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186-605: Jews in Paris were forced to wear the yellow Star of David badge , and were barred from certain professions and public places. On July 16–17 1942, 13,152 Jews, including 4,115 children, were rounded up by the French police , on orders of the Germans, and were sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp . The first demonstration against the occupation, by Paris students, took place on November 11 1940. As

372-484: A principal line of resistance made up of the most heavily armed ouvrages , which can be roughly translated as fortresses or big defensive works. This consisted of blockhouses and strong-houses, which were often camouflaged as residential homes, built within a few metres of the border and manned by troops to give the alarm in the event of a surprise attack and to delay enemy tanks with prepared explosives and barricades . Approximately 5 km (3 mi) behind

558-529: A tunnel network with attached underground facilities, such as barracks, electric generators , ventilation systems, mess halls , infirmaries and supply caches. Their crew consisted of between 100 and 200 men. These fortresses were the most important fortifications on the Maginot Line, having the sturdiest construction and the heaviest artillery. These were composed of at least six "forward bunker systems" or "combat blocks" and two entrances and were connected via

744-704: A German naval officer, Alfons Moser, in the back, as he was boarding the metro at the Barbés-Rochecouart station . The Germans had routinely taken hostages among the French civilian population to deter attacks. They responded to the Barbés-Rochechouart metro attack by executing three hostages in Paris, and another twenty the following month. Hitler was furious at the leniency of the German commander, and demanded that in case of future assassinations, there must be one hundred hostages executed for every German killed. After

930-452: A Resistance network that smuggled Jews from France to Argentina. He collected a large advance from his clients and then instructed them to come to his house, bringing their gold, silver and other valuables with them. After they arrived, he brought them to his consulting room, and, convincing them vaccination was required in order to enter Argentina, gave them a lethal intravenous injection, then watched their slow death in an adjacent room through

1116-469: A backup. It also had state-of-the-art living conditions for garrisoned troops, supplying air conditioning and eating areas for their comfort. French and British officers had anticipated the geographical limits of the Maginot Line; when Germany invaded the Netherlands and Belgium , they carried out plans to form an aggressive front that cut across Belgium and connected to the Maginot Line. The French line

1302-572: A bi-monthly magazine and guide for visiting German soldiers Der Deutsche Wegleiter für Paris (The German Guide to Paris), was first published by the Paris Kommandantur . Certain hotels and movie theaters were reserved exclusively for German soldiers. A German-language newspaper, the Pariser Zeitung (1941–1944), was also published for the soldiers. The German officers enjoyed the Ritz , Maxim's ,

1488-519: A brawl. A German soldier was punched. Bonsergent's friends escaped, but he was arrested and refused to give the names of his friends to the Germans. He was held in jail for nineteen days, taken to court, charged with "an act of violence against a member of the German Army", and sentenced to death. Bonsergent was executed by firing squad on 23 December, the first civilian in France executed for resistance against

1674-617: A defensive strategy was needed to counter Germany. The French assumption was always that Germany would not go to war without conscription, which would allow the German Army to take advantage of the Reich ' s numerical superiority. Without the natural defensive barrier provided by the Rhine River, French generals argued that France needed a new defensive barrier made of concrete and steel to replace it. The power of properly dug-in defensive trenches had been amply demonstrated during World War I, when

1860-463: A depth of 2 m (6 ft 7 in). These anti-tank obstacles extended from end to end in front of the main works, over hundreds of kilometres, interrupted only by extremely dense forests, rivers, or other nearly impassable terrains. The anti-tank obstacle system was followed by an anti-personnel obstacle system made primarily of dense barbed wire. Anti-tank road barriers also made it possible to block roads at necessary points of passage through

2046-459: A few soldiers manning a single machine gun post could kill hundreds of the enemy in the open and therefore building a massive defensive line with subterranean concrete shelters was the most rational use of French manpower. The American historian William Keylor wrote that given the diplomatic conditions of 1929 and likely trends – with the United States isolationist and Britain unwilling to make

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2232-522: A firing squad. As a consequence of the demonstration, the Sorbonne University was closed, students were required to regularly report to the police, and the Latin Quarter was closely watched. Another incident took place on 10 November; a 28-year-old French engineer named Jacques Bonsergent and his friends, coming home from a wedding, ran into a group of German soldiers in the blackout and got into

2418-463: A floral Cross of Lorraine , the symbol of de Gaulle's Free France. They were chased away by the police. At nightfall, the event became more provocative; some three thousand students gathered, chanting "Vive La France" and "Vive l'Angleterre", and invading Le Tyrol , a bar popular with the Jeune Front , a fascist youth group, and scuffling with police. At 6:00 pm, German soldiers arrived, surrounded

2604-461: A good pork chop, hidden under cabbage and served without the necessary tickets, along with a liter of Beaujolais and a real coffee; sometimes it was on the first floor at rue Dauphine, where you could listen to the BBC while sitting next to Picasso." The restrictions and shortage of goods led to the existence of a thriving black market . Producers and distributors of food and other scarce products set aside

2790-413: A good view of the surrounding area. Their purpose was to locate the enemy, direct and correct the indirect fire of artillery, and report on the progress and position of critical enemy units. These are large reinforced buried concrete bunkers, equipped with armoured turrets containing high-precision optics, connected with the other fortifications by field telephone and wireless transmitters (known in French by

2976-541: A hero of the First World War , as deputy prime minister. Neither Weygand nor Pétain felt the Germans could be defeated, and they began looking for a way out of the war. On 8 June, the sound of distant artillery fire could be heard in the capital. Trains filled with refugees departed Gare d'Austerlitz with no announced destination. On June 10th, the French government fled Paris, first to Tours and then to Bordeaux . Thousands of Parisians followed their example, filling

3162-607: A much lighter extension was extended to the Strait of Dover after 1934. The original construction did not cover the area ultimately chosen by the Germans for their first challenge, which was through the Ardennes in 1940, a plan known as Fall Gelb (Case Yellow), due to the neutrality of Belgium. The location of this attack, chosen because of the location of the Maginot Line, was through the Belgian Ardennes Forest (sector 4), which

3348-438: A network of tunnels that often had narrow gauge electric railways for transport between bunker systems. The blocks contained infrastructure such as power stations, independent ventilating systems, barracks and mess halls, kitchens, water storage and distribution systems, hoists, ammunition stores, workshops and spare parts and food stores. Their crews ranged from 500 to more than 1,000 men. These were located on hills that provided

3534-702: A new organization, the Reichsleiter Rosenberg Taskforce ( Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg ) was created to catalog and store the art. It was moved to the Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume , a building in the Tuileries Gardens used by the Louvre for temporary exhibits. More than four hundred crates of art works were brought to the Jeu de Paume by Luftwaffe personnel, unpacked and cataloged. Hermann Göring ,

3720-472: A portion of their goods for the black market, and used middle-men to sell them to customers. The bars of the Champs-Élysées, and other parts of Paris, became common meeting places between the middle-men and clients. Parisians bought cigarettes, meat, coffee, wine and other products which frequently neither the middle-man nor the customer had ever seen. Due to the shortage of fuel, the number of automobiles on

3906-611: A spyhole in the door. Afterwards, he cut up their bodies, put the pieces in the well, and dissolved them with quicklime. His activities attracted the attention of the Gestapo, which arrested him in 1943, thus allowing him to claim later that he had been a real member of the Resistance. His crimes were discovered after the Liberation in 1944, and he was charged with the murders of twenty-seven persons, tried in 1946, and sentenced to death. He went to

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4092-586: A systematic scholarly approach to the understanding of Marx and Marxism, which he perceived to be needed. For the Parisians, the Occupation was a series of frustrations, shortages and humiliations. A curfew was in effect from nine in the evening until five in the morning; at night, the city went dark. Rationing of food, tobacco, coal and clothing was initiated in September 1940. Every year the supplies grew more scarce and

4278-454: A tank on the roof, or coal gas or methane, extracted from the Paris sewers. The metro ran, but service was frequently interrupted and the cars were overcrowded. Three thousand five hundred buses had run on the Paris streets in 1939, but only five hundred were still running in the autumn of 1940. Bicycle-taxis became popular, and their drivers charged a high tariff. Bicycles became the means of transport for many Parisians, and their price soared;

4464-507: A tour to Berlin, in exchange for the liberation of her husband, Porfirio Rubirosa , a Dominican diplomat suspected of espionage. The actress Arletty , the star of Les Enfants du Paradis and Hôtel du Nord , had a relationship with Hans Jürgen Soehring, a Luftwaffe officer, and gave the famous riposte to a member of the FFI interrogating her after the Liberation: "My heart is French, but my a--

4650-455: A used bicycle cost a month's salary. Transportation problems did not end with the liberation of Paris; the shortage of gasoline and lack of transport continued until well after the war. One of the greatest art thefts in history took place in Paris during the Occupation, as the Nazis looted the art of Jewish collectors on a grand scale. Great masterpieces in the Louvre had already been evacuated to

4836-441: A very difficult existence due to shortages of personnel, film and food, but it produced several genuine masterpieces, among which: Marcel Carné 's Les Enfants du Paradis ("Children of Paradise") which was filmed during the Occupation but not released until 1945. From the very beginning of the Occupation, Jews in Paris were treated with particular harshness. On October 18th, 1940, the German occupation authorities decreed, in what

5022-500: A villa in Royan , north of Bordeaux. He returned to Paris and resumed working in his studio on rue des Grands Augustins . He frequently received visitors at his studio, including Germans, some admiring and some suspicious. He had postcards made of his famous anti-fascist work, Guernica , to hand out as souvenirs to visitors, and had serious discussions of art and politics with visiting Germans, including writer Ernst Jünger . While his work

5208-622: A yellow Star of David to keep their Jewish identity disclosed to the public in the years leading up to the Holocaust . The practice of wearing special clothing or markings to distinguish Jews and other non-Muslims ( dhimmis ) in Muslim-dominated countries seems to have been introduced in the Umayyad Caliphate by Caliph Umar II in the early 8th century. In the 9th century, Islamic authorities begun to harden their attitude on ghiyār , or

5394-644: A yellow badge in the form of a Star of David on the left side of the breast and on the back. The requirement to wear the Star of David with the word Jude (German for 'Jew') – inscribed in Faux Hebrew letters meant to resemble Hebrew writing – was then extended to all Jews over the age of six in the Reich and the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia (by a decree issued on 1 September 1941, signed by Reinhard Heydrich ) and

5580-468: Is international." ' Jewish actors were not allowed to perform. Some places in Paris were frequented by homosexual actors and artists; notably the swimming pool in the Bois de Boulogne . The actor Jean Marais was officially harassed for his homosexuality, and the actor Robert-Hugues Lambert was arrested and deported, most likely because of his relationship with a German officer whom he did not want to name. He

5766-576: Is known as the Ordonnance d'Aryanisation , that Jews would have a special status and be barred from liberal professions, such as commerce, industry, thus affecting lawyers, doctors, professors, shop owners, and also be barred from certain restaurants and public places, and that their property was seized. On May 23rd, 1942, the head of the Anti-Jewish section of the Gestapo , Adolf Eichmann , gave secret orders for

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5952-461: Is not exactly known how it looked like and it may have referred to both a special patch and an overall attire unique to Jews. At the same time, the Ayyubid Sultan decreed that the life and property of any Jew or Christian found in the street without a distinguishing badge (' alāma ) or zunnar would be forfeit. Mid-fifteenth century reports describe the shikla as a piece of yellow cloth worn on

6138-404: Is off the map to the left of Maginot Line sector 6 (as marked). The specification of the defences was very high, with extensive and interconnected bunker complexes for thousands of men; there were 45 main forts ( grands ouvrages ) at intervals of 15 km (9.3 mi), 97 smaller forts ( petits ouvrages ) and 352 casemates between, with over 100 km (62 mi) of tunnels . Artillery

6324-572: The Comédie Française were used to move the larger paintings, including Gericault 's Raft of the Medusa . The art works were carried in slow convoys of trucks, convoys, with headlights off to observe the blackout, to the châteaux of the Loire Valley and other designated locations. The architectural landmarks of the city were protected by sandbags. The French Army waited in the fortifications of

6510-460: The 16th arrondissement of Paris . They were known as the Carlingue (or French Gestapo) and were active between 1941 and 1944. The group was founded by Pierre Bonny , a corrupt ex-policeman. It was subsequently led by Henri Lafont and Pierre Loutrel , two professional criminals who had been active in the French underworld before the war. By the time that the Germans arrived in Paris, two-thirds of

6696-430: The Auschwitz extermination camp . The roundup was considered a failure by the Germans, since they had prepared trains for 32,000 persons. Arrests continued in 1943 and 1944. By the time of the Liberation, it was estimated that 43,000 Jews from the Paris region, or about half the total population of the community, had been sent to the concentration camps, and that 34,000 were murdered there. Many Parisians collaborated with

6882-529: The British Expeditionary Force landed in France in September 1939, they and the French reinforced and extended the Maginot line to the sea in a flurry of construction from 1939 to 1940, accompanied by general improvements all along the line. The final line was strongest around the industrial regions of Metz , Lauter and Alsace , while other areas were, in comparison, only weakly guarded. In contrast,

7068-599: The Coupole and other exclusive restaurants, as the exchange rate was fixed to favor the German occupiers. Many houses of prostitution existed in Paris and they began to cater to German clients. The headquarters of the Sicherheitsdienst , the counter-intelligence branch of the SS was at 84 Avenue Foch . French auxiliaries, who worked for the Gestapo , Sicherheitsdienst and Geheime Feldpolizei were based at 93, rue Lauriston in

7254-620: The French underworld , operated from 93, rue Lauriston . Many of its member were captured at the end of the war and executed. The Nazi security agencies also established Special Brigades under the Prefecture of Police in Paris, these units operated in accordance with the RHSA and the SS capturing resistance fighters and Allied agents, as well as rounding up Jews for deportation . Prisoners were routinely tortured by

7440-485: The Jeu de Paume , and filling the whole ground floor. The staff at the Jeu de Paume cataloged 218 major collections. Between April 1941 and July 1944, 4,174 cases of art works filling 138 boxcars, were shipped from Paris to Germany. Much of the art, but not all, was recovered after the war. While some painters left Paris, many remained and continued working. Georges Braque returned to Paris in autumn 1940 and quietly continued working. Pablo Picasso spent most of 1939 in

7626-619: The Maginot Line , while in Paris ration cards for gasoline were issued, restrictions were put on the sale of meat and, in February 1940, ration cards for food were issued; however, cafés and theatres remained open. The French defense plan was purely passive, waiting for the Germans to attack. After eight months of relative calm (known as the Phoney War , La drôle de guerre ) on the Western Front ,

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7812-541: The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact on August 23rd 1939, had to reverse direction. The editors of the Communist Party newspaper, L'Humanité , which had been closed down by the French government, asked the Germans for permission to resume publishing, and it was granted. The Party also asked that workers resume work in the armaments factories, which were now producing for the Germans. Many individual communists opposed

7998-626: The Opera House and viewed the Eiffel Tower from the terrace of the Palace of Chaillot , paid homage at Napoleon's tomb, and visited the artist's quarter of Montmartre . During the Occupation, the French Government moved to Vichy, and the flag of Nazi Germany flew over all the French government buildings. Signs in German were placed on the main boulevards, and the clocks of all France were reset to

8184-593: The Schorfheide Forest in Germany. Another Rothschild-owned painting, The Astronomer by Vermeer , was reserved for Hitler himself. Fifteen railroad boxcars full of artworks were sent to Germany with Göring's personal train. Göring visited the Jeu de Paume twelve more times in 1941, and five times in 1942, adding to his collection. Confiscations continued at banks, warehouses and private residences, with paintings, furniture, statues, clocks and jewelry accumulating at

8370-522: The Soviet Union . The secret German-Soviet cooperation started in 1921. The German statement following The Manchester Guardian ' s article that Germany did not feel bound by the terms of Versailles and would violate them as much as possible gave much offence in France. Nonetheless, in 1927, the Inter-Allied Commission , which was responsible for ensuring that Germany complied with Part V of

8556-518: The Statute of Jewry , which also included a requirement: Each Jew, after he is seven years old, shall wear a distinguishing mark on his outer garment, that is to say, in the form of two Tables joined , of yellow felt of the length of six inches and of the breadth of three inches. In Europe, Jews were required to wear the Judenhut or pileum cornutum , a cone-shaped hat, in most cases yellow. In 1267,

8742-478: The Synod of Narbonne , in canon 3, ruled: That Jews may be distinguished from others, we decree and emphatically command that in the center of the breast (of their garments) they shall wear an oval badge, the measure of one finger in width and one half a palm in height. However, these ecclesiastic pronouncements required legal sanctions of a temporal authority. In 1228, James I of Aragon ordered Jews of Aragon to wear

8928-640: The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier beneath the Arc de Triomphe . The event was also announced on the 10th on the BBC. The day began quietly, as some 20,000 students laid wreaths and bouquets at the tomb and at the statue of Georges Clemenceau , on Place Clemenceau , by the Champs Élysées . This part of the day was tolerated by the French and German authorities. At midday, the demonstration became more provocative; some students carried

9114-508: The Vienna city council ordered Jews to wear this type of hat rather than a badge. There is a reference to a dispensation from the badge in Erfurt on 16 October 1294, the earliest reference to the badge in Germany. There were also attempts to enforce the wearing of full-length robes, which in late 14th-century Rome were supposed to be red. In Portugal, a red Star of David was used. Enforcement of

9300-526: The "continental commitment" – the decision to build the Maginot Line was not irrational and stupid, as building the Maginot Line was a sensible response to the problems that would be created by the coming French withdrawal from the Rhineland in 1930. Part of the rationale for the Maginot Line stemmed from the severe French losses during the First World War and their effect on the French population. The drop in

9486-505: The 1930s to deter invasion by Nazi Germany and force them to move around the fortifications. It was impervious to most forms of attack; consequently, the Germans invaded through the Low Countries in 1940, passing it to the north. The line, which was supposed to be fully extended further towards the west to avoid such an occurrence, was finally scaled back in response to demands from Belgium . Indeed, Belgium feared it would be sacrificed in

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9672-597: The British Empire. About 55 per cent of overseas imports arrived in France via the Channel ports of Calais , Le Havre , Cherbourg , Boulogne , Dieppe , Saint-Malo and Dunkirk . Germany had to import most of its iron, rubber, oil , bauxite , copper and nickel , making naval blockade a devastating weapon against the German economy . For economic reasons, the success of the strategy of la guerre de longue durée would at

9858-657: The French Premier Raymond Poincaré responded by sending French troops to occupy Germany's Ruhr region. During the ensuing Ruhrkampf ("Ruhr struggle") between the Germans and the French that lasted until September 1923, Britain condemned the French occupation of the Ruhr . A period of sustained Francophobia broke out in Britain, with Poincaré being vilified in Britain as a cruel bully punishing Germany with unreasonable reparations demands. The British—who openly championed

10044-562: The French could only go so far with alienating the British. From 1871 forward, French elites had concluded that France had no hope of defeating Germany on its own, and France would need an alliance with another great power to defeat the Reich . In 1926, The Manchester Guardian ran an exposé showing the Reichswehr had been developing military technology forbidden by the Treaty of Versailles in

10230-496: The French defensive front. A rapid advance through the forest and across the River Meuse encircled much of the Allied forces, resulting in a sizeable force having to be evacuated at Dunkirk and leaving the troops to the south unable to mount an effective resistance to the German invasion of France . The Maginot Line was built to fulfill several purposes: Maginot Line fortifications were manned by specialist units of fortress infantry, artillery and engineers. The infantry manned

10416-423: The French occupation of the Ruhr. French plans for an offensive in the 1920s were realistic, as Versailles had forbidden German conscription , and the Reichswehr was limited to 100,000 men. Once the French forces left the Rhineland in 1930, this form of leverage with the Rhineland as collateral was no longer available to Paris, which from then on had to depend on Berlin's word that it would continue to abide by

10602-522: The French police. Unmarried persons and couples without children were taken to Drancy , some 20 kilometers north of Paris, while 8,160 men, women and children comprising families went to the Vélodrome d'Hiver ("Vel' d'Hiv'") stadium, on rue Nelaton in the 15th arrondissement , where they were crowded together in the heat of summer, with hardly any food, water and no hygienic facilities for five days before being sent to Drancy , Compiègne , Pithiviers and Beaune-la-Rolande internment camps, preludes to

10788-449: The German military at Fort Mont Valérien. Acts of resistance in Paris became more dangerous. In the spring of 1942, five students of the Lycée Buffon decided to protest the arrest of one of their teachers. About one hundred students took part, chanting the teacher's name and throwing leaflets. The demonstrators escaped, but the police tracked down and arrested the five student leaders, who were tried and executed on February 8, 1943. As

10974-399: The German occupation . A whispering campaign that claimed that the action was in response to the United States government requiring German Americans to wear swastikas was unsuccessful. In May 2001, the Taliban government in Afghanistan ruled that Hindus in the country must wear a yellow badge, causing international outcry. In May 2021, in response to the anti-vaccine movement in

11160-403: The German position on reparations—applied intense economic pressure on France to change its policies towards Germany. At a conference in London in 1924 to settle the Franco-German crisis caused by the Ruhrkampf , the British Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald successfully pressed the French Premier Édouard Herriot to make concessions to Germany. The British diplomat Sir Eric Phipps , who attended

11346-413: The German time. The German military high command moved into the Majestic Hotel on Avenue Kléber ; the Abwehr (German military intelligence), took over the Hôtel Lutetia ; the Luftwaffe (German Air Force) occupied the Ritz ; the Kriegsmarine (German Navy), the Hôtel de la Marine on the Place de la Concorde ; the Carlingue , the French auxiliary organization of the Gestapo , occupied

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11532-399: The Germans and many of them made their way to Germany ( Sigmaringen ) when Paris fell to the Allies. Those who did not leave were the target of the purge ( épuration ) that followed. The most notorious criminal of the period was Doctor Marcel Petiot . Petiot purchased a house at 21 rue Le Sueur in the 16th arrondissement , and under the name of Docteur Eugène , pretended to be the head of

11718-432: The Germans struck France on May 10th 1940, bypassing the Maginot Line and slipping through the Ardennes . By May 15th, German panzer divisions were only 35 kilometers from Laon , in the rear of the French and British armies, racing toward the English Channel . On May 28th, the British realized the battle was lost and began withdrawing their soldiers from the beaches of Dunkerque . Paris was soon flooded with refugees from

11904-417: The Germans were exhausted, France would begin an offensive to win the war. The Maginot Line was intended to block the main German blow if it should come via eastern France and divert it through Belgium, where French forces would meet and stop the Germans. The Germans were expected to fight costly offensives, whose failures would sap the strength of the Reich , while the French waged a total war , mobilising

12090-488: The Germans. Very few heard the broadcast at the time, but it was widely printed and circulated afterwards. On 23 June, the German occupation authorities ordered all French persons to turn in any weapons and short-wave receivers they possessed, or face severe measures. Within Paris, opposition was isolated and slow to build. On 2 August, de Gaulle was condemned to death for treason, in absentia , by Marshal Pétain's new government. The first illegal demonstration in Paris against

12276-452: The Government of Marshal Pétain and with the Germans, assisting them with city administration, the police, and other government functions. French government officials were given the choice of collaborating or losing their jobs. On September 2, 1941, all Paris magistrates were asked to take an oath of allegiance to Marshal Petain. Only one, Paul Didier , refused. Unlike the territory of Vichy France , governed by Marshal Pétain and his ministers,

12462-400: The Islamic heartlands. In Aghlabid Northern Africa and Sicily dhimmis were required to wear a patch ( ruq'a ) of white fabric on the shoulder of their outer garment, with the patch for Jews being a in the image of an ape and for Christians the image of a pig. It is not clear how long this humiliating decree remained in force, but it is clear that in the Maghrebi case, the purpose of the patch

12648-401: The Jews or Saracens from the Christians, but in certain others such a confusion has grown up that they cannot be distinguished by any difference. Thus it happens at times that through error Christians have relations with the women of Jews or Saracens, and Jews and Saracens with Christian women. Therefore, that they may not, under pretext of error of this sort, excuse themselves in the future for

12834-578: The Maginot Line. There are several kinds of armoured cloches. Cloches are non-retractable turrets. The word cloche is a French term meaning bell due to its shape. All cloches were made of alloy steel. The line included the following retractable turrets. Both static and mobile artillery units were assigned to defend the Maginot Line. Régiments d'artillerie de position (RAP) consisted of static artillery units. Régiments d'artillerie mobile de forteresse (RAMF) consisted of mobile artillery. The defences were first proposed by Marshal Joseph Joffre . He

13020-405: The Middle Ages. From the 16th century, the use of the Judenhut declined, but the badge tended to outlast it, surviving into the 18th century in places. After Nazi Germany 's invasion of Poland in 1939, there were different local decrees requiring Jews to wear a distinctive sign under the General Government . The sign was a white armband with a blue Star of David on it; in the Warthegau

13206-425: The Nazis, but the ambivalent official attitude of the Party lasted until Operation Barbarossa , the German attack on the Soviet Union on June 22nd 1941. The Ukrainian-Jewish Marxist historian , Maximilien Rubel , was living semi-secretly in Paris, and was astonished by the level of ignorance shown by Marxist members of the resistance that he met, and in consequence he introduced the term " Marxologie " to refer to

13392-795: The Normandy invasion approached, the Communists and their allies controlled the largest and best-armed resistance groups in Paris: the Francs-Tireurs et Partisans (FTP). In February 1944, the FTP became part of a larger umbrella organization, the Forces françaises de l'intérieur (FFI). Following the Normandy invasion on June 6 (D-Day), the FFI prepared to launch an uprising to liberate

13578-424: The Occupation took place on November 11th 1940, the anniversary of the end of the First World War , a day that usually featured patriotic ceremonies of remembrance. Anticipating trouble, the German authorities banned any commemoration and made it a regular school and work day. Nonetheless, the students of Paris lycées (high schools) circulated handbills and leaflets calling for students to boycott classes and meet at

13764-519: The Occupation. In 1946, the metro station Jacques Bonsergent was named after him. The first significant Resistance organization in Paris was formed in September 1940 by a group of scholars connected with the Musée de l'Homme , the ethnology museum located at the Palais de Chaillot . On December 15th, using the museum mimeograph machine, they published Résistance , a four-page newspaper which gave its name to

13950-471: The Paris streets dropped from 350,000 before the war to just under 4,500. One customer, sitting on the terrace of a café on the Place de la Bourse , counted the number of cars which passed between noon and twelve-thirty: only three came by. Older means of transportation, such as the horse-drawn fiacre came back into service. Trucks and automobiles that did circulate often used gazogene, a poor-quality fuel carried in

14136-613: The Parisians toward the occupiers varied greatly. Some saw the Germans as an easy source of money; others, as the Prefect of the Seine, Roger Langeron (arrested on June 23rd 1940), commented, "looked at them as if they were invisible or transparent." The attitude of members of the French Communist Party was more complicated; the Party had long denounced Nazism and Fascism, but after the signing of

14322-482: The Parisians, particularly those in the wealthier neighborhoods, had fled to the countryside and the south of France, in what is known as the exode de 1940 , the massive exodus of millions of people from the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, the north and east of France, fleeing after the German victory of the battle of Sedan (May 12th– May 15th 1940). Once the Occupation had begun, they started to return. By July 7th,

14508-508: The Rhineland region of Germany until 1935. Still, the last French troops left the Rhineland in June 1930 in exchange for Germany accepting the Young Plan . As long as the French occupied the Rhineland, it served as a type of collateral under which the French would annex the Rhineland in the event of Germany breaching any of the articles of the treaty, such as rearming in violation of Part V; this threat

14694-570: The Rhineland. Given the diplomatic situation in the late 1920s, the Quai d'Orsay informed the government that French military planning should be based on a worst-case scenario that France would fight the next war against Germany without the help of Britain or the United States. France had an alliance with Belgium and with the states of the Cordon sanitaire , as the French alliance system in Eastern Europe

14880-531: The Ruhr within a year. The great conclusion that was drawn in Paris after the Ruhrkampf and the 1924 London Conference was that France could not make unilateral military moves to uphold Versailles as the resulting British hostility to such moves was too dangerous to the republic. Beyond that, the French were well aware of the contribution of Britain and its dominions to the victory of 1918. French decision-makers believed they needed Britain's help to win another war;

15066-513: The Special Brigades. The Germans supported the creation by Vichy France, on February 28th 1943, of a fascist paramilitary organization, the Front révolutionnaire national , whose active police branch was called Milice . Its particular function was to help the Germans in their battle against the Resistance, which they qualified as being a "terrorist" organization. It established its headquarters in

15252-569: The Treaty of Versailles, was abolished as a goodwill gesture reflecting the "Spirit of Locarno ". When the Control Commission was dissolved, the commissioners in their final report issued a blistering statement, stating that Germany had never sought to abide by Part V and the Reichswehr had been engaging in covert rearmament all through the 1920s. Under the Treaty of Versailles, France was to occupy

15438-552: The United Nations Gilad Erdan , as well as other Israeli delegates, began wearing yellow star badges with the words " Never Again " written on them, in protest to criticism of Israel's conduct during the 2023 Israel–Hamas war . Erdan claimed that the UN Security Council was "silent" about the 7 October Hamas attack on Israel , and said that he would wear the star "as a symbol of pride". However, this decision

15624-746: The United States, hatWRKS, a hat store in Nashville, Tennessee , sold badges that resembled the yellow stars with the words "Not vaccinated" on them. In response, the Stetson company announced they would no longer sell any hats to the store. This also sparked protests outside the store. The practice of wearing yellow stars in protests against responses to the COVID-19 pandemic spread to Montreal, London, Amsterdam and Paris. The practice sparked condemnation by various Jewish advocacy groups and Holocaust survivors . On 31 October 2023, Permanent Representative of Israel to

15810-472: The acronym T.S.F., Télégraphie Sans Fil ). This system connected every fortification in the Maginot Line, including bunkers, infantry and artillery fortresses, observation posts and shelters. Two telephone wires were placed parallel to the line of fortifications, providing redundancy in case a wire was cut. There were places along the cable where dismounted soldiers could connect to the network. These were found from 500–1,000 m (1,600–3,300 ft) behind

15996-759: The actor Fernandel , the film director and playwright Sacha Guitry , and the singers Édith Piaf , Tino Rossi , Charles Trenet and Yves Montand . The jazz musician Django Reinhardt played with the Quintette du Hot Club de France for German and French fans. In 1941, Maurice Chevalier performed a new revue in the Casino de Paris : Bonjour Paris . The songs Ça sent si bon la France and La Chanson du maçon became hits. The Nazis asked Chevalier to perform in Berlin and sing for Radio Paris . He refused but did perform for French prisoners of war in Germany, and succeeded in obtaining

16182-627: The advance to the English Channel , the Germans overran France's border defence with Belgium and several Maginot Forts in the Maubeuge area whilst the Luftwaffe simply flew over it. On 19 May, the German 16th Army captured the isolated petit ouvrage La Ferté (south-east of Sedan ) after conducting a deliberate assault by combat engineers backed up by heavy artillery , taking the fortifications in only four days. The entire French crew of 107 soldiers

16368-486: The badge is repeated by local councils, with varying degrees of fines, at Arles 1234 and 1260, Béziers 1246, Albi 1254, Nîmes 1284 and 1365, Avignon 1326 and 1337, Rodez 1336, and Vanves 1368. The "rota" looked like a ring of white or yellow. The shape and colour of the patch also varied, although the colour was usually white or yellow. Married women were often required to wear two bands of blue on their veil or head-scarf. In 1274, Edward I of England enacted

16554-465: The badge, would help to mark them as an outsider . Legislation that mandated Jewish subjects to wear such items has been documented in some Middle Eastern caliphates and in some European kingdoms during the medieval period and the early modern period . The most recent usage of yellow badges was during World War II , when Jews living in Nazi Germany and German-occupied Europe were ordered to wear

16740-586: The badge; and in 1265, the Siete Partidas , a legal code enacted in Castile by Alfonso X but not implemented until many years later, included a requirement for Jews to wear distinguishing marks. On 19 June 1269, Louis IX of France imposed a fine of ten livres (one livre was equivalent to a pound of silver) on Jews found in public without a badge ( Latin : rota , lit.   'wheel', French : rouelle or roue ). The enforcement of wearing

16926-503: The battle zone. On June 3rd, the Germans bombed Paris and its suburbs for the first time, targeting in particular the Citroën automobile factory. 254 persons were killed, including 195 civilians. French Prime Minister Paul Reynaud dismissed his supreme military commander, Maurice Gamelin , and replaced him with the 73-year-old Maxime Weygand . He also named the 84-year-old Philippe Pétain ,

17112-662: The birth rate during and after the war, resulting in a national shortage of young men, created an "echo" effect on the generation that provided the French conscript army in the mid-1930s. Faced with a manpower shortage, French planners had to rely more on older and less fit reservists , who would take longer to mobilise and would diminish the French industry because they would leave their jobs. Static defensive positions were therefore intended not only to buy time but to economise on men by defending an area with fewer and less mobile forces. However, in 1940, France deployed about twice as many men, 36 divisions (roughly one third of its force), for

17298-570: The border there was a line of anti-tank blockhouses that were intended to provide resistance to armoured assault, sufficient to delay the enemy and allow time for the crews of the C.O.R.F. ouvrages to be ready at their battle stations. These outposts covered the main passages within the principal line. This line began 10 km (6 mi) behind the border. It was preceded by anti-tank obstacles made of metal rails planted vertically in six rows, with heights varying from 0.70–1.40 metres (2  ft 4  in  – 4 ft 7 in) and buried to

17484-456: The building at 93 rue Lauriston ; and the German commandant of Paris and his staff moved into the Hôtel Meurice on the rue de Rivoli . Paris became the primary destination for the rest and recreation of German soldiers. Under the slogan "Jeder einmal in Paris" ("everyone once in Paris"), each German soldier was promised one visit to Paris. One month after the beginning of the Occupation,

17670-654: The casemates is similar to the ones found in the southern part of the Maginot Line, and photographs of them are often confused with Maginot forts. Following the Munich Agreement and the German occupation of Czechoslovakia , the Germans were able to use the Czech fortifications to plan attacks that proved successful against the western fortifications (the Belgian Fort Eben-Emael is the best-known example). The World War II German invasion plan of 1940 ( Sichelschnitt )

17856-630: The châteaux of the Loire Valley and the unoccupied zone , and were safe. The German Army was respectful of the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907 and refused to transfer the works in French museums out of the country, but the Nazi leaders were not so scrupulous. On 30 June 1940, Hitler ordered that all art works in France, public and private, should be "safeguarded". Many of the French wealthy Jewish families had sent their art works out of France before leaving

18042-519: The city before the Allied Armies and General de Gaulle arrived. Yellow badge The yellow badge , also known as the yellow patch , the Jewish badge , or the yellow star ( German : Judenstern , lit.   ' Jew's star ' ), was an accessory that Jews were required to wear in certain non-Jewish societies throughout history. A Jew's ethno-religious identity, which would be denoted by

18228-568: The city government estimated the population had risen again to 1.5 million; it climbed to two million by October 22nd, and 2.5 million by January 1st 1941. At the beginning of 1943, it fell again, because of air raids by the Allies, the arrest and deportation of Jews and foreigners, and the forced departure to factories in Germany of many young Frenchmen, as part of the Service du travail obligatoire (STO), "Obligatory Work Service". The attitude of

18414-573: The city to the countryside. That night, street lights were turned off as a measure against German air raids. On 1 September, news reached Paris that Germany had invaded Poland , and France as expected promptly declared war on Germany. On August 27th, in anticipation of air raids, workmen had begun taking down the stained glass windows of the Sainte-Chapelle . The same day, curators at the Louvre , summoned back from summer vacation, and aided by packers from

18600-570: The commander of the Metz sector and other officers, the general outlined the French problem in extending the line to the sea in that placing the line along the Belgian-German border required the agreement of Belgium, but putting the line along the French-Belgian border relinquished Belgium to the Germans. Another complication was Holland, and the various governments never resolved their problems. When

18786-496: The concept of la guerre de longue durée . Germany had the largest economy in Europe but lacked many of the raw materials necessary for a modern industrial economy (making the Reich vulnerable to a blockade) and the ability to feed its population. The guerre de longue durée strategy called for the French to halt the expected German offensive meant to give the Reich a swift victory; afterwards, there would be an attrition struggle; once

18972-479: The conference, commented afterwards that: The London Conference was for the French 'man in the street' one long Calvary as he saw M. Herriot abandoning one by one the cherished possessions of French preponderance on the Reparations Commission, the right of sanctions in the event of German default, the economic occupation of the Ruhr, the French-Belgian railway Régie , and finally, the military occupation of

19158-449: The country, but others had left their art collections behind. A new law decreed that those who had left France just before the war were no longer French citizens, and their property could be seized. The Gestapo began visiting bank vaults and empty residences, and collecting the works of art. The pieces left behind in the fifteen largest Jewish-owned art galleries in Paris were also collected, and transported in French police vans. In September,

19344-493: The country. They were not experienced conspirators, and they were discovered and arrested in January 1941. Vildé and the six other leaders were sentenced to death and executed by firing squad at Fort Mont Valérien , in the western suburbs of the city, on February 22, 1942. Most of the resistance by ordinary Parisians was symbolic: encouraged by the BBC, students scribbled the letter V for Victory on walls, blackboards, tables, and on

19530-689: The creation on 16 June 1940 of the Ministère de l'agriculture et du ravitaillement (Ministry of Agriculture and Supply), which began to impose a system of rationing as early as August 2nd 1940, as per Décret du 30 juillet 1940 : bread, fat, flour products, rice, sugar; then, on 23 October 1940: butter, cheese, meat, coffee, charcuterie , eggs, oil; in July 1941: and as the war went on: chocolate, fish, dried vegetables, (like peas and beans), potatoes, fresh vegetables, wine, tobacco... Products could be bought only upon presentation of coupons attributed to specific items and on

19716-521: The decision, with one calling it a "cheap gimmick that doesn’t serve our goal", and others describing it as an attempt to appeal to Likud party members. Denmark: The king against the yellow badge Maginot Line The Maginot Line ( French : Ligne Maginot , [lˈiɲ maʒinˈo] ), named after the French Minister of War André Maginot , is a line of concrete fortifications , obstacles and weapon installations built by France in

19902-692: The defence of the Maginot Line in Alsace and Lorraine. In contrast, the opposing German Army Group C only contained 19 divisions, fewer than a seventh of the force committed in the Manstein Plan for the invasion of France. Reflecting memories of World War I, the French General Staff had developed the concept of la puissance du feu ("the power of fire"), the power of artillery dug in and sheltered by concrete and steel, to inflict devastating losses on an attacking force. French planning for war with Germany

20088-487: The defences and capturing the cities of Colmar and Strasbourg . By early June, the German forces had cut off the line from the rest of France, and the French government was making overtures for an armistice , which was signed on 22 June in Compiègne . As the line was surrounded, the German Army attacked a few ouvrages from the rear but was unsuccessful in capturing any significant fortifications. The main fortifications of

20274-564: The deportation of French Jews to the concentration camp of Auschwitz . On May 29th, 1942, all Jews in the Occupied Zone over the age of six were required to wear the yellow Star of David badge . In July, Jews were banned from all main streets, movie theaters, libraries, parks, gardens, restaurants, cafés and other public places, and were required to ride on the last car of metro trains. On 16–17 July 1942, on Germans' orders, 13,152 Jews (4,115 children, 5.919 women and 3,118 men) were rounded up by

20460-424: The differentiating of non-Muslims from Muslims. The Abbasid caliph al-Mutawakkil issued a decree in 850 that ordered Jews and Christians to wear the zunnar , honey-coloured outer garments and badge-like patches on their on their servants' clothing. This begun the long tradition of differentiating by colour, though the colour and badges would change over time and place. The clothing was also enforced outside of

20646-562: The disposition of the German occupiers. By the end of the afternoon, the Germans had hung a swastika flag at the Arc de Triomphe and organized military parades with a marching band on the Champs Élysées and Avenue Foch , primarily for the benefit of the German army photographers and newsreel cameramen. On the evening of June 16th, Prime Minister Reynaud resigned. On the morning of June 17th, General de Gaulle left Bordeaux by plane for London. At midday, Parisians gathered around radios heard Pétain,

20832-535: The document of surrender placed Paris in the occupied zone, directly under German authority, the Militärbefehlshabers in Frankreich (MBF). It stated: "The government of France will immediately invite all the French authorities and administrative services in the occupied territories to conform with the regulations of the German military authorities, and to collaborate with those in a correct manner." The prefect of

21018-558: The event of an enemy offensive. These were built near the major fortifications so fortress ( ouvrage ) crews could reach their battle stations in the shortest possible time in the event of a surprise attack during peacetime. A network of 600 mm ( 1 ft  11 + 5 ⁄ 8  in ) narrow gauge railways was built to rearm and resupply the main fortresses ( ouvrages ) from supply depots up to 50 km (31 mi) away. Petrol-engined armoured locomotives pulled supply trains along these narrow-gauge lines. (A similar system

21204-462: The event of another German invasion. The line has since become a metaphor for expensive efforts that offer a false sense of security. Constructed on the French side of its borders with Italy , Switzerland , Germany , Luxembourg and Belgium , the line did not extend to the English Channel . French strategy, therefore, envisioned a move into Belgium to counter a German assault. Based on France's experience with trench warfare during World War I ,

21390-548: The event of the German military reoccupying the Rhineland or breaking Part V, while Locarno committed Britain and Italy to come to French aid in the event of a "flagrant violation" of the Rhineland's demilitarised status, it did not define what a "flagrant violation" would be. The British and Italian governments refused in subsequent diplomatic talks to define "flagrant violation", which led the French to place little hope in Anglo-Italian help if German military forces should reoccupy

21576-439: The excesses of such prohibited intercourse, we decree that such Jews and Saracens of both sexes in every Christian province and at all times shall be marked off in the eyes of the public from other peoples through the character of their dress. Particularly, since it may be read in the writings of Moses [ Numbers 15:37–41 ], that this very law has been enjoined upon them. Innocent III had in 1199 confirmed Sicut Judaeis , which

21762-481: The first post-war municipal elections were held, in which French women voted for the first time. In the spring of 1939, war with Germany already seemed inevitable. In Paris, the first defense exercise took place on February 2nd 1939 and city workers began digging twenty kilometers of trenches in city squares and parks to be used for bomb shelters. On 10th of March, the city began to distribute gas masks to civilians, and on March 19th, signs were posted guiding Parisians to

21948-554: The former Communist Party building at 44 rue Le Peletier and at 61 rue de Monceau . The Lycée Louis-Le-Grand was occupied as barracks, and an officer candidate school was established in the Auteuil synagogue. The Front révolutionnaire national held a large rally on April 11th 1943 at the Vél d'Hiv . At the time of the Liberation of Paris in August 1944, most of its members chose to fight alongside

22134-529: The fortifications near Metz and in northern Alsace towards the end of 1944. During the German offensive Operation Nordwind in January 1945, Maginot Line casemates and fortifications were utilised by Allied forces, especially in the Bas-Rhin department in Grand Est , and some German units had been supplemented with flamethrower tanks in anticipation of this possibility. In January 1945 von Luck with 21 Panzerdivision

22320-458: The guillotine on May 25, 1946. The gold, silver and other valuables were not found when he was arrested. In search of the treasure, the house was carefully demolished in 1966, but no trace of it was ever found. On June 18th 1940, Parisians listening to the BBC heard an obscure French brigadier General, Charles de Gaulle, in London, make an appeal ( Appel du 18 juin ) to continue the resistance against

22506-404: The head of the Luftwaffe , visited the Jeu de Paume on November 3 and returned on the 5th, spending the entire day there, picking out works for his private collection. He selected twenty-seven paintings, including works by Rembrandt and Van Dyck owned by Edouard de Rothschild , as well as stained glass windows and furniture intended for Carinhall , the luxurious hunting lodge he had built in

22692-493: The idea: "To make Paris into a city of ruins will not affect the issue." On June 12th, the French government, in Tours, declared Paris to be an open city, that there would be no resistance. At 5:30 in the morning of June 14th, the first German advance guard entered the city at Porte de La Villette and took the rue de Flandres toward the center. They were followed by several German columns, which, following an established plan, moved to

22878-559: The liberation of ten prisoners in exchange. The writer Colette , who was 67 when the war began, worked quietly on her mémoires in her apartment at 9 rue du Beaujolais , next to the gardens of the Palais-Royal. Her husband, Maurice Goudeket, a Jew, was arrested by the Gestapo in December 1941, and although he was released after a few months through the intervention of the French wife of the German ambassador Otto Abetz , Colette lived through

23064-574: The lighter weapons of the fortresses and formed units with the mission of operating outside if necessary. Artillery troops operated the heavy guns, and the engineers were responsible for maintaining and operating other specialist equipment, including all communications systems. All these troops wore distinctive uniform insignia and considered themselves among the elite of the French Army. During peacetime, fortresses were only partly manned by full-time troops. They would be supplemented by reservists who lived in

23250-515: The line were still mostly intact, many commanders were prepared to hold out, and the Italian advance had been contained. Nevertheless, Maxime Weygand signed the surrender instrument and the army was ordered out of their fortifications to be taken to POW camps . When the Allied forces invaded in June 1944, the line, now held by German defenders, was again largely bypassed; fighting touched only portions of

23436-399: The local area and who could be quickly mobilised in an emergency. Full-time Maginot Line troops were accommodated in barracks built close to the fortresses. They were also accommodated in complexes of wooden housing adjacent to each fortress, which were more comfortable than living inside, but were not expected to survive wartime bombardment. The training was carried out at a fortress near

23622-559: The long journey by bicycle to the countryside, hoping to come back, with vegetables, fruit, eggs and other farm products. The rationing system also applied to clothing: leather was reserved exclusively for German army boots, and vanished completely from the market. Leather shoes were replaced by shoes made of rubber or canvas ( raffia ) with wooden soles. A variety of ersatz or substitute products appeared, which were not exactly what they were called: ersatz wine, coffee (made with chicory), tobacco and soap. Finding coal for heat in winter

23808-500: The massive Maginot Line was built in the run-up to World War II , after the Locarno Conference in 1925 gave rise to a fanciful and optimistic "Locarno spirit". French military experts believed the line would deter German aggression because it would slow an invasion force long enough for French forces to mobilise and counterattack. The Maginot Line was invulnerable to aerial bombings and tank fire; it used underground railways as

23994-474: The movement that followed. The group was led by the Russian-born (French naturalized) anthropologist Boris Vildé . The first issue of the newspaper, proclaimed: "We are independent, simply French, chosen for the action we wish to carry out. We have only one ambition, one passion, one desire: to recreate France, pure and free." They collected information and established a network to help escaped French POWs to flee

24180-547: The nearby La Samaritaine and Bazar de l'Hôtel de Ville department stores, began cataloging and packing the major works of art, which were put into crates and labeled only with numbers to disguise their contents. The Winged Victory of Samothrace statue was carefully wheeled down the long stairway on a wooden ramp to be put on a truck for its departure to the Château de Valençay in the Indre department. Trucks used to move scenery for

24366-536: The nearest shelters. On August 23rd, Parisians were surprised to read that the German foreign minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop , and Russian minister Vyacheslav Molotov had signed the Hitler-Stalin Pact of non-aggression. L'Humanité , the daily newspaper of the French Communist Party (PCF), welcomed the pact, writing: "At the moment when the Soviet Union makes a new and appreciable contribution to safeguard

24552-463: The new head of the French government, announce: "It is with a heavy heart that I tell you today that we must cease hostilities. The fighting must stop." Though no armistice had yet been signed, the French army stopped fighting. Nazi leader Adolf Hitler arrived on June 24th for a rapid tour by car, his only visit to Paris. He was guided by the German sculptor Arno Breker and by his chief architect, Albert Speer , both of whom had lived in Paris. He saw

24738-462: The next killing of a German, forty-eight hostages were immediately shot by firing squad. From London, General de Gaulle condemned the Communist policy of random assassinations, saying the cost in innocent civilian lives was too high, and it had no impact on the war, but the random shooting of Germans continued. In retaliation, an estimated 1,400 hostages from the Paris region were taken and 981 executed by

24924-540: The outer clothing that Tunisian Jews were obliged to wear. The shikla ceased to be used in Morocco from the sixteenth century, but it continued to be such a regular defining mark of Tunisian Jews up to the nineteenth century, that they were commonly referred to as shikliyyūn ("those who wear the sign"). In largely Catholic Medieval Europe, Jews and Muslims were required to wear distinguishable clothing in some periods. These measures were not seen as being inconsistent with

25110-645: The paintings that they left without taking anything. He also persuaded them that the paintings in the adjoining vault, owned by Braque, were actually his own. Other "degenerate" artists, including Kandinsky and Henri Matisse , who sent drawings up to Paris from his residence in Nice, were officially condemned but continued to sell their works in the back rooms of Paris galleries. A few actors, such as Jean Gabin and film director Jean Renoir chose, for political or personal reasons, to leave Paris, but many others remained, avoided politics and focused on their art. These included

25296-562: The papal bulls Sicut Judaeis . Most significantly, the Fourth Council of the Lateran headed by Pope Innocent III ruled in 1215 that Jews and Muslims must wear distinguishable dress (Latin habitus ). This wording of the council decree may have been influenced indirectly by the Muslim requirements for Jews. Canon 68 reads, in part: In some provinces a difference in dress distinguishes

25482-428: The patriotic demonstrations on November 11. But after Operation Barbarossa , the German attack on the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941, they became among the most active and best-organized forces against the Germans. They remained hostile to de Gaulle, whom they denounced as a reactionary British puppet. On 21st of August 1941, a 21-year-old veteran communist named Pierre Georges , who used the clandestine name "Fabien", shot

25668-519: The peace, constantly threatened by the fascist instigators of war, the French Communist Party addresses its warmest greetings to the country of socialism, to its party and to its great leader Stalin ". In Paris, the copies of the newspaper and of the other Communist newspaper, Ce Soir , were seized by the police and their publication suspended. On August 31st, anticipating bombardment, the French government began to evacuate 30,000 children out of

25854-599: The penetration, capturing four petits ouvrages. The 1st Army also conducted two attacks against the Maginot Line further to the east in northern Alsace. One attack broke through a weak section of the line in the Vosges Mountains , but the French defenders stopped a second attack near Wissembourg . On 15 June, infantry divisions of the German 7th Army attacked across the Rhine River in Operation "Small Bear", deeply penetrating

26040-434: The police and prefect of the Seine, reported to him, and only secondarily to the government of the French State in Vichy. The Reich Security Main Office , which oversaw the SS , SD and the Gestapo , worked closely with the French Police and its auxiliaries. It established the Carlingue (or French Gestapo) which was used to conduct counter-insurgency operations against the Resistance . Its cadre, which were mostly from

26226-444: The police headquarters and other government buildings. The city was liberated by French and American troops on August 25th; the next day, General de Gaulle led a triumphant parade down the Champs-Élysées on August 26th, and organized a new government. In the following months, ten thousand Parisians who had collaborated with the Germans were arrested and tried, eight thousand convicted, and 116 executed. On April 29th and May 13th 1945,

26412-425: The police of Paris, under German control, received every day hundreds of anonymous denunciations by Parisians against other Parisians. Finding food soon became the first preoccupation of the Parisians. The authorities of the German occupation transformed French industry and agriculture into a machine for serving Germany. Shipments to Germany had first priority; what was left went to Paris and the rest of France. All of

26598-462: The prices higher. The French press and radio broadcast only German propaganda. The beginning of the STO, the program that required large number of young Frenchmen to work in factories for the German war industry, in exchange for the return of older and sick French prisoners of war in Germany, greatly increased the resentment of the French population against the Germans. Most Parisians, however, only expressed their anger and frustrations in private, while

26784-434: The principal intersections. German military vehicles with loudspeakers circulated, instructing Parisians not to leave their buildings. At eight in the morning, delegations of German officers arrived at Les Invalides , headquarters of the military governor of Paris, Henri Dentz , and at the Prefecture of Police, where the Prefect, Roger Langeron, was waiting. The Germans politely invited the French officials to put themselves at

26970-514: The principal line of resistance. These were buried concrete bunkers designed to house and shelter up to a company of infantry (200 to 250 men). They had amenities such as electric generators, ventilation systems, water supplies, kitchens and heating, which allowed their occupants to hold out in the event of an attack. They could also be used as a local headquarters and counterattack base. Flood zones were natural basins or rivers that could be flooded on demand and thus constitute an additional obstacle in

27156-432: The propaganda about the line made it appear far greater a construction than it was; illustrations showed multiple storeys of interwoven passages and even underground rail yards and cinemas . This reassured allied civilians. Czechoslovakia also feared Hitler and began building its own defences. As an ally of France, they got advice on the Maginot design and applied it to Czechoslovak border fortifications . The design of

27342-461: The resources of France, its empire and allies. Besides the demographic reasons, a defensive strategy served the needs of French diplomacy towards Great Britain. The French imported a third of their coal from Britain, and 32 per cent of all imports through French ports were carried by British ships. Of French trade, 35 per cent was with the British Empire and the majority of the tin , rubber , jute , wool and manganese used by France came from

27528-399: The rest of the war years with the anxiety of a possible second arrest. In 1944, she published one of her most famous works, Gigi . The philosopher and novelist Jean-Paul Sartre continued to write and publish; Simone de Beauvoir produced a broadcast on the history of the music hall for Radio Paris; and Marguerite Duras worked at a publishing house. The actress Danielle Darrieux made

27714-467: The restaurants found ways to serve their regular clients. The historian René Héron de Villefosse  [ fr ] , who lived in Paris throughout the war, described his experience: "The great restaurants were only allowed to serve, under the fierce eye of a frequent control, noodles with water, turnips and beets, in exchange for certain number of tickets, but the hunt for a good meal continued for many food-lovers. For five hundred francs one could conquer

27900-461: The roads out of the city with automobiles, tourist buses, trucks, wagons, carts, bicycles, and on foot. The slow-moving river of refugees took ten hours to cover thirty kilometers. Within a few days, the wealthier arrondissements of the city were nearly deserted, and the population of the working-class 14th arrondissement dropped from 178,000 to 49,000. The British General Staff urged the French to defend Paris street-by-street, but Pétain dismissed

28086-420: The rules was variable; in Marseille the magistrates ignored accusations of breaches, and in some places individuals or communities could buy exemption. Cathars who were considered "first time offenders" by the Catholic Church and the Inquisition were also forced to wear yellow badges, albeit in the form of crosses, about their person. The yellow badge remained the key distinguishing mark of Jewish dress in

28272-423: The side of cars. The Germans tried to co-opt the 'V' campaign, placing huge Vs. symbolizing their own victories, on the Eiffel Tower and the National Assembly, but with little effect. From the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact in August 1939, until June 1941, the Communists played no active part in the Resistance. The Vichy government and Germans allowed their newspapers to publish, and they made no mention of

28458-412: The so-called Kriegsschuldlüge ("War guilt lie") that Germany started the war in 1914, the French had little faith that the Germans would willingly allow the Rhineland's demilitarised status to continue forever, and believed that at some time in the future, Germany would rearm in violation of Versailles, reintroduce conscription and remilitarise the Rhineland. The decision to build the Maginot Line in 1929

28644-537: The specific week in which they could be used. Parisians (and all the population of France) were divided into seven categories depending upon their age, and allotted a certain amount of each product each month. A new bureaucracy, employing more than nine thousand city employees, with offices at all schools and the city hall of each arrondissement , was put into place to administer the program. The system resulted in long lines and frustrated hopes, since promised products often never appeared. Thousands of Parisians regularly made

28830-465: The standard of the rest of the line. As the water table in this region is high, there was the danger of underground passages getting flooded, which the line designers knew would be difficult and expensive to overcome. In 1939 U.S. Army officer Kenneth Nichols visited the Metz sector, where he was impressed by the formidable formations which he thought the Germans would have to outflank by driving through Belgium. In discussion with General Brousseau,

29016-450: The students, and closed the entrance of the metro stations. They charged the students with fixed bayonets, firing shots in the air. The Vichy government announced 123 arrests and one student wounded. The students arrested were taken to the prisons of La Santé , Cherche-Midi and Fresnes , where they were beaten, slapped, stripped, and made to stand all night in the pouring rain. Some students were threatened by soldiers pretending to be

29202-411: The tank obstacles. These bunkers were armed with twin machine-guns (abbreviated as JM — Jumelage de mitrailleuses — in French) and anti-tank guns of 37 or 47 mm (1.5 or 1.9 in). They could be single (with a firing room in one direction) or double (two firing rooms in opposite directions). These generally had two floors, with a firing level and a support/infrastructure level that provided

29388-413: The terms of the Versailles and Locarno treaties, which stated that the Rhineland was to stay demilitarised forever. Given that Germany had engaged in covert rearmament with the co-operation of the Soviet Union starting in 1921 (a fact that had become public knowledge in 1926) and that every German government had gone out of its way to insist on the moral invalidity of Versailles, claiming it was based upon

29574-718: The town of Bitche in Moselle in Lorraine , built in a military training area and so capable of live fire exercises. This was impossible elsewhere as the other parts of the line were located in civilian areas. Although the name "Maginot Line" suggests a relatively thin linear fortification, it was 20–25 kilometres (12–16 miles) deep from the German border to the rear area. It was composed of an intricate system of strong points, fortifications and military facilities such as border guard posts, communications centres, infantry shelters, barricades, artillery, machine-gun and anti-tank-gun emplacements, supply depots, infrastructure facilities and observation posts. These various structures reinforced

29760-484: The troops with rest and services ( power-generating units , reserves of water, fuel, food, ventilation equipment, etc.). The infantry casemates often had one or two "cloches" or turrets located on top of them. These GFM cloches were sometimes used to emplace machine guns or observation periscopes. 20 to 30 men manned them. These small fortresses reinforced the line of infantry bunkers . The petits ouvrages were generally made up of several infantry bunkers, connected by

29946-402: The trucks manufactured at the Citroen factory went directly to Germany. (Later many of these trucks were cleverly sabotaged by the French workers, who recalibrated the dip sticks so that the trucks would run out of oil without warning). Most shipments of meat, wheat, milk produce and other agricultural products also went to Germany. What remained for the Parisians was strictly rationed, following

30132-415: The two countries had signed an alliance in 1920, by which the French army would operate in Belgium if the German forces invaded. However, after France had failed to counter the German remilitarisation of the Rhineland , Belgium—thinking that France was not a reliable ally—abrogated the treaty in 1936 and declared neutrality . France quickly extended the Maginot Line along the Franco-Belgian border, but not to

30318-455: The very least require Britain to maintain a benevolent neutrality , preferably to enter the war as an ally as British sea power could protect French imports while depriving Germany of hers. A defensive strategy based on the Maginot Line was an excellent way of demonstrating to Britain that France was not an aggressive power and would only go to war in the event of German aggression, a situation that would make it more likely that Britain would enter

30504-480: The victory of 1918 had been achieved because the British Empire and the United States were allies in the war and that the French would have been defeated on their own. With the United States isolationist and Britain stoutly refusing to make the "continental commitment" to defend France on the same scale as in World War I, the prospects of Anglo-American assistance in another war with Germany appeared to be doubtful at best. Versailles did not call for military sanctions in

30690-455: The war continued, anti-German clandestine groups and networks were created, some loyal to the French Communist Party , others to General Charles de Gaulle in London. They wrote slogans on walls, organized an underground press, and sometimes attacked German officers. Reprisals by the Germans were swift and harsh. Following the Allied invasion of Normandy on June 6 1944, the French Resistance in Paris launched an uprising on 19 August, seizing

30876-450: The war continued, the Resistance was divided largely between the groups, followers of General de Gaulle in London, and those organized by the Communists. Thanks to pressure from the British, who supplied the weapons, and the diplomacy of one Resistance leader, Jean Moulin , who created the National Council of the Resistance ( Conseil National de la Résistance (CNR)), the different factions began to coordinate their actions. In early 1944, as

31062-404: The war on France's side. The line was built in several phases from 1930 by the Service Technique du Génie (STG), overseen by Commission d'Organisation des Régions Fortifiées (CORF). The main construction was largely completed by 1939, at the cost of around 3 billion French francs (around 3.9 billion in today's U.S. dollar’s worth). The line stretched from Switzerland to Luxembourg and

31248-463: The word dhimmi on it. He also has to wear a belt round his waist. The women have to wear one red and one black shoe and have a small bell on their necks or shoes. In the late twelfth century, the Almohads forced the Jews of North Africa to wear yellow cloaks and turbans, a practice the subsequent Hafsid dynasty continued to follow. In 1250, under Hafsid caliph al-Mustansir, Jews had to wear some sort of distinguishing badge ( shikla ), though it

31434-614: Was a tacit French admission that without the Rhineland as collateral, Germany was soon going to rearm and that the terms of Part V had a limited lifespan. After 1918, the German economy was twice as large as that of France; Germany had a population of 70 million compared to France's 40 million, and the French economy was hobbled by the need to reconstruct the enormous damage of World War I, while German territory had seen little fighting. French military chiefs were dubious about their ability to win another war against Germany on its own, especially an offensive war. French decision-makers knew that

31620-423: Was also confirmed by Pope Honorius III in 1216. In 1219, Honorius III issued a dispensation to the Jews of Castile , the largest Jewish population in Europe. Spanish Jews normally wore turbans , which presumably met the requirement to be distinctive. Elsewhere, local laws were introduced to bring the canon into effect. The identifying mark varied from one country to another, and from period to period. In 1227,

31806-415: Was always based on the assumption that the war would be la guerre de longue durée (the long war) , in which the superior economic resources of the Allies would gradually grind the Germans down. The fact that the Wehrmacht embraced the strategy of Blitzkrieg (Lightning War) with the vision of swift wars in which Germany would win quickly via a knockout blow was a testament to the fundamental soundness of

31992-608: Was another preoccupation. The Germans had transferred the authority over the coal mines of northern France from Paris to their military headquarters in Brussels. The priority for the coal that did arrive in Paris was for use in factories. Even with ration cards, adequate coal for heating was almost impossible to find. Supplies for normal heating needs were not restored until 1949. Paris restaurants were open but had to deal with strict regulations and shortages. Meat could only be served on certain days, and certain products, such as cream, coffee and fresh produce were extremely rare. Nonetheless,

32178-493: Was coordinated with protective measures to ensure that one fort could support the next in line by bombarding it directly without harm. The largest guns were, therefore 135 mm (5.3 in) fortress guns; larger weapons were to be part of the mobile forces and were to be deployed behind the lines. The fortifications did not extend through the Ardennes Forest (which was believed to be impenetrable by Commander-in-Chief Maurice Gamelin ) or along France's border with Belgium because

32364-558: Was designed to deal with the line. A decoy force sat opposite the line while a second Army Group cut through the Low Countries of Belgium and the Netherlands, as well as through the Ardennes Forest, which lay north of the main French defences. Thus the Germans were able to avoid a direct assault on the Maginot Line by violating the neutrality of Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands . Attacking on 10 May, German forces were well into France within five days and they continued to advance until 24 May, when they stopped near Dunkirk . During

32550-497: Was developed with armoured steam engines in 1914–1918.) Initially above-ground but then buried, and connected to the civil power grid, these provided electric power to the many fortifications and fortresses. This was hauled by locomotives to planned locations to support the emplaced artillery in the fortresses, which was intentionally limited in range to 10–12 km (6–7 mi). There are 142 ouvrages , 352 casemates , 78 shelters, 17 observatories and around 5,000 blockhouses in

32736-516: Was gradually introduced in other German-occupied areas , where local words were used (e.g. Juif in French, Jood in Dutch). One observer reported that the star increased German non-Nazi sympathy for Jews as the impoverished citizens who wore them were, contrary to Nazi propaganda , obviously not the cause of German failure on the Eastern Front . In the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, government had to ban hat tipping towards Jews and other courtesies that became popular as protests against

32922-442: Was immediately condemned by Yad Vashem chairman Dani Dayan , calling it a "[disgrace to] the victims of the Holocaust as well as the state of Israel", pointing out that the slaughter of Jews by Hamas differs from the Holocaust in that "Jews have today a state and an army. We are not defenseless and at the mercy of others." According to Ynet , unnamed officials from Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs were also highly critical of

33108-404: Was killed during the action. On 14 June 1940, the day Paris fell, the German 1st Army went over to the offensive in "Operation Tiger" and attacked the Maginot Line between St Avold and Saarbrücken . The Germans then broke through the fortification line as defending French forces retreated southward. In the following days, infantry divisions of the 1st Army attacked fortifications on each side of

33294-425: Was known. Although the alliances with Belgium, Poland , Czechoslovakia , Romania and Yugoslavia were appreciated in Paris, it was widely understood that this was no compensation for the absence of Britain and the United States. The French military was especially insistent that the population disparity made an offensive war of manoeuvre and swift advances suicidal, as there would always be far more German divisions;

33480-444: Was murdered at the Flossenbürg concentration camp on 7 March 1945. The Germans made a continual effort to seduce the Parisians through culture: in 1941, they organized a festival of German music by the Berlin Philharmonic at the Paris Opera, a play from the Schiller Theater in Berlin at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées , and an exhibit by the German sculptor Arno Breker . The French film industry, based in suburbs of Paris, had

33666-429: Was not merely ghiyār (differentiation), but also dhull (humiliation) in keeping with the koranic injunction ( Sura 9:29 ) that non-Muslims should be humbled. A genizah document from 1121 gives the following description of decrees issued in Baghdad: Two yellow badges [are to be displayed], one on the headgear and one on the neck. Furthermore, each Jew must hang round his neck a piece of lead weighing [3 grammes] with

33852-400: Was officially condemned as "degenerate" , his paintings continued to be sold at the Hôtel Drouot auction house and at the Galerie Louise Leiris , formerly Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler 's. German treasurer officials opened Picasso's bank vault, where he stored his private art collection, searching for Jewish-owned art they could seize. Picasso so confused them with his descriptions of ownership of

34038-517: Was opposed by modernists such as Paul Reynaud and Charles de Gaulle , who favoured investment in armour and aircraft. Joffre had support from Marshal Henri Philippe Pétain , and the government organised many reports and commissions. André Maginot finally convinced the government to invest in the scheme. Maginot was another veteran of World War I; he became the French Minister of Veteran Affairs and then Minister of War (1928–1932). In January 1923, after Weimar Germany defaulted on reparations ,

34224-429: Was powerful enough to deter successive German governments all through the 1920s from attempting any overt violation of Part V. French plans as developed by Marshal Ferdinand Foch in 1919 were based on the assumption that in the event of a war with the Reich , the French forces in the Rhineland were to embark upon an offensive to seize the Ruhr. A variant of the Foch plan had been used by Poincaré in 1923 when he ordered

34410-443: Was tasked with cutting through the old Maginot Line defences and severing Allied links with Strasbourg as part of Operation Nordwind. He was told there were no plans available of the Line but that it was “barely manned and constituted no obstacle”. However they came up against fierce resistance and concentrated American artillery fire. They had to withdraw on 6 January 1945 and again after another attack on 8 January, although they drove

34596-460: Was weak near the Ardennes . General Maurice Gamelin , when drafting the Dyle Plan , believed this region, with its rough terrain, would be an unlikely invasion route of German forces; if it were traversed, it would be done at a slow rate that would allow the French time to bring up reserves and counterattacks. The German Army, having reformulated their plans from a repeat of the First World War-era plan, became aware of and exploited this weak point in

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