Wealthy German Jews saw themselves as fully German until forced out in the 1930s

Evidence

In order to rationalize an ambiguity which they themselves did not fully understand, they might pretend to “be a man in the street and a Jew at home.” This actually amounted to a feeling of being different from other men in the street because they were Jews, and different from other Jews at home because they were not like “ordinary Jews.” — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 218 (#expands, via linked claim)

By the latter half of the nineteenth century, western European Jews had become indistinguishable from other western Europeans in matters of language, dress, occupation, location of their dwellings, and the cut of their hair. Indeed, if Rudolf Virchow’s extensive study of more than ten thousand German schoolchildren published in 1886 was accurate, they were also indistinguishable in terms of skin, hair, and eye color from the greater masses of those who lived in Germany. Virchow’s statistics sought to show that wherever a greater percentage of the overall population had lighter skin or bluer eyes or blonder hair, a greater percentage of Jews also had lighter skin or bluer eyes or blonder hair. Although Virchow attempted to provide a rationale for the sense of Jewish acculturation, he still assumed that Jews were a separate and distinct racial category. — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 779 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: The inner circle were mostly middle-class assimilated Jews. — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 162; Assimilated German Jews were trapped in a double differentiation from both worlds — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 218; American Muslims now occupy the subjugated position Jews held in 1930s Germany (+6 more)

Broader Connections

• Virchow’s 1886 survey showed German Jews physically indistinguishable from other Germans #corroborates (0.90)
• Assimilated German Jews were trapped in a double differentiation from both worlds #expands (0.85) — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 218
• Jews were physically indistinguishable from other Germans by the late 1800s #corroborates (0.85) — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 779
• Assimilated German Jews tied their identity to long local roots. #expands (0.80) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 163
• German Jews’ assimilation was a mask only from the German view #expands (0.75) — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 772
• German Jews conceived assimilation as a five-generation trade of Jewishness for Europe #expands (0.75) — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 424
• American Muslims now occupy the subjugated position Jews held in 1930s Germany #complicates (0.70)
• Turkish immigrants and German Jews traded places in the national imagination #complicates (0.70) — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 771