Memorial Woeste Hoeve

This is where the SS murdered 117 Dutch as a reprisal for the attack on Hanns Albin Rauter. Here as all over Eastern Europe the enemy is The Germans. At German memorials it’s almost always Fascism, rarely Nazism.

Emblematic for me is that the Dutch Resistance hadn’t intended to attack Rauter. They were trying to procure a truck for food transport during the Hunger Winter.

Bonhoeffer at these places always makes me think of his invocation by dear American non-violent peace activists as well as friends who professed horror at what they understood as the motivations of some behind the July 20 Attentat. I think sometimes maybe I’m just easily amused.

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