I told you things were busy, right? We talked about the Horthy offer, the arrival of the Fort Ontario refugees, the attack on the Mefkure. We also talked briefly about ransom negotiations.
Let me try to summarize this: In May, Joel Brand came out of Hungary with an offer from the Nazis to exchange goods (or money for goods) for the lives of the Jews of Budapest. When Brand did not return with the offer accepted, the Jewish groups in Budapest pleaded for some sort of answer. A proposal that Joseph Schwartz, as European director of the Joint, meet with a Nazi representative was rejected by the US government. Saly Mayer, however, as the Joint’s rep in Bern, was a Swiss citizen. So Saly Mayer began to think about meeting with Nazi representatives to discuss ransoming the Jews of Budapest. The intention was to drag the negotiations on as long as possible to buy time.
