Historical Context:During the 20th Century, many leaders were starting their rise in empire. But in Germany,this is where Adolf Hitler came to power. The unit the Holocaust belongs to is An Age of Revolution, Industry and Empire. It belongs to this unit because during this time countries were beginning to start themselves up and become better and more modern. Hitler thought the world would be better without the Jewish people. He was beginning to make his empire and evolve into an empire of communism.
Summary:The Holocaust began in 1933 when Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany and The Holocaust ended in 1945 when the Nazis were defeated by the Allied powers. The term "Holocaust," originally from the Greek word "holokauston" which means
"sacrifice by fire," refers to the Nazi's persecution and planned slaughter of the Jewish people. Adolf Hitler established the "Nazi Party." These people represented themselves with a swastika , a strange looking structure that signified the party's existence. On April 1, 1933, the Nazis instigated their first action against German Jews by announcing a boycott of all Jewish-run businesses. Nazis then issued additional anti-Jews laws over the next several years. For example, some of these laws excluded Jews from places like parks, fired them from civil service jobs (i.e. government jobs), made Jews registertheir property, and prevented Jewish doctors from working on anyone other than
Jewish patients. After the beginning of World War II, Nazis began ordering all
Jews to live within certain, very specific, areas of big cities, called ghettos.
In most ghettos, Nazis ordered the Jews to establish a Judenrat (a Jewish
council) to both administer Nazi demands and to regulate the internal life of
the ghetto. Nazis would then order deportations from the ghettos. In some of the
large ghettos, 1,000 people per day were loaded up in trains and sent to either
a concentration camp or a death camp. Although many people refer to all Nazi
camps as "concentration camps," there were actually a number of different kinds
of camps, including concentration camps, extermination camps, labor camps,
prisoner-of-war camps, and transit camps. From 1933 until 1938, most of the
prisoners in the concentration camps were political prisoners (i.e. people who
spoke or acted in some way against Hitler or the Nazis) and people the Nazis
labeled as "asocial." Life within Nazi concentration camps was horrible.
Prisoners were forced to do hard physical labor and yet given tiny rations.
Prisoners slept three or more people per crowded wooden bunk (no mattress or
pillow). Torture within the concentration camps was common and deaths were
frequent. At a number of Nazi concentration camps Nazi doctors conducted medical
experiments on prisoners against their will. While concentration camps were
meant to work and starve prisoners to death, extermination camps were built for
the sole purpose of killing large groups of people quickly and efficiently. The
Nazis built six extermination camps: Chelmno, Belzec,Solibor, Treblinka,
Auschwitz, and Madjdanek. (Auschwitz and Majdanek were both concentration and
extermination camps.) Prisoners transported to these extermination camps were
told to undress to take a shower. Rather than a shower, the prisoners were
herded into gas chambers and killed. (At Chelmno, the prisoners were herded into
gas vans instead of gas chambers.) Auschwitz was the largest concentration and
extermination camp built. It is estimated that 1.1 million people were killed at
Auschwitz. These people lived through so many hardships and they deserve every
piece of distinction they deserve. For someone to go through something like
this, you can't do anything but feel for them and open the eyes of others to
what has happened. The Holocaust was truly a time of sadness and despair , I give my full respect to every single person that was involved in this unseemly event.
Websites:
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) - www.ushmm.orgMuseum of Tolerance - www.museumoftolerance.com
Questions:
What motivated survivors to live from one day to the next?
Why did Hitler hate the Jewish people?
About our Blogger:
I'm a sophomore and I love to play piano, I enjoy playing volleyball, and I love to watch movies and t.v. The Holocaust was an important event to me because in eight grade I took a trip to the Museum of Tolerance. Throughout that trip, I was exposed to the the facts and artifacts of the holocaust exhibit. There was plenty of information about the holocaust and that trip completely changed my perspective on life. It makes me sick that there are people in the world that think about these things but I'm grateful to know that there is a day where we can remember the people that were involved in the holocaust. This is truly an event worth knowing. So, maybe if you have time one day, you should take a trip down to the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles. (:
