Auschwitz was not only the largest of all the concentration camps, but also the most infamous. Concentration camps were made to make Jews and other minorities feel like they aren’t human, because according to Hitler and his repulsive philosophy, they weren’t. In Auschwitz, around 20,000 people were murdered by gas chambers alone everyday. They also used guns. Gas chambers a horrible way that the Nazis killed their prisoners.
He also banned the Social Democrat Party in June 1933, and then all other parties soon followed. There were also many other factors that made it so Hitler could establish a dictatorship. The Reichstag Fire gave him an opportunity to pass the Law for ‘The Protection of the People and the State’, which ended all the freedoms that were guaranteed by the Weimar Republic. This law gave the police total control. The police and the SA arrested all the communist leaders, their meetings were broken up and newspapers closed down.
On that night, the Nazis provoked an organized massacre against Jews in Austria and Germany in what was termed “Kristallnacht”, meaning, “night of broken glass” (Holocaust Encyclopedia). This violent night consisted of the pillaging and burning of synagogues, and breaking the windows of Jewish homes and Jewish-owned businesses. Many Jews were physically attacked, while 30,000 others were arrested and taken to
This was still not satisfactory for Reinhardt Heydrich and although 200 people were being executed a day he thought that they must be shot and hanged without trial. The Einsatzgruppen received their orders from Heydrich or Bruno Streckenbach and evidence proved that the orders included the killing of Soviet Jews. On June 22 1941 German soldiers invaded the Soviet Union and the Einsatzgruppen followed, now their orders were written, not given orally and the written orders demanded them to execute all people of many different parties and groups, including Jews. The Einsatzgruppen went to the streets and killed all Jews. Feliz Landau, a member of the Einsatzkommando wrote: “There were hundreds of Jews walking along the street with blood pouring downt heir faces, holes in their heads, their hands broken and their eyes hanging out of their sockets.” By late July 1941 all Jewish men, women and
They had the ability to tap phone lines, intercept mail and to spy on people. Anyone who was suspected as being against the Nazi Party and Hitler would be immediately arrested and detained for as long as they wished. The Gestapo was what ordinary Germans feared every day, as no one was safe from late night police raids or deportation to the concentration camps. By 1939, 150,000 political prisoners were put under ‘protective arrest’. The Nazis also controlled and altered the German judiciary system to benefit themselves.
This violence led many leaders of the SPD to flee abroad and in June its party was officially banned and the 3000 that remained were arrested and a number were killed. This ultimately portrays the brutality of the Nazis, which effectively contributed to their consolidation of power. After the Reichstag fire the police were given the powers to detain suspects indefinitely without reference to the courts. The decree ‘For the protection of the people and the state’ was used to justify the arrest, imprisonment and often torture of thousands of political opponents, and on 23 March 1933 Hitler presented the Enabling Act to an intimidated Reichstag in order to consolidate Nazi power. The Reichstag passed laws which voted itself out of existence; the communists were barred from voting.
Following the death of Von Rath Citizens of Germany were angered and Hitler had used this to his full advantage and stated that if any violence were to be taken out against the Jews as a result of the shooting he would not intervene. Some Nazi leaders stood back and watched incidents happen and some even took it as an order to attack the Jews; SA and SS forces were sent out to go cause trouble with the Jews and were ordered to organise demonstrations and arrest as many Jews as they can. On the 9th and 10th of November, gangs smashed up Jewish property and attacked Jews. A listed 814 shops, 171 homes and 191 synagogues were destroyed, about 100 Jews were killed. The damage of this left the night being called “The Night of Broken Glass” or Kristallnacht (Crystal Night).
Jewish owned businesses were looted, windows were busted, synagogues were set on fire, and the Nazis attacked Jewish people. When it was over, around 30,000 Jews were arrested by the Nazis and sent to concentration camps. It was only the beginning of their nightmare that was still to
He also blamed Germany’s difficulties on the Jews but did not tell the people his true intention was to exterminate them. Thus he created an atmosphere of hatred in Germany that later would be proven by his draconian measures towards the Jews. The first real brutal attack against the Jews came in June 1934, when Hitler had about 1,000 people murdered in the Night of the Long Knives. He then introduced the Nuremburg Laws which were as follows: all Jews had to wear the Star of David, they lost their professional careers and property, Jews could not mingle with the German population, and ultimately the Jews lost their citizenship. These laws passed without any resistance and should have been a sign to the world of things to
The Jews were physically attacked, and about 30,000 Jews were arrested and taken to the concentration camps. As SS leader Heydrich stated during the later meeting, “7,500 businesses were destroyed, 267 temples burned and 91 Jews were killed.” He also requested, “that new decrees barring Jews from any contact with Germans by excluding them from public transportation, schools, even hospitals, essentially forcing them into ghettos or out of the country.” In that meeting, Hermann Goring stated regarding the economic damage of the night that the Jews themselves would be billed for the damage, and that any insurance money due to them would be confiscated by the Nazi order the Jews lived in.