Literature

There is little systematic research and commemoration on the history of the Hakhshara. A comprehensive overview of the “Hakhshara abroad” was already presented in the 1970s by Perez Leshem/Fritz Lichtenstein. At the end of the 1990s, a small anthology on the Hakhshara was published by a group of researchers from Potsdam (Paetz/Weiss). At the same time, Eliyahu Kutti Salinger’s account of the Jewish-Christian youth movement after 1933 was published, which also dealt with questions about the Hakhshara. Ruth and Herbert Fiedler’s 2004 book on the agricultural training center in Ahrenshof contains an introduction and overview of the issue, as well as comprehensive memoirs from halutzim and halutzot. Ilana Michaeli and Irmgard Klönne’s memoirs about the Hakhshara at Gut Winkel (Winkel estate) published in 2007 contains an article by Ulrike Pilarczyk and Ilka von Cossart, which provides the first systematic register of available information about the Hakhshara and supplements this with their own research.

The topic was revisited by both authors soon after and incorporated more broadly into the context of the Jewish youth movement (Pilarczyk 2009). In 2020, two project groups dealing with both systematic questions, as well as local and regional descriptions of the Hakhshara, published their first research results. The conference proceedings “Hachschara und Jugend-Alija” (Hakhshara and Youth Aliyah) (Pilarczyk et al. 2020) present the source-based research of the DFG project at the TU in Braunschweig. It introduces an almost complete overview of the scattered research and publications on the topic for the first time.

The contributions focus on gaps in the research, including on the connection between the early Hakhshara and the youth movement (Bergbauer), on the contribution of the religious youth movement to the development of the Hakhshara (Kissling) and on specific regional developments in Hakhshara and Zionist youth movement pioneering (Heb. chalutziut) using Silesia as an example (Bergbauer). The conference papers of the Hanover/Haifa research group (Alon-Mozes et. al. 2020) contain overviews (Lavsky, Buser), articles about the relationship between the youth movement and the Hakhshara (Wolschke, Hennig) and depictions of the history of specific Hakhshara sites (Gazit-Gaglow). The volume “Jüdische Jugend im Übergang - Jewish youth in transit” (Bergbauer et al. 2024), the result of the international conference of the same name, which took place in March 2021 as part of the DFG project “National Jewish Youth Culture and Zionist Education in Germany and Palestine between the World Wars”, also focuses on issues such as Hakhshara and Youth Aliyah.

There are a few more publications on Hakhshara sites available, with information in book form on Ahrensdorf (Fiedler 2004), Gut Winkel (Michaeli/Klönne 2007), Jägerslust (Philipsen 2008) and Niederschönhausen (Museum Pankow 2020) standing out. For the Hakhshara before 1933 and the “Kibbutz Cherut” near Hameln in particular, please refer to the publications by Fölling/Melzer (1989); for the period after 1939 see Margit Naarmann’s volume on the “Umschulungs- und Einsatzlager” (retraining and deployment camp) on the Grünen Weg in Paderborn (Naarmann 2000). Werner Angress’ works on Gross-Breesen (1985 and 2005) show that there were also non-Zionist vocational retraining programs. In addition, there are two publications which deal with the (short) history of the Hakhshara after 1945.

Even if the following lists seem extensive and a whole series of smaller publications are not included at all, a comprehensive overall presentation on the history of the Hakhshara still does not exist. There are also still many “blind spots” in this field and therefore a need for further research.

The following bibliography is incomplete and is only intended to provide an overview. Memoirs/biographies in which halutzim recall (mostly briefly) their time in Hakhshara have largely been omitted.