The Holocaust And The Bosnian Genocide

If a death is preventable and one fails to prevent its occurrence, is he at fault? During and after the Holocaust, citizens of the United States pondered this question in the context of Jewish refugees murdered in Nazi Germany; ultimately, citizens remember this tragic genocide and promise it will not happen again under any circumstances, not only in America, but in other nations as well. Since the Holocaust, leaders and lawmakers in the United States have analyzed the causes that led to this event and designed laws and documents to prevent such an infraction of human rights from happening again. The long-lasting effects of the Holocaust, which expose the dangers of America’s isolation and conservative immigration policies, contribute to the liberalization of American immigration and increased worldwide instances of United States humanitarian intervention.

Jewish people were tortured, abused, and subjected through horrific unfathomable situations by Nazi Germany during the Holocaust. Despite all of the unpragmatic hardships Jews all over Europe faced, many stayed true to their faith and religion. There are numerous stories in which Jewish people tried to keep the roots of their religion well knowing the risk of torture and death. The never ending fear of Jewish people living in the Ghettos and trying to survive concentration camps was difficult, but not impossible for the Jews to keep religion.

Genocide is the destruction of an ethnic, racial, or religious group. The most famous genocide, conducted by the Germans, is the extermination of the Jewish population known as the Holocaust. There are other genocides such as the Armenian or Darfur genocide, but the Holocaust is the one talked about and studied the most around the world today. Museums exist in Washington D.C, Los Angeles, and parts of Europe that focus primarily on this dark time in history. Vast amounts of books, movies, and documents concentrate on the Holocaust. Why is this chapter, between 1939 and 1945, discussed and examined? The answer lies within people who experienced the Holocaust such as Elie Wiesel, Jay Frankston, and Franks Shatz. These men have gone through hell and back, but they believe in one thing. That is, the notion of never again. The goal is to educate future generations on what really happened, so history does not repeat itself. Never again should people of any race, religion, or ethnicity, go through the horrific past of the Holocaust. In their writing, Wiesel, Frankston, and Shatz do a great job using pathos, logos, and ethos to convey their message of never again for future generations.

A genocide is a horrible kind of war. It is a mass killing and torturing of innocent people who do not deserve any of it. There are many stages of genocides, which may or may not go in the same order. The Holocaust, being the largest genocide and a horrible point in history, is similar and different to the Bosnian/Croatian genocide. Although many aspects lead up to these genocides and other similar wars, there are possible measures that could have been taken to prevent all of this. No human should have to endure the pain of a genocide, especially as horrible as the Holocaust, or Croatian/Bosnian war. The Holocaust and the Bosnian genocide both consisted of many stages that led to a variety of horrible events, both similar and different, which could have been prevented if certain actions were taken into consideration.

People are never evil just for the sake of being evil. They always justify to themselves in some way that all of their actions are for the greater good and that the actions they have committed are not atrocities. This has to be done since normal individuals cannot justify to themselves that they are immoral. Both western imperialism and the Holocaust had their atrocities justified by the illusion of progress. Even though numerous millions of people were slaughtered in these campaigns, many of the people doing the killing, believed that it was for the greater good. Western imperialism used the notion of bettering the native population and expansion in order to justify their mass killings. On the other hand, the Holocaust rationalized its

“How fortunate for governments that the people they administer don’t think” (Hitler, Mein Kampf). As time passed, there has been many times in history where a genocide has occurred. A genocide is a one-sided massacre from one party toward an ethnic or different group of people. As genocides occurred, questions such as “Why do people kill?” and “How can people allow these atrocities to occur?” are asked. There have been many theories made up as people researched the reason behind genocides. Throughout different centuries in history, genocides such as the Holocaust, the Rwandan genocide, and the Asian genocide, have occurred because of the negative psychological effects on the people caused by propaganda, corrupted leaders, and differences in ethnic groups.

The Holocaust was a mass murder of millions of individuals’ primary to and during World War II. “Only 54 percent of the people surveyed by the Anti- Defamation League (ADL) in a massive, global poll has ever heard of the Holocaust” (Wiener-Bronner). The Holocaust was from 1933-1945 and was run by German leader named Adolf Hitler. Hitler was a man who wanted to create his own race of people. Therefore to create this race, he wiped out anyone who did not have the specific descriptions that he wanted. For people to fit into his race, they had to have blue eyes and blond hair. This excluded the Jews and from then on Hitler slowly dehumanized them. In the concentration camp the first thing they had to pass was the selection test. The selection test was what the SS man (German soldiers) used to determine who was fit for work. Usually children, mothers, and elders were the first to die because they were not mentally fit for the work they were going to be given. People who passed the selection process either died of starvation, disease, fatigue, or assassination. It took twelve years before anyone intervened and by then it was too late for millions of people. Even though over twelve million people died during the Holocaust, genocides have still happened in Rwanda, Darfur and Cambodia.

The Holocaust was a system established by the Nazis in World War II as a means to exterminate all of the people which they considered undesirable or subhuman. This included gypsies,minorities,cripples, the mentally ill, homosexuals,communists,and anyone who opposed the Nazi regime. The main target of the Holocaust was however the Jewish people. They were the main target because the leader of Nazi Germany, Adolf Hitler, believed that they were the reason for Germany losing World War 1 and thus was the reason that the German economy was in a bad state. Vladek Spiegelman and Elie Weisel were to people who were both survived their experiences in the Holocaust and both told their story in books. These books are Night by Elie Wiesel and Maus by Vladek Spiegelman.The Holocaust shaped these two different men's lives in the same way. Through their losses and experiences in this horrific point in time they learned what it meant to truly struggle and this ultimately turned them into better people.

The Holocaust was a repulsive time where many Jews suffered miserably from Hitler’s concentration camps and millions died. I researched this topic because I had learned about the Holocaust a little bit over the years, but I wanted to focus primarily on the United States and if Roosevelt helped the Jews who were suffering or if he only focused on the needs of his own country. Before I started my research, I knew a basic amount of information about the Holocaust itself and what Hitler had done to the Jews, but I knew nothing about what effect FDR had on the prosecution of Jews. I chose this topic mainly because I found it interesting to learn about and I knew I would enjoy reading about the Holocaust but another reason why I chose to research this topic is because I am Jewish. My great grandma had experienced the great depression and had lived during that heartbreaking time period. I wanted to learn more about my history and what it was like to be a Jew back in the 1930-1940’s. It is hard to imagine the hatred some people had for Jews and how awful they treated them. Learning about the Holocaust made me thankful for what I have because millions of survivors were scarred for the rest of their lives and experiencing the pain and torture European Jews underwent is unimaginable. Living in America, I wanted to know if we had helped. I wanted to know if our country cared about what was happening in Germany and if they put in a lot of effort to stop Hitler from his horrible actions.

Throughout history, there are different examples of how races were being oppressed, while the higher power does not intervene, and would almost act as a bystander, except that they have the power to stop it, and the point is that the higher power, should be the one to advocate on behalf of the oppressed. Some examples would be the Holocaust and the Rwandan genocide, in which the higher power, or the government, would not interfere with the injustices really when they should have since a whole race could have been killed off. I do however, understand that some believe that the bystander, or the others that are standing by as this happens, should be the ones to stop it. Although this may be true, the others, for example civilians who are standing by, do not have as much power as let us say, governments who have the resources and the power to make a change to other countries in need.

The definition of genocide, according to the United Nations, was the attempt to destroy “a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group” by killing members, causing mental or bodily harm, harsh living conditions, prevention of births, and separating children from their families. There are four patterns of genocide, which do not always occur in every genocide since they’re not all the same. The four patterns include persecution, which is hostility and ill-treatment, especially toward a specific race, political, or religious belief done by the ruler or government. Next is displacement or when a group of people is forced to leave their native country. Continuing, public humiliation is another pattern that freely shows off a group of people being tortured or persecuted in plain sight. Finally when selective groups of people face at terrible fate while another group is spared the same fate as them is selective murder. Those were the four, very cruel and unfair, patterns of genocide.

As a conservative cartoonist, Ramirez expresses his argument that, instead of helping the refugees find homes outside their homelands, these countries should focus on the danger present by the “elephant in the room”―ISIS. In order to accomplish his goal, Ramirez incorporates a satire in the dialogues reflecting the general reaction to the refugee crisis and

Gary Markstein created a satirical drawing demonstrating Sudan through the image of a drowning man. Crying for help, the cartoonist purposely creates the image and the desperation represented in the drowning man’s face. Yet he draws the international community safe and sound

Genocide, a dire event, has been recurring time and time again throughout history. In the past, there was the Holocaust, where Hitler exterminated over six million Jews based on his anti-semitic views. Elie Wiesel, a Jewish author, has become a very influential man in educating the world of the true events of the Holocaust due to his involvement in the disaster. Presently, a genocide is occurring in the Darfur region of southern Sudan, in which according to Cheryl Goldmark, “a systematic slaughter of non-Arab residents at the the hands of Arab militiamen called Janjaweed” has been taking place since 2003. (1) Not only is genocide a tragic historical event, it also continuously occurs today.

When someone deliberately commits any crime or act of hatred towards another group of people in the hopes of revenge or elimination, it is known as a crime against humanity. These crimes result in death, extinction, and years of pain and suffrage for people whom the act has been committed against. The cases of the Holocaust, Nanjing Massacre, and Rwandan Genocide all fall under this category. The question is, if an organization such as the UN would have stepped in during these times of crisis, would these devastating crimes against humanity have been stopped or prevented?