A new exhibition on the fate of Viennese Jews during the Holocaust will be inaugurated this week at the Austrian Parliament, in a major step forward in acknowledging the country’s Nazi past.
The parliamentary display comes amid a surge of antisemitism in Europe in the wake of the year-long war against Hamas in Gaza triggered by the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas massacre, and more than three decades after Austria formally admitted its role in the Holocaust after half a century of claiming victimhood following World War II.
The new exhibition from Jerusalem’s Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial, which opens on Tuesday, is titled “Torn from Life: The Fate of Austrian Jews After the Anschluss in 1938,” referring to the annexation of Austria to the German Reich the year before the outbreak of World War II.
The exhibition features artifacts and items from Yad Vashem’s vast archives and collections, including a photo album, a stool used to circumvent rules barring Jews from sitting in public parks, tefillin or phylacteries, a satchel and a miniature Torah scroll that tell the story of the Austrian Jewry in the 1930s and the growing persecution they endured on the eve of the Holocaust.
About 125,000 of Austria’s nearly 200,000-member pre-war Jewish community fled before the outbreak of the war in 1939, but nearly 65,000 of those who did not manage to escape were killed in the concentration camps.
A typical wooden folding stool from a dark past
A simple wooden folding stool which is among the items going on display tells the story of the increasing antisemitism and Nazi persecution against Austrian Jews following the 1938 Nazi annexation of Austria, which was warmly greeted by most Austrians.
The stool, which belonged to a Jewish family in Austria, was among those used by the Jews to sit in city parks after they were banned from sitting on public park benches starting on July 2, 1938.
“The artifacts in this exhibition are not merely remnants of a tragic past; they give voice to the millions silenced by the Holocaust,” said Yad Vashem Chairman Dani Dayan, who will inaugurate the exhibition together with Austrian Parliament President Wolfgang Sobotka and members of the families whose items are being showcased. “By displaying them here in Austria, we underscore the vital importance of remembering the past.”
Eighty years after the Holocaust, the exhibition is taking on added significance in light of today’s events.
“The fact that this exhibition is being held in the Austrian Parliament is a significant step in acknowledging Austria’s role in these atrocities and demonstrates the country’s commitment to uphold the fact-based historical narrative of the Holocaust and its pledge to combat the resurgence of antisemitism today.”
