2. Persecution and the exodus of Germany's
525,000 Jews began almost immediately
Albert Einstein called the events in Germany a
quot;psychic illness of the massesquot;
He never set foot in Germany again
He was expelled from the Prussian Academy
of Sciences and his citizenship was rescinded
In 1935, Hitler introduced the Nuremberg Laws
Stripped German Jews of their citizenship
and deprived them of all civil rights
Hitler said if the quot;Jewish problemquot; cannot be
solved by the Nuremberg laws it quot;must then be
handed over by law to the National-Socialist
Party for a final solution” (Endlösung)
quot;Endlösungquot; became the Nazi euphemism for
the extermination of the Jews
3. Heinrich Himmler
Nazi German politician and head of the
Schutzstaffel (SS)
Second most powerful man in Nazi
Germany, after Adolf Hitler
Oversaw all police and security forces
Overseer of concentration and
extermination camps
Coordinated the killing of millions of
Jews
Reinhard Heydrich
Hitler considered him a possible
successor
Chose as President of Interpol or the
Nazi international law enforcement
Heydrich chaired the Wannsee
Conference
4. November 9, 1938
Jews were attacked and Jewish property
was vandalized across Germany
Approximately 100 Jews were killed
30,000 sent to concentration camps
7,000 Jewish shops and 1,668
synagogues (almost every synagogue in
Germany) were damaged or destroyed
Countless pogroms by local groups
occurred throughout WWII
Form of riot directed against a
particular group, whether ethnic,
religious, or other
Some pogroms were with Nazi
encouragement and some were
spontaneous
5. Jews had been murdered in mass
scale since 1939
In 1940 some Nazis considered
eliminating Jews according to the
Madagascar Plan
It was unrealistic but it was an
important psychological step on the
path to the Holocaust
The plan was to ship all European
Jews to Madagascar
It was a remote and slower genocide
through the unfavorable living
conditions on the island
6. After the invasion of Poland, the Nazis
established ghettos throughout 1941 and 1942
Warsaw Ghetto was the largest (380,000)
The Łódź Ghetto the second largest
(160,000)
They were immensely crowded prisons, used as
instruments of “slow, passive murder”
Warsaw Ghetto
30% of the population of Warsaw
Occupied only 2.4% of the city's area
Averaged 9.2 people per room
1940 through 1942, starvation and
disease, killed hundreds of thousands
Over 43,000 residents of the Warsaw ghetto
died there in 1941
More than half the residents died in 1942
7. “From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered-
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers”
Why We Fight
8. Nazis intensified acts of violence in 1933
Set up camps as concentration centers within
Germany
First was Dachau (opened in March 1933)
Early camps were meant to
hold, torture, or kill only political
prisoners, such as Communists
Usually basements and storehouses
Eventually full-blown centrally run camps
emerged outside the cities
By 1942, six large extermination camps had
been established in Nazi-occupied Poland
They were places where Jews and POWs were
either killed or forced to live as slave laborers
Established 15,000 camps in the occupied
countries, many of them in Poland
9. Transportation of prisoners was carried
out under horrifying conditions
Usually via rail freight cars
Many died before reaching their
destination
Extermination through labor
Camp inmates would be worked to
death
Many camp prisoners died because of
harsh overall conditions
Upon admission, some camps tattooed
prisoners with a prisoner ID
Many who could work were dispatched
for 12 to 14 hour shifts
There were roll calls that could last
for hours
Prisoners regularly died of exposure
10. By 1941, Himmler and Heydrich were
becoming increasingly impatient with the
progress of the Final Solution
The Wannsee Conference (January 20, 1942)
Met at a villa in the suburbs of Berlin
Purpose was to finalize a plan a
extermination
They called for killing all the Jews in
Europe, including 330,000 Jews in England
and 4,000 in Ireland
Plan became known as Operation Reinhard
Officials were told there were a total of 6.5
million Jews that would be ‘dealt’ with
All would be transported by train to
extermination camps in Poland
Those unfit for work would be gassed at once
Eventually all would be killed
11. The largest of Nazi Germany's
concentration camps
Located in Poland
90% of those that died at Auschwitz were
Jews from almost every country in
Europe
Most victims were killed in Auschwitz
gas chambers
Other deaths were caused by:
Systematic starvation
Forced labor
Lack of disease control
Individual executions
“Medical experimentsquot;
12. During 1942, in addition to
Auschwitz, five other camps were
designated as extermination camps
Purpose was to carry out of the
Reinhard plan
Many camps had extermination
facilities added to them
Three new camps were built for the
sole purpose of killing large
numbers of Jews as quickly as
possible
Extermination camps are frequently
confused with concentration camps
Extermination camps were run by
SS officers
13. At camps with gas chambers all the
prisoners arrived by train
Trainloads were sent straight to the gas
chambers
Jews were first taken to platforms where
all their clothes and other possessions
were seized
They were herded naked into the
chambers
Were told there were showers inside
(signs outside said “baths” and
“sauna”)
Some were given a small piece of
soap and a towel to avoid panic
They were told to remember where
they had put their belongings
When they asked for water they were
told to hurry up, because coffee was
waiting for them in the camp
14. Once the chamber was full, the doors were
shut and cyanide was released inside
Those inside died within 20 minutes
Gas was then pumped out and the bodies were
removed
Victims were found half-squatting
Their skin was colored pink with red and
green spots
Some foamed at the mouth or bleed from
the ears
Gold fillings in their teeth were extracted
Women's hair was cut
The floor of the gas chamber was then cleaned
and the walls washed
The work was done by the Jewish prisoners
Hoped to buy themselves a few extra
months of life
15. By mid 1944, the Final Solution had run its
course
Jewish communities within easy reach of the
Nazi regime had been exterminate
90% percent in Poland
25% in France
During 1944, the task became more difficult
German armies were evicted from the
Soviet Union
In June, the western Allies landed in
France
Despite the Nazi military situation great
efforts were made to conceal evidence of the
camps
Gas chambers were dismantled
Crematorias dynamited
Mass graves dug up and the corpses
cremated
Polish farmers were induced to plant
crops on the sites to give the impression
that they had never existed
16. Commanders continued to kill Jews and
shuttle them from camp to camp by
forced quot;death marchesquot; until the last
weeks of the war
Many were already sick after months or
years of violence and starvation
Prisoners were forced to march for tens
of miles in the snow to train stations
Those who lagged behind or fell were
shot
Around 100,000 Jews died during these
marches
The largest death march took place in
January 1945 as the Soviet army advanced
on Poland
Nine days before the Soviets arrived at
Auschwitz, the SS marched 60,000
prisoners 35 miles to where they were
put on freight trains to other camps
Around 15,000 died on the way
17. The first major camp, Majdanek, was
discovered by the advancing Soviets in
July 1944
Auschwitz was liberated, also by the
Soviets, on January 27, 1945
Buchenwald by the Americans in April
1945
In most of the camps discovered by the
Soviets, almost all the prisoners had
already been removed
7,000 inmates were found in Auschwitz
The British forced the remaining SS
guards to gather up the corpses and place
them in mass graves
18. Auschwitz - 1,400,000
The total number of
dead at the hands of the
Nazis:
9 and 11 million
