon, 40,000; etc.) and puts the number of Jews living in the Italian Occupation Zone at 50,000. Under the subheading “Italian Attitude on the Jewish Question,” he begins by saying that “The attitude of the Italians is, and was incomprehensible.” He doesn’t stop there.
The Italian military authorities and the Italian police protect the Jews by every means in their power. The Italian zone of influence, particularly the Côte d’Azur, has become the Promised Land for the Jews in France. In the last few months there has been a mass-exodus of Jews from our occupation zone into the Italian zone. The escape of Jews is facilitated by the existence of thousands of flight-routes, the assistance given them by the French population and the sympathy of the authorities, false identity cards, and also the size of the area which makes it impossible to seal off the zones of influence hermetically.[21]
FOOTNOTES
[15] Approximately 850 Jews were placed in assigned residence in Saint-Gervais in the spring of 1943. The number typically cited for Megève for slightly lower, about 770. Much smaller numbers of Jewish refugees were relocated to small towns and villages that were away from, yet still within, 100 kilometers of the coast. These small towns and villages included the following: Saint-Martin-Vésubie, Venanson, and Vence in the department of the Alpes-Maritimes; and Castellane and Barcelonnette in the department of the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence.
1] Poliakov and Sabille, op. cit., page 74.
[17] Ibid., page 76.
[18] Ibid., page 80.
[19] Ibid., page 83.
[20] Ibid., page 84.
[21] Ibid., pages 104 – 106. The communication is addressed to an Obersturmbannführer Dr. Schmidt.
AUGUST – SEPTEMBER 1943
On the night of July 9 – 10, the Allies began their miliary campaign against Italy by invading the island of Sicily. It was a massive attack, involving large numbers of parachutists and troops brought ashore via amphibious vehicles. In less than six weeks, “Operation Husky,” as it was called, had driven Italian and German forces from the island. In early September, the Allies would use that island foothold to launch their invasion of the Italian mainland.
By that time, Italy had suffered a number of military defeats, and the public ‘s confidence in, and support of Mussolini was at a low point. On July 25, Vittorio Emanuele II, the King of Italy, backed by the Fascist Grand Council and the army, deposed and arrested Mussolini. The king called on Marshal Pietro Badoglio, a well-known general, to form a new government.
Initially, many in Italian Occupation Zone – Jews and non-Jews alike as well as many Italian soldiers stationed there – celebrated the news, believing it heralded the end of the war. Unbridled celebration quickly gave way to grave concern, however. The situation that had existed in southeast France had suddenly become destabilized. It was impossible to predict how events would unfold. It seemed likely that the Italian army would withdraw from all or part of the territory it occupied in France, but no one knew when or how this would occur. Although the situation was unsettling for many who lived in the Italian Occupation Zone, it was particularly perilous for Jews. What would happen to them? Would they fall into the hands of German and French authorities, eager to arrest and deport them? Would they be allowed to retreat along with Italian soldiers and remain under their protection?
As August began, anxiety was high among Jews living in Saint-Gervais, Megève, and other centers of assigned residence established by the Italian authorities. Jewish leaders of those enclaves kept in contact with key individuals in Nice, awaiting instructions as to when and how the refugees should evacuate and where they should go. Generally speaking, Jews believed that their chances for survival were best if they remained in Italian hands; for that reason, Jewish leaders sought assurances from Italian officials that, if and when their soldiers withdrew from France, they would not leave the Jewish refugees behind.
The Jewish rescue organization known as OSE (Œuvre de secours aux enfants; generally translated as Children’s Rescue Network) had begun smuggling groups of unaccompanied children from France into Switzerland in March 1943. The border crossings were staged in the French department of the Haute-Savoie; the children were passed into the Swiss canton of Geneva. Once having crossed the border, the children were safe; they were beyond the reach of German and French authorities. A few months later, in May, OSE suspended its smuggling operations. There was no need to continue passing children across the border; Jewish children were safe once brought into the Italian Occupation Zone.
At the end of July 1943, after Mussolini was deposed and the situation in the Italian Occupation Zone became destabilized, OSE resumed its smuggling operation. Shortly after that, OSE officials enjoined Simon Lévitte, the head of the Mouvement de jeunesse sioniste (MJS; Zionist Youth Movement), to set up a second smuggling réseau – a network – that would operate separately from the first. Simon Lévitte asked Mila Racine to take on this dangerous mission. In the middle of August, she conducted a kind of “test case,” organizing a group of 11 unaccompanied children, taking them to the border near Annemasse, and effectuating their clandestine crossing. The eleven children had all been living with their families in Saint-Gervais. Mila was soon joined by a young Jewish man named Tony Gryn. The two worked together to organize and lead a team that included five other MJS members.
By mid- to late August, many living in the Italian Occupation Zone were holding onto the hope that a plan had been put in place and that they would remain in Italian hands. In negotiations with its Axis partner, Italy had agreed to withdraw from most of its occupation zone. It would hold onto the eastern half of the department of the Alpes-Martimes, an area that included the city of Nice. The fate of the Jews living under the protection of the Italian army did not enter into the negotiations about troop withdrawal. Nevertheless, the Italians did not want the Jews to fall into German hands, and the agreement they negotiated seemed to offer a means of protecting them. Most the Jews living in the Italian Occupation Zone resided in Nice. Of the several centers of assigned residence to which Jews had been sent, Saint-Gervais and Megève were of greatest concern; these two centers were far from the area slated to remain in Italian hands and they had become home to large numbers of Jews. In the waning days of August, Jewish leaders in the various inland enclaves worked with members of the Dubouchage Committee in Nice and with Lospinoso and his staff to arrange for the orderly transfer to Jews to what they referred to as the new Italian zone.
In early September, events transpired to upend the agreement that had been negotiated between the Axis partners, and this unfortunate occurrence had terrible consequences for the Jewish refugees in southeast France. On the evening of September 8, General Dwight Eisenhower announced over United Nations radio that Italy had unconditionally surrendered to the Allies. (Some historians have called the timing of the announcement “premature.” However, if one considers the historical record regarding negotiations carried out in August and early September between the representatives of Italy and representatives of the Allies, one must conclude that the word “premature” does nothing to convey the true nature of the situation and is, in fact, misleading.[22]) On that same day (September 8), many of the Jewish refugees who had been living in Saint-Gervais and Megève were brought to Nice via a convoy of military trucks.
Eisenhower’s announcement caught many off-guard, but some were ready and waiting. The German High Command in France had been busy preparing to seize Jews who had been living under the protection of Italian soldiers as soon as the soldiers were gone. German troops had quietly taken up positions throughout the Italian Occupation Zone and were awaiting the order to pounce. On September 4, Röthke had issued a directive to his sub-lieutenant, SS-Stürmbannführer Hagen, to arrest and deport all Jews, regardless of citizenship status.[23] In his lengthy directive, Röthke briefed Hagen on various procedural matters.
The Côte d’Azur, the Departments of Savoie and Haute-Savoie, Grenoble, and all the frontier areas will be the central points for this action… To prevent Jews from escaping the action will begin in the frontier areas and work inward, to clear out all the places mentioned, from east to west.
The Jews will be arrested, with all the members of their families. They may take with them essential clothing, and articles of daily use, provided their immediate transfer to the provisional assembly-points is not for special reasons considered pressing and urgent…
When the capture of the Jews is completed, they will be transferred from the provisional camps in transports of 1,000 to 2,000 heads to the Jewish camp in Drancy, whence after thorough examination of their citizenship they will be immediately evacuated to the east so far as they are capable of being deported.
The complete evacuation of the Jews in the former Italian occupation zone is not only necessary in the interests of the final solution of the Jewish question in France, but is also an urgent security need for the German troops…
Because the Italians have forbidden in their zone of influence the stamping of identity and ration-cards, it is much harder to discover the suspicious elements who belong to the Jewish race than in the former occupation zone, where we are in control of the registers of Jews. Consequently it is necessary to appoint French antisemites to spy out and denounce the Jews who are camouflaged or hidden. Money should be no consideration (propose to pay 100 francs per Jew).
For ten months, the Italians had done their best to keep Jews from falling into German hands. Throughout August, even as their own foothold on French soil slipped, they had promised Jewish refugees that they would protect them. However, once the armistice was announced, Italian soldiers faced the immediate threat of being shot or captured as franc-tireurs, guerilla fighters not entitled to prisoner of war status. To save themselves, they took flight.
Immediately, Wehrmacht troops and a hand-picked team of Gestapo agents took up positions in and around Nice. Historians agree that the reign of terror that they unleashed and pursued throughout the fall of 1943 was unlike anything that had previously transpired in France. Between mid-September and mid-December, 2,157 Jews were transported from Nice to the internment camp at Drancy, often referred to as the antechamber of Auschwitz.[24]
FOOTNOTES
[22] See, for example, Agarossi, Elena, A Nation Collapses: The Italian Surrender of September 1943, translated by Harvey Gergusson II (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000). Armistice negotiations that took place between the Badoglio government of Italy and the Allies were long and complicated. The signing of the armistice occurred on September 3 but was kept secret. Upon the signing of the armistice, the Italians were obligated to make whatever preparations were within their power that would enable them to fight alongside the Allies – and in opposition to German forces – once the invasion was launched. The Allies especially counted on the help of the Italian army in and around Rome. Agarossi writes that, “The extent of the Italian lack of preparation was discovered only on the night of September 7, when General Maxwell Taylor arrived in Rome on a secret mission. As commanding general of the paratroop division, he was accompanied by another officer on his mission of drawing up the final agreements and confirming the reliability of Castellano’s assurances that the airports where the Allied paratroopers were to land were indeed in Italian hands. But the two officers realized to their astonishment that the only preparation made for them was a luxurious dinner” (page 87). The lack of preparation on the part of the Italians had the effect of upending the type of coordinated military operation that had been planned.
[23] Poliakov and Sabille, op. cit., pages 119 – 122.
[24] Klarsfeld, Serge, Nice/Hôtel Excelsior: Les rafles des Juifs par la Gestapo à partir du 8 septembre 1943 (Paris : Les Fils et Filles des Déportes Juifs de France, 1998).
Postscript to the Demise of the Italian Occupation Zone in France
As noted above, from late July throughout August, Jews living in the Italian Occupation Zone were aware of the impending threat to their safety and security. They understood that the Allies were preparing to invade Italy and that such an invasion would cause seismic changes in Italy’s relationship with Germany and with the Allies. While no one could predict precisely what would happen or when, Jews who were living under the jurisdiction of the Italian military believed that their chances of survival were best if they remained under such jurisdiction, rather than falling into the hands of German or French authorities. One man’s heroic efforts to devise and implement a plan that would achieve this warrants mention.
Angelo Donati was a Jewish-Italian banker and businessman who was well-known and well-respected by business leaders and government officials in both France and Italy.[25] From the earliest months of the Italian Occupation, Donati worked with members of the Dubouchage Committee to assist Jewish refugees who had managed to make their way to Nice. Once Italian Police Inspector General Guido Lospinoso arrived in Nice, Donati worked in partnership with him. In June, well before Mussolini was deposed, Donati was concerned about what might befall Jews living in southeast France. He sought the assistance of Père Marie-Benoît, a Capuchin monk who was, at that time, being transferred from France to the Vatican.
Angelo Donati
Père Marie-Benoît.
Initially, Donati’s plan was to obtain authorization for thousands of Jews residing in southeast France to enter Italy. He pursued this through discussions with Italian officials in both France and Italy. To further the plan, Père Marie-Benoît sought and eventually obtained a meeting with Pope Pius XII and submitted materials to the pontiff’s office that detailed this proposal.
In late July, after King Vittorio Emanuele II I dismissed Mussolini and appointed Marshal Pietro Badoglio as the head of a new government, it became clear that Italy, which already perceived itself as struggling to accommodate a large number of refugees, was not going to be receptive to the idea of absorbing 20,000 to 30,000 Jewish refugees exiting France. In August, Donati amended his plan: he proposed that the refugees admitted into the Italy then be transferred to North African territory held by British and American authorities. The transfer was to be effectuated using leased Italian ships, the cost of which would be paid by funds received from the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (“the Joint”).
Throughout August and the first days of September, Donati and Père Marie-Benoît worked diligently to gain the acceptance of this plan by the various parties involved and to attend to the complex logistics required to implement it. It was not an easy task. A large number of individuals were involved, including British and American diplomats, Italian government officials, and representatives of the Vatican and the Holy See. General Eisenhower’s announcement of the armistice on Setpember 8 put an end to any hope of achieving what had been planned.
FOOTNOTES
[25] An excellent discussion of the significance of Angelo Donati in the history of the Italian Occupation Zone of France as well as of his plan to rescue Jews can be found in Susan Zuccotti’s Père Marie-Benoît and Jewish Rescue: How a French Priest Together with Jewish Friends Saved Thousands during the Holocaust (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2013). As the title suggests, the book also provides great insight into the role that Père Marie-Benoît played in seeking acceptance of, and support for the Donati plan. As Zuccotti explains, the priest’s work on behalf of the Donati plan was only one of a number of efforts he made, in France and Italy, to assist and save Jews during the Shoah.
Photo: Painting by Daniella Wexler Racine.
MILA'S LEGACY
Daniella Wexler Racine is a daughter of Mila’s brother, Emmanuel (Mola). She has lived in Israel for nearly all of her life. Formerly a judge, she is now a renowned multi-media artist whose works have been exhibited in Israel and abroad. Daniella created the four paintings of Mila that appear on this website. I invited her to share her thoughts about the painting you see here and, more generally, about how Mila inspired her life and art.
I painted this portrait of my Aunt Mila, whom I never knew, in 2009, after the death of my father, her brother. At that time, I discovered documents, photographs, and medals posthumously awarded her. She was a heroine of the Resistance, having saved many children by secretly helping them cross into Switzerland.
Although she had been, in her youth, a pampered and fragile girl, the war revealed in her a woman of exceptional courage.
In my imagination, Mila has always been young, beautiful, and radiant, surrounded by admirers and the object of their affection. She loved to sing and dance and had an immense joy for life. That is why I wanted this portrait of her to be colorful, feminine, and radiant. I wish for her to be remembered in this way, and not only through the prism of the war
.and the Holocaust