Night

NightElie WieselMs. Mac Eng. IIPre-AP

Elie WieselMr. Elie Wiesel is a Jewish writer, professor, political activist, Nobel Laureate and Holocaust survivor. He is the author of over 40 books, the best known of which is Night, a memoir that describes his experiences during the Holocaust and his imprisonment in several concentration camps. Mr. Wiesel established The Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity soon after he was awarded the 1986 Nobel Prize for Peace. The Foundation's mission, rooted in the memory of the Holocaust, is to combat indifference, intolerance and injustice through international dialogue and youth-focused programs that promote acceptance, understanding and equality.Wiesel

Wiesel

Wiesel

WieselElie Wiesel was born in Sighet, Romania in 1928 into a strict Jewish family. Wiesel's autobiographical book, Night, explores some of Wiesel's early childhood experiences, one of which includes the anecdote of Moshe the Beadle. A caretaker for the synagogue in Sighet, Moshe had a great impact over the young Wiesel; it was from Moshe the Beadle that Wiesel learned the secrets of the Talmud. In 1941, foreign-born Jews in Hungary were deported to Polish concentration camps; among the foreign, Jewish deportees was Moshe the Beadle. WieselIn late 1942, Moshe the Beadle escaped from the Polish concentration camp that he had been deported to and returned to Sighet with hope of forewarning the Sighet Jews of what was awaiting them in Poland. You don't understand ... you can't understand. I have been saved miraculously. I have managed to get back here [to Sighet]. Where did I get the strength from? I wanted to come back to Sighet to tell you the story of my death. So that you could prepare youselves while there was still time. To live? I don't attach much importance to my life anymore. I'm alone. No, I wanted to come back and to warn you. And see how it is, no one will listen to me (Johnson & Strom, 120).Disregarding the warnings of Moshe the Beadle and the reports from Poland, Romania was invaded by the German Nazi on March 19, 1944.

World War IIWWII began September 1, 1939 and ended September 2, 1945Over 70 million were killed by the end of the war and were mainly civilians103 different countries were involved in or affected by WWIIBefore the war there were 9,793,700 Jewish people Nearly 6 million killedHolocaustThe total number of victims of Nazi genocidal policies, including the handicapped and Romani, Poles and Soviet POW is generally agreed to be between 9 and 11 million. Approximately 6 million were Jewish people.9GhettoGhettos were established across all of occupied Europe, especially in areas where there was already a large population of JewsMany ghettos were closed by barbed wire or walls and were guarded by SSJews sometimes had to use bridges to go over Aryan streets that ran through the ghettosLife was hard: food was rationed; several families often shared a small space; disease spread rapidly; heating, ventilation, and sanitation were limitedMany children became orphaned in the ghettosGhettos

Adolf HitlerWas the ruler of Germany from 1933-1945Was part of the Nazis PartyBuilt Concentration Camps where he forced Jewish families to liveBelieved that Jewish people:Were lazy and contributed little to world civilizationHad a secret plan to take over the worldWere responsible for everything he did not likeShould lose their rights of citizenship

12Nazi PartyNational Socialist German Workers' party of GermanyHitler smothered all resistance and ruled over all cultural, economic, and political activities of the peopleHitler also created a Nazis Army

Marching group of Hitlers armyGestapoGerman internal security police as organized under the Nazi regime, known for its terrorist methods directed against those suspected of treason or questionable loyalty

Final SolutionEinsatzgruppen were mobile killing squads made up of Nazi (SS) units & police. They killed Jews in mass shooting actions throughout eastern Poland and the western Soviet Union.

Concentration CampA prison camp where people are held without regard for accepted rules of arrest and detentionThe Nazis constructed concentration camps to hold Jews, Gypsies, communists, and others considered enemies of the state.

Elie Wiesel2nd row 7th from the leftDeath CampA camp where the Nazis murdered people in assembly-line styleThe largest death camp was Auschwitz-Birkenau (referred to as Auschwitz)Also used to describe concentration camps such as Bergen-Belsen and Dachau

Auschwitz-BirkenauWas established in 1940 as a concentration campThere were three separate camps that make up Auschwitz-Birkenau complexAuschwitz I: original camp which served as the administrative centerAuschwitz II (Birkenau): a killing center which was added in 1942 and became the main campAuschwitz III (Buna- Monowitz): a slave labor camp

Auschwitz I

Main entranceAriel view

Included gas chamber and crematories

Auschwitz II (Birkenau)

Auschwitz III (Buna-Monowitz)

Crematories & Gas ChambersA crematory is a furnace where a corpse can be burned and reduced to ashesGas chambers were sealed chambers into which a poisonous gas is released

Both crematories and gas chambers were used to kill prisoners in concentration campsHeinrich Himmler, head of the SS (Schutzstaffel)SS (or Schutzstaffel in German) was the elite guard of Nazi GermanyIt provided staff for the police , camp guards, and military units within the Germany army

KapoPrisoner forced to oversee other prisoners

Separatioin of PrisonersSelectionThe process the Nazis used to separate those prisoners who would be assigned to forced labor from those who were to be killed immediately

Final SolutionJosef Mengele (1911-1979)Was a senior SS physician at Auschwitz-Birkenau (from 1943-1944)Carried out selections of prisoners upon arrival at camp and conducted experiments on some of those prisonersPeople afflicted with any sort of physical deformity would be killed for him, on his orders, upon their arrival in the death camp, to provide new material for his studies.Josef Mengele

Totalitarian StateNuremberg Laws stripped Jews of their German citizenship. They were prohibited from marrying or having sexual relations with persons of German or related blood.

PersecutionNazi plan for dealing with the Jewish Question evolved in 3 steps:1. Expulsion: Get them out of Europe 2. Containment: Put them all together in one place-namely ghettos 3. Final Solution : annihilation

PersecutionKristallnacht was the Night of Broken Glass on November 9-10, 1938

Germans attacked synagogues & Jewish homes & businesses

Jews arrested during Kristallnacht line up Buchenwald concentration camp Nov. 1938.

PersecutionNazis targeted individuals & groups in addition to the Jews:

GypsiesHomosexual menJehovahs WitnessHandicapped GermansPolesPolitical DissidentsResistanceThe White Rose movement protested Nazism, though not Jewish policy, in Germany.White Rose stood for purity & innocence in the face of evil.Founded in June 1942, by Hans Scholl, 24 year old medical student, his 22 year old sister, Sophie, & 24 year old Christoph Probst.

White Rose MovementIn February 1943, Hans & Sophie were caught distributing leaflets & were arrested. They were executed with Christoph 4 days later.

ResistanceWarsaw Ghetto Uprising

ResistanceJewish partisans who escaped to fight in the forestsMost of the Jewish Partisans were European teenagers who fought against the Nazis during World War II. They were typically everyday people with little or no military background who had escaped the ghettos and work camps and formed resistance groups in the forests and urban underground. This made it impossible for them to return home and so they were forced to constantly move around, living in the shadows on the edges of cities and towns. The few that knew anything at all about guns and ammunition quickly became important teachers and leaders of the groups. A typical requirement to join one of the groups was the ownership, be it legal or not, of a gun.

Ten percent of the group members were women, only some of which were fighters. Most were part of the infrastructure, cooking for the group and taking care of the sick and wounded. Most groups denied the membership of families with small children.

Jewish Partisans

RescueLess than 1% of the non-Jewish European population helped any Jew in some form of rescue.Denmark & Bulgaria were the most successful national resistance movements against the Nazis attempt to deport their Jews.RescueIn Denmark 7,220 of the 8,000 Jews were saved by ferrying them to neutral Sweden.The Danes proved that widespread support for Jews could save lives.

RescueThe War Refugee Board was established by the U.S. Secretary of Treasury Henry Morgenthau, Jr., and it worked with Jewish organizations, diplomats from neutral countries, & European resistance groups to rescue Jews from Nazi-occupied territories.

RescueSwedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg worked in Hungary to protect tens of thousands of Jews by distributing protective Swedish (a neutral country) passports.

AftermathSoviet soldiers 1st to liberate camp prisoners on July 23, 1944, at Maidanek in Poland.

AftermathBritish, Canadian, American, & French troops also liberated camp prisoners.

AftermathTroops were shocked at what they saw.

AftermathMost prisoners were emaciated to the point of being skeletal.Many camps had dead bodies lying in piles like cordwood.Many prisoners died even after liberation.

AftermathJewish displaced persons, eager to leave Europe, pushed for the founding of a Jewish state in British-controlled Palestine.U.S. President Harry Truman issued an executive order allowing Jewish refugees to enter the U.S. without normal immigration restrictions.

AftermathNuremberg Trials brought some of those responsible for the atrocities of the war to justiceThere were 22 Nazi criminals tried by the Allies at the International Military TribualTwelve subsequent trials followed as well as national trials throughout formerly occupied Europe Nuremberg Trials12 prominent Nazis were sentenced to deathMost claimed they were only following orders, which was judged to be an invalid defense