The Holocaust, known in Hebrew as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered around six million Jews, roughly two-thirds of Europe's Jewish population. Most victims were killed by mass shootings in Eastern Europe or in poison gas chambers at extermination camps in occupied Poland. The Nazi persecution of other groups, including Romani people, Soviet prisoners of war and Polish and Soviet civilians, killed millions more, and the term is sometimes applied to those crimes as well.
Roots of the genocide
Antisemitism had a long history in Europe, rooted in Christian theology and later in nationalism and racial ideas. After Germany's defeat in World War I, many Germans blamed Jews and socialists for the loss, a claim that the Nazi Party later built into its ideology. The Nazis aimed to remove Jews from German society, first through laws, boycotts and violence, including the nationwide pogrom of November 1938 known as Kristallnacht. After the invasion of Poland in 1939, occupation authorities began confining Jews in ghettos.
Implementation of the Final Solution
After the invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, German forces and local collaborators murdered between 1.5 and 2 million Jews, initially targeting men and then women and children. By early 1942, following the Wannsee Conference, the Nazis implemented the Final Solution to murder all Jews in Europe. Victims were deported to extermination camps, while others were forced into labor camps where many died from starvation, abuse, exhaustion or medical experiments. The killing continued until the end of the war in 1945.
Legacy and remembrance
Many Jewish survivors emigrated from Europe after the war, and a minority of perpetrators faced criminal trials. Reparations have been paid, though they fell short of the losses suffered. The Holocaust is commemorated through museums, memorials and culture, and it is considered the deadliest genocide in human history. It has become central to Western historical consciousness as a symbol of extreme human evil.