Book Description

During World War II, most of the European Jews perished by bullets, starvation and in concentration camps. The Jews in Bulgaria avoided that fate, despite Hitler's repeated attempts to impose his "final solution" on the country. Until recently, not enough was known about those events and as the knowledge expanded, so did the arguments about what exactly happened, as it is the case with almost every historical event in the Balkans. Many individuals and groups contributed to the survival of the 50,000 Bulgarian Jews and it is difficult to pinpoint who played the crucial role. Was it King Boris III, the Parliament, the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, the Jewish Consistory, the Communist Party or the ordinary people? Unlike Germany, where people generally were indifferent to the fate of the Jews, many Bulgarians, with different social status and political convictions, resisted the looming catastrophe. The book "Holocaust Averted - Bulgarian Jews in World War II" is the result of years of research, based on over one thousand books, articles, memoirs, letters and other archival materials. Reflecting the fact that Bulgaria is little known throughout the world, the book provides a concise introduction to the Bulgarian history, with special emphasis on the long and volatile cohabitation of Bulgarians and Jews, during which they often faced the same challenges. The main chapters of the book analyze the factors that averted the Holocaust in Bulgaria and especially the specific roles played by countries, organizations and individuals in those highly dramatic events. To place the World War II events in Bulgaria in a wider historical context, they are compared with the experiences of other European countries, where things developed differently. The book also covers the controversial issue about the deportation of over 11,000 Jews from the territories occupied by German and Bulgarian troops in Macedonia and Aegean Thrace. The conclusion is that history is complicated, the mechanical application of simplistic moral judgments to the war time in Bulgaria fails to explain the complexity of the behavior of all participants involved in the events. Illustrated with photographs and maps.