Murdered Jews of Europe

That is a strong title, I know.  I thought of many other titles, but settled on the facts.   The Truth is the Best in this case.  Millions and Millions of people were murdered by Hitler’s German Riech.  The majority of those were from the Jewish Population throughout Central and Eastern Europe.  Although The Jewish people were not the only persecuted and murdered, but they were certainly the focus of the intolerance and hatred spread by Hitler and his ilk.

The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in the Center of Berlin is the Holocaust Memorial for Germany.  It’s creation all started with the citizen’s initiative that was facilitated by journalist Lea Rosh and Historian Eberhart Jäckel at the end of the 1980’s.  On June 25th, 1999 the German Federal Parliament took the decision to build the memorial.

The memorial consists of a Field of Stelae covering an area of nearly 5 acres and containing 2711 concrete blocks plus an information center.  The exhibition about the persecution and extermination of the European Jews and the historical crime sites was designed by Dagmar von Wilcken.  The exhibition attracts nearly half a million visitors per year.

The Information center is a fascinating museum that chronicles the time line from 1933 through 1945.  The Information Center is underground and is quite unique in that the above ground Concrete Stelae are mirrored underground in the ceiling of the Center.  The center is made up 7 sections or rooms as follows:

1. Exhibition Prelude.
   • The exhibition starts with an overview of the National socialists terror policy between 1933-1945.  A timeline of images and texts deal with the persecution and murder of European Jews.  Six large scale portraits represent the six million victims.
2. Room of Dimensions
   • The first room centers on diary entries, letters and last notes that were written during the holocaust.  The personal level is enhanced above by a circumferential row that provides the number of victims for the European Countries concerned, using the borders in 1937.
3. Room of Families
   • Various Jewish lifestyles are shown, using the examples of 15 families.  Photos and personal documents reflect the variety of European Jewish culture before the holocaust and illustrate the destruction, displacement and murder of these people.
4. Room of Names
   • Here the names and brief biographies of murdered and missing Jews from all over Europe can be heard.  Presenting all victims names in this way would take six years, seven months and 27 days.
5. Room of Sites
   • This room shows the geographical extent to the Holocaust in the whole of Europe.  The focal points are the crime sites in Central and Eastern Europe.  Historical film and photo material represent 220 exemplary places of persecution and murder of European Jews and other Victims.
6. Commeration Site Portal
   • A portal offers current and historical information concerning commemoration sites, museums and memorials and provides insight into the world of European remembrance of the Holocaust and the Second World War.
7. Additional Databases and Video Archives
   • The name database of the Holocaust Victims at the Israeli Yad Vashem commemoration site with over 3 million entries and the Commemoration Book of the Federal Archive for the Victims of the National Socialist Persecution of Jews in Germany (1933-1945) are available here for individual research.
   • The Voices of Survival Video Archive offers ten computer terminals for interviews with Holocaust survivors in ten languages.  The videos can be searched for places, persons or events, using a multitude of search options.

Following an amendment on July 3, 2009, the Federal Foundation Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe is now also responsible for the Memorial to the Homosexuals persecuted under the National Socialist Regime and the Memorial to the Murdered Sinti and Roma of Europe.

All of these Memorial’s are a somber and enlightening experience.  Although so many people in the World believe they know all there is to know about the Holocaust, one walk through this very important exhibit you realize you do not know all there is.  It is important to remember that there are millions of people in this World that believe the Holocaust never happened.  This is the fear for all of humanity, that we forget or don’t acknowledge this attempted purging of a whole society.

“It happened, therefore it can happen again: this is the core of what we have to say”

-Primo Levi

Photo Album: Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe