Rafle du Vélodrome d'Hiver

 

 From Wikipedia:  The Rafle du Vel' d'Hiv: "Vel' d'Hiv Police Roundup / Raid"), was a round up of Jews in Paris by the French police directed by German Nazi authorities, code named Opération Vent printanier ("Operation Spring Breeze"), on 16 and 17 July 1942. The name "Vel' d'Hiv Roundup" comes from the Vélodrome d'Hiver ("Winter Velodrome"), a bicycle velodrome and stadium where most of the victims were temporarily confined. The roundup was one of several aimed at reducing the Jewish population in Occupied France.   According to records of the Préfecture de Police, 13,152 victims were arrested and held at the Vélodrome d'Hiver and the Drancy and Beaune la Rolande internment camps nearby, then shipped by railway transports to Auschwitz for extermination.

 The velodrome was near the current Bir Hakim metro stop.   

The round up was not the first round up in Paris, but it was the biggest.  At the beginning of the war, the French rounded up only foreign Jews and, in the past, women and children had often been spared.  This time French Jews were included in the round up and the majority were women and children.  No children who did not escape before begin taken to the stadium survived the holocaust.  Only eight hundred of the over thirteen thousand survived to the end of the war.

 

 French policeman planning route of round up with German SS officer.

The French worked with the Germans and helped to round up and transport these Jewish families.

 Only in 1995 did President Jacques Chirac apologize for the complicit role of the French.

 

 

 

 

 Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay is a work of fiction, part of which takes place during the Rafle du Vél d'Hiver.  I had read this book in the past and my book club just discussed it.  I did not like the book, but appreciate that it has helped to educate people about the facts of the Rafle du Vélodrome d'Hiver.