Exodus to Berlin: The Return of the Jews to Germany

by Peter Laufer

In the years following the Holocaust, the Jewish community in Germany was tiny, decimated by the Nazis and shrinking fast as most survivors died or emigrated. But once the Berlin Wall fell, the German government invited Soviet-bloc Jews to come make a new life in prosperous and democratic Germany. Exodus to Berlin tells the story of that migration. Since 1989 more than 100,000 Jews have accepted Germany's invitation, filling Berlin and the rest of the country with a vibrant subculture. Germany now wakes up to synagogues filling for services, bagels and blintzes in new restaurants, and the mournful strains of Klezmer music in clubs and street festivals. Jews are finding sanctuary in Germany from the anti-Semitism, violence, and economic chaos that plague the former Soviet empire. But almost simultaneous with the first flow of Jewish immigrants, and stimulated by the failure of German unification to deliver promised prosperity to the former East Germany, neo-Nazis have been on the march in Germany, vowing to reclaim "Germany for the Germans!" More than a hundred murders and countless acts of vandalism are blamed on marauding right-wingers. Peter Laufer brings this current history to life through vivid narratives of events he experienced in Germany and dozens of highly personal interviews he conducted with the participants―Jews as they arrived at Germany's border, neo-Nazis who want to send those immigrants to Israel. Exodus to Berlin is a book of uncommon interest about one of the more unnoticed developments on the European continent. Illustrated with black-and-white photographs.

256 pages, Hardcover

First published September 25, 2003

About the author

Peter Laufer, Ph.D., is the author of more than a dozen books that deal with social and political issues, including "Mission Rejected: U.S. Soldiers Who Say No to Iraq," "Wetback Nation: The Case for Opening the Mexican-American Border," and "Iron Curtain Rising: A Personal Journey through the Changing Landscape of Eastern Eurpoe." He is the coanchor of "The Peter Laufer Show" on radio station Green 960 in San Francisco. More about his books, documentary films, broadcasts, which have won the George Polk, Robert F. Kennedy, Edward R. Murrow, and other awards, can be found at peterlaufer.com. He lives in Bodega Bay, California.