Holocaust Vocabulary

Anti Semitism  Extreme or irrational prejudices or discrimination against Jews

Aryans  according to the Nazis, this was the pure German race which was superior to all others in every way.

Crematorium  a furnace or establishment for the incineration of corpses

Death Camps  prison camp designed for the purpose of putting people to death

Death Marches  forcible movement between Autumn 1944 and late April 1945 by Nazi Germany of thousands of prisoners from German concentration camps near the war front to camps inside Germany.Nazi Germanyconcentration camps

Deportation  the forced removal from a country, particularly the Nazi movement of Jews and other groups to ghettos and camps.

Dictator  ruler of a state who takes total power and holds onto it by removing any opposition

Final Solution  the cover name for the plan to destroy the Jews of Europe- the “Final Solution of the Jewish Question.” Beginning in December 1941, Jews were rounded up and sent to extermination camps in the East. The program was deceptively disguised as “resettlement in the East.”

Genocide  mass killing to exterminate a whole race of people

Gestapo  Nazi secret police

Ghetto  separate part of a city or town, often a slum area, where a minority group of people lived, e.g., the Jews.

Holocaust  the destruction of some 6 million Jews by the Nazis and their followers in Europe between the years

Kapo  a Nazi concentration camp prisoner who was given privileges in return for supervising prisoner work gangs: often a common criminal and frequently brutal to fellow inmates

Kristallnacht  “Night of Broken Glass.” The night of November 9, 1938, on which the Nazis coordinated an attack on Jewish people and their property in Germany and German- controlled lands.

Nazi  abbreviation for the National Socialist German Worker’s Party that ruled Germany from 1933 to 1945.

Nuremberg Laws  In 1935 Hitler announced new laws against Jews and all people of Jewish decent. These laws took away the Jew’s civil rights.

Nuremberg Trials  Trials of Nazi leaders conducted after World War II. A court set up by the victorious Allies tried twenty-two former officials, including Hermann Goering, in Nuremberg, Germany, for war crimes.NaziWorld War IIAllies GoeringGermanywar crimes

Pogroms  government-approved massacre or attack on a minority community, generally referring to attacks on Jewish communities

Resistance  the “underground” organizations working to help the Jews against Hitler/Nazi army

SS (Schutzstaffer)  means Schutzstaffel, which means “protective squads.” They were soldiers who served the Nazi leaders.