Holocaust - Essay Example

Download file to see previous pages... 2 Even prior to the burst of the World War II, Nuremberg Law was ratified. On the one hand, the Nazis also subjected to slave labor and tortured to death the inmates seized in concentration camps. 2. Causes of the Holocaust What had made the Nazis to commit the Holocaust or the persecution of the approximately six million Jews was their discrimination and hatred against Jews or a phenomenon also known as anti – Semitism. The fundamental impetus for this disturbing massacre was only ideological. The Nazis had envisioned a world where the Jews would rule the world in which this was contradictory to the Aryan quest. They massacred millions of Jews as they regarded the Jews to be inferior to the Germans’ “supposedly” superiority. They killed these Jews because of the Nazi racial propaganda. 3. Pre-Holocaust German Culture and History The advent of the Volkisch movement in Germany and Austria – Hungary marked the second half of the 19th century. The anti – Jewish sentiments were so apparent. ...
, that the it was pressed by Alldeutscher Verband to strip of their German citizenship all the German Jews and just be regarded of having an alien status.5 In addition to that, Class also called for the Jews to be singled out in all aspects of German life. Jews should not be permitted to own any land.6 For Class, they should not even embrace a public office or be engaged in banking, journalism and other professions of liberal nature where they could voice out their point of views.7 It was a total urge for anti - Semitism. 4. The Targeted Victims of the Holocaust The main victims of the Holocaust were the Jews residing in Europe. Hitler's Nazi regime massacred two - thirds of the nine million European Jews population. Nonetheless, it is of importance to note that during the Holocaust, the Jews were not only the segment affected. In fact, the Nazis also annihilated five hundred million Gypsies. Apart from that, there were more than three million Soviet prisoners of war who were killed. The mentally challenged and physically disabled individuals also were subject to killings. Under the Nazi rule, those undesirable to them including the Communists, Social Democrats, Polish intelligentsia, members of the trade unions, partisans, Jehovah's Witnesses, homosexuals and others were subject to persecution. Selection of Jews located at Auschwitz-II (Birkenau) in year 1944 It is also the case that the children were also victimized by the Nazis. They were also subject to death. Though the total number of children killed in this period was not known, an estimate as high as one and a half million children were believed to be murder. 8 5. Germany’s Responsibility of the Final Solution In 1930s, the world outside Nazi Europe had been aware of the persecution of Jews and the situation ...Download file to see next pagesRead More