AHC: Maximum attempted Jewish migration to Mandatory Palestine.

With a POD after January 1, 1938, what events would see the largest number of Jews attempt to get to Mandatory Palestine?

I've been talking to the Writer of Blunted Sickle. The French stay in the War, and as such the Germans never attack the Soviets, and as the Germans are able to kill fewer Jews and he thinks that you would have fewer Jews fleeing.

The thought that comes to me for the Maximum number would occur for a Hitler Death and peace in the West (at least) sometime in 1943, (What would a Jew in Belarus would had family shipped to the Camps do in this circumstance, welcome back the Soviets or try to flee to Palestine...

Another possibility might be Goering deciding to expel the Jews en masse during the Phony war.

Ideas?
 
I wonder if various Zionist thinkers/organisations/Jewish Agency did any serious planning around this in the 1930s, pre WW2/ Holocaust, when the idea of wiping out European populations was almost unthinkable.

If not perhaps we look at say UK as example - where the populations were not under Nazi / hostile control and were increasingly settled / established - what ratio of those populations migrated to Palestine in 1930s-50s, when Palestine/Israel was very much a hardship migration
 
With a POD after January 1, 1938, what events would see the largest number of Jews attempt to get to Mandatory Palestine?

The international community being willing to finance the 'export' of Jews from Germany. The Nazi's would have been glad to see the back of them, but the foreign currency flowing out of the country when the Jews liquidated their holdings was unsustainable for the Nazi economy so they were caught between their anti-Semitism and their need for hard currency.
 
In 1933, there were 3 million Polish Jews, 2.5 million Soviet Jews, .75 million Romanian Jews, .5 million German Jews, and .45 Czechoslovak Jews. If you want Palestine to have the largest possible Jewish population, the key would be for European Jewry to survive Nazi Germany and emigrate after the war.
The most direct possible way would be for the Nazi regime to collapse sometime after occupying Poland and parts of Eastern Europe but before the worst parts of the Holocaust, saving European Jews but also convincing them that Europe wasn’t safe. Maybe Germany’s re-arming is smaller, they just barely defeat Poland, and are defeated by the WAllies?
If Nazi occupation was followed by a far-right nationalist governments or Soviet occupation, a large number of European Jews would probably leave for Palestine or the United States.
OTL, Jews were targetted in the political violence after the war by Polish partisans for their believed cooperation with the Soviets (Jozef Kuras allegedly targetted Jews, but this was possibly Soviet propaganda).
The USSR could very easily become terribly antisemitic and target the majority of their Jewish population.
OTL, the Doctor’s Plot was allegedly the first step of this (though Stalin died shortly afterwards and political targeting decreased). Stalin also targeted the leadership of the JAO. Jews in Poland and other Eastern European countries, having ecaped one antisemitic totalitarian regime, would not be willing to sit as another antisemitic totalitarian regime took over.
If the USSR doesnt succeed Nazi Germany in Eastern Europe, nationalist governments could easily become terribly antisemitic as well. OTL, Poland began creating antisemitic laws before the war, and far-right nationalist governments could continue or increase these policies, convincing Poland’s Jewish population to leave.
If Stalin’s antisemitic USSR collapses violently (maybe as a reaction to Stalin’s presumably larger and crazier purges), Jews in the USSR would escape the political violence by heading to either the US or Palestine.

OTL 1947: 630k Jews, 1.2 million Arabs. ITL 1947, Palestine would see massive amounts of Jewish immigration, possibly amounting in the millions depending on how many distrust the United States.
 

The Avenger

Banned
With a POD after January 1, 1938, what events would see the largest number of Jews attempt to get to Mandatory Palestine?

I've been talking to the Writer of Blunted Sickle. The French stay in the War, and as such the Germans never attack the Soviets, and as the Germans are able to kill fewer Jews and he thinks that you would have fewer Jews fleeing.

The thought that comes to me for the Maximum number would occur for a Hitler Death and peace in the West (at least) sometime in 1943, (What would a Jew in Belarus would had family shipped to the Camps do in this circumstance, welcome back the Soviets or try to flee to Palestine...

Another possibility might be Goering deciding to expel the Jews en masse during the Phony war.

Ideas?
The best move would probably be to have France avoid falling in 1940 and have Hitler kill a sufficiently large number of German, Austrian, Polish, and Czechs Jews before he gets overthrown by the Schwarze Kapelle (or, alternatively, have the SK fail in overthowing him; that should ensure that the Holocaust goes on uninterrupted until Britain and France--or perhaps the Soviet Union--are able to liberate the territories under Nazi rule.

In this TL, you'll still have many--if not most--Polish and Czech Jews and the remaining German and Austrian Jews get murdered. However, you'll also have a much larger Jewish population in the Soviet Union--which doesn't get invaded in this TL. If the Soviet Union still goes anti-Semitic (Britain and France will probably create Israel in this TL in response to the Holocaust, and if Israel rejects Soviet overtures for an alliance, well ...) and still falls several decades later, then you could have much more Jews (on account of there being much more total Soviet Jews) want to leave the Soviet Union. If the U.S. will still mostly close its doors to them as in our TL, Israel would be the most likely country for them to go en masse to.

Note: Without Operation Barbarossa, there'd probably be something like 2.5-3.0 million additional Jews in the Soviet Union.
 
If I recall, wasn't it British policy to prevent the large-scale immigration of Jews to the region, specifically to avoid upsetting the ethnic balance as much as possible? That would have had an even large effect on who manages to make it - it's one thing to want to emigrate, but someone has to be willing to let you in.
 

The Avenger

Banned
If I recall, wasn't it British policy to prevent the large-scale immigration of Jews to the region, specifically to avoid upsetting the ethnic balance as much as possible? That would have had an even large effect on who manages to make it - it's one thing to want to emigrate, but someone has to be willing to let you in.
If European Jews still get killed by the hundreds of thousands or by the millions, I'd expect this British policy to change.
 
If European Jews still get killed by the hundreds of thousands or by the millions, I'd expect this British policy to change.

Not really. The Arabs had revolted which caused the British halt in migration.

If Britain is at peacetime and the World is mostly peaceful then maybe they will allow much more migration but otherwise worries of an Arab revolt that might spread like Wildfire over all the Arab regions including the critical Suez Canal will mean that unless we see massive lobbying in Britain and from America that migration to the Mandate will be much the same with potentially small increases but nothing major.
 
The problem in the 1930s and after the Nazis took power was not that German/Austrian Jews couldn't leave, although the Nazis swiftly ensured they left assets behind. It wasn't that before the war Jews of the countries the Nazis occupied couldn't leave (except the USSR). The problem was the British would not let them in to Mandatory Palestine. I would expect had the British allowed all the Jews who wanted out of Germany/Austria as well as any others who wanted out of Poland, Hungary, etc in to Palestine prior to September, 1939, you probably would have seen at least 500,000 more Jews there, possibly twice that. Once the war kicks off, basically everywhere the Nazis occupy things will go as OTL.

As far as the USSR goes, they are not going to let Soviet Jews go. Allowing mass emigration from the worker's paradise, inconceivable...
 
The international community being willing to finance the 'export' of Jews from Germany. The Nazi's would have been glad to see the back of them, but the foreign currency flowing out of the country when the Jews liquidated their holdings was unsustainable for the Nazi economy so they were caught between their anti-Semitism and their need for hard currency.

Could the Germans put controls on how much currency could be exported by Jews being relocated to Palestine? They could partially sell it as "we need to cover the cost of relocating you".
 
You could have Ethiopia join the Entente during World War 1 which sees a few thousand Ethiopian Jews (or Beta Israel) sign up for the Jewish Legion where they fight alongside British forces in Palestine and manage to convince the British administration in Palestine to accept Ethiopian Jews. I believe Ethiopia had a few hundred thousand native Jews which could lead to increasing Jewish emigration from Ethiopia and see the Jewish population in Palestine swell as the Ethiopian Jews settle in.
 
Could the Germans put controls on how much currency could be exported by Jews being relocated to Palestine? They could partially sell it as "we need to cover the cost of relocating you".


They did exactly that OTL, hence very few Jews were willing to leave. One of the motivations behind Kristallnacht and the general increasing oppression after Munich was that since the Nazi's couldn't make leaving more appealing they would make staying even less so. Even that didn't really do the trick, hence the Nazi's effort to effectively 'sell' the Jews in exchange for large foreign loans. Ironically this failed because despite what the Nazi's believed the international banking community was not controlled by Jews and there was zero interest in such a deal.
 

The Avenger

Banned
The problem in the 1930s and after the Nazis took power was not that German/Austrian Jews couldn't leave, although the Nazis swiftly ensured they left assets behind. It wasn't that before the war Jews of the countries the Nazis occupied couldn't leave (except the USSR). The problem was the British would not let them in to Mandatory Palestine. I would expect had the British allowed all the Jews who wanted out of Germany/Austria as well as any others who wanted out of Poland, Hungary, etc in to Palestine prior to September, 1939, you probably would have seen at least 500,000 more Jews there, possibly twice that. Once the war kicks off, basically everywhere the Nazis occupy things will go as OTL.

As far as the USSR goes, they are not going to let Soviet Jews go. Allowing mass emigration from the worker's paradise, inconceivable...
Would Palestine's logistics in 1939 have supported an additional 500,000 Jews?
 

The Avenger

Banned
Not really. The Arabs had revolted which caused the British halt in migration.

If Britain is at peacetime and the World is mostly peaceful then maybe they will allow much more migration but otherwise worries of an Arab revolt that might spread like Wildfire over all the Arab regions including the critical Suez Canal will mean that unless we see massive lobbying in Britain and from America that migration to the Mandate will be much the same with potentially small increases but nothing major.
Sure, Britain won't allow Jewish immigration into Palestine during WWII. However, after WWII, their calculations might very well change.
 

The Avenger

Banned
Also, if a lot of Jews still get killed in the Holocaust, Yes, there absolutely would be mass lobbying to open Palestine's doors to large numbers of Jewish immigrants.
 
OTL the British troops liberated a number of concentration camps, the evidence of the Holocaust was fully there in 1945. Yet, between 1945 and 1948 the British made every attempt to prevent any Jews from immigrating to Palestine. British policy was to do what it took to keep the Arabs calm and maintain control over Suez, presence in the Persian Gulf etc. They gave the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem a pass even though he spent much of WWII in Germany broadcasting to the Arabs to join with the German friends, helped to recruit Muslims in the Balkans for SS units etc. More Jews die in WWII, less Jews die in WWII British policy won't change.

You need to posit a POD that will change British policy vis a vis Palestine, the Arabs etc in place before WWII to expect more Holocaust survivors being allowed in to Mandatory Palestine postwar.
 

The Avenger

Banned
OTL the British troops liberated a number of concentration camps, the evidence of the Holocaust was fully there in 1945. Yet, between 1945 and 1948 the British made every attempt to prevent any Jews from immigrating to Palestine. British policy was to do what it took to keep the Arabs calm and maintain control over Suez, presence in the Persian Gulf etc. They gave the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem a pass even though he spent much of WWII in Germany broadcasting to the Arabs to join with the German friends, helped to recruit Muslims in the Balkans for SS units etc. More Jews die in WWII, less Jews die in WWII British policy won't change.

You need to posit a POD that will change British policy vis a vis Palestine, the Arabs etc in place before WWII to expect more Holocaust survivors being allowed in to Mandatory Palestine postwar.
Even if the Brits don't change their immigration policy in relation to Palestine, wouldn't they still eventually withdraw from Palestine--thus allowing Zionists to create a Jewish state and to allow unlimited Jewish immigration into their part of Palestine?

Or is the OP here only talking about Jewish immigration to the British Mandate of Palestine?
 
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