Nazi Germany and the Karaites in 1938–1944: between racial theory and Realpolitik

Abstract

This article explores the policies of Nazi Germany towards the Karaites, a group of Jewish ancestry which emerged during the seventh to the ninth centuries CE, when its followers rejected the mainstream Jewish interpretation of Tanakh. Karaite communities flourished in Persia, Turkey, Egypt, Crimea, and Lithuania. From 1938 to 1944, the Nazi bureaucracy and scholarship examined the question of whether the Karaites were of Jewish origin, practiced Judaism and had to be treated as Jews. Because of its proximity to Judenpolitik and later to the Muslim factor, the subject got drawn into the world of Nazi grand policy and became the instrument of internecine power struggles between various agencies in Berlin. The Muslim factor in this context is construed as German cultivation of a special relationship with the Muslim world with an eye to political dividends in the Middle East and elsewhere. Nazi views of the Karaites' racial origin and religion played a major role in their policy towards the group. However, as the tides of the war turned against the Germans, various Nazi agencies demonstrated growing flexibility either to re-tailor the Karaites' racial credentials or to entirely gloss over them in the name of “national interests,” i.e. a euphemism used to disguise Nazi Germany's overtures to the Muslim world.

Keywords:

• Nazi Germany
• Karaites
• Holocaust

Acknowledgements

The research was supported by a grant from the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture.

I am grateful to Professor Dan Shapira and Dr Mikhail Kizilov for their most valuable remarks and the sources they shared with me.

Notes

He repeated his arguments twenty years later in Friedman, Roads to Extinction, 153–75.

The process of German decision-making with regards to the Crimean Karaites in 1941 was further explored in recent years by German scholars Andrej Angrick and Norbert Kunz who dealt with the topic on the background of the activities of the EG D and the German occupation of the Crimea, respectively (Angrick 326–30; Kunz 187–90). The subject is also mentioned in general Holocaust (Arad 374–76) and Karaite studies (Freund 88–96; Schur 123–25; Harviainen 651–54). The Crimean Karaites' own point of view was recently presented by local Karaite researchers Yuri Polkanov and Vladimir Kropotov (Y. Polkanov; Kropotov 82–97, 125–26) but is absent from the writings of other Karaite scholars (Fuki; Kefeli) as well as from the official Karaite history compiled by Israeli-based Karaite researcher Yosef Algamil (Algamil, Toldot ha-yahadut ha-karait 198–200, Ha-yehudim ha-karaim 163–209). In contemporary Russian historiography the subject is handled by Vsevolod Vikhnovich (Vikhnovich, “Massovye etnicheskie deportatsii iz Kryma” 89–93, 2000 let vmeste).

The last period dealt with in the article is the end of 1944. It does not reveal any significant German correspondence on the Karaites in 1945.

A secular State of Israel recognizes Karaites as eligible to make aliyah. This attitude should be traced back to the history of the biggest Karaite community in Egypt that was clearly pro-Zionist prior to Israel's establishment 1948.

Sicherheitshauptamt (Security Service Main Office) controlled the Sicherheitsdienst des Reichsfuhrers-SS (henceforth – RF SS) or SD (Security Service of the RF SS). From 27 September 1939, it became a part of the Reich Central Security Main Office, or the RSHA.

Geheime Staatspolizei. Geheimes Staatspolizeiamt. II B4. Dem Sicherheitshauptamt RF SS in Berlin. Betr.: Karaimen oder Karaiten (Hebraer-Sekte) 12 October 1938. Yad Vashem Archive, Jerusalem, Israel (henceforth – YVA): O.51.Osoby/30, pp. 29–33.

Sicherheitshauptamt RF SS. 27 October 1938. YVA: JM/19022.

For example, the SD report from the occupied Soviet territories (Meldungen aus den besetzten Ostgebieten dated 1 May 1942 enlarged upon the Karaites' high standing in Tsarist Russia. Meldungen aus den besetzten Ostgebieten (henceforth – MbOg). Nr. 1. Berlin. Chef der Sicherheitspolizei und der SD (henceforth – CSpSD). Kommandostab. 1 May 1942. Russian State Military Archive, Moscow, Russia (henceforth – RGVA): fond 500, opis 1, delo 775, p. 78.

Der Generalkomissar in Kauen. Vermerk. Betr.: Karaimenfrage in Litauen: Nichteinordnung als Juden. 1 September 1941. YVA: JM/528.4. Cf. Leibbrandt (Reichsministerium für den besetzten Ostgebieten (henceforth – RMfdOg) an die Partei-Kanzlei, den Reichsinisterium des Innern, das RSHA, das Oberkommando der Wehrmacht. Schnellbrief. Geheim. Betr.: Stellung der Karaimen. 12 June 1943. YVA: JM/528.4.

The analysis of German prewar studies on the Karaites follows Feferman, 101–02.

Gutachten, Prof. Dr. Lothar Löffler, Rassenbiologischen Instituts der Universität Königsberg/Pr. 11 February 1939. In Ehrenreich, The Nazi Ancestral Proof, p. 13.

Referat II 112. Sicherheitshauptamt RF SS. An alle SD-Führer der SS-Oberabschnite. Betr.: Jüdische Sekte: Karaiten. 11 January 1939. YVA: JM/528.4, pp. 27–28.

Idem. On this agency see Ehrenreich; Pegelow.

Der Leiter der Reichsstelle für Sippenforschung. Berlin. 5 January 1939. RGVA: fond 500, opis' 1, delo 263, p. 5. However, the actual decree was adopted by the Ministry of Interior on 22 December 1938. Friedman, “The Karaites under Nazi Rule,” 99.

Teich and Rübel; Die Völker des Kaukasus. RGVA: f. 1323, op. 1, d. 54.

Correspondence between Der Chef des Distriktes Warschau and Der Höchere SS- und Polizeiführer im Generalgouvernement für die besetzten polnischen Gebieten. March-October 1940. YVA: JM/11227.

Ministerol cultrur si artelor. Consiliul de avocati. 8 October 1940. YVA: O.11/115, pp. 1-2. Corrado Gini, “I Caraimi di Polonia e Lituania”, Genus (Roma), 1936. (I am grateful to Dr. M. Kizilov for this information. See also Friedman, “The Karaites under Nazi Rule” 100). Correspondence between the Committee of the Russian refugees in Bulgaria and the Bulgarian Ministry of Interior and Religious Affairs. August-December 1941. YVA: JM/19022.

Friedman, “The Karaites under Nazi Rule” 100–06.

Les caraites. Commissariat général aux questions juives. Statut des personnes. 8 February 1943. YVA: JM/528.4, pp. 2–9.

Mikhail Kizilov, Karaites (Karaims) in Poland and Lithuania in the Twentieth Century. History. Culture. Ethnic Self-Identification (monograph in progress); see esp. Chapter 5. Between the Soviet Scylla and Nazi Charybdis: Polish-Lithuanian Karaites during WWII (1939–1945).

Karaimenfrage in Litauen. YVA: JM/528.4.

Idem.

On the religious criteria, see next section.

On Georg Leibbrandt, see Schmaltz and Sinner 28–64.

RMfdOg an Reichskommissar für das Ostland. Betr.: Stellung der Karaimen. 1 October 1941. YVA: JM/528.4.

Rosenberg's plans included granting wide autonomy and probably curtailed independence under the German protectorate to non-Russian peoples of the Soviet Union. Piper, 509–17.

“Babi Yar”. Account of V. Liberman. L. Ozerov (ed.). Collection of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee. YVA: M.35/25, pp. 12–14.

Report “On the cultural construction among the national minorities” presented by the People's Commissariat for Education at the 1st All-Crimean Conference of national minorities dedicated to the problems of national policy carried out by the Party and the Soviet authorities and to current tasks of the national construction in the Crimea. Quoted in: Igor' Achkinazi, Krimchaki, Istoriko-etnograficheskii ocherk (Simferopol: DAR, 2000), 117–18.

SS-Obersturmführer Alfred Karasek. Testimony of Efim Gopshtein. 16 August 1944. YVA: M.35/23, p. 59. Cf. A. Polkanov 5; Y. Polkanov 119.

Letter by Viktor Beletski to the Prosecutor of the Yaroslavl District. 22 April 1955. Complaint by Viktor Beletski forwarded to the Chief Prosecutor of the USSR. July 1955. US Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, D.C., U.S.A. (henceforth - USHMM) Archive: RG-31.018M, reel 10, pp. 283–85, 297–99.

Operational situation report (henceforth – OSR) USSR No 142. Chief of Security Policy and Security Service (henceforth – CSPSS). Berlin, 5 December 1941. In Yitzhak, Krakowski and Shmuel, 250.

Ortskommandatur I (V) 287. Tätigkeitsbericht für die Zeit bis 12.11.1941. 12 November 1941. Feodosia. 12 November 1941. YVA: M.29.FR/41, p. 21.

On Franz Six, see Hachmeister.

Strafsache gegen Walter Bierkamp. München. 16 July 1959. YVA: TR.10/1147, pp. 18–19. It is of note that at the same time, Himmler ordered to annihilate another Crimean group, Krymchaks, which was also probed on account of its links to Jews and Judaism. Spector, “Shoat ha-yehudim ha-krymchakim”, 18–27.

Idem.

Villages of Kamzetovka, Novyi Korogurt, Mityaevo and Lesnovka. Interrogation of Timofei Budei. 15 December 1949. State Archive of the Security Service of the Ukraine, Simferopol: No 11670, vol. 2, pp. 14, 23–24. Testimony of Iosif Shabanov. 12 January 1950. Idem, vol. 4, pp. 35–36. Courtesy of USHMM. Lvov 185–86.

Stellung der Karaimen. 6 October 1942. YVA: JM/5626.

Stellung der Karaimen. 7 May 1943. Idem.

Dr. Klopfer (NSDAP, Partei-Kanzlei) an SS Standartenführer Brandt (Persönlicher Stab, RF SS). 27 September 1944. YVA: JM/528.4.

More precisely, by the Krimtatarische Leitsstelle in RMfdOg. Brief von Musa-Michael Kowschanly an SS-Hauptamt. September-December 1944. YVA: JM/4473.

Idem.

Idem.

See section “Strategic considerations.”

SS-Hauptamt, Amtsgruppe D – Oststelle. 1 November 1944. Betr.: Karaimen. Idem.

SS-Obergruppenführer Berger (Chef des SS-Hauptamt) an SS-Standartenführer Dr. Brandt (Persönlicher Stab, RF SS). Betr.: Karaimen. 24 November 1944. YVA: JM/4473.

Brief von Kowschanly. Idem.

I would like to express my gratitude to Dr. Asaf Yedidya who shared with me the findings of his postdoctoral project “The Nazi's Attacks on the Talmud in the Third Reich” conducted in 2009–2010 at the Yad Vashem International Institute of the Holocaust Research.

Thus, the Ministry embraced the standpoint of the Karaite spiritual leader Szapszał.

Karaimenfrage in Litauen. YVA: JM/528.4.

OSR USSR No 142. In The Einsatzgruppen Reports, 250.

MbOg, Nr. 4. CSpSD. Kommandostab. Berlin. 22 May 1942. In The Einsatzgruppen Reports, 344–45.

Dr. Leibbrandt (RMfdOg). Betr.: Stellung der Karaimen. 6 October 1942. YVA: JM/5626.

RMfdOg. Berlin. Geheim. Betr.: Stellung und Behandlung der Karaimen. 7 May 1943. Idem.

Dr. Wetzel (RMfdOg). Berlin. Geheim. Betr.: Stellung der Karaimen. 7 May 1943. Idem.

SS-Hauptamt, Amtsgruppe D – Oststelle. Betr.: Karaimen. 1 November 1944. Idem.

SS-Obergruppenführer Berger (Chef des SS-Hauptamt) an SS-Standartenführer Dr. Brandt (Persönlicher Stab, RF SS). Betr.: Karaimen. 24 November 1944. YVA: JM/4473.

Archevêché de Paris. 11 December 1941. YVA: JM/528.4, p. 11.

Those living in the non-occupied zone were handled by Vichy government.

“Babi Yar”. Account of V. Liberman. L. Ozerov (ed.). Collection of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee. YVA: M.35/25, pp. 12–14.

This was the result of the activities of Soviet agents left in the city who set off radio-guided mines laid in Kiev's central buildings.

Correspondence of the Section of Propaganda of the Kiev Municipal Authority (goruprava) with organizations and private persons on publishing notices in newspapers. 15 October–19 December 1941. State Museum of the Kiev District: R-2412/261/2 (back), pp. 14-16. Courtesy of USHMM.

MbOg. Nr. 1. RGVA: f. 500, op. 1, d. 775, p. 78.

RMfdOg. Betr.: Stellung und Behandlung der Karaimen. 7 May 1943. Idem.

Max Bergemann, “Im befreiten Wilna”, Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung No 234, 17 May 1943, p. 1.

Brief von Kowschanly. YVA: JM/4473.

Idem.

SS-Sturmbahnführer Dr. Arlt (SS-Hauptamt, Amtsgruppe D) an SS-Hauptsturmführer Dr. Olzscha (Leiter der Kaukasischen und Osttürkischen Leitstelle). 27 October 1944. Idem.