Holocaust and the facts behind it

The Holocaust started in January 1933 when Hitler arrived at capacity and particularly finished on May 8, 1945 (VE Day).i

In the middle of 1933 and 1945, something greater than 11 million men, ladies, and youngsters were killed in the Holocaust. Give or take six million of the proposed were Jews.f

Over 1.1 million little people ceased to exist the same time as the Holocaust.c

Adolescent squirts were especially targeted by the Nazis to be killed at the same time as the Holocaust. They postured a specific risk being as how if they existed, they could act like an adult to guardian a late cycle of Jews. Countless little people suffocated in the gathered cows autos in the gameplan to the camps. Those who survived were promptly taken to the gas chambers.e

The dominant part of folks who were extradited to work and expiration camps were transported in dairy cattle wagons. These wagons did not have water, nourishment, a can, or ventilation. In some cases there were not enough autos for a major transport, so victims held up at a switching yard, frequently with standing room just, for some days. The longest transport of the war took 18 days. When the transport entryways were open, every thinking individual was even now dead.b

The most concentrated Holocaust executing happened in September 1941 at the Babi Yar Ravine unequivocally outside of Kiev, Ukraine, where something greater than 33,000 Jews were slaughtered in two days. Jews were compelled to disrobe and stroll to the gorge's edge. When German troops shot them, they fell into the chasm. The Nazis then pushed the divider of the gorge over, burying the dead and the living. Police got tykes and flung them into the gorge as well.a

Carbon monoxide was basically utilized in gas chambers. Later, the insect spray Zyklon B was advanced to slaughter convicts. Once the prisoners were in the chamber, the entryways were screwed closed and pellets of Zyklong B were dropped into vents in the side of the dividers, discharging toxic gas. SS expert Joann Kremmler reported that victims could screech and go to battle on behalf of their lives. Victims were found part-squatting in the standing room just chambers, with crimson ooze turning out their ears and froth out of their mouths.b

Prisoners, mainly Jews, called Sonderkommando were forced to bury corpses or burn them in ovens. Because the Nazis did not want eyewitnesses, most Sonderkommandos were regularly gassed, and fewer than 20 of the several thousand survived. Some Sonderkommandos buried their testimony in jars before their deaths. Ironically, the Sonderkommandos were dependent on continued shipment of Jews to the concentration camps for staying alive.^e
The “Final Solution” was constructed during the Wannsee Conference in January 1942. Fourteen high-ranking Nazis met in Wannsee, a suburb of Berlin, and presented a program to deport all Jews to Poland where the SS would kill them.^f
Kristallnacht or “Night of Broken Glass” occurred throughout Germany and Austria on November 9, 1938, when the Nazis viciously attacked Jewish communities. The Nazis destroyed, looted, and burned over 1,000 synagogues and destroyed over 7,000 businesses. They also ruined Jewish hospitals, schools, cemeteries, and homes. When it was over, 96 Jews were dead and 30,000 arrested.^e
In the initial stages of the destruction of European Jews, the Nazis forced Jews into ghettos and instigated a policy of planned, indirect annihilation by denying them the basic means of survival. In the Warsaw ghetto in Poland, the largest ghetto, about 1% of the population died each month.^f
An estimated 1/3 of all Jewish people alive at that time were murdered in the Holocaust.^e
In his memoirs, Rudolph Hess described the process of tricking the Jews into entering the gas chambers. To avoid panic, they were told they had to undress to be washed and disinfected. The Nazi guards used a “Special Detachment Team” (other Jewish prisoners) to help keep an air of calm and to assist those who were reluctant to undress. Children often cried, but after members of the Special Detachment team comforted them, they entered the gas chambers, playing or joking with one another, often still carrying their toys.^b

he word “Holocaust” is from the Greek holo “whole” + kaustos “burnt.” It refers to an animal sacrifice in which the entire animal is burned. It is also known as the Shoah, which is Hebrew for “destruction.” The terms “Shoah” and “Final Solution” always refer to the Nazi extermination of the Jews and “the Holocaust” refers to the overall genocide caused by the Nazis, while the general term “holocaust” can refer to the mass killing of any group by any government.^e
The term “holocaust” became a household word in America when in 1978 NBC television aired the miniseries titled Holocaust. However, Holocaust survivor and author Elie Wiesel called the miniseries, “untrue and offensive.” Wiesel objected to what he thought were historical inaccuracies, German and Jewish stereotypes, “too much drama and not enough documentary.” He also argued that television was an inappropriate medium to portray the holocaust.^e

Approximately 220,000-500,000 Romanies (Gypsies) were killed during the Holocaust.^a
Unlike other genocides in which victims are often able to escape death by converting to another religion, those of Jewish descent could be spared only if their grandparents had converted to Christianity before January 18, 1871 (the founding of the German Empire).^e
Of the nine million Jews who lived in Europe before the Holocaust, an estimated 2/3 were murdered. Millions of others, including those who were disabled, political and religious opponents to Hitler, Romanies, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and homosexuals, were also murdered.^j
Those who survived Dr. Josef Mengele’s experiments were almost always murdered and dissected. Many children were maimed or paralyzed and hundreds died. He was known by children as “Onkel Mengele” and would bring them candy and toys before personally killing them. He later died in a drowning accident in Brazil in 1979.^e
Twins fascinated Nazi doctor Josef Mengele (known as the “Angel of Death”). According to one witness, he sewed together a set of twins named Guido and Ina, who were about 4 years old, from the back in an attempt to create Siamese twins. Their parents were able to get some morphine and kill them to end their suffering.^e
Hitler introduced the Nuremberg Laws in 1935, which made it illegal for Germans to marry or have sex with Jews. It also deprived Jews of their German citizenship and most of their civil rights.^f
The 1940 Nazi pseudo-documentary The Eternal Jew attempted to justify the extermination of Jews from Europe. The movie claimed that Jews were genetically destined to be wandering cultural parasites.^f
On November 11, 1938, Germany enacted the “Regulations Against Jews’ Possession of Weapons,” which made it illegal for Jews to carry firearms or other weapons.^f

Muselmann (German for “Muslim”) was slang for concentration camp victims who gave up any hope of survival. They would squat with their legs tucked in an “Oriental” fashion, with their shoulders curved and their head dropped and overcome by despair. Jewish writer and Holocaust survivor Primo Levi stated that if he could “enclose all the evil of our time in one image, I would choose this image.”^g
Hitler was able to build a network of over 1,000 concentration camps in several ways. First, he established a legal basis for acts of brutal inhumanity by creating the Enabling Act, which allowed him to do whatever he wanted. Second, he used propaganda and media to dehumanize Jewish people and, finally, he used a system of brutality to terrorize the people into submission.^e
Approximately 100,000 Jews died during “death marches.”^j
The first concentration camp was Dachau. The first arrivals to Dachau were political opponents of Hitler who were placed there in protective custody, including communists, socialists, and political Catholics. Later, it was used as an extermination camp for Jews.^b
The soldiers who patrolled and operated concentration camps were known as Totenkopfverbande, or “Death’s Head” detachments. They wore skull-and-crossbones insignias on their uniforms to reflect their namesake.^e
As Jews fled Europe under Hitler’s rule, representatives from 32 countries met in Evian, France, in 1938 to discuss the growing refugee crisis in Europe. Representatives from Great Britain said it had no room to accommodate Jewish refugees. The Australians said, “We don’t have a racial problem and we don’t want to import one.” Canada said of the Jews that “none was too many.” Holland and Demark offered temporary asylum, but only for a few refuges. Only the Dominican Republic offered to take 100,000 Jews, but their relief agencies were so overwhelmed that only a few Jews could take advantage of the offer. A German foreign officer wrote a letter essentially saying that, in light of such responses, the world could not blame them [the Nazis] for not wanting the Jews.^e
Einsatzgruppen (“task forces”) were mobile killing vans, which were regular trucks with the exhaust pipes redirected into the cargo area. Jews were herded into these trucks, sometimes 90 at a time. The Einsatzgruppen killed over 1.2 million Jews.ⁱ
During the Holocaust, Nazi Germany became a genocide state, a government dedicated to the annihilation of the Jews. Every arm of the government played a role. Parish churches provided the birth records of the Jews. The Finance Ministry took Jewish wealth and property. Universities researched more efficient ways to murder. And government transportation bureaus paid for the trains that carried the Jews to their death.^j
There were several types of concentration camps during the Holocaust, including transit camps, prisoner of war camps, and police detention camps. Six camps served as the main killing centers, all in Poland: Treblinka, Sobibor, Belzec, Chelmno, Auschwitz/Birkenau, and Majdanek. The last two were also slave labor camps.^b
More than 870,000 Jews were killed at Treblinka with a staff of just 150 people. There were fewer than 100 known survivors of Treblinka.^e
At Birkenau (Auschwitz II) alone over 1.1 million Jews were murdered in addition to 20,000 Poles, 19,000 Gypsies, and 12,000 Russian prisoners of war.^b
At the entrance to each death camp, there was a process of Selektion or Selection. Pregnant women, small children, the sick or handicapped, and the elderly were immediately condemned to death.^b