In histories of the Holocaust, the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia often appears as a detail on Nazi Germany's path of empire building in the East. It is a case that in many overviews of the Nazi genocide is seen as offering little new in terms of understanding the development of German anti-Jewish policies, unlike the occupation of Poland. In The Holocaust in Bohemia and Moravia, Wolf Gruner shows exactly what can be gained from paying attention to this region, especially with regard to the question of indigenous collaboration in anti-Jewish persecution. Highlighting continuities and ruptures between the independent and the occupation Czech regimes rather than focusing exclusively on the new German authorities, Gruner examines the role played by Czech politicians and local and central administrations in the development and implementation of anti-Jewish policies in the protectorate. Contrary to previous scholars and popular perceptions, anti-Jewish policies—the dispossession, isolation, ghettoization, and branding of Jews—were often promoted, initiated, and implemented by members of the Czech government, by Czech authorities and professional associations rather than by Germans. While this is especially noticeable in the first two years of the occupation, as German policies radicalized, forced labor and ghetto guard duty became the nexus for the participation of Czech authorities in the Holocaust.

While Gruner draws on his previous work on forced labor and anti-Jewish persecution in the protectorate, in this book he introduces a substantial new source base, namely the weekly reports submitted by the Jewish leadership in Prague to the Central Office for Jewish Emigration starting in early 1940 (15). These reports allow Gruner to glean not only the impact of anti-Jewish policies on Jews’ lives across the protectorate but also Jewish leaders’ responses to the shifting and radicalizing policies. In seeking to understand the Czech and German authorities’ plans and, crucially, their negotiation of various initiatives directed at the protectorate's Jews, Gruner draws extensively on official correspondence and documents. Testimonies, diaries, and various types of reports illuminate the conditions of persecution for ordinary Jews. In short, the book relies on wide-ranging, rich sets of sources that allow the reader to understand the decision-making process as well as the responses to these policies from multiple Jewish and non-Jewish perspectives.

The book is organized chronologically, beginning with a brief overview of the 1920s and 1930s and ending in 1945. It is well known that the Czech leaders of the so-called Second Republic pursued anti-Jewish policies and fueled antisemitic rhetoric. What is new, thanks to Gruner's work, is that he shows the continuity between the Second Republic and the protectorate in terms of the initiatives and policies of the Czech government and administration vis-à-vis the region's Jews. For example, the Aryanization of the civil service, the registration of “Jewish” businesses, and the localized ghettoization of Jews were initiated by Czech actors rather than German ones between late 1938 and early 1940 (72–73). Throughout the book, Gruner traces how anti-Jewish policies were negotiated between the various levels of Czech and German political and administrative leaderships. The most interesting part of Gruner's analysis is the material he has uncovered that speaks to the work of the Jewish leadership in responding to and trying to mitigate the effects of persecution. The leadership of the main Jewish community in Prague assumed responsibility for all of the protectorate's Jews—the communities and their assets—in early 1940. Thus, the weekly reports at the heart of Gruner's analysis provide a lens into the profound destitution into which Jews fell as they lost jobs, businesses, savings, and property.

While thousands of Jews had fled Germany, Austria, and the former Sudetenland, local ghettoization efforts displaced hundreds more who sought help at the soup kitchens and shelters, as well as the work and lodging agencies run by the Jewish community in Prague. This internal displacement, rising unemployment, and poverty placed an enormous financial burden on the Jewish community. Early on, the destitution even hampered German plans for the majority of Jews to emigrate. Once the Germans decided to create the Terezín ghetto, the community supplied the ghetto with packages of food, medicines, and other necessities. One of the ways in which the Jewish leadership sought to mitigate unemployment among Jews—and thus the financial burden on the Jewish community—was to offer Jewish workers to local and regional authorities for labor, mainly snow clearing and road construction. As mass deportations began, that process in and of itself created a need for labor to assist with packing and assembling deportees, clearing out homes, and sorting and packing belongings for storage or redistribution.

This book is rich in details, statistics, and complex documentary narratives. It is therefore an especially valuable resource for scholars. At times, the “chronological” organization of the material results in a barrage of statistics and details. This kind of material could easily have been presented in a way that not only allows for a deeper analysis but also communicates the findings more clearly. Similarly, greater attention to the broader context of protectorate society and developments in the war overall would also have grounded this important study better. Yet, even if the work has less to offer the general reader, it is a key reference for any specialist working on the Holocaust.