Wegman 1

Lexi Wegman

Mrs. Ebel

ERWC

13 February 2017

The Holocaust

Human rights are natural born rights given to all people members of and a part of the

united nations. These rights protect all right given people from mistreatment in religion,

education, and all around: fear (The Universal Declaration of Human Rights). When these rights

are violated, there seems to be a constant correlation with grief and tragedy when related to many

tragic events that have happened in history. In 1939, Europe was faced with a tragedy in the form

of a mass genocide known today as The Holocaust; of the thirty articles in the Universal

Declaration of Human Rights, The Holocaust mainly violates articles 1, 2, 3 and 5.

The word holocaust comes from the meaning a burned offering or death by fire and

is officially defined as a destruction or slaughter on a mass scale, especially caused by fire or

nuclear war (Zullo). The Holocaust lasted from 1939 to 1945 and nearly 6 million jews across

the European countries were executed in the nightmare-ish death camps that were created by

Adolf Hitler where jews were forced to do hard labor under harsh conditions with little to no

nutrition provided for them (Bergin). Michael Berenbaum explains how the holocaust was led by

the anti-semitic dictator, Adolf Hitler, who was the former military leader of Germany

(Berenbaum). Berenbaum further explains how his army and himself were referred to as Nazis;

they soon became the government rulers of most of Germany, creating a country that was formed

around anti-semitism and created a living nightmare for those that Hitler did not see as an ideal
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person. World War II began after the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939 and the British Prime

Minister, Neville Chamberlain, officially declared war on Germany. Shortly after this invasion,

France also declared war on Germany and officially became a part of the resistance whose

main goal was to overthrow Hitler and stop his expansion across Europe. During the Hitlers

reign, him and his army captured millions of jews and sent them to ghettos which were small,

unkempt cities with unhealthy living conditions, or they were sent to concentration camps where

jews were gassed, shot, or murdered all while being forced to perform strenuous labor which also

led to many deaths in itself (Zullo). Prior to being sent to camps or ghettos, jews were forced to

wear the star of david on their clothing for anyone to see and were also banned from many local

places such as cinemas, restaurants, parks, and many other public areas (ATGTTH). The jews

that were sent to the camps were captured by the gestapo or by the S.S. which were both forms

of police authority at the time and they were taken from homes, churches, or even off of public

streets. In December of 1941, the United States joined the resistance and slowly the Nazi rule

began to dwindle until in May of 1945 when the axis powers officially surrendered after the

United States stormed the beaches of Normandy and pushed back the Nazi Regime (Zullo).

When incidents of World War II are examined under the articles of human rights, it is

seen that there are multiple violations due to the grotesque actions that were enforced by Adolf

Hitler and his army. Article 1 states that, All human beings are born free and equal in dignity

and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in

a spirit of brotherhood (UDHR), Jews were not treated equally for almost a decade; they were

murdered in mass numbers and treated as animals, not human beings. Article 2 states, Everyone

is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any
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kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social

origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of

the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person

belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of

sovereignty (UDHR). The holocaust broke this human rights rule because of the fact the jews

were murdered for the sole reasoning that they were of the Jewish decent. Simply because of

someones religious beliefs as well as Hitlers belief that the economic issues of Germany on the

jews and used this idea murder all of them, he and the Nazi soldiers found it necessary to

exterminate 6 million people. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights also states in article 3

that everyone has the right to liberty, life, and the security of a person. Jews were not safe, they

were massacred, and had their rights stripped from them. Finally, in article 5 of the Universal

Declaration of Human Rights it is stated that, no one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel,

inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. In the concentration camps the jews were

forced to do harsh labor such as digging ditches, building large machinery, and many other

grueling tasks that led to exhaustion and eminently death for many people. Not only were they

forced to perform such gruesome tasks, but they also had to perform these tasks under harsh

weather conditions, with little to no nutrition, little to no rest time, and under the constant fear

that they could be murdered at any moment an S.S. soldier deemed fitting. Jews in the

concentration camps were forced to live in constant fear and punished simply for not fitting

Hitlers view of an ideal person.

As stated by the liberation article, the holocaust was resolved with the help of liberation

forces such as the United States, Poland, France, Great Britain, and Canada; each having
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liberated different camps. America liberated Buchenwald and Dachau, Canada took

Bergen-Belsen and in each camp the troops found thousands and thousands of bodies despite the

efforts by the Germans to hide the evidence of mass murders (Bergen). The surviving prisoners

were said to have looked like skeletons by an American soldier and they were all given

nourishment in hopes to save them, but some were too weak to even digest and could not be

liberation. More and more camps were liberated and in May of 1945, all camps located in the

Netherlands were liberated. (Zullo) Finally, the reign of the Nazis came to an end when on April

30th 1945 Adolf Hitler committed suicide by gunshot.

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Works Cited

"A Teacher's Guide to the Holocaust, Timeline." A Teacher's Guide to the Holocaust, Timeline.

Florida Center for Instructional Technology, 2005. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.

Berenbaum, Michael. "HOLOCAUST: The Untold Story." HOLOCAUST: The Untold Story.

Newseum, n.d. Web. 20 Nov. 2013.

Bergen, Doris L. The Holocaust: A Concise History. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009.

Print.

Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camps. 1945. Photograph. United Kingdom Armed Forces, n.p.

"Liberation." Liberation. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, n.d. Web. 26 Nov.

2013.

"The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, UDHR, Declaration of Human Rights, Human

Rights Declaration, Human Rights Charter, The Un and Human Rights." UN News

Center. UN, n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.

Zullo, Allan. Escape: Children of the Holocaust. New York: Scholastic, 2009. Print.