Why Did Hitler Hate The Jews?

Transcription

1 World War 2

2 Why Did Hitler Hate The Jews? An important term to mention here is scapegoat. Hitler and the Nazis said the Jews were responsible for huge events like losing World War One and the economic crisis. This was totally untrue. But by giving the Jews the blame Hitler created an enemy. Hitler said that all Germany s problems had been caused by the Jews. Many people believed him. The solution to all these problems was to banish the Jews from society. With this political message and the promise to make Germany a large and economically powerful country Hitler s party won the 1932 election. In 1933 he and his party came to power. Did Hitler invent hatred of Jews? No, Hitler built on and used anti-semitic ideas that already existed. He was Austrian and grew up in Vienna where the mayor was extremely anti-semitic and where hatred of Jews was widespread. His hatred of Jews cannot be tied down to a specific event in his life, for example a Jewish childhood friend, as many children think.

3 What Is The Holocaust? The Holocaust (Shoah) was a unique event in 20th century history. It evolved slowly between 1933 and It began with discrimination; then the Jews were separated from their communities and persecuted; and finally they were treated as less than human beings and murdered. During the Second World War the Nazis sought to murder the entire Jewish population of Europe and to destroy its culture. In 1941 there were about 11 million Jews living in Europe; by May 1945 the Nazis had murdered six million of them. Oneand-a-half million of these were children. We now call these events the Holocaust. Whilst the Jews of Europe were the Nazis primary target, many millions of other people were also imprisoned, enslaved and murdered. These people included Roma, those with mental or physical disabilities, homosexuals, Jehovah's Witnesses, trade unionists, political opponents, Poles and Soviet prisoners of war. The Nazis did not act alone. They were supported and assisted by people from within the countries they occupied across Europe. Most countries stood by while the Nazis and their accomplices carried out the mass murder of the Jewish people.

4 The Nuremberg Laws At the annual party rally held in Nuremberg in 1935, the Nazis announced new laws which made official many of the racial theories prevalent in Nazi ideology. The laws excluded German Jews from Reich citizenship and prohibited them from marrying relations with persons of "German or related blood. The Nuremberg Laws separated the Jews from all the German citizens. Not allowing them to do every day things like the Germans could. Therefore, they went to the concentration camps.

5 What are the ghettos? Definition: a part of a city, especially a slum area, occupied by a minority group or groups. The Jewish quarter in a city. "the Warsaw Ghetto An isolated or segregated group or area. There are a number of reasons that the Nazis established ghettos. Originally a 'shortterm' measure to contain and control Jews, ghettos were very soon incorporated into the Nazi's long-term racial policy. Ghettos can be classified into three types; Open, Closed and Destruction. The most common type of ghettos were closed ghettos, surrounded by walls, or high barbed wire fences. Jews from the surrounding area were ordered to move into the ghetto, after which time the area was sealed off. Extreme overcrowding, insanitary conditions and lack of food and water contributed to the deaths of a large proportion of the prisoners.

6 Kristallnacht On November 9 to November 10, 1938, in an incident known as Kristallnacht, Nazis in Germany torched synagogues, vandalized Jewish homes, schools and businesses and killed close to 100 Jews. In the aftermath of Kristallnacht, also called the Night of Broken Glass, some 30,000 Jewish men were arrested and sent to Nazi concentration camps. German Jews had been subjected to repressive policies since 1933, when Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler ( ) became chancellor of Germany. However, prior to Kristallnacht, these Nazi policies had been primarily nonviolent. After Kristallnacht, conditions for German Jews grew increasingly worse. During World War II ( ), Hitler and the Nazis implemented their so-called Final Solution to the what they referred to as the Jewish problem, and carried out the systematic murder of some 6 million European Jews in what came to be known as the Holocaust.

7 HITLER AND HIS HATRED FOR JEWS By Calum Sweeney

8 THE JEWS Did Hitler invent hatred of Jews? No, Hitler built on and used anti-semitic ideas that already existed. He was Austrian and grew up in Vienna where the mayor was extremely anti-semitic and where hatred of Jews was widespread. His hatred of Jews cannot be tied down to a specific event in his life, for example a Jewish childhood friend, as many children think

9 THE JEWS Hitler and the Nazis also thought that people could be divided into different races and that there was a struggle going on between these different races. According to the Nazis the Aryan race was the best and strongest race. Jews were of another inferior race. In fact so inferior that they were not considered to be people by the Nazis. Hitler had Jewish and African roots', DNA tests show. Hitler killed about 6 million Jews.

10 THE JEWS others were forced to beg or steal to survive. During the long winters, heating fuel was scarce, and many people lacked adequate clothing. People weakened by hunger and exposure to the cold became easy victims of disease; tens of thousands died in the ghettos from illness, starvation, or cold. Some individuals killed themselves to escape their hopeless lives

11 LIFE IN THE GHETTOS Life in the ghettos was usually unbearable. Overcrowding was common. One apartment might have several families living in it. Plumbing broke down, and human waste was thrown in the streets along with the garbage. Contagious diseases spread rapidly in such cramped, unsanitary housing. People were always hungry. Germans deliberately tried to starve residents by allowing them to purchase only a small amount of bread, potatoes, and fat. Some residents had some money or valuables they could trade for food smuggled into the ghetto;

12 The sign in the picture means Jews live here and its forbidden to enter Jewish Ghettos During World War II, ghettos were established by the Nazis to confine Jews and sometimes Gypsies into tightly packed areas of the cities of Eastern Europe. These Nazi ghettos sometimes coincided with traditional Jewish ghettos and Jewish quarters