An official who helped the Nazi regime formulate the anti-Jewish Nuremberg Laws reinvented himself “as a spy master, diplomat and kingmaker” and “played a key role” in the development of the Israeli nuclear program, according to a British newspaper report.
Hans Globke was a high-ranking official in the Ministry of the Interior during the Nazi era and was central to the interpretation and implementation of the Nuremberg Racial Laws and contributed to the “Jewish Code” enforced in Slovakia, according to the Times of London.
When Hitler came to power, Globke “took responsibility for” citizenship and race issues “and was praised by his bosses for his” positive attitude “towards National Socialism, the Times of London reported.” In 1936, he wrote an infamous legal commentary on the Nuremberg Race Laws “and his travel guide” became ubiquitous in the courtrooms of National Socialist Germany “and offered” many strict interpretations of the rules “.
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For example, he stated that “sex between Aryans and non-Aryans was a crime, even if it took place outside of Germany”. He also introduced the law that “forced Jews to use the middle name Israel if they were men or Sara if they were women, so that they could be more easily identified.”
According to the Times, in 1941 he was involved in drafting an “ordinance that stripped Jews in the conquered nations of their statehood and allowed the confiscation of their property, which was considered to be one of the most important legal foundations of the Holocaust.”
At the beginning of World War II, he traveled through Nazi-occupied territories, “from France to Czechoslovakia, and made further decisions to distinguish between Aryans and” smaller “races.”
According to the Times, in 1941 he was involved in drafting an “ordinance that stripped Jews in the conquered nations of their statehood and allowed the confiscation of their property, which was considered to be one of the most important legal foundations of the Holocaust.”
Globke and the Extermination of the Jews: A Book Published in East Germany in 1960 (Amazon)
However, according to the Times, Globke managed to reinvent himself after the war, to the point where he “hired a respected group of anti-Nazis to testify under oath that he had been a leading figure in the resistance against Hitler was “.
In its story, published earlier this month, the Times said that documents it discovered also show that Globke had links to the formation of the Israeli nuclear program and the trial of Adolf Eichmann, one of the main organizers of the Holocaust.
After the end of World War II, Globke was viewed by the West as a functionary of the Nazi government rather than a true loyalist or a Nazi ideologue, according to the Times. He even appeared as a witness at the Nuremberg post-war trials.
Globke was Chief of Staff and trusted confidante of the former conservative West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer between 1953 and 1963 and was responsible for recruiting at the heart of the West German government.
His continued service in the West German government led him in turn to a well-connected position within the intelligence community.
This position and its connections were used to ensure that Globke’s name did not appear in the Eichmann trial in Israel from 1961 to 1962 and to ensure, with the help of the CIA, that his name was also kept out of documents related to the trial. “The Germans persuaded the White House to have the CIA remove all mentions of Globke from a serialization of Eichmann’s memoirs in an American magazine,” the Times reported. In addition, Eichmann’s lawyer Robert Servatius, who was also “a West German secret service figure, cut out Globke’s name and others from his client’s last speech in court.”
Months before the Eichmann trial, the Times reported, Globke helped Adenauer begin work on a secret agreement to give Israel today’s equivalent of £ 4 billion (about $ 5.5 billion) for a “development project” in Israel Negev desert lend.
View of the nuclear reactor in Dimona, southern Israel, in 2016. (Moshe Shai / Flash90)
Documents made available to the German journalist Gaby Weber show that this money was intended for use in the nuclear research facility and in the Dimona reactor. Foreign news reports that nuclear weapons are being manufactured at the facility.
According to the Times report, a memorandum from the then German Foreign Ministry describes a meeting between German Defense Minister Franz-Josef Strauss and then Prime Minister David Ben Gurion: “Ben Gurion dealt with the manufacture of nuclear weapons. In an interview, Ben Gurion said that the Chancellor had promised him that Germany would take part in the development of the Negev desert. “
According to the report, the Germans apparently suspended the nuclear negotiations during the Eichmann trial. “In no case can we commit ourselves before the completion of the Eichmann process,” says a document from the German Foreign Ministry.
The Times report did not specify whether talks were renewed after the trial, nor did it indicate whether the $ 5.5 billion loan money was sent, despite Globke having “played a key role in the development of nuclear weapons in Israel.” has played “.
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