How Did the Holocaust Happen? the Holocaust Is a Big and Difficult Topic, and It Is Extremely Difficult to Do It Justice Without a Teacher
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Y10 History Week beginning 15/06/20 Lesson Three: How did the Holocaust happen? The Holocaust is a big and difficult topic, and it is extremely difficult to do it justice without a teacher. It is also one which needs to be treated with sensitivity. We cannot hope to teach you about it in the way we would like during the current circumstances. However, your teacher can and will answer further questions that you have about this material through Teams or via email. As a minimum, work through the tasks that describe and explain the escalation of the Holocaust over time. Much of this is connected to your earlier work about increasing Jewish persecution and the Nazis’ discrimination towards minority groups. Once you have done this, there are many more activities provided here from the Holocaust Education Trust to give you a better understanding of how and why the Holocaust occurred. INTRODUCTION In order to effectively study the Holocaust, it is important to understand what the term means. In this first activity we will consider that, whilst there are different versions of a definition of the Holocaust, they all have certain things in common. The Holocaust is not a simple subject, and as you study it you might find you come away with more questions than answers. This is absolutely fine and we encourage you to think about these questions as you work through all of the activities to come. Ideally a definition of the Holocaust would give some indication of a response to important questions such as: Who were the victims? Who were the perpetrators? When did this happen? Where did this happen? How did it happen? Why did this happen? Answering these questions in a short definition is very difficult. One historically accurate and academically acceptable definition that the Holocaust Educational Trust uses is: The Holocaust was the murder of approximately six million Jewish men, women and children by Nazi Germany and its collaborators during the Second World War. Whilst this does not respond to all of the questions above, a historian would accept it as a valid definition, even if not a perfect one. In the coming activities you will explore these questions and discover some of the complexities of the Holocaust – complexities which make any definition seem inadequate. WHAT DO WE MEAN BY THE TERM ‘HOLOCAUST’? The word ‘Holocaust’ comes from ancient Greek: ‘holos’ means ‘completely’ and ‘kaustos’ means ‘burnt’. The word was first used to describe religious sacrifices. For this reason, some people have objected to the term ‘Holocaust’ and prefer to use the Hebrew word ‘Shoah’, which means ‘catastrophe’. The term ‘Holocaust’ means different things to different people. However, there are several key themes that run through any definition of the word. Below are three definitions of what the Holocaust was. Each has been written by an institution that helps to commemorate and educate about the Holocaust. TASK 1 Complete the following tasks based on the definitions below: Read through the definitions and underline any terms or phrases they have in common. (You may need to look up any new words you find.) What do all of the definitions have in common? What can we learn from this? DEFINITIONS OF THE HOLOCAUST “The Holocaust was the systematic murder of Europe's Jews by the Nazis and their collaborators during the Second World War. For the first time in history, industrial methods were used for the mass extermination of a whole people. Between 1933 and 1945, Jews were targeted for discrimination, segregation and extermination. […] The Nazis enslaved and murdered millions of others as well. Political opponents, Roma and Sinti (Gypsies), homosexuals, prisoners of conscience, people with physical and mental disabilities, Poles, Soviet prisoners of war and others were killed or died in camps as a result of neglect, starvation or disease.” Imperial War Museum, London, UK “The Holocaust was the murder of approximately six million Jews by the Nazis and their collaborators. Between the German invasion of the Soviet Union in the summer of 1941 and the end of the war in Europe in May 1945, Nazi Germany and its accomplices strove to murder every Jew under their domination. Because Nazi discrimination against the Jews began with Hitler’s accession to power in January 1933, many historians consider this the start of the Holocaust era. The Jews were not the only victims of Hitler’s regime, but they were the only group that the Nazis sought to destroy entirely.” Yad Vashem, Jerusalem, Israel “The Holocaust was the systematic, bureaucratic, state-sponsored persecution and murder of approximately six million Jews by the Nazi regime and its collaborators. During the era of the Holocaust, German authorities also targeted other groups because of their perceived “racial inferiority”: Roma (Gypsies), the disabled, and some of the Slavic peoples (Poles, Russians, and others). Other groups were persecuted on political, ideological, and behavioural grounds, among them Communists, Socialists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and homosexuals.” United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, D.C., USA TASK 2 Read through the article below, detailing how persecution against the Jews escalated. For each year, explain how these events either made it easier for the Nazis to push for further discrimination against Jews, or how it made it harder for the Nazis to ‘dial back’ and reduce their discrimination against Jews. Murder on an industrial scale- A Timeline of the Holocaust 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 Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany in 1933. Hitler rose to power in Germany by offering a version of history in which the depression of the 1930s was the fault of the Jews. 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. “I refuse to admit that the police are a defence squad for Jewish stores.” - Herman Göring, reported in the Times, 11 March 1933 1934- Hitler declared Führer In a speech broadcast on BBC radio in November 1934, Churchill warned of the Nazi ‘gospel of intolerance and racial pride'. 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. “Hurrah for the Blackshirts.”- Daily Mail, January 1934. ‘Blackshirts’ was the nickname for the British Union of Fascists. 1935- Anti-Semitism as law The Nuremberg Laws defined a Jew as anyone with three or more Jewish grandparents. Four German grandparents were needed to be classified as German. 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’. “Like so many Nazi catchwords… “May Jewry perish!” – was meant literally and will be literally brought to pass if the fanatics have their way.” -The Times, 8 November 1935 1936- The Third Reich on show The Berlin Olympics of 1936 was a propaganda success and marked Germany's return to the world stage after the First World War. Hitler's anti-Semitic rhetoric had turned many Germans against the Jews. But a different propaganda strategy was needed for a global audience. The Summer Olympics in Berlin gave the Nazis a platform to project a crafted image to the world. Despite calls for boycotts, the games were a success. Anti-Jewish notices were removed and German spectators cheered black athlete Jesse Owens to four gold medals. Visitors saw a tolerant Reich. However, three days after the games ended, the head of the Olympic Village, Wolfgang Fürstner, killed himself as he would soon be dismissed due to his Jewish ancestry under the Nuremberg Laws. “This contact with many nationalities and races has made the Germans more human again.” Frederick T Birchall reports on the Berlin Olympics, New York Times, 16 August 1936 1937- Escalation of anti-Jewish propaganda As the world’s eyes were on the battle between Fascism and Communism in Spain, the Nazis stepped up their erosion of civil rights in Germany.