Nazi Germany's Holocaust: A Crime Against Humanity

As Stephen Ambrose, American historian and biographer, once said, “The Holocaust was the most evil crime ever committed.” As Stephen Ambrose observed, the Holocaust is recognized as a time in which the worst possible crime of all was committed. Millions of people died, and not many people tried to do anything to stop it.

From 1941 to 1945, Jews were systematically murdered in one of the deadliest genocides in history, which was part of a broader aggregate of acts of oppression and killings of various ethnic and political groups in Europe by the Nazi regime. Every arm of Germany 's bureaucracy was involved in the logistics and the carrying out of the genocide. Other victims of Nazi crimes included Romanians, Ethnic Poles and other Slavs, Soviet POWs, communists, homosexuals, Jehovah 's Witnesses and the mentally and physically disabled. A network of about 42,500 facilities in Germany and German-occupied territories were used to concentrate victims for slave labor, mass murder, and other human rights abuses. Over 200,000 people are estimated to have been Holocaust perpetrators. Beginning in 1941, Jews from all over the continent, as well as hundreds of thousands of European Gypsies, were transported to the Polish ghettoes. Every person designated as a Jew in German territory was marked with a yellow star making them open targets. Thousands were soon being deported to the Polish ghettoes and German-occupied cities in the USSR. Since June 1941, experiments with mass killing methods had been ongoing at the concentration camp of Auschwitz and many more. That August, 500 officials gassed 500 Soviet POWs to death with the pesticide Zyklon-B. The SS soon placed a huge order for the gas with a German pest-control firm, an ominous indicator of the coming Holocaust. Beginning in late 1941, the Germans

The Holocaust was the systematic killing and extermination of millions of Jews and other Europeans by the German Nazi state between 1939 and 1945. Innocent Europeans were forced from their homes into concentration camps, executed violently, and used for medical experiments. The Nazis believed their acts against this innocent society were justified when hate was the motivating factor. The Holocaust illustrates the consequences of prejudice, racism, and stereotyping on a society. It forces societies to examine the responsibility and role of citizenship, in addition to approaching the powerful ramifications of indifference and inaction. (Holden Congressional Record). Despite the adverse treatment of the Jews, there are lessons that can be learned from the Holocaust: The Nazi’s rise to power could have been prevented, the act of genocide was influenced by hate, and the remembrance of the Holocaust is of the utmost importance for humanity.

Horror struck on January 30, 1933, when Germany assigned Adolf Hitler as their chancellor. Once Hitler had finally reached power he set out to complete one goal, create a Greater Germany free from the Jews (“The reasons for the Holocaust,” 2009). This tragedy is known today as, “The Holocaust,” that explains the terrors of our histories past. The face of the Holocaust, master of death, and leader of Germany; Adolf Hitler the most deceitful, powerful, well spoken, and intelligent person that acted as the key to this mass murder. According to a research study at the University of South Florida, nearly eleven million people were targeted and killed. This disaster is a genocide that was meant to ethnically cleanse Germany of the Jews. Although Jewish people were the main target they were not the only ones targeted; gypsies, African Americans, homosexuals, socialists, political enemies, communists, and the mentally disabled were killed (Simpson, 2012, p. 113). The word to describe this hatred for Jewish people is known as antisemitism. It was brought about when German philosophers denounced that “Jewish spirit is alien to Germandom” (“Antisemitism”) which states that a Jew is non-German. Many people notice the horrible things the Germans did, but most don’t truly understand why the Holocaust occurred. To truly understand the Holocaust, you must first know the Nazis motivations. Their motivations fell into two categories including cultural explanations that focused on ideology and

The Holocaust was the Nazi attempt to wipe out the Jewish race (Rossel 12). The Holocaust took place from 1933 to 1945 (Rossel 12). The Holocaust took place in Europe, mainly Germany (“Introduction” par 3). Mainly Jewish and Nazi people were involved in the Holocaust, as well as some Gypsies (“Introduction” par 2, 3). The Holocaust was the persecution of 6 million Jews and millions of others forced to live in ghettos, deported to camps, and systematically annihilated until the Allied forces liberated the remaining survivors.

While examining the works of Elie Wiesel and Primo Levi it becomes apparent that the holocaust was a horrendous time in our human history. However, although both writers went through similar experiences during this time; both seem to reflect and dwell on things differently such as their point of view and lives in the camps as well as the different themes they focus on. In this analysis the stories of the two authors will be compared and as stated above will also focus on how they recount their experiences.

The Holocaust is essentially one of the most horrific and remembered acts of genocide within history, it’s estimated that “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 ” (Jones 2010, p. 233). A majority of these killings were implemented by the German Army, but the German Army was not solely responsible for these horrendous crimes. As there was a majority of seemingly normal citizens ordering and engaging in atrocious crimes. These citizens were recognised as policemen, camp guards, office workers, doctors and nurses, their crimes were horrific and were performed in seemingly normal environments or situations. A majority of these people had

Throughout history, the world has seen many horrible acts committed against its people, but of all these acts none are as horrendous as the Holocaust. This event led to the prosecution and execution of millions of people just because those from the Nazi Regime felt they were superior. The Nazis invaded Poland because of this assumed superiority over the Jewish population, and since Nazis thought that the Jews were beneath them they sent them to concentration camps to be worked like animals and to die. The entire world saw this as inhumane, but unlike the Polish and German Jews, the entire world did not experience this great atrocity first hand.

The Holocaust was the single most heinous act in history for many reasons, the first of which is the death toll of innocent men, women, and children, almost as horrifying was the treatment of German Citizens within the camps and ghettos, and finally the effect Hitler and his Nazi regime still has on the world and America today.

The Holocaust of 1933-1945, was the systematic killing of millions of European Jews by the National Socialist German Worker’s Party (Nazis) (Webster, 430). This project showed the treacherous treatment towards all Jews of that era. Though many fought against this horrific genocide, the officials had already determined in their minds to exterminate the Jews. Thus, the Holocaust was a malicious movement that broke up many homes, brought immense despair, and congregated great discrimination. The Holocaust was an act of Hell on earth.

In the article, “Letter to Cambodia” the text quotes, “head of the central detention center scrawled “Kill them all” over lists of prisoners,” and in “Barely Trying” it states, “virtually the entire population of the city had been deported to deadly work camps.” As a result, extermination came sooner than anticipated and hundreds of thousand of civilians were killed by their own leaders. We can see this in “Forgetting Pol Plot” where they state, “The Khmer Rouge killed Sam’s father and two brothers, using rifle butts (in order to conserve bullets) … hold any of them accountable for the murder of 1.7 million people, “ and i'm “Barely Trying’’ the text states, “nearly two million Cambodians died of starvation or disease or were executed.” Even with all these accounts and facts denial is still present in Cambodia today where officials will deny the event or the younger generation will not believe the stories. “Forgetting Pol Pot”, quotes, “They don't believe the stories, … denial of history is encouraged as a way to create cultural impurity

The Communist Party of Kampuchea, also known as the Khmer Rouge, took control of Cambodia on April 17, 1975, which lasted until January 1979. For their three-year, eight-month, and twenty-one day rule of Cambodia, the Khmer Rouge committed some of the most heinous crimes in current history. The main leader who orchestrated these crimes was a man named Pol Pot. In 1962, Pol Pot had become the coordinator of the Cambodian Communist Party. The Prince of Cambodia, Norodom Sihanouk, did not approve of the Party and forced Pol Pot to flee to exile in the jungle. There, Pol formed a fortified resistance movement, which became known as the Khmer Rouge, and pursued a guerrilla war against Sihanouk’s government. As Pol Pot began to accumulate power,

Some say that Pol Pot was responsible for the power and control of Cambodia because “Pol Pot cut Cambodia off from the world. He banned foreign and minority languages and attacked the neighboring countries of Laos, Vietnam, and Thailand in an attempt to regain ancient ‘lost territory’” (The life of Pol Pot- Cambodia 4). This statement is true because the Khmer Rouge did gain part of their power by isolating the country, but Pol Pot is not fully responsible for that. There were other people involved, like Nuon Chea, Ieng Sary, Son Sen and Khieu Samphan all of these people were also leaders in the Khmer Rouge. Nuon Chea was the second leader in the Khmer Rouge he is known as “The evil genius of the movement” (Chandler 1), because he is the one who was in charge of the prison system. He was one of the one’s with a heartless mind, planning tortures and executing innocent people.

The Khmer Rouge grew and grew as more people started being recruited. Due to a big amount of Cambodians death because of America's strategies to the war, other Cambodians grew disappointed with the western democracy. What drove new recruits to Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge guerilla movement was the heavy U.S. bombardment and Lon Nol’s collaboration with the US. Pol Pot’s force had grown to over 700,000 men by 1975.Pol began implementing his extremist policies of collectivization within a few days of the Khmer Rouge takeover. He took over schools, hospitals and other communal labor and societal institutions.

“Your life becomes so much better when you remove all the negative people from it” was the mentality of cambodian dictator, Pol Pot.The cambodian genocide killed more than a quarter of the country due to execution, mass killings, starvation, and torture.The cambodian genocide was one of the worst genocides in the 20th century due to the rise to power, number of fatalities and how they managed to hide it from the rest of the world.