Going through something like this was tough on them, especially with families like Eliezer and his own. Just being in an enclosed area for long time made them go mad and lose hope. In the first camp all of them lost faith in God and in themselves, because they witnessed people and even babies getting murdered on the spot. They killed each other over food, because they lost humanity. The german soldiers had them locked up like dogs, and that’s why they lost everything that made them who they are. Even though their attitudes and personalities changed, some of the Jewish refugees kept pushing on when they were weak. The old and the weak knew there was no hope for them, they were the one’s that did give up easily. That is why the Jews and non-jewish people, who were put in the concentration camp lost their personality and their behavior had changed over the time being locked in a small confined area for months or…
If you were ever put in a “survival of the fittest” situation, would you ever get to a point where nothing matters? Eliezer Wiesel’s book describes this situation perfectly. People who conveyed Jewish religion were exhibited inhumane treatment. They were tortured and beaten every day until they couldn’t take it anymore. The overall theme that was faintly suggested throughout the book is to show men’s harshness to one another in a life or death situation.…
During the holocaust, Jews were losing their jobs, rights, and property. In 1933, the Nazi leaders began assigning Jews to handle situations to help the jews in the Ghettos, these Jews were known as the Judenrat. The Judenrate weren’t Jewish volunteers, they were assigned and given tasks to perform: “Composed of 24 male jews … prescribed as 1) executing German orders, 2) taking an improvised census of the Jew in their area, 3) executing the Jew from rural to urban locations, 4) furnishing adequate maintenance for the evacuees en route to the cities, 5) providing quarters for the evacuees in the cities ghetto.” (Bernard 27). In many cases, the Judenrat were responsible for distributing food, water, and resources. Some Jewish council joined the Jews to resist the Nazis, such as the Vilna ghetto, where Jews insult and refuse the Ghetto police. The Nazis eventually kill the Jews one way or the other. The Judenrate’s purpose was to help the Jews endure the holocaust conditions, but ultimately the Judenrate leads the Jews to death.…
While outside factors could play an important role in enhancing survival chances, many internal mechanisms played their part to allow the prisoners to deal with the trauma and horrors of their daily lives. No matter what phase of his experience a prisoner was going through, these mechanisms were used. One of these mechanisms was apathy that desensitised the prisoners and allowed him to cope with punishments and the terror of concentration camps. Other mechanisms, similar to apathy, detached the prisoner from his surrounding or distracted him from his suffering. Without these mechanisms a person's suffering would have been unbearable and would have lead to his certain death. While finding a meaning in life was important to survive and to withstand the trauma a prisoner experienced, other factors and mechanisms also played a very important role in the struggle for survival that all prisoners of concentration camps…
Many factors contributed to the reason that the Germans tried to dehumanize the Jews in the concentration camps, partly so that they would lose the will to live. I feel like the German soldiers, ruthless as they were to the Jews, needed to dehumanize the Inmates because they didn’t have enough immortality to kill. But since the Jews were viewed, treated, and forced to live like animals, the German soldiers didn’t feel as wrong killing them.…
The only efforts made to try and liberate the Jews were from the other armies in the war since regular people didn’t have enough power to face the Nazi soldiers. In the novel, it talks about the prisoners spreading rumors that the Red Army are making advancements and will soon liberate them which provided them with much needed hope but it is evident that it didn’t come true. Talk of that could have also reached the nearby villages of the camps which put them off from doing anything to stop the Nazis because the army was making “advancements”. Another important…
The Jews had to go through terrible atrocities. They were being treated terribly, but they stood strong against the cruelty. The Jews enduring those terrible acts show how, even while being treated at the lowest levels humans can still persevere, retain their humanity, and live on. This is shown through how they kept their faith, how they treated each other, how they pushed on while being treated like animals, and how they kept on living and pushing on. All of these claims can be explained and supported by, Elie Wiesel's Documentary, his memoir, Night, Maslow's hierarchy of needs, and the official documentary of Night and Fog.…
The prisoners’ lack of will for revenge is in no way surprising. The Jews held in the concentration camps had little will to survive after liberation, let alone seek retaliation. The entire point of the concentration camps themselves was to exterminate the Jews, both physically and mentally, and they were terribly effective. The atrocities these humans underwent had an immense toll psychologically, and succeeded in breaking their spirit. The fact that the prisoners had no thoughts of revenge is simply a testament to how horrendously successful the…
Torture played a very big part in the Jews feeling inhuman. The SS officers beat the Jews very often, many times for no reason. Eliezer talks about how “one day when Idek was venting his fury, I happened to cross his path. He threw himself on me like a wild beast, beating me in the chest, on my head, throwing me to the ground and picking me up again, crushing me with ever more violent blows, until I was covered in blood.” (Wiesel 53). When his father was on the verge of dying he was calling out to Eliezer, he was told to shut up by one of the officers. He kept yelling, and then he was beat repeatedly for talking. He then fell unconscious and died soon after. Many people inside the camps were tortured very badly, and often.…
In every Ghetto, in every deportation train, in every Labour Camp, within the Hidden Forests, and even in the Death Camps; the will to resist was strong, and took many forms. Fighting with the few weapons that would be found, individual acts of defiance and protest, the courage of obtaining food and water under the threat of death, and the superiority of refusing to allow the Germans their final wish to gloat over panic and despair, were all successful resistance’s that made impact throughout WWII. How can one say that the resistance of Jews made no impact, when each life saved is a blessing, and is some cases more than 1000 of them were saved? Even passivity was a form of resistance. Even to die with dignity was a form of resistance.…
Political, economic and historical events created a lot of inequalities in society towards different races and classes of people, but the Jewish people faced a lot of discrimination. One of the main reasons Herzl wanted to create this Jewish state was because of the constant violence and attacks Jewish people were facing from mainstream European groups. Herzl describes how Jews constantly faced “attacks in parliaments, in assemblies, in the press, in the pulpit, in the street”, and explains how often many Jews “are put to death”. Jewish people suffered and lost their lives as a result of this violence and many governments in Europe also did very little to stop this abuse from being committed against hundreds of Jews. This is significant as…
Their persistence that continued even in the most hopeless circumstances further proves their bravery. In addition to courage, a defining trait that people involved in resistance movements share is selflessness, and the ZOB was no exception. Although the Warsaw Ghetto uprising was one of the more violent resistance efforts of World War II, the members of the ZOB fought selflessly. They knew that they stood no chance, but they willingly sacrificed their lives for the sake of justice. According to Emmanuel Ringelblum, a former inhabitant of Warsaw who kept a diary about life in the ghetto, “We took stock of our position and saw that this was a struggle between a fly and an elephant. But our national dignity dictated to us that the Jews must offer resistance and not allow themselves to be led wantonly to slaughter” (Kopel). Though the Jews knew they were as powerless against the Germans as “a fly” was to “an elephant,” individuals continued to fight to their own deaths. They threw away personal motivations, fighting instead on behalf of all Jews and the protection of their pride, which demonstrates their self-sacrificing…
The rescuers were from different Religions and backgrounds, but that didn't stop them from rescuing the Jews. They might not have had the same beliefs, but they all had the belief that the Jews didn't deserve the pain they were put through. They were also from all over the world which created a bigger resistance.…
The culture that encourages resiliency in their children is a Jewish tradition because they followed their teaching every parent had to teach their child how to swim. (Mogel 3/43) However, the parents prepared their children to face their future meaningful, as they are going to leave their parents and start their own lives; it was difficult for them at first, but the children got used after sometimes. This can be applied to the children who are starting to walk and move few steps and fall continue until they are able to walk properly. In my culture, we believe that resiliency was a primary concern for the children because children are taught different activities like cooking, farming, prayers, cutting firewood, sent to the market/shop and going…
While the Nazi’s treat the Jews like animals they do nothing in defense because they can and will be shot if they disobey. If the Nazis command them to run, they run, if they command them to move they will move, no questions asked. The Jew’s self-worth decreased since they do anything and everything the Nazi’s commands them, without any self-respect. For example, Amon Goeth, a Nazi soldier that leads the building of Plaszow work camp, sexually harasses Helen Hirsch, Amon’s maid, and kills her in a basement. Helen couldn’t defend herself nor scream for help since Amon could kill her, instead she was paralyzed in fear, and took all the pain. In another scene, the Nazis celebrate Oskar Schindler’s birthday, the main protagonist of the film. During the celebration, a Jewish mother and daughter enter the party to present a cake to Oskar. In gratitude of the cake, Oskar kisses the little girl on the cheeks and the mother on the lips, without any respect for the husband. Since the mother were surrounded by all the Nazis they could not give any kind of reaction, they hurried along without a word. The verse from the Bible Matthew 24:13 “But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.” was possibly in the Jew’s minds since they did not make any reactions to the inhumane acts. They are God’s people and should not worry about death because they will be in God’s…