A Childrens’ Tisha B Av Story Not For Children, The Current US Congressional Visit To Israel

In the August 7 edition of Ami magazine, a story concerning the real truth about the Nazi leader’s final days also commented about the final days of Joseph Goebbels and his family, including their 6 children. The days of Tisha B Av would be the only time I would consider commenting on a story such as this in detail.

I want to credit Wikipedia for much of the research contained in this article.

The Goebbels children were the five daughters and one son born to Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels and his wife Magda Goebbels. The children, born between 1932 and 1940, were murdered by their parents in Berlin on 1 May 1945, the day both parents committed suicide.

Magda Goebbels had an older son, Harald Quandt, from a previous marriage to Günther Quandt. Then aged 23, he was not present when his younger half-siblings were killed.

The marriage between Joseph and Magda reached crisis point in the late summer of 1938 over Goebbels’ affair with Czech actress Lída Baarová. Hitler negotiated an agreement whereby the actress would be banished and the couple would keep up public appearances subject to any reasonable conditions Magda might make. Goebbels abided scrupulously by the agreement.

By 22 April 1945, the day before the Red Army entered the outskirts of Berlin, the Goebbels moved their children into the Vorbunker, connected to the lower Führerbunker under the Reich Chancellery garden in central Berlin.^[25] German Red Cross leader SS-Gruppenführer Karl Gebhardt wanted to take the children out of the city with him, but was dismissed.^[26]

General Bernd Freytag von Loringhoven later described the children as “sad,” but nurse Erna Flegel, with whom they had much contact in the bunker, characterized them as “charming” and “absolutely delightful.”^[11][27] They are reported to have played with Hitler‘s dog Blondi during their time in the bunker complex,^[28] where they slept in a single room. While many reports suggest there were three separate bunk beds, secretary Traudl Junge insisted there were only two. The children are said to have sung in unison while in the bunker, performing for both Hitler and the injured Robert Ritter von Greim, as well as having been conducted in play-song by pilot Hanna Reitsch. Junge said she was with the children on the afternoon of 30 April, when Hitler and Eva Braun killed themselves.

Joseph Goebbels added a postscript to Hitler’s last will and testament, stating that he would disobey the order to leave Berlin: “For reasons of humanity and personal loyalty” he had to stay.^[29] Further, his wife and their children supported his refusal to leave Berlin and his resolution to die in the bunker. He later qualified this by stating that the children would support the decision [to commit suicide] if they were old enough to speak for themselves.^[29] Both pilot Hanna Reitsch (who had left the bunker on 29 April) and Junge (who left on 1 May) carried letters to the outside world from those remaining. Included was a letter from Magda to Harald, who was in an Allied POW camp.^[28]

On the following day, Magda and Joseph Goebbels arranged for an SS dentist, Helmut Kunz, to inject their six children with morphine so that, when they were unconscious, ampules of cyanide could be crushed in their mouths.^[10] According to Kunz’s later testimony, he gave the children morphine injections, but it was Magda and SS-Obersturmbannführer Ludwig Stumpfegger, Hitler’s personal doctor, who administered the cyanide.^[10]

Rochus Misch, the bunker telephone/radio operator, stated that Werner Naumann told him that he had seen Hitler’s personal physician, Dr Stumpfegger, give the children something “sweetened” to drink.^[30] Another account says that the children were told they would be leaving for Berchtesgaden in the morning, and Stumpfegger was said to have provided Magda with morphine to sedate them. Erna Flegel claims that Magda reassured the children about the morphine by telling them that they needed inoculations because they would be staying in the bunker for a long time. Author James P. O’Donnell concluded that, although Stumpfegger was probably involved in drugging the children, Magda killed them herself. He surmised that witnesses blamed the deaths on Stumpfegger because he was a convenient target, having died the following day. Moreover, as O’Donnell recorded, Stumpfegger may have been too intoxicated at the time of the deaths to have played a reliable role.^[31]

Magda refused several offers from others, such as Albert Speer, to take the children out of Berlin. The children seemed unaware of the impending danger, but the eldest child, Helga, seemed to sense that the adults were lying to her about the outcome of the war and asked what would happen to them.^[33] Misch was among the last to see the children alive. They were seated around a table in his work area as their mother combed their hair and kissed them, all wearing nightgowns as it was close to their bedtime. Heide, the youngest, had scrambled up onto the table. Helga, whom Misch called the brightest of the children, was “crying softly” just before bedtime on that final night and wore a glum expression. Misch felt Helga had little fondness for her mother. Magda had to push Helga towards the stairs that led up to the Vorbunker. Four-year-old Heide, who had tonsillitis and wore a scarf around her neck, turned back to look at Misch, giggling, and teasingly said, “Misch, Misch, du bist ein Fisch,” or “Misch, Misch, you are a fish”, just before her mother led her and her siblings upstairs. Misch recalled later that he suspected what was about to happen and would always regret not intervening.^[34]

The children’s bodies, in nightclothes, with ribbons tied in the girls’ hair, were found in the two-tiered bunk beds where they were killed, when Soviet troops entered the bunker a day later. A Soviet autopsy on Helga’s body noted “several black and blue bruises”, indicating that she probably woke up and struggled with her killer.^[35] A photograph taken during the autopsy showed heavy bruising on the dead child’s face. The injuries were apparently caused when a cyanide capsule was forced into her mouth.^[10][36] The child’s jaw might also have been broken.^[37]

Aftermath

On 3 May 1945, the day after Soviet troops led by Lt. Col. Ivan Klimen had discovered the burned bodies of their parents in the courtyard above, they found the children down in the Vorbunker dressed in their nightclothes, with ribbons tied in the girls’ hair.^[38]

Vice Admiral Hans Voss was brought to the Chancellery garden to identify the bodies, as was Hans Fritzsche, a leading German radio commentator who had answered directly to Goebbels. Their bodies were brought to the Buchau Cemetery in Berlin for autopsy and inquest by Soviet doctors. In spite of repeated attempts, even Frau Behrend, the children’s grandmother, never learned what became of the bodies. Thereafter, the remains of the Goebbels family, Hitler, Eva Braun, General Krebs, and Hitler’s dogs were repeatedly buried and exhumed.^[39] The last burial was at the SMERSH facility in Magdeburg on 21 February 1946. In 1970, KGB director Yuri Andropov authorized an operation to destroy the remains.^[40] On 4 April 1970, a Soviet KGB team used detailed burial charts to exhume five wooden boxes at the Magdeburg SMERSH facility. The remains from the boxes were burned, crushed, and scattered into the Biederitz river, a tributary of the nearby Elbe.^[41]

In 2005, Rochus Misch attracted controversy when he called for a memorial plaque to be installed in honor of the six Goebbels children. Critics felt it would taint the memory of Holocaust victims to honor the children of the Nazi leader. Despite their parents’ crimes, Misch argued that the children themselves were innocent, that to treat them as criminals like their parents was wrong and that they were murdered just as other victims during the war were murdered.^[42]

Commentary

Ami makes a comment that the way the Nazi  leader was killed represents not merely the death of one person but the death of the Nazi regime.  Ami credits historian Luke Daly-Groves’ for the analysis  tying  a Nazi principle to the  gruesome expression of nihilism –meaning that life is meaningless.

I want to add that if we apply this to today, the Nazi view on life is no different to the PLO leader Arafat which is proven by his quote to celebrate the birth of a child which appears in a previous Blog. His quote clearly agrees with the value the Nazis place on life, especially when it comes to their own children.

The Current Congressional Visit To Israel

It was reported on this site that Congressional leaders are happy to allow some Squad members into Israel.

“I think it would be helpful for anyone that has an opinion to come,” Republican Leader Kevin  McCarthy said in response to a question by The Times of Israel.

“I feel very secure in this. Everyone who comes with open ears, open eyes, and an open mind will walk away and have an understanding… that this bond is unbreakable, that there is an importance to democracy in the Middle East, that it makes a difference to security. I think all should come,” he said.

“Any member of Congress is welcome to visit,” House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said. Anybody who comes to Israel to learn about what Israelis are doing to cope with the protracted security situation and the government’s efforts to create a better economy for its people, he said, “will leave with a much more positive view.”

Asked whether he believes the two congresswomen would really be open to changing their views of Israel and not merely use their visit as an opportunity to accuse the country of mistreating the Palestinians, Hoyer recalled that he took Omar’s predecessor, Keith Ellison, who is also Muslim, on a trip to Israel a few years ago.

“He came back with a more positive view, and a more informed and more balanced view. I would hope that, and think that, [the same] would occur” with Omar and Tlaib, Hoyer said.

“I know both… and they’re all very bright. Ms. Omar apologized for statements she had made that were perceived as, and probably were, anti-Semitic. She apologized. So there is an openness of mind to learn, and that I think would be positive for Israel and for those members,” he said.

Omar and Tlaib’s offices did not respond to requests for comment.

In my opinion, the problem with the response by the two Congressional leaders is that they are not making any mention of the latest problems discovered with Omar’s marriage and family history which makes her a prime suspect in a number of law violations.

And furthermore, Hoyer most probably has not been in contact with Ellison for a long time thereby making his opinion of what Ellison thinks now very suspect. Especially since Omar and Tlaib both continue to refuse to comment on all the above mentioned issues.

And finally, it is hard to understand how anyone can even think that these two PLO supporters can come away from a visit here in Israel with open eyes, ears and mind.

In summary, the issue of allowing these people into our country is a danger for Israelis and Jews everywhere.

I would just hope that those Congressional leaders have suddenly opened their eyes to see the reality.

Especially since Israel just buried its most recent terrorist victim.

The Shin Bet security service announced Saturday that it had arrested two Palestinian cousins suspected of stabbing to death 18-year-old Israeli Dvir Sorek in a terror attack late on Wednesday near the West Bank settlement of Migdal Oz.

Security forces identified the two suspects as Nasir Asafra, 24, and Qassem Asafra, 30, from the village of Beit Kahil in the southern West Bank. While the Israel Defense Forces said that the former suspect is a Hamas member, neither of them had any prior arrests.

Since Omar has definite ties to Hamas, I just don’t understand the logic in what these Congressional leaders are saying. Especially since Omar and Tlaib continue to remain silent when there is a terrorist attack in Israel by the people who these two Congresswomen support.

And furthermore, Dvir Sorek was killed clutching some books he had just bought in Jerusalem. This was a Yeshiva student doing a good deed to show appreciation to his Rabbis.

When the Israel Defense Force has to kill terrorists, many of whom support Hamas, they are usually clutching an explosive device.

If Congressional leaders cannot appreciate what is truly happening in Israel today, I just don’t understand the purpose of their trip.