Following Adolf Hitler's appointment as German Chancellor in January 1933, an organized campaign of violence and boycotting was undertaken by Hitler's Nazi Party against the Jews of Germany, to which critics responded with worldwide calls for protest and boycotting.[1]
However, the Central Jewish Association of Germany was of the opinion that the Nazi government was not deliberately provoking anti-Jewish pogroms. It issued a statement of support for the regime and held that "the responsible government authorities [i.e. the Hitler regime] are unaware of the threatening situation," saying, "we do not believe our German fellow citizens will let themselves be carried away into committing excesses against the Jews."[2] Nevertheless, even though vandalism of Jewish businesses and property across Germany was already occurring, prominent Jewish business leaders wrote letters in support of the Nazi regime calling on officials in the Jewish community in Palestine, as well as Jewish organizations abroad, to drop their efforts in organizing an economic boycott.[3] In point of fact, the Nazi anti-Jewish boycott was supported by the regime, with Hermann Göring stating that "I shall employ the police, and without mercy, wherever German people are hurt, but I refuse to turn the police into a guard for Jewish stores".[4]
In March 1933, the international critics, transformed their verbal protests into a worldwide, organized economic boycott against German goods.[5]
On March 24, 1933, The London tabloid newspaper The Daily Express printed an issue with the headline "Judea Declares War on Germany" detailing the Jewish boycott of German goods. Because of the wording of the headline, Holocaust deniers have exploited the article in order to claim the Jews declared a literal war on Germany, when in fact what was described was an economic boycott.[6]