The Choice of the Jews under Vichy: Between Submission and Resistance

Based on extensive research into previously unpublished sources, including the archives of the military, the Central Consistory of the Jews of France, police prefectures, and Philippe Petain, Adam Rayski clearly demonstrates the Vichy government's role as an accomplice in the Nazi program of genocide. He also explores the sizeable prewar divide between French-born and immigrant Jews. This manifested itself in cultural conflicts and mutual antagonism as well as in varied initial responses to the antisemitic edicts and actions of the Vichy government. Rayski reveals how these communities eventually set aside their differences and united to resist the Vichy-supported Nazi threat.

Library Journal

Rayski, a journalist, historian, and former Resistance worker, uses archival material, oral interviews, and his own personal reminiscences to piece together a rich and detailed description of the challenges faced by French Jewry during World War II. Rayski describes key aspects of Jewish life in these years, including the long-standing cultural rift between French-born and immigrant Jews and its impact on the wartime experience, and covers issues ranging from the variety and diversity of Jewish resistance groups to the changing role of French public opinion as persecution and anti-Semitic propaganda escalated. Through interviews with survivors, he pieces together the hidden face of daily Jewish life under the Occupation and relates the experiences of those who went underground-an especially rich and valuable discussion as this phenomenon has rarely been studied. Rayski aims to answer fundamental questions, e.g., with France's record of xenophobia and anti-Semitism, why did nearly three-quarters of all Jews in the country survive? This complex but important book is recommended for scholars of French history and Jewish and Holocaust studies.-Marie Marmo Mullaney, Caldwell Coll., NJ Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.