The Doctors resistance

I have written quite extensively about the failure of the Dutch to protect their Jewish neighbours, and even resist the Nazi occupiers in general. However on February 24th 1941, the Dutch communist party had called for a nationwide strike to protest against the treatment of Jews as well as the forced labour in Germany. The Communist Party of the Netherlands, made illegal by the Germans, printed and spread a call to strike throughout Amsterdam the next morning. The first to strike were the city’s tram drivers, followed by other city services as well as companies like De Bijenkorf and schools. Eventually 300,000 people joined in the strike, bringing much of the city to a halt and catching the Germans by surprise.

Though the Germans immediately took measures to suppress the strike, which had grown spontaneously as other workers followed the example of the tram drivers, it still spread to other…