Essay Sample About Antisemitism

Topic Question: How and Why were the Jews persecuted from 1933 to 1939?
Persecution. Noun. Hostility and mistreatment, particularly because of racial, political, or religious convictions. So, how were Jews oppressed, and what impact did Nazi ideologies have on the Jewish community? Though it is clear from researching the Holocaust that Jews were widely targeted and killed within concentration camps, the Nazis' anti-Semitic objectives were more ambiguous at the start. That was until Kristallnacht, often known as the "Night of Broken Glass." In this article, I will explore the numerous causes and events that led up to the violent outrage of Kristallnacht, as well as the devastation caused by the Nuremberg Race Laws. This is how one person's viewpoint influenced the course of history. This is the start of the Holocaust. When the glass is quiet and the smoke has settled, we can see what really caused World War II.

When Hitler was chosen Chancellor, he immediately began distributing anti-Semitic propaganda with the intent of alienating Germany's Jewish populations. The Nazi Party's philosophy was that Jews were to blame for all of Germany's misfortunes, including the defeat in World War One. Hitler held many divisive views on how propaganda might be used to affect the German people, devoting two chapters of his novel Mein Kampf (1925) to his beliefs on the "proper" uses of it. In chapter six of this book, he writes, “The art of propaganda consists precisely in being able to awaken the public's imagination through an appeal to their feelings, (...) the great majority of a nation is so feminine in its character and outlook that its thoughts and conduct are ruled by sentiment rather than by sober reasoning.” Furthermore, Hitler took advantage of the Great Depression and Germany's poor economic wealth, using the Party's Propaganda Minister, Joseph Goebbels, to drip feed propaganda into every German household. Hitler’s posters, such as 'Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Fuhrer' ('One People, One Nation, One Leader,' 1938), were placed in every street with the intention of attracting supporters for Hitler's initiatives. Hitler's followers were instructed to shun all Jews, prompting a retail boycott of Jewish companies in 1933. Many Jewish businesses went bankrupt, and many of their prior clients refused to visit the buildings, let alone buy anything. This propaganda was discovered to be an efficient way of isolating Jews from German society, and it was utilised to persecute the Jewish community.

The Nuremberg laws were used to keep and imprison Jewish residents. Persecution had taken on a new form, control, and the Nazi party had numerous tools for implementing it. Laws were enacted to restrict the Jewish community's freedom, and the Nazis used governmental power against them in acts of persecution. Restrictions were imposed that restricted Jews within Germany, such as the Reich Citizenship Law (1935), which deprived them of their German citizenship but also denied them access to a visa, preventing them from leaving the nation. Article Two, Section One of The Reich Citizenship Law states “A citizen of the Reich is that subject only who is of German or kindred blood and who, through his conduct, shows that he is desirous and fit to serve the German people and Reich faithfully”. The Nazi party also wished to maintain pure generations of German citizens, and therefor restricted marriage between German citizens and Jews throu the German Blood Purity Law (1935). The Nazi Party feared that Jewish blood would corrupt their own. The Nazis believed that Jewishness was a race and not a religion, hence, in their eyes, the fault of a Jew could be passed down through DNA. Mixed marriage between a German citizen and a Jew became illicit and sexual relationships that threatened to contaminate German genealogy were classed illegal. In relation to the ‘Blood Purity Law’, a debate occurred on who would be considered a Jew, and a definition was reached. With deep consideration it was decided, anyone who had three grandparents of Jewish descent would be considered a Jew. Persecution was maintained with power, and the Nazis strategically confined Jews to maintain that power, therefore persecuting them furthermore.

Kristallnacht stood as the first publicly violent persecution of Jews. The Nazi Party used the shooting of a German diplomat, Ernst Vom Rath, by a French Jew, Hershcel Grynszpan, as a campaign against the Jewish community. Kristallnacht was the German citizens' response towards the death of this diplomat, and the murder of over ninety Jews was mitigated by the Nazis and claimed as justified by Hitler. This act of violence was instigated in hope to encourage Jews not to act out against the Nazi regime. It is believed that 7,000 Jewish enterprises were plundered or destroyed, including hundreds of synagogues that were burned down. German civilians were not authorised to assist in cleaning up the destroyed properties or putting out fires