The Survival of the Jews in France, 1940-44

How and why did 75 percent of Jews escape the Holocaust in France, despite the Nazi extermination plan and the collaboration of the Vichy regime? How can this unexpected survival rate, of which the French themselves are still largely unaware, be explained? The author sheds a new light on the everyday life tactics and tricks that allowed the persecuted to escape raids and deportations. Beyond the international context and geographical, political and cultural factors, the author shows that the Jews found in France a degree of empathy, especially from the summer of 1942, despite anti-Semitism and denunciation. between arrests and deportations, gestures of mutual aid and practices of solidarity, the author brings together the history of the 220,000 Jews in France who were still alive at the end of the occupation. It is a history close to the daily realities of the persecuted Jews, illustrated by the trajectories of individuals and families.