61340 Vorabseiten_e - Unabhängige Expertenkommission Schweiz

Federal Council’s delegate for international relief organisations, Edouard de
Haller, remarked that the matter would be discussed at UNRRA headquarters
in London in order to obtain «if not an assurance for the ‹resorption› of the
children, then at least support for ridding ourselves of them». 170
In the debate surrounding Swiss refugee policy it is repeatedly claimed – as a
defence against criticism or for reasons of relativism – that the Swiss attitude
should be compared with that of other countries. Such comparisons are fraught
with problems, however, owing to the different temporal, geographic, and
political conditions prevailing at the time. 171 In addition, the availability of
source material and the degree of research already carried out vary enormously
from country to country.
After France and Great Britain had admitted several thousand Jewish refugees
during the months leading up to the outbreak of the war, it became more or less
impossible to enter either country after September 1939, and naturally from
June 1940 onward. While British policy was based on the transit principle,
French pre-war policy did not oblige foreigners – Jewish or other – to continue
to a third country, but subjected them to numerous controls of various types.
At the outbreak of the war, thousands of Jews were interned in both countries
as «enemy aliens», later leading up to the terrible fate which befell those in
France. Between 1933 and 1945, there were around 20,000 refugees living in
Great Britain on a temporary basis. These were joined by some 60,000 Jewish
refugees who were able to take up residence there after the end of the war. 172
Approximately 70,000 Jewish refugees were taken in by France between 1933
and 1939.
Since Britain wanted to avoid at all costs a rapprochement between Arab nationalists
or Arab governments and the Axis powers, it kept the doors to Palestine
closed from the beginning of 1939 on, apart from the five-year fixed quota of
75,000 people. It was for this reason that Britain opposed most of the rescue
projects, in particular in 1943 and 1944. A total of around 140,000 Jews
emigrated to Palestine – legally or illegally – between 1933 and 1941. British
policy on Palestine finally influenced decisions taken in Washington as well. The
British Dominions played a negligible role in saving Jews; Canada was
conspicuous by its almost total refusal to accept any Jewish immigrants, a policy
which was largely due to the determined opposition of the Province of Quebec. 173
With their admission of around 40,000 Jews, mostly German, up to the
beginning of the war, the Netherlands followed a comparatively liberal policy
on immigration, although here too restrictions were toughened after the annexation
of Austria. Spain kept its borders open for Jewish and other refugees in
transit throughout the duration of the war, in particular during the months
following the fall of France and from 1943 until the end of the war without,
166