Holocaust

  • Jewish neighbours

    It is easy to blame the Germans for the Holocaust and of course for the most part they are to blame for it. However there were many in the occupied countries who were very happy to lend a helping hand. There were even more who did something worse then helping out. There were those who…

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  • Gesina Groen would have been 80 today. But she was murdered on her 1st birthday. She was born on July 26,1941 in Amsterdam and murdered in Auschwitz July 26,1942, together with her mother. There are no pictures of Gesina, just a picture of the house she lived in. The address is Nieuwe Keizersgracht 70, Amsterdam,…

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  • I could have done a piece on any of the millions of victims of the Holocaust. The reason why I picked Kurt Jozef Rudolf Rosenthal, is because he was murdered today 80 years ago. His story is still important today because he was a refugee, trying to find a better future but he found death…

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  • Happy Birthday Gretha Reintje Cohen. It should have been your 84th birthday today. An evil regime did not even allow you to reach your 6th birthday. You were murdered 10 days before your 6th birthday in Sobibor, on July 9th 1943. No matter how sad your death is, it is even sadder to see that…

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  • Vél d’Hiv It always amazes me how easy it was for some Europeans to give up their Jewish neighbours. I know it’s easy for me to say that in retrospect, because I don’t know how I would have reacted if put in that situation. But I have a feeling I would have spoken out about…

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  • I could have picked any name out of millions of victims to write about today. So why did I select Margot Frank-Cohen? No particular reason other than that she would have been 100 years old today. A few decades ago, it would have been utter nonsense to talk about someone’s 100th birthday. Hardly anyone would…

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  • The plan of the Nazis was to eradicate anyone who they deemed not worthy. This didn’t mean only killing but also ensuring that not one person, who the Nazis considered subhuman, would be born. On July 14,1933 the Nazi regime fulfilled the long-held dreams of eugenics proponents by enacting the Law for the Prevention of…

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  • Being taught to hate.

    Education is the key to a better world and to end ignorance and racism. However if education does not include an element of critical thinking, it is open to abuse and it can be used to indoctrinate young impressionable minds, or any impressionable mind really. This blog will refer to the education in the Third…

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  • I would be lying if I would say that all Dutch opposed the Nazi occupiers because many were happy enough to follow the rules of the new lords of the land. However, many opposed the evil regime and especially opposed the way they treated their Jewish friends and neighbours. Organisations like Het Derde Front (The…

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  • Dagobert Stibbe was born in Amsterdam, 13 October 1918. He was murdered in Auschwitz, 23 June 1943. He was a student at the Technische Hogeschool(Technical University)Delft. He tried to escape to Switzerland, but this failed. He was caught on 2 June 1943 just 15 meters away from French-Swiss border. He was sent to the transit…

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