US IB English-Maus: The Holocaust

The Holocaust was the systematic, bureaucratic, state-sponsored persecution and murder of six million Jews(including one and half million children) by the Nazi regime and its collaborators. It is the sum total of all anti-Jewish actions carried out by the Nazi regime between 1933 and 1945: from stripping the German Jews of their legal and economic status in the 1930s`; segregating and starvation in the various occupied countries; the murder of close to six million Jews in Europe. Acts of oppression and murder of various ethnic and political groups such as the Roma (Gypsies), Slavs (Russians and other Eastern European nations) and the disabled in Europe by the Nazis is also a part of the Holocaust.

The biblical word Shoah (which has been used to mean “destruction” since the Middle Ages) became the standard Hebrew term for the murder of European Jewry as early as the early 1940s. The word Holocaust, which came into use in the 1950s as the corresponding term, originally meant a sacrifice burnt entirely on the altar. The selection of these two words with religious origins reflects recognition of the unprecedented nature and magnitude of the events. Many understand Holocaust as a general term for the crimes and horrors perpetrated by the Nazis.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Introduction to the Holocaust

Yad Vashem The Holocaust Definition and Preliminary Discussion

Map of SS-designated concentration camps and subcamps, 1933–1945. Each large dot represents the main camp with the smaller dots referencing subcamps. The original map is animated to show the expansion of the camp system over time (Data source: The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos, Vol. 1 [2009]). —Alexander Yule and Anne Kelly Knowles

Crematorium at German Concentration Camp

The term concentration camp refers to a camp in which people are detained or confined, usually under harsh conditions and without regard to legal norms of arrest and imprisonment that are acceptable in a constitutional democracy. In Nazi Germany between 1933 and 1945, concentration camps (Konzentrationslager; KL or KZ) were an integral feature of the regime. Nazi Germany established about 20,000 camps to imprison its many millions of victims. These camps were used for a range of purposes including forced-labor camps, transit camps which served as temporary way stations, and killing centers built primarily or exclusively for mass murder. From its rise to power in 1933, the Nazi regime built a series of detention facilities to imprison and eliminate so-called "enemies of the state."

The Nazis established killing centers for efficient mass murder. Unlike concentration camps, which served primarily as detention and labor centers, killing centers (also referred to as "extermination camps" or "death camps") were almost exclusively "death factories." German SS and police murdered nearly 2,700,000 Jews in the killing centers either by asphyxiation with poison gas or by shooting. The first killing center was Chelmno, which opened in December 1941. In 1942 the Nazis opened the Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka killing centers to systematically murder the Jews. The largest killing center was Auschwitz-Birkenau, which by spring 1943 had four gas chambers (using Zyklon B poison gas) in operation. At the height of the deportations, up to 6,000 Jews were gassed each day at Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland.

USHMM Nazi Concentration Camps

USHMM German Nazi Killing Centers

USHMM German Concentration Camp System 1933-1939

The Auschwitz concentration camp complex was the largest of its kind established by the Nazi regime. It included three main camps, all of which deployed incarcerated prisoners at forced labor. One of them also functioned for an extended period as a killing center. The camps were located approximately 37 miles west of Krakow in German Occupied Poland.

Auschwitz contained the facilities for a killing center. It played a central role in the German plan to kill the Jews of Europe. During the summer and autumn of 1941, Zyklon B gas was introduced into the German concentration camp system as a means for murder. Gas chamber  went into operation in January 1942 and operated through the fall of 1944. Four large crematorium buildings were constructed between March and June 1943. Gassing operations continued  at Auschwitz-Birkenau until November 1944.

On January 27, 1945, the Soviet army entered Auschwitz and liberated around 7,000 remaining prisoners, most of whom were ill and dying. It is estimated that the SS and police deported at a minimum 1.3 million people to Auschwitz complex between 1940 and 1945. Of these, the camp authorities murdered 1.1 million.

USHMM Information on Auschwitz

The Auschwitz Album (Yad Vashem)

Murder on an industrial scale: The discovery of Nazi concentration camps towards the end of WW2 revealed the full horror of Hitler's plans to exterminate Europe's Jews and other minorities. The media reports of the systematic slaughter shocked the world.
What happened in Germany to lead to these events? And how much was known about the mass murders during the years that led to one of the darkest chapters of the 20th Century?

1933
Nazis in power
In January, Adolf Hitler was appointed Chancellor of a coalition government, his own National Socialist party being the largest in parliament. Hitler quickly moved to cement his power by suspending many civil liberties and allowing imprisonment without trial. By March, the first Nazi concentration camp was established at Dachau, not to imprison Jews but to hold political dissidents. Further laws targeted Jews, restricting the jobs they could hold and revoking their German citizenship. Anti-Semitic sentiment increased as the Jewish population was blamed for many of Germany's recent and historical problems.

1934
Hitler declared Führer
By August, Hitler’s grip on power was secured after a bloody purge that destroyed all opposition in the party. He declared himself Führer, or leader. His grip on German society tightened and those who publicly objected to Nazi policies were often sentenced to hard labour in the rapidly expanding concentration camp system. Jews were subjected to further laws restricting their rights, but rising anti-Semitism in Europe wasn’t limited to Germany. In the UK, Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists gained support from sections of the public and press, even filling the Royal Albert Hall in April.

1935
Anti-Semitism as law
In September, policy escalated. The Nuremberg Laws reduced Jews to second-class citizens because of their 'impure' blood.
Defined by the religion of their grandparents rather than by their own beliefs, Jews were viewed as having impure blood lines. The new laws were taught in schools, cementing anti-Semitism in German culture. Most Germans kept quiet, often benefiting when Jews lost jobs and businesses. Persecution of other minorities also escalated: the police were given new powers to arrest homosexuals and compulsory abortions were administered to women considered to be ‘hereditarily ill’.

To read the full timeline, please go to the BBC site, by clicking HERE.

The Holocaust and WWII TImeline from the Holocaust Encyclopedia at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum can be found HERE while a more detailed version can be found HERE

The Holocaust Timeline from Israel's Holocaust Museum Yad Vashem can be found HERE

The Chronology of Jewish Persecution in the Holocaust from the Jewish Virtual Library Online can be found HERE

The Teacher's Timeline Guide to the Holocaust from the Florida Center for Instructional Technology, College of Education at the University of South Florida can be found HERE

The Timeline of the Holocaust from the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles can be found HERE

Timeline source: “The Holocaust and WWII Timeline” The Holocaust Encyclopedia information retrieved from:  and timeline

An online version of the book The Holocaust Chronicle, published by Publications International LTD in April 2000 as a not-for-profit project can be found HERE

Raphael Lemkin (1900-1959)

"The term “genocide” did not exist prior to 1944. It is a very specific term, referring to violent crimes committed against groups with the intent to destroy the existence of the group. In 1944, a Polish-Jewish lawyer named Raphael Lemkin sought to describe Nazi policies of systematic murder, including the destruction of the European Jews. He formed the word “genocide” by combining geno-, from the Greek word for race or tribe, with -cide, from the Latin word for killing. In proposing this new term, Lemkin had in mind “a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves.”"

There are several books available in the John Jay Library collection about Raphael Lemkin and his struggle to have the word "genocide" adopted. In particular there is "Raphael Lemkin and the struggle for the Genocide Convention" by John Cooper (Call Number Stacks - HV6322.7 .C67 2008) and "Lemkin on genocide" by Raphael Lemkin himself (Call Number Stacks - HV6322.7 .L46 2011).

USHMM Definition of Genocide

The Nazis frequently used euphemistic language to disguise the true nature of their crimes. They used the term “Final Solution” to refer to their plan to annihilate the Jewish people. It is not known when the leaders of Nazi Germany definitively decided to implement the "Final Solution." The genocide, or mass destruction, of the Jews was the culmination of a decade of increasingly severe discriminatory measures.

USHMM "Final Solution" Overview and Encyclopedia Entry

After the war, some of those responsible for crimes committed during the Holocaust were brought to trial. Nuremberg, Germany, was chosen as a site for trials that took place in 1945 and 1946. Judges from the Allied powers -- Great Britain, France, the Soviet Union, and the United States -- presided over the hearings of twenty-two major Nazi criminals.

Twelve prominent Nazis were sentenced to death. Most of the defendants admitted to the crimes of which they were accused, although most claimed that they were simply following the orders of a higher authority. Many more criminals were never tried. Some fled Germany to live abroad. After Nuremberg trials of Nazis continued to take place both in Germany and many other countries. Adolf Eichmann, who had helped plan and carry out the deportations of millions of Jews, was brought to trial in Israel in 1961. The testimony of hundreds of witnesses, many of them survivors, was followed all over the world. Eichmann was found guilty and executed in 1962

USHMM Nuremberg Trials

Yad Vashem Nuremberg Trials

Jewish Virtual Library Nuremberg Trials

Anne Frank was one of over one million Jewish children who died in the Holocaust. She was born Annelies Marie Frank on June 12, 1929, in Frankfurt, Germany, to Otto and Edith Frank. During the first half of July, Anne and her family went into hiding in an apartment which would eventually hide four Dutch Jews as well—Hermann, Auguste, and Peter van Pels, and Fritz Pfeffer.  On August 4, 1944, the Gestapo (German Secret State Police) discovered the hiding place after being tipped off by an anonymous Dutch caller. Anne and her sister, Margot were transferred to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp near Celle, in northern Germany in late October 1944. Both sisters died of typhus in March 1945, just a few weeks before British troops liberated Bergen-Belsen on April 15, 1945. Only Anne's father, Otto, survived the war. Soviet forces liberated Otto at Auschwitz on January 27, 1945. While in hiding, Anne kept a diary in which she recorded her fears, hopes, and experiences. Found in the secret apartment after the family was arrested, the diary was kept for Anne by Miep Gies, one of the people who had helped hide the Franks. It was published after the war in many languages and is used in thousands of middle school and high school curricula in Europe and the Americas. Anne Frank has become a symbol for the lost promise of the children who died in the Holocaust.

USHMM Encyclopedia on Anne Frank

Anne Frank Museum Amsterdam

Above: The United Partisan Organization (refered to as FPO from the Yiddish initials for the group name "Fareynikte Partizaner Organizatsye") a Jewish resistance group organized in the Vilna Ghetto in what is today Lithuania. In the center of the photo, fourth from the left is the famous Hebrew poet Abba Kovner

The Final Solution was a planned, methodical process of mass murder by the German state.

The Jews were confined to ghettos where conditions were harsh and many subsequently starved. Underground groups were formed, initially engaging in resisting the Nazis by operating illegal schools, printing presses and other clandestine activities. Only as they became aware of the Nazi plans for extermination, which was already in progress, did these groups start to organize armed resistance. Between 1941 and 1943, underground resistance movements developed in approximately 100 ghettos in Nazi-occupied eastern Europe (about one-fourth of all ghettos), especially in Poland, Lithuania, Belorussia, and the Ukraine. Their main goals were to organize uprisings, break out of the ghettos, and join partisan units in the fight against the Germans. Despite numerous difficulties, uprisings against the German authorities broke out in several ghettos. The most famous of which was the uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto. Jewish resistance also existed in settings other than the ghettos. In some of the extermination camps, uprisings were organized and carried out; Jews fought the Germans as partisans in the forests, sometimes together with local resistance groups and sometimes in separate units; Jewish soldiers took part in the fighting in all the Allied armies that fought the Nazis.

Most Jewish armed resistance took place after 1942, as a desperate effort, after it became clear to those who resisted that the Nazis had murdered most of their families and their coreligionists. Despite great obstacles (such as lack of armaments and training, conducting operations in a hostile zone, reluctance to leave families behind, and the ever-present Nazi terror), many Jews throughout German-occupied Europe attempted armed resistance against the Germans. As individuals and in groups, Jews engaged in opposition to the Germans and their Axis partners. Jewish resistance units operated in France, Belgium, the Ukraine, Belorussia, Lithuania, and Poland. Jews also fought in general French, Italian, Yugoslav, Greek, and Soviet resistance organizations.

USHMM Armed Jewish Resistance: Partisans

USHMM Jewish Uprisings in Ghettos and Camps

Jewish Virtual Library: Resistance to Nazi Genocide

Anti-Defamation League: Resistance During the Holocaust (PDF)

High-ranking U.S. Army officers inspect the newly liberated Ohrdruf concentration camp.
Pictured are: Generals Dwight D. Eisenhower, George Patton and Omar Bradley.
Also pictured is Jules Grad, correspondent for the U.S. Army newspaper, "Stars and Stripes" (at the far right).

As Allied troops moved across Europe in a series of offensives against Nazi Germany, they began to encounter tens of thousands of concentration camp prisoners. Many of these prisoners had survived forced death marches into the interior of Germany from camps in occupied Poland. These prisoners were suffering from starvation and disease. Soviet forces were the first to approach a major Nazi camp, reaching Majdanek near Lublin, Poland, in July 1944. Surprised by the rapid Soviet advance, the Germans attempted to hide the evidence of mass murder by demolishing the camp. Camp staff set fire to the large crematorium used to burn bodies of murdered prisoners, but in the hasty evacuation the gas chambers were left standing. In the summer of 1944, the Soviets also overran the sites of the Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka killing centers. The Soviets liberated Auschwitz, the largest killing center and concentration camp, in January 1945.

US forces liberated the Buchenwald concentration camp near Weimar, Germany, on April 11, 1945, a few days after the Nazis began evacuating the camp. On the day of liberation, an underground prisoner resistance organization seized control of Buchenwald to prevent atrocities by the retreating camp guards. American forces liberated more than 20,000 prisoners at Buchenwald. They also liberated Dora-Mittelbau, Flossenbürg, Dachau, and Mauthausen. British forces liberated concentration camps in northern Germany, including Neuengamme and Bergen-Belsen. They entered the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, near Celle, in mid-April 1945. Some 60,000 prisoners, most in critical condition because of a typhus epidemic, were found alive. More than 10,000 of them died from the effects of malnutrition or disease within a few weeks of liberation.

Jewish Virtual Library: Allied Liberators

USHMM Liberation of Concentration Camps