Danish Jews escape to Sweden

© bülow Georg Duckwitz (1971 at the Yad Vashem memorial) is honoured by Israel as a Righteous Among the Nations; Duckwitz was a secretary of state when Willy Brandt was Chief of the Foreign Ministry and stayed one of his closest advisers when Brandt became Federal Chancellor

In a major raid on 1 October 1943 the German occupiers intend to arrest the approximately 8,000 Jews living in Denmark. However, the Danish resistance movement was forewarned by Georg Duckwitz, a staff member of the German embassy in Copenhagen. With help from the resistance, over 7,000 Jews are able to flee in time to Sweden. However, 480 are arrested by the Germans and deported to the ghetto of Theresienstadt (Czechoslovakia).