Language:
English
Year of publication:
1995
Titel der Quelle:
Holocaust and Genocide Studies
Angaben zur Quelle:
9,1 (1995) 94-120
Keywords:
Jews History 1939-1945
;
Antisemitism
;
Jews, East European
;
Jewish refugees
;
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)
;
Brazil Emigration and immigration
;
Europe, Eastern Emigration and immigration
Abstract:
In the 1930s-early 1940s Brazil was increasingly closing its doors to potential Jewish refugees from Europe. The main motif in the rejection of Jewish refugees was antisemitism, imbued with racism. Not only the ministerial bureaucracy in the country, but also the Brazilian consuls and ambassadors in Europe helped to shape this policy; many of them took up antisemitism from the atmosphere prevalent in the countries to which they were posted. Examines the cases of two state officers who were extreme antisemites: Oswaldo Aranha, who had been ambassador to the USA and in the late 1930s was the Foreign Minister, and Ciro de Freites Vale, the ambassador to Berlin. For example, the latter prevented the admittance into Brazil of 2,000 Jews converted to Catholicism, whom the government of Brazil had agreed to admit in 1939-41. Luiz de Souza Dantas, the Brazilian ambassador to France, may be regarded as an exception: he considered the refugee problem as a humanitarian problem, and made all efforts to help Jews leave Europe.
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