Holocaust - 1 Der Judenfrage(The Jewish Question 1 Attempt...

1. Der Judenfrage (“The Jewish Question”)
1. Attempt on German Nazi party to exterminate all Jews—genocide, killed 6 million people
1. Didn’t immediately embark on this, came later and gradually emerged from anti-Semitic discoursge
throughout the 1920-30’s. obsessed with The Jewish Question—question what ought to be done with the
Jewish population in Europe.
2. Solutions:
1. Gather all the Jews in Europe and deport them to a newly created Jewish Homeland.
2. A Jewish Homeland?
1. In Madagascar, even though there were no cultural ties to Jewish people. Nazis were just looking for a
dumping ground to get rid of the Jews. Driven by the fear of interbreeding—a pure Aryan race, and non
Aryans interbreeding with them and dilute the purity of the Aryan race. Plan was eventually rejected
3. The Nuremberg Laws (1935)
1. After 1933 when they came into power, they made laws to Jews in Germany. Prior to 1935, any Jew born
and raised in Germany, they would be considered as a full fledge German, but not anymore.
1. Stripped citizen rights
2. Interbreeding—prohibited marriage between Aryans and non-Aryans and especially outlawed Jews and
Aryans.
1. Even in 1935, the Nazis were plagued by problems that always haunted their Anti-Semitic
philosophy  they never came up with an effective definition of who was a Jew and who wasn’t
1. Came up with a chart with how Jewish you were—look at picture on slides
2. Obsessed with the definition and classification of Jews. Wasted a lot of time doing this!
3. 361 story of nazi official who came to German to school to provide lesson of racial classification “blue