Seventy Years November Progrom

Austrian Press Agency (APA) (07/23/08)

Seventy Years November Progrom
Spindelegger. Collective Responsibility

Vienna – Austria is characterized, justifiably so, as the first victim of National Socialism. This will not change anything about the fact that we have to admit “that our people bear the responsibility for all those having taken part in that time, “ stated Spindelegger, who will participate on Sunday in a commemoration of the Vienna Jewish Community in the City temple.

Like Federal President Fischer and Foreign Minister Plassnik previously claimed, the Second National Council President viewed the so-called “Reichskristallnacht” as a shameful prelude to an historical unprecedented annihilation of people.” There must be a consensus among all of the political parties “to do everything to forbid anything like that from happening in the future.” Spindelegger reminded one that many Austrians participated in the progrom: “the night of the progrom in 1938 was not solely organized by Nazi commandos. Many people from the civilian population participated in the attacks and brutality directed against Jews.”

November 9, 1939, is probably one of the darkest days in Austrian history. The November progrom remains in one’s memory as the atrocious beginning of systematic persecution of Austria’s Jews, which shortly thereafter ended in the Holocaust carried out on European Jews,” explained head of the Green Party Eva Glawischnig. Glawischnig spoke of a “duty to remain vigilant” based upon the events of that time: “We must do everything also in 2008 that right-wing extremism doesn’t infiltrate the core of society, but rather has no place in society.”

According to the head of the Green Party, Jewish heritage in Austria has been abandoned and left to decay. “It is overdue to draw one’s attention to the deteriorating Jewish cemeteries. According to the Washington Agreement, Austria is responsible for renovating and maintaining the cemeteries. “What has been possible with the war graves has to be possible for Jewish cemeteries,” stated Glawischnig.