All signs of anti-Semitism were removed. However, harassment of Jews continued at a local level and decrees continued to be passed. In October 1936 a decree was passed banning all civil servants from consulting Jewish doctors. Different ideas between 1937-8 As the economy improved through 1937, the attacks on Jews intensified. Those who feared the attacks turned to the Minister of Economy Hjalmar Schacht.
The British blockade kept all trades away from the Germans, including food (Ghost Liners 124).Yet, when the Germans retaliate, the Americans hate them for it. The Germans received blame for a crime that followed the rules of war blockades. America shames the Germans for killing civilians warned of the possible danger. Finally, the Lusitania allowed for the British to win in a win-win situation that their government
The Holocaust in Europe all began in 1940. Adolf Hitler blamed the Jews for every problem Germany was experiencing at the time. Death camps were set up to exterminate them all and leave behind the perfect Ayrian race. Despite all the hatred toward the Jews there were still many people who did not believe in this sort of treatment. Raoul Wallenberg and Hans and Sophie Scholl were three of these good, moral souls who tried to help the Jewish people.
They were told to execute them because according to Hitler, anyone that isn’t German is a Jew and as we all know Hitler disliked Jews. Also they just did not kill the Jews, but they had a very big role in deporting them for eastern and western Europe to the Germans concentration camp. Browning portrays these men as ordinary men. This group of men consisted mostly of working class, middle aged men from Hamburg. These men all went through their formative period before the Nazis came into power.
Hitler deliberately expressed his hate toward Jews and gave ample warnings, as it was all written down in his autobiography “Mein Kampf”. In 1935, the introduction of the Nuremberg Laws stripped German Jews of their citizenship and civil rights. Jewish rights were steadily restricted, as in many cases Jewish political and intellectual leaders were the first to be sent to concentration camps. The Night of Broken Glass, on November 9, 1938 lead to the death of approximately 100 Jews, while other 30,000 were sent to concentration camps. Jewish businesses along with almost every synagogue in Germany were damaged or completely destroyed.
There was an influx of Jewish people into Germany, therefore the anti-emetic actions grew larger, despite it already being apparent that the Kaiser was anti-Semitic himself, at the end of the19th century there was a wave of anti Semitic publications, the Kaiser is known to have read these books etc.., this causes great tensions, as clearly the population agrees with their Kaiser’s opinion causing anti-Semitism to rise. Another source of tension was the anti-Semitism being clear through the idea that no Jews were able to do more traditional career areas, such as government, the army and judiciary’, this meant the they had no choice but to become bankers and lawyers act, all high earning jobs, this caused some tension within the country as they were the higher earning majority,
Although we know there was opposition against Hitler and the Nazi regime it is hard to assess who and how many people took a negative approach to him. Fear of the Gestapo (the secret police) was vast and always present as people were regularly being arrested for crimes of speaking out against Hitler and the Government and sent to the early concentration camps which were later became the ‘death camps’. After the war people were all too keen to announce their distrust and negative feelings towards Hitler as they were ashamed of what he had done, however during his regime many people did not openly oppose him. This makes it hard to know how many people really opposed Hitler. There were different types of opposition towards the Nazi
When finally they arrived at their destination and the doors were opened, the light hurt their eyes because they were no longer used to something so bright. People dressed in funny looking striped clothes, yelled for them to get out of the cars. They were surrounded by barracks and barbed wire fences. One witness describes his reception to the Auschwitz by saying that as they were marched through a meadow one of the Jewish prisoners turned and walked back into the meadow. They yelled at him to stop but he continued until they opened gunfire on him (30).
Unfortunately, when speaking of the Holocaust, Jehovah's Witnesses are often forgotten or left out. Unending persecution against Jehovah's Witnesses as a group and its members as individuals spanned the Nazi years. Unlike Jews, who were persecuted and killed because of their ethnicity, Jehovah's Witnesses were persecuted for not renouncing their religious beliefs. The courage the vast majority displayed in refusing to do so, in the face of torture, maltreatment in concentration camps, and execution, won them the respect of many contemporaries. “Within months of the Nazi takeover, regional governments, primarily those of Bavaria and Prussia, initiated aggressive steps against Jehovah's Witnesses, breaking up their meetings, ransacking and then occupying their local offices.
Few of the many examples are: being unable to get accepted into the society; feeling as if they were getting chased and hunted down; being constricted and controlled by governments and losing their identity and freedom. For example: "... The speaker got up and said: If we let them in, they will steal our daily bread" this displays the unwelcoming and selfish behaviour of society towards the refugees; Auden also writes about the concept of freedom, which is a basic human right, that the German Jews simply didn't have. Due to which the speaker felt envious towards animals: " Saw the fish swimming as if they were free" and " Walked through the woods and saw the birds in the trees; They had no politicians and sang at their ease. They weren't the human race, my dear..." This sentence clearly shows that the speaker was perceiving that the