The document defines genocide according to the UN Convention and provides context about the Holocaust. It discusses Jewish life in Europe pre-Holocaust, the rise of antisemitism and Nazi policies that targeted Jews in the 1930s. It then details the mass killings and death camps during the Holocaust from 1941-1945, resistance like the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, death marches as the Nazis retreated, and liberation of camps at the end of WWII. Survivor quotes convey personal experiences of loss and separation from family members.
4. “ Never shall I forget that night, the first night in the camp, which has turned my life into one long night… Never shall I forget the little faces of the children whose bodies I saw turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky… Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust… Never shall I forget these things… Never.” - Night Elie Wiesel Oprah Interview - 1993
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6. A first-grade class at a Jewish school. Cologne, Germany, 1929-1930. — United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
7. Jewish children gathered for a sporting event in a summer camp organized by the Reich Union of Jewish Frontline Soldiers. Germany, between 1934 and 1936.
8. Three generations of a Jewish family pose for a group photograph. Vilna, 1938-39 — United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
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10. Illustration from an antisemitic children's primer. The sign reads "Jews are not wanted here." Germany, 1936. — United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
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13. During the anti-Jewish boycott, SA men carry banners which read "Germans! Defend Yourselves! Do Not Buy From Jews!" Berlin, Germany, March or April 1933. — Dokumentationsarchiv des Oesterreichischen Widerstandes
14. A sign outside a town in northern Bavaria warns: "City of Hersbruck. This lovely city of Hersbruck, this glorious spot of earth, was created only for Germans and not for Jews. Jews are therefore not welcome." Hersbruck, Germany, May 4, 1935. — United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
15. A woman who is concealing her face sits on a park bench marked "Only for Jews." Austria, ca. March 1938. — Institute of Contemporary History and Wiener Library Limited
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18. "the Führer has decided that … demonstrations should not be prepared or organized by the Party, but insofar as they erupt spontaneously, they are not to be hampered." - Joseph Goebbels (Nazi Propaganda Minister)
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22. Members of an Einsatzkommando (mobile killing squad) before shooting a Jewish youth. The boy's murdered family lies in front of him; the men to the left are ethnic Germans aiding the squad. Slarow, Soviet Union, July 4, 1941.
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24. Children eating in the ghetto streets. Warsaw, Poland, between 1940 and 1943. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
25. This image originates from a film produced by the Reich Propaganda Ministry. It shows patients in an unidentified asylum. Their existence is described as "life without hope." The Nazis sought, through propaganda, to develop public sympathy for the Euthanasia Program. — United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
26. Hairbrushes of victims, found soon after the liberation of Auschwitz. Poland, after January 27, 1945.
32. Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (April-May 1943) Jewish homes in flames after the Nazis set residential buildings on fire in an effort to force Jews out of hiding during the Warsaw ghetto uprising. Poland, April 19-May 16, 1943. - National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Md.
33. Jewish partisans, survivors of the Warsaw ghetto uprising, at a family camp in Wyszkow forest. Poland, 1944. — YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York
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38. A view of the death march from Dachau passing through villages in the direction of Wolfratshausen. German civilians secretly photographed several death marches from the Dachau concentration camp as the prisoners moved slowly through the Bavarian towns of Gruenwald, Wolfratshausen, and Herbertshausen. Few civilians gave aid to the prisoners on the death marches. Germany, April 1945.
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41. An American soldier looks at the corpses of Polish, Russian, and Hungarian Jews found in the woods near Neunburg vorm Wald. The victims were prisoners from Flossenbürg who were shot near Neunburg while on a death march. Germany, April 29, 1945. — National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Md.
42. An American soldier stands among the corpses of prisoners exhumed from a mass grave in a ravine near Nammering. On April 19, 1945, a freight train with nearly 4,500 prisoners from Buchenwald pulled onto the railroad siding at Nammering. Hundreds of prisoners who had died on the train were buried in the mass grave along with the prisoners who were forced to carry the corpses to the ravine and were then shot. Germany, ca. May 6, 1945. — USHMM, courtesy of Seymour Schenkman
43. The bodies of Jewish women exhumed from a mass grave near Volary. The victims died at the end of a death march from Helmbrechts, a subcamp of Flossenbürg. Volary, Czechoslovakia, May 11, 1945. — USHMM, courtesy of Dr. Robert G. Waite
44. Soon after liberation, surviving children of the Auschwitz camp walk out of the children's barracks. Poland, after January 27, 1945. — United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
45. Soon after liberation, a Soviet physician examines Auschwitz camp survivors. Poland, February 18, 1945. — Federation Nationale des Deportes et Internes Resistants et Patriots
46. American military personnel view corpses in the Buchenwald concentration camp. This photograph was taken after the liberation of the camp. Germany, April 18, 1945. — United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
47. Gerda Weissmann “ We had to form a line and an SS man stood there with a little stick. I was holding hands with my mother and… he looked at me and said, ‘How old?’ And I said, ‘eighteen,’ and he sort of pushed me to one side and my mother to the other side… And shortly thereafter, some trucks arrived… and we were loaded onto the trucks. I heard my mother’s voice from very far off ask, ‘Where to?’ and I shouted back, ‘I don’t know’ - “One Survivor Remembers”