Download The Jews 1940 - 1945

The Holocaust
Vocab
1. Concentration Camps – detention centers, prisons, for
civilians considered enemies of the state.
2. Holocaust – Nazi massacre of approx. 6 million Jews. About
5 million other people: Gypsies, Poles, Homosexuals, people
with handicap, and political dissenters were also killed.
3. Genocide – the murder of a group of people based on their
race.
4. Nuremburg Trials – European trials for Nazis who
committed “crimes against humanity”
Prelude to the Final Solution
• In 1935 Nuremberg laws limit the Jews rights
• In 1938, the Nazi attack on the Jews changed and
became more violent with Himmler launching
Kristallnacht on 11th November 1938.
• By 1939, half of Germany’s 500,000 Jews had
emigrated to escape Nazi persecution.
Prelude to the Final Solution
• In 1939, Germany invaded
Poland which had a much
larger population of 3
million Jews.
• Jews were forced into
Ghettos, walled off
sections of town and given
very little food. (starve
them out)
Children Dying of Starvation in
the Warsaw Ghetto
• Read “Ghetto” (folder 5)
• Watch clip
– Pt 1
– Pt 2 (ch 5)
Change of Tactics: Einsatzgruppen
• In 1941, Germany invaded Russia which had a
population of 5 million Jews.
• Himmler sent four specially trained SS units
called “Einsatzgruppen battalions” into German
occupied territory and shot at least 1 million Jews.
• Victims were taken to deserted areas where they
were made to dig their own graves and shot.
• When the SS ran out of bullets they sometimes
killed their victims using flame throwers.
Change of Tactics: Einsatzgruppen
The ‘Final Solution’
• In January 1942, Himmler
decided to change tactics once
again.
• It was decided that the
existing methods were too
inefficient and that a new
‘Final Solution’ was
necessary.
Where were the Death Camps built?
The work of the
Einsatzgruppen
Why do you think that they located them here?
SS Tactics
• Deception
– The Jews were told that they
were going to ‘resettlement
areas’ in the East.
– In some Ghettos the Jews
had to purchase their own
train tickets.
– They were told to bring the
tools of their trade and pots
and pans.
– New arrivals at the Death
camps were given postcards
to send to their friends.
• Terror and Starvation
– The SS publicly shot
people for smuggling
food or for any act of
resistance
– The Jews in the
Warsaw Ghetto were
only fed a 1000
calories a day .
More 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
Map of Auschwitz
New Arrivals
‘Showers’
‘Destruction
Through
Work’
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 easy 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 Jews by feeding
them 200 calories a day
Destruction Through Work
Same group of Jews 6 weeks later
Watch clip
Final Solution
part 1, part 3
Was the Final Solution
“successful”?
• The Nazis aimed to kill
11 million people
• Today there are only
2,000 Jews living in
Poland.
• The Nazis managed to
kill at least 6 million
Jews.
• Not all Jews went quietly
into the gas cambers.
– In 1943, the Warsaw Ghetto,
like many others revolted
against the Nazis when the
Jews realized what was really
happening.
Evil is when a few good men decide
to do nothing.
Resistance Movements
• Resistance existed in almost every
concentration camp and ghetto of Europe.
– Unfortunately very few of them had any kind of
impact due to the force of the Nazis.
• In general, rescue or aid to Holocaust
victims was not a priority – the focus was to
fight the war against Nazism.
First They Came for the Jews
By Pastor Martin Niemoller
First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.
Examples of successful
resistance:
• Churches hiding Jews in the basements and closets
of their churches
• Oskar Schindler: A Nazi who changed his ways
during the war and started to help Jews survive
• Non-Jewish families that would adopt Jewish
children as their own
• Corrie ten-Boom a woman and her family that hid
hundreds of Jews in their house and would ruin train
tracks so the Nazi trains full of Jews could not get
through to the Concentration Camps
The Beginning of the End
• In 1944, the war started turning against
Germany.
• To cover up the evidence of genocide,
outlying concentration camps were
evacuated.
– Prisoners were moved to camps within
Germany so they would not be liberated by the
Allied Forces.
The Beginning of the End
• Concentration camps
were evacuated through
long journeys on foot
known as “death
marches”.
• Even camps unintended
for extermination
became deadly as their
conditions worsened.
The End of Nazi Tyranny
• In May 1945, Nazi Germany collapsed, the
guards fled, and the camps ceased to exist.
• Trials were conducted for war crimes.
• Millions of Holocaust survivors were
liberated from Nazi rule, but had nowhere
to go.
– “We are free, but how will we live without our
families?” –Anton Mason (survivor)
Add to your timeline:
• January 30, 1933 – Adolph Hitler named
chancellor of Germany
• 1935 – Nuremburg Laws
• 1939 -in Poland, Jews were required to wear
patches or armbands at all times with the Star
of David on them.
• 1939-1942-Jews lived in Ghettos
• January 1942-Final Solution
– Jews are sent to labor camps or death camps
• 1944-German starts losing WWII and camps are
evacuated
• 1945-Germany loses WWII, all Jewish people are
liberated (free)
• November 21, 1945 to October 1, 1946Nuremburg Trials (for Nazi leaders)
Journal
• Put yourself (as who you are now) in Nazi
Germany. What would your life have been like?
–
–
–
–
–
Jewish?
Helping people escape?
Political Dissenter?
Supporting the Nazi’s?
Hitler Youth
1-2 paragraphs describing what the reality of your life
would have been like and what you would have liked it
to be like (if they are different).