In this video, Professor Harold Troper and Professor Adara Goldberg explain how the German invasion of Poland in 1939 signalled the beginning of the Second World War, and brought an additional 3 million Jews under Nazi control. Canada admitted two groups of Jewish refugees during the war period: so-called “enemy-aliens” from England, and a small group of refugees from neutral Portugal and Spain. Source: Montreal Holocaust Museum, 2016
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Video begins with the title “1939-1945” in white text on a black screen while instrumental music plays and fades into the next frame.
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Cut to Historian Adara Goldberg, sitting in front of the dark wall. Dr. Goldberg looks towards the right of the camera. The camera shows a medium shot of her upper body as she speaks during an interview conducted at the Montreal Holocaust Museum in April 2016.
>> Adara Goldberg: The German invasion of Poland in September 1939 signalled the start of the Second World War in Europe, and brought an additional 3.3 million Jews under Nazi authority.
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Camera angle changes to a close-up shot of Adara Goldberg.
>> Within months of the occupation, the Nazis imposed race laws, stripped Jews of their rights, including the right of movement, the right to practice their professions, and to leave their spaces, and established restrictive ghettos that Jews were not permitted to leave.
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Camera angle changes back to a medium shot of Adara Goldberg.
>> Ghetto populations were forced to perform slave labour in support of the German war effort.
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Camera angle changes back to a close-up shot of Adara Goldberg.
>> In 1942, Germany controlled much of Europe, and the Final Solution, or the complete destruction of Europe's Jews, was unveiled.
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Camera angle changes back to a medium shot of Adara Goldberg.
>> Some 6 million Jews died as a result of starvation, disease, mass shootings, or in concentration and death camps.
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Cut to University of Toronto Professor Harold Troper sitting in front of a dark wall that displays text, which is out of focus. Professor Troper looks towards the right of the camera. The camera shows a close-up shot of his upper body as he speaks during an interview conducted at the Montreal Holocaust Museum in April 2016. The name “Harold Troper” and underneath, “Professor at the University of Toronto” temporarily display in white text on the right side of the frame.
>> Canada was not an option for immigration from Europe. First of all, it was very difficult, it would have been almost impossible for Jews to get out of Europe once the war began. And Canada was not about to change its immigration regulations from an earlier period of time.
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Camera angle changes to a medium shot of Harold Troper.
>> Jews were barred from Europe, it didn't matter whether there was a war on, whether the Jews were the primary victims of…
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Cut to close-up shot of Harold Troper.
>> …the Nazi bloodlust. Canada was closed to Jews.
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Camera angle changes to a medium shot of Harold Troper.
>> There were two small groups of Jews who were allowed into Canada during the war.
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Camera angle changes back to close-up shot of Harold Troper.
>> With the fall of France, those German citizens who had made it as refugees to Britain, were rounded up by the British and many of them were sent to either Australia or to Canada for the duration of the war.
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Camera angle changes to a medium shot of Harold Troper.
>> Canada welcomed that group, not as refugees, but as prisoners-of-war, and held them in internment camps through most of the war.
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Cut to close-up shot of Harold Troper.
>> Many of those were young Jewish men, most of them anti-Nazis who had somehow rather found sanctuary in Britain. Only much later were they finally released into Canadian society.
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Cut to close-up shot of Adara Goldberg.
>> The second wartime group to come to Canada were the Iberian refugees.
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Camera angle changes back to a medium shot of Adara Goldberg.
>> Canada had reluctantly agreed to a program to temporarily resettle up to 200 Jewish families displaced in neutral Spain and Portugal.
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Camera angle changes back to close-up shot of Adara Goldberg.
>> Through very strict regulations, including proof of complete family units and the funds to pay for the journey, only 450 refugees made it to Canada during this period. The closure of the Canadian immigration office in Lisbon signaled the end of this movement.
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Credit pages appear in white text on black screen. Instrumental music continues.
Interview conducted by Laurel Ovenden, Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre, April 2016
Directing, Camera, and Editing: Helgi Piccinin; Colorization: Michaël Gravel; Assistant Director and Sound: Philippe Dubois; Audio Mix and Original Music: Pierre-Luc Lecours. [Logo for Chaire de recherche du Canada en patrimoine ethnologique]
Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre, copyright 2017.
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