Holocaust Themes

OUTCOMES OF ANTI SEMITISM: The Germans and their allies had created many ghettos, transit camps, concentration camps, and forced Jews into labor camps to monitor Jewish population and keep them close for deportation. The Jews were forced to wear identification badges or armbands, which had the Star of David on them. They were sent to work for the Deutsches Reich (German Reich), which was the official name for Germany from 1871-1943. Between 1941 and 1944, the Nazi’s had deported millions of Jews to ghettos and extermination camps. The major ghettos were Warsaw, Krakow, Vilna, Lodz, Bialystok, Lvov, Lublin, Kovno, Czestochowa, and Minsk. The living conditions in the ghettos were horrendous and a vast majority of its population died from diseases, starvation, were shot, or were deported to killing centers (United States Holocaust Memorial, n.d.). Also, they had created many camps which included concentration

The Judenrat was a Jewish council that was established by German orders in the Jewish communities throughout Nazi occupied Europe. The Judenrat was called the “Aeltestenrat” which meant “Council of Elders” and was considered a mediator between the Jewish people and German individuals. The Judenrat was composed of about 24 male Jews, who rejected the Jewish religion or had intermarried and were responsible for executing German orders and cases of sabotage (Klein, 1960). The Sonderkommando (Special Commands Unit) were male Jewish prisoners who were relatively healthy and were forced to work in Auschwitz-Birkenau, Treblinka, Belzec, Chelmno, or Sobibor. These Jews were forced into this position. If they declined their job offer, they were then sent to the gas chambers or shot by the SS Guards. The Sonderkommandos were forced to lie on the behalf of the Nazis and had the job of removing the corpses of those who were already murdered by the Germans, process them, and transport them to the