Anti-Jewish Legislation in North Africa

Long understood as a strictly European tragedy, the Holocaust’s reach extended far beyond the traditional boundaries of continental Europe to the Muslim world of North Africa. The Vichy regime introduced race laws to the North African territories in October of 1940. These laws were implemented variously across North Africa, as Vichy law interacted with pre-existing colonial law and wartime realities.

The International League Against Anti-Semitism in North Africa

Fascism

Fascism is a far-right political philosophy, or theory of government, that emerged in the early twentieth century. Fascism prioritizes the nation over the individual, who exists to serve the nation. While fascist movements could be found in almost every country following World War I, fascism was most successful in Italy and Germany.

Jews of the Maghreb on the Eve of World War II

North African Jews did not constitute a single community before or during World War II but, rather, were a diverse population of roughly 500,000. There were variations between the present-day countries of the Maghreb (Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya); by class, sub-ethnic histories, region; and by rural or urban lifestyle.

Labor and Internment Camps in North Africa

In Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, and French West Africa, French collaborationist Vichy authorities established a network of different types of camps: penal camps, labor camps, and internment camps.  These camps included Jewish and non-Jewish European refugees, those already residing in French colonial North Africa before 1940, those deported for forced labor in the Sahara, Allied prisoners of war, and civilians.

The Role of Civil Servants

Persecution of Jews and other groups was not solely the result of measures originating with Hitler and other Nazi zealots. Nazi leaders required the active help or cooperation of professionals working in diverse fields who in many instances were not convinced Nazis. Civil servants, from government officials to judges, helped draft, implement, and enforce laws aimed at depriving Jews of their rights, livelihoods, and assets.

The Role of Academics and Teachers

Persecution of Jews and other groups was not solely the result of measures originating with Hitler and other Nazi zealots. Nazi leaders required the active help or cooperation of professionals working in diverse fields who in many instances were not convinced Nazis. Teachers and university professors were actively involved or went along with the ouster of Jews from their fields and cooperated in other ways with the Nazi regime in the implementation of racial policies.

The Role of the Military

Persecution of Jews and other groups was not solely the result of measures originating with Hitler and other Nazi zealots. Nazi leaders required the active help or cooperation of professionals working in diverse fields who in many instances were not convinced Nazis. The military played a vital role in the consolidation of Nazi power and persecution and mass murder of Jews and other groups.

The Role of German Clergy and Church Leaders

Persecution of Jews and other groups was not solely the result of measures originating with Hitler and other Nazi zealots. Nazi leaders required the active help or cooperation of professionals working in diverse fields who in many instances were not convinced Nazis. Church leaders and other members of the conservative elite who were in a position to influence public opinion were all but silent regarding the persecution of Jews.

The Role of Business Elites

Persecution of Jews and other groups was not solely the result of measures originating with Hitler and other Nazi zealots. Nazi leaders required the active help or cooperation of professionals working in diverse fields who in many instances were not convinced Nazis. Among these professionals were business leaders. 

Communism

Communism is an economic and political philosophy grounded in the belief that societies are shaped by their economic systems. According to communism, capitalism creates social problems by dividing wealth unfairly between two classes of people. Therefore, the economic system must be reformed to distribute wealth equally. Communist ideas spread rapidly in Europe during the 19th and 20th centuries, offering an alternative to both capitalism and far-right fascism and setting the stage for a political conflict with global repercussions.

Jewish Refugees Aboard the SS Quanza

The SS Quanza was a Portuguese ship chartered by 317 Jewish refugees attempting to escape Nazi-dominated Europe in August 1940. Passengers with valid visas were allowed to disembark in New York and Veracruz, but that left 81 refugees seeking asylum. Their request to land in the USA triggered a political and legal battle between First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and Assistant Secretary of State Breckinridge Long.

Bayer

Public Humiliation

During the twelve years of the Third Reich (1933-1945), Nazi officials and organizations perpetrated public humiliations of individuals in Germany and Nazi-occupied  countries. The Nazis singled out Jews and other victims who violated racial laws as targets for humiliation. For example, Jewish men often had their beards forcibly shaved and endured  physical punishment.

Nazi Imperialism: An Overview

Warsaw Uprising

On August 1, 1944, the Polish Home Army (Armia Krajowa, AK), a non-Communist underground resistance movement, initiated the Warsaw uprising to liberate the city from the German occupation and reclaim Polish independence. The impetus for the military action was the ongoing retreat of the German forces from Poland, followed by the appearance of the Soviet Red Army along the east bank of the Vistula River. By October 2, 1944, the Germans had suppressed the uprising, deporting civilians to concentration and forced-labor camps and reducing Warsaw to ruins.

Timeline of the German Military and the Nazi Regime

This timeline chronicles the relationship between the professional military elite and the Nazi state. It pays specific attention to the military leaders’ acceptance of Nazi ideology and their role in perpetrating crimes against Jews, prisoners of war, and unarmed civilians in the name of that ideology. 

Nazi Party Platform

Melk

Millions of people suffered and died in camps, ghettos, and other sites during the Holocaust. The Nazis and their allies oversaw more than 44,000 camps, ghettos, and other sites of detention, persecution, forced labor, and murder. Among them was Melk, a subcamp of Mauthausen. 

Joseph Goebbels

Gleichschaltung: Coordinating the Nazi State

The Nazi Party came to power in 1933 and quickly began trying to control all aspects of society. This internal consolidation of power to remake Germany as a Nazi state was known as Gleichschaltung. The term is a German word that means “coordination” or “synchronization.” Under Gleichschaltung, German political, social, and cultural life were rearranged to serve Nazi goals.

Sobibor Uprising

Under the most adverse conditions, Jewish prisoners initiated resistance and uprisings in some Nazi camps. On October 14, 1943, prisoners in Sobibor killed 11 members of the camp's SS staff, including the camp’s deputy commandant Johann Niemann. While close to 300 prisoners escaped, breaking through the barbed wire and risking their lives in the minefield surrounding the camp, only about 50 would survive the war. 

Esther Lurie

While confined in the Kovno ghetto, several artists drew and painted portraits and landscapes. They were even made to create copies of art masterpieces for the German overseers and others stationed in Kovno. In addition, they worked secretly to capture scenes of violence and deportations. Among these artists was Esther Lurie.

Cookbooks and Recipes

In many families, recipes and cookbooks hold a special place—a well used, tattered cookbook passed down from one generation to the next, a treasured family recipe prepared for gatherings, the aroma of a favorite pie baking.

"Degenerate" Art

Nazi leaders sought to control Germany not only politically, but also culturally. The regime restricted the type of art that could be produced, displayed, and sold. In 1937, Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels made plans to show the public the forms of art that the regime deemed unacceptable. He organized the confiscation and exhibition of so-called “degenerate” art.

The Nazi Party

The National Socialist German Workers’ Party—also known as the Nazi Party—was the far-right racist and antisemitic political party led by Adolf Hitler. The Nazi Party came to power in Germany in 1933. It controlled all aspects of German life and persecuted German Jews. Its power only ended when Germany lost World War II.

The Role of Doctors and Nurses

Persecution of Jews and other groups was not solely the result of measures originating with Adolf Hitler and other Nazi zealots. Nazi leaders required the active help or cooperation of professionals working in diverse fields who in many instances were not convinced Nazis. The German medical profession played a central role in shaping and implementing many Nazi policies. A high number of doctors and nurses supported the regime, and many became complicit in Nazi crimes.

Janusz Korczak

Janusz Korczak was a well-known doctor and author who ran a Jewish orphanage in Warsaw from 1911 to 1942. Korczak and his staff stayed with their children even as German authorities deported them all to their deaths at Treblinka in August 1942.

Charles E. Coughlin

Throughout the 1930s, Charles E. Coughlin was one of the most influential men in the United States. He was a Catholic priest in the metro Detroit area who became politically active. Foreshadowing modern talk radio and televangelism, Coughlin led radio broadcasts that reached tens of millions listeners. He broadcast religious services with political overtones and expressed antisemitic views. He also voiced pro-Nazi opinions that made him a person of interest for the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in 1942.

The Role of the German Police

Persecution of Jews and other groups did not result solely from measures originating with Hitler and other Nazi zealots. Nazi leaders required the active help or cooperation of professionals working in diverse fields who in many instances were not convinced Nazis. Germany’s policemen played a key role in the consolidation of Nazi power and persecution and mass murder of Jews and other groups.

Wannsee Protocol

The Wannsee Protocol is one of the most important surviving German documents on the Holocaust.

Aryan

The word Aryan has a long history. Initially, it was used to refer to groups of people who spoke a variety of related languages, including most of the European ones and several Asian ones. Over time, however, the word took on new and different meanings. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, some scholars and others transformed the Aryans into a mythical “race” that they claimed was superior to other races. In Germany, the Nazis promoted this false notion that glorified the German people as members of the "Aryan race," while denigrating Jews, Black people, and Roma and Sinti (Gypsies) as “non-Aryans.” 

Ben Ferencz and the Fight for International Justice

Benjamin B. Ferencz has devoted his life to creating an international system of justice that protects everyone's right to live in peace with dignity. As a war crimes investigator and a Nuremberg prosecutor, he witnessed the horrifying effects of Nazi crimes. He became convinced that the world can prevent such atrocities only by outlawing and systematically punishing aggressive war and acts such as genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. 

Lebensborn Program

Nazi authorities created the Lebensborn program to increase Germany’s population. Pregnant German women deemed “racially valuable” were encouraged to give birth to their children at Lebensborn homes. During World War II, the program became complicit in the kidnapping of foreign children with physical features considered “Aryan” by the Nazis.

The Nazification of the German Police, 1933–1939

Beginning in 1933, the Nazis took control of and subsequently transformed the police forces of the Weimar Republic into instruments of state repression and, eventually, of genocide. They did so by Nazifying policing. The new government removed anti-Nazi police leaders, reorganized Germany’s police forces, and reoriented police culture towards Nazism.

Mass Shootings at Babyn Yar (Babi Yar)

In late September 1941, SS and German police units and their auxiliaries perpetrated one of the largest massacres of World War II. It took place at a ravine called Babyn Yar (Babi Yar) just outside the Ukrainian capital city of Kyiv.

Introduction to the Holocaust

The Holocaust was the systematic, state-sponsored persecution and murder of six million European Jews by the Nazi German regime and its allies and collaborators. The Holocaust was an evolving process that took place throughout Europe between 1933 and 1945.

Josef Mengele

SS physician Josef Mengele conducted inhumane medical experiments on prisoners at Auschwitz. He was the most prominent of a group of Nazi doctors who conducted experiments that often caused great harm or death to the prisoners. 

The White Rose Opposition Movement

In 1942 Hans Scholl, a medical student at the University of Munich, his sister Sophie Scholl, Christoph Probst, Willi Graf, and Alexander Schmorell founded the “White Rose” movement, one of the few German groups that spoke out against Nazi genocidal policies.

Magnus Hirschfeld

Magnus Hirschfeld (1868–1935) was a German Jewish doctor and a leading researcher of sex, sexuality, and gender. He wrote and lectured widely on these topics, treated and advised patients, and worked to promote the rights of those who did not conform to existing gender or sexual norms. After Adolf Hitler was appointed chancellor in 1933, Hirschfeld was forced to live in exile. The Nazis vandalized his Institute for Sexual Science in Berlin and forced it to close.

Gassing Operations

The Nazis killed millions of people in gas vans or in stationary gas chambers. The victims were people with disabilities and later Jews and other prisoners. The vast majority of those killed by gassing were Jews.  

Elie Wiesel

Elie Wiesel. Auschwitz survivor. Author of Night. Human rights activist. Wiesel devoted his life to educating the world about the Holocaust. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986.

The War Refugee Board

Jewish Partisans

The Wannsee Conference and the "Final Solution"

Prisoners of the Camps

Heinrich Himmler

Genocide of European Roma (Gypsies), 1939–1945

International Holocaust Remembrance Day

January 27 is designated by the United Nations General Assembly as International Holocaust Remembrance Day (IHRD). Since 2005, the UN and its member states have held commemoration ceremonies to mark the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau and to honor the six million Jewish victims of the Holocaust and millions of other victims of Nazism.

Afro-Germans during the Holocaust

Although the Nazis did not have an organized program to eliminate African Germans, many of them were persecuted, as were other people of African descent. Some Black people in Germany and German-occupied territories were isolated; an unknown number were sterilized, incarcerated or murdered.