The World War II was the biggest orgy of killing ever experienced by mankind: 15 million combatants died in battles, 18 millions of civilians died as a result of the war, 11.5 million of people were exterminated by the Germans (five million Christians and 6.5 million Jews). In addition to the material losses in destroyed buildings, factories, there were immeasurable pain and sufferance of millions of people.

But regardless to the destruction and sufferings experienced by all people, the Jews as a group suffered the most. 6.5 million Jews perished in the Holocaust, the bulk of the European Jewry. Before the War Europe was the home to 9 million of Jews, and at the war the European Jewry was reduced to about 3 millions.

Holocaust Losses by Countries

Country	Pre-War 1939	After -War 1945	Survival Rate	Remarks
Poland	3,250,000	50,000	1.5%	250,000 that survived in Russia are excluded
Russia	2,100,000	600,000	28%	-
Rumania	800,000	430,000	53%	-
Hungary	400,000	200,000	50%	-
Czechoslovakia	315,000	44,000	14%	-
France	350,000	275,000	78%	Including foreign refugees
Germany	240,000	80,000	33%	-
Netherlands	140,000	20,000	15%	-
Italy	50,000	33,000	66%	-
Yugoslavia	75000	12,0	14%	-

Those are the dry figures, they do not represent the un-imaginable amount of human sufferance, starvation, tragedies. Six million of Jews were annihilated within a short period of 5 years. Most of the of the people were killed on the territory of Poland. The infamous death camps Auschwitz, Treblinka, Belzec, Majdanek, Sobibor, Birkenau were all located in Poland. Even from those rough figures it is possible to see that the Polish Jewry had the worst fate. Over 3 million Polish Jews were killed. The average survival rated in the small towns of Poland averaged 1%, out of 100 people 1 person survived.

Within a short period of a 18 months, the Death Factories processed the following number of victims:

HOLOCAUST STORIES.

Six million Jews perished in the Holocaust and they were not struck simultaneously like by an atom bomb, but they died a slow dead lasting 5 years. The Jews were locked in the ghettos, aware about their forthcoming doom. A whole sector of a society lived under a death sentence, without hope of redemption, without the right of appeal. They were worse off than a criminals on the death row, they had to risk their life to beg or buy food, work without compensation for the German masters, prepare mass graves, bury the victims, and helplessly waiting for their turn, hoping for a quick and painless death for themselves and their loved ones.

kimel@systec.com