jews and german products

I have several Jewish friends, one has a BMW, another has a Mercedes, and he always buys Mercs.

For years, Germany has been Israel's second-largest trading partner after the US. In 2006, bilateral trade totalled USD 4.9 billion, Germany providing 8.26% of Israeli imports (worth approx. USD 3.2 billion) and taking 5.58% of Israeli exports (worth approx. USD 1.7 billion). Imports from Germany grew by 7.33% and exports to Germany by 31.20% compared with the previous year.

Germany's relatively large share of Israel's foreign trade is all the more remarkable given the fact that German companies are not involved in important trade sectors: the import of petroleum and other fuels and the diamonds trade.

The principal German exports to Israel are high-quality processed goods, the most important being chemical products, plastic and rubber goods, metal goods, all types of machinery, vehicles, measuring and medical equipment. As in other markets, quality and innovativeness are particularly valued.

Germany's main imports from Israel are chemical products, especially pharmaceuticals, and electrical and electronic goods. Agricultural products are much less important than in the past.

My Jewish grandparents drove Cadillacs. If it was because of the war they never said so. My grandfather lost almost his entire immediate family in the camps, but he never expressed anger at Germans or German corporations in my life time. I think there was always a huge difference between a Nazi and a German in his mind. I did have a Jewish friend growing up whose parents banned Wagner operas from being played in their home. They said it made them think of Hitler.

I was raised in a near microcosm of irish roman catholicity, though not inculcated - perhaps unusually, or maybe not - with aversion to jewish people. To some extent, maybe the opposite; my parents worked in Hollywood in the thirties, where they met.

My first lover was jewish, his parents very very left on the spectrum, and he and they weren't religious. That was in the early sixties. He would never have bought a volkswagen; I somehow, this time later, remember him saying so - though vdubs were few on the land back then, though I rode in a vw in Chicago in 1955 - and not only because he only got around by bicycle over scads of miles.

On the other hand, as years have gone by, many friends of whatever level of jewish observation have bought bmws and mercedes, perhaps in a kind of take that, thwap!!!, or not. Not my business, basically.

I can understand either way.

I'll add that my friend's opinion in 1963 could be very different from people's opinions now. Now most everybody who can afford such wants a well engineered car, except those who may buy local for various patriotic reasons, or financial reasons. Well engineered cars aren't all from one place, but a whole bunch are.

My Mercedes driving friend told me that if he were to let sentiment drive his automobile choice, he would rather drive a Mercedes than a Ford, given Henry Ford's Nazi sympathies and involvement with Hitler and the National Socialist régime. Ford wrote a notorious book called "The International Jew".

That Henry Ford, the famous automobile manufacturer gave money to the National Socialists directly or indirectly has never been disputed," said Konrad Heiden, one of the first biographers of Hitler. Novelist Upton Sinclair wrote in The Flivver King, a book about Ford, that the Nazis got forty-thousand dollars from Ford to reprint anti-Jewish pamphlets in German translations, and that an additional $300,00 was later sent to Hitler through a grandson of the ex-Kaiser who acted as an intermediary.

The US Ambassador to Germany, William E. Dodd, said in an interview that "certain American industrialists had a great deal to do with bringing fascist regimes into being in both Germany and Italy." At the time of Dodd's criticisms, the general public was aware that he was speaking of Ford because the press made a direct association between Dodd's statements and other reports of Ford's anti-Semitism.

Henry Ford's reward from Hitler finally came in July 1938, when on his seventy-fifth birthday he was awarded the Grand Cross of the Supreme Order of the German Eagle. Ford was the first American and the fourth person in the world to receive this medal, which was the highest decoration that could be given to any non-German citizen. Benito Mussolini, another of Hitler's financiers, had been decorated with the same honor earlier that year.

The presentation was made in Ford's Dearborn office by the German Counsul on Cleveland, Karl Kapp, and Consul Fritz Hailer of Detroit. Kapp placed the silk red sash over Ford's right shoulder. The sash was worn in a diagonal line from the right shoulder to the left hip where it was clasped with a gold and white cross. Kapp then pinned a large, shining star-shaped medal of Ford's white suit. The decoration was given "in recognition of [Ford's] pioneering in making motor cars available for the masses." Hitler's personal congratulatory message accompanied the award.

A post-war Congressional subcommittee investigating American support for the Nazi military effort described the manner in which the Nazis succeeded in obtaining U.S. technical and financial assistance as "quite fantastic". Among other evidence the Committee was shown a memorandum prepared in the offices of Ford-Werke A.G. on November 25, 1941, written by Dr. H. F. Albert to R. H. Schmidt, then president of the board of Ford-Werke A.G. The memo cited the advantages of having a majority of the German firm held by Ford Motor Company in Detroit.

German Ford had been able to exchange Ford parts for rubber and critical war materials needed in 1938 and 1939 "and they would not have been able to do that if Ford had not been owned by the United States." Further, with a majority American interest German Ford would "more easily be able to step in and dominate the Ford holdings throughout Europe." It was even reported to the Committee that two top German Ford officials had been in a bitter personal feud about who was to control Ford of England, such "that one of them finally got up and left the room in disgust."

According to evidence presented to the Committee, Ford-Werke A.G. was technically transformed in the late 1930s into a German company. All vehicles and their parts were produced in Germany, by German workers using German materials under German direction and exported to European and overseas territories of the United States and Great Britain. Any needed foreign raw materials, rubber and nonferrous metals, were obtained through the American Ford Company. American influence had been more or less converted into a supporting position (Hilfsstellung) for the German Ford plants.

At the outbreak of the war Ford-Werke placed itself at the disposal of the Wehrmacht for armament production. It was assumed by the Nazis that as long as Ford-Werke A.G. had an American majority, it would be possible to bring the remaining European Ford companies under German influence ?- i.e., that of Ford-Werke A.G. ?- and so execute Nazi "Greater European" policies in the Ford plants in Amsterdam, Antwerp, Paris, Budapest, Bucharest, and Copenhagen.

thanks for some intresting observations, it seems that german products are not a problem for the jewish community, likewise in the uk pensioners who were held by japanese captors in the war buy a lot of japanese cars
also of note many pakistani muslims are huge watchers and fans of hindu bollywood movies -despite the historical tensions between the 2 countries

As a Jew for years after WW2 the thought of buying a volkwagen or any other German made product was abhorrent to me. But than I came to realize if we did not buy products of any nation that in the past had engaged in murdering Jews. We would not buy a single product from Europe and other areas of the world.
Note:I still would not purchase a German auto.

Well, I suppose I understand that, because I will not willingly buy an American product if I can get the equivalent from elsewhere. This is because of Iraq, and blind US support of illegal Israeli behaviour in Palestine. I say this as a (non-self-hating!) British born secular Jew.

contrex
To say I disagree with you regarding Israel would be an understatement. I have however, no wish to debate the issue with you. I wonder however , where you will run to when they start killing Jews in France. Remember the German Jews all loyal Germans had the same attitude as you seem to have.

I am German, I have Jewish friends, they drive German cars, their son
is my godchild. We celebrate jewish and catholic holidays together.
We are foremost people, nationality and religion comes in second, at least
for some of us.

PS someone should have told that to the Germans before the marched the Jews to The Ovens and gas chambers.

I can understand your position au1929, but neither my friends or I have
been part of WWII, nor have my parents for that matter. There is certainly a collective guilt we carry as Germans, however, I refuse to buy into
being blamed for something I have not taken part in.

You are not being invited to.

CalamityJane
I am not blaming you for anything. However, being old enought to have lived when all this occurred has left a bitter taste that will never go away. At least not for me.

tali:

Hmm, many of the top Bollywood stars are Muslims - Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan, oldies like Suraya, Dilip Kumar, Manoj Kumar, Saira Banu, singer Mohammed Rafi,

Even as a secular atheistic American Jew I am not anxious to buy any European products. I have this nagging feeling that there were too many Europeans that were just too comfortable with the Holocaust. Anti-Semitism was such an indelible part of many country's culture, I would rather buy Asian products. Even today, the European concern for Palestinians makes me wonder if that is just an excuse to revert to the anti-Semitism that was a part of Europe (when there were Jews there). It's almost as though some Europeans miss their anti-Semitism.
Germans were historically less anti-Semitic than many other European (and Eastern European) countries. They just had the technology at that point in time (WWII) to be very efficient. I think Israel exists today because the Allies understood that much of Europe, after WWII, did not want any surviving Jews returning to the countries that they lived in.
I understand many American Jews won't buy German cars, or more telling perhaps, won't visit Germany on vacation. However, some Russian Jews have emigrated to Germany, and the day will come when Germany will have a Jewish community again. The fact that Russian Jews are already laying the foundation for a Jewish community in Germany may be a very good indicator of Germany, more than many other countries, as having addressed their past (in WWII) and has attempted to deal with it.