According to the historian Ben H. Shepherd, these forced labour camps came in effect when the Afrika Korps had already been retreating and there is no proof of contact between Rommel and the unit.[4] According to historian Haim Saadon, Director of the Center of Research on North African Jewry in WWII, there was no extermination plan: Rauff's documents show that his foremost concern was helping the Wehrmacht to win, and he came up with idea of forced labour camps in the process. This was in no way benevolent, but in relative terms, the North African Jews escaped the Final Solution.[5][6]