The 2005 Sybil Halpern Milton Memorial Book Prize was awarded in the U.S. by the German Studies Association to Prof. Aronson for his book, Hitler, the Allies and the Jews¸ published last year by the Cambridge University Press.
In the book, said the German Studies Association, Aronson details how the exigencies of war and diplomacy, the allied insistence on unconditional surrender, and the need to maintain a multi-national alliance against Nazi Germany conflicted with, and ultimately made impossible, the rescue of European Jewry; the Allies wanted to demonstrate that they were not fighting a "war for the Jews." The Jews, Aronson writes, were caught in "an unstoppable doomsday machine."
In his book, said the association, Aronson presents "a masterfully wide-ranging, tightly argued and truly innovative study of the Holocaust and its relationship to World War II." By utilizing a broad range of various sources, including previously unknown material, Aronson in this book "greatly enriches our knowledge of the Holocaust," said the association.