By Elliot Nidam-Orvieto

Among its conclusions in last year’s final report, the International Commission on the Holocaust in Romania recommended “encouraging academic cooperation on issues relating to the Holocaust.” Having hosted a group of young Romanian researchers from the Goldstein Goren Center for Hebrew Studies (University of Bucharest) and the Dr. Moshe Carmilly Institute for Hebrew and Jewish History (Babeş-Bolyai University Cluj), the International Institute for Holocaust Research convened its seventh annual workshop with researchers from abroad, entitled: “Antisemitism, Fascism, Holocaust: History and Interpretation.” The workshop, held in early June, featured lectures on a range of related topics, including “Antisemitism in Romania as Reflected in the Romanian Antisemitic Newspapers in the 1930s;” “Representations of the Holocaust in Romanian Historiography and Literature;” “Religious Antisemitism from the Perspective of the Holocaust;” and “Contesting Memories of Fascism in Post-World War II Europe.”

In May 2004, a group of young Israeli researchers flew to Austria to participate in a workshop on the Holocaust with colleagues from the Universities of Vienna and Salzburg. The event was reciprocated this June when a group of Austrian researchers were invited to a workshop at the Institute entitled: “New Aspects in Holocaust Research.” The Austrian participants, led by Prof. Gerhard Botz of the University of Vienna and Prof. Helga Embacher of the University of Salzburg joined their Israeli counterparts in discussions on numerous new and wide ranging topics on the Holocaust, including “Dienstboten-Emigration (Refugees as Domestics in England);” “Fertility Experiments in Auschwitz-Birkenau;” and “Public Health and Racial Hygiene in National Socialist Vienna, 1938-1945.”

The Institute continues its international cooperation with plans to host researchers from Belgium and the Netherlands in the fall.

The author is Academic Assistant to the Head of the International Institute for Holocaust Research.

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