"Ostjuden" in Deutschland als Freiwild: Die nationalsozialistische Aussenpolitik zwischen Ideologie und Wirklichkeit

Describes German hostility, beginning in the 1870s, to Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe who were under suspicion for their alien traditions, just as German Jews were for their rejection of tradition. German governments, even before 1933, attempted to hinder Jewish immigration. The Nazi regime immediately revoked the German citizenship of the minority of post-1918 immigrants who had attained it. The Foreign Office, however, opposed measures against Jews who retained foreign (mainly Polish) citizenship; these were protected by the governments of their home countries, even those which themselves persecuted their Jews and sympathized with German antisemitic policy in general. By international treaty, Jews in Silesia were, until 1937, under the protection of the League of Nations. The many stateless Jews, however, were defenseless. And as the Nazis consolidated their power, they were able, more and more, to disregard foreign reactions.