Germans Confront The Holocaust

In a face-to-face confrontation, German Holocaust experts attacked an American scholar’s thesis that ordinary Germans willingly took part in Adolf Hitler’s campaign to exterminate Jews.

Daniel J. Goldhagen’s long-awaited showdown with five German Holocaust experts was preceded by months of bitter debate in Germany over his book, “Hitler’s Willing Executioners” and the origins of the Holocaust.

Many were insulted by Goldhagen’s claims that most Germans during the Nazi era were in the thrall of what he calls “eliminationist anti-Semitism.”

Critics complain Goldhagen comes close to making racist remarks against Germans in his book.

Nonetheless, Germans still trying to sort out for themselves how their parents and grandparents let the Nazis murder 6 million Jews are fascinated by Goldhagen, the son of a Holocaust survivor and a Harvard University political scientist.

A bestseller in the United States, the German translation of the book sold out in stores when it was released here last month.

Hamburg’s Kammerspiele theater was also sold out, with more than 500 people showing up to hear Goldhagen defend himself.

Goldhagen’s five opponents acted politely toward him at the start of the debate. But as time went on, some of them leveled serious accusations.

At times, Goldhagen’s critics seemed to be lecturing him as if he were still a student, and not an assistant professor at one of the most prestigious universities in the United States.

He was accused of oversimplifying history, ignoring parts of Germany’s past, exaggerating German zeal to kill Jews, and failing to acknowledge that there were varying degrees of anti-Semitism in Nazi Germany.

Reinhard Ruerup, a Berlin university professor old enough to be Goldhagen’s father, said Goldhagen failed to acknowledge the social and professional advances Jews achieved in Germany in the 19th century.

“This part (of Goldhagen’s book) is completely unhistorical,” Ruerup told the 36-year-old Goldhagen.

Goldhagen denied that. He also rejected that his book intentionally manipulates historical facts to support his thesis.