This blog was created in 2005 to allow students at Cold Spring Harbor High School in Long Island, New York and at Lakeview High School in Battle Creek, Michigan to share their reflections upon reading the autobiographical memoir Night by Elie Wiesel. A new round of blogging continues in the 2009 school year. Students throughout the United States and from other nations are invited to post comments.
Has your reading of Night raised additional questions about the Holocaust? United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Teacher Fellow Honey Kern looks forward to joining the discussion. Please scroll down to the page bottom to view the most recent questions.
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86 Comments:
Hello,
I am delighted to be part of this Night blog. My 10th grade honors students took part in the original blog (school year: 2005-06), and it was a wonderful experience for everyone involved.
Good luck with your reading of Night; I look forward to answering questions and getting to know you all.
In the meantime, take advantage of the web links that have been listed on this blog, for they may aid you in your studies, too.
Best wishes, Honey Kern
Hi, I'm Cait. I have a question that I've always wondered about. I'm not Jewish, but I have dark brown curly hair, brown eyes, and olive skin. Would I have been a target in Hitler's rampage?
Hi, I'm Kylie. I was wondering if the Jews were the only religious group targeted in Hitler's tormented reign as dictator-murderer.
Kylie
Hi Cait,
Good question. You might have been a 'target' in the Nazi Aryan program which promoted 'blonde hair, blue eyes' as the ideal. Still, remember, Hitler himself was dark-haired. Seems ironic,yes?
Honey Kern
Hi Kylie,
Many times students ask this question which is important. Five million 'other' people were killed by the Nazis in the Holocaust: the mentally and physically handicapped, Jehovah Witnesses, homosexuals, political dissidents, and Gypsies (known as Roma). So many people were killed in addition to the six million Jews.
Honey Kern
Hi Cait,
Your question is really an excellent one and shows your ability to connect with the history of the Holocaust in a personal way. As your class learned last week when viewing the film RACE – The Power of an Illusion, antisemitism and the persecution of Jews were backed by the Nazi ideology of racism.
In the Nuremberg Race Laws,the Nazis gave precise definitions of who was a Jew. You would not be identified as Jewish because you possessed features that typically were associated with Jewish or non-Aryan individuals. On the other hand, it was more difficult for a Jewish child to go into hiding or to pass for a Christian if he/she looked Jewish.
In 2005, the Battle Creek Art Center hosted a very moving exhibition from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum about hidden children during the Holocaust. We heard incredible stories of how children survived because they could change their features or pass for non-Jews. There was even a case where a boy was disguised as a girl and fortunately, was spared during the Holocaust.
- Mrs. Lincoln
Honey Kern , have you ever heard that hitler was part jewish . If he was it's insane. Why would you try to kill particulary your own people. I also had a question for the moderator , did hitler dislike the religiously jewish or just heritage wise.
Hi "Skittlebrain92",
I was wondering if, since I'm using my name, would it be possible for you to use your first name in the postings?
As for Hitler (who was Austrian), being part Jewish, it has been rumored that one of his grandparents was Jewish, but there is no definitive proof of it as far as I know.
If your library has a copy of the book, The Holocaust Chronicle, on pages 26-27, you will find some other rumors that circulated about Hitler, started by his political enemies.
Good question!
Honey Kern
The Holocaust Chronicle is a very useful source. Lakeview HS Library has a print copy of this book in our reference section. You can also access the book online, including the section on Hitler
(page 26-27) which Mrs. Kern points out.
Hi i'm courtney, i have a question: jews have been used as scapegoats many times through out history, i dont know how bad their conditions were then, but why are people so shocked that it happened relatively recently? I'm not saying the Holocaust wasn't awful, because it was. But what makes using jews as scapegoats this time any different than before?
why is this one so famous?
Hey, I was once told that Isreal was established as a "homeland" for the Jews after the Holocaust. I was wondering if the person who told me that was right.
Kylie
Hi Courtney,
Yes, Jews have been used as 'scapegoats' throughout history from biblical times. What makes the Holocaust so 'unique' as you said, is the number of Jews who were killed, six million, and the fact that Jews were murdered systematically,scientifically, mechanically and by a highly cultured German society that took pride in their own love of the arts, music,education,and science. How could such a cultured people take part in such a mass murder?
Hi Kylie,
Your question is interesting. I'm quoting from a very fine book, Tell Them We Remember: The Story of the Holocaust, by Susan D. Bachrach. It's actually a publication of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, and it might be online at that site.
She writes on page 82, "Many survivors ended up in displaced person (DP) camps set up in western Europe under Allied military occupation at the sites of former concentration camps.There they waited to be admitted to places like the United States, South Africa, or Palestine. At first, many countries continued their old immigration policies, which greatly limited the number of refugees they would accept. The British government which controled Palestine, refused to let large numbers of Jews in....
Finally, the United Nations voted to divide Palestine into a Jewish and an Arab state. Early in 1948, the British began withdrawing from Palestine. On May 14, 1948, one of the leading voices for a Jewish homeland,
David Ben-Gurion, announced the formation of the State of Israel."
Another good question, Kylie! If we had more time to spend in our reading and discussion of Night, it would be worthwhile to consider the important historical event of the 20th century that you mention: the establishment of the State of Israel as a response to the Holocaust. As Mrs. Kern points out, following the defeat of Germany in 1945, many survivors were confined to DP camps and a Jewish homeland was not declared until May 1948. Throughout history, the idea of a Jewish homeland had been raised by other statesmen including John Adams.
The term which is used to describe the national movement for the return of the Jewish people to their homeland is Zionism and its most famous spokesman was Theodore Herzl. In 1903, Zionists even considered Uganda as a possible Jewish homeland. In 1917, The British government decided to endorse the establishment of a Jewish home in Palestine which later became the modern State of Israel.
- Mrs. Lincoln
Hi. I recently heard something about Hitler having a daughter, but I wasn't sure if it was true. But, if he did have a daughter, where was she all through the Holocaust and where did she go after?
Thanks.
-Cait
Hi, i'm grace. I have a question that kind of goes along with Cait's question. I was wondering what kind of family Hitler had. Did he have children of his own? I wonder thhis becaus eit seems like people with kids have so much love for them that they wouldn't be able to kill other innocent children. Just wondering...
thanks, Grace
were all nazis punished after the war? Even though some of them were forced into it?
I wondering if there was even the slightest chance that Elie's mother and sisters could have survived the first selection without Elie knowing. Did things like that ever happen?
Why did France, Great Britain, and everyone else just stand by and let Hitler rise to power when they probably could have stopped him??
--Dustin--
When The Nazis were trying to “get rid” of all the living evidence of what they done in the concentration camps why did they take the men and women who were still living on death marches? If they wanted to dispose of them why didn’t they just kill them all right then and there? What was the point of making them march for months when they wanted them all to die anyways? I was just wondering if you could help me understand this.
Thank you,
Haley
I've been learning a lot about the holocaust lately, and although it was a horrible event that happened I was wondering why nobody ever mentions or makes a gig deal about what was going on in russia at the exact same time. When Stalin was in power he killed anyone who did not agree with what he was doing in the country, not only did he kill them but he killed many people for their land. Stalin killed roughly 35-40 million innocent people in his country, Hitler killed 6 million. SO my question is why are we only learning about the holocaust when there was something even bigger going on at the exact same time?
I was suprised when the germans didn't kill those who were in the hospital because if they were trying to hide what they were doing at the camps then why (not to sound morbid) didn't they just kill them and get rid of the bodies or have them be transferred somewhere else or something because those people could easily tell the russians what was going on in the camps even if the camps were basically cleared out.
---Dustin---
Hi Cait and Gracie,
As far as I know, Hitler didn't have children of his own. In 2003, Jackie French wrote a book called, "Hitler's Daughter" but it's fiction (false), and there was a movie made of the same title.
Hitler did love dogs, however, and there are many pictures of him with animals. One would think that an animal lover would love people as well, but this was not the case.
Hi Courtney,
I'm not sure what you mean about the Nazis being 'forced into it', but,yes, there were trials after WWII called "The Nuremberg Trials, and they were held by the Allies in Nuremberg, Germany where 22 Nazi war criminals came to trial.
"Of the twenty-one who stood trial, fourteen were sentenced to death by hanging. The remaining seven received prison sentences.Before Goring could be hanged, he committed suicide..." (The World Must Know: A History of the Holocaust as Told in the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, by Michael Berenbaum, pgs. 199-200)
In addition, there were more trials afterwards while many Nazis escaped to South America after the war.
Hi Kylie C.
"Men to the left! Women to the right!" Wiesel, pg. 27
How we wish that the women and children were saved and that Elie could have seen his mother and sister Tzipora again. But sadly, in almost all cases, the women/children/elderly, disembarking from the cattle cars at Auschwitz, were taken straight to the gas chambers and death.
Remember, this was at the end of the war; Hungarian Jews were the last ones to reach Auschwitz, and the Nazis were speeding up their deaths.
Haley,
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Website provides a good overview of the Death Marches. Essentially, the evacuations of the concentration camps took place for the following reasons:
1. SS authorities did not want prisoners to fall into enemy hands alive to tell their stories to Allied and Soviet liberators.
2. The SS thought they needed prisoners to maintain production of armaments wherever possible.
3. Some SS leaders, including Himmler, believed irrationally that they could use Jewish concentration camp prisoners as hostages to bargain for a separate peace in the west that would guarantee the survival of the Nazi regime.
Sadly, many prisoners perished during the course of the marches or shortly after Liberation as a result of the exposure, starvation, and exhaustion which they were forced to endure.
- Mrs. Lincoln
Hi Dustin,
The link below will lead you to info about the German invasion of Poland and some reasons why the French and British didn't 'stop' Hitler in the late 30's.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?ModuleId=10005070
After Germany invaded Poland in September, 1939, France and Britain followed a 'policy of appeasement' and neither country was militarily strong enough at that time to fight Nazi Germany.
I hope you can find the link; you asked a good question!
Hi,
I am joining your blog, at least briefly, because, like you, I am very interested in the topic--Night, the life of Elie Wiesel, and the Holocaust.
Bill Younglove
Lakewood, California
Kylie asked a question regarding the possibility that Elie's mother and sisters could have survived the first selection without Elie knowing. The answer is yes, because, his two older sisters survived the Holocaust itself--and were eventually reunited with Elie. In his two volume memoir, ALL RIVERS RUN TO THE SEA and THE SEA IS NEVER FULL, Elie talks about his reunion with each and subsequent get togethers over the years. Quite interesting, however, is that fact that none of the three ever had a detailed conversation with each other about exactly what happened after the two lines at Auschwitz split...
Bill Younglove
Rebecca, you are raising an interesting, an important, and a crucial point. As usual, the answer to: Why not Stalin? Why "only" Hitler/Nazis/Holocaust? is complex. I can't substantiate your figures for the number of people killed under Stalin's dictatorship, but that is, perhaps, the first point I would like to raise. Do we study atrocities based simply upon their horrendous statistics? I hope not. Supposedly, Stalin once said, "The death of an individual is a tragedy. The death of millions is a statistic." If he did say it, he is right. I don't see comparative studies of mass killings as studies about who hurt more, who suffered more... Pain is pain. Anyone who has felt it does not need/want it to be compared. Still, why Holocaust studies, particularly now, more than 60 years after the event? Perhaps the answer has to do with the fact that it was unique, if not unprecedented. It has become the moral compass we might use to determine if world events turn in the direction toward mass atrocity again. So, if we study Stalin's bloody purge of Soviet peoples, let's do the same thing: Figure out exactly how he did it...
Bill Younglove
Dustin,
Your question/comment about why the Nazis didn't just simply kill the prisoners left alive in the camp hospital is a good one. The simple answer might be that the Nazis thought they were going to get away with what they were doing; that is, they would win the war; then world opinion wouldn't mean anything to them anyway. Another answer is that the Nazis' entire plan for over three years was to destroy all those whose blood (i.e., "race") threatened the purity of the Aryan race. They couldn't/didn't easily let go of that idea, even when they were losing. Somewhere I read that a victim who was about to be destroyed in a camp once asked a Nazi why he didn't just kill him back in the ghetto. The answer probably lay in the word genocide; that is, the Nazis were attempting to destroy the culture of the victims, too--in as secret and as methodical a way possible. The death marches seem to be an extension of the slow destruction often meted out to the victims.
Hi I'm Serena I don't have any questions but I would like to thank you for helping us understand some of the things in the Holocaust.
Hey, I’m Christina I’m a sophomore at CSH
And currently reading the memoir “Night” so far we are up to the part where the people arrive at the ghetto. The saddest part of this portion of the book is the part where the little child is hung. There is so much emotion there because, the child is said to have a face of an angel.
I know that no one asked this question, but many of you wrote so well about Juliek and his violin, a section of the memoir that is very moving, that I thought I would add a little info.
Juliek was playing strains from Beethoven's "Violin Concerto". What made this so important for Juliek and Elie Wiesel, and anyone who could hear it, was that Jews were forbidden to play this German composer's music, so in playing it, Juliek was indeed 'resisting'.
I hope you can listen to this music; it's available everywhere. Perhaps the class can listen to some of it. When you listen, think of Juliek, his violin, and his great spiritual strength.
Hi I'm Steven and I am a student at CSH. A question that I am wondering about is what ever happens to Madame Scachter. I was wondering because as she was on the train screaming fire, I see fire. I felt a lot emotions because the little boy was going through so much he already lost his Dad and brother ,and now his mom was going crazy ,and all he could do was cry. So, I felt bad for him. I was just wondering about Madame Scachter because the Jewish people on the train told a German OFficer that she was crazy ,and he said he will take car of it. So I was wondering what happened to her and her little boy.
Hi I'm Maria and I am a student at Cold Spring Harbor High School. A question that has been on my mind since reading Night, may be somewhat of a personal question but I feel that it is appropriate. The prisoners in the concentration camps are put through a tremendous amount of hardship and heartache. By now, some of the prisoners have lost their faith and hope in God. Elie Wiesel writes, "For the first time, I felt revolt rise up in me. Why should I bless His name? The Eternal, Lord of the Universe, the All-Powerful and Terrible, was silent. What had I to thank Him for? I was wondering if Elie or any of the other prisoners had ever regained their hope or faith in God? I was also thinking, after the Holocaust were some prisoners hesitant to have faith in God again, because maybe they felt that God was not there during the horrible experience with the Holocaust?
Ruth Sender has come to our school, Cold Spring Harbor, before and I was wondering if there have been any other Holocaust survivors that have spoken out about their experiences during this time?
Hi Honey Kern,
We always hear about how the Jews were powerless, and had no choice but to do what the Nazis told them to do. But, wasn't there any non-jews that could have spoke out against the Nazis to fight for the Jews rights??
-Madison
Hey,after reading this work of literature many questions popped into my head. Did hitler know for a fact all the people were " Jewish ", or did he simply just go by Jewish looks?
thankyou, Colin
Hi my name is Kathryn from Cold Spring Harbor High School. My question that I would like to ask you is why were the Nazis so mean and inconsiderate to the prisoners if they were made to work for so many long hours? I think they should have treated them a little better so they would do a better job when they are working. If they treated them better not as many people would be dieing of illnesses.
Hey, I am a tenth grader at Cold Spring Harbor High School. After reading "Night" I was confronted with a few questions. The first being why did the prisoners have to witness the hangings that go on throughout the book? My second question was there ever an instance were you had a Jewish Kapo instead of a Nazi? If any bloggers can answer my question that would be extremely helpful.
Thankyou, Birdman
Hi I’m a tenth grader at cold spring harbor high school and after reading night a have a question about the Holocaust. My question is what was it like to meet Elie Wiesel, and just sit down with a holocaust survivor.
-james
Hi, I am Chelsea a Student at Cold Spring Harbor High School and I was just wondering if there were any Nazis that rebelled against doing Hitler's word? What would have happened to them? Would they have become a prisoner of Hitler or were they just killed immediately?
Hey I'm Andrew from CSH.
Ive heard this was true but i wasnt sure about it - I heard there was a much smaller scale genocide in Italy by Mussolini.
Is this true and if it is who was targeted?
Steven,
I agree that he scene with Madame Schachter on the train to Auschwitz is very frightening and prophetic.
As you said, at the end of that chapter she is left with her little boy on the train. She was probably mentally 'mad', dragged off, and put to death with her son. She had 'seen' the future.
In the next chapter, Elie and his father were walking to the 'fire' ditch, and they saw the flames. Elie thought that he and his father were going to die right there. When looking at the flames, Elie's father said, "Do you remember Madame Schacter in the train?" (31)
Hi Maria,
This question about 'belief in God' is often asked when students read Night.
If you look at "A Prayer for the Days of Awe", written by Elie Wiesel which has a link for you on this blog, you can read it and realize that Elie Wiesel may have questioned God in Auschwitz, but that he really never abandoned God believes in God.
Some prisoners lost their beliefs; some prisoners became more religious and even tried to keep their prayers and commemoration of holidays in the camps. Some people asked, "Where was God? How could he let this happen?"
I think it must have been a very personal decision for each one.
You and Steven have asked good questions.
Hi Tori,
Are you referring to other Holocaust survivors who have visited Cold Spring Harbor HS or Holocaust survivors in general?
I can tell you that many survivors have visited our school over the past years. One of them, Irving Roth, who is presently Director of the Holocaust Center at Temple Judea in Manhasset, has written a memoir entitled, "Bondi's Brother" and been very active visiting CSHHS.
Irving originated the "Adopt a Survivor" program, whereby students, over time, met with survivors in small groups to learn their life histories so that after the survivor is deceased, the students will remember and 'pass on' the survivors' stories to others. CSHHS was the pilot program for that, and Irving brought 6 survivors to school, after school, for over several months
You can read about this in the June, 2000 issue of An End to Intolerance, the online magazine of your school's Holocaust/Genocide Project. There's a link to the project and the magazines right on this blog!
Also, you can go to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum's web site (another link on this blog)and you can search the bibliography section for more survivors and their books. In addition, you can listen to survivors online at that site! Good luck with your search!
Hi "Displayname" (Madison),
First, I hope you don't mind if I suggest that all Jews were not "powerless".
There is a fabulous booklet that you can download from the US Holocaust Memorial Museum website:http://www.ushmm.org/education/forstudents/resource/
Its title is: "Resistance During the Holocaust" (54 pages,and it will tell you of Jews who took part in: (I'm quoting from the hard-copy table of contents): spiritual and physical resistance in the Ghettos, in Nazi Camps, as partisans in the forests, etc. There was unarmed and armed resistance by Jews to what was happening to them.
Please be patient while I gather the material for you about non-Jews who spoke out during the Holocaust. There are wonderful books and resources about extraordinary people who tried to help the Jews. Unfortunately there were not enough of them. I'll write more to you tomorrow.
Hi Madison,
Here I am again with info about people who 'spoke up' during the Holocaust.
In Germany there was a group called 'The White Rose'. It was founded by a brother/sister team: Hans and Sophie Scholl. They were university students in Munich and distributed flyers that spoke out against Hitler, but unfortunately, in 1943, they were arrested and murdered for their act.
There are 2 books that might also help you and your classmates:
1. Rescuers, Portraits of Moral Courage in the Holocaust, by Gay Block and Malka Drucker....and
2. The Courage to Care, Rescuers of Jews During the Holocaust, by Carol Rittner and Sondra Myers, editors.
I hope you can find these books in your school library!
Hi Kathryn,
YOu asked about the treatment of prisoners. Well, the Nazis didn't want to treat their prisoners better. Their purpose was to kill as many Jews and other prisoners as possible. With each transport to the camps, there came more workers; the "Final Solution" of 1942, determined by the Nazi higher command at the Wannsee Conference, put forth a plan to kill as many Jews as possible as soon as possble.
Hi Colin,
Thanks for your interesting question, but I have to tell you that there is no such thing as, "Jewish looks" to determine if a person is Jewish or not.
But, remember, the Nazis wanted to establish an "Aryan" race. Their model was the 'blond, blue-eyed, tall' person, and they thought that people who looked Aryan were superior. (Hitler wouldn't have passed the test!)
Nazis counted on a 'false' science called, Eugenics, and actually measured people's noses, and checked eye color, lip size, hair
color, according to their charts.
Also, you asked how the Nazis were able to 'find' the Jews in the general population. In 1939, Germany took a full census of all its population. It was conducted on 'punch out' cards similar to the ones you sometimes use in class for short answer exams! Then the cards were put into a computer called the "Hollerith" machine, named after its inventor. It's surprising to know there were computers like this then; isn't it?
The Hollerith Machine was used in other Nazi dominated countries, and there is one on display in the USHMM in Washington, DC.
Hi Andrew,
Did you mean a 'genocide' of Italian Jews?
There is a wonderful narrative of "The Fate of Bulgarian and Italian Jews" in the book, "The World Must Know" by Michael Berenbaum, pages 166-169.
I'm pretty sure your high school library has a copy. If it doesn't, please tell Ms. Bergida to let me know, and I will donate a copy for your use. Thanks.
Hi James,
I met Elie Wiesel two times when I actually was introduced and spoke to him, but I have heard him speak several other times, and my students there at CSHHS and I have received letters from him.
He likes to hear from students who have read his works and are studying about the Holocaust.
I've met Ruth Sender, author of The Cage, and as you know she visits CSHHS to speak to the 8th graders who just love to meet with her, have their picture taken with her, and have Ruth sign their books.
Most survivors are very special people; when I meet them, I let them 'talk' to me, and I just listen in awe. As a group, Holocaust survivors are getting older. I hope that you have met one.
It's a little off topic, but, what ever happened to the chilren that were born as a result of Hitler trying to create a "perfect race"? Are they still around today...?
I am very pleased to be part of the new Night blog for 2009.
I hope I can answer your questions as you read Elie Wiesel's memoir Night.
Best wishes!
Hi Meaghan, You asked a good question. I was able to find this information from the 2guysinpoznanblogspot.com
I hope it helps:
"Here is a description of the information presented in the show from the History Channel store where the DVD is available for purchase.
Hitler's Perfect Children DVD
Blond hair, blue eyes and fair skin were the hallmarks of the ideal Nazi citizen. In order to insure the future of the "1000 Year Reich," Heinrich Himmler, the head of the SS, established the Lebensborn Foundation in 1935. Put simply, its goal was to breed Aryans.
HITLER'S PERFECT CHILDREN reveals how Lebensborn operated. Aryan women (especially the wives of SS men) were given the best possible pre and post-natal treatment, providing they could prove their own racial purity and that of the father. But only 7500 children were born in German Lebensborn facilities from 1935 to '45, so Himmler looked beyond Germany. In Scandinavia, he struck genetic gold, and thousands of women in occupied nations produced Aryan children in Lebensborns. And in Poland, up to 200,000 children were taken from orphanages or their parents to be raised as Germans. Only 40,000 returned to their homeland after the war.
Most of the German Lebensborn children grew into adulthood not knowing that they were the product of a Nazi breeding experiment. And those that did find out were rarely able to learn the complete story because of the secrecy that surrounded the program."
I've always wondered what could've happened to the all those German people to make them believe what Hitler had to say? Were they really that desperate for a leader? And even if they were, it seems like if you walked past the guy screaming that all the Jews are evil and need to die, you'd pretty much ignore them and keep moving along. Did Hitler not start talking about how Jews were evil until AFTER he gathered his following? And why did that not instantly make people realize that he was insane and probably shouldn't be given a position of power?
Hi guys,
I was wondering what is the current beliefe of Elie Wiesel?
He had so many experiences that he wrote about how he turned away from his God...
I was also wondering if any of my fellow bloggers are Jewish?
Jesse,
Last year I read Animal Farm and I think if you were to read that you might get an idea to how they could believe Hitler....
Hello again! I was just wondering what the exact number of survivors was. I know how many perished, but I want to know how many lived.
Cait,
I read that Hitler had a misteress, but there are no signs that he had children...
but even if he did who would openly admit that they were related to him?
To begin to answer your question, Han, about the number of Holocaust survivors, an article in the Holocaust Encyclopedia from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) provides this information: The Jewish population of Europe was about 9.5 million in 1933. In 1950, the Jewish population of Europe was about 3.5 million. Before the Nazi takeover of power in 1933, Europe had a vibrant and mature Jewish culture. By 1945, most European Jews--two out of every three--had been killed. Further statistics provided by Yad Vashem (Israel’s memorial to the victims of the Holocaust) give a breakdown of victims by country. There is also a Frequently Asked Questions section with valuable information. Details and figures about numbers killed can be overwhelming. Following the end of the war, however, Holocaust survivors (like Elie Wiesel) have rebuilt their lives and have worked to pass on a legacy to future generations. The USHMM website offers a powerful exhibition documenting experiences of survivors in the aftermath of the Holocaust.
Quwenci, you raise some interesting questions and have brought up the matter of Elie Wiesel’s current outlook and beliefs. Tragically, Professor Wiesel has been in the news recently as a victim of the Bernard Madoff Ponzi scheme. His charitable foundation lost $15.2 million to Madoff. Elie Wiesel and his wife, Marion, lost their life savings. USA Today and The New York Times have provided coverage of this developing story. These articles also give a good update on Professor Wiesel’s present work.
Hi Jesse C.
You've asked a good multi-faceted question. First, I want to direct you to the United States Holocaust Museum's new informative online exhibit "State of Deception: Powers of Nazi Propaganda" at www.ushmm.org
Hitler actually began his anti-Jewish rantings before he came to office as Chancellor in 1933. Earlier he written "Mein Kampf" which revealed his racial theories and hatred of the Jews. Once appointed to the government by President Hindenberg (who thought he should bring Hitler into the gov't where he could watch Hitler rather than let him continue his speeches and gatherings), Hitler immediately took power. Before this, the German people thought Hitler was a 'radical'; his party was not popular, but after the burning of the Reichstag, Hitler
took over and then everything happened very quickly.
Remember, the Germans were humiliated by the terms of the Treaty of Versailles after WWI; there was a world-wide Depression; Hitler, a rousing speaker, promised to make Germany great again. He appointed Joseph Goebbels as his Minister of Propaganda; all anti-Nazi beliefs were censored everywhere: at school, the workplace, at home. Hitler's rallies were often 'frenzied' as people went along with his anti-Jewish remarks.
Hi Quwenci,
My life and my studies have been greatly influenced by Elie Wiesel and his life and studies.
You can find out more about his
"Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity" online. Wiesel has posted a message there about his recent financial losses. As always, he is going to continue his humanitarian work around the globe. Contributions are coming in from all over, and my former school is hoping to take part in that effort to help Wiesel continue.
Here is quote of his; it has always affected me:
"Sometimes we must interfere when human lives are endangered. When human dignity is in jeopardy, national borders and sensitivities become irrelevant. Whenever men or women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views-that place must-at that moment-become the center of the universe."
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Hey, I have a few questions and if you could answer them, that would be great! Do you know how the Nazis were able to gain so many followers? It seems unlikely that the large men who made up the large armys ALL hated Jewish people. Did they bribe them to join the armys, or prehaps did they hurt their families in warning if they didn't join?
Also, I heard that once Hitler heard that he was going to loose the war, he locked himself and his men (with their families) in a room. I was told that he made everyone in the room kill themselves, and I wondered if that was true.
My final question is about Hitler's "Perfect Race." How were they treated while they were being raised by Germans? Were all of the people Hitler dated part of the "Perfect Race?"
Thank you so much for all of your help in answering my questions.
Hi Rachel,
You’ve brought up some very important questions. I’ll try to provide some resources to answer the first one about what motivated Germans to join the Nazi party and about how Germans were persuaded to enlist in the army to fill the ranks of those responsible for murdering Jewish people.
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum currently has on display an exhibition called State of Deception: The Power of Nazi Propaganda showing how the Nazi Party used modern techniques as well as new technologies and carefully crafted messages to sway millions with its vision for a new Germany.
Christopher Browning, one of the world's noted Holocaust scholars, wrote a book in 1992 Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland. According to Browning, ordinary Germans were not inherently anti-Semitic. Instead, they were disproportionately influenced by the Nazi Party’s anti-Semitic education and propaganda as well as by discriminatory laws and institutionalized racism. This led, writes Browning, to the transformation of many ordinary men into brutal killers who carried out the Holocaust.
The USHMM podcast series on anti-Semitism has a short excerpt of Browning speaking on this topic.
- Mrs. Lincoln
Hi Rachel,
First I want to thank the moderator for providing the hyper link to the United States Holocaust Museum's new exhibit on propaganda that I had previously mentioned to Jesse.
Since you asked, I thought you might want to read about Hitler's suicide on the HistoryPlace website. You will find Hitler's last will there, too.
You've asked good questions!
Honey K.
Hi Rachel,
I was interested in your question about the 'army' and the excellent info the Moderator gave as sources and about 'ordinary men' who turned out to be brutal.
I like to refer to Wiesel's text in Night, when he writes from the ghetto:
"Faster! Faster! Get on with you, lazy swine, yelled the Hungarian police.
It was from that moment that I began to hate them, and my hate is still the only link between us today.They were our first oppressors. They were the first of the faces of hell and death." (17)
Honey K.
Honey Kern and Moderator i would like to thank you for your responses to my questions. They helped alot!!!
Hello i am hanna. i am sixteen and go to Columbia Falls
i have a couple questions, first does anyone know of a book about Hitler, giving the most accurate information?
i wish he would have written a book during the war because i really want to know what was going through this madmans mind!
also i was sittin in a class, and we came up with the discussion that he was a drug addict? which i would completely believe, because i dont know of aynone that was in their right mind that would do this
and then third, where was his family during all of this, if i even thought about planning something like this i would get the biggest spanking! :) haha
but really, if his family had told him what he was doing was wrong would he have backed out? did anyone try to tell him not to keep doing this?
now that just brought up some more questions, in the site that Honey Kern gave to Rachel, about the suicide, i was really interested in that, because he was going to die either way and i didnt know how he would be able to live with himself. but it said he got married while he was in the bunker, was that girl just as eveil as he was or do you think she felt threatened? like she was going to lose her life if she didnt?
and last, , if Hitler anjoyed killing, than how come he didnt do it himself, i have read ALOT of Holocaust books and not once have i read of a victim even seeing hitler?
Thanks and if you cant answer then no problem. i am just curious, but these would be hard questions to answer, so thanks again for even trying!
~Hanna :)
Hi Quwenci,
Thank you very much for thanking the moderator and me! You asked good questions; we're glad the answers helped!
Hi Hanna,
I'm not sure I can answer all your questions, but I'll try.
First, if you go to Google
and search for "Biographies of Hitler", you will find over one million books listed!
There is a good book entitled, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, by William L. Shirer which gives some very interesting info about Hitler's family and early life (in the first 13 pages or so). Your library might have this book.
You called Hitler a 'madman' and maybe a 'drug addict'. Because of Hitler's philosophy, put forth in his book of 1926, Mein Kampf, it may be easy to say that Hitler was, indeed, 'crazy'. But somehow that would be making it too easy, giving an excuse to what he perpetrated in WWII with his racist theories.
Hitler didn't do the killing himself because he had a huge organization in the government to carry out his orders.
One of the most important things to remember is that Hitler didn't act alone. Ordinary people helped him succeed with his horrible plans to create an Aryan race and murder every last Jew.
Thanks for asking about all these things.
Hi again, Hanna,
I wanted to correct my comment about Google's list of biographies about Hitler. Google lists over one million 'entries', not all books.
Hope I didn't confuse you.
Mrs. Kern has shared some excellent suggestions for books and resources about Adolf Hitler to help answer these probing questions which you are asking.
In addition to The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William L. Shirer, we have several good biographies of Hitler in the Lakeview High School Library collection – for example, The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler by James Cross Giblin or The last days of Hitler by Hugh Trevor-Roper.
You will also want to check out Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler’s Shadow by Susan Campbell Bartoletti which uses oral histories, diaries, letters, and interviews with Holocaust survivors, Hitler Youth, resisters, and bystanders to tell the history from the viewpoints of people who lived through this era.
Thank you so much for answering my earlier questions. I now understand them perfectly and the sites you linked for me were wonderful!
I just finished reading Night a few moments ago, and I was wondering about why they didn't just kill all of the Jews when they knew they were going to loose the war? It seems as though it would have been easier to do that rather than move thousands of dying people for hundreds of miles. I was also curious about what they did with the camps once they were abandoned. Did they just leave them or did they try and destroy them? Did they leave the dead behind just lying scattered around the camp in the rush to transport the living prisoners? Are some camps still intact today? If they are, are they open to researchers or to the public like a museum?
Also, do you know what they did with the mass graves that they filled in with bodies? I know they buried some in dirt, but did they leave some unburied? Have researchers ever found any of these graves? Is it possible that there are graves that are undiscovered presently?
Thank you for all of your help!
Hi Rachel,
There are many answers to your first question, a good one. Germany was losing the war as the allies approached, yet the Nazis did not want to leave evidence of what they had done. Here is some information about the Death Marches that you might find helpful.
Having visited some of the Death Camps in Poland with my students on our Poland/Israel Study Mission, I will write more about your other questions in my next reply.
Hi Rachel,
Oops, here is the link to the Death Marches
Hi Rachel,
I recall that I visited Auschwitz-Birkenau, Majdanek, and Treblinka, three death camps in Poland.
All are open to visitors. There is nothing left of the original camp at Treblinka...just sharp, jagged stones that each name the communities that were destroyed by the Nazis. Auschwitz is like a museum; one can see very moving displays and then walk to Birkenau to enter the barracks and see the crematories. Most is falling apart. Visitors from all over the world often have ceremonies and leave flowers at the Russian memorial to the victims. The Russians liberated this camp on January 27, 1945. Majdanek Camp was also liberated by the Russians on July 24, 1944 and there is a huge monument there filled with ashes of the dead.
Until 1944, most Hungarian Jews (and those in Sighet where Elie Wiesel grew up) were spared the deportations to the death camps. How terrible that even though Germany was losing the war by then, its leaders chose to run trains night and day, filled with Hungarians, to Auschwitz in order to kill them all.
Rachel,
During the summer of 2007, I traveled to Poland with a group of teachers as part of a Seminar on the Holocaust and Jewish Resistance.
Some very emotional and vivid memories remain with me. I still see and experience the sight of Majdanek, one of the six death camps and located in the town of Lublin.
The weather was unseasonably cold in Poland that early July. As we walked the long path across an open field, leading to the Mausoleum, the wind howled and a light freezing rain fell. Under the dome of the Mausoleum is a large circular urn, shaped like a saucer and containing ashes of some of the victims who perished at Majdanek.
Words cannot express what one feels in such a place. I am so grateful, though, that you and other students care about what happened nearly 70 years ago and that you want to study and understand the history of the Holocaust.
- Mrs. Lincoln
Good question cait, In history we learned that they figured out who was Jewish in 3 ways. The first was if you had 2 grandparents that were Jewish and your parents were Jewish you were too. The second was that if you had 3-4 grandparents that were Jewish you'd be considered Jewish. The last was if you were practicing the faith or you used to. At least that is what we were learning in U.S. History!
Erika is correct in pointing out that the Nazis gave precise definitions of who was a Jew. According to the Nuremberg Race Laws of 1935, a person was not considered Jewish because of physical appearance or based upon particular religious beliefs. Instead, anyone who had three or four Jewish grandparents was defined as a Jew, regardless of whether that individual identified himself or herself as a Jew or belonged to the Jewish religious community.
In 2005, the Battle Creek Art Center hosted a very moving exhibition from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum about hidden children during the Holocaust. We heard incredible stories of how children survived because they could change their features or pass for non-Jews. There was even a case where a boy was disguised as a girl and fortunately, was spared during the Holocaust.
- Mrs. Lincoln
If Hitler's body was never found, why is it that we are so sure he's dead?
I'm not saying I beleive that he is alive, but I know that there are groups out there that do.
Meaghan,
I'm not sure why people want to believe that Hitler is still alive. There are many myths: that the Russians found some of his remains and later buried them, and even that Hitler's ghost had been seen.
I think the groups that want to believe Hitler is still alive are the ones that want to continue Hitler's philosophy, and that is very sad.
Well, finally I read "Night".
Wiesel doesn't even mention the existence of gas chambers. He describes pits full of fire (not accepted by Holocaust Scholars) as the method to kill Jews. Mengele wears monocle. He and his father chose to quit with the Germans before falling in Russian hands. Plenty of details obviously impossible like the case of the Jew that after disappearing and taken to a death camp, suddenly comes back to tell what will happen to them all. How could he escape and why did he come back to be taken again? How and old man could walk such a long way?. Maybe he was insane... all the book seems insane. Seriously... it should be banned. It's a missile against the official version of the Holocaust. If the consequences that this lie has nowadays upon so many people were not so dramatic I would find this book funny.
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