Holocaust - the persecution and extermination of the Jewish people by fascist Germany and its allies during World War II. In a broader sense, the Holocaust is the mass destruction of representatives of social and ethnic groups that are objectionable to the Third Reich.
In Russian, when spelling the word "single" with a small letter, it means the destruction or genocide of any people. If the word "Holocaust" is capitalized, it refers exclusively to events of the Second World War.
Timeline
January 30, 1933 Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany, which became one of the main prerequisites for the events of the Holocaust. Already on September 10 of the same year, Jews were forbidden to participate in the cultural life of the country. On October 5, 1938, a law was passed according to which, in the passports of the Jews, the mark “J” was put down - an abbreviation for German jude, that is, a Jew.
In November 1938, more than 1, 400 synagogues were destroyed, and tens of thousands of German Jews were sent to concentration camps. A year later, in September 1939, a decree was issued on the imprisonment of Polish Jews in the ghetto, and a month later they were obliged to wear a patch with the emblem of the Star of David on their sleeves.
After the German attack on the Soviet Union in 1941, mass extermination of Soviet Jews began in the occupied territories, and ghettos were opened throughout the German-controlled Soviet territory.
In March 1942, gas chambers began their work in the German Auschwitz camp, where, according to the French historian Georges Weller, about 1 million 100 thousand Jews were killed. Over the next two years, millions of Jews were killed in European concentration camps and ghettos.
On April 19, 1942, the first Jewish rebellion took place. It happened in the Warsaw ghetto. During the year, uprisings took place in several more camps.
In the first half of 1944, when the Allies liberated the occupied territories, the camps of Majdanek and Transinsria were destroyed - the second and third camps in terms of the number of victims after Auschwitz. On January 27, 1945, Auschwitz camp was liberated and destroyed.
The surrender of Germany on May 8 and 9, 1945 marked the end of the Holocaust and the beginning of judicial investigations of fascists and war criminals.
