Folke Bernadotte: Enemy of Israel? | Featured Documentary
Al Jazeera English
223,280 views Nov 9, 2023 #Aljazeeraenglish #MiddleEast #Israel
Episode 2: • The assassination of Count Bernadotte in J...
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Al Jazeera's two-part documentary Killing the Count examines the eventful life of Count Folke Bernadotte, head of the Swedish Red Cross and a leading figure in the rescue of thousands of concentration camp prisoners in World War II.
Count Folke was appointed as UN Mediator in the first Arab-Israeli war, shortly before he was assassinated by Zionist extremists in 1948.
In part one of Killing the Count , we explore the story of Count Folke Bernadotte's efforts during World War II to help prisoners in Nazi concentration camps.
Bernadotte negotiated the release of more than 30,000 prisoners, one third of them Jews, from German concentration camps, in an extraordinary humanitarian effort which would come to be known as the 'White Buses campaign'.
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Transcript
a small air strip north of [Music]
Jerusalem today it's derelict and
abandoned but for years Candia airport was the gateway to
Palestine on the morning of the 17th of September 1948 a white plane carrying un and Red
Cross markings landed [Music] here with the first Arab Israeli War
already raging across Palestine the UN mediator count fol Bernard do had come
to [Music]
Jerusalem that same afternoon as it passed through the Israeli controlled part of the
city his Convoy was ambushed one Jeep uh blocked away and
three guys with machine guns came out two of them went up to the first
core third one went directly to the third and shot through the
window by 5:00 p.m. Camp bernot was
dead the assassination was carried out by an extremist Zionist
group Lei Fighters for the freedom of
Israel I don't think anybody in Israel shed a tear about the death of
bernot it turned to be an eny of of the state of Israel and of the Zionist
dreams yet only 3 years earlier bernot had made another
Journey flying into Nazi Germany on the biggest humanitarian effort of World War
II he would save more than 30,000 prisoners from the concentration
camps a third of than Jews badot was not an enemy of the Jews
and there is nothing to suggest anti-Semitism in his entire
record this is the story of how peace can be frustrated by
extremism how assassination can turn the tide of
history with consequences that still SC Scar the Middle [Music]
East this is the story of killing the
[Music]
count the Villa visor in the French Riviera the winter home of count batil
badot youngest son of count FAL [Music]
bernot vertil loves this place where his father and mother first met in the late
[Music] [Applause]
1920s the Riviera was and still is a favorite holiday destination of the Rich
and titled and royal families from around the
world in the winter of 1928 King Gustaf V King of Sweden was
spending his holidays [Music] here but at the back of his mind he had
a worry his nephew FCO Bernard
do his uncle was the king and um he was every year down here on the Riviera and
he had met what he thought a very nice American family that had a young daughter my father was by that time over
30 and I think his uncle felt it was time that fol got married so he sent for
him and they were put together and um my mother told me it wasn't a big success
in the beginning but it became quite positive after some
time and uh he uh proposed later on in the year and she accepted and that's how
it [Music]
started in the Autumn of that year fala crossed the Atlantic in the company of
friends and relatives from Sweden's royal
family this was big news in America the first wedding of European royalty on
American soil [Music]
fala Bernard do and Estelle Manville were married on the 1st of December 1928
in Pleasantville New York 1500 guests attended the wedding
party on the private estate of Estelle's father father a millionaire American
industrialist the Father of the Bride holds the wedding and um quite a few of
his friends came over the um herit Prince Gustav alov he was there and uh
some of his brothers was at the wedding and and other friends of my fathers and of course a lot of Americans were in the
wedding party after the wedding Estelle sailed
to Europe with fol to live with her new husband in the Swedish Capital
[Applause] [Music]
Stockholm this was the world that forged a talent for mediation a talent which
would take him to the center of world politics in the same City almost 34
years earlier count faler bernot of Viborg had been born 2 days into the new
year of 1895 his father Prince Oscar bernardt
was the son of King Oscar II king of both Sweden and [Music]
Norway at school in Stockholm faler showed himself to be practical rather
than intellectual A Gifted linguist he spoke fluent English French and German it was
a talent he would put to good use in later [Music]
life in 1918 he graduated from the military academy of
carlberg a skilled Horseman he rose to the rank of major in the elite Dragon
Cavalry unit
but not long after his marriage he was forced to resign his Commission on medical
[Music] [Applause]
grounds shortly after when the drons were absorbed into the Swedish army
bernot decided to rent the draon garden his unit's former
headquarters Estelle the Millionaire's daughter transformed this military
office into a luxurious home fit for a
prince but in 1934 Family Life at draon Garden was
struck by tragedy the couple's third son Frederick
died shortly after to his birth 2 years later their eldest son
Gustaf died he was just 6 years
[Music]
old after the loss of two of his sons F bernot decided to seek a new goal in
life
in 1937 he became the head of the Swedish Scout [Applause]
movement he had two sentences to guide his life uh the first was we have not
come to this world to be happy ourselves but to make other people
happy and the second one was what is possible is already done the impossible
must be done good causes became the new focus of
Bernard Do's
[Music]
life yet the utopian world bernot and Sweden were living in was about to
end on the 1st of September
1939 the Second World War began when German troops invaded
[Music]
Poland [Music] the following year Hitler turned to
Sweden's [Applause]
[Music]
neighbors by the summer of 1940 the Nazis had occupied both Norway and
Denmark King Gustav of Sweden incred active at the age of over 71 attended
the recent Maneuvers held by his army Swedish armed forces were put on alert
Sweden threatened by the Nazis and the Russians looks to her
defenses soon Bernard do was [Music]
mobilized and with his country in fear of invasion he began working to integrate the scouts into Sweden's
defense plan training them in anti-aircraft work and as medical
[Music] assistants but Sweden's defenses would
not be put to the test Germany did not invade Sweden for
at least two reasons Sweden was not of very strategical importance and the
second reason is that Sweden was quite willing to supply the German
armorment Industries with the necessary raw materials iron or in
particular and Sweden at least in the first part of the second world war was leaning towards the Nazis they even
allowed the German Navy to cross Swedish
Waters uh they allowed German airplanes to violate the airspace in
Sweden so officially they were neutral that leaning towards Germany and that
was easy for the Germans I mean they they got almost everything they
wanted but during 1943 the tide of War would change
dramatically the seemingly Invincible Nazi Germany now found itself losing on
several [Music] fronts the Allies had been victorious in
North Africa and had landed Invasion forces in southern
[Music] Italy on the Eastern
Front The Red Army had begun a huge [Music]
Counterattack pushing German troops back [Music]
westwards from 1943 onwards as soon as the Swedish government sensed or
recognized that Germany is going to lose the war they increasingly lean towards the
Allies so a change in the Swedish [Applause]
attitude in October 1943 the Swedish Red Cross by now under
the energetic command of f badot organized a prisoner of war
exchange between the Western allies and Nazi Germany at the Swedish Port of gothenberg
[Music]
a year later a similar intervention brought the total of prisoners
repatriated to over 10,000 on their way home at last our
heartfelt thanks are due to Sweden for the vital part played by that country in the organization of the exchange
FAL Bernard do had successfully established Sweden's role as an
intermediary but in Germany there were other prisoners in even greater need of
the Swedish count skills as a
mediator Allied Naval forces supported by strong Air Forces began Landing
Allied armies this morning on the northern coast of France
[Music] as Allied troops pushed towards Berlin from east and
[Music] west they began to encounter concentration
camps and tens of thousands of prisoners living and dying in Desperate
conditions in January 1945 Soviet troops entered
aitz the largest center of the Nazi industrial killing
machine rumors were circulating that had given orders to hinr himler the
commander of ss troops for the liquidation of concentration camp
inmates there was to be no evidence Left Behind no prisoners to tell the
tale quick and decisive action was [Music]
[Music] needed through six years of neutrality during World War II Sweden had remained
a country at [Music]
peace unlike its neighbors Norway and
Denmark nothing has been able to stop the Danish sabot who are continually blowing up Factory buildings starting
fires derailing trains and so on those Court resisting the Nazi
occupation had been removed to concentration camps in Germany
[Music] in the racis ideology of national
socialism they were aryen as long as they were not Jewish people who had been
put to Germany into concentration camps out of political reason because they resisted in Norway or in Denmark they
were Aryan in the eyes of the SS and they were okay many of them were able to
understand and to talk German which made them more human to the SS because they
could talk to them they could give them order they were
understood exploiting this special status bernad do and the Swedish Red
Cross had already managed to get more than 70,000 Parcels of food and clothing
to Scandinavian inmates in Nazi
camps the Danish government had lists of the prisoners that had been brought to German concentration camps the list was
a privilege because people in Denmark knew where who was in which
concentration came and this meant that the relatives knew where their loved
ones were and that the government was able to send packages red Fross packages
with food and with clothing to people personally if you sent packages to a
concentration camp without uh a special um name on it the SS just took them
and never gave it to the prisoners but when the official packages from the Red Cross came the SS gave them to the
prisoners and that made danger prisoners they had more to eat and they had a better
situation by February 1945 all privileged treatment had been
overtaken by the threat of total liquidation as the situation in the
camps deteriorated the Swedish government stepped in those identified as Scandinavian
interes in German concentration camps were to be rescued by a Swedish Red
Cross Expedition count F bernardt was the man
who would lead the mission the relations between Sweden and
Germany had by historical memories been very good before the war and I think
actually that they were slightly impressed of a member of the King's
family uh to take on this work I think there must have
been the man Bernard do would have to impress was hinr himler commander of the
SS the notorious paramilitary Defense Force a leading member of the Nazi party
he had risen to become min minister of the interior and by now the second most
powerful man in Germany on Hitler's orders it was himler
who had set up the concentration camps controlling them through his SS
troops this was the man with whom Bernard do would have to negotiate to secure the prisoner's
[Music] release but how to reach him that was The crucial question
Felix ksten was him's personal masser a Baltic German physician he
lived in Stockholm but traveled regularly to Germany to treat himmler's chronic abdominal
cramps Felix Kon acted as a kind of intermediary between banard do and himna
and as soon as banard do offered you know this kind of deal himla sensed that this might be a
chance not only to rescue him to save him as a personis against revenge of course but
also maintain and even increase his power he still had power he had the
power over the lives of the
prisoners ksten gave a green light to Stockholm himler had agreed that Sweden
could send an Envoy to Germany on the 16th of February 19 1945
Berard do embarked on one of the most courageous humanitarian efforts in
history Estelle accompanied her husband to Stockholm's Brahma airport as count
fol Bernard do boarded a German airplane to
Berlin it was a journey into
hell the situation was desperate from the point of view of the German ruling
Elite from the point of the view of the Nazis of course benad do wanted to uh
take advantage of this and pressurize the Nazi lead to uh concede the release
of some prisoners but to achieve this Bernard do
would have to take a crucial step negotiating face to face with
himler the man who controlled Germany's concentration
[Music]
[Music] camps ravensbrook
Germany 90 km north of Berlin a cal and beautiful
place yet this name is Infamous synonymous with one of the most
notorious Nazi concentration camps specially built to House women and
[Music]
children by 1945 over 130,000 female prisoners had passed
through [Music] ravensbrook Polish women were the largest group incarcerated here many of
them Jews more than 990,000 died in
ravensbrook 70% of those sent
here to this day the deserted houses of the SS guards
remain homes of officers under the command of one of the most feared and
powerful men in Germany hinr himler the man with whom count fulker
Bernard do would have to negotiate to secure the release of Scandinavian
prisoners on the one hand banad do wanted uh to save as many prisoners uh
as as possible on the other hand negotiating with a leading Nazi like
himla to some extent implied recognizing him as a kind of
partner so it's a dilemma it's a catch 22
situation but for Bernard do there was no choice on the 19th of February 19
1945 3 days after his arrival in Germany he was taken to what was then a
sanatorium at hnan not far from ravensbrook he was brought here to meet
himler at his Villa in the sanatorium
grounds at the negotiating table himler flatly rejected Bernard Do's proposal
for the release of all Scandinavian prisoners
but Bernard do achieved one major concession that Norwegian and danish
inmates should be moved to a camp where the Swedish Red Cross would be able to support
them the camp was called No
Gama n was the camp which was nearest the Danish border so he hoped that hinr
shimer with whom he was negotiating um would say okay take all the Scandinavian
prisoners back home and then he wanted to be as near to the Danish border as he
could and this was why they chose noing Gama as a
place 3 days after meeting himler Bernard do was back in Sweden working
hard to assemble a rescue
Expedition 300 volunteers were quickly identified officers and soldiers from
the Swedish army Red Cross doctors and
nurses among them Bernard Do's own
sister Swedish transport Vehicles were to be allowed into Germany to collect
Scandinavian prisoners from other concentration camps and move them to
[Music] noama Allied Forces by now in control of
the Skies over Germany were informed of the plan their response would give the whole
campaign its name Bernard spoke uh to some uh
commander of the Allied Forces and said okay we are doing doing this rescue actions and please don't bomb us and
then the soldier said no we can't guarantee you that so it's better if you paint the buses white or if if we can
see which buses belong to your rescue action and so they decided on painting
the buses white and they decided to put the Swedish flag to paint it on the roof so
that the PLS could see ah these are non German buses but these are Scandinavian buses
on March the 8th 1945 the First Column of Swedish buses
their white paint still wet boarded a ferry in the Swedish Port of
malmer 4 days later the Vanguard of the Expedition reached the place burn ad do
had chosen as its headquarters in Germany friedrich's r
Castle the castle was owned by Prince Otto Fon bismar grandson of Germany's
Iron Chancellor his wife and Marie Tang was
[Music]
Swedish Bernard my mother was friendly with the Bernard do
family especially with falka Bernard do who came here a lot to negotiate with
the representatives of the Third Reich when he did that F bernot always
stayed here overnight he got on with my mother or rather with my parents very
[Music] well F bismar Castle home at friedr crew
was ideally placed close to the Danish border and just 20 km from no Gama
[Music]
itself the white buses were headquartered in the ZX VA Forest here in fried's room and was sent out to
various different areas of Germany to pick up prisoners from the concentration
camps and to try wherever possible to take them back to
Scandinavian the first phase of the evacuation started on March the 15th the
white buses divided into two platoon around 40 SS and gestapo liazon
officers were attached to the expedition the first platoon headed east
to the camp at saxonous over 300 km
away Ste yason a Swedish Red Cross volunteer accompanied them as a
motorcycle escort there we come to
house morning so when we finally arrived in
sakan hous the gates were opened and a lot of
Norwegians came out in a fairly orderly way
Norman don't and when they took the first
steps towards Freedom that was an
experience huge experience
really the second white bus's platoon headed south to daa sherberg and mount
Housen they took with them the detailed lists of Danish and Norwegian prisoners
being held in Nazi custody theist helped the people from
the rescue mission to know whom they searched in which Camp so they took the lists and went or drove into the
concentration camps and they could read out Mr Anderson Mr Yensen and so on must
be here so we search for him and he is to come to the bus and we take him with
us so it made it very easy um in in in that part for the rescue action that the
lists were there
but within 2 weeks the white buses campaign had become a victim of its own
success by late March more than 4,500 Danish and Norwegian prisoners had
been evacuated and brought to the no gamut Camp which was over capacity even before
the first White bus arrived [Music]
Nama uh had been built for 2,500 prisoners and at the end shortly before
the Scandinavians were brought here there were 14,000 prisoners so the camp was totally
crowded and the people were dying because no one had an own bed and
there was not enough to eat and so on the Germans insisted that if the EV
evacuations were to continue the Swedish buses would have to transfer 2,000
inmates of noama away to other [Music]
camps on the 27th of March the Swedish yield it to the German
demand the white buses designed to save Scandinavian prisoners were now carrying
hundreds of others to an unknown [Music]
future as far as we know not many of them made it because they were so ill
and dying that many many of them died during the transports in this white buses to other um concentration
camps and this was a problem for the Scandinavian prisoners knowing that those people had been brought away in
order to give them space they hadn't asked for this they they wen't guilty
but but they felt they were guilty because their um better life was um made
other people die this terrible task complete the
white buses could return to their job of collecting more Scandinavian inmates
from camps and prisons scattered across Nazi Germany and by the beginning of April
1945 some 7,000 Danish and Norwegians had been brought together in
noama but the ultimate purpose was still to be achieved getting all the
Scandinavian prisoners out of Germany and a way to Safety in
[Music]
Sweden once more count fulker Bernard do the driving force behind the the
Expedition returned to [Music]
Germany himler agreed this time to the transfer of the sick and of all female
Scandinavian [Laughter]
prisoners by the 18th of April more than 12200 sick prisoners had arrived in
[Music]
[Music] Sweden the following day British forces
arrived at the river Elber practically within sight of no
G by now German control of the camp had
[Music]
evaporated the German soldiers I think most of them ran and hid at that point
the war was almost over there was nothing they could do and it wasn't easy being a German
soldier then if they were out on the streets they would tear off anything which marked them as being a
Lord in the chaos now engulfing Germany evacuation of the camp became a matter
of logistics rather than permission Danish buses had now joined
relieving exhausted Swedish
volunteers [Music]
by April the 20th Hitler's last birthday 4,300 Norwegians and Danes had been
rescued from no [Music]
Gama most were brought to a Reception Center set up in a spar in the Swedish
city of RAM [Applause] lza
[Music]
today this Memorial beyond the waves in the grounds of the spa is dedicated to
the efforts of the white buses Expedition but the white bus volunteers
were not [Music] finished the bus drivers who came from
Sweden and Denmark they told us that it was very cruel to see other people other
prisoners who were non-scandinavian standing there seeing the white buses seeing the Red Cross and laughing and
yelling and thinking they would be rescued now because Red Cross buses were arriving and then they had to say no
sorry we are only taking the Scandinavian
prisoners benad dot wanted to try to save those they had been forced to leave
behind
to return would mean facing a new danger Allied Air Forces were attacking
virtually anything that moved on German
roads on the 15th of April the white buses left fredr on their most dangerous
Mission yet a long trip South to Terian stat in
what is today the Czech [Music]
Republic we stayed overnight in teresian and there were 400 Jews I think
it was families we were picking up there so we
there and during the night while we slept they loaded up the buses
everything was ready but there were some complaints
when baby carriages wouldn't fit and we had to throw them away that I
remember after a perilous return Journey they achieved what looked impossible
just weeks earlier evacuating four 424 Danish
Jews the Jews didn't come first this is a fact this is nothing to make fuz about
because the situation was much should understand the situation in Germany also under what conditions they could squeeze
the SS and himler Bernard couldn't start with saying well I'm coming here to I
want to to rescue with Jews he couldn't do that but after a while quite a number of Jews were
rescued [Music]
bernad Do's next goal was ravensbrook and the release of French women held
[Music] there with the advancing Soviet Army
just days away himler unexpectedly agreed to the evacuation of the entire
Camp women of over 20 20
nationalities there
were there were many Polish women and among them there were three
women that were well their pregnancies were well
Advanced so someone asked the guards how come there were so many pregnant women
oh and the Germans said that it was the Holy
Spirit we had this chief medical officer with us Anon was his name and he told
the person in charge that one of them would probably become a mother during the
night B
so they fitted out a bus which they called Alin they fitted it out like a
Maternity Ward and the three women were kept in [Music]
there and one of them gave birth to a son that [Music]
night in the closing days of April the white buses transported some 10,000
women to
[Music]
Sweden [Music] at the end of the month with Soviet
troops battling their way into Berlin Adolf Hitler committed
suicide the war in Europe had just a few days to [Music]
run on May the 1st the Swedish white buses came home to
Malo all except one [Music]
volunteer this
Vin
for
for
[Music]
after the German surrender the buses would return to bring another 10,000
prisoners to Sweden of 30,000 lives saved by the
white buses at least 10,000 were [Music]
[Music]
Jews in the months that followed count ful Berard do was honored by countries
whose citizens had been saved by the campaign
Jewish organizations were among the first to celebrate his
achievement Bernard do was now an international
star 3 years later he was called on again heading this time to the Middle
East which had been plunged into
war a white plane with un and Red Cross
markings was carrying the brave count nephew of the Swedish King organizer of
the white buses campaign on a mission that would seal his
fate faler bernot was on his way to Palestine and to his death at the hands
of Jewish militants
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