The Holocaust

Religious Studies: KS3, topic 3.3.9

The Holocaust was by far the worst occasion of violence against Jewish people. Under the Nazis, millions of Jewish people were murdered.

The word Holocaust means destruction and slaughter.
The Jewish people themselves often call this time the 'Shoah', which literally means 'catastrophe'.

It is estimated that 6 million Jews were murdered during this period.
This was about two-thirds of all Jews living in Europe at the time.
The Jewish population was rounded up and sent to Death Camps, where many were killed in gas chambers.
Others died because they were used as part of evil medical experiments.
Others were shot in huge numbers and buried in mass graves.

After the First World War, Germany was in a very bad economic situation.
Germany had to make payments to other countries and the whole world was going through an economic depression.
Hitler made speeches saying that the situation was the result of a Jewish conspiracy.
He later made it clear he believed the solution to Germany's problems would be killing all Jews.

In the 1930s Hitler was elected to lead Germany.
Soon after he abolished elections and ruled as a dictator until his suicide in 1945.
Because of the high rate of poverty and unemployment, many Germans were prepared to 'scapegoat' the Jewish people.
Scapegoating means laying all the blame for problems on one person or one group.

This is an example of two of the reasons for extremism.
Firstly, Hitler and his followers (who became the Nazi Party) fed lies to the German people about the reasons for their problems.
Joseph Goebbels was one of Hitler's most trusted followers.
Goebbels said 'If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it'.
Secondly, the German people were looking for simple solutions to what was a very complex problem.

Test yourself on The Holocaust

What is the proportion of Jews living in Europe that are estimated to have been murdered during the Holocaust?