{"id":1129,"date":"2026-07-03T13:56:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T17:56:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/emmanuelringelblumresearchcenter.org\/?page_id=1129"},"modified":"2026-07-19T16:59:36","modified_gmt":"2026-07-19T20:59:36","slug":"emmanuel-ringelblum-research-center","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/emmanuelringelblumresearchcenter.org\/","title":{"rendered":"Emmanuel Ringelblum Research Center"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Studies in Jewish Solidarity, 1933-1945<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Not to Judge, but to Understand<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Introduction<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Our Center was founded in\u00a0 2024 for the purpose of fostering research in the spirit of Emanuel Ringelblum and the Oneg Shabbat\/Oyneg Shabes group in its broadest sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our founding premise is the the period from 1933-1945 must be taken as a whole, as a central chapter in the history of the Jewish people, when all strands of Jewish life came together in a common struggle. All Jews everywhere watched the rise of the Nazis with concern, and responded in whatever ways their circumstances allowed and their judgment advised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Center aims to explore the whole gamut of Jewish responses, around the the world and throughout the Nazi period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

History Through the Eyes of Those who Lived It<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In The Holocaust in History<\/em>, his survey of the Holocaust literature in 1987, Michael Marrus wrote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In 1957 Philip Friedman, himself a survivor of the Holocaust and a pioneer in its investigation, called for a Judeocentric view of the subject as opposed to one that saw everything from the standpoint of the Nazis\u2014a view of the Jews not only as the victim of a tragedy but also as the bearer of a communal existence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

M.Marrus,<\/em> The Holocaust in History<\/em>, p.201<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

The conventional narrative of the Holocaust emerged from the rubble of the Second World War, and does tend to see everything from the standpoint of the Nazis, or sometimes the bystanders, while as Saul Friedlaender remarked, <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Implicit assumptions regarding the [Jews] general helplessness and passivity … have turned them into a static and abstract element of the historical background<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

A Different War<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The conventional narrative fails to understand that the Jews were fighting an entirely different war: an ideological one, to which the appropriate collective resonse was to maintain solidarity and seek support – which the Jews, well-organized to deal with repression through the ages, did, very successfully Solidarity was expressed openly before the war and outside the Nazi sphere. Under Nazi occupation, it continued clandestinely, invisible to the Germans, and exposing only a public face to others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr Gunnar S. Paulsson, our founder and director, belongs to the first post-war generation of Holocaust scholars, born in 1946 to a Jewish mother rescued from the camps by the Swedish Red Cross. His aim has always been to tease out the common thread of communal solidarity and self-help from a cacophony of angry voices, all claiming authority. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

His book, Secret City: The Hidden Jews of Warsaw 1940-1945<\/em> (YUP, 2002), a product of a lifetime’s reflection and 15 years of intensive research, is a study of a Jewish community, based on Jewish memoirs and testimonies, backed by records kept by Jewish activists of Jewish organizations, supported materially and financially by Jewish communities abroad, chanelled through the existing network of Jewish charities, to Jewish representatives in London, thence to Jewish leaders in Warsaw, to distressed Jews wherever they could be found. It is a stepping-stone and methodological model for the Center’s more extensive research agenda. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Studies in Jewish Solidarity, 1933-1945 Not to Judge, but to Understand Introduction Our Center was founded in\u00a0 2024 for the purpose of fostering research in the spirit of Emanuel Ringelblum and the Oneg Shabbat\/Oyneg Shabes group in its broadest sense. Our founding premise is the the period from 1933-1945 must be taken as a whole, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1129","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emmanuelringelblumresearchcenter.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emmanuelringelblumresearchcenter.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emmanuelringelblumresearchcenter.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emmanuelringelblumresearchcenter.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emmanuelringelblumresearchcenter.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1129"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/emmanuelringelblumresearchcenter.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1129\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1138,"href":"https:\/\/emmanuelringelblumresearchcenter.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1129\/revisions\/1138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emmanuelringelblumresearchcenter.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}