Question

Explain how Jews were treated in Nazi Germany

Answer 1

Prior to the Nazi’s rise to power, Jewish history in Germany had been chequered with alternating periods of success and victimisation. Stretches of relative tolerance by those in power allowed the community to prosper and caused its numbers to grow with immigration — often due to mistreatment in other parts of Europe. Conversely, events like the Crusades, various pogroms and massacres, resulted in exodus to more accepting territories.

As the quintessential ‘other’ in central Europe, many tragedies were arbitrarily blamed on the Jewish community. Events as disparate as the Black Death and the Mongol Invasion were somehow attributed to a nefarious Jewish influence.

While some nationalist political movements in the 19th century typically vilified Jews, from the latter half of the 1800s until the rise of National Socialism, the Jewish community enjoyed at least nominal equality with Germany’s majority populace, though practical experience often revealed a different story.

Answer 2

Jews were treated as untouchables and they were sent them to concentration camps and they were killed in the gas chamber