Brittani Gugel 102-102

8/2/2019 Brittani Gugel 102-102

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Research Paper

Holocaust Overview

Brittani Gugel

English Com 102-102

Mr. Neuberger

2 April 2012


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The Nazi symbol

Source: http://bit.ly/HwFb4N

The Holocaust happened over a two year period, however, the events that happened prior

to the Holocaust lasted much longer. Through the use of propaganda the world had no idea what

was really going on; it had never crossed their minds that the Nazis were killing thousands of

people every day. It is important for people to understand what happened before, during, and

after Holocaust so the world doesnt endure the tragedy, pain, or loss again.

The Nazis rise to power

According to the History web site, in 1918 World War II

ended with the Treaty of Versailles and Germany ended up

going into a deep depression and the birth of the National

Socialist Party (Nazi) which grew into a mass movement across

Germany. In 1923, Hitler joined the Nazi party and in 1933,

Hitler was appointed German chancellor and his Nazi

government soon came to control every aspect of German life.

Furthermore, the History website describes how in 1933, the Nazis opened their first

concentration camp, in Dachau, Germany, to house political prisoners. Dachau evolved into a

death camp where countless thousands of Jews died from malnutrition, disease and overwork or

were executed. In addition to Jews, the camp's prisoners included members of other groups

Hitler considered unfit for the new Germany, including artists, intellectuals, Gypsies, the

physically and mentally handicapped and homosexuals. (Nazi Party)

Anthisemitism-the Nazis views on the Jews

According to the BBC website, Antisemitism, the new racist version of the old Jew-

hatred, viewed the Jews as not simply a religious group but as members of a 'Semitic race', which

strove to dominate its 'Aryan' rivals. It proved convenient glue for conspiracy theories since the


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The Nuremberg Laws.

Source: http://bit.ly/Il9Yl3

Jews were involved in all sorts of ventures and political

movements. Thus Jews were held responsible for Communism

and capitalism, liberalism, socialism, moral decline, revolutions,

wars, plagues and economic crises.

Furthermore the BBC website states that Jews werent the

only target the Nazis had, they also went after gays, gypsies, and

polish political prisoners. The Jews figured in Nazi ideology as

the arch-enemy of the 'Aryan race', and were targeted not merely for terror and repression but for

complete extinction. The Nazis failed in this aim because they ran out of time, but they pursued

it fanatically until their defeat in 1945 (A View of the Holocaust).

The Nuremberg Laws

After Hitler was named Fuher (father of the country) he established dictatorship and with

the help of the Nazis created the Nuremberg Laws. The Nuremberg Laws are a set of laws

created for how to strip the rights of the Jews and how to get them out of Germany for good. It

took them a long process to decide who was a true Jew since some of the Jews in Germany

didnt consider themselves a Jew since theyre family didnt

embrace their Jewish heritage.

According to the United States Holocaust Museum, the

Nuremberg Laws, as they became known, did not define a

"Jew" as someone with particular religious beliefs. Instead,

anyone who had three or four Jewish grandparents was defined as a Jew, regardless of whether

that individual identified himself or herself as a Jew or belonged to the Jewish religious

community. Many Germans who had not practiced Judaism for years found themselves caught in

The Jewish symbol .

Source: http://bit.ly/HCXjsT


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the grip of Nazi terror. Even people with Jewish grandparents who had converted to Christianity

were defined as Jews (The Nuremberg Race Laws).

The Nazi Propaganda

Over the course of the Holocaust the Nazis had sent the Jews to ghettos and stripped them

of their homes and belongings. The dressed the ghettos up and made them and the Jews look like

they were living an ideal life to make sure no one knew what was really going on. They set up

their gas chambers in different parts of the towns near the concentration camps that they were

stationed at so if someone was to come by there they wouldnt see the destruction that was really

going on. The Nazis even had made movies to broadcast showing how

well the Jews were living, but behind the cameras they were treating the

Jews like trash.

According to the United States Holocaust Memorial

Museum,(USHMM) the Ministry's aim was to ensure that the Nazi

message was successfully communicated through art, music, theater,

films, books, radio, educational materials, and the press. Propaganda also

encouraged passivity and acceptance of the impending measures against

Jews, as these appeared to depict the Nazi government as stepping in and restoring order. The

propaganda sought to elicit political loyalty and so-called race consciousness among the ethnic

German populations. It also sought to mislead foreign governments -- including the European

Great Powers that Nazi Germany was making understandable and fair demands for concessions

and annexations (Nazi Propaganda, 2011).

Kristallnacht

A movie of all the films the

Nazis had created to showthat the Jews were living a

good life.

Source: http://bit.ly/HFOIJs


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According to the PBS website, Kristallnacht was a program against Jews. The Nazi party

burned down all the Jewish buildings, Synagogues, the Jews homes, and terrorized them and

their once peaceful home life and moved the Jews into ghettos. In the end they had destroyed

several thousand Jewish businesses, set fire to almost a thousand Synagogues, killed close to a

hundred Jews and deported several thousand Jews to different concentration camps. Kristallnacht

provided the Nazi government with an opportunity at last to totally remove Jews from German

public life.

The PBS website also states that within a week, the Nazis

had circulated a letter declaring that Jewish businesses could not

be reopened unless they were to be managed by non-Jews. On

November 15th, Jewish children were no longer allowed to

attend school, and shortly afterwards the Nazis eliminated the

Jews from German Economic Life. In addition, the Nazis determined that the Jews should be

liable for the damages caused during Kristallnacht (People & Events-Kristallnacht).

The ghettos: rounding up the Jews and the lifestyle

After Kristallnacht the Nazis placed the Jews in different ghettos away from their homes

and stripped them of their personal belongings. It didnt matter if they claimed themselves as not

being a Jew, the Nazis still took them away from their homes and took their belongings that had

any sort of value. The ghettos were absolutely filthy, people were dying on the streets and

everyone had to walk around them until the Nazis came and hauled them away.

According to Yad Vashem website, they were rewarded

with food tickets and if they didnt work they didnt get a ticket

and go without food. The Jews died of disease and starvation.

Jewish buildings getting destroyed by

the Nazis.

Source: http://bit.ly/HabgU1

Children eating in the streets of the

Warsaw ghetto.

Source: http://bit.ly/p8PHez


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The ghettos were run by Jewish council who were responsible for carrying out the Nazi s orders

(Ellis & Silinsky, 2012). Despite the inhumane conditions that persisted in the ghettos,

communal institutions and voluntary organizations strove to imbue life with meaning and to

provide for the publics needs.

Furthermore, Yad Vashm states that many risked their lives for values like education,

religion, and cultural activities. These activities helped many to rise above the other jews and

humiliation despite the murderous reality to which the Jews were exposed (Daily Life in the

Ghettos).

The resistance

According to the USHMM the Jews in the ghettos and camps also responded to Nazi

oppression with several forms of spiritual resistance. They made attempts to preserve the history

and communal life of the Jewish people despite Nazi efforts to terminate the Jews from human

memory. After the Jews in the Warsaw ghetto heard a rumor saying they were going to be

deported to a killing camp they devised a plan to attach the SS officers (Jewish Resistance).

The USHMM also states that Jewish civilians offered armed resistance in over 100

ghettos in Poland and the Soviet Union. As German SS and police units entered the ghetto,

members of the Jewish Fighting Organization and other Jewish groups attacked German tanks

with Molotov cocktails, hand grenades, and a handful of small arms. It took the vastly superior

German forces nearly a month before they were able to completely pacify the ghetto and deport

virtually all of the remaining inhabitants. For months after the end of the ghetto uprising,

individual Jewish resisters continued to hide in the ruins of the ghetto, which SS and police units

patrolled to prevent attacks on German personnel (Jewish Resistance).


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The building the conference was heldin.

Source: http://bit.ly/hlpChH

The Wannsee Conference-The Final solution

According to the United Holocaust Memorial Museum

the Nazi party gathered together for the Wannsee conference to

establish what was going to be the final decision with the Jews. They finally decided that anyone

who has a Jewish background is considered a Jew. Hitler ended

up authorizing a mass murder plan for all of the Jews in

Germany.

The USHMM also states that at the time of the

Conference, most participants were already aware of the mass

murder of Jews. The Nuremberg Laws would serve as a basis for

determining who was a Jew (Wannsee Conference and the "Final Solution").

Selektion-The selection of Jews

When the train would arrive at the concentration camps the

Jews would be unloaded and would go through selection. Over all

this was a pretty fast process and didnt take more than just a few

minutes at a time. They had different groups set aside including

woman with children, woman without children, men, healthy, and

weak. The Jews that were in the weak group were killed

immediately since they were not able to work where the Jews that were in the healthy group

were sent to work in different stations around the camp. The woman and children were also

killed off immediately unless the child was old enough and strong enough to work at the camp.

The Extermination Methods

Some of the Jewish resistance fighters.

Source: http://bit.ly/HIFzQ6

The officers going through the Jews

and putting them where they need togo.

Source: http://bit.ly/HGqwrx


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The gates of the killing centers.

Source: http://bit.ly/X2rFf

The SS officers and the Nazis used different killing methods to exterminate the Jews

quickly and efficiently while trying not to get caught. At first they lined the Jews up and then

they shot them, afterward, they buried them all in one burial pit. After a while they realized that

this wasnt a very good method and it was extremely costly having to buy so many bullets.

According to the USHMM the Nazis ended up trying

out mobile killing units first. Mobile killing units were squads

composed primarily of German SS and police personnel.

Thereafter they were marched or transported by truck to the

execution site, where trenches had been prepared. In some

cases the captive victims had to dig their own graves. After the victims had handed over their

valuables and undressed, men, women, and children were shot, either standing before the open

trench, or lying face down in the prepared pit (Einsatzgruppen-Mobile Killing Units).

Also according to the USHMM they ended up figuring out the same thing as the time

before hand, there was too much evidence. So, the Nazis established killing centers for efficient

mass murder. Unlike concentration camps the killing centers (also referred to as "extermination

camps" or "death camps") were almost exclusively "death factories."

German SS murdered 2,700,000 Jews either by poison gas or

shooting; the SS considered the killing centers top secret. To

obliterate all traces of gassing operations, special prisoner units were

forced to remove corpses from the gas chambers and cremate them.

The grounds of some of the killing centers were used as landscaped or camouflaged to disguise

the murder of millions of Jews (Killing Centers: An Overview).

The trenches they buried the bodies in.

Source: http://bit.ly/HGq7W9


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A gas chamber.

Source: http://bit.ly/HJpA2X

Entrance of one of the largest deathcamps in Poland.

Source: http://bit.ly/IPWS2R

The USHMM also states the last method they used, which turned out to be the most

effective, was the gas chambers. The Nazis began experimenting

with poison gas for the purpose of mass murder in late 1939 with

the killing of mental patients. In 1941, the SS concluded that the

deportation of Jews to extermination camps (to be gassed) was

the most efficient way of achieving the "Final Solution". victims

were "unloaded" from cattle cars, they were told that they had to be disinfected in "showers."

The Nazi and Ukrainian guards sometimes shouted at and beat the victims, who were ordered to

enter the "showers" with raised arms to allow as many people as possible to fit into the gas

chambers. The tighter the gas chambers were packed, the faster the victims suffocated (Gassing

Operations).

The Death Camps

According to Yad Vashm the death camps were like the concentration camps except that

the Jews that arrived there were killed within a few days. When the Jews reached the camp, they

undress, got stripped of their belongings, and boarded a van whose exhaust pipe was connected

to its inside instead of the outside. When the doors were closed, the SS officers would drive the

van toward a burial place in a forest. By using three gas vans every day, 300,000 Jews were

killed. (The Implementation of the Final Solution-Death Camps).

According to a History website at Auschwitz alone, more

than two million people were murdered in a process resembling a

large-scale industrial operation. Jewish and non-Jewish inmates

worked in the labor camp;; though only the Jews were gassed and

not the non-Jews; thousands of the non-Jews died of starvation or disease. During the summer of


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1944, a large amount of Hungary's Jews were deported to Auschwitz, and 12,000 Jews were

killed every day that passed (Holocaust Death Camps).

Liberation

According to Yad Vashm World War II ended in May 1945, after six years of bitter

fighting. There were victory celebrations throughout the streets of Europe. The first of the Nazi

camps to be liberated was Majdanek, in July of 1944, and the rest of the camps were liberated by

the spring of 1945. At first glance one might assume that after all the suffering, liberation would

be a moment of great joy. However, the immense difficulties and pain of the Jewish survivors

presented a different reality.

Furthermore, Yad Vashem states that after years of the

abuse and fear that the Jews went through, the survivors were

able to came face to face with the fact that the world they had

once lived in was now gone. They were still able to pick up the

pieces and begin new lives (Liberation and Survival).

After Liberation

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum states that after liberation, many Jewish

survivors feared to return to their former homes because of the antisemitism that persisted in

parts of Europe and the trauma they had suffered. Some who returned home feared for their lives.

With few possibilities for emigration the Holocaust survivors migrated west to different

European courtiers that were liberated by the western Allies. There they were housed in

displaced persons camps such as Bergen-Belsen, the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation

Administration (UNRRA) administered these camps.

Jews leaving a concentration camp.

Source: http://bit.ly/HLz7pr


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Also the USHMM states that with few possibilities for emigration, tens of thousands of

homeless Holocaust survivors migrated westward to other European territories liberated by the

western Allies. There they were housed in hundreds of refugee

centers and displaced persons (DP) camps such as Bergen-

Belsen in Germany. The United Nations Relief and

Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) and the occupying

armies of the United States, Great Britain, and France

administered these camps.

Furthermore, the USHMM states that a variety of Jewish agencies worked to assit the

displaced persons. The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee provided the Holocaust

survivors with food and clothes while the Organization for Rehabilitation through Training

offered vocational training. Refugees formed their own organizations, and a lot of them labored

for establishment of an independent Jewish state in Palestine. The establishment of the State of

Israel was in May 1948 and the Jewish displaced persons and refugees began moving. As many

as 170,000 Jews had immigrated to Israel by 1953 (The Aftermath of the Holocaust).

Now one understands what happened before, during, and after Holocaust, we can be sure

the world doesnt endure the tragedy, pain, or loss again. Over the two year period of the

Holocaust, the events that happened prior to the Holocaust lasted much longer and what had

happened because of those events are now what you are able to better understand. Then, because

of the use of propaganda the world had no idea what was really going on; it had never crossed

anyonesmind that the Nazis were killing thousands of people every day. Now, we have the

information about what really happened.

The Israel flag.

Source: http://bit.ly/IFQ1dg


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Work Cited

Ellis, Eliyahu, and Shmuel Silinsky. "The Ghettos." Aishcom-Your Life, Your Judaism.

Aishcom, 2012. Web. 11 Apr. 2012.

"The Holocaust: A Learning Site for Students." The Nuremberg Race Laws. Ushmm. Web. 09

Apr. 2012.

"The Holocaust." Daily Life in the Ghettos. Yadvashem, 2012. Web. 11 Apr. 2012.

"Holocaust History." Einsatzgruppen (Mobile Killing Units). United States Holocaust Memorial

Museum, 6 Jan. 2011. Web. 12 Apr. 2012.

"Holocaust History." Gassing Operations. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 6 Jan.

2011. Web. 12 Apr. 2012.

"Holocaust History." Jewish Resistance. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 6 Jan.

2011. Web. 11 Apr. 2012.

"Holocaust History." Killing Centers: An Overview. United States Holocaust Memorial


"Holocaust History." Nazi Propaganda. Ushmm. Web. 09 Apr. 2012.

"Holocaust History." The Aftermath of the Holocaust. United States Holocaust Memorial


"Holocaust History." Wannsee Conference and the "Final Solution" United States Holocaust

Memorial Museum. Web. 11 Apr. 2012.

"The Holocaust." History.com. A&E Television Networks, 2012. Web. 13 Apr. 2012.

"The Holocaust." The Death Camps. Yadvashm, 2012. Web. 13 Apr. 2012.

"The International School for Holocaust Studies." Liberation and Survival. Yad Vashm, 2012.

Web. 13 Apr. 2012.


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"Nazi Party." History.com. A&E Television Networks, 2012. Web. 06 Apr. 2012.

PBS. PBS. Web. 09 Apr. 2012.

Brittani Gugel 102-102

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