The Eyes Behind the Curtain

Jakub Canda
Alexandra Nguyen
Catherine Pourdavoud
Jennifer To
 The Genocidal State
“Every arm of the country's sophistcated bureaucracy was involved in the killing
process. Parish churches and the Interior Ministry supplied birth records showing who
was Jewish; the Post Ofce delivered the deportaton and denaturalizaton orders;
the Finance Ministry confscated Jewish property; German frms fred Jewish workers
and disenfranchised Jewish stockholders; the universites refused to admit Jews,
denied degrees to those already studying, and fred Jewish academics; government
transport ofces arranged the trains for deportaton to the camps;
German pharmaceutcal companies tested drugs on camp prisoners; companies bid
for the contracts to build the crematoria; detailed lists of victms were drawn up
using the Dehomag (IBM Germany) company's punch card machines, producing
metculous records of the killings. As prisoners entered the death camps, they were
made to surrender all personal property, which was carefully catalogued and tagged
before being sent to Germany to be reused or recycled. Berenbaum writes that the
Final Soluton of the Jewish queston was "in the eyes of the perpetrators …
Germany's greatest achievement."
Michael Berenbaum
"Not one social group, not one religious community, not one scholarly insttuton or
professional associaton in Germany and throughout Europe declared its solidarity
with the Jews."

Saul Friedlander
BEGINNING?
1933
1935
THE NUREMBERG LAWS
1938
DIE KRISTALL NACHT
 Collaborators

ing
The Beginn

Vienna,
1938
Ant-Sem
itsm
test
35 , “ Th e Jew is our grea
19 w!”
are of the Je
enemy; bew
 Collaborators

The Local Police

“The Lithuanian army is spread
out in the street; soldiers push,
people drag along, everyone is
electrifed, irritated, exhausted…
and weeping.” –Herman Kruk, The
vely Last Days of the Jerusalem of
ac t
c ho ice to Lithuania: Chronicles from the
ak i ng the ress Vilna Gheto and the Camps,
M opp
1939-1944

“That was when I began to hate them, and my

hatred remains our only link today. They were our
frst oppressors. They were the frst faces of hell
and death.”- Elie Wiesel, Night
 Collaborators

Not merely “watching” on the sidelines

Laughing, Spitng, Throwing

Rocks

de, No v. 1939
Germany Para

Holocaust Survivor Account: Esther Meisler

arch 1938
Vienna, M
 Collaborators
Even the children!

st,
Schindler’s Li
Polish girl in eto
f Jews to Gh
Evacuaton o

Inbred ant-Semitsm, fear,

and hate

149
Maus, pg.
 Collaborators

Bribery

Maus, pg. 89 How much is a human life worth?

Dana Schwartz, Holocaust Survivor Story

 Collaborators

The line becomes “fuzzy”

Architecture of Mobile Gas Van

concentraton camps Producton
and gas chambers

The questonable:
To blame or not?

Zyklon B Manufacture (Degesch, Degussa,

IG Farbin, Testa)
They were neither collaborators nor
resistors
Reasons to what led them to be who they are

Dana Schwartz
 “They simply didn’t care”

“Behind The Curtains”

“Looking the other way”

 Helping the Jews

• Share informaton
• Provide resources (food,
shelter, etc…)
• Smuggle Jews out of the
ghetos
• Hide Jews
• Help Jewish partsans
..But the Risks!

• Confscaton of all
possessions
• Sent to concentraton
camps
• Poland and other parts
of Eastern Europe:
Death Penalty
 So Why Help?

• Bribery
• Ant-Nazi
• Moral reasons
• Protectng citzens
• Connectons/relatonships
 Everyday Heroes

• The “Righteous Gentles”

Works Cited
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<htp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WByrxGE64Y0>.
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