© 1990 by United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
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ON THE RELATIONS BETWEEN THE BALTIC PEOPLES AND THEIR JEWISH NEIGHBORS BEFORE, DURING AND AFTER WORLD WAR II*
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem Israel
The article surveys relations between the Baltic peoples and the Jews, from the beginning of Jewish settlement in these countries several centuries ago to the present time. These relations have been overshadowed in this century by two relatively brief but powerful and contradictory historical occurrences: the socio-cultural autonomy granted the Jewish minority by the independent Baltic states betwen the wars, and the massive participation of Baltic nationals in the murder of the Jews in the Holocaust. A bitter polemic has ensued since then between Jewish survivors from these countries and Baltic emigres living in the West Among the latter there is a tendency to minimize Baltic collaboration and come to the defense of accused Baltic war criminals, while at the same time portraying such collaboration as an understandable reaction to supposed Jewish collaboration with the Soviets against the Balts during the year of Soviet rule, June 1940–June 1941. Recently, such symmetrical formulations have appeared within the Baltic countries as well. Yet, the younger generation of Baltic emigres in the West have displayed a new, more honest approach to the Holocaust in their countries.
*This is a revised version of the paper presented at the ‘Remembering for the Future’ Conference, Oxford, 10–13 July, 1988.