The Holocaust

February 20, 2013

• Holocaust: Nazi attempt to kill all Jews

• Includes all Jews & “undesirables”– Gay; twin; gypsy; disabled

(mental/ physical); criminal; dated/ married Jewish

– Speak out against Hitler– “Anti-Social”

• Genocide: Mass elimination of entire group of people

WHY???• Racist Nazi Ideas

– Aryan myth - superior to all• Blame Jews for EVERYTHING

– World War I loss; Depression

Holocaust begins as soon as Hitler takes power (1933)

1. Hitler urged Germans to boycott Jewish owned businesses

2. No gov’t jobs or jobs in banking, stock exchange, law, journalism, or medicine

3. Nuremburg Laws

– Deny citizenship to Jews

– Ban marriage between Jews & non-Jews

– Segregated Jews at every level

4. Propaganda

– Newspapers attack on Jews

– Children taught in schools that Jews “polluting” Germany

– Comic books

• Between 1933 - 1937– 130,000 Jews flee Germany & Austria

(artists, doctors, scientists)Why didn’t others leave too???• Great Depression: Not welcome in other

countries– Immigration limits

• 1933 - 1st concentration camp built– Dachau– Not designed to kill (work camp)

Concentration Camps• Tattoo numbers on arm/• Vertically striped clothes• Torture/ kill with no fear of reprimand• Starve/ disease• Medical experiments

– No anesthesia– Kill/ deform

Holocaust Continued

February 21, 2013

• Places conquered (Poland, Denmark, France)– Force Jewish population into ghettos– Construct concentration camps

• 1942 - Wannsee Conference– New design for camps– Plan to kill over 11 million Jews

Auschwitz• South Poland• Gas: carbon monoxide or insecticide, OR• Mass execution with guns

• Take what want & burn in crematory– Human fat - soap– Hair - wigs, slippers, mattresses, etc.– Cash, gold fillings, wedding rings, etc.

• How many died???– MILLIONS– No real number could be known

• Records burned• Bodies in ashes

Could the Holocaust have been prevented?

1. Immigration policies strict– Great Depression– Worry about selves

2. Apathy: don’t care– North America: Europe is far

away• Can’t relate

3. Underestimate Hitler– Big fear was Soviet Union/

communism

4. 1940s: news does NOT travel fast– No TV/ internet in homes

• No specific details known about Holocaust during WWII– Specifics not known until allies

liberated camps after WWIIAllies heard some stories about camps• Stalin: no concern• Churchill & FDR: sympathy but

thought focus should be on defeating Hitler– If war ends, they can get the

people out of the camps• No pressure on countries to NOT

send Jews• Don’t know magnitude

– Internment camps in U.S. for Japanese

• ENORMITY of Holocaust became real when camps liberated (freed)– Piles of bodies– Warehouses full of hair, jewelry,

shoes, etc.– Ashes

• Lieutenant Winters (Band of Brothers)– “The memory of starved, slaved men,

who dropped their eyes and heads when we looked at them through the chain link fence, in the same manner that a beaten, mistreated dog would cringe, leaves feelings that cannot be described and will never be forgotten. The impact of seeing those people behind that fence left me saying, ‘Now I know why I’m here.’”