Audiobook15 hours
FDR and the Jews
Written by Richard Breitman and Allan J. Lichtman
Narrated by Todd McLaren
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
3.5/5
()
About this audiobook
Nearly seventy-five years after World War II, a contentious debate lingers over whether Franklin Delano Roosevelt turned his back on the Jews of Hitler's Europe. Defenders claim that FDR saved millions of potential victims by defeating Nazi Germany. Others revile him as morally indifferent and indict him for keeping America's gates closed to Jewish refugees and failing to bomb Auschwitz's gas chambers.
In an extensive examination of this impassioned debate, Richard Breitman and Allan J. Lichtman find that the president was neither savior nor bystander. In FDR and the Jews, they draw upon many new primary sources to offer an intriguing portrait of a consummate politician-compassionate but also pragmatic-struggling with opposing priorities under perilous conditions. For most of his presidency Roosevelt indeed did little to aid the imperiled Jews of Europe. He put domestic policy priorities ahead of helping Jews and deferred to others' fears of an anti-Semitic backlash. Yet he also acted decisively at times to rescue Jews, often withstanding contrary pressures from his advisers and the American public. Even Jewish citizens who petitioned the president could not agree on how best to aid their coreligionists abroad.
Though his actions may seem inadequate in retrospect, the authors bring to light a concerned leader whose efforts on behalf of Jews were far greater than those of any other world figure. His moral position was tempered by the political realities of depression and war, a conflict all too familiar to American politicians in the twenty-first century.
In an extensive examination of this impassioned debate, Richard Breitman and Allan J. Lichtman find that the president was neither savior nor bystander. In FDR and the Jews, they draw upon many new primary sources to offer an intriguing portrait of a consummate politician-compassionate but also pragmatic-struggling with opposing priorities under perilous conditions. For most of his presidency Roosevelt indeed did little to aid the imperiled Jews of Europe. He put domestic policy priorities ahead of helping Jews and deferred to others' fears of an anti-Semitic backlash. Yet he also acted decisively at times to rescue Jews, often withstanding contrary pressures from his advisers and the American public. Even Jewish citizens who petitioned the president could not agree on how best to aid their coreligionists abroad.
Though his actions may seem inadequate in retrospect, the authors bring to light a concerned leader whose efforts on behalf of Jews were far greater than those of any other world figure. His moral position was tempered by the political realities of depression and war, a conflict all too familiar to American politicians in the twenty-first century.
Related to FDR and the Jews
Related audiobooks
World of Our Fathers: The Journey of the East European Jews to America and the Life They Found and Made Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Chutzpah Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Travelers in the Third Reich: The Rise of Fascism: 1919-1945 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Those Angry Days: Roosevelt, Lindbergh, and America's Fight over World War II, 1939-1941 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5In Hitler's Munich: Jews, the Revolution, and the Rise of Nazism Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPrologue to Annihilation: Ordinary American and British Jews Challenge the Third Reich Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Last Jews in Berlin Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Hitler's American Friends: The Third Reich's Supporters in the United States Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/51940: FDR, Willkie, Lindbergh, Hitler---the Election Amid the Storm Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Hitler Years: Disaster, 1940-1945 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Three Days at the Brink: FDR's Daring Gamble to Win World War II Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5All Against All: The Long Winter of 1933 and the Origins of the Second World War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Life Under Nazi Occupation: The Struggle to Survive During World War II Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Great Escape: Nine Jews Who Fled Hitler and Changed the World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Trials of Zion: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Ben-Gurion: A Political Life Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Icon of Evil: Hitler's Mufti and the Rise of Radical Islam Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5"The Rest of Us": The Rise of America's Eastern European Jews Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Where the Jews Aren't: The Sad and Absurd Story of Birobidzhan, Russia's Jewish Autonomous Region Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5We Stand Divided: The Rift Between American Jews and Israel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Case for Israel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Jewish New York: The Remarkable Story of a City and a People Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Rise Abraham Cahan Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Third Reich in Power Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Menachem Begin: The Battle for Israel's Soul Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Defending Israel: The Story of My Relationship with My Most Challenging Client Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A World of Trouble: The White House and the Middle East---from the Cold War to the War on Terror Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Resistance: A Frenchwoman's Journal of the War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5"Our Crowd": The Great Jewish Families of New York Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Holocaust For You
The Dressmakers of Auschwitz: The True Story of the Women Who Sewed to Survive Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Night: New translation by Marion Wiesel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Jack and Rochelle: A Holocaust Story of Love and Resistance Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Swingtime for Hitler: Goebbels’s Jazzmen, Tokyo Rose, and Propaganda That Carries a Tune Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Happiest Man on Earth: The Beautiful Life of an Auschwitz Survivor Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Betrayal of Anne Frank: A Cold Case Investigation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Escape Artist: The Man Who Broke Out of Auschwitz to Warn the World Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Choice: Escaping the Past and Embracing the Possible Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Daughter of Auschwitz: My Story of Resilience, Survival and Hope Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Watchmaker's Daughter: The True Story of World War II Heroine Corrie ten Boom Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Killing the SS: The Hunt for the Worst War Criminals in History Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Stone Crusher: The True Story of a Father and Son's Fight for Survival in Auschwitz Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Irena's Children: The Extraordinary Story of the Woman Who Saved 2,500 Children from the Warsaw Ghetto Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5How Do You Kill 11 Million People?: Why the Truth Matters More Than You Think Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Nazis Next Door: How America Became a Safe Haven for Hitler's Men Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Displaced: A Holocaust Memoir and the Road to a New Beginning Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Sisters of Auschwitz: The True Story of Two Jewish Sisters’ Resistance in the Heart of Nazi Territory Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Cold Crematorium: Reporting from the Land of Auschwitz Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Doctors from Hell: The Horrific Account of Nazi Experiments on Humans Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Light of Days: The Untold Story of Women Resistance Fighters in Hitler's Ghettos Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Born Survivors: Three Young Mothers and Their Extraordinary Story of Courage, Defiance, and Hope Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Holocaust Memoirs of a Bergen-Belsen Survivor: Classmate of Anne Frank Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Masters of Death: The SS-Einsatzgruppen and the Invention of the Holocaust Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Pharmacist of Auschwitz: The Untold Story Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5What They Didn't Burn: Uncovering My Father's Holocaust Secrets Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Hitler, the Germans, and the Final Solution Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Reviews for FDR and the Jews
Rating: 3.5714285714285716 out of 5 stars
3.5/5
7 ratings0 reviews