The Holocaust Tragedy - Essay Example

 The Holocaust The Holocaust serves as one of the most horrible as well as most disputed and argued incidents occurred during the first half of twentieth century, which startled the entire globe because of the miseries and atrocities claimed by the Jews they had to undergo at the hands of the Nazi Germany during 1933-1945. The Nazi Party, according to the Jewish community, inflicted mayhem and cruelties out of sheer feelings of hatred and abhorrence for Jews; they not only made the Jewish men prey to their ethno-racial prejudice and religious discrimination, but also killed women, elderly and even over one million children in cold blood, in order to take revenge of the alleged support rendered by some European Jews to the enemies of Germany during WWI. It is claimed that nearly six million Jews were massacred during these twelve years through different painful means, besides other cruelties inflicted upon the community. “Between 1941 and 1945, five to six million Jews were systematically murdered by the Nazi regime, its allies, and its surrogates in the Nazi-occupied territories. Yet despite the extraordinary scale and intensity of the genocide, its prominence in recent decades was far from preordained.” (Mayer, 1988:107) Somehow, the Nazis and pro-Nazis refute(d) the very claim by declaring it an infamous blur on the very face of their party and its leader Adolf Hitler. They are of the opinion that the Nazi government persecuted only the traitors and the supporters of the rivals of Germany in order to suppress the rebellion and revolt against the German nation at large in order to escape any further treachery within Germany against her army and leadership on the one hand, and to save the country from dividing into ethnic, racial and religious groups and communities on the other. Since unity of a nation is vehemently necessary one during the time of war and peace, the communities challenging the unity and playing into the hands of the foes must be taught a remarkable lesson in order to avoid defeat, chaos and turmoil in the country. Consequently, the Germans, according to the pro-Nazi claimants, did not kill the Jews en masse; on the contrary, the entire claims portraying holocaust are the product of the USA and her allies designed and planned to defame their opponent Adolf Hitler and Germany in such a nefarious manner that the future German generations would neither gather courage to raise any voice against the UK and USA altogether, nor could they seek the support from the Jewish community in order to fight war on some justified cause and issue. Hence, the Holocaust had been a burning issue as well as a moot point between pro-Jewish and pro-Nazis for the last six decades, and both the groups claim themselves as innocent and guiltless, which had to face the conspiracies, trials and opposition from the rivals. Additionally, since Hitler sought the domination of the great and superior German nation, he intended to kill or kick out the sick, retarded, disable and infected people from Germany, so that German nation could be consisted of brave, talented, healthy and vigorous individuals. “Unwanted children, in the eyes of Hitler, were orphans, children in care because of emotional or behavior problems, adolescent non-conformists as well as children with physical disabilities or mental handicaps (in addition to Jewish, Gypsy and non-white children).” (holocaust-trc.org) Before embarking upon the topic under study, it would be advisable to briefly throw light upon the historical background of the catastrophe. By critically examining the history of the world at large, it becomes evident that human beings had been at daggers drawn against one another since man’s arrival on the very face of the earth. Hundreds of thousands of wars had been fought and battlefields had been arranged and decorated by the groups, communities, states and nations in order to subjugate the opponents in the name of seeking peace and justice by fighting against the people belonging to rival clans, communities, ethno-racial groups, and religious faiths. Hence, ethnicity, race and religion have always played dominant role in waging and fighting wars between the opponent forces, states and countries. History is replete with the examples of horrible wars, which not only cost millions of precious lives, but also left indelible imprints of destruction, ruination, chaos and annihilation in their aftermath on the lands and nations involved in the conflict and bloodshed. Twentieth century was the most destructive and fatal one in comparison with all the wars fought on the earth, as the two Great Wars also took place during the first half of the previous century, during which every type of cruelties and violations were exercised by the Europeans for obtaining supremacy over one another. The intensity of hatred was at such a high magnitude that the warring factions dragged ethno-racial and religious differences too in the battlefield, and inflicted punishments and penalties on the defenseless civilians too in cold blood just to humiliate their opponents and pressurize them in such a powerful manner that they could be forced to run away from the battlefield eventually. The purported holocaust was also the part of same campaign launched by the Nazi leadership of Third Reich to sustain the racial supremacy and political and financial domination of German nation over the rival states. The term holocaust is derived from Greek words, which simply mean whole annihilation or entire destruction. The Nazi Government, according to the Jewish and anti-Hitler sources, under the leadership of its Chancellor Adolf Hitler, inflicted different kinds of pains and sufferings upon the Jewish community that had been residing in Germany for decades, out of the feelings of sheer abhorrence for them. The Jews argued that the Nazis believed that since Germany had no grudge and enmity against the Jews, the Jewry had no right to stand by the UK and against Germany in WWI; on the contrary, the should have supported their nation at the hour of the need instead of forcing the USA to plunge into the war from the Allies side. Had the USA not entered into WWI, the Germany-led Centre Powers would not have to face the humiliating defeat at the hands of the Allies. Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire were broken into pieces; all the three had to relinquish their claims on the foreign lands situated in Africa and Asia; the Central Powers had to pay a huge war indemnity to the victorious Allies, and their countries were forced to bring political and social changes and reforms in the patterns adopted by the Allies. Consequently, the crown, thrown and royalty were vanished from Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire, and the UK style democracy made its sure headway. Moreover, Germany had to withdraw her claim on the lucrative and productive provinces Alsace and Lorraine, which she had won as war indemnity from France in 1871. Further, Germany had to observe starvation, joblessness and chaos in the aftermath of WWI, and the German nation was well aware of all the agonies it had been inflicted at the hands of the Allies. It is therefore the nation intended to take revenge from the nations and communities responsible for the miseries and atrocities inflicted and imposed upon it. Since the Jews were also the allies of the UK and the USA in First Great War, they turned out to be the target of the wrath of the German leadership as soon as German economy observed uplift and improvement on the advent of the intelligent and nationalist leadership in the person of Adolf Hitler in 1933. In addition, the US and Russian armies also consisted of Jew soldiers, and their governments had constructed synagogues and prayer centers for their comforts. “Interested in discipline and control, the pragmatic-minded war ministry authorized the establishment of Jewish soldiers’ prayer houses and synagogues. As a result, long before the dismantling of the Pale in 1917, permanent and not insignificant Jewish communities emerged around the congregations of reserve Jewish soldiers in several towns in both European and Asian parts of the Russian Empire far beyond the Pale of Settlement.” (Yohanan Petrovsky-Shtern, 2005:2) Once artist and passionate German in the prime of his youth, Hitler was also one among those nationalists, who had closely observed the humiliation of his country in the battlefield in 1918 after the US entry in the war in 1917; and during Versailles Treaty in 1919, when the members of German embassy and attaches were treated like prisoners during their stay in Versailles. The entire nation turned out to be furious against such maltreatment of their officials at the hands of the Allies. The unjust war indemnity and the economic collapse of the country added fuel to fire, and the nation elected Nazi Party to obtain the prestige and status Germany used to enjoy before WWI. There is no apparent reality in the allegation that Hitler maintained serious grudge against Jews, and viewed them as an ill-natured nation, which remained involved into mischievous and destructive activities as well as in conspiracies and intrigues in order to have more and more financial gains out of the mistakes and problems of other. It is therefore Hitler ordered for the construction of separate residential places for Jews, so that the traitors could be stopped from mixing with the patriots. On the other hand, Hitler aimed to separate all the communities that could turn out to be weak, conspirators and traitor at the eve of the imminent war against the rival European powers. Thus, the gypsies, Romanis and Polish were also kept in concentration and labor comps, along with the Jews, where they were treated like cattle, and forced labor was taken from them against which they got very low or no wages altogether. “Starting in 1938 and 1939, the “Reich Office of the Criminal Police” ordered about 3,000 men and women, who were capable of carrying out hard physical labor, to be deported to concentration camps. Himmler needed these prisoners for the development of an SS-controlled industry.” Hitler’s rising at the helm of German government in 1933 turned out to be a horrible and dreadful nightmare for the entire Jewish community of Germany, which left indelible impact of hatred and racial discrimination on the lives and minds of the Jews for future decades to come. The Jews were the most unwanted nation in the eyes of Hitler, which left no stone unturned to cause financial and political losses to the Christians, Muslims and the followers of other rival faiths. The existing literature created in fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, including martin Luther’s treaties, Christopher Marlow’s Jew of Malta, and Merchant of Venice by Sir William Shakespeare, had also developed the people’s minds against the Jews as an extremely prejudiced and selfish nation, which strived to take maximum benefit out of the problems and difficulties of others, and exploited the same for their personal gains. “In 1543, Martin Luther set out his “honest advice” as to how Jews should be treated. “First,” he wrote, “their synagogues should be set on fire, and whatever does not burn up should be covered or spread over with dirt so that no one may ever be able to see a cinder or stone of it.” Jewish homes, he urged, should likewise be “broken down or destroyed.” (Gilbert, 1987:19) The Jews deflowered and raped Aryan women as a religious custom, and killed them subsequently after quenching the thirst of their lust. Since Hitler strived for the building of a united and strong nation, consisted of sincere and true patriots, the Jews always appeared a round peg in the square hole of German unity. Thus, anti-Semitic sentiments prevailing in the hearts of the Nazis were expressed by treating the Jews very harshly. Most of these camps were established in the German-occupied parts of Poland, where prisoners of war (POWs) were also imprisoned along with the Jews. Every type of atrocities was considered fair on the Jews in the concentration camps, and there was no one to set the free from the clutches of the retaliating and revengeful Nazis. These camps were crowded with humans, which caused suffocation and breathing problems too, and the children kept in these camps kicked the bucket because of insufficient air necessary for human survival. “During 1942, trainload after trainload of Jewish men, women, and children were transported from countries all over Europe to Auschwitz, Treblinka, and four other major killing centers in German occupied Poland. By year’s end, about 4 million Jews were dead. During World War II (1939–1945), the Germans and their collaborators killed or caused the deaths of up to 6 million Jews.” (ushmm.org) The Jews were not the only community that was inflicted with holocaust. On the other hand, the Romanis, homosexuals and other non-German tribes and ethnic groups also faced the same fate. However, the Jews were the special target of Nazi hatred. The Jews were deprived of jobs, properties, pelf and possessions in Germany; they were ransacked, adversely hurt, wounded and humiliated at state level. It is stated that the Jewish women were raped, and men, children and elderly were killed at the hands of the Nazi forces during WWII. Consequently, the remaining German Jews had to flee from the country in order to save their life and honor. Renowned scientist and man of the millennium Einstein also belonged to the same Jewish population, who fled to the USA in late 1930s and invented atomic bomb for America, which was used against Japan in August 1945, killing one million people at the spot. It is a misconception that Hitler had declared the Jews as destructive by nature, and viewed them as an obnoxious group, which always remained engaged in the plans meant for destroying the others. It is therefore he looked for the methods to get rid of the Jews in order to retaliate from them the financial and territorial losses Germany had to undergo in the aftermath of WWI. On the contrary, he also applied the same rudeness towards the Russian and Polish citizens and prisoners, homosexuals and even his German political rivals. Thus, the Jews were not the only victim of the Nazi atrocities. On the contrary, Hitler was determined to crush all obstacles on the way to German supremacy over the rest of the world. He was strictly against the homosexuals, as they were pervert and deviants in his eyes, who had refuted the charms and pleasures nature offered to them. It is therefore Hitler did not allow inter-marriages between the Germans and gypsies. “In 1933 Roma were forced to undergo sterilization and in 1935 a special law forbade intermarriages of “Gypsies” and “Aryans”. Between 1936 and 1938 the two central institutions of “Gypsy” persecution were created, the so-called “Rassehygienische Forschungsstelle” (Research Centre for Racial Hygiene). (Baumgartner, 2001:3) Similarly, Hitler decreed of shifting the Jews to the concentrated camps, for his personal disliking for the community, as the Jews, according to him, not only remained indulged into mercenary gains and pelf, power and possession, but also they maintained vital role in the defeat of Central Powers during WWI. The Jews had supported the Allies through huge amount of money, strategies and tactics, which not only urged the USA to enter into the war from the Allies’ side in 1917, but also it caused the turn of tables in the Allies’ favor. As a result, the Central Powers, including Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire, had to bear the brunt of war, where they were deprived of large area of land in Europe as well as in the subjugated Asian and African states. Consequently, “the Germans had moved the prisoners, including Jews, Romanis and others, mostly skilled laborers, to the castle after liquidating the Mir ghetto in town. Over the course of two days, Germans had marched most of the Jewish men, women, and children from the ghetto to the outskirts of town and forced them at gunpoint to dig their own mass grave.” (ushmm.org) The supporters of killing the Jewish children claim that since Hitler looked for building a supreme and refined nation, which could combat with the challenges of changing world, so he ordered the killing of only disabled and infected children. “Childhood in Nazi Germany was cast in the mythic illusion of a super race. Children who did not meet the social or biological criteria of “perfect” children were removed from their homes and communities, isolated in institutions, hospitals, work and concentration camps, and many thousands were murdered.” (Aly, 1993) To conclude, it becomes evident that the Hitler-regime was consisted of the prejudiced nationalists and patriots, which sought military and political domination of Germany over the entire Europe. Hitler and his Nazi Party wanted to create an intelligent, hardworking, brave, dedicated and loyal nation, which could take the responsibility of the most superior nation of the world. It is therefore the Party confined the Jews and other biased groups in the concentration camps, so that their nefarious and anti-nationalist activities could be regulated, monitored, controlled and condemned by the German soldiers. There is no validity of the creation of gas chambers, ghettos and other torture cells specifically constructed to keep Jews in them. On the contrary, every criminal, offender and traitor of the German soil was sent to labor and concentration camps in order to get him engaged in different tasks, so that he could not take part in destructive activities against the national interest. Since the large majority of Jewry had religious inclinations towards the UK, Russia and the USA, they got indulged into the activities that came under the definition of anti-patriotic ones. Secondly, the killing of the Jews was not as much as it has been being exaggerated by the community. The WWII was itself very horrible and dreadful, which cost millions of human lives. Since the majority of Jews lived in European countries, they were also murdered during the course of war. It is therefore they established their new state in Asia under the title Israel, for they found themselves unsafe and insecure in the then war-afflicted zone of the world i.e. Europe. Somehow, deliberate and planned killing of the Jewish population cannot be denied altogether, as the community became victim of the wrath, malice and hatred of the Nazis in the same manner as the Turks committed the genocide of the poor Armenians during WWI, and the cruel US forces massacred the helpless Iraqis during the Gulf War. No one raised a sonorous voice against the Armenians, the Vietnamese and Iraqis in such a manner as the voice against Nazis was raised at global scale, echo of which could still be heard from the pro-Semitic media and literature. References Aly, G. (1994) Medicine against the useless In G. Aly, P. Chroust, & C. Pross (Eds.) Cleansing the Fatherland: Nazi Medicine and Racial Hygiene. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, Ch.2, 22-98 Retrieved from http://www.holocaust-trc.org/unwanted.pdf Baumgartner, Gerhard (2001) Concentration Camps Project Education of Roma Children in Europe http://www.un.org/en/holocaustremembrance/docs/Roma%20concentration-camps%20OSCE%20.pdf Gilbert, Martin (1987) The Holocaust: the Jewish Tragedy Fontana, Glasgow Retrieved from www.thehealingproject.net.au Mayer, Arno J. (1988) Why Did the Heavens Not Darken? The Final Solution in History Pantheon New York Yohanan Petrovsky-Shtern. (2005) Military Service in Russia YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, Inc. Yale University Press Retrieved from http://www.yivoinstitute.org/downloads/Military_Service.pdf United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (1995) Resistance during the Holocaust 100 Raoul Wallenberg Place, SW Washington, D.C. 20024-2150 Retrieved from http://www.ushmm.org/education/foreducators/resource/pdf/resistance.pdf Hitler's Unwanted Children Retrieved from http://www.holocaust-trc.org/unwanted.pdf http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005137 Read More