The Holocaust

Pre-War

• Approximately 11 million Jews in Europe

• Poland and the Soviet Union had the largest Jewish populations

• Jews very assimilated in European society Jewish community of Sighet,

Romania in front of a wooden synagogue.

Evolution of Holocaust

1. Persecution

2. Containment

3. Final Solution

1. Persecution

Persecution - Scapegoats

• Post WWI Blues and Depression

• Extremists blamed Jews for Germany’s defeat in WWI– Blamed the German

Foreign Minister (a Jew) for his role in reaching a settlement with the Allies.

Persecution – Characteristics of a Totalitarian State

• Gov has total control of a country– It subjugates the individual’s rights.

– It demonstrates a policy of aggression.

– In a totalitarian state, paranoia and fear dominate.

– The government maintains total control over the culture.

– The government is capable of indiscriminate killing.

Persecution - Anti-Semitism Propaganda

• Nazi teachers began to apply the “principles” of racial science– Measured skull size and nose

length– Recorded students’ eye/hair – Determined whether students

belonged to the “Aryan race.”

• The Nazis used propaganda to promote their anti-Semitic ideas.– The Poisonous Mushroom.

Persecution – Taking Away Civil Rights

• April 1933 – eliminated from civil service– social security eliminated– quotas in schools

• September 15, 1935 - Nazis passed Nuremberg Laws:– Stripped Jews of their German citizenship.– Prohibited from marrying or having sexual relations with

persons of “German or related blood.”– were required to carry ID cards

Kristallnacht

• “Night of the Broken Glass” November 9-10,1938

• Anti-Jewish rampage in Germany: Burnings, arrests and beatings

• Nazis attacked synagogues, homes and businesses

Persecution

• Other Groups Targeted:– Gypsies (Sinti and Roma)– Homosexuals– Jehovah’s Witness– Handicapped Germans– Poles– Political Dissidents– Catholics

Helene Gotthold, a Jehovah's Witness, was beheaded for her religious beliefs on December 8, 1944, in Berlin. She is pictured with her children in 1936.

2. Containment – The Ghettos

• Nazis established 356 ghettos between 1939 and 1945.

• Jews were not allowed to leave the so-called "Jewish residential districts," under penalty of death.

• All ghettos had the most appalling, inhuman living conditions.

3. The Final Solution

Nazis would attempt to exterminate the entire Jewish population of Europe, an

estimated 11 million persons.

Prelude to the Final Solution• In 1939, Germany

invaded Poland which had a much larger population of 3 million Jews.

• In 1941, Germany invaded Russia which had a population of 5 million Jews.

Final Solution

• Himmler established specially trained SS units called “Einsatzgruppen” to shoot Jews.

• Attempted to kill Jews by having them dig their own graves and then stand in front of grave and be shot.

• Inefficient– Too Long, Needed Bullets for war

• Wannsee Conference to determine a more effective way

Einsatzgruppen

Wannsee Conference• January, 20, 1942, headed by

Himmler, head Nazis met in Berlin to coordinate the “FINAL SOLUTION”

• Used “secret” language in discussing plan

• "...eliminated by natural causes," refers to death by a combination of hard labor and starvation.

• "treated accordingly“, "special treatment" and "special actions" refers to execution by SS firing squads or death by gassing

Final Solution

• Jews to be rounded up, go through process of selection

• Healthy Jews Labor camps – Death through over work and starvation

• Too Young, Too Old, Mothers of young, or unhealthy Death Camps

Where were the Death Camps built?

Why do you think that they located them here?

The work of the Einsatzgruppen

Children Dying of Starvation in the Warsaw Ghetto

SS Tactics: Dehumanisation• The SS guards who murdered the Jews were

brainwashed with Anti-Semitic propaganda.

• The Jews were transported in cattle cars in terrible conditions.

• Naked, dirty and half starved people look like animals, which helped to reinforce the Nazi propaganda.

• The SS used to train their new guards by encouraging them to set fire to a pit full of live victims – usually children.

Entrance to Auschwitz

Notice how it has been built to resemble a railway station

Auschwitz Orchestra

Auschwitz from the air

Notice how the Death camp is set out like a

factory complex

The Nazis used industrial methods to murder the Jews and

process their dead bodies

The Gas Chambers• The Nazis would force

large groups of prisoners into small cement rooms and drop canisters of Zyklon B, or prussic acid, in its crystal form through small holes in the roof.

• These gas chambers were sometimes disguised as showers or bathing houses.

The SS would try and pack up to 2000 people into this gas chamber

The outside of the Gas Chamber

Notice the Ovens easily located near the Gas Chambers

Processing the bodies

• Specially selected Jews known as the sonderkommando were used to to remove the gold fillings and hair of people who had been gassed.

• The Sonderkommando Jews were also forced to feed the dead bodies into the crematorium.

The Ovens at Dachau

Dead bodies waiting to be processed

Shoes waiting to be processed by the sonderkommando

Taken inside a huge glass case in the Auschwitz Museum. This represents one day's collection at the peak of the gassings, about twenty five thousand

pairs.

Destruction Through Work

This photo was taken by the Nazis to show just how you could quite literally work the fat of the men by feeding

them 200 calories a day

Destruction Through Work

Same group of men 6 weeks later

Was the Final Solution successful?

• The Nazis aimed to kill 11 million Jews

• Today there are only 2000 Jews living in Poland.

• The Nazis managed to kill at least 6 million Jews.

The Holocaust

To What Extent did the World Know?

Evil is when a few good men decide to do nothing.

U.S. and World Response• Evian Conference - summer of 1938 in Evian, France.

– 32 countries met to discuss what to do about the Jewish refugees who were trying to leave Germany and Austria.

– Despite voicing feelings of sympathy, most countries made excuses for not accepting more refugees.

• Some US congressmen proposed the Wagner-Rogers Bill – let 20,000 endangered Jewish refugee children into the country– bill was not supported in the Senate.

• Anti-Semitic attitudes played a role in the failure to help refugees.

• The SS St. Louis, carrying refugees with Cuban visas, were denied admittance both in Cuba and in Florida. After being turned back to Europe, most of the passengers perished in the Holocaust.