Hitler And The Holocaust Essay Research Paper

From the beginning the Nazis who were being faithful to Hitler had specifically targeted the Jews. The Nazis relentless hatred for the Jews rested on the view they had of the world, which saw history as of racial struggle. They thought the Jews goal was world domination. This made the Nazis think that the Jews were an obstruction to Aryan dominance. They considered it their duty to eliminate the Jews, whom they regarded as a threat. Other factors also contributed toward the Nazi hatred of the Jews. These included the ideas of Christian anti-Semitism, which negatively stereotyped the Jews as Christ-killers. Also significant was the political anti-Semitism from the nineteenth and early part of the twentieth centuries, which singled out the Jews as a threat to the established order of society. All of these factors combined made the Jews a perfect target for persecution and ultimate destruction by the Nazis.

The Nazis harassed and brutalized the Jews throughout the 1920s during the ?struggle for power.? Speech after speech painted the Jews as Germany?s ?misfortune? and prophesied a time of reckoning. (McFee, Gordon, Are the Jews Central to the Holocaust? http://www.holocaust-history.org/jews-central)

In 1933, when the Nazis came to power, the Jews were their first target. A boycott against Jewish businesses took place in April 1933 and the first laws against the Jews were enacted as early as April 17, 1933. The Jews were being progressively erased from almost every facet of German life. The Nuremberg Laws that were passed deprived the Jews of almost every remaining right and whatever freedom they had. In November 1938, Nazi hate against the Jews broke out into anti-Semitic violence, the event that took place that night became known as the Kristallnacht. Nazi mobs broke the glass in Jewish shop windows; they stole from Jewish apartments, torched synagogues, and sent thousands of Jews to concentration camps. Over 400 Jews were murdered and a fine was levied against them. In 1941 the Nazis decided to kill the Eastern European Jews by shooting them. By the end of the year they decided to kill all European Jews.

Only one man could have such a sick, compulsive mind, living in his own distorted world. A world that caused a long torturous journey of converting living souls, into ashes and gas. This man was known as Adolph Hitler. When Hitler was young he was infected with syphilis. As he grew older the disease caused an inflammation of the brain. It is believed that is what made him a sick, paranoid man that was full of delusions.

With respect of the Jewish Question. The Fuhrer has decided to make a clean sweep. He prophesied to the Jews that if they again brought about a world war, they would live to see their annihilation in it. That wasn?t just a catch-word. The world war is here, and the annihilation of the Jews must be the necessary consequence. (McFee, Gordon, Are the Jews Central to the Holocaust? Http://www.holocaust-history.org/jews-central/ )

Hitler had said if there was another war that he would annihilate the Jews. During the war he said he was in the process of annihilating them. In his Testament he said he had did exactly what he had said he would. For the satisfaction of one man, a whole nation was crucified and wounded.

The Holocaust was from January 30, 1933 to May 8, 1945.

The term ?Holocaust? was coined to describe the uniquely Jewish aspect of the Final Solution. (McFee, Gordon, Are the Jews Central to the Holocaust? http://www.holocaust-history.org/jews-central/ )

In 1933 there lived approximately 450,000 Jews. When Hitler first came to power 50,000 Jews fled Germany. By 1938 150,000 Jews had left, but there were still about 300,000 Jews still in Germany. But eventually it became harder and harder for any of them to flee. The Jews that were still in Germany had their possessions taken away from them and walled into ghettos. They were powerless.

Many Jews were hauled off into concentration camps. Also known as a death or mass murder camp. A concentration camp is a prison camp that is outside the normal criminal system. They were specifically designed for the sole purpose of murder. The murders of over thousands of men, women, and children.

There were six camps Auschwitze-Birkenau, Belzec, Chelmnp, Majdanek, Sobibor, and Treblinka. Once a Jew was taken there they were first brought to be registered, received numbers on their left arm, undressed, deloused, their body hair would get shaven off, and they would shower while there clothes were being disinfected. Many Jews died here through gas chambers, starvation, disease, shooting, burning, and being overworked. Jews were forced to work and once they became too weak they were killed and replaced by younger and stronger inmates. Their job included the removal of gold teeth or any other valuables from the corpses. They were forced to transport the corpses to mass graves for burial.

?There was a sign ?to disinfection.? He said ?you see, they are bringing children now.? They opened the door, threw the children in and closed the door. There was a terrible cry?.Then, the prisoners opened the doors. Everything was in disorder and contorted. Heat was given off the bodies were loaded on a rough wagon and taken to a ditch. The next batch were already undressing in the huts?.? (JSOURCE, http://4holocaust.4anything.com/network-frame/0,1855,4033:40358,00.html )

Children were killed right away and if they were born in a camp they were generally killed on the spot. So called camp doctors would torture and inflict inconceivable anguish on Jewish children. They were put into pressure chambers, tested with drugs, castrated, frozen to death, or exposed to many other traumas. Over a million children under the age of sixteen died in the Holocaust.

The red army went to liberate many other towns that were now empty of Jews where there were once thousands before the Holocaust. When the Nazis realized the end of the war was near, they attempted to remove all evidence of what went on in the camps. They dismantled the gas chambers, crematories, and any other buildings. They burned documents and evacuated all prisoners who could walk to the interior of Germany. When the red army marched into Auschwitz to liberate the camp on January 15, 1945, they found about 7,600 survivors abandoned there. More than 58,000 prisoners had already been evacuated by the Nazis and sent on a final death march to Germany. In late April, Hitler and his wife Eva Braun committed suicide. Then friends of theres carried there bodies to the garden placed their bodies in a shell hole form a Russian bomb, then they ignited it with gasoline all about them. As the U.S. army approaches and even though Hitler is dead the death marches continues. As U.S. troops entered camps the Germans were fleeing. The U.S. troops rescued whatever Jews are left but they did not have enough food to feed the starving Jews and many died of malnutrition. May 8, 1945, Germany surrenders. The Holocaust is now over.

The Holocaust finally came to an end. It was realized no matter what race, color, or nationality someone is human life should always be held sacred. Was this realization worth all the lives that were lost? U.S. troops entered Mauthausen where they encountered the shock of piles of over thousands of dead bodies lying in one huge grave. The full horror of the Holocaust had never really set in until the end. The rumors of what went on inside of the concentration camps were no more then exactly that, rumors. Not until the U.S. troops saw what had went on did they real horror set in. Just how long did this need to go on? Just how many lives needed to be lost before it was time to interfere? No one?s life is more valuable then anyone else?s. Everyone is given only once chance at life but they also deserve the chance to live it. Just because of their race too many Jews were denied that chance. It was not their fault they had different beliefs, which they were entitled to have. It just goes to show how narrow-minded people can really be. When something is different in the slightest bit they are afraid. They do not know what to do or how to handle these differences. Hitler was like that. He figured if he destroyed everyone and everything that was not exactly like him a perfect society would be born.

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