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Click on an image to see a larger, more detailed picture.
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| 1942: The "Final Solution" |
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pg. 309 |
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As part of an effort to reduce partisan activity, the Nazis regularly performed mass executions. This one was carried out in the Ukrainian town of Drogobych. The atrocity was not the end of the suffering of Drogobych's Jews, however. From March to November 1942, about 7800 of the town's Jews died in the gas chambers at Belzec.
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Although the British made a valiant effort to withdraw their forces after the April 1941 fall of Greece, not all could be rescued from there or from Crete, which fell shortly thereafter. Among those captured were 1400 Jewish soldiers from Palestine, who had volunteered to fight in the British Army. To keep up morale during the dark days of imprisonment in 1942, this group of eretz Israel soldiers, interned at a POW camp in upper Silesia, Germany, combined their talents to start an orchestra.
Photo: Beth Hatefutsoth
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German successes in 1942 led to the near collapse of the Soviet Red Army. Casualties on both sides were enormous. Despite overwhelming odds, Soviet forces--motivated by a fierce patriotism--sought to hold the line and even push forward. Here, Soviet soldiers crouch behind modest revetments as they fire machine guns and rifles, and tend to their wounded.
Photo: Corbis-Bettmann U953047INP
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March 6, 1942: During a meeting at the Head Office for Reich Security, Adolf Eichmann emphasizes the need for strict security during deportation and annihilation of Jews presently living in Germany, Austria, Moravia, and Bohemia.
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March 14, 1942: At Ilja, Poland, Jews sent to labor on a farm join Soviet partisans in a nearby forest. In reprisal, the Germans shoot old and sick Jews in the streets, then herd more than 900 Jews into a building that is set ablaze. All inside die.
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March 15, 1942: Trumpeting his Wehrmacht, Hitler predicts that the Red Army will be "beaten in every direction in the summer."
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March 16, 1942: More than 1800 Jews from Pochep, Russia, are executed.
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March 17, 1942: Full-scale extermination begins at the Belzec death camp; deportees are accepted from Poland and from as far away as the western provinces of Germany. By the end of 1942, 600,000 Jews will be murdered there.
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| 1942: The "Final Solution" |
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pg. 309 |
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The Holocaust Chronicle
© 2009 Publications International, Ltd.
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