In August 1941, Artur London, a member of the Czechoslovak group and one of the national co-leaders of the M.O.I., was tasked with organizing the German Work(TA), a particularly sensitive undertaking.
The organization, established by the Communist Party nine months earlier, has three main anti-Hitler objectives:
- intelligence gathering by infiltrating the German army (the Wehrmacht),
- the desertion of German soldiers,
- the demoralization of the occupying forces.
German anti-Nazi refugees and German-speaking Resistance fighters took part in the TA. Young Jewish women played an important role in it.
The TA continued its activities until the fall of 1943, when the reactivated German Communist Party took over its leadership.
At the same time,the “Red Orchestra,” an anti-Nazi military intelligence network linked to the USSR and composed mainly of Jews—both men and women—was active in Europe. The group was dismantled by the Gestapo in 1942.
As early as September 1941, the leadership of the clandestine Jewish section of the M.O.I. embarked on a new form of resistance. The first plan of action to sabotage goods intended for the Germans was devised by Jewish glove makers, knitters, carpenters, and furriers, the vast majority of whom were union members.
In Paris, that same month of September 1941 (and continuing through June 1942), the Occupation forces launched a virulently anti-Semitic exhibition titled “The Jew and France.” The event was sponsored bythe Institute for the Study of Jewish Issues and supported by Nazi propaganda agencies; its aim was to blame the Jews for France’s past and present misfortunes.
Anti-Semitic persecution continues to intensify. The clandestine Jewish section of the M.O.I. is a particular target. Following the attack carried out by Pierre Georges, Vichy presented the Germans with its draft emergency law, which provided for the establishment of a special court and the death penalty for communist activities.
Jews were guillotined or shot for selling *Unzer Wort*, distributing anti-Nazi leaflets, or simply “spreading communist ideas.” The Nazis retaliated very quickly following the execution of two German officers in Nantes and Bordeaux by members of the Resistance. Between October 22 and 24, 1941, 48 hostages were shot in Châteaubriant, Nantes, and Mont-Valérien near Paris, and 50 near Bordeaux.
This marked the beginning of the policy of executing hostages, targeting primarily communists and Jews. Nazi ideology, promoted by the Vichy regime, relentlessly repeated the refrain of “Judeo-Bolshevism,” which combined anti-Semitism and anti-communism.
Speaking from London, General de Gaulle stated that the attacks against the Germans were justified but premature. This stance, described as“wait-and-see” by the Communists, including those of the M.O.I., is endorsed by certain groups within the domestic Resistance of various denominations.
But all members of the Resistance—whether communists or not—organized into underground groups, share a common goal: to liberate France from Nazism.
