Hachshara

Already in the decades before the Nazi dictatorship, Austrian Jews and Jewesses emigrated to Palestine due to anti-Semitism and Zionist enthusiasm. For the immigration into the country Israel (Hebr. Alija), at that time the British mandate area, mainly agricultural and handicraft skills were in demand. One of the organizations who had made the appropriate training of their members was the "Hechaluz" (the pioneer), founded in 1922.

This preparation, Hebr. "Hachshara", could be completed as "Inland-Hachshara" on agricultural goods of Jewish owners mainly in Lower Austria and Burgenland, as well as in urban kibbutz in Vienna and Graz. In Latvia, Yugoslavia, the Netherlands and Czechoslovakia there were facilities for a "foreign shakhara".

After the "Anschluss" the emigration to the country Israel became particularly urgent. Eichmann's "center for Jewish emigration" promoted the Hachshara and used it to exploit Jewish workers. In October 1938 he advised the Viennese IKG "Aryan" estates in Kottingbrunn, Moosbrunn, and Fischamend. He also asked the IKG for a list of the participants.

Retraining camps in the area of ??the IKG St. Pölten were located in Absdorf, Eichgraben, Landersdorf, Thalheim and Walpersdorf. Also in Gerolding, Aggstein and Aggsbach there were such camps, whereby Aggsbach, one lies north and one south of the Danube, could not be unambiguously identified. All these camps were organized by the "Hechaluz".

In the summer of 1939, four of the 15 camps, namely Aggstein, Aggsbach, Landersdorf and Walpersdorf, were already directly under the responsibility of the responsible forestry authorities. Accordingly, the mostly youthful Jews were mainly used for forest work. In Walpersdorf the production of building materials was added. These activities did not have much to do with agricultural retraining.

After completing the camp, the participants received certificates from the Jewish Agency for legal entry into Palestine. The number of these certificates was, however, limited, which is why the Aliya was carried out illegally.

These illegal actions took place in agreement with the NS authorities, who thus approached their goal of a "Jew-free" country and at the same time wanted to make the situation of the British in their mandate Palestine more difficult. The British responded with a total immigration block from October 1939 to April 1940. Nevertheless, the only 22-year-old Viennese Jew, Aron Menczer, managed to illegally bring 419 juveniles to Palestine by the end of December 1939. At the beginning of 1940 the Hachshara and the "emigration" of the "Hechaluz" had to be stopped.