CIE IGCSE History - Treatment of Jews

cie igcse history - germany 1918-45 depth study - treatment of Jews 1933-45

why did the Nazis persecute the Jews?

• blamed them for the loss of WW1 - ‘Jewish Conspiracy’

• believed that they were sub-human (Untermensch)

• believed that they were not Aryan and their presence was polluting the race

what did Hitler believe about the Jews and society in general?

• believed in Social Darwinism - idea that humanity worked around the survival of the fittest - believed that this was between Aryans and Non-Aryans

• applied this to leading Nazis - made them compete for jobs and his approval - led to cumulative radicalisation as policies submitted became more and more radical

• hated jews

• wanted to make a national community (Volkgemeinschaft) free from Jews and non-Aryans

what happened in April 1933 to the Jews?

• one day boycott of businesses organised

• Jews banned from civil service

what was the one-day boycott?

• one day boycott of all Jewish businesses and shops, enforced by SA

• set precedent for antisemitism in Germany

what laws were passed against German Jews in 1935?

Nuremburg laws

what did the Nuremburg laws encompass?

• Blood and Honour Law

• Citizenship Law

what was the Blood and Honour law?

a law which forbade any Non-Aryan (Jew) from being in a sexual relationship with an Aryan incl. marriage - all current marriages nullified

what was the Citizenship law?

• a law which stripped Jews of their citizenship, making them ‘stateless’

• split Germans into three groups: Aryans, Mixed Race and non-Aryans

why was the Anschluss (1938) significant for Nazi persecution of Jews?

first time non-German jews had been persecuted; followed by Sudetenland and Czechoslovakia

what happened to Jews in 1938?

Kristallnacht

what was Kristallnacht?

• mass attack on Jews, including burning of synagogues, smashing of homes and businesses, murder

• mainly undertaken by SA

• ‘pogrom’

• happened due to the murder of a German diplomat by a Jew in Paris

what was the impact of Kristallnacht on Jews?

• 20,000 Jews sent to concentration camps

• 91 Jews murdered

• Jews had to pay for damage

why was Kristallnacht significant for Nazi racial policy?

• first time violence against Jews had been openly condoned and encouraged by Nazi leadership (Goebbels)

• set precedent for/accelerated future acts of antisemitism like Aryanisation

when did Aryanisation occur?

1937-39

Broadly, what was aryanisation?

the exclusion of Jews from the economy

what did Aryanisation entail?

• Jewish businesses were seized or shut down

• Jewish property was confiscated and given to ‘Aryans’

• Jews were excluded from many professions, and if doctors/dentists/teachers were only allowed to treat/teach other Jews

what other measures were taken against Jews in 1939?

• Reich office for Jewish Emigration opened

• passports had to be stamped with a ‘J’

• Jews were given new names - Sarah (Women) or Israel (Men)

how did the German invasion of Poland cause changes to anti-Jewish policy?

• now had many many more Jews to deal with

• process of Ghettoization began

what was ghettoisation?

• deportation of Jews from Germany/Germany territories and Poland to ‘Ghettos’ in large cities in Poland - locked areas

• conditions awful - only allowed 300 calories a day

when did the Nazis invade the USSR?

1941

how many Jews did the Nazis control in the USSR?

3 million soviet Jews

what was anti-Jewish policy like in the USSR and Eastern Front?

• Communists and Jews were rounded up and shot

• Genocide on the Eastern Front

which groups carried out the ‘genocide on the Eastern front’?

Einsatzgruppen (part of SS)

when and where was the final solution decided?

• January 1942 at the Wannsee conference in Berlin (coordination of policy)

what was the final solution?

• regarded as the ‘final solution’ to the ‘Jewish Question’

• Himmler put in charge of the systematic killing of all Jewish people

• slave labour and death camps were built in Auschwitz, Treblinka, Chelmo - transported there by train

• killed in gas chambers - carbon monoxide and pesticide gases

• the sick, women, and young children were killed immediately - able bodied sent to work

how many Jews died in the Final Solution?

6 million - 2/3 of European population