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# The Holocaust ## Origins * Rise of Nazi ideology and antisemitism in post-WWI Germany * Hitler's promotion of "racial purity" and Aryan supremacy ideology * Nuremberg Laws (1935): establishing legal discrimination. The laws denied German citizenship to Jews, banned marriage between Jews and non...

# The Holocaust ## Origins * Rise of Nazi ideology and antisemitism in post-WWI Germany * Hitler's promotion of "racial purity" and Aryan supremacy ideology * Nuremberg Laws (1935): establishing legal discrimination. The laws denied German citizenship to Jews, banned marriage between Jews and non-Jews. * Kristallnacht (1938): marking a transition to violent persecution. * A Jewish refugee killed a German diplomat in Paris, Austria, and the Sudetenland. * Secret police military units destroyed more than 1500 synagogues and 7,500 Jewish-owned businesses. * Killed more than 200 Jews and injured more than 600 others. * The Nazis arrested thousands of Jews. * Hitler blamed Jews for the ills of Germany (from communism to inflation to abstract losses in WWI). * Hitler banned Jews from jobs in civil service, banking, the stock exchange, law, journalism, and medicine. ## Implementation * Wannsee Conference (1942): formalizing systematic genocide plan * Establishment of 42,500 concentration and death camps * Implementation of mass murder through gas chambers and firing squads * Total victims: 6 million Jews and 5 million others, including Roma, disabled, and political prisoners ## Global Response * U.S. and allies aware of genocide by 1942 but took limited action. * Strict immigration quotas prevented refugee escape to America. * War Refugee Board established late 1944. * Military prioritized winning the war over humanitarian intervention. ## Major Concentration Camps * **Auschwitz-Birkenau (Poland):** Largest death camp, 1.1 million killed. * **Treblinka (Poland):** 870,000 victims in just 13 months. * **Bergen-Belsen (Germany):** 52,000 died, including Anne Frank. * **Dachau (Germany):** First concentration camp, model for others.