Who betrayed Anne Frank?

Experts in the Netherlands believe they have discovered who the traitor is

A team that included a former FBI agent has been investigating for the past six years one of the unresolved issues of World War II.

They most likely estimate that a Jewish notary who reported the family that was hiding was sent to the camps to save his family from the clutches of the Nazis.

Reuters

17/01/2022

Monday, 17 January 2022, 11:21 Updated: 11:24

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Her diary was published by her father after her death.

Anne Frank (Photo: AP, Anne Frank Center, HO)

Experts who have been researching Anne Frank's story for the past six years have identified a surprising suspect in the extradition of the famous Jewish girl and her family to the Nazis.

The team of investigators, which includes a former FBI agent and about 20 historians, criminologists and information experts, pointed to the Jewish notary Arnold van den Berg, a relatively unknown figure, as the one who apparently discovered a family hiding place in exchange for saving his family life.

Peter van Twisk, a member of the team, told the NRC newspaper today (Monday) that it was "very likely" that he was the one who betrayed the Frank family to the Germans who captured them on August 4, 1944, and then sent the family to the camps.

Anna died of typhus in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in 1945, and she became famous thanks to a diary kept by a member of her family and passed on to her father Otto in 1947.

The diary has captured the imagination of millions of readers around the world, and has been translated into about 60 languages.

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