Transitional Community, Historical Successor, or a New Beginning: Jewish Life in Postwar West Germany

The article explores the complex reestablishment of Jewish life in postwar Germany from 1945 to 1970. It presents the formation of “transitional” communities of Jewish displaced persons (DPs), primarily Eastern European Holocaust survivors and refugees, in American-occupied Germany, and contrasts these with smaller German-Jewish communities. While Eastern European Jews leaned toward Zionism, many of the German Jews envisioned collaboration within a democratic Germany. After dealing with the immediate postwar period (1945–1948) and the years of transformation (1948–1950), the article delves into debates over Jewish property restitution and the moral legitimacy of Jewish life on German soil. Amid the establishment of the Federal Republic of Germany, the Jewish community faced persistent tensions about continuity with prewar Jewish culture and lingering anti-Semitism. By the 1970s, a more stable Jewish presence in Germany had emerged, yet questions of historical memory persisted.