Holocaust & Canada's response

1. The Holocaust

2.  a) Discuss the nature of the Holocaust and b)
address individual and collective responsibility
in human rights issues
 Discuss Canada’s response to anti-Semitism
and the Holocaust
 Explain how intolerance has been an issue in
Canada since 1914

3. 11 Million people were
killed, murdered,
exterminated
~ 6 Million Jews
~ 5 Million other
“undesirables”

5. Walmart employees:
Worldwide – 2.2 million
America – 1.4 million
Estimated people (military and
civilian) working in the Nazi
concentration camp system, 1943-
45:
4.5-5 million

6. “Anti-Semitism”
Racism / Hatred of Jews
Reasons for Anti-Semitism in Germany?
Europe?

9.  167,000 Jews in Canada,
representing 1.5% of
the population
 Most lived in Montreal,
Toronto and Winnipeg
 The majority were foreign-
born and many spoke Yiddish
as their first language.

10. A 1943 Gallup poll put Jews in third place, behind the
Japanese and Germans, as the least desirable immigrants
to Canada

12. During the Holocaust from 1933 to
1945, Canada admitted fewer than
5,000 Jews, arguably, the worst
record of all the other refugee-
receiving countries.
By contrast Argentina admitted
50,000 Jewish refugees; Australia,
15,000; Brazil, 27,000; the United
Kingdom, 70,000; and the United
States, 200,000.

13. Summer 1939:
907 German Jews with visas for Cuba sailed
from Hamburg aboard the S.S. St. Louis.
When the ship reached Havana on May 27,
the Cuban government refused to honour
their landing permits.
Panama, Argentina, Columbia, Chile and
Paraguay all denied the ship permission to
land.
The Americans sent its coast guard to escort
the St. Louis northward and away from the
American coast.
S.S. St. Louis

14. The St. Louis’ last hope was Canada. The Canadian
government refused them.
Many of the passengers who disembarked in Belgium,
France and the Netherlands were later caught up in the
Holocaust and perished.

15. Defining the Holocaust
HOLOCAUST (Heb., sho'ah) which
originally meant a sacrifice totally
burned by fire
the annihilation of the Jews and other
groups of people of Europe under the
Nazi regime during World War II
GENOCIDE: the systematic
extermination of a nationality or
group

16. Casualties of the Holocaust:
63% of Jewish population in Europe killed
91% of Jewish population in Poland killed
Auschwitz-Birkenau was liberated by Soviet troops on
Jan. 27, 1945. The Soviets found 836, 255 women’s
dresses, 348, 000 men’s suits, 38, 000 pairs of men’s
shoes and 14, 000 pounds of human hair. But only
7, 650 live prisoners

17. “The great masses of the people will more easily fall
victims to a big lie than a small one”
“How fortunate for leaders that men do not think”
The victor will never be asked if he told the truth”
The personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil
assumes the living shape of the Jew”
What do all these quotes have in common?

18. All are quotes from ADOLF HITLER…

19. The Holocaust was a progression of
actions leading to the annihilation of
millions by:
1: Stripping of Rights
2: Segregation
3: Concentration
4: Extermination
Evil in Stages…

20. Sept 15, 1935: Nuremberg Laws stated that all JEWS were :
- stripped of German citizenship
- fired from jobs & businesses boycotted
- banned from German schools and universities
- Marriages between Jews and Aryans forbidden
- Forced to carry ID cards
- Passports stamped with a “J”
- forced to wear the arm band of the Yellow “Star of David”
- Jewish synagogues destroyed
- forced to pay reparations and a special income tax
Stage 1: Stripping of Rights

21. GHETTOS
Jews were forced to live in designated areas called
“ghettos” to isolate them from the rest of society
Stage 2: Segregation

22. - essential to Nazi’s systematic oppression and eventual mass
murder of enemies of Nazi Germany (Jews, Communists,
homosexuals, opponents, gypsies)
- Slave labor = “annihilation by work”
- Prisoners faced undernourishment and starvation
- Prisoners transported in cattle freight cars
- Camps were built on railroad lines for efficient transportation
Stage 3: Concentration

25. Stage 4:
Extermination
Einsatzgruppen (mobile killing units)
had began killing operations aimed
at entire Jewish communities in the
1930s
But this was soon realized to be too
inefficient… Too much time, a waste
of bullets.

26. Wansee Conference
(Berlin -1942 ) established the
“complete solution of the
Jewish question”
called for the complete and
mass annihilation and
extermination of the Jews as
well as other groups
Zyklon B gas became the
agent in the mass
extermination
The “Final Solution”

27. Prisoners were sent to gas chambers
disguised as showers
Zyklon B gas used to gas people in 3 – 15
minutes
Up to 8000 people were gassed per day at
Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest death camp
with 4 operating gas chambers
Gold fillings from victims teeth were melted
down to make gold bars
Prisoners moved dead bodies to massive
crematoriums
Gas Chambers and
Crematoriums

29. With the end of the war and the liberation of the concentration camps, the
atrocities of the Holocaust became more widely known. Hundreds of
thousands of surviving European Jews found themselves displaced with no
homes or communities to return to.
Despite this growing refugee crisis, Canada steadfastly maintained its
restrictive immigration policies. In 1945 a senior Canadian government
official was asked how many Jews he thought that Canada would be
prepared to admit. His response, which reflected Canada’s official position
at the time, was “none is too many.”
“None is Too Many”