Photos That Helped to Document the Holocaust Were Taken by a Nazi – The New York Times
Posted By admin on July 31, 2022
AMSTERDAM On June 20, 1943, bewildered and terrified families, laden with baggage and branded with yellow stars, were forced into Olympiaplein, one of this citys most recognizable public squares. Few knew where they were going, or for how long, so they wore their winter coats despite the blazing sun as they registered with the Nazi authorities.
A Dutch photographer, Herman Heukels, moved through the crowd, taking pictures of people who would soon be deported to concentration camps. His images would be the final portraits of many of these people, who were among 5,500 sent that day from Amsterdam to Westerbork transit camp, and then on to the east. The vast majority would never return.
Heukelss photos are some of the strongest visual evidence used by historians to illustrate the Holocaust in the Netherlands, which took the lives of more than 102,000 of the estimated 140,000 Jewish civilians who lived in the country before World War II.
Yet despite their ubiquity in books and films, few people outside of scholarly circles know that these images were actually taken by a Dutch Nazi. He intended to depict Jews in a demeaning light. Instead, he ended up paying stark witness to the atrocities of the Third Reich.
These are very famous photos, some of the most requested photos in our archive from across the whole world, said Ren Kok, a researcher at the NIOD Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide Studies in Amsterdam. The institute holds an archive of about 30 original Heukels photos from the Dutch Ministry of Justice, which confiscated them as part of his postwar collaboration trial.
In recent months, a deeper sense of Heukelss beliefs and motivations has emerged from a biography published in Dutch this spring that reveals how an ordinary young man from Zwolle became radicalized as a member of the Dutch Nazi party. The book, by Machlien Vlasblom, a Dutch World War II historian, provides new insights into how Heukels betrayed Jewish people from his town, looted their businesses and property, and recorded their history as a press photographer for the Dutch S.S.
He captured them at their weakest moments, Vlasblom said in an interview, and the way he acted there was rude and brutal. Of course, he put the Nazi ideology into these images.
How does this new information change the way we might look at these photos? Or how historians might use them, or contextualize them in the future?
The photos are quite exceptional, said a NIOD researcher, Kees Ribbens, a professor of Popular Historical Culture and Mass Violence at Erasmus University Rotterdam, because they show the Holocaust taking place in a very well-known place in the center of Amsterdam. They show how the whole bureaucracy of deportation worked.
Yet, these are not innocent images, said the Amsterdam-based Israeli artist Ram Katzir, who recently used one of Heukelss pictures as the foundation for a memorial he created for the site of deportations. The artwork, Shadows, unveiled on the 79th anniversary of the raid in June, reproduced the shadows of the deportees from the photos, in the exact locations on Olympiaplein where they were last documented alive.
We had no names of any of the victims, said Katzir, so he deliberated a lot about whether to include Heukelss name on the information plaque. In the end, he decided to do so. Its a double-edged image; and if you hide that, you hide the role of the collaborator.
Katzir added, When you look at the information plaque, youre standing exactly where the photographer stood.
In fact, a majority of the surviving images of Jewish persecution in the Netherlands were made from the point of view of the persecutor, Ribbens said. These include those by Bart de Kok, a member of the Dutch Nazi Party, known as N.S.B., and a German press photographer, Franz Anton Stapf, who captured some of the last images of Amsterdams Jewish community before it was decimated.
Janina Struk, author of the 2005 book Photographing the Holocaust: Interpretations of the Evidence, said that in the postwar period, photos taken by bystanders, perpetrators and victims were all kind of mixed together, and hardly anyone asked who had shot the photos or for what purposes.
Until quite recently, historians have not really been so concerned about who took the pictures, and why they took them and what they were for, she said. Its been rather historians using pictures as illustrations of a text, rather than being a text themselves.
In recent years, she added, there has been a greater emphasis on contextualizing the images, explaining how they were made, so that viewers have a better understanding of what theyre looking at and so people can make better ethical choices about how to present them.
Ribbens said that in learning that Heukelss aim was to publish his photos in Storm S.S., a Dutch Nazi propaganda weekly (they were never published there), we can think about what he chose to leave out of the frame. In his series, he said, we dont see the Nazi officials or the Dutch police who were forcibly rounding up civilians.
It doesnt automatically raise the question: Who organized this, who is responsible for this persecution? he said. People show up, and its not clear what kind of stress theyre under, why theyre sent here, what choice did they have in leaving their homes, why they didnt find a hiding place? What was so threatening about it?
The official policy of the German occupiers was that no images of Jewish people could be published in the legal Dutch press, explained NIOD researcher and photography expert Erik Somers. Propaganda newspapers, however, could print such images alongside articles with expressly antisemitic content.
As a result, a high proportion of Holocaust images, both in the Netherlands and elsewhere, were taken by Nazi-endorsed propaganda photographers who had explicit permission to carry cameras, Struk said. Other images came from German soldiers who specifically sought out souvenir images of Jews who they thought fit a physical stereotype.
We know that the Germans used photography as a weapon, and they invested a great deal in propaganda photography, said Sheryl Silver Ochayon, program director for Echoes & Reflections, an educational arm of Yad Vashem World Holocaust Remembrance Center in Israel.
Photographs never killed anyone, she added, but what photographs can do is they can justify an ideology. If you present your victims as low or passive, or like vermin, you can justify a genocidal plan of action, as the Germans did.
Vlasblom began her research when a friend from church, Gerard Visser, asked her to look at a box of family letters he had inherited. Although he knew the papers concerned his two great-uncles, Herman Heukels and Jan Heukels, who was also a Nazi collaborator, he said in an interview, I didnt really know the family structure, so I didnt know who sent what to whom or why.
Not everyone in Vissers family is pleased that Vlasbloms book, We waren supermannen (We Were Supermen), which also includes information about Jan Heukels, called attention to these two ancestors who were collaborators.
You hear all the heroic resistance stories from Holland, Visser said, but there are people like the Heukels, who really did bad things. I felt that part of a countrys history should also be told.
Does knowing more about Herman Heukelss personal biography imply that historians should use these photographs in a different way or even use them less often?
Somers from the NIOD, the Dutch archive, said these images continue to be a valuable historical source, but the Heukelses story underscores the importance of providing context to pictures.
You have to find out from the beginning the elements of those photos, he said, who made the photo and for what purpose, and in what context?
Struk added, We need to move away from the idea that a photograph is just a window on the world. It isnt. Its a very edited version of what the photographer chose to photograph.
Read more:
Photos That Helped to Document the Holocaust Were Taken by a Nazi - The New York Times
- Jews assaulted during a pro-Israel protest in Toronto - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- 'A very different tone this time': Canadian Jewish leaders warn of spike in anti-Semitic violence - National Post [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Ohio supporter of ISIS pleads guilty in attempted attack on Jewish synagogue - cleveland.com [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Operation Solomon: Thirty years since the rescue of the Jews of Ethiopia - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Can Arab-Jewish peace survive the ongoing violence in Israel? - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Ultra-Orthodox Jewish women are bucking the patriarchal, authoritarian stereotype of their community - The Conversation US [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- The making of the Jewish extremist Meir Kahane - TRT World [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- The total collapse of Jewish and Israeli PR - opinion - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Most US kids of intermarriage raised Jewish; parents want institutions to notice - The Times of Israel [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Are the Jews being attacked in Israels mixed cities victims of pogroms - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Rise in antisemitic incidents in Florida prompts Jewish groups to spend thousands on security - WTXL ABC 27 [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- There are more American Jews and they're staying Jewish - thejewishchronicle.net [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Members of Jewish synagogue come together after act of vandalism - KVOA Tucson News [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Fact Check-Video of people tearing clothes in Jerusalem shows a Jewish custom and is not linked to the 2021 Hamas-Israel conflict - Reuters [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Charles Grodin and the Jewish question - Religion News Service [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Rise in antisemitic incidents in South Florida prompts Jewish groups to spend thousands on security - WPTV.com [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- No, 'Minions' weren't inspired by Jewish children who endured the Holocaust - PolitiFact [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Lod counts its losses: Torched synagogues and coexistence in this Jewish-Arab city - Haaretz [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- The Wawa Foundation Selects Jewish Family Service to Receive $15000 Grant - InsiderNJ [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Non-Jewish man assaulted in Munich and called a 'Jewish pig' - Cleveland Jewish News [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- The moral imperative behind the Big Bold Jewish Climate Fest - Yale Climate Connections [Last Updated On: May 20th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 20th, 2021]
- Can America Be America When Jews Are Beaten in the Streets? - The Dispatch [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Essay: The Four Absurd Criticisms of Israel's War Conduct Detroit Jewish News - The Jewish News [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Joseph Borgen, Brutally Beaten By Group Of Suspects In Manhattans Diamond District, Speaks Out: My Whole Face Felt Like It Was On Fire For Hours - CBS... [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- The American Jewry demographic is only growing and becoming more diverse - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- As trust between Israeli Jews and Arabs reaches new lows, Netanyahu rises again - The Conversation US [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- The Tensions Inside a Mixed Jewish-Arab City in Israel - The New Yorker [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Organs of Arab teen allegedly shot by police save Arab and Jewish lives - The Times of Israel [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Heartwarming WWII Film 'Shepherd: The Story of a Jewish Dog' Screens at the Virtual KCET Cinema Series on May 26th - KCET [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Young American Jews Have Reached a Tipping Point With Israel - Rolling Stone [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Jews and Muslims find common ground in German city - DW (English) [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Jews Who Leave the Faith Are Still Treated as Jewish - The Wall Street Journal [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Police investigating attacks on Jewish business, synagogue in N. Ireland - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Marjorie Taylor Greene Insists Any Rational Jewish Person Thinks Mask Mandates Are as Bad as the Holocaust - Vanity Fair [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- A second person was arrested in the gang assault of a Jewish man in New York during protests - CNN [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Officials Say Hate Crimes Against Jews Are Growing In The Aftermath Of Gaza Violence - NPR [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Police Investigate Possible Jewish Hate Crime Attack At Beverly Grove Restaurant - CBS Los Angeles [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Jew | History, Beliefs, & Facts | Britannica [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Judaism: Founder, Beliefs & Facts - HISTORY [Last Updated On: May 25th, 2021] [Originally Added On: May 25th, 2021]
- Bubbys Jewish Soul Food will bring traditional family recipes to North Central San Antonio this fall - San Antonio Current [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- Elazar Stern is the most likely Herzog successor at the Jewish Agency - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- Opinion | The Jewish History of Israel Is Over 3,000 Years Old. Thats Why Its Complicated. - The New York Times [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- When the Mob Came for the Jews of Baghdad - The Wall Street Journal [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- Jewish, Arab actors work together to rebuild theatre burnt in Acre riots - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- Portland Bagel Shop and Jewish Deli Coming to the College Area - Eater San Diego [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- Jewish-Asian college student grieves lost senior year, and so much more J. - The Jewish News of Northern California [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- Belgium to return Nazi-looted painting to German Jewish family - The Times of Israel [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- The Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh holds rally to bring awareness to increase in 'antisemitic attacks' - WPXI Pittsburgh [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- These Nice Jewish Boys answered John Oliver. YouTube called it hate speech - Haaretz [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- Cops release new images of men sought in alleged attack on Jewish man; Islander previously arrested - SILive.com [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- Jewish heiress abandons claims over priceless painting stolen by Nazis - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- Biden science adviser takes oath on 500-year-old Jewish text - The Times of Israel [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- Is it safe to become Jewish? What I tell conversion students - opinion - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- For Jewish immigrants, Boyle Heights was a place for community building and a slice of the American dream - KCRW [Last Updated On: June 3rd, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 3rd, 2021]
- Jewish writers with Soviet roots have deep stories to tell J. - The Jewish News of Northern California [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2021]
- Stanford therapists allege 'hostile climate' for Jews in the workplace J. - The Jewish News of Northern California [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2021]
- Omar seeks to clarify comments after Jewish House Democrats accuse her of comparing US and Israel with Hamas and Taliban - CNN [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2021]
- Jewish student group 'SLO Hillel' opens new Pavilion The new gathering space is located at the - KSBY San Luis Obispo News [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2021]
- Original source of pound cake recipe in new Athens Jewish cook book remains a mystery - Online Athens [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2021]
- Readers Write: Far-right extremists not representative of L.I's Jewish community - Readers Write - The Island Now [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2021]
- Our Jewish Israeli writer in Ramallah is ready to reveal who she is - Haaretz [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2021]
- Jewish groups in the US and South Africa among recipients of MacKenzie Scott's latest $2.74B in grants - Cleveland Jewish News [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2021]
- 'George Soros was an easy target: hes Jewish, wealthy and secretive' - Haaretz [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2021]
- John Rathbun of East Longmeadow convicted of attempting to burn Jewish elder care campus after 2nd trial - MassLive.com [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2021]
- Here are the top candidates to one of the most prestigious jobs in the Jewish world - Haaretz [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2021]
- Jewish Federation Expands Outreach and Education to Counter Increased Antisemitism Detroit Jewish News - The Jewish News [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2021]
- JCF awards more than $140000 in scholarships for Jewish campers - Jewish News of Greater Phoenix [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- What is an egg cream and why is it so Jewish? - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- YC4KF Thanks Jewish Community Foundation for $8,000 Grant - Signals AZ [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- Google criticized by Jewish organization for 'allowing' antisemitism - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- Mission: Volunteer 52 Times in 52 Weeks - Jewish Exponent [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- First German Army rabbi in 100 years takes office - Haaretz [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- Synagogues and camps are getting help to better support LGBTQ youth - JTA News - Jewish Telegraphic Agency [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- 'Schitt's Creek': Where 'Jews of no religion,' facing exile, find redemption - The Conversation CA [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- Man arrested after attacking 12-year-old Jewish boy in Los Angeles - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- Jewish congregations gather at Davenport location - New Haven Register [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- Jews are the only minority that tolerates the intolerable - The Jerusalem Post [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- The Jewish mensch who helped fight racial injustice in the Deep South - Haaretz [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- Holocaust Center presents Jews' escape to India and Iran after 1933 - The Oakland Press [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
- Diplomat Turned Educator will Head Local University Detroit Jewish News - The Jewish News [Last Updated On: June 21st, 2021] [Originally Added On: June 21st, 2021]
Comments