For two years, Anne Franks family hid in secret rooms in Amsterdam, knowing that a curtain left open by mistake, a wayward noise or a nervous conspirators phone call to the Nazis could land them all in concentration camps.
The worst happened on a summer day in 1944, when investigators discovered their secret world behind a movable bookcase and rounded them up.
Of the eight Jewish people seized, seven died before the Holocaust was over, including Anne, whose diary was a testament to the horrors of the Nazi regime. She died of typhus at age 15 at Bergen-Belsen camp in Germany.
For decades, Annes father, Otto, tried to figure out who tipped off the Nazis — a question historians have debated for 72 years.
Now, the Anne Frank House museum in Amsterdam has put forth a new theory: It was a coincidence.Advertisement
For decades, the common theory has been that Anne Franks family was betrayed, possibly by a new employee at her fathers business or a conspirators wife, unsympathetic to the plight of the eight Jews.
But according to a research paper published this month by the Anne Frank House, “this explicit focus on betrayal, however, limits the perspective of the arrest. … [O]ther scenarios tend to be overshadowed.”
Previous theories were based on Otto Franks suspicions, which centered on Willem van Maaren, a new employee who hadnt been let in on the secret about the hiding place.
On its website, the museum says van Maaren was an inquisitive type who became suspicious and “laid a trap in the warehouse once: on the corners of the tables there are sheets of paper which fall off when you walk past.”Advertisement
Still, no conclusive evidence has ever come to light of van Maaren alerting authorities, the paper says.
Through the decades, others have been identified as potential betrayers, including Dutch National Socialist Tonny Ahlers, as well as the wife of an employee who helped Annes family hide.
In part, that is because historians believed the three investigators who found the Jews hiding in the Opekta building were members of the Sicherheitsdienst, which tracked down potential enemies of Hitlers Nazi regime.
But new information uncovered by researchers showed the three men Otto Frank later identified as the investigators werent looking for enemies of Nazis, but were likely assigned to track down people committing ration card fraud or dodging service in the military — not hunting down Jews.Advertisement
Gezinus Gringhuis, for example, had previously been assigned to track down Jews, but had a new assignment — “investigating economic violations,” according to the research paper.
In her diary, Anne repeatedly wrote about the arrests of men who had been caught dealing in illegal ration cards “so we have no coupons.”
Such arrests were often reported to authorities, who frequently came across hiding Jews as they tried to sniff out people with phony ration cards.Austrian lawmakers seize house Hitler was born in. (Video: Reuters)
The research paper also highlights other circumstantial evidence that pokes holes in the betrayal theory. Many phone lines were cut off, for example, which would make it hard for civilians to call authorities about Jews in hiding.
“This creates a real possibility that the call, if it actually took place, came from another government agency,” the paper says.Advertisement
The paper stressed that there is no conclusive theory about how Annes family was discovered — including its own hypothesis.
“In any case, the Anne Frank Houses investigative report indicates that more was going on in the building (than) only people being hidden there,” it says. “The possibility of betrayal has of course not been entirely ruled out by this. … Clearly, the last word about that fateful summer day in 1944 has not yet been said.”
The interest in the betrayal of a teenage girl seven decades after her death is a testament to the universality of Annes powerful tale.
Many have pointed out the historical similarities between the plight of Annes family and the current debate about Syrians seeking refuge in the United States. As The Washington Posts Elahe Izadi wrote, the Franks collided with restrictive policies “designed to protect national security and guard against an influx of foreigners during [a] time of war.”The Post talks with three people who fled the war in Syria to find a better life in Germany. Here are some of the most challenging things they face. (Video: Hani Zaitoun for The Washington Post)
The Franks were unable to immigrate to the United States and instead lived in a hidden storeroom.Advertisement
And a 7-year-old Syrian girl, Bana al-Abed, has been called a modern-day Anne Frank, according to The Posts Caitlin Gibson. Bana amassed 200,000 Twitter followers while documenting her familys struggle to survive in war-ravaged Aleppo.
The subject is still being researched. For instance, the Anne Frank House in 2016 reinvestigated the raid, and in 2017 a former FBI officer announced that he would be looking for the possible traitor of the people in hiding with the help of an international cold case team and new technology. On 17 January 2022 the cold case team presented their findings. We question several elements of the investigation: read our statement. In that statement we indicated the need for further research.
SD big shot Willy Lages knew that ‘the caller’ was a well-known informant. This theory continues on an assumption that in itself is insufficiently proven, that is that betrayal by telephone led to the raid. In 1963, the National Police Internal Investigation Department investigated the raid. They asked SD chief Willy Lages whether it was common for his former service to jump to action upon receiving a telephone tip-off about people in hiding. Lages answered that the credibility of the tip-off would have been checked first, unless it came from an informant who had proved to be reliable before. In other words: If a call was actually made that morning, and the response was immediate, then one may conclude that the informant was known and reliable, according to Lages. He only stuck to the logic of assumptions of which he did not know the validity, nor did he need to know the validity in order to give a reasoned answer.
For example, it is certain that two representatives from whom the helpers bought illegal coupons were arrested for black marketeering. Warehouse worker Lammert Hartog did undeclared work, and director Victor Kugler kept part of the company income out of the books. There was more going on in that building than just the hiding of Jews.
In the end, the list of people who were accused of being involved in the case is too long to include in its entirety. All the more so because betrayal was never established beyond a doubt. More recent research by the Anne Frank House highlights and substantiates the possibility that the reasons for the raid may have been completely different.
Explanations for the discovery are mainly based on testimonies, because no documents about the raid on the Secret Annex have been preserved. For a long time, betrayal was considered to be the reason for the arrest of the people in hiding, but the focus is shifting, as there are several other options.
Was Anne Frank’s Family Betrayed by a Fellow Jew?
In a 2018 book, The Backyard of the Secret Annex, Gerard Kremer, the son of a member of the Dutch resistance of the same name, argues that a Jewish woman, Ans van Dijk, was responsible for the Franks capture. Kremers father was an acquaintance of Van Dijk in Amsterdam and Kremer writes that in early August 1944, his father overheard Van Dijk speaking about Prinsengracht, where the Franks were hiding, in Nazi offices. That same week, the Franks were arrested—while Van Dijk was away in the Hague.
The involvement of Van Dijk, who was executed in 1948 after admitting to collaborating in the capture of 145 people, had been previously claimed. But, the Anne Frank House museum and research center were unable to confirm Van Dijks involvement after its own investigation.
Anne Frank in 1940. (Credit: Collectie Anne Frank Stichting Amsterdam)
Among other theories the Anne Frank House investigated was a 2016 report that suggests no one was, in fact, responsible for leaking to the Nazis. Instead, the group’s arrest could have been a tragic accident. That report, written by senior historian Gertjan Broek, argued that the German Security Service might have simply stumbled upon the eight Jews while raiding the premises to search for fraudulent food-ration cards.
Nevertheless, researchers do not rule out the potential that Frank and the others were the victims of a betrayal. “Clearly,” the museum’s report concludes, “the last word about that fateful summer day in 1944 has not yet been said.”
It is known that a report was filed by a Dutch citizen claiming that Jews were being hidden in the Franks’ apartment building. However, the SS officer who arrested the Frank family never was told the name, only his commanding officer knew the identity. He never revealed it. There has been a great deal of speculation, but the most common suspect is Willem van Maaren, an Opekt employee who was not in on the secret of protecting the Jews and often asked about suspicious things he saw.
