{"id":16741,"date":"2024-06-17T10:22:44","date_gmt":"2024-06-17T08:22:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/general-union-of-french-jews-ugif\/"},"modified":"2026-06-22T16:15:03","modified_gmt":"2026-06-22T14:15:03","slug":"general-union-of-french-jews-ugif","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/general-union-of-french-jews-ugif\/","title":{"rendered":"General Union of French Jews (UGIF)"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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The General Union of French Jews (UGIF) was established in November 1941 by the Vichy government at the request of the Germans. All Jews, whether French or foreign, were required to join it. Jewish organizations were dissolved, and their assets were transferred to the UGIF. <\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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     Theodor Dannecker, the Gestapo official in charge of Jewish affairs in Paris, wanted an organization representing the Jews of France to serve as an intermediary in the implementation of anti-Semitic measures. He secured the creation of the UGIF through a French law passed on November 29, 1941. From the outset, this move was condemned by the clandestine Jewish section of the M.O.I., as it entailed dangerous ties to the General Commissariat for Jewish Affairs. <\/p>\n

The organizations\u2014which were still legal at the time\u2014affiliated with the Jewish section refused to join the UGIF and went underground.<\/p>


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    The leadership of the General Union of French Jews consists of French Jews who were involved in charitable work before the war. Dannecker also appointed two Jews from Vienna to the organization, describing them as \u201cliaison officers and personal supervisors.\u201d <\/p>\n

The UGIF\u2019s mission is to represent Jews before public authorities. In particular, it provides social assistance: it pays benefits to households without income and funds soup kitchens and hospices. Following the roundups of the summer of 1942, it opened shelters for Jewish children in Paris and its suburbs. <\/p>


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    One could criticize the UGIF leaders for having underestimated the role of Vichy and for having turned a blind eye to the reality of the Shoah.<\/p>\n

One could criticize them for not having attempted to save foreign Jews from the immediate danger of deportation and for having fostered false hopes among French Jews.<\/p>\n

Finally, and most importantly, they can be criticized for failing to evacuate the children from the centers, who were victims of mass roundups in July 1944.<\/p>\n

However, unbeknownst to the UGIF leadership, the Resistance activities of some of the organization\u2019s members made it possible to rescue children and place them in the care of non-Jewish families.<\/p>


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    The record of the General Union of French Jews is highly controversial. While its role in providing assistance was effective and while clandestine anti-Nazi operations used its legal cover, its institutions were often veritable traps, particularly vulnerable to roundups. <\/p>\n

The law establishing the UGIF was repealed upon the Liberation.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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References:<\/strong><\/p>

\u2014 Cukier, Simon; Dec\u00e8ze, Dominique; Diamant, David; Grojnowski, Michel, 1987, Revolutionary Jews<\/em>, Messidor \/ \u00c9ditions sociales.<\/p>

\u2014 Annette Wieviorka, 1986, *They Were Jews, Resistance Fighters, Communists<\/em>*. Deno\u00ebl. <\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The General Union of French Jews (UGIF) was established in November 1941 by the Vichy government at the request of the Germans. All Jews, whether French or foreign, were required to join it. Jewish organizations were dissolved, and their assets were transferred to the UGIF.      Theodor Dannecker, the Gestapo official in charge of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[155],"tags":[],"salle":[172],"source":[],"zone-geo":[],"class_list":["post-16741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-notes","salle-7-1-anti-jewish-legal-measures-the-m-o-i-s-response"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16741"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16741\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16743,"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16741\/revisions\/16743"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16741"},{"taxonomy":"salle","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/salle?post=16741"},{"taxonomy":"source","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/source?post=16741"},{"taxonomy":"zone-geo","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.museemrjmoi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/zone-geo?post=16741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}