Final Solution

Hitler 1923 – Beer Hall Putsch – imprisoned – Mein Kampf – Medieval-style irrational prejudice on Jews

Hitler Jan appointed CHANCELLOR – March DACHAU – 1st concentration camp  worldwide protest = „Jewish plot“  launches an ANTI-JEWISH CAMPAIGN -April GENERAL BOYCOTT OF JEWISH SHOPS AND PROFESSIONALS (students, professors, judges)

The Nuremberg Laws Discriminatory Legislation Sep Nuremberg Laws – CLEAR DEFINITION OF A JEW

The Nuremberg Laws The Law for the Protection of German blood and German Honor The Reich Citizenship Law – Reich Citizens x Nationals (State Members) – A Jew can not be Reich Citizen = NO POLITICAL RIGHTS

The 2nd Phase of Persecution The Night of Broken Glass – Nov – German diplomat Ernst vom Rath assasinated by a German-born Polish Jewish boy Herschel Grynszpan – COORDINATED ATTACK on Jewish people and their property 91 Jews murdered – arrested and deported 200+ synagogues destroyed

The 2nd Phase of Persecution The Night of Broken Glass – HJ´s, Gestapo, SS, SA – Means for the confiscation of firearms from Jews – Followed by economic and political persecutions = BEGINING OF THE FINAL SOLUTION

THE HOLOCAUST The Last Phase of the Persecution of the Jews = Final Solution Wansee, Jan – 1st Vernichtungslager in CHELMNO, summer 1941 – Heydrich – goal= removal of the Jews from the Lebensraum of the German people Emigration „had become a problem“: Jews 2nd solution: EVACUATION OF THE JEWS TO THE EAST

THE HOLOCAUST The Last Phase of the Persecution of the Jews = Final Solution Wansee, Jan – Slovakia + Croatia „the essential and crucial problems have already been solved“ Slovakia – June 1941 Croatia – July 1941 First deportations, concentration camps and genocide

THE HOLOCAUST The Last Phase of the Persecution of the Jews = Final Solution Wansee, Jan – Northern countries „omitted for the time being“

THE HOLOCAUST The Last Phase of the Persecution of the Jews = Final Solution Wansee, Jan – Final Solution welcomed by the military governor of Poland „Jews constitute a substantial danger as carriers of epidemics and most of them are useless.“ – First targets

RESISTANCE Warszaw Ghetto Uprising – April 19- May – THE LARGEST SINGLE JEWISH REVOLT during WWII – Mordechai Anielewicz letter to Antek Yitzhak Zuckerman Read at the Eichman trial in 1961 ABOVE ALL A SYMBOL TO SHOW THAT JEWS DID NOT DIE WILLINGLY

RESISTANCE Uprisings in: – Treblinka, Aug 1943 – Sobibor, Oct 1943  closed – Auschwitz, Oct 1944

Reaction of the International Community Bermuda Conference – Apr – Extended mandate of the Inter-Governmental Comitee on Refugees Set up in 1938 – EVIAN conference – BUT THE PROBLEM WAS NO LONGER ONE OF REFUGEES  NO REAL MEASURES WERE TAKEN

Shocking indifference – Shmuel Zygelboym (BUND) 1940 escaped Poland Implored the governments to take retaliatory and rescue action Committed suicide to protest against the world´s indifference, May Letter in NY Times, June Reaction of the International Community