- December 19, 2025
- 11:43 am
- Israel
Those who claim that “Israel is not obliged to help Ukraine” and that “every country has its own interests” should remember the consequences of such thinking at the Evian Conference, held from July 5 to 16, 1938.
The fates of European Jews, whom the Third Reich had already deemed “subhumans,” were on the agenda.
In July 1938, U.S. President Roosevelt convened an international conference to promote and finance the emigration of “political refugees.”
But Hitler, before the ovens of Auschwitz began operating, offered the world community to take the Jews and watched with interest to see how it would end.
Representatives from 32 countries participated in the conference. These were countries from Western Europe (Hungary was the only representative from Eastern Europe), North and South America, as well as Australia and New Zealand. Additionally, 24 Jewish and international humanitarian organizations, including the Joint, the Jewish Agency, and the World Jewish Congress, sent their delegates to Evian.
The situation at the start of the conference was previously described by Chaim Weizmann:
“The world is divided into two parts – those places where Jews cannot live, and those where they cannot go.”
None of the countries participating in the Evian Conference were to be forced to increase their immigration quotas – it was solely about voluntary agreement to accept more Jewish refugees.
However, Switzerland, strictly maintaining neutrality, refused to host the conference, so it was held in France. Due to the annexation of Austria in March 1938, the number of potential Jewish victims of the Nazi regime significantly increased. Many Jews had already been expelled from Germany and Austria, and now Jews from Czechoslovakia were in danger.
The conference participants expressed sympathy for the suffering Jews but made no commitments. The U.S. did not want to increase immigration quotas due to anti-Semitic sentiments in Congress and fears of job competition. Britain could not accommodate refugees on its territory, and Eretz-Israel was excluded due to the Arab uprising.
Some countries stated they had already accepted as many as they could, while others refused due to the economic crisis and unemployment. As a result, only the Dominican Republic and Costa Rica agreed to accept refugees, although only about 500 people ended up in the Dominican Republic.
Israeli leaders of the time, Chaim Weizmann and David Ben-Gurion, were also against Jews entering Western countries. They hoped that restricting entry to other countries would force Britain to open Jewish emigration to Palestine.
The outcome of the conference quite suited Hitler, who sarcastically remarked:
“I hoped that the world, which feels such deep sympathy for these criminals [Jews], would at least be generous enough to turn this sympathy into practical help.”
The refusal to accept Jews was considered a grand victory for the German propaganda machine.
Golda Meir, who was at the forum, later described the events in her book “My Life”:
“I was there in the strange capacity of a ‘Jewish observer from Palestine’ and even sat not with the delegates but in the hall, although the refugees in question belonged to my people, to my family, and were not an unwanted number to be squeezed into a quota if at all possible.
It was a terrible thing – to sit in a luxurious hall and listen to the delegates of thirty-two countries explain in turn that they would like to accept a significant number of refugees but, unfortunately, are unable to do so.”
In an interview with journalists, Golda Meir added:
“I want to see only one thing before I die: that my people no longer need expressions of sympathy.”
The Evian Conference, which took place in July 1938, had serious consequences for the Jewish population of Europe. Not wanting to exacerbate their internal problems and fearing confrontation with the Nazi regime, the civilized international community failed to save millions of people, only postponing a world war indefinitely. Less than six months after the conference, Kristallnacht occurred, resulting in many Jews being killed, others arrested, and sent to concentration camps.
The historical lesson that can be drawn from the events of the Evian Conference should be taken into account by NATO in 2023. It is especially important to understand that the desire to avoid expanding the conflict when war is already underway can lead to a global conflict. NATO is currently providing material and tactical assistance to Ukraine but is not opening a second front against Russia.
Russian experts gleefully noted that the NATO summit communiqué paid little attention to Ukraine, with no clear promise of further material and financial support. They question whether only Ukraine has been “abandoned” or if it faces an even harsher fate in a world war.
Those who claim that Israel is not obliged to help Ukraine and that every country has its own interests should remember the consequences of such thinking at the Evian Conference. The Netherlands, London, France, Belgium, the USA, and other countries suffered damage from Nazi Germany.
This conference was recognized as a shameful page in Western history and serves as a lesson that by rejecting people in distress, states bring trouble upon themselves.
However, the Israeli government has not yet learned the lessons from the history of its people.
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Evian Conference – Material from Wikipedia — the free encyclopedia
