3 - Refugee

Summary

By 1921, peace was returning to Europe and the League of Nations was formed in Geneva. The catastrophe seemed to have passed, and the Joint Distribution Committee was ready to rehabilitate Europe’s Jews before making a quick exit. That same year, however, would bring new crises, pushing Jewish security into the ever-receding distance. American Jews could not ignore their duty to help their still-suffering Jewish kin; the international Jewish humanitarian effort became a permanent fixture of interwar Jewish life. Hias, the JDC, and a loose network of European organizations were invested in the cause of refugee relief. With Fridtjof Nansen at the center of the intergovernmental interwar refugee regime, and the United States closing its borders in an antisemitic campaign, Jewish organizations argued over definitions of refugees and other migrants and devised solutions accordingly. Ultimately, the refugee crisis that had its origins in mass expulsions along the Eastern Front could not be solved and remained a stubborn human crisis across Europe that persisted into the 1930s.