Esther and Magda

An interpretation of the Book of Esther, appearing in Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels' Berlin Der Angriff last week, was of greater interest to diplomats than to Bible students.

The Der Angriff version of Esther was labeled The Tale of a King and His Jewish Girl Friend. It told how King Ahasuerus of Persia was lured into marriage by the Jewess Esther, how she persuaded him to banish the Jew-baiting Vizier Haman, and thus saved the Persian Jews from massacre. Adding details not found in the original, Der Angriff related that the King was later murdered and his kingdom, "infected and poisoned by Jews," finally went to pieces.

Just so none of Der Angriff's readers would miss the contemporary point of this parody-parable, the face of Mme Magda Lupescu, the part-Jewish mistress of Rumania's King Carol, was used to illustrate the article. And to ram it home, next day the Frankfurter Zeitung's comment on Carol's shooting of Rumanian Nazis was concluded with the observation: "At some time, one is inclined to believe, Rumania will see a revolution, perhaps very soon."

Elsewhere the controlled Nazi press began a campaign which suggested that Rumania had now been definitely nominated as next on Germany's list of bloodless conquests.* The Essener National-Zeitung announced that the Rumanian Nazi-shooting had been ordered by a Jewish and Masonic camarilla which included friends and relatives of Mme Lupescu. When 2,000 more Nazi-backed Iron Guardsmen were arrested in Rumania, Adolf Hitler and Carol Hohenzollern-- who shook hands at Berchtesgaden a few weeks ago-- had definitely parted ways.

Those Iron Guards who fled from Rumania to Germany found a welcome not unlike that given to the Sudeten "refugees" in September. That Germany would threaten to invade Rumania was improbable, since the two have no common frontier. That Germany might foment a Nazi revolt in Rumania, under the slogan FIGHT AGAINST WORLD JEWRY, had become increasingly probable.

* On the grounds that Austria could no longer control its internal disorders, Nazis marched into Austria March 12, 1938.

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