The Holocaust
The beginning
Holocaust: the Nazi attempt to kill all Jews under their controlresult of racist ideology of Nazis – any undesirables were persecuted; only the
Aryan race should survive (Germanic, Nordic, Anglo-Saxon blood)
Anti-Semitism – hatred of Jews – Hitler blames them for all Germany’s problems: things like communism, abstract painting, and defeat in WWI
Begins with an economic attack – boycott Jewish businesses, bars Jews from civil service jobs, banking, stock exchange, law, journalism, and medicine
Nuremberg Laws come next – denies German citizenship to Jews, bans marriage between Jews and non-Jews, segregates Jews at every level of society
Hints there will be a ‘Final Solution to the Jewish question’
Kristallnacht
Nov. 9, 1938 – known as Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass) happened after a Jewish refugee killed a German diplomat in Paris – Nazi officials order
attacks on Jews in Germany, Austria, and Sudetenland (all he had conquered at that point)secret police and military destroy 1500 synagogues and 7500 Jewish-owned
businesses, kill 200 Jews, injure 600 and arrest 1000s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynypuxgCbH4
Other Obstacles
Between 1933-37, 129,000 Jews flee Germany and Austria, including Einstein
More may have left, but really weren’t welcomed in other countries
Due to Depression and lack of jobs and anti-Semitism, The U.S. and other countries shut their doors – The St. Louis sails with 900 Jews and can’t find anyone to take them – return to Germany and their eventual deaths
The final solution
Genocide: the willful annihilation of a racial political, or cultural group
1933 – first concentration camp opens – areas include Dachau, Sachsenhausen, and Buchenwald
All ‘enemies of the state’ were placed in camps – each designated by color-coded patches
Purple: Jehovah’s WitnessesYellow: Jew
Pink: homosexualRed: Political Prisoner
Blue: ImmigrantGreen: Criminal
Black: ‘antisocial’Included anyone who spoke out against Hitler – labor leaders, socialists, communists, ministers, priests, Gypsies, beggars, physically and mentally disabled and many others
Prisoners were tattooed with numbers (numbers make them not human) and dressed in vertically striped uniforms
Within prison walls, guards could do as they pleased –
Death by starvation and disease was an everyday occurrence; doctors conducted horrible experiments
Poland was home to large groups of Jews – Warsaw, Lodz, and other cities – Jews were forced to live in crowded areas known as ghettos; additional camps were constructed
By 1942 – Nazi officials were ready to move ahead with the Final Solution – extermination of 11,000,000 Jews – some camps, especially in Poland, were designated as death camps
largest death camp was Auschwitz, also Treblinka, Maidenek, Sobibor, Belsec and Chelmno
forced into death chambers that were pumped in carbon monoxide and showers that released deadly insecticide – human fat was turned into soap; hair was woen into wi, slippers, etc; cash, gold fillings, wedding rings were stripped from the bodies – bodies were then burned
Some were simply lined up and shotBy 1945 – 6 million Jews had been murdered; 5 million others had died
http://video.about.com/history1900s/Nazi-Concentration-Camps.htm
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNJlLBD-EO0
http://www.britishpathe.com/video/concentration-camp-footage
Allies response to the holocaust
Could it have been prevented? – relaxed immigration policies might have helped; our State Dept made a conscious effort to block Jewish immigration – why?
As the horrors of the camps begins to be reported once we enter the war, and effort is made to rescue Jews; not until 1944 did FDR respond by establishing the War Refugee Board – working with the Red Cross saving many Jews, especially in Romania and Hungary
Stalin had no concern over the death camps, although his country is the closest
As our soldiers began to liberate the camps, Americans began to get the whole picture – leads ti support of an independent Jewish homeland – in 1948 when the Jewish community proclaimed the State of Israel, President Truman immediately recognized the nation
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmyP-ljev68
http://www.wingclips.com/movie-clips/schindlers-list/one-more-person
