Soap

[Eddy Marz]

Some of the rumors about 'soap' were based on the fact that soap bars available in some ghettos and camps bore the initials "RIF" - whom many interpreted as meaning "Rein jüdisches Fett" (pure jewish fat), without bothering to think that if that was the case, the initials would have been "RJF"…

In his book, « The Terrible Secret » (1980), jewish historian Walter Laqueur declared that "the tales about soap are completely unfounded".

The Zentrale Stelle in Ludwigsburg also refuted "the universally accepted tale that corpses were used to manufacture soap or fertilizers" (see G. Sereny notes in "Into that Darkness").

In 1981, Deborah Lipstadt - professor in modern Jewish History - declared : "The fact is that the nazis never used the corpses of jews, or anyone else for that matter, to manufacture soap".

[little grey rabbit]

It appears to be RIF soap (ie just normal wartime soap)



What a surprise!

[wm]

Some of the rumors about 'soap' were based on the fact that soap bars available in some ghettos and camps bore the initials "RIF" - whom many interpreted as meaning "Rein jüdisches Fett" (pure jewish fat), without bothering to think that if that was the case, the initials would have been "RJF"…

I'm not sure it's not another legend too.
Before the WW2 mom-and-pop soap factories were everywhere. People were frequently making soap themselves, especially the peasants I suppose. I've read a story about German women teaching the newly arrived Polish settlers the art of making soap shortly after the war.
The point is people knew very well the process, especially the fact that only the useless animals were used for it (like Boxer in Orwell's Animal Farm). So the association was obvious: useless/worthless=only good for soap. And the Jews were "worthless" too.

[Paul Lantos]

My grandmother, who was in Lodz, Birkenau, Bergen-Belsen, and Salzvedel, was given RIF soap and was told at the time that same rumor about how it stood for pure Jewish fat (which to this day I think she believes).

I've read enough about the death camp operations to be convinced that the SS were in no mood to mess around collecting fat. There is just enough testimony from people who worked in the creations and no one mentions collecting fat. Hair, teeth, yes, but fat no.

[wm]

I know the RIF stories are true. But I don't believe those people made up that forced backronym in vacuum. That they simply interpreted a meaningless acronym in such a precise manner without a reason.
I suppose the RIF soap was another manifestation of the pre-war black humor soap jokes. Many people believed in it because they knew it is possible. They didn't invent the "soap is made from people" because they simply saw the letters RIF. They invent the meaning of the RIF because they knew it was possible and could become reality, and were afraid of it.

[Sampo Jämbeck]

Israeli director Eyal Ballas suggests that the whole soap thing is a myth.
He made a film "Soaps" in which he studies the subject.

http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jew ... m-1.527623

“Soaps,” a new film by director Eyal Ballas, 43, finds that the soap myth originated in World War I, when Germans were rumored to be turning bodies into the cleaning product. During World War II, SS guards would harass concentration camp members by threatening to kill them and turn them into soap.

Holocaust historian Deborah Lipstadt told The Jewish Week that “there is no proof that the Nazis made Jews into soap in a mass fashion … There were attempts, but it was never practical.”

http://www.jta.org/2013/06/06/arts-ente ... -soap-myth

Some clips can found on his YouTube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/user/eyalballas/videos

[Ponury]

From Jews not, from Poles yes. In Gdańsk, in prof. Spanner laboratory...

[Sergey Romanov]

I have examined most of the relevant sources on the issue: the Soviet investigation materials (from GARF), the German investigation (5 volumes at ZStL) and, partially, the Polish investigation (incl. the modern reports). While this is a topic where it's hard to draw many "proven" conclusions, my tentative conclusion is very close to that of Dr. Joachim Neander: yes, some soap from human fat was produced; it is unlikely that anyone was killed to specifically to produce soap, and when the soap was produced, it was largely a byproduct of maceration of corpses that were otherwise being prepared for anatomical lessons. There was no "soap factory" and it is unlikely that Mazur's claims about some systematic plan are true. It is unlikely that a crime has been committed, with a possible exception of desecration of corpses. The so-called soap recipe should be treated with skepticism. The Soviet and Polish claims about the Danzig soap were exaggerations.

[Ponury]

But Mazur dont tell, after that soap was produced industrially. It's that his claims are false?

[wm]

He never said it was produced industrially, he said they produced about 25kg of it - it's not an industrial amount. The soap was produced for their own purposes (because no soap was allocated to the Institute), later some of it was probably sold on the black market, some was stolen by looters.

[Sergey Romanov]

But Mazur dont tell, after that soap was produced industrially. It's that his claims are false?

Mazur implied that there were plans for industrial production. From USSR-197:

http://holocaust.skeptik.net/documents/197-3.jpg

The work for the production of soap from human bodies has, as far as I know, also interested Hitler's Government. The Anatomic Institute was visited by the Minister of Education, Rust; the Reichsgesundheitsfuehrer, Doctor Conti; the Gauleiter of Danzig, Albert Forster; as well as many professors from other medical institutes.
[...]
At our institute the soap production was of experimental character, but I don't know when the use of corpses for soap production on the industrial scale was supposed to begin.

The first paragraph is nonsense - while I don't doubt the visits, to imply that they visited because of the soap...

He probably thought telling this the Soviets was of benefit to him, whatever it was.

The very idea that any "experiments" were needed is illogical - there were (and are) tried and true procedures for making soap from animal fat, no experimenting was necessary.