A refugee woman. Photo: Amrulqays Maarof from Pixabay
World Refugee Day is observed on 20 June 2026.
Hannah Arendt had quite a bit to say about refugees. She was one - in the eyes of US citizens - even though a clear-thinking scholar and political activist. She once wrote an article published in the New York Times in 1943, her first line being: We don’t like to be called refugees. We call each other “newcomers” or “immigrants”.
Hannah was born in Germany in 1906 and grew up amid WWI and its aftermath, following Germany’s defeat. She was a scholar and academic. Being Jewish, she was threatened by the Nazi government that took over the reins of power from 1933 to 1945.
She analysed the situation in Europe succinctly:
- Since 1938 - Hitler’s invasion of Austria - we have seen how quickly eloquent optimism could change to speechless pessimism.
- Since the outbreak of war and the catastrophe that has befallen European Jewry, the mere fact of being a refugee has prevented our mingling with native Jewish society, some exceptions only proving the rule. These unwritten social laws, though never publicly admitted, have great force of public opinion.
- The comity of European peoples went to pieces when, and because, it allowed its weakest members to be excluded and persecuted.
Many Jews fled Germany for fear of what might happen to them under the Nazi regime. Hannah fled to France, where she was relatively free to be herself, until Germany invaded France, among other European countries. Germany took over the French government in 1941 but left the southwest in the hands of a puppet (Vichy).
Hannah was moved to a camp in Gurs, a town in southwest France near the Pyrenees, about 85 kilometres from the Spanish border. With others, she escaped from the camp, crossed the border to Spain with help from a US journalist, and then headed towards Portugal and Lisbon, where she and her recently escaped husband, Bob, boarded a ship going to New York. There she spent most of the rest of her life and died in December 1975.
The Nazi war criminal’s trial began in Jerusalem in April 1961 until December of the same year. Hannah was sent by the New York Times to report on the trial and in 1963 published a book about the trial that, according to her, described the banality of evil.
Eichman was a pivotal actor in the implementation of what was called ‘The Final Solution’, which was about ridding Europe of Jews. Hannah concluded that he was simply one of many pawns involved in Nazi slaughter before and during WW2.
Hannah did not profess any particular religious belief, but she had a deep interest in the writings of St Augustine of Hippo (354 to 430). While she was clearly a spiritual person and delved into the spiritual insights of other scholars, she did not identify with any particular religion.
Hannah was an enduring witness to honesty and truth.
Columban Fr Peter Woodruff lives and works in Australia.
Related links
- Read more from the current Columban eBulletin
