HAIFA —"Medical practice in Nazi Germany was supposedly performed by doctors who are seen as having been forced to do what they did. Or they are looked upon as insane or as lacking values. However, these claims are deceptive and a distortion of the truth," states Dr. Tessa Chelouche, chair of the Department of Healthcare, Ethics, and the Holocaust, a new department being offered at the University of Haifa.

"Many of the Nazi doctors who committed war crimes/Holocaust crimes were talented, qualified doctors who believed that what they were doing was right," she claims. 

The department Chelouche chairs was recently established at the University's International Center for Health, Law, and Ethics.  Its objective is to advance research and teaching on the subject of medicine during the Holocaust.

"At the Nuremberg trials and other trials, doctors and scientists gave very detailed explanations about their actions.  They did not apologize for what they did.  They tried to explain in their words and so-called ethical ideas why they did what they did," says Chelouche.

She explains that moral and ethical dilemmas did arise for doctors during the Holocaust, even for Jewish doctors. "In order to save lives, they, the Jewish doctors, often hid patients with contagious diseases, made false diagnoses, and lied to the authorities." She added somberly that they also performed abortions in abysmal conditions on pregnant women, who otherwise would have been sent directly to the gas chamber if discovered to be pregnant.

Chelouche also noted that there were Jewish doctors who worked alongside or even cooperated with the Nazi doctors.

The University of Haifa 's novel Department of Healthcare, Ethics, and the Holocaust has formed a steering committee of professionals from the fields of nursing, medicine, history, and law.  The committee is currently involved in establishing an international interdisciplinary organization that will participate in different projects, among them writing a text book on how to teach this subject in academic institutions.

Schwab is an intern in the external relations department of the University of Haifa