THE HOLOCAUST 11 MILLION MURDERED
Anti-Semitism: hatred of Jews Jews had been persecuted for centuries throughout Europe Used as scapegoats for problems Nazi ideology Aryans are master race claimed Jews destroy culture, to blame for everything, were inferior (not human) Some Germans blamed Jews for losing WWI & the economic problems after the war Again, scapegoats
Nazis made targeting Jews govt policy 1935 Nuremberg Laws deprived Jews of rights Deprived Jews of German citizenship Marriages b/w Jews & non-Jews forbidden Limits of type of work
German diplomat is killed by Jewish youth, Nazis respond violently Nazi storm troopers attack Jewish homes, businesses, synagogues, & murder 100 Jews Major increase in Nazi persecution of Jews from here on
Some Jews realized that violence toward them was going to get worse so they try to leave After thousands immigrate, countries such as Britain, France, U.S., close their doors to further refugees They have nowhere to escape
Hitler ordered that Jews in all countries he controlled be moved to designated areas Ghettos=segregated Jewish areas Nazis sealed off ghettos w/ barbed wire & stone walls Hoped they would starve to death or die from disease Many Jews survived Kept records, taught in secret, wrote music, plays, struggled to keep traditions
Hitler grew impatient waiting for Jews to die of starvation & disease Genocide: systematic murder of an entire people To protect Aryan racial purity Nazis had to eliminate other races & groups deemed inferior (subhuman) Gypsies, Poles, Russians, homosexuals, disabled, mentally handicapped, Jehovahs witness 5 MILLION MURDERED And JEWS 6 MILLION MURDERED
SS units (killing squads) moved from town to town hunting Jews Men, women, children, babies, murdered & dumped in mass graves Jews not killed by SS were rounded up & taken to concentration camps (slave-labor prisons) Some worked to death Starvation Beaten or killed for not working fast enough
A MAP OF THE CONCENTRATION CAMPS AND DEATH CAMPS USED BY THE NAZIS.
Nazis built extermination camps w/ gas chambers that could kill as many as 6000 in one day Prisoners paraded b4 doctors & separated weak from strong Those labeled weak died that day in gas chambers Bodies burned in ovens Auschwitz-largest extermination camp
Smoke rises as the bodies are burnt.
Nazis sift through a huge pile of clothes left by victims of the massacre. Two year old Mani Halefs clothes are somewhere amongst these.
After liberation, an Allied soldier displays a stash of gold wedding rings taken from victims at Buchenwald. Bales of hair shaven from women at Auschwitz, used to make felt-yarn.
A Total of 6,000,000 Jews Percentage of Jews killed in each country
Until September 14, 1939 my life was typical of a young Jewish boy in that part of the world in that period of time. I lived in a Jewish community surrounded by gentiles. Aside from my immediate family, I had many relatives and knew all the town people, both Jews and gentiles. Almost two weeks after the outbreak of the war and shortly after my Bar Mitzvah, my world exploded. In the course of the next five and a half years I lost my entire family and almost everyone I ever knew. Death, violence and brutality became a daily occurrence in my life while I was still a young teenager. Leonard Lerer, 1991 WHY?