Background
One of the worst historical occurrences in a time of intense antagonism and violence was the Holocaust. Nazi ideology denigrated all other races and emphasized that Germans were descended from the Aryan race. Jews were considered Nazi Germany’s foes and a threat to its survival. The Holocaust can only be understood in the context of what was destroyed and how the Holocaust’s damage extends beyond individual lives and permanently alters social structures. Historians typically make associations between fiction and truth; experience and how it is recounted, and being alive and dead have also undergone a profound and horrifying change.
Nazi Ideology and the Targeting of Jews
The Jews who were slaughtered were no fatalities of the Second World War, which decimated Europe, but rather victims of the Nazis’ deliberate and methodical attempts to exterminate all Jews in Europe. Adolf Hitler was chosen to lead Germany after the National Socialist German Workers Party won the 1932 elections (Lang & Gigliotti, 2005, p. 30). The Nazis used the then-unstable German government as a political springboard. The Weimar administration and the Jews, whom the Nazis blamed for Germany’s problems, were their political rivals. They were the targets of a vicious propaganda effort by the Nazis, which organized numerous protests, and incited conflict with the communists.
European Christians’ attitude toward Jews is thought to have contributed to the Holocaust. These beliefs are supported by several anti-semantic fallacies that were prevalent in Europe. The rest of the communities in Europe despised the Jews because of these tales that represented them as ruthless and sacrilegious individuals.
Anti-Jewish Laws and Kristallnacht
The Holocaust occurred in Germany, which is understandable given that most of these legends were spread there. Hitler began persecuting Jews and imposing strict laws on them. Exclusion from public proceedings, asset and investment confiscation, the abolition of their professions and public educational institutions, and the burning of works by Jewish authors were just a few of the actions taken in the name of racism (Bergen, 2009, p. 14).
The Nuremberg laws were the most infamous of the anti-Jewish regulations. This statute provided the legal basis for the extermination of Jews from Germany. These changes led to a significant Jewish diaspora from Germany to the surrounding European countries. However, strict immigration regulations made it difficult for Jews to emigrate from Europe. Such frustrations drove a 17-year-old Jewish teenager to shoot and kill a third secretary at the German Embassy in France (Niewyk, 2003, p. 48).
This murder was the justification for the notorious night of carnage known as Kristallnacht, which Nazi hooligans carried out (Niewyk, 2003, p. 48). They steal and desecrate various Jewish possessions, including synagogues, homes, businesses, and places of worship. Numerous Jews perished in these battles, while 30,000 others were detained and sent to detention camps.
The Final Solution and Mass Executions
The Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 resulted in their “final solution” execution plot. The Nazis created Einsatzgruppen A, B, C, and D, four mobile assassination squads in the same year. Their job was to roam the countryside, murdering Jews (Niewyk, 2003, p. 35). These groups’ tasks included routinely rounding up Jews from towns, parading them to trenches that had already been dug, stripping and aligning them, and then shooting them with submachine guns.
The Babi Yar massacre, where between 30,000 and 35,000 Jews were killed over two days, is one such well-known atrocity (Lang & Gigliotti, 2005, p. 33). The highest levels of Nazi power gathered to create a plan for the systematic murder of Jews. The Wannsee Conference, which took place, created the strategy for the administration of the enormous, thorough Jewish extermination that soon followed the conference’s conclusion.
Other ethnic groups and communities were also murdered by the Nazis, such as gypsies, Polish scholars, and numerous Soviet prisoners of war. Still, only the Jews were singled out for systematic eradication. Jews were explicitly wiped out via poisoning with chlorine gas. Notably, all the execution sites were near railroad tracks to make it simple to transport the Jewish victims (Bergen, 2009, p. 27). A sizable camp complex supported the execution camps.
The support camps served a variety of purposes, including labor camps, transportation camps, concentration camps, and death camps. Jews had to wear identification badges in practically every Nazi colony to be separated from other ethnic groups and herded into ghettos or concentration camps before being transported gradually to the execution camps. From all of the Nazi colonies, thousands of Jews were transported to the execution camps. The victims will be gas-poisoned, and the bodies will be set on fire shortly after their arrival. According to estimates, 3.5 million Jews perished in concentration camps (Bergen, 2009, p. 27).
Forced Labor and Death Marches
However, the young Jews who were physically fit were spared and exploited as forced labor to help the Nazis win the war. They were imprisoned in labor and concentration camps and made to work at Germany’s armaments and other production facilities, notably I.G. Farben and Krupp, and wherever else that required labor. These enslaved people worked nonstop from morning to night without enough food or shelter (Lang & Gigliotti, 2005, p. 18).
By performing many of these Jews nearly to death, the Nazis and their allies executed them. The Nazi troops eventually started to parade the survivors of the concentration camps to the areas they still controlled in the closing months of Adolf Hitler’s rule. The famished and ailing Jews were forced to travel great distances by the Nazi forces to reach other concentration camps in countries under their control. During the marches, 250,000 Jews naturally perished or were shot (Lang & Gigliotti, 2005, p. 20).
Six million European Jews were subjected to systematic, state-sponsored persecution and murder during the Holocaust by the Nazi German government and its allies and accomplices. The Nazis did not begin committing mass murder as soon as they took control of Germany. However, they soon started to target and expel Jews from German society by manipulating the government. The Nazi German government established discriminatory laws and orchestrated violence against Germany’s Jews, among other antisemitic actions.
Dehumanization in Concentration Camps
The strategies/methods for survival that Holocaust victims had to resort to in concentration camps are prime examples of the dehumanization they experienced. The Germans used dehumanization as a tool to control and oppress those in concentration camps. Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines “dehumanization” as to deprive (someone or something) of human qualities, personality, or dignity, such as a subject (someone, such as a prisoner) to inhuman or degrading conditions or treatment.
One way the Nazis dehumanized those in concentration camps was through the “selection process.” Most elderly, the disabled, and the mothers who could not separate themselves from their children were all sent to the gas chambers along with their children to be killed. Prisoners were subjected to forced labor and physical abuse. If the soldiers thought they were not working hard enough, fast enough, or physically could not work, then they would get a lash from a whip.
Brutal beatings and torture were only a small part of stripping them of their humanity and making them more compliant with their rules. During the twelve-hour work day, furthermore, prisoners were often not allowed to answer natural needs, or they were forced to do so while they worked and on the spot where they worked.
Another way the Prisoners were dehumanized was through psychological abuse. They would break down the prisoners and get into their heads. The soldiers believed that the prisoners were a piece of property that they owned and that wasn’t worth a thing. “The systematic dehumanization of the victims in Nazi camps, Bettelheim argues, crippled inmates psychologically and caused them to regress to childlike behavior.”
The prisoners had to see propaganda that portrayed them as subhuman and abnormal. They were treated as if they were animals and not human beings. They were also dehumanized when they were deprived of fundamental human rights such as privacy, freedom of speech and movement, and were denied education. They were stripped of their names and instead tattooed with numbers. A man’s value was dictated only by their number and not by their character, skill, or traits that made them a unique individual.
Another form of dehumanization that was used was starvation in the concentration camps. The prisoners were told they were not worthy enough to get regular rations or anything to drink. Prisoners were given minimal rations of food and hardly any water, and most of the time, the water was contaminated. The prisoners suffered from malnutrition and were at high risk of catching diseases.
They would resort to eating dirt, clay, and even dead carcasses. They would drink soiled water if they got to drink any water at all. They would have to work for all the food they brought. The Nazis used dehumanization as a way to control and own the prisoners in the concentration camps through physical abuse, psychological abuse and manipulation, and starvation tactics.
Witnesses, Collaborators, and Resistance
It is essential to examine the role of witnesses and collaborators in the Holocaust, including the complicity of ordinary people in the persecution and murder of Jews and other target groups. Niewyk explores Holocaust resistance, including individual acts of defiance and organized efforts to resist Nazi oppression (Niewyk, 2003). In addition, the author examines the aftermath of the Holocaust, including the prosecution of Nazi war criminals, the founding of Israel, and the impact of the Holocaust on postwar Europe. Thus, the effect of the Holocaust was significantly noticeable in Eastern Europe, as evidenced by the involvement and suffering of Poles during the Holocaust. Thus, it is essential to conduct a historical analysis of the involvement and suffering of Poles during the Holocaust.
In his article “Poles and Jews in the Second World War: The Revisions of Jan T. Gross,” historian John Connelly examines the controversy sparked by Jan T. Gross’s book “Neighbors: The Destruction of the Jewish Community in Jedwabne, Poland” (Connelly, 2002). The evidence for this is the events in Jedwabne, including the long history of tension and violence between Poles and Jews in the region. However, the participation of the Polish population in the oppression of Jews undermined the perception of Poles as victims of the regime (Connelly, 2002). Therefore, it is widely accepted that the Poles were not victims but collaborators of the German authorities.
However, the properly understood role of the Polish people during the Holocaust was multifaceted, as they cooperated with the German authorities and were, at the same time, targets of violence and destruction. Consequently, it is important to consider the facts of Polish assistance in the extermination camps for Jews, not just their suffering (Connelly, 2002). As a result, it reveals the tensions and divisions in Polish society and highlights the ongoing problems of memory and historical interpretation in shaping national identity and narratives.
It is important to note that Richard S. Lukas’s book “The Forgotten Holocaust: The Poles Under German Occupation, 1939-1944” argues that the suffering and persecution of the Polish people during World War II have been largely overlooked and marginalized in mainstream historical narratives (Lukas, 1986). Specifically, it is a fact that Poles were also victims of Nazi aggression and that they resisted and fought back against the German occupation in various ways.
Evidence of the negative impact on the Polish nation is the widespread and systematic violence and oppression under German rule, including mass executions, forced labor, and the destruction of cultural and religious institutions. At the same time, Poles attempted to counteract and develop the underground, which played a crucial role in undermining Nazi rule and contributed to the Allied victory (Lukas, 1986). Therefore, the Polish people not only suffered greatly but also took measures to stop the German regime.
Despite the negative experiences of Eastern Europeans and their systematic denigration, their experiences have been overshadowed by other narratives, particularly the Jewish understanding of the Holocaust. As a result, attempts to portray Poles in a negative context demonstrate historical neglect of Eastern Europe and its people, as well as a tendency to favor Western perspectives and narratives in mainstream historical accounts.
Thus, these authors present different conceptions of the roles of Polish Jews, with Gross emphasizing that Poles cannot be labeled as victims alone and providing evidence of their collaboration with the German authorities. Instead, Lukas explores the underground resistance and the Polish regime’s struggle against anti-Semitic policies (Lukas, 1986). Lukas also focuses on the fact that contemporary literature minimizes the role and achievements of Eastern Europe during the Holocaust.
Broader Historical Context and Dual Realities
It is worth mentioning the book by Israel Gutman and Shmuel Krakowski that investigates the relationship between Poles and Jews during World War II (Gutman & Krakowski, 1986). Thus, during the German occupation, the theorists argued that there was a systematic extermination of Jews by the Nazi regime, including the creation of ghettos and death camps.
According to historical accounts, Poles were also involved in the persecution of Jews, involving cases of collaboration and betrayal. In addition to these cases, there is evidence of Poles creating movements and organizations whose members risked their lives to save Jews. Accordingly, the involvement of Poles in the Holocaust and their sacrifice and suffering from violence at the hands of the German authorities are phenomena that occurred in parallel.
The suffering of Eastern Europeans should be assessed, and the broader historical context should be examined to evaluate the extent of their victimization (Gutman & Krakowski, 1986). Therefore, it is fair to consider the evidence that describes not only the negative impact of German persecution on the Polish people but also their relationship with the occupation authorities.
Thus, the primary focus of contemporaries is on the Holocaust and the persecution of Poles and Jews by the German authorities during World War II. However, it is also necessary to recognize the suffering of Poles and all the inhabitants of Eastern Europe during their extermination by German troops. At the same time, there is evidence of the involvement of Poles in the actions of the German authorities. Thus, these facts create different points of view, ranging from the massive suffering of the Poles to their involvement in the Holocaust. However, these facts should be considered in parallel.
References
Bergen, D. L. (2009). The Holocaust: A New History. Doris Bergen. Tempus.
Connelly, J. (2002). Poles and Jews in the Second World War: The Revisions of Jan T. Gross. Contemporary European History, 11(4), 641–658. Web.
Gigliotti, S., & Lang, B. (2005). The Holocaust: A Reader. Wiley-Blackwell.
Gutman, I., & Krakowski, S. (1986). Unequal victims: Poles and Jews During World War Two.
Lukas, R. C. (1986). The forgotten Holocaust: The Poles Under German Occupation, 1939-1944.
Niewyk, D. L. (2003). The Columbia Guide to the Holocaust. Columbia University Press.