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By leaving the Jews destitute as they drove them from the country, Germans made them undesirable immigrants in the eyes of the host states. Work restrictions, police checks, expulsions and internment in camps were the result. This article covers the German anti-Jewish policy from 1933 to 1939 and its imitation by other authoritarian states, the reaction of the countries of refuge as well as attempts to resolve the refugee crisis internationally. In spite of increasingly rigid immigration policies, the numbers of refugees dramatically rose in 1938 after the annexation of Austria and the November Pogrom. The Evian Conference not only made the failure of international regulatory efforts apparent; it also drastically sped up the trend towards sealing the borders. Jews were increasingly forced to resort to illegal and dangerous escape routes and look for refuge in countries where they could, at best, wait for the end of the war under wretched conditions.