Anne Frank: Experts cast doubts on the informer notary

(ANSA) - NEW YORK, 19 JAN - Was it really a Jew from Amsterdam who betrayed Anne Frank?

Dutch historians cast doubt on the conclusions of the investigation coordinated by a former FBI agent that the wealthy notary Arnold van den Bergha had directed the police to the Prinsengracht attic where the Frank family hid for two years to escape extermination camps.

    The investigation by former FBI agent Vincent Pankoke and a dream team of archival investigators and researchers, published yesterday in Rosemary Sullivan's book "The Betrayal of Anne Frank" ahead of Remembrance Day on January 27, has received extensive coverage around the world in the last few hours. Today, however, in the Netherlands numerous experts have expressed doubts about the conclusions: "They offer information that deserves further study, but no basis for the central accusation," said Ronald Leopold, the director of the Anne Frank house-museum who will present the findings of the Pankoke group as "one of the many theories "considered over the years.

    Many then disputed the weight given in the course of the investigation to the Jewish Council of Amsterdam, a committee of collaborators of which van den Bergh was one of the founders which, according to investigators, would have kept lists of Jewish hiding places such as the one where iFrank had closed.

"They accuse without giving any real evidence," said Laurien Vastenhout, a researcher at the NIOD Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide Studies: "Once again we have a narrative in which Jews are the culprits."

(HANDLE).