Italian diplomatic documents on the history of the Holocaust in Greece (1941-1943)

Presents 158 documents (mostly from 1943), in Italian or German, from the archives of the Italian Foreign Ministry, and a brief English summary of each document. The documents clarify the situation of the Jewish community in Salonika during World War II. As Germany's major ally and as a country which had some citizens, including Jews, living in the German-occupied zone of Greece, Italy saved a number of them from deportation. For some time Italy also succeeded in preventing the introduction of anti-Jewish measures in its zone of occupation. Italian diplomats were involved in negotiations concerning the fate of Jews with Spanish citizenship, who were saved from deportation. The documents mention prominent figures in the Axis camp who were involved in the fate of Salonika's Jews, including the Nazis Dieter Wisliceny, Alois Brunner, and Maximilian Merten, and the Italian consuls Guelfo Zamboni and Giuseppe Castruccio. The introduction (pp. 11-61) presents an overview of the relevant events of the period and raises the question of what the Italians knew, and when, about German actions against the Jews. It also provides information about two Jews who collaborated with the Nazis. (From the Bibliography of the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism - The Hebrew University of Jerusalem)