Task Force For International Cooperation On Holocaust Education, Remembrance and Research

Holocaust Education, Remembrance, and Research in France

Following the defeat of France in June 1940, Alsace-Lorraine was annexed and France was divided into an "occupied zone" and a "free zone" placed under the authority of the Vichy government led by Marshal Pétain, a prominent figure in World War One. A government in exile was established at the same time in London by General de Gaulle. It made efforts to rally the Resistance against the German occupants and the collaborationist government.

During the war, some 350000 Jews were living in France. Over half of the Jewish community was made up of foreign nationals. The first Antisemitic measures were carried out by Germans in the occupied zone. The Vichy Regime issued a "Jewish Statute" in October 1940, which gradually turned Jews into second rate citizens. An Office for Jewish Affairs was created in 1941 to implement Antisemitic measures, including the confiscation of property and companies belonging to Jews. Jews were also required to wear a badge with a yellow Star of David by a German edict in 1942.
Arrests of foreign Jews began in 1940 and by the end of 1941 over 8000 Jews were being held in internment camps administered by French authorities.The nomination of Pierre Laval, an advocate for more extensive collaboration, as head of the government in April 1942 marks a stepping up of repression policy. French Police agreed to collaborate more actively in the arrests in exchange for more independence. It was also the beginning of deportations to concentration and extermination camps.The Vel d'Hiv round-up took place on 16th and 17th July 1942 and nearly 13000 foreign Jews including women and children were arrested in Paris and brought to the Vélodrome d'Hiver (a stadium) or sent to the Drancy internment camp, to then be deported. In the summer of 1942, some 42500 Jews were arrested in the two zones and deported East.On 11th November 1942, the free zone was invaded and German and Italian occupation was extended to the whole of France. Many Jews sought refuge in the Italian zone until September 1943 and the surrender of Italy. Others attempted to escape to Spain and Switzerland. Many people managed to hide thanks to Resistance networks or actions on the part of the Righteous among the Nations. As a result, three quarters of the French Jewish population were saved despite active collaboration on the part of the government.
Increasingly unpopular, the Vichy Regime encountered difficulties and in 1943, in the wake of French people's growing protests when the deportations began to include French citizens, Laval refused to revoke French Jews' nationality. This did not prevent deportations from continuing. In 1942, some 42500 Jews were deported to Nazi extermination camps, approximated 17000 in 1943 and 16000 in 1944.
In total, approximately 80000 Jews were deported from France. A quarter of the Jewish population in France had disappeared at the time France was freed and General de Gaulle marched victoriously through Paris.

Education

In France, the teaching of the Holocaust is mandatory in the school curriculum. It is taught in history class at three levels: at ages 10 and 11, ages 15 and ages 17 and 18. It is also taught in other subjects such as philosophy, literature and language, German, and at times, music. The teaching of the Holocaust has however undergone many changes since the end of World War Two. It is only since the 1980s that education has evolved towards a gradual acknowledgement of the specific nature of the genocide of the Jewish people in World War Two and towards accepting it as a fully-fledged episode in France's history. In 1995 acknowledgement by President Jacques Chirac of France's responsibility in the genocide against the Jews was an important milestone. It reflected France's determination to lay the foundations for deep understanding of the mechanisms which were able to produce genocide while supporting institutions tasked with teaching the Holocaust.

The work of the government is currently primarily carried out by the Ministry of National Education, and the major private national institutions, first and foremost the Shoah Memorial / Center of Contemporary Jewish Documentation and the Foundation for the Memory of the Shoah, which provides financial backing for many actions undertaken in France. The Shoah Memorial gives lectures to school groups, offers dozens of school visits to historic sites, particularly Auschwitz, and provides courses for teachers every year in all regions in France and several European countries and for other groups such as recently recruited police officers, young judges, and even journalists and librarians. The Shoah Memorial also offers many education workshops and develops a wide array of tools meeting specific needs of teachers and students at all levels. An example is the well-known Web site for young children www.grenierdesarah.org helping primary school children learn about the genocide of the Jewish people.
Also, many other institutions, museums and memorials, such as the Maison des Enfants d'Isieu and the Musée d'Art et d'Histoire du Judaïsme, and dozens of associations are helping to support Holocaust education by guiding school visits and providing courses for teachers.

Remembrance

It took France many decades to agree to take initial steps to preserve Holocaust memory and recognise the specific nature of the Jewish genocide, thereby renouncing the Gaullist tradition which considered Vichy as an episode that was unrelated to France's history. The deported people themselves saw it fit to take on the duty of remembrance, especially those in the Amicale d'Auschwitz group who unveiled its first monument at Père Lachaise Cemetery in 1949.

However, documentation work was already underway. It began in 1943 at the Center of Contemporary Jewish Documentation where, headed by Isaac Schneersohn, evidence was secretly compiled on the persecution of Jews in France. This evidence would be used in justice system work, from the Nuremberg Trials to modern-day cases. After World War Two, Schneersohn decided to build a Tomb of the Unknown Jewish Martyr, whose first stone was laid in 1953. It was the first memorial in the world devoted to the remembrance of six million Jews killed by the Nazis. It provided the foundations for the Memorial of the Shoah, which today represents the largest Holocaust education and research centre in Europe.

It was only in the late 1960s that the history of deported Jews as such was a subject of public debate. The attitude of the Vichy government during the Occupation began to be examined and denounced. The lists of convoys of deported people were published by Serge Klarsfeld and the Association of Children of Jews Deported from France, which tracks the French and German people responsible for deportation.

In 1993, President François Mitterand established a National Day of Commemoration of Racist and Antisemitic Persecutions, to which the Righteous among the Nations who helped save three quarters of the French Jewish population would be associated in 2000. In 1995, President Jacques Chirac recognised the responsibility of the French State in the anti-Jewish persecutions in World War Two. As a result, a Study Mission on Spoliation of Jews in France was set up and a Foundation for the Memory of the Shoah was established in 2000 to support education, history research and remembrance. This gradual acknowledgement was based on a number of legally-binding legislative acts and has been coupled since the 1980s with a major overhaul of school curricula and more interest in preserving the places of remembrance and building new museums throughout France.

Internationally, France has backed the Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education, Remembrance and Research since its inception, assuming its chairmanship in 2002. It has been particularly involved in the Council of Europe, sponsoring in 2002 the creation of the Day of Holocaust Remembrance and Prevention of Crimes against Humanity. More recently it backed the creation of the UN-designated International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Research

When the Stockholm Conference gathered, and when the ITF was founded, research dealing with the Shoah in France already had entered a new era, with political turning points since 1995 and the full recognition of French responsibility in the persecutions on French soil. Since then, academic or free lance research has been dealing with French aspects of the destruction of European Jewry, and contributed to the international debates of the times ("aryanisation", restitutions, local aspects...). The Shoah is now an entire part of French history and memory, with its darkest and more positive sides (entrance of the Righteous into the Panthéon in 2007).