From September 1943 until July 1944, while the Germans were arresting and displacing Jews all over Greece, no measures were taken against the Jews living in Rhodes. This eased their initial fears and gave to the members of the Jewish Community the false impression of peace and hope that nothing serious was going to occur. Only a few young Jews, risking their lives, dared to escape in shaky boats to the Turkish coasts. The rest waited and hoped.
Period of False Hope
Contents
In the meantime, the Nazis were preparing their criminal plan for the displacement and the elimination of the Jews. In mid-July 1944, the German Command ordered the Jews to reside solely within the confines of the city of Rhodes or in the villages of Trianta, Kremasti and Villanova (now known as Paradisi). These were the places where they had fled in order to escape the bombardments, in a distance no more than twelve kilometres from the city.
A few days later, on 18 July 1944, a German officer turned up at the house of the president of the Jewish Community and told him that, according to the orders of the German Commander, all Jewish men over 16 had to appear the following morning in the old headquarters of the Italian Air Force. They had to bring with them their identity cards and their work permits. This trick made everyone believe that they would be gathered in order to be sent to forced labour.
The Nazi Deception and Forced Gathering
In the next morning, two SS officers, who were sent from the “Rosenberg Command” in Athens, walked into the room accompanied by an interpreter. With brutality and threatening, they grabbed the documents from the hands of the Jews gathered in the room. They assigned the president of the Community the task to inform the women to join their husbands within 24 hours, otherwise they would be shot. They also had to carry with them all their belongings: jewellery, gold sovereigns, banknotes, a few personal items and food.
In the confusion that ensued, and in their ignorance, the women could do nothing but to obey the order. On 20 July, almost all the Jews of Rhodes had been captured and were held in this improvised concentration camp. The Germans started, with immense brutality, taking everything valuable from them. In the meantime, the Germans were plundering the houses of the Jews that had been hastily deserted. The Italian High Command was forced to issue an order according to which all Jewish real estate and assets were confiscated in favour of the Italian State.
It must be noted that the Turkish consul, Selahettin Ulkumen, intervened to save not only Turkish nationals but whole families as well, even at the remotest proof of their Turkish citizenship. He managed to save from the Nazis approximately 40 Jews who would have otherwise been led to death. For his acts, he was awarded after the war the title of “Righteous among the Nations” by Yad Vashem.
The order for the departure came at noon of Sunday 23 July. An endless queue of Jews set off. They were more than 1,600 men, women, children and elderly. Some were dragging their sad belongings, others were carrying them on their backs. Some were not walking fast enough. The guards, who were following the file accompanied by wild Alsatians, were beating them with their rifle stocks. Heads down, they passed through the city. The streets were empty as the Germans had sounded the alarm for air attacks. Once they arrived at the port, they were thrown in three very old cargo vessels. The presence of Jews on the island, which dated many centuries back, ended on that sad day of the summer of 1944.
The course from Rhodes to the port of Piraeus was horrible. It was terribly hot and the vessels were so full that those in the cargo hauls could not go up even to get some air. Seven persons died in the course of the voyage and their bodies were thrown in the sea.
They arrived at the port of Piraeus on 31 July 1944 and were immediately taken to Haidari, where they were ruthlessly humiliated. The Red Cross was not allowed to give them food and water until 36 hours after their arrival. The women were separated from the men. They were stripped in the most barbaric way to make sure that they had no more jewellery on them.
The Germans in an apparent attempt to break their morale were beating men, women and children sometimes to death. During the three days of their stay in the Haidari camp, another ten of the Jews of Rhodes died.
On 3 August, after having extracted their gold teeth and glasses, the Germans led the Jews in animal wagons. They put 65 persons in each wagon and sealed the doors. That was the last “consignment” of Jews from Greece. The trip to Poland lasted 13 days. About 100 people died during the trip and their bodies were thrown in the fields along the rail lines. They arrived in Auschwitz on 16 August and, after the horrible “selection” procedure, 1,200 persons, those who were judged too weak to work, were immediately sent to the gas chambers and the crematoria. The remainder were sent to forced labour in quarries, in coal mines and in the railways. The women were raped, sterilized and used in inhuman experiments, with no mercy.
Despite their short stay in the camp, most died of hardships, weakness and diseases. Only 150 survived: 120 women and 30 men. It is worth mentioning though that even after their liberation by the Allied forces, many of them died of exhaustion as they had become living skeletons.
Before the War, the Jewish Communities of Rhodes and Kos numbered 1,900 members. After the liberation their total population was not more than 200 persons
Deportation and Final Atrocities
The Legacy of Holocaust Recognition in Rhodes
On August 6th, 1946, Gabriel Charitos was elected First Mayor of a free Rhodes, after 600 years of occupation. In memory of his fellow Rhodians, the members of the Jewish Community, he named the central square of “La Juderia” to “Square of Jewish Martyrs”, the unanimous resolution of the then City Council of Rhodes, being the first official recognition of the Holocaust on behalf of a Greek authority.
The armistice between Israel and her Arab enemies following Israel’s War of Independence was signed in Rhodes in 1949.
From the late 1950s a few people would visit the island on holiday, spending time wandering in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City. Some families made efforts to reclaim their properties after a lapse of several years, but they were largely unsuccessful because of property laws and legal restrictions imposed by the Greek state. Many properties in the Juderia had also been bombed by the British during the war and had been destroyed.
In 2002 the Municipality approved the erection of a Monument of the Victims of the Holocaust in the Jewish Martyrs square, in the place where the Jewish quarter used to be. The Jewish cemetery of the island is still preserved through the efforts of the Rhodesli diaspora.
Holocaust Survivors
The Cape Town Holocaust and Genocide Centre has established and archive containing film, audio and written testimony of survivors, liberators and Righteous Among the Nations, who settled in South Africa after the war.
Testimonies of the following survivors originally from Rhodes Island include:
Amelia Algrante, Asher Varon, Bella Avzaradel, Bella Rahmani, Bella Sigoura, Clara Soriano, Diamante Franco, Giuseppe Coné, Lina Amato-Kanto, Lucia Amato, Lucia Habib, Mathilda Hasson, Mercada Alhadeff, Ner Alhadeff, Sarah Jerushalmi, Stella Israel and Violette Finz.
The Cape Town Holocaust and Genocide Centre produced a series of videos of second- and third-generation survivors sharing fond memories of their loved ones who survived the Holocaust.
“No one is born knowing hate, you learn to hate” Sarina Blacher talks about her father, Jack Hasson from the Island of Rhodes. This video is part of our series of second- and third-generation survivors sharing fond memories of their loved ones who survived the Holocaust.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ERu6AEmubg
Stacy Closenberg shares fond memories of growing up with her granny Violette Fintz.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKsuR0-YJbc&list=PLyhVXFct3eP3QaxZSWKVWfMjfoqMMviT9&index=1
Isaac Habib, son of Holocaust survivor Lucia Capelluto Habib, shares for the first time a poem he wrote in honour of his mother’s sister who he never had the privilege to meet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Evh2vAwKH14
Holocaust survivor Sarah Jerusalmi, matriarch of the Notrica family, is fondly remembered for her zest for life by her nieces and grandnephew who were like her own children.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uV5dXQb-eqs
Gary Kantor shares fond memories of his mother, Holocaust survivor Lina Kantor (nee Amato).
“Music has played such an important part in my mother’s life” – Gary Kantor talks about his mother, Lina Amato.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFG8WhNTrnU
Leora Hessen & Amanda Varkul share fond memories of their grandma Holocaust survivor Stella Israel.
Stella Israel was born in Rhodes Island in 1926. She was deported to Auschwitz and then to Bergen-Belsen, before being liberated from Theresienstadt. She lived briefly in Spain and Belgium, before moving to the Congo. She settled in South Africa in 1960. Stella passed away in 2014, leaving behind two children, five grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ri_6NBlzbEg
David Coné, grandson of survivor Giuseppe Coné, describes how his grandfather’s positive attitude was the key to his survival in the camps.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGyX90kil0I
Commemoration
Rhodes, Cos Commemoration
A special commemorative presentation by Sephardic Community Leaders, Stella Hanan Cohen and Jo Mallel, of Zimbabwe and South Africa, respectively. 2023: https://zjc.org.il/rhodes-cos-commemoration/
Additional Resources
The Jewish Martyrs of Rhodes and Cos
Hizkia M Franco, 1994
The Deportation of the Jews of Rhodes, 1944: An Integrated History
A McElligott,2018,
In Sacred Memory – Recollections of the Holocaust by survivors living in Cape Town, with testimonies from Clara Soriano, Violette Finz (nee Maio), Lucia Amato, R.A., Giuseppe Coné, Sara Jerusalmi, Asher Varon, Diamante Franco and Matilda Hasson.
Gwynne Schrire (ed), 1995,
Remembering Rhodes and the Holocaust: Intergenerational Trauma, Nostalgia and Identity, University of Limerick
Milena Callegari Cosentino, 2021
For this I lived – My Life at Auschiwitz-Birkenau and other Exiles
Sami Modiano, 2022
‘I’d Like to Become a Bird’
My great-great-grandmother’s letters—in Ladino—paint a portrait of the Sephardic community on the Isle of Rhodes, moments before it was destroyed in the Holocaust
By Hannah Pressman
Deportations of Jews during the Holocaust: Stories of the Last Deportees, June 1944-April 1945
The Hasson Family from Rhodes
Holocaust Survivor Testimony: Stella Franco Israel
YouTube Channel: Yad Vashem
The Jewish Martyrs of Rhodes and Cos
Hizkia M Franco, 1994
The Deportation of the Jews of Rhodes, 1944: An Integrated History
A McElligott,2018,
In Sacred Memory – Recollections of the Holocaust by survivors living in Cape Town, with testimonies from Clara Soriano, Violette Finz (nee Maio), Lucia Amato, R.A., Giuseppe Coné, Sara Jerusalmi, Asher Varon, Diamante Franco and Matilda Hasson.
Gwynne Schrire (ed), 1995,
Remembering Rhodes and the Holocaust: Intergenerational Trauma, Nostalgia and Identity, University of Limerick
Milena Callegari Cosentino, 2021
For this I lived – My Life at Auschiwitz-Birkenau and other Exiles
Sami Modiano, 2022
‘I’d Like to Become a Bird’
My great-great-grandmother’s letters—in Ladino—paint a portrait of the Sephardic community on the Isle of Rhodes, moments before it was destroyed in the Holocaust
By Hannah Pressman
Deportations of Jews during the Holocaust: Stories of the Last Deportees, June 1944-April 1945
The Hasson Family from Rhodes
Holocaust Survivor Testimony: Stella Franco Israel
YouTube Channel: Yad Vashem