Why holocaust

Meet the year-old world record breaking sprinter! Home Menu. Why did the Holocaust happen? Top Stories. How Christmas can still sparkle with plastic-free glitter 8 hours ago 8 hours ago. Auschwitz, also known as Auschwitz-Birkenau, opened in and was the largest of the Nazi concentration and death camps. Located in southern Poland, Auschwitz initially served as a detention center for political prisoners.

However, it evolved into a network of camps where Facing economic, social, and political oppression, thousands of German Jews wanted to flee the Third Reich but found few countries willing to accept them. Auschwitz was the largest and deadliest of six dedicated extermination camps where hundreds of thousands of people were tortured and murdered during World War II and the Holocaust under the orders of Nazi dictator, Adolf Hitler.

As one of the greatest tragedies Eighty-eight pounds of eyeglasses. Hundreds of prosthetic limbs. Twelve thousand pots and pans. Forty-four thousand pairs of shoes. In fewer than four years, more than 1. People were crammed into cattle cars with little food or toilets and transported to Auschwitz in German-occupied Poland. Upon arriving, they were Mindu Hornick, 13, peered through a crack in the door of her stopped cattle car and read a name: Auschwitz. Heinrich Himmler , a Dachau, the first Nazi concentration camp, opened in , shortly after Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany.

Located in southern Germany, Dachau was initially a camp for political prisoners; however, it eventually evolved into a death camp where countless Live TV. This Day In History. History Vault. Image shows a copy of the Editorship Law. On 3 October , shortly after its defeat, France introduced its first antisemitic law under occupation - the Statut de Juifs.

Section: How and why did the Holocaust happen? What was the Holocaust? In defiance of the Treaty of Versailles , Germany remilitarized and readied itself for war. The United States and other countries, still suffering under the Great Depression and remembering the needless destruction of World War I, did not meaningfully intervene to protest Nazi militarization or Nazi antisemitic policies until Germany invaded Poland in Nazi policy moved from forced emigration to mass murder.

The Holocaust could not have happened without the active or passive participation of millions of people, each of whom acted for their own reasons. Some people recognized that they could personally benefit from the persecution and murder of Jews.

Sometimes that meant acquiring the property or homes of Jews who were deported or murdered, or the businesses of Jews forced to immigrate or sent to concentration camps. Other people found jobs in the Nazi regime, which gave them newfound financial or political power and influence. In countries that Germany invaded, many collaborators saw the benefit of assisting their new leaders and took advantage of the opportunity to take revenge on their Jewish neighbors by denouncing them.

There was also a great deal of pressure to conform. Even if people were not antisemitic to begin with, Nazi leaders and propaganda provided ample reasons to help them, with time, to come around to this point of view. Few people were brave enough to publicly speak out or to help Jews, especially when they could be arrested or executed for doing so. The Nazi Party was founded in It sought to lure German workers away from socialism and communism and commit them to its antisemitic and anti-Marxist ideology.

It attracted support from influential people in the military, big business, and society. The Party also absorbed other radical right-wing groups.

Hitler emphasized propaganda to attract attention and interest. He used press and posters to create stirring slogans. He displayed eye-catching emblems and uniforms. The Party staged many meetings, parades, and rallies. In addition, it created auxiliary organizations to appeal to specific groups. For example, there were groups for youth, women, teachers, and doctors.

The Party became particularly popular with German youth and university students. Other politicians thought they could control Hitler and his followers, but the Nazis used emergency decrees, violence, and intimidation to quickly seize control.

The Nazis abolished all other political parties and ruled the country as a one-party, totalitarian dictatorship from to The Party used its power to persecute Jews. It controlled all aspects of German life and waged a war of territorial conquest in Europe from World War II , during which it also carried out a genocide now known as the Holocaust. Antisemitism , the specific hatred of Jews, had existed in Europe for centuries.

The early Christian church had portrayed Jews as unwilling to accept the word of God, or as agents of the devil and murderers of Jesus. This accusation was renounced by the Vatican in the s. During the Middle Ages, State and Church laws restricted Jews, preventing them from owning land and holding public office. Jews were excluded from most occupations, forcing them into pursuits like money-lending, trade, commerce. They were accused of causing plagues, of murdering children for religious rituals, and of secretly conspiring to dominate the world.

None of these accusations were true. The second half of the 19th century saw the emergence of yet another kind of antisemitism. Antisemites believed racial characteristics could not be overcome by assimilation or even conversion.

These ideas gained wide acceptance. When the Nazi Party took power in Germany in , their antisemitic racism became official government policy. Hitler and other Nazi Party leaders played a central role in the Holocaust. In countries across Europe, tens of thousands of ordinary people actively collaborated with German perpetrators of the Holocaust, each for their own reasons, and many more supported or tolerated the crimes. Millions of ordinary people witnessed the crimes of the Holocaust—in the countryside and city squares, in stores and schools, in homes and workplaces.

The Holocaust happened because of millions of individual choices. In much of Europe, government policies, customs, and laws segregated Jews from the rest of the population, relegated them to particular jobs,and prohibited them from owning land. Although life for Jews had improved in many parts of Europe—including Germany—in the century prior to the Holocaust, these prejudices remained. When the Nazi Party came to power in Germany in , many Germans tolerated Nazi antisemitic policies because they supported Nazi attempts to improve the country economically.