Jewish War Prisoners Mistreated in Germany, Escaped Officer Reports

Details of how the Nazis, in defiance of the existing international regulations, are segregating and mistreating Jewish war prisoners were reported here today by a French Jewish officer who was one of a group of 186 French war prisoners who succeeded in breaking away en-masse from a German prison camp to Soviet territory and reached England by way of the Near East. All 186 will be awarded war decorations by General de Gaulle at a formal ceremony here.

Jewish war prisoners, the officer related, are never addressed by the Nazi guards in the German camps as “soldiers” but always as “Jude.” They are excluded from farm work outside the camp under the pretext that they speak the German language and therefore constitute a danger since their contact with the native population “is contaminating the superior German race.” Instead they are made to do the hardest and most degrading work in the camps, such as cleaning the sewers and the latrines with old tin cans or even with their bare hands. When not engaged in this kind of work, Jewish prisoners are forced to do so-called “exercises” consisting of standing at attention for hours or throwing themselves flat on the ground at the sound of whistle. They must lie in snow or in mud for as long as the sadistic Nazi sergeants wish.

This policy of harsh treatment of Jewish war prisoners, the French Jewish officer continued, is approved by the superior military and political authorities. In certain cases the Nazi military authorities, in order to facilitate the segregation of the Jewish prisoners of war, spread the rumor that Jewish war prisoners would be released because they are not desirable on German soil. The prisoners thus identified as Jews were then sent to “special camps” in Germany. In the officers camp, a list was demanded of all officers of Jewish race and religion for unspecified purposes. On the advice of the superior war prisoners in the camp many Jewish officers refused to register for such a list. Others, however, made it a point of honor to acknowledge their Jewishness. The latter were later ordered into a special camp.