On this episode of The Sofa King Podcast, we explore one of the darkest chapters in all of human history—the Jewish Holocaust. During this horrible period of history, an estimated 6 million European Jews were killed by the Nazi regime. Many of them were in murder camps such as Auschwitz, but more of them were killed in round ups and purges in local towns. “Holocaust,” is a mix of the Greek words “holos” (whole) and “kaustos” (burned) and in the ancient world was used to describe a sacrificial offering burned to a god. The Nazis obviously burned the bodies, but the term will forever mean something more somber.

The Nazis were anti-Semitic, and Hitler used a building hatred of Jews to help amass his power and establish the Reich. He blamed the Jews for their loss of World War One and the poverty that struck the nation afterwards. During a period of many years, he slowly eroded the rights of Jews, taking their property, and spreading hate through his all-powerful propaganda machine. Eventually, it culminated in the Kristallnacht or “night of broken glass” where Germans burned synagogues and busted windows of Jewish owned shops. Soon after that, Hitler established the walled Ghettoes in Poland and through all of Europe. All of this was, of course, the wind up to the “Final Solution” where the Jews were systematically murdered.

So, how many camps existed in Europe (you might be surprised at this one!)? Did anyone successfully resist the Jewish killings? What were murder vans, and how did they help to establish the gas chambers? How long did the gas chambers take to kill people? Why did the Nazis start to burn all the old bodies from mass graves? How many people were murdered in each of the murder camps, and which camp was the worst? Listen, (laugh?), learn.

Horrible Photos: https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2011/10/world-war-ii-the-holocaust/100170/