On 28 January 1957, Zoltán Klar (1894–1966), a Hungarian Jewish émigré physician and journalist, wrote a letter to the president of the American Jewish Committee (AJC) in New York. There, he thanked Irving M. Engel (c.1891–1978) for the AJC’s service not only to »the democratic way of life in America, but also to the cause of the great Hungarian Revolution and the ideal of freedom«. This expression of gratitude was prompted by a political crisis that had been unfolding for several weeks in the wake of the failed 1956 uprising in Hungary.
Between 23 October 1956 and April 1957, approximately 200,000 Hungarians fled their country following the attempted overthrow of Soviet rule, crushed by the Red Army and the counter-government installed by Moscow. Facing criticism for not providing military support to the Hungarian freedom fighters – despite political rhetoric that had raised hopes for American intervention – the Eisenhower administration came under additional pressure as other countries generously opened their doors to the refugees. In response, the American president launched »Operation Safe Haven« with Congress’ approval, aiming to provide refuge for displaced Hungarians.
In November 1956, Camp Kilmer in Piscataway, New Jersey, reopened as the primary reception center for Hungarian refugees arriving in the United States. Within five months, the former US-Army base received more than 32,000 people. As refugees arrived by military ships and planes, the camp’s population increased rapidly, reaching its peak by mid-January 1957. Hungarian Americans who had immigrated earlier helped the newcomers with the challenges of resettlement.
These efforts were primarily supported by religious and non-governmental relief organizations. In the United States, widespread support for victims of communism led to receptiveness towards Hungarian refugees at home and to the mobilization of substantial funds to support them abroad. However, alongside the humanitarian response, security concerns emerged as well. While the primary fear centered around the potential admission of communist spies, other political risks soon came to the surface.
One such risk materialized in the sprawling tent city of Camp Kilmer, where a neo-Nazi paper titled Szabad Magyarság (Free Hungarians) began circulating among the refugees. The weekly newspaper was published and edited in New York by Hungarian fascist émigrés, including war criminal Lajos Marschalko (1903–1968) and propagandist Zoltán Fay. Disguised as a pro-Hungarian nationalist paper, it spread antisemitic conspiracy theories about the allegedly »sabotaged« uprising and glorified Hungary’s wartime Arrow Cross puppet regime. The camp administration initially failed to recognize the inflammatory content due to a lack of Hungarian-speaking personnel, allowing hundreds of copies to be distributed unchecked.
There was a justified fear that the antisemitic agitation could lead to unrest and endanger the thousands of Jewish refugees who counted among the Hungarian fugitives. Reports from Austria, the first stop for many refugees, related several incidents in which the local police had to protect Hungarian Jews from violence by their compatriots. Nevertheless, anti-Jewish hostility was neither widespread among the escapees nor a general characteristic of the uprising. Due to the large proportion of Jews in the communist party leadership, however, Jewish Hungarians did face the threat of being identified with the dreaded regime and thus becoming a target. The trauma of the Holocaust, the pogroms in the immediate postwar period and the fear of falling victim to popular anger again in the event of political instability were ever-present among the Jewish population – in Hungary and in exile.
Against this backdrop, Zoltán Klar, who had fled Budapest in 1950 and lived in the United States since 1953, warned the AJC about the developments at Camp Kilmer. A survivor of Mauthausen, Klar had returned to Hungary after his liberation, where he worked tirelessly as the president of the Magyar Zsidók Országos Társadalmi Szövetsége (National Association of Hungarian Jews) to rebuild the shattered Jewish community. After the communist takeover, he witnessed the repression of Hungary’s Jews under the new regime and became keenly aware of antisemitism in all its guises.
In the United States, Klar maintained close ties with his compatriot Eugene Hevesi (c.1896–1983), who served as a foreign affairs specialist for the AJC since 1940. Through Hevesi, the AJC leadership was informed of the fascist newspaper circulating in Camp Kilmer, which prompted an internal investigation and a rapid organizational response. Alerted by Klar’s report, Irving Engel, president of the AJC, issued a press release publicly condemning Szabad Magyarság, describing it as »flagrantly pro-Nazi«. The US Army, which was responsible for censorship at the refugee camp, consequently acknowledged the distribution of the paper and took action to prevent its further dissemination.
In a letter to Engel, which the AJC attached to its press release, Klar referred to the confiscation of the newspapers on the same day and expressed gratitude for the organization’s protection of the »ideal of freedom«. However, Klar’s mission did not end with the banning of the publication at Camp Kilmer: following his intervention, the AJC decided to support Az Ember (The Man), a Hungarian-language newspaper of which Klar was the chief editor. The formerly social democratic paper had been based in New York since 1941, following its ban in Hungary under Miklós Horthy (1868–1957). Az Ember evolved from a magazine primarily read by left-leaning Jews in prewar Hungary into an important outlet of Cold War liberalism aimed at Hungarian-speaking intellectuals in the United States. In its coverage of developments from behind the Iron Curtain, it criticized both Hungarian revisionism in the United States and the communist regime in the old country.
While the revisionist Szabad Magyarság portrayed the 1956 uprising as »the West selling out Hungary to the Jewish merchant«, Az Ember interpreted it, in Klar’s words, as Hungary’s »return […] to the fold of Western democratic civilization«. The AJC’s support of Az Ember, which included covering the production and transportation costs for weekly distribution of two thousand copies in Camp Kilmer, thus balanced the fascist outlook of Szabad Magyarság among Hungarian newcomers to the United States. A CIA report from 1959 on the political evaluation of Hungarian-speaking newspapers described the editor, Zoltán Klar, as »a Hungarian Jew, [who] is said to be a fierce patriot«. For Klar, confronting antisemitism, whether by the communist regime in Hungary or among right-wing émigré circles in the United States, was not a partisan cause, but a universal imperative to defend democratic values.
Alexandra Bandl is a PhD candidate at the Leibniz Institute for Jewish History and Culture – Simon Dubnow in Leipzig. Her research focuses on the 1953 »Anti-Zionist« trials in Stalinist Hungary and their impact on local Jewish communities | bandl(at)dubnow.de.
If you want to be informed regularly about the posts on Mimeo, subscribe to our rss-feed or send an informal message to mimeo(at)dubnow.de.