ALEXANDER KIMEL - HOLOCAUST UNDERSTANDING & PREVENTION

The victims were subjected to deliberate overcrowding, terror, cruelty, starvation, to break down their resistance and dehumanize them to make their destruction easier for the executioners. Absurd violence was perpetrated to dull the sensitivity of the perpetrators, bystander and collaborators, toward the victims.

Although no master plan for the Final Solution was found, the following elements are easily discernible:

• TERROR AND STARVATION
  Random terror, starvation were used extensively to demoralize the victims, remove their will to live, and victims, to convert them into an amorphous mass, easily guided into the gas chambers.
• COLLECTIVE RESPONSIBILITY
  Collective responsibility, deceit, rumors, were used to give the victims false hope, to guide them to the mass graves.
• DECEPTION
  The Nazis, used extensive psychological warfare methods, to keep the victims unaware of their pending destruction. It was necessary to avoid panics, difficult to control.
• DEHUMANIZATION
  Naked, starved people were transported for weeks, without food, water or sanitary conditions. Removing any semblance of humanity, made their killing easier for the murderers.
• HELP FROM THE VICTIMS
  The Nazis, used extensively labor of the victims in the process of self-destruction. Jews were manning the crematorium ovens, catching the victims in the ghettos, keeping the ghettos isolated.

kimel@systec.com